REGIONAL #254:  As with the last group, this one seemed to be packed with a number of competitive squads, including a 2020 Rays team that won a pandemic pennant and a 2022 Braves team who might have been expected to win a pennant, but didn’t.  There was also a Red Sox team a couple of years after a pennant, as well as a Phillies squad from the 80s that probably had a very good Mike Schmidt in the lineup.  My hunch was that the Braves would take the bracket, defeating the Rays in the final who might be limited by a usage-constrained starting rotation.  The ELO rankings picked exactly the same outcome, suggesting that the Braves should have a relatively easy path to the finals..

First round action

The ELO ratings suggested that the 2015 Red Sox and the 1986 Phillies were pretty evenly matched opponents in this first round game.  The Phils went 86-75 and Mike Schmidt was the NL MVP while Von Hayes finished 8th, and Bruce Ruffin (9-4, 2.46) had a nice singles-only card with a good bullpen behind him.  The Red Sox were a below .500 team at 78-84, but 22 year old Mookie Betts and 39 year old David Ortiz both got some MVP votes, and Clay Buchholz (7-7, 3.26) was hoping his porous defense would hold up.  Sure enough, 3B-4 Pablo Sandoval drops the first chance of the bottom of the 1st, but somehow C-4 Blake Swihart throws out AA Gary Redus to wipe out that mistake.  In the 3rd, Swihart throws out AA Juan Samuel try to steal and the Philadelphia fans are screaming for a new split die.  They don’t get one, but Redus leads off the 4th with a walk and finally he successfully steals second, with Schmidt swatting a single that put the Phils in the lead.  However, a sac fly by Xander Bogaerts immediately ties it in the top of the 5th, and the Red Sox make a series of moves in the 6th designed to shore up the defense.  When Darren Daulton doubles off Buchholz’s card in the 7th, the call is made to the pen for closer Koji Uehara, who ends the inning with Samuel missing a SI* 1-14 split.  Ruffin also tries to end the top of the 8th with a SI* 1-14 split, but Boston converts to put runners on first and second with two out, so the Phils move to their closer in Kent Tekulve, who whiffs defensive replacement Travis Shaw for the third out.  However, the Red Sox get runners on 2nd and 3rd on Tekulve in the top of the 9th, and a Bogaerts single scores one although 1-10+2 Sandoval is out at the plate to hold it to one.  The Phils are down to their last three outs and Uehara is running out of eligible innings; the home team gets two runners aboard, but Uehara retires Glenn Wilson for the final out and the Red Sox squeak into the semifinals with the 2-1 win.  

The 2020 Rays went 40-20 and won the AL pennant, although the usage constraints around the abbreviated pandemic year posed some challenges for their lineup and their top IP starter, Tyler Glasnow (5-1, 4.08), had the worst ERA in their rotation.  However, the 2009 Marlins looked better than I had guessed they would be; they won 87 games led by batting champ and MVP runner-up Hanley Ramirez, and Josh Johnson (15-5, 3.23) was an excellent round one starter although the rotation took a nosedive after him.  The Rays go ahead in the bottom of the 2nd on a two-out two-run triple by Kevin Kiermaier, but their defense implodes in the 4th as back to back errors by 2B-2 Brandon Lowe and 3B-3 Joey Wendle sets up a run-scoring sac fly from Jorge Cantu that narrow the Rays lead to 2-1.  Clinging to that lead entering the 6th, the Rays put in their low-usage wonders and go to their deep pen to avoid Glasnow’s longball tendencies even though he’s only allowed two hits, with Aaron Slegers getting the call.  And the Rays real-life low usage postseason hero, Randy Arozarena, belts a 3-run homer in his first AB in the 6th to provide some insurance for the Tampa pen, which doesn’t need it as they hold the Marlins to four hits and move on with the 5-1 win.

The Zoom game of the week was a bit of a bait and switch, as I promised Eaglesfly and Tall Tactician two good teams in a strong matchup.  So Eaglesfly got a good one as promised, the 2022 Braves who were a 101-win team with a top 50 ELO ranking with MVP votes for Austin Riley, Dansby Swanson, and Michael Harris, and a great rotation where Spencer Strider (11-5, 2.67) had a better card than two other starters who were serious Cy Young contenders.  However, one of my infamous clerical errors led me to inform TT that, rather than a great team, he was instead stuck with the 2023 Giants, who limped to a 79-83 record with a rather lackluster lineup in support of Cy Young runner-up Logan Webb (11-13, 3.25).  However, TT’s hope for a pitcher’s duel was dashed in the bottom of the 1st by a two-run homer from Matt Olson, and when Olson comes up next in the 3rd he crushes another on for a 3-0 lead.  At that point TT has had it and intentionally walks Olson in all subsequent at-bats.  He then begins to chip away at the Atlanta lead with an RBI single from Thairo Estrada and a sac fly from Paul Dejong in the 5th, and although Swanson doubles in a run in the bottom of the inning, the Giants match that with a solo homer by Wilmer Flores in the 6th.  But from then on Strider disperses the Giants like a pack of Nazgul, and Riley adds an RBI double to bring the final score to 5-3 Braves, with Strider striking out 14 to advance to the semifinals.

The 2006 Brewers went 75-87 despite having some pop in the lineup courtesy of guys like Prince Fielder, Bill Hall and Carlos Lee, probably because their defense was suspect and the rotation was mediocre with Ben Sheets (6-7, 3.82) getting the round one assignment.  Even so, they still looked better than the 2023 Pirates, who fell to a similar 76-86 record after a promising start; with only two starting pitchers having over 100 innings, the start fell to Mitch Keller (13-9, 4.21).  However, the Pirates get off to a rapid start with a solo homer by their second batter in the top of the 1st, Bryan Reynolds, and elder statesman Andrew McCutchen leads off the 3rd with another blast to make it 2-0.  But Fielder jacks a 2-run homer into the nether reaches of Miller Park in the bottom of the 4th to tie it up, although doubles by Jack Suwinski and Alfonso Rivas put the Pirates back on top in the 6th, leading the Brewers to summon closer Francisco Cordero who quickly strikes out two to prevent further damage.  With two away in the 7th, Milwaukee PH Corey Koskie converts Keller’s 6-5 HR split for a two run shot and the lead, and Keller is out for Dauri Moreta who escapes a missed HR split to keep Pittsburgh within one.  The Brewers decide to ride with Cordero in the 9th and burn him, but he walks leadoff PH Miguel Andujar; Cordero then bears down and strikes out three in a row to lead the Brewers to the semifinals with the hard fought 4-3 win.

The survivors

The #2 seeded 2020 Rays were facing the 2015 Red Sox in this semifinal after having knocked off a team in round one with an identical ELO rating as this opponent.  The Rays had Ryan Yarborough (1-4, 3.56) as a decent mandated second starter, while Boston had the option of Eduardo Rodriguez (10-6, 3.85) over some more frightening alternatives.  The Red Sox load the bases in the top of the 1st but 2B-2 Brandon Lowe turns a DP to bail out Yarbrough.  Lowe then turns on a pitch in the bottom of the 4th for a solo homer and a Tampa lead, and then a few batters later .156 hitting Hunter Renfro rolls a 1-2 for a solid HR that plates three and the Red Sox are looking at a 4-0 deficit after four.  Lowe adds an RBI double in the 5th to increase the Rays’ lead, and both teams bring in some key subs to begin the 6th.  In the 7th, the Red Sox get a 2-run triple from Brock Holt, and when Ryan Hanigan doubles Holt home the Rays call Ryan Sherriff and his 0.00 ERA to lay down the law.  However, he immediately yields a double to Jackie Bradley and it’s a one-run game with the tying run in scoring position, but Sherriff whiffs Xander Bogaerts to preserve the Tampa lead.  In the bottom of the 8th SS-2 Bogaerts makes his second error of the game, and after two walks load the bases the Red Sox summon Robbie Ross from the pen, with their closer out of commission after his round one appearance.  Ross responds by stranding the runners and the game heads to the 9th with Boston needing a run to stay alive.  The Rays opt to stick with Sherriff, which will burn him for the final, but it is worth it as he sets down the Red Sox to close out the 5-4 win and send the Rays to the regional title game.  

The top seeded 2022 Braves were hoping to live up to their ELO hype as one of the 50 best teams in history, but in this semifinal they would need to get past the 2006 Brewers who had pulled off a come-from-behind win in round one.  It didn’t hurt that the Braves rotation was crazy good and Max Fried (14-7, 2.46) was a second round starter who finished second in the Cy Young voting; the Brewers had no such luck with Chris Capuano (11-12, 4.03) being their best option.  In the top of the 2nd, Matt Olson hits his 3rd homer of the regional, a 2-run shot that puts the Braves up briefly until an error by Braves 3B-3 Austin Riley helps set up a two-run double from Tony Graffanino that rapidly ties things in the bottom of the inning.  And the Brewers don’t let up as they surge into the lead in the 3rd courtesy of a 2-run bomb by Prince Fielder, although the Braves pull back to within one in the 6th on doubles from Dansby Swanson and Michael Harris.  Then Travis d’Arnaud leads off the 7th by homering off Capuano’s card, and the Brewes opt to try Rick Helling out of the pen, and he gets bailed out when 1-14+2 Ozzie Albies is gunned down trying for third on a single.  In the 8th, Harris locates Helling’s solid 6-5 HR result to put the Braves ahead, which brings the Brewers to their last outs in the bottom of the 9th.  Fried gets two quick outs, but then Geoff Jenkins singles and Graffanino rips a liner towards RF-3 Acuna; it gets by him for a double that scores Jenkins and the Brewers now have the winning run in scoring position.  With the game on the line, the Braves summon Raisel Iglesias and his 0.34 ERA and he fans David Bell to push the game to extra innings.   Helling completes his last inning of eligibility in the bracket by retiring Olson with two runners aboard, so it’s Carlos Villanueva’s turn as the Brewers get down into the more uninspiring part of their bullpen.  Neither team can do much until Harris leads off the 13th with a triple off Villanueva’s card; Villanueva retires two straight and looks like he’s going to strand Harris, but PH William Contreras crushes one for a  2-run shot and his teammates mob him at the plate.  Iglesias has two outs of eligibility left in the bottom of the 13th, and he gets those two in a row but has to turn it over to closer Kenley Jansen to get the final out.  And get it he does, fanning Fielder to send the Braves to the finals with a 7-5 win that took 13 innings.  

A rarity in the regional finals with the two top seeded teams facing off, the pennant-winning 2020 Rays and the 101-win 2022 Braves each aiming to survive and advance.  The Rays would have to overcome the usage challenges of the pandemic season, with their biggest weapon in phenom Randy Arozarena not available until the 6th inning, and although mandatory #3 starter Blake Snell (4-2, 3.24) was not bad, he had some problems with the gopher ball that could spell disaster; the Braves had 20-game winner Kyle Wright (21-5, 3.19) who finished 10th in the Cy Young votes in the third slot of their strong rotation.  Manual Margot begins the top of the 1st for the Rays with a single, and then he steals second and scores when Braves LF-2 Adam Duvall drops a Brandon Lowe flyball.  However, Snell hands the lead to the Braves in the bottom of the 3rd by fielding an Austin Riley grounder and throwing it into right field, allowing two runs to score, and then it’s none other than Matt Olson finding Snell’s solid 6-5 HR for his fourth blast of the regional; when another run scores on a passed ball by C-3 Michael Perez the Braves lead 5-1 after three innings.  When Snell issues a walk to lead off the 4th he’s gone for Aaron Slegers, but that proves disastrous as Riley and Michael Harris go back to back for homers, and after an Olson double Travis d’Arnaud hits d’Homer for their second 5-run inning in a row for Atlanta.  D’Arnaud hits his second HR of the game in the 6th, a solo shot that makes things even uglier, and the Rays late-inning replacements make no difference as Wright finishes the game with a one-hitter–that leadoff single in the first inning.  And the Braves, who couldn’t do the job in the 2022 postseason, prove quite capable of doing it here as they crush the Rays 11-1 and earn the regional crown; Matt Olson’s four homers and seven RBI earn him bracket MVP recognition although he was just one of many weapons, with d’Arnaud, Harris and Riley all enjoying strong performances.  

Interesting card of Regional #254:  With only a couple of these opportunities left in the regional phase of this tournament, it seems fitting to feature the NL MVP from the final season of the die cut cards that were the last to have the look and pattern of the Strat cards I grew up with; he even has that the “2-10” pattern etched into my brain by the 1927 Babe Ruth old-timers card.  Although his team didn't get past the first round of the bracket, Schmidt didn’t have a ton of help; he did what he could that season at age 36, winning his 3rd and final MVP to go along with his 10th and final Gold Glove award and his final league home run and RBI titles.  Back in the early days of my Strat playing in the 60s and 70s, we would assemble these ridiculously overpowered teams out of Hall of Fame, Old Timers, and whatever current seasons we happened to have, but third base was always a bit of a challenge.  There were a few guys who could hit but not field, and then there were a bunch of guys who could field but would end up batting ninth on those teams alongside eight other legendary players.  I’m pretty sure that it was this guy who put an end to that shortage of options.

REGIONAL #253:  It seems that as I get down to the final teams that have yet to play in the tournament, I discover that many of the remaining ones are quite good–where were these guys during some of the motley brackets that I’ve played over the past year?   This group has two pennant winners in the 2022 Phillies and the pandemic Dodgers; another non-pennant Dodger team from 2022 that nonetheless has one of the best ELO ratings of all time; an Astros team one season away from their trashcan-banging pennant; a Giants team two seasons away from a World Series win, and a Mets team from last season that has proved to be quite successful this year.  All in all, a very strong bracket, ignoring a couple of play-in teams that were not likely to last long.  I had a feeling that a Dodger team would win it, although I wasn’t sure if it would be the one that was successful in the post-season or the one that wouldn’t suffer from pandemic year usage complications.  Ultimately I went with the 2022 version over the 2020 squad in the final, as did the ELO ratings, although the latter suggested that a 2015 Pirates team that I ignored might be the best non-Dodgers team in the bracket.

First round action

Play-in game: With my brother Chuck in town and only one remaining entry for his favorite team, the Rockies, in the tournament, it seemed fitting that he take over the helm of the 2022 Rockies for their play-in game against the 2008 Pirates, which I would be directing.  Being a play-in game, both of these teams were dreadful, with the Rockies losing 94 games and the Pirates doing them one better (or worse) with 95 losses, though the matchup between Colorado’s Kyle Freeland (9-11, 4.53) and the Bucs’ Paul Maholm (7-7, 3.71) was better than the disasters that lurked at the back of these rotations.  Although Chuck was not the Strat veteran that I was, having different pursuits during our wayward childhoods, he nonetheless seemed to have inherited the shared genetic knack of jinxing our favorite squads, as the Pirates’ Jason Bay homers off Freeland’s Coors-influenced card in the top of the 1st, and a Xavier Nady RBI double in the 3rd makes it 2-0 Pirates.   However, the Rockies show some signs of life in the bottom of inning and a CJ Cron sac fly makes it a one-run game. In the 6th, Adam Laroche draws a leadoff walk and pinch runner Brian Bixler races to 3rd on a single, so Chuck calls upon closer Daniel Bard and his 1.79 ERA to try to stay in the game, but Bixler does plate on a Freddie Sanchez sac fly to provide a little padding.  Although Bard shuts down the Pirates the rest of the game, it is to no avail as the Rockies can’t get a hit against Maholm after their brief excitement in the 3rd, and Maholm finishes with a three-hitter as the Pirates move on with the 3-1 win and the final Rockies entry in the tournament heads for the hills.

The 2020 Dodgers were World Series champions in that pandemic season, with a 43-17 record and a stacked lineup led by MVP runner-up Mookie Betts and 9th place finisher Corey Seager; Clayton Kershaw (6-2, 2.16) was the mandated opening round starter who came in 9th for the Cy Young.   They faced the 2016 Astros, who were just a trashcan away from their own Series win the following season, but this was a good 84-78 team that had Jose Altuve finishing 3rd for MVP, and Chris Devenski (4-4, 2.16) was 4th for Rookie of the Year as a spot starter who was the only possibility in the rotation that might be able to compete with Kershaw.   The Dodgers strike first when Cody Bellinger leads off the 3rd with a single, steals second, and scores on a 2-base error by Astros 3B-3 Alex Bregman, and that remains the only run until the 8th when Will Smith slaps a 2-out 2-run homer that provides Kershaw with a little breathing room.  However, in the bottom of the 9th, Carlos Correa and Evan Gattis single to put the tying run at the plate with one away, so the Dodgers head to the pen for Adam Kolarek and his 0.95 ERA in an effort to put the game away.  Bregman lofts a sac fly to make it a two-run game but there are now two away, but 2B-3 Enrique Hernandez bobbles the third out and the winning run now comes to the plate.  The Astros decide to pinch hit with future Dodger Teoscar Hernandez, and the roll is a 6-5:  groundout on Kolarek and the Dodgers hang on to win 3-1 even though Devinski only allows four hits while striking out 11.  

The first round matchup between the 2023 Mets and the 2008 Giants involved the two lowest-rated teams in the bracket who didn’t require a play-in game.   The Mets had a disappointing 75-87 record lthough they would reach the NLCS the following (this) year; there was significant MVP support for Francisco Lindor and Pete Alonso, and Kodai Senga (12-7, 2.98) finished 7th in the Cy Young sweepstakes.  The Giants’ record was slightly worse at 72-90 although their ELO ranking was much worse; still, they were only two seasons away from a pennant, and Tim Lincecum (18-5, 2.62) was the NL Cy Young winner, providing a formidable equalizer for a team that had little punch left when Barry Bond retired after the previous season.  The Giants jump out to a quick lead in the top of the 1st, courtesy of bad defensive plays by Mets 3B-4 Brett Baty and 1B-4 Alonso that set up a 2-run single from Benji Molina.  However, San Francisco get rattled by RBI singles from two Franciscos, Lindor and Alvarez, in the bottom of the inning and the game is tied.  In the 2nd, Omar Vizquel races home on a 2-out Randy Winn single that puts the Giants back in the lead, and they add to it when Molina leads off the 3rd with a homer.  Lincecum gets out of a bases loaded jam in the bottom of the 3rd with two clutch strikeouts, but the Franciscos come through again in the 5th when Lindor walks, steals second, and scores on an Alvarez single; Alvarez ultimately scores on a Starling Marte fielder’s choice and the game is tied once again after five.  A two run blast by Alonso followed by a Lindor double spells the end of the road for Lincecum as Sergio Romo replaces the ineffective ace and ends the inning while knocking out Mets 2B Jeff McNeil with an injury.  Meanwhile, Senga is dealing, but in the top of the 9th Aaron Roward leads off the inning with a single and PH Nate Schierholtz knocks a double to put the tying run in scoring position, so the Mets head to the pen for Brooks Raley with the game on the line.  Raley is flawless, stranding both runners and earning the save as the Mets escape with the 6-4 win. 

The second very strong representative of the franchise in the bracket, the 2022 Dodgers may not have won a pennant but their 111 wins and their ELO ranking indicated that they should have, with the latter being the best in MLB that season and one of the five best in history.  This team returned many of the biggest weapons from the 2020 team that had already advanced in this regional, but added Freddie Freeman (4th place in MVP votes) and Trea Turner (11th) to go along with Mookie Betts (5th), and Tony Gonsolin (16-1, 2.14) had a lower ERA than the NL ERA champ, who was also in this rotation.  The 2015 Pirates were probably the best Pittsburgh team in the past 30 years, with 98 wins but a rapid elimination in the postseason as a wild card.  Andrew McCutchen finished 5th for NL MVP, and Gerrit Cole (19-8, 2.60) was 4th for the Cy Young, earning them a #3 seed in this bracket and a challenge for the top ranked Dodgers.  Nobody crosses the plate until Chris Taylor’s fielder’s choice scores one for LA in the top of the 4th, and when Will Smith slaps a double off Cole’s card in the 6th, the Pirates waste no time in bringing in Joe Blanton and his 1.57 ERA and he quickly ends the threat.  He rapidly becomes the pitcher of record because Pedro Alvarez knocks a 2-run homer in the bottom of the inning and the Pirates take the lead, but Trayce Thompson responds with a solo shot in the 8th to tie it at 2-2, and that’s still the score after nine so the game heads to extra innings.  With Blanton now burnt, the Bucs insert Joakim Soria, and that proves problematic as he issues four walks, one with the bases loaded to Justin Turner, and then PH Jake Lamb chops a 2-out 2-run single for a 5-2 lead.  With Gonsolin in his last inning of eligibility, he gets one out quickly but then he drops a grounder and, rattled, he yields a homer to PH Josh Harrison and it’s a one run game so the Dodgers summon Yency Almonte’s 1.02 ERA to try to preserve that lead.  And he does, striking out McCutchen to end the game and save the 5-4 extra inning win.   

I had steered the 2008 Pirates through a live play-in game, and now I would be guiding them in a Friday Night Strat challenge that would be more formidable:  the pennant winning 2022 Phillies helmed by Phillies fan Tall Tactician.  Those Phils may have won the NL but they finished 3rd in the NL East with an 87-75 record, and their ELO ranking was one of the poorer ones I’d seen for a pennant winner.  Nonetheless, they were still miles better on paper than the Pirates, so TT decided to save the top of their rotation for more imposing obstacles to come later in the tournament, tapping Ranger Suarez (10-7, 3.65) who was probably their third best.  My best option seemed to be Zach Duke (5-14, 4.82), which wasn’t a good sign, and neither was JT Realmuto’s solo homer that gave the Phils the lead in the 3rd.  But Duke settles down and RBI hits from Jason Bay and Ryan Doumit put the Pirates on top in the 4th.  However, not trusting Duke’s pockmarked card, when the Phils get a leadoff double in the top of the 7th I go to the bullpen for closer Matt Capps and he escapes the inning with no damage.  Unfortunately, the same doesn’t hold true in the 8th, as the Phils explode Capps with hit after hit that’s Capped by a three-run homer by Nick Castellanos and when the dust clears they lead 6-2, which is how it ends because other than the 4th inning, Suarez doesn’t allow a hit to finish a three-hitter and the Phils move on to the semifinals.

The survivors

Having already suffered one loss in this bracket, my brother Chuck figured he’d try a rematch and participate in the semifinal game between the 2020 Dodgers and the 2023 Mets.  We picked our teams randomly for this one, but Chuck drew the mediocre Mets which left me with the Series champion Dodgers, so it looked like his misfortunes might continue, particularly since the Dodgers mandated #2 starter Dustin May (3-1, 2.57) looked better than the Mets Max Scherzer (9-4, 4.01), who had his best games that season after he was traded to the Rangers.  Although May’s card was quite good, it had a problematic solid 5-9 homer, and Chuck found that result twice in the bottom of the 3rd resulting in solo homers by Brett Baty and Brandon Nimmo for a lead.  Will Smith quickly returns the favor in the top of the 4th by slapping a solo shot off Scherzer’s solid 4-9 homer to make it a one run game, and when the Dodgers get runners on 1st and 3rd with two out in the 6th, Scherzer is gone.   Chuck figures he’ll replace Scherzer with another mid-season trade victim, tapping Justin Verlander to work out of the pen as he doesn’t have sufficient innings to start any games.  Verlander quickly ends the threat, and in the bottom of the inning Chuck finds that 5-9 on May for the third time, this one with Pete Alonso, and although Victor Gonzalez comes in to shut down the Mets, it’s too late as Verlander is in control and preserves the 3-1 win for the Mets.  The Mets head to the finals despite only getting four hits, three of them solo homers off the pitcher’s card, but that’s enough to prevent an all-Dodgers finale.  

With TT having steered the 2022 Phillies past the first round, we continued with a Friday Night Strat and let him try their hand in a semifinal game against the 2022 Dodgers, the team that probably should have won the NL given their historically good ELO rating.  ColavitoFan would take the reins of the Dodgers, and Julio Urias (17-7, 2.16) was the NL ERA leader and was 3rd in the Cy Young voting; TT countered with Aaron Nola (11-13, 3.25), who finished 4th in the exact same vote.  With a matchup like that, a pitching duel might be expected, but that was thwarted by defensive miscues, both by the Dodgers good defense and the bad gloves of the Phillies.  Various unearned runs push the Phils to a 2-1 lead, but Will Smith slaps a three-run homer in the 4th to put the Dodgers on top, although Kyle Schwarber’s solo shot in the bottom of the inning narrows the gap to one.  Trea Turner’s RBI single extends the lead to 5-3, and when Nola gets in trouble in the 6th TT pulls him for Jose Alvarado but Cody Bellinger’s sac fly adds to the Dodger’s lead.  Disaster strikes in the 8th for the Dodgers as big weapon Freddie Freeman is essentially lost for the tournament to injury, just days after finishing up a remarkable World Series in real life, and the lofty ranking of this Dodger team has to plummet.  However, Urias is cruising in the late innings, until an error and a walk brings the tying run to the plate for the Phils in the bottom of the 9th; ColavitoFan takes no chances and summons Caleb Ferguson to try to get the last out.  He does, and the Dodgers head to the finals with a 6-3 win that somewhat settles the score against a third-place team that ended up in the Series instead of the 111-win Dodgers. 

With my brother Chuck now having headed home, it nonetheless seemed only fair that I drag him onto Zoom to continue his good work piloting the 2023 Mets into the regional final against the 2022 Dodgers, a dry run of sorts for the 2024 NLCS.  Of course, when Chuck checked his remaining rotation, it was clear this wasn’t exactly a favor, as David Peterson (3-8, 5.03) was perhaps the best of two terrible options.  On the other hand, I had the luxury of Clayton Kershaw (12-3, 2.28) as the third starter in an outstanding rotation, but my management of the Dodgers would be somewhat complicated with Freddie Freeman watching the game from the hospital after a gruesome injury in the semifinal.  But my task got a bit easier in the bottom of the 1st as Mookie Betts blasts a 2-run homer courtesy of Peterson’s card, and in the third Justin Turner singles through a drawn-in infield with the bases loaded for two more runs, in the process teaching Chuck about the perils of the ++’s.  Will Smith keeps on slapping with a three-run homer for a 7-0 lead, and Betts adds two more with his second 2-run dinger of the game in the 6th.  In the meantime, the Mets still don’t have a baserunner against Kershaw, but in the top of the 7th injury replacement 1B-5 Edwin Rios muffs a grounder for a 2-base error that ends the quest for a perfect game, and a miffed Kershaw then allows a single to lose the no-hitter.  He bears down and prevents any runs from crossing the plate, and ends with a flourish in the 9th, striking out the side to finish with 14 strikeouts in a 2-hit shutout as the Dodgers live up to their lofty rating and crush the Mets 9-0 to take the regional crown.  

Interesting card of Regional #253:   With a bunch of very contemporary teams in this bracket with cards that most Strat players would have seen recently, the furthest I could go back was 2008, so I figured I’d feature the card of the NL Cy Young winner from that season.  At age 24, Tim Lincecum got his real first chance as a regular in the rotation and he took full advantage, leading the league in strikeouts, fewest HR/9, and winning percentage, despite playing for a 90-loss team.  He repeated his Cy Young win the next season, and for three years he led the league in strikeouts despite a rather thin frame and an unusual pitching style.  However, for reasons that were never clear, at age 28 he suddenly didn’t seem to be the same pitcher, leading the league in losses and wild pitches in 2012 while sporting a 5.18 ERA; although there were brief flashes of his old self, he never regained his old form and his last stint in the majors was at age 32 with the Angels, with a limited but terrible performance during the 2016 season.  , In this tournament, although he had this imposing card from his youth, he pitched more like the older Timmy, as he was gifted two different leads in his first-round assignment and couldn’t hold any of them, absorbing the loss while not making it out of the 6th inning.  Even so, for four fleeting seasons this guy was as good as they came.

REGIONAL #252:  This batch of remnants was more diverse than many of the recent regionals, with three 20th century teams including the final entry from the 1950s.  That entry just so happened to be a pennant winning Yankees team, but I thought they might have some competition here.  The two different colored Sox teams from 1982 were both within range of post-season appearances, while the Rays and Reds from 2023 I suspected were also good squads.  It might be wishful thinking, but I picked the ‘57 Yanks to go all the way, and I figured the White Sox jinx would spell a loss to the Red Sox, enabling Boston to make the finals but lose to their hated rivals.  The ELO ratings portrayed this as a strong bracket with 6 top 1000 teams, including Cardinals and Mets squads that the Yanks would need to get past to reach the finals.  Those ratings also picked the Bronx Bombers to win, but suggested that the 2023 Rays could give them a run for their money in the finals. 

First round action

The Yankees of the 1950s were more successful in real life than they’ve been in this tournament, but the pennant-winning 1957 Yankees were seeking to duplicate the success of the lone regional winner from that vintage, the ‘58 squad.  This version won 98 games but fell one game short in the Series; Mickey Mantle was the league MVP with Gil McDougald finishing 5th, while Tony Kubek was Rookie of the Year.  Three of their pitchers also received MVP votes, and although Bob Turley (13-6, 2.71) was not one of them, he arguably had the best card on the staff.  They faced a powerful 2022 Cardinals team who won 93 games and the NL Central, who also had an MVP winner in Paul Goldschmidt, with Nolan Arenado finishing 3rd in that voting, and Miles Mikolas (12-13, 3.29) was a capable round one starter.  Tommy Edman misses his HR split in the top of the 2nd and Turley strands him at second, and the Yanks take the lead when Bobby Richardson races home on a 2-out single by Mantle in the 3rd.  Hank Bauer extends the lead by finding and converting Mikolas’s HR split to lead off the bottom of the 4th, and a few batters later the unlikely Bobby Richardson does the same for a 2-run blast and the Cards are in a 4-0 hole.  They pull out the stops and insert closer Ryan Helsley to begin the 6th to try to keep it close, but an error by C-2 Yadier Molina and a squib single from Richardson sets up a two out RBI single from Kubek.  However, in the top of the 7th Turley loses control, with three walks loading the bases for Goldschmidt with two away, and Goldschmidt puts it into the monuments for a grand slam and suddenly it’s a one run game.  Albert Pujols then goes back to back to tie it, stunning the Yankee Stadium crowd.  Then, Brendan Donovan leads off the top of the 9th converting Turley’s HR result for the first Cardinal lead of the game, and they seek to preserve some eligibility for Helsey by inserting Zack Thompson to try to earn the save against the heart of the Yankee order.  Mantle draws a walk to lead things off, but Thompson retires Skowron and Bauer to bring up Yogi Berra.  He rolls a 6-5, HR 1-9/flyB, and the game is going to be over one way or another depending upon the split die.  The split is a 3, it’s a two-run shot into the stands for a walkoff and Yogi is mobbed at the plate as the Yankees survive the 7-6 comeback win.  

The 2008 Mets went 89-73, with David Wright and Carlos Delgado finishing in the top 10 on the MVP ballots and Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes also getting votes.  However, after Johan Santana (16-7, 2.53), 3rd for the Cy Young, the rotation dropped off quickly, although Santana would certainly pose a challenge for a middling 82-80 2023 Reds team.  For the Reds, TJ Friedl received one lone MVP vote while Elly de la Cruz got one vote for Rookie of the Year, but the rotation was bad with spot starter Andrew Abbott (8-6, 3.87) the only respectable option.   A two out single by Reyes drives in a run in the bottom of the 3rd, and then Wright doubles him home to put the Mets up 2-0.  In the 5th Abbott yields a bases-loaded walk to Ryan Church to put the Reds deeper in the hole, but a 2-out RBI single by Hunter Renfroe gets Cincinnati on the board.  However, with two outs the Mets get back to back errors from 3B-2 Wright and C-3 Brian Schneider, and Spender Steer singles a run home while a walk to Friedl loads the bases for Matt McLain.  The Mets sense the game getting away from Santana and so closer Billy Wagner is called upon in this clutch situation, but McLain laces a double to put the Reds ahead while Renfroe follows with another double and the Reds bat around with two outs to take a 6-3 lead.  Now handed a lead, Abbott no-hits the Mets the rest of the way, striking out the side in the bottom of the 9th to put an exclamation point on the 6-3 upset victory.

The 1982 White Sox were a season away from their “winning ugly” division-winning team, although they did win 87 games and many of the pieces of their success were here, with Harold Baines getting MVP support and Lamarr Hoyt (19-15, 3.53) having a decent season before taking the Cy Young the next year.  However, they faced both my White Sox jinx as well as a higher-rated 1982 Red Sox who won 89 games in the same year and league; the Bosox had Dwight Evans, Jim Rice, and Carney Lansford with MVP votes, as did reliever Bob Stanley with 168 relief innings.   That was understandable given their rotation, as although John Tudor (13-10, 3.63) wasn’t terrible by any means, the bottom of their rotation was.  In the top of the 1st, Rudy Law leads off with a single and promptly steals second, but then the next batter Tony Bernazard gets injured and the rally dies along with him.  Boston takes advantage in the 2nd with an RBI double from Dave Stapleton followed by a 2-run single by Rick Miller and the Red Sox lead 3-0 after two.  In the 4th, Rich Gedman converts Hoyt’s HR 1-6/flyB split for a two run shot and Boston is breaking the game open; two more singles and Hoyt is gone for Kevin Hickey, who gets the final out.  In the 6th, injury replacement Jim Morrison tries to light a fire with a two-out, two-run homer that makes it 5-2, and in the 8th Aurelio Rodriguez adds a solo shot that narrows the Chisox deficit to two.  In the 9th, Tudor gets the first two outs but then a walk to Greg Luzinski and a Baines single puts the go ahead run at the plate, so Stanley is summoned to try to get the final out, and he does so to earn a one-out save that sends to Red Sox on to round two with a 5-3 win.  

The second-seeded 2023 Rays won 99 games but didn’t make it past the wildcard round in the postseason; Yandy Diaz finished 6th in MVP voting, and Tyler Glasnow (10-7, 3.53) was a strikeout machine.  The 2021 Marlins lost 95 games and were the bottom seed in the bracket, although Trevor Rogers (7-8, 2.64) was the Rookie of the Year runner-up and had a mean strikeout pitch himself, so this one promised a lot of whiffs.  Jesus Aguilar puts the Marlins on the board in the bottom of the 4th with an RBI double on a missed HR split, but he scores nonetheless on a 2-out Starling Marte single.  The Rays look to come back in the top of the 5th getting men on 2nd and 3rd with nobody out, but they fail to plate anything, including missing a SI* 1-14 split in the failure.  Jorge Alfaro then leads off the bottom of the inning converting Glasnow’s HR split, and the Marlins go all in to begin the 6th trying to shore up their terrible defense with five defensive replacements.  Rogers again gets out of a 2nd & 3rd jam in the 7th with two straight strikeouts, and in the bottom of the inning a Glasnow error and a Jon Berti single leads Tampa to insert closer Pete Fairbanks, who quickly puts out the fire.  But Jazz Chisholm adds to the Miami lead with an RBI double in the 8th, but Rogers doesn’t need the padding as he wraps up a 6-hit shutout to lead the Marlins to the 4-0 upset win.  

The survivors

The semifinal game between the pennant-winning 1957 Yankees and the .500 2023 Reds had a bit of a mismatch look about it, but my impression during this tournament is that the walk-prone pitching staffs of the 40s and 50s have tended to suffer against the power and depth of contemporary squads.  Unfortunately for the Reds, NY’s Bobby Shantz (11-5, 2.45) had excellent control, while Graham Ashcraft (7-9, 4.76) of the Reds could make up for the power differential between the eras.  And Ashcroft begins the top of the 1st with two straight walks off his card, and then Moose Skowron nails Ashcroft’s solid 5-5 HR result for a three run shot and the Yankees have a solid lead before most of the Reds fans have found their seats.  Reds #9 hitter Kevin Newman narrows the gap by finding and converting Shantz’s HR split for a solo shot in the 3rd, but Yogi Berra immediately gets it back by leading off the 4th with a blast for his second homer of the regional.  Bobby Richardson adds a sac fly later in the inning to make it 5-1 Yanks, but TJ Friedl pokes an RBI single in the 6th to pull the Reds within three.   The New York defense takes a hit when SS-2 Gil McDougald is knocked out of the game with an injury in the 7th, but Shantz is in command and holds off the Reds for the 5-2 win and a trip to the finals, with the good news that McDougald will be ready to go for that game.  

The 2021 Marlins had already eliminated the #2 seed in the bracket to get to this semifinal, and now they faced the #3 seeded 1982 Red Sox and Dennis Eckersley, although the Marlins countered with a good Sandy Alcantara (9-15, 3.19) who would win the Cy Young the following year.  However, Jim Rice finds and converts Alcantara’s 6-5 HR split for a 2-run homer in the top of the 1st, and in the 6th Carney Lansford also converts that split for a two-out solo shot.  The Marlins respond with mass offensive substitutions, and that produces their first run in the bottom of the inning on a Lewin Diaz fielder’s choice.  When Alcantara issues a leadoff walk in the 8th, the Marlins go to closer Dylan Floro in a desperate move to stay in the tournament, and he wards off any damage.  However, it makes no difference as Eckersley rests the pen to finish out a 6-hitter and the Red Sox gain the finals with the 3-1 win. 

Archrivals from different eras face off with the top seeded 1957 Yankees taking on the #3 seed 1982 Red Sox in Fenway for the regional crown.  The pitching depth of the pennant-winning Yanks was evident with Tom Sturdivant (16-6, 2.54) better than most of the number one starters of other teams in this bracket, while the Red Sox were hoping that Chuck Rainey (7-5, 5.02) could last long enough to get the game to a rested bullpen.  He gets off to a rough start as Tony Kubek doubles off the pitcher’s card, and Mickey Mantle singles off Rainey to drive in Kubek for a quick lead in the top of the 1st; it doesn’t stop there as a Yogi Berra RBI single and an error by 1B-4 Wade Boggs score two more runs and the Yanks lead 3-0 before the Red Sox swing a bat.  The hits keep coming for the Yanks in the 2nd, and a 2-run double by Mantle (also off Rainey’s card) spells the end for the Boston starter after 1.3 innings, and in comes Bob Stanley for two straight strikeouts to try to keep the Red Sox hopes flickering.  Mantle raps his 4th RBI of the game in the 6th, a single off Stanley that wraps up his eligibility, so Luis Aponte comes in to pick up the pieces.  In the bottom of the inning Jim Rice is either injured or wants to beat the traffic, but either way it doesn’t help the odds of a Boston comeback.  The Yanks almost get another one in the 8th but this time a mad dash for home by Enos Slaughter doesn’t work and he’s out at the plate, but he does manage to score in the 9th on a sac fly from Bobby Richardson.  Meanwhile, Sturdivant is in control as he whiffs PH Tony Perez to complete a 5-hit shutout and the Yanks win easily 7-0 despite three errors committed by excellent fielders.  

Interesting card(s) of Regional #252:  A round one game in this bracket included the only two MVP winners in the group, and it’s interesting to compare the cards of two such winners nearly 70 years apart.  Mantle won his second straight MVP in 1957 at the age of 25, getting 69% of the votes compared to Ted Williams’ 62%; Mantle led the league in walks and runs scored while William led in batting average, SLG% and OBP, but Mantle’s team won the pennant–and this regional.  Goldschmidt was nearly a decade older at age 34, and he received a 90% share far outdistancing Manny Machado at 69%; Goldschmidt led the NL in SLG% and OPS, but was behind Mantle in both categories, and Goldschmidt’s team lost to Mantle’s Yanks in extra innings in the first round in this tournament.  Goldschmidt just finished his 14th season at age 36, which coincidentally was Mantle’s age during his final season; Goldschmidt finished 2024 with a .782 OPS, which was identical to Mantle’s in his final season, so you have to wonder how much Goldschmidt has left in the tank.  Mantle was a lock HOFer; does Goldschmidt have a shot?  With career marks well behind Mantle in virtually every major category, I’m guessing not–I’d put him in the Hall of Very Good, maybe suited for an appearance in a new Baseball Heroes set.

REGIONAL #251:  This group was notable for a pair of very recent Dodgers teams that were likely to be very good; there was also an Orioles team from the most current Strat season that I remembered as being quite strong in the regular season, but like the Dodgers I remembered them as coming up short in the playoffs.   There was a recent Mets team that I thought might be pretty good on cardstock if less so in reality, and a Marlins team that would win a pennant two years later, but they were so up and down in those years I wasn’t putting any money on them.  The field was rounded out by a Phillies team from a vintage that has made a strong showing in this tournament, and so with the exception of the two abysmal play-in teams I would not be surprised by any of these teams winning the bracket, although being forced to predict I went with an all-Dodgers final, with 2021 (whom I remembered as having an extremely good ELO ranking) over 2023 in the faceoff.  Those ELO ranks portrayed this as a strong regional with four teams essentially in the top 350 of all time, and forecast the same results in the final as I.

First round action

The regional play-in game was another battle of the bad.  The 1999 Rays lost 93 games although they had some big names in the lineup such as Fred McGriff, Wade Boggs, and Jose Canseco, all of whom had decent years; however, the rotation was dreadful with Ryan Rupe (8-9, 4.55) getting the start.   At least the Rays had the excuse of being a second-year expansion team; the 2021 Diamondbacks lost 110 games and gave no indication that they would be heading to a World Series in two seasons.   Ketel Marte was the only guy in the lineup with an OPS over .800, and although Zac Gallen (4-10, 4.30) was their best starter, it was pretty much his worst season in the rotation thus far in his career.  The Rays strike first in the top of the 1st with a 2-out RBI single by Bubba Trammell, but Pavin Smith finds and converts Rupe’s HR split for a 3-run shot in the bottom of the inning and Arizona leads 3-1.  Trammell comes up again with two out in the 3rd and contributes another RBI single to make it a one run game, and Miguel Cairo leads off the 4th with a triple but Gallen bears down and strands him on 3rd.  Although Rupe has settled down, the Rays move to closer Roberto Hernandez in the 7th to try to keep them in the game, but Dalton Varsho swats an RBI double and Smith singles him home to extend the Dback lead nonetheless.  Randy Winn finds Gallen’s solid HR result in the top of the 8th to narrow the gap, but Kole Calhoun matches that in the bottom of the inning.  Gallen takes the Arizona lead into the top of the 9th, and although he allows a few baserunners, his 3B-5 Josh Vanmeter remarkably makes the play for the final out and the Diamondbacks head into the tournament proper with a 6-3 win.  

The 2023 Orioles won 101 games and the AL East, but had no success in the postseason, perhaps because although there was power up and down the lineup, they really didn’t do a very good job of getting on base.  However, Kyle Bradish (12-7, 2.83) finished 4th in the Cy Young votes and was good enough where a few solo shots should do the trick.  The 2020 Cardinals went 30-28 in that pandemic year, good enough to make the playoffs as a wild card but they were quickly eliminated, probably because Paul Goldschmidt was their only real offensive weapon, earning him 15th place in MVP voting.  Fortunately for them, Adam Wainwright (5-3, 3.15) was a solid option as the mandatory first round starter, but Adley Rutschman finds Wainwright’s HR result for one of those aforementioned solo shots in the bottom of the 1st.  However, Tyler O’Neill swats a 2-out, 2-run double in the top of the 4th and the Cards move in front, and RBI singles from Goldschmidt and Tommy Edman in the 5th make it a 4-1 Cardinal lead.  Back to back RBI doubles from Gunnar Henderson and Anthony Santander in the bottom of the inning make it a one run game, and when AA stealer Jorge Mateo walks and steals second to lead off the bottom of the 7th, the Cards summon Austin Gomber and his 1.86 ERA from the pen to try to preserve that lead.  But Rutschman greets him with a double that ties the game and leaves the O’s catcher a triple short of a cycle.  A leadoff walk by Bradish to begin the 8th and it’s Baltimore’s turn to head to the bullpen for closer Feliz Bautista who does his job with three quick outs; both relievers then silence the opposition and the game heads to extra innings.  In a controversial move, the O’s pull their closer hoping to preserve him for later rounds, and Daniel Coulombe is given the responsibility of getting them there.  He gets a scare when Brad Miller doubles past RF-3 Santander to lead off the 10th, but Coulombe bears down and strands Miller at third, and Gomber holds in his final inning of eligibility so things head to the 11th.  The Cards stage a two-out rally with a walk and a double that brings up Goldschmidt; although first base is open and the go-ahead run is on 3rd, the O’s opt to pitch to him, mainly because I hate the intentional walk, and Coulombe fans the Cards’ star to end the threat.  Neither offense can do anything, and Yennier Cano takes his turn on the hill for the O’s to begin the 14th while Giovanny Gallegos comes in for the Cards to begin the bottom of the 15th.  However, Gallegos is betrayed when LF-1 O’Neill commits an unthinkable 2-base error, and with two out Cedric Mullins laces a single to walk it off as the Orioles survive the 15-inning 5-4 win and advance.  

The 2021 Dodgers had one of the highest season-ending ELO ratings in baseball history, making them not only the favorite in this regional, but one of the favorites to capture the entire tournament.   The team won 106 games but fell short in the NLCS; they boasted a formidable lineup with Trea Turner and Max Muncy both in finishing in the top 10 for MVP, as well as an insanely good rotation, with three starters in the top 7 for the Cy Young including 3rd place Max Scherzer (1504, 2.46), supported by a killer bullpen.  However, their opponents, the 2022 Mets, were no slouches either, winning 101 games although exiting quickly from the postseason.  They had Pete Alonso, Francisco Lindor, Jeff McNeil, Starling Marte, and closer Edwin Diaz all receiving MVP votes, and who should be on the mound but another Max Scherzer (11-5, 2.29) having another fine year.  Justin Turner converts his HR 1-7/flyB split for a 3-run shot in the bottom of the 2nd, and things don’t stop there as Mookie Betts drives in one with a sac fly and a 2-out RBI double by Trea Turner makes it 5-0 Dodgers after two.  However, the LA Scherzer quickly gives up some ground in the 3rd, walking four Mets to score one before Marte swats a 2-run double and it’s now a 5-3 game.  When Chris Taylor leads off the bottom of the 6th with a homer to extend the LA lead, the Mets yank their Scherzer for Jacob deGrom, only eligible out of the pen due to limited innings, and he promptly strikes out the side but NY now trails by three.  But Dan Vogelbach leads off the 7th with a homer that narrows it to two, and a Mark Canha hit brings up PH Tyler Naquin as the tying run, so it’s the Dodgers’ turn to de-Scherzer for Jimmy Nelson and his 1.86 ERA.  He fans Naquin, and then Justin Turner knocks his second homer of the game that sends deGrom into a tailspin; he loads the bases for the other Turner, Trea, who swats a 2-run single and the Dodgers coast into the 9th with a five run pad.  Alex Vesia is brought in to mop up, and that doesn’t prove to be a good idea as he walks two and then Brandon Nimmo finds Vesia’s solid HR result and with one out, it’s suddenly a two run game.  But Vesia recovers, striking out Alonso for the final out of the game, and the Dodgers survive a scare and advance with the 9-7 win, with Scherzer getting both the win and the loss. 

The second modern Dodger team in the bracket, the 2023 Dodgers, were also a highly-rated team that won 100 games and the NL West, but they were less similar to their ‘21 counterparts than might be expected.  The big guns in the lineup for this version were MVP runner-up Mookie Betts and #3 MVP vote-getter Freddie Freeman; the rotation wasn’t as good as the other team’s but Clayton Kershaw (13-5, 2.46) was a top flight starter for round one.  Fortunately for these Dodgers, they weren’t playing their prior selves in the first round, instead drawing the #7 seeded 1998 Phillies, a 75-87 team that had HOFer Scott Rolen getting some MVP votes, and Strat expert Doug Glanville there to coach his teammates about what column to roll.  On the mound was Curt Schilling (15-14, 3.25), thinking that a first round victory over the Dodgers might bolster his HOF case.  He does have a no-hitter the first pass through the lineup, but he loads up the bases with nobody out in the 4th, and a DP ball scores one; after a walk, Jason Heyward proves he’s not just a singer in a rock and roll band by rolling the 6-5, and although he misses the HR split by one, both runners race home and the Dodgers lead 3-0.  When the Phllies get runners on 1st and 3rd in the 6th, LA gets nervous about Kershaw’s gopher ball results and bring in Shelby Miller and his 1.71 to try to preserve the lead; 3B-4 Max Muncy is able to make the play on a Mike Lieberthal grounder but a run scores to narrow the gap.  However, Will Smith slaps a homer to lead off the top of the 7th and after two strikeouts, a walk is followed by a 2-run Betts homer that chases Schilling for Jerry Spradlin, but the damage is done.  Caleb Ferguson comes in to mop up for the final two innings, and the Dodgers head to the semifinals with the 6-1 win.

The 2021 Diamondbacks had won their play-in game and now faced a team that, like themselves, would win a pennant in two seasons, the 76-86 2001 Marlins.  A strong year from Cliff Floyd earned him some MVP votes, but Brad Penny (10-10, 3.69) sat atop a lackluster rotation, while the Dbacks had to go deeper into their limited staff and hoped Madison Bumgarner (7-10, 4.67) could last long enough to turn it over to a rested bullpen.  A sac fly in the bottom of the third by Carson Kelly gives Arizona a 1-0 lead, while Bumgarner carries a shutout into the 6th, but when Floyd misses a HR split for a double to lead off the 6th, the Dbacks seek to cling to the slim lead and Noe Ramirez comes in from the pen.   He chalks up two whiffs and a groundout to end the inning, then strikes out the side in the 7th, but Penny is holding the Dbacks in check and it’s still a one-run game.  Floyd misses Ramirez’s HR 1-4/flyB split in the top of the 8th, and then in the bottom it’s Josh Rojas converting Penny’s HR 1-7 split for a two-run shot and Penny is pulled for Vladimir Nunez, but it looks to be too late.  The Dbacks then try to preserve some usage for Ramirez and put in JB Wendelken to try to mop up the 9th; he allows a couple of baserunners to bring the tying run to the plate, but he strikes out Alex Gonzales to seal the 3-0 win, with three pitchers sharing the 5-hit shutout, and the play-in Dbacks make the semifinals.  

The survivors

The top seeded 2001 Dodger may have one of the best ELO ratings in the entire tournament, but they also have one of the toughest paths through the regional, facing their second straight 100-win team in a row in the 2023 Orioles.  One of the reasons the Dodgers were so highly rated was their rotation, with a #2 starter in Walker Buehler (15-4, 2.47) who was 4th in the Cy Young voting, as opposed to the Orioles’ Grayson Rodriguez (7-4, 4.35) who had a depleted bullpen after their 15-inning round one win.  The Dodgers begin the bottom of the 1st by missing two HR splits, but the second one by Cory Seager ends being a two run double, and then Will Smith slaps a 2-run homer converting Rodriguez’s split to put Baltimore in a quick four-run hole.  Cedric Mullins cuts into the lead with a solo shot in the top of the 2nd, but in the 3rd Justin Turner finds the Rodriguez HR result for a 2-run blast, and the O’s are stuck with Rodriguez at least for a few more innings because of the bullpen situation.  He settles down, but when Trea Turner singles and steals second to lead off the 7th, the O’s summon closer Felix Bautista who shuts down the threat.  Mullins leads off the 9th with his second solo homer of the game, and Buehler is wondering if he should take the day off as he allows two more hits, but with the pen needing some rest, the Dodgers stick with him and he rewards them by closing out the 6-2 win for an appearance in the finals.  

The plucky 2021 Diamondbacks had survived a play-in game and a first round battle, but it seemed like reality might set in against the 100-win 2023 Dodgers and Bobby Miller (11-4, 3.76), with the Dbacks down to Caleb Smith (4-9, 4.83) in the rotation.  But Carson Kelly quickly puts Arizona in the lead with a solo homer in the bottom of the 1st, and in the 4th errors by Dodgers C-3 Will Smith and 2B-2 Amed Rosario set up a 2-run single from Josh Vanmeter and a sac fly by Nick Ahmed that makes it 4-0.  With their hopes fading, the Dodgers move to Ryan Brasier from the pen to begin the 6th, but he immediately loads the bases with three walks to set up a 2-run single by Kelly, and then another walk leads to a Pavin Smith sac fly and it’s 7-0 Arizona after six.  In the top of the 7th, a double by Rosario puts the Dodgers on the board, and James Outman lives up to his name with a DP ball but another run scores and an RBI single by Mookie Betts narrows the gap to 7-3.  The Diamondbacks are hoping that Caleb Smith can hang in for the entire game, but a 3-run homer from PH Chris Taylor off Smith’s card puts an end to that experiment, so Tyler Gilbert comes in, issues a walk, and Mookie Betts misses a DO 1-7/flyB that could have tied the game.  A double by Kelly in the bottom of the 8th leaves him a triple short of a cycle, but Ketel Marte singles him home and Arizona has a little breathing room for the 9th.  However, Freddie Freeman opens the top of the 9th with a homer and it’s a one-run game, but Gilbert survives the remainder of the inning and the unlikely Diamondbacks head to the finals by squeaking out the 8-7 win.  

It doesn’t get much more lopsided than this regional final, as one of the best rated teams in history, the 2021 Dodgers, face one of the worst, the 110-loss 2021 Diamondbacks who finished 54 games behind the Dodgers in the same division.  Making matters worse, the Dodger had 20 game winner Julio Urias (20-3, 2.96), 7th in the Cy Young votes, on the mound, while the Dbacks were down to Merrill Kelly (7-11, 4.44), who wouldn’t compete for the Matt Young award.  Still Arizona had won three straight with timely hitting and lucky splits, and like the Dodgers their pen was in pretty good shape, so underestimating them would be dangerous.  LA strikes in the top of the 1st when Trea Turner walks, steals second, and scores on a two out Max Muncy single, and after a walk Will Smith slaps another single and Muncy races home; Justin Turner follows with another RBI single and Kelly only gets out of the inning on an unexpectedly fine play by 3B-5 Josh Vanmeter.  A fielder’s choice in the bottom of the inning narrows the gap to 3-1 LA, but AJ Pollock crushes a 3-run homer in the 2nd to extend the Dodger lead and the Dbacks in desperation move to the pen for Noe Ramirez who ends the inning without further damage.  In the 4th, Pollock misses his HR split for a double, but Muncy does not miss his and it’s a 2-run homer that pushes the score to 8-1; two batters later, it’s Will Smith with another big slap for a long homer and it’s 10-1.  The Dbacks bullpen then holds their own against a raft of LA defensive replacements, but it doesn’t matter as Urias closes out a 4-hitter while striking out 10, and the Dodgers win 10-1 and live up to their lofty rating with a regional championship, the 12th for the franchise.

Interesting card of Regional #251:  As I get close to my goal of playing every team Strat has printed as an entry in this tournament, I felt that I should use one of the few remaining editions of this feature to recognize a long-term booster of the game.  Recruited into his brother’s league when he was 5 years old, Doug Glanville won the league the following season and the rest was history–a history that apparently included a 31-0 mauling of Diego Segui, and spilling grape juice on Ron Guidry’s card for a nasty purple stain.  In his Strat story that is posted on his webpage, he notes that the game laid the foundation for a successful nine-year career in the majors with a .277 lifetime batting average and 168 steals.  He also mentions the particular pride that he took when he received a “1” rating in CF, but he admits that he was bitter when didn’t get that same “1” rating for his centerfield play in 2001.  He further points out the importance of Strat in helping him develop critical thinking skills, and those skills were evident from his Ivy League degree in engineering from the University of Pennsylvania; I know that I and many others also see the influence of Strat in our eventual career paths.  In a 2013 interview conducted by the game company, he proved he was a man after my own heart when asked about his favorite Strat cards, as he replied “I just enjoyed the unusual cards, not so much the great ones.”  As such, it seems mandatory to me to present fellow Strat-o-matic fanatic Doug Glanville as the feature card of the regional.

REGIONAL #250:  Once again, it appeared that two of the best teams in the draw would be facing off in round one, with last season’s Yankees and Phillies being two teams that I vaguely remembered were thought to be potential Series opponents, although neither team took the pennant.  However, there was one squad that indeed did capture the pennant, the 2009 version of the Phillies, and they were right in the middle of an remarkable run of regional winners for the franchise that already included 2005, 2006, 2008, 2011, 2012, and 2014.  Among other potential competitors were a Nationals team separated from their lone pennant by a pandemic year, the 2023 Twins who I seemed to remember playing in the postseason, and a strike-season Red Sox team some years before the infamous ‘85 pennant-winners.  Aside from the Marlins and the ‘59 Senators, I thought this looked like a strong group but I had to pick the 2009 Phils given their previous successes in this project, and for extra measure I selected the other Phillies team to face them in the Phinals.   The ELO rankings agreed with that assessment, but suggested that the older Phils would have a more challenging path to the final than the newer model.

First round action

In what looked like the best round one matchup in this group, it was the top seeded, pennant winning 2009 Phillies facing the #4 seed 1981 Red Sox.  The Phils took the NL East with 93 wins and cruised through the playoffs but fell short in the Series; they were loaded offensively with Ryan Howard finishing 3rd for MVP and Chase Utley, Shane Victorino, and Jayson Werth all also received votes.  However, their pitching staff was not the best, although JA Happ (12-4, 2.93) was a strong option at the top of the rotation, and Brad Lidge was one of worst closers I’d seen on a pennant-winning team.  The Red Sox went 59-49 in that strike-shortened season, with hitting leader Carney Lansford and Dwight Evans both in the top ten for MVP, but innings shortages left Mike Torrez 10-3, 3.69) atop a rather shallow rotation.  Boston suffers a blow in the top of the 3rd when Jerry Remy is knocked out of the regional in his second at-bat, and those 24-player die cut teams didn’t provide much depth to replace him.  The Phils don’t get their first hit until the bottom of the 4th, but it’s a long one as Raul Ibanez provides a lead with a solo shot, and Jimmy Rollins leads off the 5th by converting Torrez’s HR split for another run.  Torrez gets out of a jam, striking out Werth with the bases loaded to end the 7th with no damage, and the Phils leave two more on in the 8th, but their limited production proves sufficient as Happ finishes up with a 4-hit shutout and the favorites move on with a quiet 2-0 win.

I was surprised to discover that this first round game was a huge mismatch by the ELO ratings, mainly because I didn’t realize the 2021 Nationals had collapsed after winning a season two seasons earlier.  This version of the Nats managed to lose 97 games, and although Juan Soto was the MVP runner-up and Kyle Schwarber provided additional power, the rotation was painful to look at with Joe Ross (5-9, 4.17) just tossing enough innings to be eligible as their best option.  Meanwhile, I had accurately remembered that the 2023 Twins made the playoffs and won the AL Central with 87 wins; Sonny Gray (8-8, 2.79) was the runner-up for the Cy Young award and the fourth starter in their rotation still probably had a better card than Ross.  But Schwarber spots Ross with a leadoff homer in the top of the 2nd, and in the 7th the lead gets extended by RBI hits from Alcides Escobar and Starlin Castro.  When Soto leads off the 8th with a double, the Twins are forced to try Brock Stewart and his 0.65 ERA to try to head off further damage, but he yields a 2-out single to Escobar that scores another run.  Meanwhile, Ross is mystifying the Twins, and he ends with the second 4-hit shutout of the regional as the bottom seed in the bracket surprises and moves on with the 4-0 win.

This matchup features two franchises that haven’t seen a lot of success in the tournament.  The 2023 Marlins were the #6 seed but had a decent 84-78 record; Luis Arraez led the NL with a .354 average and finished 8th in the MVP voting, while Jesus Luzardo (10-10, 3.58) was a respectable round one starter.    For the #7 seed 1959 Senators, it was the usual first in war, first in peace, and last in the American League with 91 losses, but this team had Harmon Killebrew leading the league in homers and he, Jim Lemon, and Bob Allison all received MVP votes, as did Camilo Pascual (17-10, 2.64) with an outstanding year.   Washington comes out charging in the bottom of the 1st, with an RBI single by Roy Sievers, a sac fly by Faye Throneberry, and an error from Miami 3B-3 Jake Burger resulting in a 3-0 Nats lead.  They add to it in the 2nd with a 2-run double from Lemon, although Burger atones for his error by leading off the 4th with a long homer and Jorge Soler goes back to back to make it a 5-2 game.  Meanwhile, Luzardo settles down for a while, but when he puts the first two runners on in the 5th the Marlins move to Tanner Scott from the pen, and he gets out of the jam to keep Miami in the game.  Killebrew jacks one to lead off the7th but the Marlins get it back on a Jesus Sanchez RBI single in the 8th, although Jazz Chisholm misses his HR 1-15 split that could have made it even closer.  The Marlins mount a comeback in the top of the 9th, as Arraez drives in a run with his first hit of the game, and with two out and two runs in scoring position that could tie the game, Burger comes to the plate as the go-ahead run.  A mound chat with Pascual and the Senators stick with their ace, who strikes out Burger and Washington heads to the semifinals with the 6-4 win.  

Two teams from the past season that fell short of expectations, the 2023 Phillies were the #2 seed while the 2023 Yankees were seeded as #5.   The Phils won 90 games but fell just short of a pennant in the NLCS; there were MVP votes for Bryce Harper, Nick Castellanos, and Kyle Schwarber, who hit 47 homers but batted .197 and would occupy a well-deserved DH role because he was a hazard in the outfield.  Zack Wheeler (13-6, 3.61) was 6th in the Cy Young voting and was a force to be reckoned with.   The Yankees limped to an 82-80 record, and their primary weapon was Aaron Judge, who needed to stay healthy unlike the actual season.  However, their great equalizer was Cy Young winner Gerrit Cole (15-4, 2.63) who would give them a chance against anybody.  Things go sour in the bottom of the 2nd for Wheeler, as two walks and errors from LF-2 Brandon Marsh and two errors in the inning by SS-3 Trea Turner help the Yanks bat around, garnering six unearned runs in the process, and the Bronx cheers are deafening.  The Phils try to get back into it in the 3rd but 1-11+2 Alec Bohm is cut down at the plate for the third out, leading to a lot of second-guessing by Philly sports radio, especially when Castellanos leads off the 4th with a homer.  Two straight hits by the Yanks to lead off the bottom of the 4th and Wheeler is pulled for Jose Alvarado and his 1.74 ERA, and he staves off further damage but the Phils are swinging and missing against Cole.  Finally, some running aggressiveness pays off in the 7th as Turner walks, steals second, and races home on a JT Realmuto single, but that’s all Cole is giving up as he finishes out a 5-hitter while fanning 13 and the Yankees pull off the upset with the 6-2 win.  

The survivors

This semifinal appeared to be quite lopsided with the top seeded 2009 Phillies against the bottom seed 2021 Nationals, but the Nats had already pulled off one big upset and were aiming for a second, although their Paolo Espino (5-5, 4.27) looked to be at a disadvantage against Philly’s Cliff Lee (14-13, 3.22).   However, things start out rough for the Phils in the top of the 1st as they miss two DO 1-13 splits for singles, miss a HR 1-10 split for a double, and then miss a 1-13 split trying to score on that double–and come away with zero runs on three potential extra base hits.  In the bottom of the 3rd Kyle Schwarber hits his second solo homer of the regional to give the Nats the lead, while in the 4th the Phils lose their RF as Jayson Werth gets injured while hitting into a double play.  In the 6th Ryan Howard misses a HR split, but advances to 3rd with one out on an error by Espino, so the Nats seek to hold their slim edge and summon Andres Machado out of a none-too-good bullpen.  Machado fans injury replacement John Mayberry Jr. and Ben Francisco and the Phillies again come up empty-handed.  However, in the 7th they load the bases with nobody out, and with the infield in Machado strikes out Shane Victorino and it’s deja vu all over again.  However, Machado misses to Chase Utley and walks in the tying run, but he gets out of the inning without further damage, and when Victor Robles finds and converts Lee’s HR 1-6 split Washington moves back on top.  The Phils again get two runners in scoring position in the 8th but fail to score, and when Lee allows two hits in the bottom of the inning they move to Scott Eyre and he gets out of the jam to keep it a one-run deficit as the Phils take their last cuts in the 9th.  It’s the top of the order for Machado, and Victorino pops out, but Utley crushes one and the game is tied and heads to the bottom of the 9th, where Eyre dispatches the Nats and we head to extra innings.  With Machado burnt, Washington turns to Kyle Finnegan.  Both relievers do their job until the top of the 12th, when a double by Mayberry puts two runners in scoring position with nobody out, and the Nats do their familiar infield in positioning.  A groundball B gets one out at the plate, but a walk loads the bases for Jimmy Rollins–who fans and leaves the game with an injury.  An out by Pedro Feliz and once again the Phils come up empty.  In the bottom of the inning Eyre has to leave after four hitless innings, and Clay Condrey comes in to immediately yield a triple to Josh Harrison, putting the winning run 90 feet away and Juan Soto at the plate.   But Condrey whiffs Soto and the game heads to the 13th, where Raul Ibanez makes a statement with a 3-run homer in the top of the inning, after which the Phils load the bases but then fail to score.  Even so, Condrey has all the runs he needs as he holds on to send the Phillies to the finals with the 5-2 win, and although Rollins will be back for game, Werth is still out and the bullpen is in rough shape.  

After starting a Cy Young winner in the first round, the #5 seeded 2023 Yankees were now looking at a very shallow rotation, and decided that they had to use spot starter Michael King (4-8, 2.75) as their best chance of reaching the finals.   For the #7 seed 1959 Senators it would be Pedro Ramos (13-19, 4.15) trying to keep the ball in the newfangled Yankee Stadium, but it’s the Senators who knock the first homer as Roy Sievers crushes a 3-run shot, with Faye Throneberry then going back-to-back in the top of the 1st to silence the Bronx.  Then, in the 4th the Nats load the bases on two singles and a walk, and then Lenny Green draws a walk for one run, and Jim Lemon rolls King’s HR 1-9/flyB split–he misses the grand slam, but gets an RBI on the sac fly.   That brings up Killebrew, and he leaves no room for splits, crushing a solid 3-run homer that makes it 9-0 Washington and the crowd begins heading for the exits.  King joins them, with Wandy Peralta coming in to get the third out.  Anthony Volpe leads off the bottom of the 5th with a homer to try to begin the long climb back into the game; Anthony Rizzo then converts a TR 1, and Isiah Kiner-Falefa, although not an Anthony, then singles in another run.  A few batters later, Giancarlo Stanton belts a three-run homer and suddenly it’s 9-5 and Ramos’s leash gets a lot shorter.  The Yanks’ comeback hopes take a hit when 3B DJ LeMahieu is lost for the tournament to injury leading off the 6th, but the next batter Volpe avenges his fallen colleague with his second homer of the game; Jimmy Cordero then takes over on the mound for New York to begin the 7th as they inch closer.  Throneberry greets Cordero with his second homer of the game and Washington takes a 10-6 lead into the 7th inning stretch.  But two straight walks to lead off the bottom of the inning and the Senators summon Chuck Stobbs to face Judge; Stobbs induces a DP ball from Judge and whiffs Stanton in a clutch situation.  And Washington’s offense isn’t done yet; Bob Allison knocks a two-out, two-run double in the top of the 8th and he scores on a Sievers single, and so the Nats preserve Stobbs and bring in Hal Griggs to try to close things out.  He tosses two hitless innings and the upstart Senators give a hint of things to come in Minnesota during the 60s, pounding the Yankees 13-6 to reach the bracket final.  

A lopsided matchup in the bracket final pits the top-seeded, pennant winning 2009 Phillies against the #7 seeded, 91-loss 1959 Senators, with the Phils Cole Hamels (10-11, 4.32 ) facing Washington swingman Tex Clevenger (8-5, 3.92).  This was also the Zoom game of the week, with TT taking the reins of his Phils while I would attempt to continue the good fortune that I’d seemed to bring to the Senators in the first two rounds.  However, that quickly turned to misfortune as the Senators would lose their primary weapon, big Harmon Killebrew, to a tournament-ending injury in the bottom of the 1st inning.  The team rallied around this big loss, with Lenny Green finding and converting Hamels’ inviting 6-5 HR split in the 3rd, and Hal Naragon drove in another in the 4th while Clevenger was tossing no-hit ball.  However, Washington’s terrible defense, with its all-”4” infield, quickly loses that lead, with an error by SS-4 Ron Samford and an X-chart double from Pedro Feliz tying the game in the 5th.  That is the only hit Clevenger allows until the 8th, but then Clevenger commits the 3rd Nats error of the game, Shane Victorino knocks an RBI single, and with first base open I refuse to walk Ryan Howard, who promptly drives in another run and the Phillies move in front.  Skeptical of that 6-5 on Hamels, TT motions for Ryan Madson from the pen (leaving the terrible Brad Lidge warming up), and that proves to be enough to cement the 4-2 win and adding another regional crown to the Phillies collection from that era; in a decade long span, seven versions of the Phils have won regionals:  2005, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012, and 2014, the most impressive run of any franchise in this tournament, although they’ve had limited success outside of that run. 

Interesting card of Regional #250:   The ‘59 Senators were unlikely candidates to reach the regional finals, but they did so thanks in large part to the efforts of a 23-year old in his first full time season in the majors; all he did was lead the AL in homers and received noteworthy support for MVP on a bottom-dwelling team.  Killebrew signed as a 17 year old out of Idaho, on the recommendation of an Idaho senator who was a regular at the Senators’ games, and he began spot appearances in the majors at age 18, but the team didn’t seem to know what to do with him.   For example, his debut appearance was as a pinch-runner, a concept not reflected in his Strat running rating, and the Senators were committed to Eddie Yost at third base, so he spent most of 1954 to 1958 in the minors.  When Yost was traded after the 1958 season, Killer got his chance and he certainly made the most of it.  Shortly thereafter he and the team moved to Minnesota where both met with greater success, and he crossed the 500 homer threshold in 1971–but you have to wonder what his totals might have been if he’d been a Senators regular the five seasons that he spent primarily in the minors.  In this tournament, as Killebrew went, so went the team, as he led them to the finals with his combination of power and on-base ability, but his injury in his first at bat of the final spelled doom for the Senators unlikely run.   

REGIONAL #249:  After a careful cross-checking of tournament entries, I had discovered that I’d overlooked a few earlier teams that were pretty good, and one of them, the 1955 Giants, looked like a contender to capture this regional, as they had put together a season for the ages in the preceding season.  Still, I thought that they would face a serious obstacle in the first round in the 2022 Yankees, and other teams that I thought might be in the hunt were the 1986 Pirates and teams from the past two seasons representing the Indians, Red Sox, and a modern Giants squad.  I was pretty confident that the winner of the first “play-in” game of the tournament wouldn’t get very far; ultimately, I went with those ‘55 Giants to win, besting the ‘86 Pirates in the finals.  The ELO ratings indicated that the 2022 Yankees were by far the best team in the bracket, although they would face the #2 seeded ‘55 Giants in round one, and those ratings predicted that the Yanks would defeat the other Giants team in the finals, with most other teams in the group looking to be pretty bad.

First round action

Play-in game:  In the single elimination format, I often run across matchups where I hate that one team has to lose and be eliminated; however, in these play-in games needed to round out the tournament evenly, it’s hard to believe that one of these teams actually has to win.  This one matches two terrible teams from last season, the 2023 A’s and the 2023 Rockies, and the best that can be said is that at least the game won’t be played in Oakland, meaning that there might be more than 10 spectators in attendance.  The A’s lost 112 games and their best starter, JP Sears (5-14, 4.54), must have come from the clearance section of the catalog;  the Rockies lost 103 games and although their lineup looked quite a bit better than the A’s, led by Rookie of the Year vote-getter Nolan Jones, their pitching staff was even worse and Kyle Freeland (6-14, 5.03) topped one of the worst rotations I’ve run across in recent memory.  The fireworks begin in the top of the 1st when Zack Gelof converts Freeman’s HR split, and that is followed by a Brent Rooker triple and a Shea Langeliers single, all off Freeland’s card and the A’s quickly lead 2-0.  That doesn’t last long as Ryan McMahon hits Sears’ solid HR result for a 2-run shot and a tie game, and both squads are counting the outs until they can try out their bullpens.  A 2-run single by Ryan Noda, at least off his own card, puts the A’s back on top in the 2nd, but Brenton Doyle finds the solid HR department at Sears for a 2-run blast and again it’s tied.  Somehow both pitchers each manage two scoreless innings, but in the bottom of the 5th Jones converts Sears’ HR split to lead off the inning and having allowed the requisite five runs, the A’s move immediately to reliever Mason Miller, who ends the inning without further damage but the Rockies lead 5-4 after five.  Armed with a lead, the Rockies pull the terrible Freeland to begin the 6th and hope Brent Suter can hang on; he does, so in the 8th Colorado moves to the closest thing they can find to a closer, Justin Lawrence,   Lawrence does a solid job with a perfect 9th inning to lock down the save in the Rockies’ 5-4 that earns them a seat at the table in the regional proper–but they probably shouldn’t get too comfortable.

This first-round matchup featured two contemporary mediocrities that weren’t bad enough to require a play-in game, but probably not good enough to go very far in this project.  The 2022 Red Sox went 78-84 but did have MVP support for SS Xander Bogaerts and 3B Rafael Devers, and Michael Wacha (11-2, 3.32) had a good card if you could ignore some gopher ball issues.  The 2023 Indians were called the Guardians by this time, although doing so here would mess up my search functions and besides, it only says “Cleveland” on the cards so I can call them the Spiders or the Naps if I want to.  However, I can’t call them very good, as they went 76-86 without much offense besides Jose Ramirez, 10th in the MVP voting, and Josh Naylor, who received one such vote.  Even so, Tanner Bibee (10-4, 2.96) was a strong option at the top of the rotation so there was some chance of a tight pitcher’s duel here.  Disaster strikes Cleveland as Naylor is lost for the regional to injury in the bottom of the 3rd inning, weakening an already limited offense, The Red Sox load the bases in the top of the 5th but injury replacement 1B-3 David Fry turns a DP that the 2 that he replaced would have dropped and the game remains a scoreless tie after five.  Boston again loads the bases in the 7th, but Bibee records a clutch strikeout and then Wacha holds and the game enters the 8th with no score.  The injury bug hits the Red Sox in the 8th as RF Rob Refsnyder is knocked out of the game at an already thin position thanks to a midseason trade, but that seems to wake up their offense as Devers and JD Martinez then hit back to back 2-out doubles for a 1-0 lead.  Despite Wacha’s longball issues, he’s tossing a shutout and the Red Sox opt to stick with their ace, but he runs into some trouble in the 9th as PH Josh Bell singles and then defensive replacement 1B-3 Triston Casas drops a grounder for the 4th Boston error of the game.  But Cleveland is out of credible pinch hitters by now, and Wacha retires weak hitting Miles Straw for the final out and the Red Sox move on with the 1-0 win with the 4-hit shutout.  

My vague memory of the Pirates of the 1980s was that they were pretty good, but the 1986 Pirates proved that my memory is going as they lost 98 games with a talented pair of youngsters named Barry Bonds and Bobby Bonilla having unimpressive years, although Rick Rhoden (15-12, 2.84) was a good first round starter that finished 5th in the Cy Young votes.  The 2022 Giants went an even 81-81 but were the #3 seed by ELO ratings in this bracket, but they seemed to have a lot in common with the Pirates with limited offense but a strong top starter in Carlos Rodon (14-8, 2.88), the 6th place Cy Young finisher.  Things start slow, but a dropped popup by SF C- 3 Joey Bart opens the door for a 2-run single by Pirates DH Mike Diaz, but a chance for a rally in the bottom of the inning is cut short as 1-12+2 Joc Pederson is cut down at the plate for the third out.  Bart does lead off the bottom of the 5th with a solo homer that might keep SF from taking his name off the transit system, but from there on out Rhoden is untouchable, finishing out a 5-hitter as the Pirates take the 2-1 pitcher’s duel to advance to the semifinals.

It seems to happen with annoying regularity that the two best teams in the regional have to play each other in the first round, and so it goes in this bracket with the 2022 Yankees facing cross-town and cross-era rivals 1955 Giants for what should be a clear path to the regional crown.  The Yanks were the top seed with a very strong ELO ranking, winning 99 games and the AL East only to get swept in the ALCS; they famously had MVP Aaron Judge break the AL home run record, and Nestor Cortes (12-4, 2.44) finished 8th for the Cy Young.  The Giants dropped off quite a bit a year after their legendary 1954 team, going 80-74, with Willie Mays leading the NL in homers while finishing 4th for MVP, while Johnny Antonelli (14-16, 3.33) would have benefited from having more weapons like Mays in the lineup.  In the top of the 3rd, Yankees DH deluxe Matt Carpenter crushes one deep into the Polo Grounds for a 3-run homer, although Willie Mays lofts a sac fly in the bottom of the inning to narrow the gap to 3-1 Yanks after three.  The worst nightmares of the Yanks come to life when Judge is injured in the top of the 7th, although he could return for the regional final should the team last that long.  The Giants immediately set out to keep that from happening, as a single and an Al Dark double begin the bottom of the inning to put the tying run in scoring position with nobody out; after a visit to the mound, the Yanks decide to stick with Cortes, but Don Mueller lofts a fly to make it a one-run game.  However, with two out in the top of the 8th Josh Donaldson smacks a 2-run homer off Antonelli’s split, and the Giants summon Windy McCall sensing that the horse has left the barn.  MCall does his best to burn the barn down, allowing three straight hits, the last an RBI single from Andrew Benintendi but 1-15+2 Isiah Kiner-Falefa is cut down for the third out.  The assault on McCall continues in the 9th as defensive replacement DJ LeMahieu singles in a run, and Cortes sets down the Giants in order to close out the 7-2 win, earning a trip to the semifinals but without their MVP.

The 2023 Rockies survived their play-in game, but their remaining starters were terrible, with Austin Gomber (9-9, 5.50) the best option, and they had already put some wear on the few decent arms in their bullpen.  The good news was that the opposition, the 2023 Cardinals, were also pretty bad, losing 91 games with Paul Goldschmidt and Nolen Arenado coming back to earth after a big season the previous year; still, Jordan Montgomery (6-9, 3.42) was more than two runs better than Gomber in the ERA department.  Tommy Edman breaks the ice in the top of the 3rd by finding Gomber’s solid 5-9 homer for a two-run blast, and later in the inning a two-out error by 3b-1 Ryan McMahon opens the door for a 2-run shot by Nolan Gorman for a 4-0 Cardinal lead.  In the 6th, it’s Goldschmidt’s turn to roll the 5-9 for a 2-run homer and Gomber is a goner, with Brent Suter coming in to yield three straight singles and another run before he can get the third out.  The Rockies blow a chance to get on the board in the 8th when  1-12+2 Brendan Rodgers is nailed for the third out at the plate, but backup 1B Mike Moustakas connects for a 2-run homer in the 9th to provide a flicker of hope, but Montgomery quickly extinguishes it and the Cardinals move on with an easy 7-2 win.

The survivors

The top seeded 2022 Yankees will have Luis Severino (7-3, 3.18) uninjured and ready to go for their semifinal game, but not their MVP Aaron Judge who was still recovering from a first round injury.  They faced their contemporary rivals, the 2022 Red Sox, who finished 21 games behind the Yankees and also had a key offensive weapon, DH Rob Refsnyder, out with an injury, while Rich Hill (8-7, 4.27) was on the hill.  Severino is bailed out in the top of the 2nd when his RF-4 Giancarlo Stanton makes a spectacular catch with the bases loaded to crush a rally, but Severino’s luck runs out in the 4th when Alex Verdugo knocks a 2-run double off the pitcher’s card for a Red Sox lead.  In the 5th, it’s Trevor Story’s turn for a 2-run double for Boston, and that’s followed by Verdugo converting Severino’s HR 1-2/flyB split for a two run shot, so the Yankees summon Ron Marinaccio from the pen to get the final out but it’s now 6-0 Boston.  In the bottom of the inning, a two out two run homer by Andrew Benintendi narrows the gap somewhat, but in the 7th two RBIB singles by Eric Hosmer and Reese McGuire and a sac fly by Enrique Hernandez and the rout is on.  From there, it’s all down Hill and the Red Sox lay a whipping on their favored rivals with a 9-2 win to earn a trip to the regional finals.

The ELO ratings had this semifinal as a very even matchup between two pretty bad teams:  the 1986 Pirates and Bob Walk (7-8, 3.75) against the 2023 Cardinals with Steven Matz (4-7, 3.86).  Nolan Arenado finds and converts Walk’s HR split for a solo shot in the bottom of the 1st and then Tyler O’Neill goes back to back courtesy of his own homer result and it’s 2-0 Cards.  They get another run in the 3rd on a Willson Contreras fielder’s choice,  The Pirates get  on the board in the 6th with an RBI single from Barry Bonds, but the Cards start the bottom of the inning with a walk and a sharp single and Walk walks to the dugout and Don Robinson comes in to walk the bases loaded.  However, he then gets a clutch strikeout and a DP to escape the inning and the Pirates hang on, but the Cards pound Robinson in the 7th with an RBI single from Tommy Edman and a 2-run double from Arenado makes the lead look insurmountable, with Matz in control, and the Cards starter makes a nice defensive play on a grounder from PH Junior Ortiz to close out the 6-1 Cardinal win that sends them to the finals. 

A very modern final matches the #4 seeded 2022 Red Sox against the #7 seed, the 2023 Cardinals, with neither team really expected to get this far.  It was good news for the Red Sox as they would be getting their RF, Rob Refsnyder and his .881 OPS, back from injury and they had a fully rested pen ready to go in support of gopherball-prone Nathan Eovaldi (6-3, 3.87).  Even so, the Cards were also at full strength, although Miles Mikolas (9-13, 4.78) looked rather hittable himself.  The Red Sox move ahead in the top of the 4th when Trevor Story finds and converts Mikolas’s HR split, and when Story doubles in the 6th the Cards decide to go to the pen for Ryan Helsley, but Alex Verdugo singles and Boston move ahead 2-0.  In the bottom of the 7th St. Louis starts a two-out rally with two consecutive singles, and even though Eovaldi is tossing a shutout the Red Sox don’t trust the multiple homer results on his card, so John Schreiber comes in and records the third out.  However, in the bottom of the 8th Jordan Walker leads off by wrapping one around the foul pole to make it a one-run game; that’s followed by a single and a double that sets up a 2-run single by Nolan Arenado and suddenly the Cards are in front.  The Cards stick with Helsley to finish things out even though it will burn him for much of any super-regional that might be played, but they need to get there first and he does the job, sending the lightly-regarded Cards to the regional crown and earning the 3-2 comeback win.  It’s the 15th regional win for the franchise, who earned this one largely due to a pitching staff that held opponents to a total of five runs across the three games of the bracket. 

Interesting card of Regional #249:  When your teammate sets a single season league record for homers, you might think it would be difficult to lead the team in slugging percentage, but Matt Carpenter wasn’t holding anybody’s beer.   He spent only one season with the Yankees at age 36, but he made the most of it, posting a HR% of 9.7% that was substantially better than Aaron Judge’s record setting production at 8.9%.  That prorates out to a 68-homer season when based upon the number of plate appearances that Judge had.  Carpenter was a late bloomer with the Cardinals, not really seeing significant playing time until he was a 26-year old rookie, but he quickly demonstrated that he was a valuable and versatile infielder, leading the NL in doubles twice and also good at getting on base, leading the league in walks as well.  When he turned 30, he began to demonstrate formidable power, with 36 homers in 2018 getting him significant MVP support.  However, with two consecutive seasons below the Mendoza line in 2020 and 2021, the Cards let him go, but early in the 2022 season an injury-racked Yankee team signed him out of the minors.  That proved to be a wise move, as he immediately went 8 for 24, with six of his first seven hits being home runs.  The power surge continued, but as evident from his 2-9 roll, he couldn’t escape the injury plague in the Bronx; on August 8th, he fouled a ball off his foot and it was broken, and he did not return during the regular season.  Now age 38, he has returned to the Cards and although not the player he once was, it looks like he may bow out from the franchise more gracefully than he was able to following the pandemic.