REGIONAL #115:  This regional is one of the more old-school draws I’ve had lately, with only one 21st century team represented, and that’s my favorite kind of bracket.  There were two teams in the regional that were close in proximity to two of the Strat Old-Timer teams that I’m so fond of--the 1934 Giants (the year after their ‘33 pennant winners) and the 1920 Browns (two years before the 1922 Old-Timer squad).   However, both of those Old-Timer teams had been eliminated in the first round by more modern squads, so I was skeptical these lesser variants would get very far.  Another team that caught my eye was the 1970 A’s, which Charlie Finley was building into a group that would capture three consecutive pennants in a few years, but I thought they might not be quite ready for prime time.   No, in spite of my preference for the older teams (and despite the previous regional final featuring a 1950 team defeating one from 2019), I was picking the lone 21st century squad, the 2008 Dodgers, over the A’s in the final.  This was in part because these modern teams tend to have power and depth lacking in older teams, plus I remembered how formidable the 2006 version of the Dodgers was in winning Regional #106.  The ELO ranks appropriately predicted a much more old-school final, with the 1934 Giants favored over the 1924 Pirates, who had not been on my radar.  I have to confess that I’d probably prefer the ELO version over my selection.

First round action

The 1934 Giants won 93 games to finish in 2nd place two games behind the Gas House Gang, and they were clear ELO favorites in this regional with four Hall-of-Famers on the team, fronted by league ERA and WHIP leader Carl Hubbell on the mound.  They faced the 77-75 1938 Braves (actually the “Bees” that year), whose only HOFer on the roster, Al Lopez, got in as a manager.  Still, the B’s did have Elbie Fletcher, MVP of Regional #102 and Boston was hoping he could recapture that magic.  However, B’s starter Lou Fette gets raked for four hits in the top of the 1st, including a 2-run triple from Lefty O’Doul, and the Giants jump out to a 3-0 lead before Hubbell has thrown a warm-up pitch.  However, the Braves get two of those back in the 3rd when Giants CF-4 George Watkins plays a flyball into a double, while Fette seems to have settled down, tossing three straight 1-2-3 innings.  The Giants do threaten in the 6th, pinch hitting for Watkins to get his glove out of the lineup, but B’s SS-3 Rabbit Warstler turns a key DP to keep the score within one.   By the 7th, the Giants have their best defense out on the field in support of their ace, and Hubbell comes through to finish out the narrow 3-2 win, tossing a 6-hit CG to allow the Giants to survive and advance.  

I had picked the 2008 Dodgers sight unseen to win the regional, so I was interested to actually take a look at the team to see what I’d chosen.   Turns out they had won the NL West (although with only 84 wins) and made the NLCS, with weapons like Manny being Manny in the lineup and a solid rotation of adequate if unspectacular starters.  It didn’t look to me like they would exactly need Cy Young to defeat the 1972 Rangers, who went 54-100 for manager Ted Williams and according to the ELO ranks were among the 150 worst teams of all time.  Even so, the Rangers strike first, putting up a run in the 3rd off LA starter Derek Lowe when Ted Ford singles in Lenny Randle.  The Dodgers can’t do anything against Texas starter Rich Hand until the bottom of the 5th, when Randle can’t get to an Andre Ethier grounder and Rafael Furcal scores to tie the game.  Things remain quiet until Toby Harrah smacks a one-out double in the top of the 8th, and the Dodgers go to Hong-Chin Kuo out of the pen, who promptly allows a single to Ford and Harrah races home to give the Rangers the lead.  That leaves Hand to try to finish things out in the 9th, but he allows a leadoff single to PH Garciaparra, with Juan Pierre coming in to pinch run.  Furcal advances Pierre to second on a groundout, bringing up Manny with the tying run in scoring position.  Hand is cautious with Manny and walks him, so Ethier--who was the MVP of Regional #106--now comes to the plate with the winning run at first.  And….boom, 3-4 roll, solid HR on Ethier’s card and his 3-run walkoff homer gives the Dodgers their first and final lead in the game as they advance to the semis with the 4-2 win.

The 1969 Dodgers sought to make it 2 for 2 for LA in this regional, although this 85-77 team was quite different from the 2008 squad that won the previous game.  The ‘69s did have a Manny (although Mota, not Ramirez), but their main claim to fame was a strong rotation that included two 20-game winners.  They were still ELO underdogs against the 90-63 1924 Pirates, who sported Hall of Famers at four of their eight positions and had 18-3 Emil Yde (not sure what happened to the rest of his last name) on the mound to counter LA’s Claude Osteen.  The Dodgers get on the board first when Andy Kosco leads off the bottom of the 2nd with a long HR, but the Pirates tie it promptly with Max Carey singling, stealing 2nd, and scoring on an Eddie Moore single.  Both teams then struggle to score, so when Carey leads off the 8th with a single and again steals second, the Dodgers eye Jim Brewer in the pen but decide to stick with Osteen for a while longer, fearing that Brewer might be needed in extra innings.  That move almost went south, as Pie Traynor rolled a SI* 1-10 on Osteen’s card that would have put the Pirates ahead, but he missed the split and the Dodgers escape the inning.  Sure enough, the game heads into extra innings with neither starter showing signs of weakness, but in the bottom of the 10th Wes Parker leads off with a walk and Kosco singles him to 3rd, so in comes the infield and Yde tries to get out of his jam.  A walk to Willie Crawford loads the bases with nobody out, and then Bill Sudakis crushes a flyball deep--Dodger Stadium holds it in, but Parker dashes home for a sac fly and a 2-1 victory, one in which they mustered only five hits.

The two teams matched up in this first round game were on the verge of some of the best years for their franchises.  For the 89-win 1970 A’s, the pieces were there to drive them to 2nd place in the AL West, with Joe Rudi and Don Mincher wielding big bats and Reggie there to stir the drink, along with a colorful rotation staffed by guys with names like Catfish, Mudcat, and Blue Moon.  The 76-77 1920 Browns were also starting to put together what would become the best squad in Browns history, with Baby Doll Jacobson and Ken Williams supporting .407-hitting George Sisler, and Urban Shocker won 20 games and had one of his finest seasons.   The A’s countered Shocker with young swingman Rollie Fingers, who might be spending some time in the bullpen in the future.  The A’s score an unearned run in the bottom of the 1st when Ken Williams misplays a Rudi flyball, allowing Campaneris (who had stolen 2nd) to score.  The Browns promptly threaten in the 2nd, but that threat ends when Jacobson (1-17) is cut down at the plate trying to score on a Hank Severeid single.  In the bottom of the inning, another unearned A’s run (courtesy of a two-base error by STL SS-3 Wally Gerber) and a Rick Monday solo shot make it 3-0, and when the A’s add three more in the 3rd, keyed by a 2-run Frank Fernandez double, some Browns fans are already starting to shuffle sadly out of Sportsman’s Park.  Monday leads off the 4th with his second HR of the game, but then in the 6th the Browns come to life, narrowing the score to 7-3 on a pair of RBI singles from Sisler and Jacobson.  However, that inning proves to be the only real lapse from Fingers, who ends with a 5-hitter and the A’s coast to the 7-3 win. 

The survivors 

For the 1934 Giants, a dropoff in starting pitching after Carl Hubbell was unavoidable, but having 23-game winner Hal Shumacher as their #2 was not a bad option to send against Chad Billingsley and the 2008 Dodgers, who were still buzzing from their walk-off win in the first round.  The Dodgers ride that momentum in the bottom of the 1st with a Rafael Furcal double followed by an Andre Ethier flyball to center that Giants CF-4 George Watkins misplays, allowing Furcal to score to put LA up 1-0.  Watkins then gets some satisfaction in the 4th by smacking a fly to his LA counterpart Matt Kemp, who misplays it for a 2-base error and ultimately Watkins scores on a Gus Mancuso sac fly to tie the game.   The Giants then move ahead in the 5th when Jo-Jo Moore doubles and Bill Terry singles him home, a pattern that repeats itself in the 7th and NY now leads 3-1.  From there on out it’s Schumacher in control, and when the Dodgers come up in the bottom of the 9th looking to recapture their 9th inning heroics, Hal sets them down in order and the Giants head to the finals, seeking a 9th regional win for the franchise.

Stirring two drinks

The semifinal between the 1969 Dodgers and 1970 A’s featured two California contemporaries that were both pretty good teams that had vanquished opponents from the Roaring 20s.   The Dodgers trotted out their second straight 20-game winner, Bill Singer, to face 18-game winner Catfish Hunter, who had a solid year but had some frightening areas on his card.  The game begins auspiciously for the Dodgers with Maury Wills working a leadoff walk but getting caught stealing by Frank Fernandez, and then in the bottom of the 1st the A’s begin their at-bats with three straight doubles, followed by a colossal Reggie Jackson homer and it’s 4-0 Oakland early.  A Rick Monday homer in the 4th makes it 6-0, and Jackson leads off the 6th with another huge blast and Singer gives way to Jim Brewer, but Sal Bando takes Brewer deep for a 3-run homer in the 7th and the A’s are in double digits.  Meanwhile, the southern Californians are getting Catfished, not putting anything on the scoreboard until a Manny Mota RBI single (no doubt on a bad pitch) breaks the ice in the 8th, but that’s all she wrote for LA as Hunter finishes out a 5-hitter and the A’s move on to the finals with a blowout 10-1 win.  Meanwhile, two Dodger squads from 40 years apart both get bounced in the semis.

The two teams in the regional final, the 1934 Giants and the 1970 A’s, were both good 2nd place teams during their seasons, but they reached the third round in very different ways, with the Giants allowing only 3 runs to opponents and the A’s belting six homers in their two games.  The Giants were starting 18-game winner Fat Freddie Fitzsimmons, while the A’s decided to try their luck with Diego Segui.  The A’s home run prowess is evident early as Don Mincher belts a 2-run shot in the bottom of the first to give Oakland a quick 2-0 lead, continuing their trend of scoring in the 1st.  However, Mel Ott responds with a solo shot in the 3rd to narrow the lead, and a sac fly by Blondy Ryan in the 4th ties the game, and the A’s are confronting a team that counterpunches against their early onslaughts for the first time in the regional.  Undaunted, in the bottom of the inning Frank Fernandez hits an RBI single, as he has in every game thus far despite his .214 average, and the A’s move back in front 3-2, but the Giants tie it again in the top of the 5th when their own Jackson, Travis, scores Moore on a sac fly.  Again the A’s answer, this time with Mincher’s second HR of the game that puts Oakland up 5-3, but wheh the Giants begin the 6th with three straight hits--including a Ryan RBI single--the A’s decide to yank Segui (who allowed 10 hits in 5 IP) for Bob Locker.   Locker retires three in a row, but one of those is a Hughie Critz sac fly and the score is once again tied, 5-5.  At that point Locker and Fitzsimmons settle into a battle of nerves, but in the 8th the A’s put two runners on and decide to pinch hit for Fernandez with Gene Tenace, who pays off with an RBI single to put Oakland up by a run with the Giants down to their last three outs but with the top of the order coming up in the 9th.  Locker, down to his last inning of eligibility, retires Moore, but Bill Terry singles to bring up Ott as the go-ahead run.  The pitch--gbA, double play, game over and the A’s capture their 5th regional crown with the hard-fought 6-5 win.  

Interesting card of Regional #115:   There really didn’t seem to be a lot of unique cards in this regional, but I thought I would bring out the Catfish from the regional winners to illustrate some changes in Strat card-making over the years.  Hunter shut down a pretty good Dodgers team with a 5-hitter to get the A’s to the regional finals, but I have to admit that I was very reluctant to send Hunter out in the second round over other options.   Something about that HR/TR split at 4-8 and a solid DO at 4-7 just seemed to invite disaster, but nobody on the Dodgers found those results and Hunter pitched like the All-Star that he was.  One bit of Strat-card trivia that is highlighted by this card is that for this ADV 1970 set (released I think in 1984) the Basic side of the card was exactly the same as the original 1970 Basic-only set (the final year of one-sided cards).  Back then, information about doubles allowed and triples allowed by pitchers was not readily available, and so the game company made those chances strictly a function of home runs allowed--if you allowed lots of HRs, then your card would allow lots of DO and TR as well.  Catfish had a tendency to be taken deep throughout his career (3rd most in the AL in 1970, although he did lead the league in 1973 and 1976), hence the other extra-base hits on his card also would pile up.  I wonder:  if there is ever a SADV reissue of 1970 backed by new research on extra-base hits allowed, will his card finally be better?

REGIONAL #114:  This regional included a collection of teams that I suspected would be decent--not great, not terrible, but fair to okay and pretty evenly matched.  No pennant winners, and only one team within a year of doing so, but that was the 2019 Rays and I had the feeling they were a different team in the weird 2020 season.   There were two Mariners teams trying to give Seattle their first regional win, and two Tigers teams trying to give Detroit their first win since Regional #95.  After correctly picking the outcome of the previous regional, I was really at a loss in guessing on this one, but I took a flyer on the 1988 Tigers over the 1994 Mariners in the finals.  The ELO ranks didn’t suggest that my Tigers pick was delusional, but they did remember (which I didn’t) that the Rays were a post-season team in 2019 and ranked them over the oldest team in the bracket, the 1950 Cards, in the finals.

First round action

The 1994 Mariners only went 49-63 but had a monster year from Ken Griffey Jr., and although the strike-shortened season left gaping holes in their starting rotation, at the top of it was a fireballing Randy Johnson, who could give them a shot against any first round opponent.   That opponent was the 2006 Marlins, a 78-84 team that had an infield that could hit, although almost nobody on the team could play defense worth a damn.   Things get ugly quick for Marlins’ starter Scott Olsen, as Jay Buhner and Tino Martinez take him deep in the top of the 1st to push the Mariners out to a 3-0 lead, but a 2-run blast from Florida’s Wes Helms in the bottom of the inning narrows the gap quickly.   Then, in the 2nd Johnson issues three walks, allows a couple of RBI singles, and Dan Wilson throws in a bases-loaded passed ball and the Marlins now have a 5-3 lead.  However, the Mariners tie it up in the 3rd on a Reggie Jefferson solo shot and a Felix Fermin triple, and the smattering of fans in Dolphins Stadium are figuring that they’ll need to stay to the end of this one to see who wins.   Things stay quiet until the 6th, when Fermin is cut down at the plate to end the inning trying to score on an Edgar Martinez double, but the Marlins get payback in the bottom of the inning with Mike Jacobs out trying to score on a Hanley Ramirez single, so the score is still tied.   Rich Amaral breaks the deadlock in the 8th by finding Olsen’s HR result for a solo shot that gives the Mariners a 6-5 lead, although Joe Borowski comes in to relieve and prevents further incidents.  It thus comes down to Johnson in the 9th; he records a strikeout, then has Miggy Cabrera miss a 6-12 roll TR 1-10/flyB split.  Wes Helms then finds a triple result on his own card, and the tying run is 90 feet away and the winning run at the plate in the form of Josh Willingham….but Josh grounds out and the Mariners survive to play another day with the 6-5 victory, one in which Griffey Jr. goes 0 for 5.

In setting the lineup for the 60-84 1995 Tigers, I hoped for their sake that the ‘88 team that would play later in the regional was better, because the ‘95s didn’t look so hot.  Lou Whitaker had some unexpected pop, but he could no longer play 2b adequately and was relegated to DH duties, Alan Trammell was a backup, but David Wells had a good year and would start the game.   Their opponent, the 1950 Cardinals, had a much better ELO ranking, but aside from Stan Musial they looked like the .500ish (78-75) team that they were.   The Cards rap out three singles against Wells in the top of the 1st, the last being an RBI poke from Enos Slaughter, to jump to a 1-0 lead, and extend it in the 6th when Musial finds Wells’ HR result for a 2-run shot and it's 3-0.  Meanwhile, the Tigers are struggling to gain a foothold against Cards’ starter Howie Pollet, and when Wells allows two baserunners in the 7th the Tigers turn to closer Mike Henneman for help, which he provides by getting the DP ball from Schoendienst to end the inning.   The Tigers then get two baserunners on in the bottom of the 7th and summon elder statesman Kirk Gibson to pinch hit, to see if he can recapture his past glories in that role, but he pops out to the catcher for the second out.  However, the next batter, another PH in the form of Todd Steverson, doubles to score both runners and the Cards lead is cut to 3-2.  The Cards strike back as the 8th inning begins with back to back doubles from Chuck Diering and Musial, and the game goes into the bottom of the 9th with Pollet trying to hang on to that 4-2 lead.  Cecil Fielder leads off with a long single, then Pollet records two outs.  Trammell comes in and delivers a pinch hit single, so now Steverson is back up to bat representing the winning run.  He sends a towering fly to deepest center field, but Diering hauls it in and the Cards move on to the semis with a 4-2 victory on Pollet’s 6-hitter.

The 90-loss 2000 Astros were a typical steroid era team, with 5 guys in the lineup smacking over .500 SLG%, but little defense and only one starting pitcher with an ERA under 5.00, that being Scott Elarton who was getting the first round start.   They still looked better than the 2010 Mariners, who lost 101 games and had only one guy in the lineup who had a SLG% above .400--but they had Felix Hernandez on the mound, who managed to win the AL Cy Young Award while pitching for a 100 loss team.   Mariners SS Josh Wilson finds Elarton’s solid HR result in the 2nd to give Seattle a 2-0 lead, and the Astros don’t get their first hit off Hernandez until the 4th from Daryle Ward, but that drives in Caminiti who had reached courtesy of a Jose Lopez error.  Both pitchers are on lockdown from there out, but when Elarton issues a walk in the 8th the Astros bring in Joe Slusarski to keep things within reach, and he retires the side without incident.  That makes it Hernandez’s job to nail down the win in the top of the 9th, and he puts the Astros down in order, fanning Meluskey to end the game with a 4-hitter and a 2-1 victory.  The Mariners themselves only get 6 hits and commit 3 errors, numbers that will need to improve in the semifinal when they won’t have a Cy Young winner on the mound for them.

The ELO ranks pegged this game as the marquee matchup of the first round, with the two best rated teams in the regional facing off.   The 2019 Rays won 96 games, good for a wild-card appearance in the postseason; they were the ELO regional favorites, sporting a lineup in which all nine batters had double-digit HR totals, and Charlie Morton on the mound came in 3rd in the Cy Young voting.  Like the Rays, the 88-win 1988 Tigers also finished 2nd in the AL East, doing so with solid defense and a veteran rotation backed by a strong bullpen.  However, the Tigers elect to go with swingman Jeff Robinson as their best option against the favored Rays, and Detroit spots Robinson a quick 2-0 lead courtesy of a Fred Lynn triple in the top of the 1st.  The Rays get some of that back in the bottom of the inning on a Matt Nokes error and an Austin Meadows sac fly that makes it 2-1.  Nokes does atone for his mistake in his next at-bat, crushing a 2-run homer, and an RBI single from Luis Salazar in the 4th chases Morton, who allowed 10 hits in his 3+ innings, as Colin Poche inherits the 5-1 deficit.  However, in the 6th Robinson walks two and then Yandy Diaz launches a homer that cuts the margin to 5-4, and a subsequent Eric Sogard double sends Robinson to the showers, with Eric King coming in to try to hold the lead.  He immediately yields a single to d’Arnaud off the pitcher card, but Sogard is cut down at the plate trying to tie the game and the Tigers escape the inning still holding a slim lead.  When King issues two straight walks to start the 7th, the Tigers have seen enough and as they had done previously in this regional, summon their closer Mike Henneman, who records two straight popouts.  However, then Nokes drops a third popup, and with the bases now loaded Diaz drives in two with a double and the Rays take the lead for the first time.  The Rays bring in four defensive replacements in the 9th and send spot starter Tyler Glasnow out (with his 1.78 ERA but only eligible to relieve with just 61 IP) as their 4th pitcher to try to lock it down against the top of the Tigers order.  A two out Salazar single gives Detroit faint hope, but Lynn strikes out for the final out and the Rays escape with a 6-5 come from behind victory.

The survivors

With Randy Johnson spent, the 1994 Mariners had very little talent left in their rotation, and facing a big favorite in the 1950 Cardinals they had to hope that Griffey Jr. would be a much bigger factor than he proved to be in the first round.   The Cards certainly look to have an advantage in sending Max Lanier to the mound against Seattle’s 4-10 Chris Bosio, but Griffey announces his presence with a long 2-run homer in the top of the 1st.  The Cards are struggling to find a way to score, and in the 5th they try some smallball, with Marion singling, sacrificing him to 2nd, and then Chuck Diering comes through with a single, but Marion is cut down at the plate to end the inning.  The M’s then put up another run when Enos Slaughter can’t get to a Tino Martinez liner, and Buhner scores to make it 3-0, and Seattle is now ready to go to their bullpen at the slightest sign of faltering from Bosio.  Those signs don’t appear until the bottom of the 9th, when Bosio walks the first two batters, so closer Bobby Ayala is summoned--but Ayala walks one to load the bases, records a whiff, and then Red Schoendienst rips a long single that scores two.  Ayala fans Diering, but now has to face Musial with runners on 1st and 3rd.  Musial hits a grounder to Edgar Martinez, who muffs it and the game is tied and will head to extra innings.  The Cards have to turn to their non-existent bullpen in the 11th, but Erv Dusak retires the Mariners, and in the bottom of the inning new Seattle reliever Jeff Nelson allows a Musial triple with one out.   The infield comes in for Enos Slaughter, who nails one deep to RF, and although Buhner grabs it Musial races in to give the Cards the 4-3 come from behind win and a berth in the regional final.  

The semifinal between the 2019 Rays and the 2010 Mariners had the makings of a lopsided affair with a 96-win team against a 101-loss squad, although both teams had a little added incentive in that neither franchise had ever won a regional before.   The starters were Ryan Yarbrough for the Rays and Jason Vargas for Seattle, and Vargas gets off to a rough start by allowing a HR on his card to Tampa leadoff hitter Tommy Pham, with cleanup hitter Brandon Lowe adding another solo shot (off Lowe’s card this time) and the Rays lead 2-0 after one.  In the 3rd, Pham comes up for his second AB and nails Vargas’s HR result again to make it 4-0; the Mariners threaten in the 5th as a Jose Lopez double puts runners on 2nd and 3rd with nobody out, but Yarbrough strands them to keep Seattle off the board.   However, they do put up some numbers in the 6th on a Russell Branyan RBI double and a Franklin Gutierrez single that makes it 4-2.  In the 8th Branyan singles and the Rays look at their pen, but it was seriously taxed in their 1st round win and they decide to stick with Yarbrough to preserve their relievers, but that proves to be a mistake as Gutierrez nails Yarbrough’s HR result to tie the game 4-4. A Lowe double in the bottom of the inning chases Vargas for Seattle closer David Aardsma, who ends the inning with no damage.  Neither team can break the stalemate in regulation, so we head to extra innings, with Yarbrough finally yielding to Tyler Glasnow to face the top of the Mariners order in the 10th, where Chone Figgins starts off with a single and a stolen base, but Seattle can do nothing further to bring him home.  Aardsma then starts the bottom of the inning by fanning Pham, walks Ji-man Choi, and Austin Meadows pops out to the catcher.   That leaves it to .231 hitter Joey Wendle, in the game as a pinch runner and defensive replacement for Lowe; however, Wendle finds Aardsma’s 5-5 HR 1-15 split, rolls a 2, and it’s a walk off 6-4 win that vaults the Rays into the finals and provides a chance for their first regional win.   Meanwhile, the Mariners’ chances for their first win are dashed by two extra-inning losses in the semifinals.

Yonny Chirinos, you have mail

As predicted accurately by the ELO rankings (and certainly not by me), the regional finals feature a 2019 Rays team that made the postseason and are trying to earn the first such title for the fledgling franchise, and a 1950 Cardinals team trying to win their 6th regional.  Although separated by almost 70 years, the two starting pitchers (Harry Brecheen for the Cards, Yonny Chirinos for the Rays) were pretty similar, with both having good control but a propensity to allow the longball a bit too much for comfort.  And it takes exactly two Cardinal batters for Chuck Diering to find Chirinos’s solid 6-5 HR result for a quick St. Louis lead, which expands to 3-0 in the 2nd when Del Rice also finds that same HR result.  In further deja vu news, Diering again finds the 6-5 in the top of the 5th for a solo shot, and the Rays have seen enough of Chirinos, whose mistakes have put them in a 4-0 hole after five, and try Nick Anderson.   Finally, in the 7th Rays SS Willy Adames finds Brecheen’s solid 6-4 HR result and the score is narrowed to 4-2, with the Cards having little in the bullpen if Brecheen falters further.  But Brecheen is solid until he allows a 2-out triple to Kevin Kiermaier in the 9th, but the sure handed Schoendienst then handles a Pham grounder to clinch the regional for the Cardinals, sustaining the legacy of the great Cards teams of the 1940s and torpedoing one of the Rays' best hopes for their first franchise win.

Interesting card of Regional #114:  Okay, so maybe I’ve been living under a rock for a few years, but when I was digging deep into the bullpen of the 2019 Rays I was initially mystified when I ran across this guy.   At a quick glance, this card doesn’t seem all that unusual, but wait a second--this guy was second on the Rays staff in Games Started, but he only has the “relief” role on his card, meaning that in this tournament, he can’t start because I take those pitcher role assignments kind of literally.  On the other hand, he ALSO can’t start in this tournament because he needs at least 100 IP to be an option as a starting pitcher, and he’s only got 56 IP despite having 27 starts!   Yes, this is a prime example of the “opener” concept, for which the Rays of 2018-2019 were really the primary innovators.  Now, on the Advanced side of the card, Stanek is rated as a relief(1)/starter(1), which describes his role better than the Basic relief-only card, but I guess I had never really noticed before how Strat handled this prior to playing the Rays.  It seems that the pennant-winning 2020 Rays had pretty much abandoned the use of an “opener”, but while it lasted it certainly created a challenge for representing Stanek in the Basic game.  

REGIONAL #113:  I was excited to have my draw for this regional finally pull a 2020 team as an entrant, particularly an NL squad, as I was curious as to how a team from that weird season would fare given tournament rules around IP/AB restrictions, but with that obstacle potentially offset by the enhanced possibility of low usage wonders that could be situationally useful.   That 2020 team, the Nationals, was one of five teams that was within 1 or 2 years of a pennant, and with a couple more squads that I felt were probably contenders as well, I thought that just about anybody aside from the ‘57 Senators could take this bracket.  However, tradition required that I hazard an ill-informed guess, so I went with the Phillies over the Nationals in the finals, as the Phillies from around that vintage had been quite successful in this tournament.   I was surprised to discover that the ELO rankings agreed with me, ranking the Phillies as the best team in baseball that season and among the 100 best teams of all time.

First round action

The 1988 Reds won 87 games to finish 2nd in the NL West, and they might have done better if manager Pete Rose hadn’t been suspended for 30 days for shoving an umpire, a suspension during which they played under .500 ball.  Aside from Eric Davis, the offense wasn’t much to write about but they had an excellent bullpen and a rotation fronted by Danny Jackson, who won 23 games and was the Cy Young Award runner-up.   They faced the 1958 Dodgers, who were in their first year in Los Angeles and would win the NL the next season.  However, they were 71-83 in 1958 and finished next to last in the NL, being in transition with stars like Erskine, Hodges, Snider and Furillo fading and others like Koufax and Drysdale not yet in their prime.  Still, it was the Dodgers who struck first in the 1st, grabbing a 1-0 lead courtesy of two consecutive poor fielding plays by Barry Larkin (a two base error and a single-2).   Meanwhile, Dodgers starter Johnny Podres is almost untouchable until the 7th, when two consecutive two-out singles makes LA search their bullpen, but seeing no better options stick with the tiring Podres, who retires PH Ron Oester to end the threat.  Sensing his pitcher in need of support, John Roseboro leads off the bottom of the 7th by clouting one over the netting at the Colosseum, and the Reds yank Jackson for Rob Dibble, who gets out of the inning without further damage but the Dodgers still lead 2-0 with two innings to go.  In the 8th, the Reds get a run on a Kal Daniels RBI single, but Larkin gets caught stealing and the Dodgers hold onto a slim lead, and Podres sets the Reds down in order in the 9th to seal the 2-1 victory.

According to the ELO ranks, the first round matchup between the 55-99 1957 Senators and the 102-win 2011 Phillies was one of the most lopsided in the history of the tournament, with the Phillies listed as one of the 100 best teams in baseball history, and the Senators ranked as one of the 100 worst.   The Phillies won the NL East with a strong rotation, tight defense, and a lineup with 7 players in double digits in homers; the Senators, well, they had Roy Sievers, whose 42 homers led the AL, and little else.  The Phillies score on Nats starter Camilo Pascual in the 2nd when Ryan Howard (1-10) puffs home safely on a Jimmy Rollins single, which is followed by a Carlos Ruiz double that scores another but Rollins (1-16) gets nailed at the plate--Howard then offered Rollins some baserunning tips and the Phils lead 2-0.  In the 5th, Hunter Pence singles off Pascual and Howard doubles him home, and with the great Phils defense operating flawlessly behind starter Cole Hamels, a three run lead is looking pretty formidable.  Pence adds a two-out, two-run double in the 6th, but the Senators finally respond in the 7th when Sievers leads off with a big fly, and Herb Plews contributes a two-out RBI double of his own to narrow the gap to 5-2, and the fans at Citizens Bank Park are wondering if they should withdraw their money.   They get even more worried when in the 8th Sievers hits his second HR of the game, a two-out two-run shot, and Hamels heads to the showers in favor of closer Ryan Madsen--whose card I personally think isn’t as good as his stats suggest it should be.  Regardless of what I think, Madsen does his job and the Phils survive a scare to notch a 5-4 win and a trip to the semifinals.  The Nats may have had little besides Roy Sievers, but that was almost enough.

The matchup between the 2013 Yankees and the 2020 Nationals was the featured first round game of the regional, according to the rankings, as both were in the top 1000 teams, but both teams had their issues.  The Yankees won 85 games and featured a long list of good players reaching the end of their careers at the same time, with the result being uglier than their record--Joe Girardi must have earned his paycheck as their Pythagorean projection suggested that they should have been a sub-.500 team.  The Nationals were following up on 2019 WS champs, but in the pandemic year only went 26-34, equating to a 90-loss year in a regular season.  The tournament usage rules present a challenge for the 2020 teams, as they have a fixed rotation (starters in descending order of IP) and typically few DH options, particularly the NL teams.  However, these pandemic teams also tend to have some low usage wondercards that may come in handy in the 6th inning plus, and the Nats had a couple of those, so things could balance out.  Washington was fortunate in that their top IP starter was Max Scherzer, who was facing off against the Yanks’ Hiroki Kuroda.  New York grabs a run in the top of the 1st when Gardner scores on a Robinson Cano DP ball, and add another in the 4th when Alfonso Soriano drives in Ichiro with an RBI single.  However, in the bottom of the inning the Nats’ big basher, Juan Soto, crushes one with one aboard and the game is tied 2-2.  Cano leads off the 7th with a monster blast of his own to give the Yankees the lead, and they start warming up their strong bullpen, so when Yan Gomes doubles with one out in the bottom of the inning, NY relieves Kuroda with David Robertson.  The Nationals respond with one of their low AB wonders as a PH, Andrew Stevenson, and he laces a single (off the only complete hit on Robertson’s card, no less) to score Gomes and tie the game, and in the bottom of the 8th Soto launches a two-out solo moonshot to give the Nats their first lead.  When Brett Gardner leads off the top of the 9th with a single, Washington looks to their bullpen, and I discover that their closer has a 6.10 ERA and two solid HR results on his card, so Scherzer remains in, but then Ichiro doubles and the tying run is on 3rd and the go-ahead on 2nd.   I grit my teeth and summon Tanner Rainey, who also has two complete HR results on his card, but a ton of strikeouts as well, which is what’s needed.   Cano grounds out with the runners holding as the infield is in; Soriano whiffs, and the game is up to a 37-year-old ARod.  The roll:  SI* 1, lineout 2-20, and the split is a 9.  The Yankees go back into storage, and the first pandemic team gets a come-from-behind 4-3 win.

The first round game between the 84-78 2019 Cubs and the 73-81 1951 Phillies appeared to feature two “okay” teams with different strength, with the Cubs sporting some Wrigley-fueled offense and the Phillies having solid defense and 21-game winner Robin Roberts, who was in the midst of a 7-year stretch of receiving MVP votes.   The Phils take a 1-0 lead in the 2nd courtesy of a two-base error by Cubs LF-4 Kyle Schwarber on an Andy Seminick flyball, although Seminick is later cut down at the plate trying to score on a two-out single by Waitkus.  Bill Nicholson adds an RBI single in the 3rd to make it 2-0, and Cubs starter Kyle Hendricks is struggling.  When Seminick singles in a run in the 6th to make it 3-0, the Cubs bring in reliever Rowan Wick to try to keep the game from getting away from them, and although Wick issues a couple of walks, he escapes further damage when Schwarber actually makes a tough fielding play.  That seems to inspire Cubs SS Javier Baez, who then leads off the top of the 7th with a round tripper, but Phils 3B Willie Jones responds by leading off with a HR in the bottom of the inning and the score is now 4-1 Phils with two innings remaining.  However, in the 8th, an error by Phils SS-2 Granny Hamner opens the door for disaster, and Schwarber bulls through it with a 3-run homer that ties the game.  The Cubs then begin the 9th with two straight singles and the Phils finally pull a tiring Roberts for Andy Hansen, but Kris Bryant greets him with a double and the Cubs head into the bottom of the 9th with their first lead of the game, ahead 5-4.  Cubs management eyes the card of their leader in saves, Craig Kimbrel, and with its FOUR solid HR results decide maybe they would try Steve Cishek instead.  Cishek issues two straight walks but then gets Dick Sisler to ground into a DP, and so it’s up to PH Mel Clark with the tying run on 3rd.  The result--CATCH X, Wilson Contreras drops the popup, and the game is tied and we head to extra innings.  The teams then trade blown opportunities, as Cishek walks the bases loaded in the bottom of the 11th but the Phils can’t score, and then Jason Heyward misses a HR 1-16 split and gets stranded at 2nd in the 12th.  In the 13th the Phils have to dig deeper into their shallow bullpen and try Niles Jordan, but Schwarber finds Jordan’s HR result for his second blast of the game, and it’s 6-5 Cubs with Tyler Chatwood coming in to try to notch the save.  He gets two quick outs, but then he commits the Cubs’ 5th error of the game to put the tying run on 1st.  However, he gets a popout from Seminick and the Cubs manage a 6-5 extra inning win--meaning that all of the first round games in this regional were one-run affairs.

The survivors

The 1958 Dodgers were the elder statesmen of the remaining four teams in the regional, as the others played at least 50 years after the recently relocated Bums.  Although young versions of Koufax and Drysdale were available, LA opted to start swingman Stan Williams against the 2011 Phillies and Roy Halladay, runner-up for the NL Cy Young Award.  The Phils go through the bottom of the 1st with mixed blessings, scoring a run when LA SS-3 Don Zimmer throws a ball into the Dodger dugout, but the inning ends with Chase Utley injured, with a split roll of 20 putting him out in perpetuity.  Zimmer atones for his miscue in the 5th with a two-out double, and then he races home on a Jim Gilliam single to tie the game.  Williams immediately gives the lead back to the Phils by allowing a single and walking three, while also striking out three, but the casualties mount for the Phils as their DH John Mayberry Jr. gets injured for two games.  Even so, Halladay is cruising, and he takes his one-run lead into the 9th and gets two quick outs.  However, Roseboro singles and that brings up Dodger veteran Gil Hodges as the potential go-ahead run, but Hodges pops out and the battered Phils head to the finals with a 2-1 win, the 5th straight one-run game of the regional.  The Phils only manage three hits against Williams, but he issues 8 walks to provide the Phils with their chances.    

The disadvantages of a pandemic-shortened season caught up with the 2020 Nationals in the semifinals, because without any 100 IP starters, under tournament rules they were compelled to start Patrick Corbin and his 4.66 ERA with the second most IP on the staff.  The 2019 Cubs had a much better option with Yu Darvish, but they also had a seriously depleted bullpen after their 13-inning win in the first round.   And it’s Darvish who gets roughed up in the top of the 1st, as the Nationals explode for 4 runs, keyed by an Adam Eaton triple, and things could have been worse as Yan Gomes missed a TR 1-16/FlyB split that would have added more damage.  Juan Soto hits his third homer of the regional in the 2nd to make the score 6-0, and now all Corbin has to do is be suitably mediocre to finish things out.   A Kris Bryant solo shot in the 4th makes it 6-1, and in his next AB Bryant adds a 2-run blast and it’s now Nats 6, Bryant 3.  When the Cubs start off the 7th with two straight singles, Washington goes to the bullpen, which has some truly frightening options, and selects Kyle Finnegan to try to nail things down.  Finnegan allows an RBI single to Willson Contreras, but is bailed out when Contreras is nailed at the plate trying to score on a Baez single, so the score is 6-4 heading into the 8th.  After his early issues, Darvish has been lights out, allowing only one hit since the 2nd inning, but when the Nats get two men on in the 9th the Cubs bring in Tyler Chatwood to try to keep it close.  That goes awry, as Chatwood issues two straight walks and a long Soto single, and the Nats take a 9-4 lead going into the bottom of the 9th, where they turn to Ben Braymer, who issued 5 walks in his 7 IP.  Braymer does walk one, but that threat ends with a DP and the Nationals head to the finals with a 9-4 win.  

The regional final featured the tournament’s first pandemic-year team in the 2020 Nationals against an injury riddled 2011 Phillies squad that had the opportunity to continue an era of tournament dominance for the franchise, with this being potentially their 5th regional win in the decade from 2005 to 2014.  Although they had no injuries, the pandemic impact on the Nats was evident as they were forced to start Anibal Sanchez and his 6.62 ERA against 17-game winner Cliff Lee and his 2.40 ERA.  However, it’s Lee who meets with disaster in the 1st inning, giving up two straight singles off his card to lead off the inning, and then being taken deep by Juan Soto for a 3-run shot, Soto’s 4th HR of the regional.  Trea Turner then goes back to back, and the Phils are down 4-0 after one and trying to figure out how they can come back while missing important cogs in their offense.  The answer comes quickly in the top of the 2nd, as Sanchez issues three straight walks and then Shane Victorino finds Sanchez’s solid 5-9 HR result for a grand slam, and then Ryan Howard goes back to back (this time on Howard’s own card) and suddenly the Phillies lead 5-4, with a lot of game left to go.  Not to be outdone, Soto leads off the 3rd with his 5th blast of the tournament and the game is tied.  In the 5th, replacement DH Domonic Brown smacks a 2-run HR to put the Phils back on top, and the Nats have seen far too much of Sanchez, and bring in Kyle Finnegan, who gives them two innings without further damage.  Tanner Rainey adds two more perfect innings for Washington, but in the 9th Ben Braymer walks the bases loaded and then walks in a run, and the Phils now lead 8-5 heading into the bottom of the 9th.  Yan Gomes then leads off with a HR to make it 8-6, and Philadelphia pulls the tiring Lee for Ryan Madsen, who recorded the save in the first round.  Madsen allows a single to .353-hitting PH Jake Noll, but he goes nowhere as the Phillies lock down the win and the regional title.  The 2011 Phillies thus join the 2005, 2006, 2008 and 2014 squads as regional winners, with the 5 titles in a 10 year span representing a dynasty unequalled in this tournament.   Juan Soto is the regional MVP in a losing effort, contributing 5 HR and 11 RBI to almost single-handedly push the Nats to the brink of the title.

Interesting card of Regional #113:  His team didn’t make it past the semifinals, and he never put in an appearance, but this Craig Kimbrel card raises an issue regarding different ways that people play Strat.   As may be obvious from this project, I am clearly a “what-if” kind of Strat player, devising impossible scenarios with teams from 1911 facing teams from 2011.  However, many of my friends, and I’m sure many people on this forum, are strict “replayers”, using as-played lineups and keeping usage to exact levels in the interest of realism.  Even so, in focusing on “realism” it is important to remember that unlike the managers in the real world, we Strat managers know exactly how these players did over the course of the season.  So this is where Kimbrel comes in--he was the Cubs primary closer in 2019, leading the team in saves with a paltry 13.  Having him as the closer in 2019 made perfect sense--he had recorded 8 straight seasons with more than 30 saves, and an All-Star in 7 of those seasons.   However, with the benefit of hindsight, if I really wanted to win games with the 2019 Cubs, I just couldn’t bring myself to use this card in a save situation; it is a disaster waiting to happen, perhaps the most wretched card I’ve seen for a team’s go-to reliever.  Yikes.