REGIONAL #230:  This draw proved to be an eclectic one, with one of the last teams from the 1920s included, as well as representatives from the 80s, 90s, 00s, and the pandemic.   There was a pennant winner here in the 2003 Marlins, and there was also a Marlins team from the year following their prior pennant–a team that I remembered being almost immediately disassembled.  There was also another pair in the poker hand, this one from the Orioles, although I didn’t expect big things from either.  In trying to remember what other teams might be competitive, I knew that the White Sox entry was from a ebb between good teams in the early 80s and early 90s, and I doubted that they would survive the Sox jinx; there was a Cardinals team from the year before McGwire’s record setting that was probably pretty good, and a Padres team that had won a pennant a few years earlier.  I suspected that the 1927 Braves would get demolished by this competition, so as far as predictions go I went with the pennant winning Marlins over the Cards in the final.  The ELO ratings portrayed the ‘03 Marlins as the only really good team in the group, picking them over the 1999 version of the Orioles.

First round action

One season after winning the World Series, the 1998 Marlins managed to pull off a collapse not seen since Connie Mack’s A’s, losing 108 games; the squad jettisoned about three quarters of it’s lineup and rotation, and what was left of the latter was gruesome, with Kurt Ojala (2-7, 4.25) the least terrible options.  The 1997 Cardinals were the #3 seed in the bracket even though they only went 73-89, but they looked better on cardstock with a late season acquisition of Mark McGwire, who hit 24 homers in 174 ABs for the Cards, and a strong rotation fronted by a pair of Benes’s, with Andy (10-7, 3.10) getting the nod over his younger brother.  The game is scoreless until the top of the 4th, when Ray Lankford crushes a solo shot to put the Cards ahead, but the Marlins tie it with smallball as Edgar Renteria squibs a single past 1B-2 McGwire, advances on a bunt, and races home on a single from Dave Berg.  The pitchers remain in control until the top of the 9th, when the Cards get two aboard and Royce Clayton doubles to score one, but the stop sign goes up for slow-footed Gary Gaetti with just one out.  The Marlins counter with reliever Matt Mantei and bring the infield in, which works as Gaetti is out at the plate trying to score on a Willie McGee grounder.  Nonetheless, the Cards hold the one run lead entering the bottom of the 9th and it’s up to Benes to close things out, but the first batter Mark Kotsay doubles off the pitcher’s card to put the tying run in scoring position.  Tony Larussa eyes Dennis Eckersley in the pen but all he can see is that solid 5-9 homer, so he sticks with his starter and he strands Kotsay at second for the 2-1 as the Cards squeak into the semifinal with no help whatsoever from Big Mac.

One of the last pre-war teams left in the tournament, the 60-94 1927 Braves had the look of a deadball era squad, with five .300 hitters in the lineup but with their leading home run hitter, the legendary Jack Fournier, barely clearing double digits with 10.  Their pitching was not great either, with Joe Genewich (11-8, 3.83) their top option.  They had to go against the #2 seed in the bracket, the 1999 Orioles, a steroid era team where only one players in the lineup hit fewer homers than Fournier.  Although they only went 78-84, that was six games under their projection, and BJ Surhoff got MVP votes while Mike Mussina (18-7, 3.50) was the Cy Young runner-up.  The O’s get a run in the bottom of the 1st when Will Clark doubles and Albert Belle singles him home; in the 3rd they pile on, starting with a 2-run homer by Brady Anderson and then a sac fly from Belle and a 2-out RBI single from Jeff Conine makes it 5-0.  Genewich then gets injured in the bottom of the 5th, and George Mogridge comes in and retaliates by injuring Belle for 6 games, basically knocking him out of the tournament.  Fournier gets the Braves on the board in the 6th by doubling and eventually scoring on an Eddie Moore sac fly; in the 8th they start going to town on Mussina, and RBI doubles from Jimmie Welsh and Shanty Hogan make it a one run game with Hogan in scoring position on only one out.  The O’s check the pen and see a lot of steroid-era relievers that allow longballs, so they stick with their ace and he gets the final outs so Mussina enters the 9th trying to protect the narrow lead.  The top of the 9th begins with C-1 Charles Johnson dropping a popup to put the tying run aboard, and with two away Dick Burrus singles that runner to 3rd; Doc Farrell then rips a grounder to second, and I had forgotten to bring in a defensive replacement for 2B-4 Delino Deshields, but amazingly Delino scoops it up and tosses to Conine for the final out as the Orioles sneak into the semifinals with the 5-4 win, but without their top HR threat for the remainder of the regional.

The top-seeded 2003 Marlins won 91 games and managed to win the World Series from a wild-card berth, with a lineup boasting four guys getting MVP votes and a deep rotation fronted by Mark Redman (14-9, 3.59).  They faced the 2001 Padres, who were a mediocre 79-83 and unfortunately the two Hall of Famers they could put in the lineup, Tony Gwynn and Rickey Henderson, were both over 40, and their steroid-era rotation meant that swingman Brian Lawrence (5-5, 3.45) was the least likely to need assistance from closer Trevor Hoffman.  The Marins waste no time asserting themselves in the top of the 1st with a three-run homer by Derrek Lee and a solo shot from rookie Miguel Cabrera providing a large lead before most Padres fans were in their seats.  Things don’t go much better in the 2nd, as a two-out two-base error by Padres 3B-4 Phil Nevin gives him two errors for the game and scores two runs.  At this point the Pads see no point to save Hoffman for anything and he ends the inning with his team losing 6-0.  That seems to inspire San Diego somewhat, as Mark Kotsay leads off the bottom of the inning with a homer to get them on the board.  However, the beating continues in the 3rd, with Juan Encarnacion recording a 2-run triple; the Juan-two punch continues as he scores on a Juan Pierre single, and the AA Pierre swipes second and scores on a Mike Lowell single that makes it 10-1.  In the 5th, Luis Castillo drives a triple past Padres RF-4 Bubba Trammell to score two more; he scores on a Lee single and the Marlins then load the bases for Encarnacion, who clears them with a double and it’s now 16-1.  The Padres get a couple of runs in the bottom of the 5th on RBI hits from Ryan Klesko and Ray Lankford, but with the score 16-3 after five the Marlins decide to avoid injuries with some wholesale substitutions, and one of them, Ramon Castro, adds a two-run homer to give Hoffman 12 runs allow in his four innings pitched.  Klesko posts a sac fly in the bottom of the 6th in response, but Castilo cranks out a 2-run single in the 7th to make things even more lopsided.  In the 8th Alex Gonzalez somehow locates a split HR on reliever Jay Witasick’s 3-2 roll, and he converts it with two out for a three-run shot that caps off a remarkable 23-4 win for the Marlins, crushing the previous record (17) for runs scored by a team in the first round of this tournament.

The last game of the first round in the bracket was between two bad teams, the pandemic-year 2020 Orioles and the 1988 White Sox, who were more plagued by my Sox jinx than by viruses.  The Orioles went 25-35 and had a few pandemic-fueled oddities, like the .373 batting average of SS Jose Iglesias and a bevy of dominating relievers, and fortunately for them their best starter was also their most used, so Alex Cobb (2-5, 4.30) would get the start.  Meanwhile, the Sox lost 90 games with few threats in the lineup other than Carlton Fisk, although the rotation was okay with veteran Jerry Reuss (13-9, 3.44) getting the first round start.  In the top of the 1st, Anthony Santander goes deep with a 2-run shot that knocks a few bricks off decaying old Comiskey Park, and after a walk Reuss is injured and knocked out of the game, with Shawn Hillegas coming in to end a bad inning.  The Sox do respond in the bottom of the 1st when Harold Baines doubles and scores on a Fisk single that cuts the deficit to 2-1, but in the 4th the O’s begin the inning with a double and a triple off Hillegas’s card, and then Rio Ruiz hits a 2-run moonshot to make it 5-1 Baltimore.  The Sox respond again in the bottom of the inning with a leadoff homer from Daryl Boston and another run scores on a grounder by Ozzie Guillen, and it’s back to a two run game.  When Baines doubles to lead off the 8th, the Orioles decide to make use of their strong bullpen and Dillon Tate comes in to retire three straight, with all rolls on his card.   By the top of the 9th, Sox closer Bobby Thigpen is burnt for the regional so Jeff Bittiger comes in to yield an RBI single to Ryan Mountcastle to give the O’s additional insurance, but Tate doesn’t need any as he closes out the 6-3 win that sends a second Baltimore team to the semifinals and another Sox team back to the storage drawers.

The survivors

This resembled a traditional elimination tournament semifinal with the #2 seeded 1999 Orioles and the #3 seeded 1997 Cardinals matched up.  Although the O’s were the higher rated team, they had lost their top HR hitter Albert Belle to injury, and the remainder of their rotation looked like victims of the steroid era, with Juan Guzman (5-9, 4.18) hoping to keep the ball in the park.  Meanwhile, the Cards were at full strength and would be pitching their second Benes brother in a row, Alan (9-9, 2.89) as part of a strong rotation.  In the 3rd, the bat of big Mark McGwire comes alive for a long two-run homer and a Cardinals lead, but from there the starters look strong.  However, in the top of the 8th two walks and a squib single load the bases for Cards #9 hitter C Mike Difelice, but Guzman walks him also to drive in a run, and then Delino Deshields, who is in the starting lineup for both teams, triples to break the game open.  Meanwhile, Benes outshines the fine first round performance of his older brother, and completes the 4-hit shutout to send the Cards to the finals with the 6-0 win.  

The world champion 2003 Marlins scored a tournament-record 23 runs in their first round win, and they didn’t think they would need that many to handle the #7 seeded 2020 Orioles, who because of pandemic-year constraints would have to start John Means (2-4, 4.53) who was blessed with two solid and one split HR result on his card.  Meanwhile, the Marlins would have Rookie of the Year Dontrelle Willis (14-6, 3.30) going for them to add to the imbalance.  However, the underdog Orioles threaten in the bottom of the 1st when Rio Ruiz smacks a two-out double and 1-12+2 Jose Iglesias heads for home, but the split die comes up 20 and the inning is over.  Turnabout is fair play, so in the 2nd the Marlins get hit when 1-15 Juan Encarnacion heads for home on a Pudge Rodriguez double but is nailed with the 16 split; Pudge himself does make it home when Marlins 1B-4 Pat Valaika boots a Miguel Cabrera grounder.  When Jeff Conine doubles on a missed HR split, the Marlins are afraid to tempt the split die with the 1-13 Cabrera with only one out, but Means strands the two runners in scoring position to limit the damage to the one unearned run.  In the 3rd, Derrek Lee converts a HR 1-14 split for a 2-run shot, and then Encarnacion goes back to back by finding one of Means’ solid HR results to make it 4-0 Florida.  In the 6th, the O’s immediate go to their killer pen as soon as they are able, with Tanner Scott’s 1.31 ERA taking over, and he holds the Marlins offense at bay, while in the 6th Hanser Alberto converts a HR split on Willis for a solo shot to get the O’s on the board.  And although the Baltimore bullpen allows just one hit and no runs over the last four innings, the Marlins’ starter is what you talkin’ bout Willis as he finishes out the 4-1 win while holding the O’s to seven hits.  

The regional final was also the Zoom game of the week as I led the top seeded 2003 Marlins, who had scored 27 runs in their first two rounds, again TT and the #3 seed 1997 Cardinals, who had allowed only one run in their two games.  These two good clubs both had decent number three starters ready to go, Matt Morris (12-9, 3.19) for the Cards and Josh Beckett (9-8, 3.04) for the Marlins, but it quickly doesn’t look like a pitching duel; the second batter of the game homers in the form of the Cards’ Ray Lankford, and then Juan Encarnacion singles in a run in the bottom of the 1st to make it 1-1.  The Cards unleash a barrage of hits in the top of the 2nd and load the bases for Lankford with two out, and he rips his first of three doubles to clear the bases and when the dust settles it’s 5-1 St. Louis.  But this Marlins team has proven itself capable of scoring, and Miguel Cabrera drives in a run in the 3rd to narrow the gap to 5-2; Royce Clayton knocks one in for the 5th but Encarnacion matches that in the bottom of the inning and after five it’s 6-3.  By now the Marlins have tired of Beckett and closer Ugueth Urbina is summoned, and he yields a 2-run homer to Mark McGwire in the 6th, but Mike Lowell answers again with a three-run shot of his own in the bottom of the inning and the Cards’ lead is cut to 8-6.  But St. Louis continues to rough up Urbina, getting some RBI from John Mabry and Mike Difelice in addition to another 2-run shot from Big Mac, and although Marlins PH Ramon Castro knocks a solo homer in the bottom of the 9th, it’s not enough as Morris scatters 14 hits to record the complete game 12-8 victory and the Cards record their 14th regional win, making them one of the most successful franchises in this tournament.

Interesting card of Regional #230:  Those of you paying close attention may have noticed that creating homebrew Strat cards (basic only, old-school style, thank you) is a long-standing hobby of mine, and one of the challenges faced in creating cards is getting all results to fit into the three columns.  You see, split results and the LOMAX outcome take up four lines each, groundballs, X-chart results each take up two, and injury results add another line; you put enough of those into one column and they just won’t fit.   So, for some players it resembles a game of Tetris trying to get things to come out cleanly, but I have to say that 1997 Mark McGwire does not suffer from that problem.  I think he has more white space on the bottom of his three columns than any Basic card I’ve seen, and by this point in the tournament I’m pretty close to having seen them all.   Big Mac pretty much has the minimum; there is the obligatory LOMAX and injury, and he has to have two grounders to fit his ++ results in somewhere, but other than that, it’s pretty straightforward.  It’s either going to be a walk, a strikeout, or a solid homer, no need to burn up your ink supply on this guy.  Mac was picked up later in this season by the Cards, and as you can see he brought his nutritional supplements with him from Oakland, hitting homers at a torrid pace that he obviously continued into the next season to break Maris’s record.  But this pickup worked nicely for the Cards in this regional, as Mac hit three two-run homers in the three games to help St. Louis capture their 14th regional win in this tournament.