REGIONAL #141:  The random team selector pulled one that I’ve been dreading–the pennant winning and World Series champion 2005 White Sox, the only time in my lifetime that I’ve been able to describe the Sox that way.  So why dread it?  It’s because my favorite teams tend to tank in this tournament, and the more “favorite” they are, the quicker they exit–and this team holds a special place for me, so I’m pretty certain that they are doomed.  Given that eventuality, there were a host of interesting teams that could win the bracket instead.  There was another pennant-winner, an A’s team from the “Bash Brothers” years; there was a Bambino-led Yankees team that would face a steroid-era Dback team that would win a pennant the following year; there was a Marlins team that would win a pennant in two years, although that’s like 30 in Marlins’ years; and with probably competitive entries from the Mariners and Nationals, this seemed like one of the strongest regionals in a long time.  My guess was that the A’s would defeat the Yankees in the finals to join their 1989 A’s brethren as regional winners.   The ELO ranks predicted exactly the same outcome, even agreeing with me that the Sox would have trouble getting past the Nationals in the first round.   We can only hope.

First round action

It was a good thing the Mariners won their first regional in the previous bracket, because after setting their lineup it did not seem like the 2004 Mariners would be able to compete in this strong group.  Losing 99 games after multiple seasons with 90+ wins, the team had a killer leadoff hitter in Ichiro and his .372 batting average, but it was all downhill from there and their rotation was dreadful, with swingman Ron Villone (8-6, 4.08) better than the alternatives.  They faced the regional favorite, the 1990 A’s, who won 103 games and the AL pennant; somehow they got swept in the Series but they had the Bash Brothers for offense, strong defense, and a very good pitching staff headed by Bob Welch (27-6, 2.95), the runaway winner in the Cy Young voting.  In the 2nd, an error by M’s 1B-5 Bucky Jacobsen sets up Mike Gallego, who misses a HR split and then the trailing runner is cut down on the resulting double, so the A’s only get one run out of the sequence as Gallego is then stranded at third.  The A’s get another run in the 4th on a Harold Baines RBI single, but they squander another opportunity as Jose Canseco leaves the bases loaded.  In the 6th, Welch issues a 2-out walk and then 2B-2 Gallego commits an error, which Bret Boone makes the A’s pay for with a 3-run homer and the Mariners suddenly have the lead.  In the top of the 8th, Randy Winn leads off with a single and Jacobsen doubles, scoring the speedy Winn and Welch is gone and Dennis Eckersley and his 0.61 ERA is summoned in desperation.  Eck gets two quick outs but then Edgar Martinez singles to drive in the pinch runner, and the A’s now have six more outs to make up a 5-2 deficit.  Villone sets the A’s down in order in the 8th, but in the 9th Baines leads off with a single and Rickey Henderson walks, so it’s Canseco at the plate as the tying run with nobody out.  The M’s look at Eddie Guardado and his gopher balls in the bullpen and decide to stick with Villone for the time being; it doesn’t matter as the roll is on Canseco’s card:  3-7, HR 1-15/flyB, the split roll:  16.  One away, and now it’s McGwire as the tying run at the plate.  The roll:  6-5, whiff.  So, it all comes down to Dave Henderson against Villone for the game, Villone delivers:  1-5, whiff, game over, and the Mariners continue their winning ways with the 5-2 upset of the region’s top seed.

I followed the exploits of the 2005 White Sox very closely at the time, and I even attended Game 3 of the World Series, which turned out to be the longest game in Series history up to that point.  Still, it had been a long time since I dug out their Strat cards and it was interesting to take a close look at the team after having played hundreds of different squads in this tournament.  They had strong defense, a lineup with some pop in it, and they would be buoyed in that respect by Frank Thomas, who was injured for much of the season and sadly missed the lone successful postseason in his storied White Sox career; here, he squeaked over the 100 AB threshold for DHing in this tournament and I was pleased that he’d get his chance to shine in my tournament.  However, although it was spectacular in postseason play, I found that the starting rotation was good, deep, but not great and had no real dominating ace, although Mark Buehrle (16-8, 3.12) did finish 5th in the Cy Young voting.  The Sox had drawn a very tough first round opponent in the 2014 Nationals, who won 96 games and the NL East and who had a rotation at least as good as that of the Sox, with Tanner Roark (15-10, 2.85) getting the starting nod. Both starters are in control for the first pass through the lineups, but in the bottom of the 4th Tadahito Iguchi draws a leadoff walk and Paul Konerko follows by converting a HR 1-13 split to give the Sox the early lead.  Of course, the tournament curse against my favorites has to retaliate, and Konerko is promptly injured for four games in his next at-bat.  When Ryan Zimmerman leads off the 7th with a double, the Sox smell trouble and call for Neal Cotts to replace Buehrle, but Bryce Harper singles to score Zimmerman and it’s 2-1 Sox at the 7th inning stretch.  It stays that way until the 9th, and the Sox face the decision to burn up Cotts or try to save him for later rounds; then Ozzie Guillen comes out and issues the “fat guy” signal, so it’s Bobby Jenks coming in with the game on the line.  The first batter, Adam LaRoche, singles off Jenks’ card; the second, Ian Desmond, homers off his own card, the Nats take the lead, and the air goes out of New Comiskey like a bad Walmart tire.  Jenks then issues a single to Zimmerman, followed by another 2-run homer, this one by Bryce Harper, and Jenks is gone after recording no outs, four hits, four runs, and 2 homers allowed.   Roark shuts down the Sox 1-2-3 in the bottom of the 9th, and the curse continues as the Nationals move on with the 5-2 win, and the Sox head back to storage with an angry mob chasing Jenks the entire way.

The 1924 Yankees won 89 games to finish 2nd in the AL, but they were clearly a few years away from legendary status.  The Babe was the dominant player in the league, but he didn’t have much to protect him in the lineup with Gehrig still basically at Columbia at the time, so it was easy to see why Ruth walked 142 times.  The Yanks did have a very good starter in Herb Pennock (21-9, 2.83), but he would have his hands full with the steroid-packed lineup of the 2000 Diamondbacks, an 85-77 team that had power up and down the line–even Steve Finley hit 35 homers that year.  Furthermore, the Dbacks had an imposing Randy Johnson (19-7, 2.64), the NL Cy Young winner, on the mound, and Johnson goes through the top of the 1st in typical form, walking two and striking out three.   The Dbacks take a lead in the 2nd when Danny Bautista triples and scores on a sac fly from C Damien Miller (is it an Omen that Damien doesn’t have his name on his card?).   However, the Yanks begin the 3rd with two singles to bring up the Babe, and he knocks one into the desert for a 3-run homer, although the Dbacks get one of the runs back in the bottom of the inning when a Jay Bell triple is followed by an Erubiel Durazo double.  Arizona then ties it in the 6th when Steve Finley converts a HR 1-2 split for a solo shot, and the game then heads into the 9th with the score still knotted at three.  Bob Meusal leads off the top of the 9th with a double, but the latter half of the Yankee order can’t bring him home, so the Dbacks have their chance for a walkoff in the bottom of the 9th but Pennock sets them down in order and we head to extra innings.  Johnson is perfect in the top of the 10th and completes his eligibility with 6 hits allowed and 16 strikeouts; Pennock sets AZ down noiselessly and the game now is handed over to the respective bullpens–a clear advantage for the modern team.  Dan Plesac comes in and sets down the heart of the Yankee order in order, so it’s Sad Sam Jones’ turn in the bottom of the 11th and he does likewise.  Plesac then issues two walks in the top of the 12th, and Everett Scott makes him pay with a 2-out RBI single so now it’s up to Jones to hold serve.  And he becomes Happy Sam after setting down the Dbacks in order and the Yankees take the tight 4-3 win to move on.

Although they would win a pennant two years later, the 67-76 1995 Marlins were nowhere near the same team, but they did have Gary Sheffield with a 1.054 OPS and a pretty good #1 starter in Pat Rapp (14-7, 3.44).  Still, I was surprised to find that they were slight ELO underdogs to the 90-loss 1992 Royals, who had a largely punchless offense somewhat offset by decent pitching, and ace Kevin Appier (15-8, 2.46) had a formidable card.   Neither team can mount much offense until Chuck Carr leads off the bottom of the 4th with a double, and scores on a Jeff Conine fielder’s choice to give the Marlins a lead.  Meanwhile, Rapp doesn’t allow a hit until two are out in the 5th when Jim Eisenreich singles off Rapp’s card; Rapp then allows two more singles off his card, with the last one by Brian McRae tying the game.  However, in the bottom of the inning Marlin’s DH, 40 year old Andre Dawson, gets hold of one for a solo shot and Florida regains the lead.  In the 6th, Mike MacFarlane misses a HR 1-11 split to get a double, but he’s cut down at the plate with two out trying to score on a Gregg Jeffries single.  Disaster strikes for the Marlins in the bottom of the 6th when Sheffield is injured for 7 games; stung by the loss of their biggest offensive weapon, they respond by expanding their lead to 5-1 when Gregg Colbrunn hits a 3-run homer, and add another when Charles Johnson scores on a single by Sheffield’s replacement, Russ Morman, although 1-19 Quilio Veras is nailed at the plate with a roll of 20.  In the 8th, MacFarlane finally converts that HR 1-11 split for a solo homer, but that’s all the Royals have left in them as the Marlins close out the 6-2 win–even though they only managed seven hits off Appier.

The survivors

The regional had two pennant winners, and both were eliminated in the first round by identical 5-2 scores; this semifinal featured the two teams that eliminated them, the 2004 Mariners and the 2014 Nationals.  Although a Mariners team from 14 years earlier had won the previous regional on the strength of their starting pitching, that wasn’t the case with this version as Joel Pineiro (6-11, 4.67) seemed to be the best of bad options, while the Nats’ Jordan Zimmermann (14-5, 2.66) was just one of several good arms available.  Still, Zimmermann lets up four straight hits on his card in the top of the 2nd, including a 2-run single by Scott Spiezio, and the M’s take the early lead.  However, Spiezio makes a rapid transition to goathood when his error in the bottom of the inning opens the door for a 3-run homer from Bryce Harper, and then Spiezio hits into an inning-ending double play with the tying run on third in the top of the 4th.  But from there both pitchers settle in, and it remains a one-run game to start the 9th inning.  Zimmermann gets the first two outs quickly and faces, you guessed it, Scott Spiezio with the game on the line.  But Spiezio converts a DO 1-3, Willie Bloomquist comes in to pinch run, and the tying run is in scoring position.  Dave Hansen is then summoned by the Mariners to pinch hit for Rich Aurelia, and the Nats decide to counter with Drew Storen and his 1.12 ERA out of the pen.  Storen delivers, FLY X to CF-1 Denard Span, and it’s game over as the Nationals head to the finals, escaping with the 3-2 win despite being held to 5 hits by Piniero.

The 1995 Marlins were not optimistic given that they would have to face the top remaining seed in the bracket without Gary Sheffield, while those 1924 Yankees with Babe and company were at full health.   The pitching matchup was more balanced than one might expect, as Waite Hoyt (18-13, 3.79) and the Marlins’ Chris Hammond (9-6, 3.80) had similar decent-but-not-great cards, and the Yanks ended up on Hammond’s card for the first four rolls of the game, resulting in a double and two walks that set up a 2-run single by Wally Pipp for a quick lead.  In the 3rd, Ruth doubles off the wall and his young legs (1-15, not bad Babe) take him home on a Bob Meusal single, but Meusal gives the run back in the bottom of the inning with a 2-base error on a Jeff Conine fly ball that scores Charles Johnson.  However, the Yanks load the bases in the top of the 4th on a series of squib singles, and Whitey Witt adds one more to score a run and keep the bases loaded for the Bambino with one away.  The roll is on Hammond’s card, but it’s good for a sac fly and the boys from the Bronx lead 5-1.  Hammond loads up the bases again in the 6th with one out to bring up Ruth once again, and this time the Marlins have seen enough and summon Robb Nen from the pen to face the predicament.  Ruth again rolls on the pitcher’s card, but it’s a FLYX to LF-4 Jeff Conine, who turns it into a two-run single, Pipp adds another RBI single, and the rout is on.  The Marlins get a run in the 7th when Johnson triples and Quilio Veras singles him in, but the Yanks punish them for their efforts with solo HRs from Ruth and their own Johnson, Ernie, in the top of the 8th.  From there, Hoyt is on cruise control to give the bullpen a rest and the Yankees coast to the finals with a 10-2 blowout.

The regional final comes down to the #3 seed 1924 Yankees and the #4 seed 2014 Nationals, two good teams separated by 90 years. With both teams now down to their third starter, each were able to field decent candidates, with the Nats’ Stephen Strasburg (14-11, 3.14) and NY’s Bob Shawkey (16-11, 4.12) among the better pitchers of their respective times. The Nats’ defense lets Strasburg down in the bottom of the 3rd, with two errors and a double allowed by RF-3 Jayson Werth resulting in a 2-0 Yankees lead. Washington charges back in the 5th with three runs, which includes an RBI single from Werth, and it could have been worse as they left the bases loaded as Shawkey struggled to record that third out. Shawkey struggles along until the 8th, which he begins by allowing a single off his card and then a 2-run homer by Bryce Harper, again off Shawkey’s card, and Sad Sam Jones comes in as a last gasp with the Yankees now down 6-2. Bob Meusal drives in Combs in the bottom of the inning to get one run back, but it’s academic as in the top of the 9th the Nats wreck Jones to score four, including a Werth solo shot and a 2-run triple from Harper. Strasburg thus only needs to get through the feeble bottom of the Yanks order in the bottom of the 9th, which he does to seal the 10-3 Nationals win and the regional flag. Strasburg allows seven hits and records seven strikeouts, but it’s Bryce Harper who gets regional MVP honors, homering in all three games and driving in 10 runs in the process. This squad joins the 2012 team as the second Nationals-branded regional champion, creating another mini-dynasty of certain runs of teams that have success in this tournament.

Interesting card of Regional #141: Although the Bambino’s card may have been better, I thought I’d go with a somewhat less obvious selection this time around. His team fell short in the regional final, but because of his AB limitations there was only so much that Earle Combs, getting his first cup of coffee in the big leagues at age 25, could do to help his team–he did knock a pinch-hit double (not surprisingly) and subsequently scored in the losing effort. Those few ABs provide insight into why these 1924 Yankees just weren’t great yet–they were still assembling a supporting cast for the Babe that would really flower a couple of seasons later. With Combs being 25 years old, I wondered why they took so long to make him the regular CF, given that CF-4 Whitey Witt obviously wasn’t much with the glove and his 1 HR suggested that he wasn’t in there for his power, either. At any rate, Combs' performance in these limited appearances apparently convinced management as he promptly became the full-time CF in 1925, going on to hit .325 for his career and he was selected to the Hall of Fame in 1970. Even so, this card nonetheless reflects the highest batting average, slugging percentage, and on-base percentage he would ever attain in his illustrious career.