SUPER-REGIONAL N:  This was the first group of 64 teams that didn’t include a single pennant winner, but the eight participants in this super-regional featured a number of squads that were near misses.  These included two Yankee teams from different dynasties that had considerable success, a Phillies team from a similar vintage to one that had overcome numerous injuries to capture the previous super-regional, and serious challengers from the Angels and the Red Sox.  And then there was a Cubs team that really had no business making it this far, doing so just to spite me and that spitefulness was all too likely to persist here.  However, I couldn’t see them handling three more wins against this competition, so I picked the Babe and the Iron Horse to handle the Angels in the final.  Although that Red Sox team was sort of a sentimental favorite for me, I figured that sentiment would spell doom against the Cubs, but I counted on the Angels to end the North Siders’ luck.  The ELO rankings yielded the same prediction as me, meaning that it was unlikely to happen that way! 

Round four action

The 1995 Yankees went 79-65 in a strike shortened year, and made a brief postseason appearance but would meet with considerably more success in the following years.  They had two rookies get a cup of coffee in Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera, and although they and their teammates had considerable real life success, this was one of the few squads from that era that had made any progress whatsoever in this tournament.  They would turn to Andy Pettitte (12-9, 4.17) on the mound, but two 13+ inning games in the regional semis and finals left their bullpen a bit ragged, so they were hoping Pettitte would go deep in the game against the 2006 Dodgers.  The Dodgers had also briefly visited the postseason with an 88-74 record, but their options for a #4 starter were not exciting, with Mark Hendrickson (6-15, 4.21) getting the nod.  However, they were at full strength with a fully rested pen, so they were hoping that their solid offense could stake Hendrickson to an early lead.  He escapes a NY threat in the top of the 1st, leaving the bases loaded, while the Dodgers do provide him with an early lead as Nomar Garciaparra knocks an RBI single in the bottom of the 1st, although LA also leaves the bases loaded to end the inning.  In the 2nd, AA Rafael Furcal singles, steals second, and scores on a 2-out Andre Ethier single that makes it 2-0 Dodgers, and then Nomar leads off the 3rd with a blast into the ravine as Pettitte can’t seem to keep LA off the scoreboard.  However, an error by SS-2 Furcal in the top of the 4th and Hendrickson seems to lose his composure, as Randy Velarde singles in a run, Tony Fernandez misses Hendrickson’s HR split but drives in another with the resulting double, and Wade Boggs singles in Fernandez to quickly tie the game.  Pettitte responds with a 1-2-3 inning and it’s game on, tied 3-3 entering the 5th.  Hendrickson holds for the 5th, but when he walks the leadoff batter in the 6th the Dodgers aren’t messing around and bring in closer Takashi Saito, who strikes out the side, punctuated by two walks that loaded the bases but resulted in nothing for the Yanks.  New York loses DH Ruben Sierra for three games with an injury in the 7th, and when Kenny Lofton leads off the bottom of the inning with a single and steals 2nd for LA’s 4th stolen base of the game,  it’s the Yankees turn to summon their closer, John Wetteland.  But Ethier drives a single under the glove of 2B-3 Randy Velarde and Lofton scores to the LA back on top.  Faced with a tough decision in the 9th, the Dodgers opt to burn their closer for the super-regional and trust Saito to seal the win against the heart of the Yankee lineup, and he sets them down in order to propel the Dodgers on to round five with the 4-3 victory.

The Zoom game of the week looked to be an epic battle of the titans, with Philadelphian Tall Tactician guiding an 85-77 2006 Phillies team that was quite similar to the one he had led to crown of the previous super-regional; this version boasted NL MVP Ryan Howard, who had smacked a Ruthian 58 homers.  In the other corner, StratFan Rick made a return appearance as guest manager after a long layoff in this tournament, unable to resist the allure of helming the 86-68 1930 Yankees, featuring an even more Ruthan Babe Ruth leading the league in homers with 49, and representing the last surviving team from the Ruth/Gehrig era of the Bombers. With both teams reaching the bottom end of their rotation, they both had options, but unfortunately all of those options were bad.  For the Yankees, Hank Johnson (14-11, 4.67) would get the starting assignment against the truly terrible Ryan Madson (11-9, 5.69), and although both teams had lost a regular to injury that carried over to this game, these powerful lineups suggested that a pitching duel was unlikely.  That becomes obvious in the top of the 1st as Gehrig rips an RBI single, helping to set up a Ben Chapman double that scores Lou, but the Babe is gunned down trying to score and then a DP ball ends the rally leaving the Yanks with a 2-0 lead that should have been more.  They get more in the 3rd as TT, issues a second intentional walk of the game to Bill Dickey, offending Tony Lazzeri who responds with an RBI single, and Earl Combs adds a solo homer in the 4th for a 4-0 Yankee lead.  Madson’s first pitch of the 5th to Ruth travels about 550 feet and the only good news for Philly phans is that Madson can now be pulled, but reliever Geoff Geary fares no better, yielding another RBI single to Lazzeri in the top of the 6th.  Finally, in the bottom of the 6th, the power of the Philly lineup begins to show, with back to back solo homers from Jimmy Rollings and Carlos Ruiz narrowing the gap to 6-2 after six innings.  With the possibility of a game emerging, TT wants nothing to do with Gehrig and Ruth leading off the 7th, so he intentionally walks both of them, but Chapman makes him pay with a 2-run double and although David Delucci knocks in a run in the bottom of the inning, the Yanks hold a solid 8-3 lead heading into the 9th.  Having now abandoned the intentional walk, TT directs closer Tom Gordon to pitch to Dickey, and he enjoys the opportunity to swing the bat with a solo homer to extend the lead.  In the bottom of the 9th, Johnson is still looking capable, and he gets two quick outs but Howard finally wakes up with a long home run, but it’s too little too late as the Bombers waltz to a 9-4 win and a trip to round five.

The 2004 Angels were a 92-70 team that won the AL West, but they had still needed to pull off three straight upsets to win a very strong Regional #109.  Thus battle-hardened, they would send out John Lackey (14-13, 4.67) supported by a deep bullpen against the 1960 Indians, a 76-78 team that would still be without injured 3B Bubba Phillips for the duration of the super-regional.   The Indians would pitch Barry Latman (7-7, 4.04) against a powerful Angel lineup that included MVP Vladimir Guerrero, and Vlad walks and races home in the top of the 1st on a two-out Jose Guillen single, although Troy Glaus is nailed at the plate trying the same thing on a Garret Anderson hit to end the inning.  The Indians retaliate immediately with a 2-run Woodie Held home run in the bottom of the 1st to take the lead; in the 2nd, they get an RBI double from injury replacement Marty Keough, a run-scoring single by Ken Aspromonte, and then Held adds another RBI double to chase Lackey before he can complete two innings.  The desperate Angels summon nearly unhittable closer Francisco Rodriguez and he gets the final out but the Indians lead is 5-1 after two.  Back to back doubles by John Romano and Tito Francona lead off the bottom of the 5th to extend the Indians lead, and Jimmy Piersall singles home Francona while Harvey Kuenn adds another RBI single to make it 8-1 Indians after five.  The Angels load the bases in the 6th but Piersall makes a highlight reel catch to end the threat, while Held picks up a single in the bottom of the inning to leave him one triple away from a cycle.  3B-4 Kuenn, having to cover third with Phillips hurt, drops a grounder that sets up a run-scoring fielder’s choice from Darin Erstad, but Angels reliever Brendan Donnelly loses all control in the 8th, walking three to set up two more run for the relentless Cleveland offense-including a Held single that fails to complete the cycle, since neither he nor Donnelly have a triple result on their cards.  Still, the Indians cruise to the 10-2 win and look forward to revisiting the top of their rotation for round five.  

The 1996 Red Sox were a sentimental favorite as I’d taken my oldest son to see this team at Fenway a number of times when I was on sabbatical in Boston, and it was a good team that won 85 games and it had one of the most legendary cards in Strat history, that of nameless Rudy Pemberton, available come the 6th inning.  However, the only option for a #4 starter was Tom Gordon (12-9, 5.59) who had the dubious distinction of leading the AL in earned runs allowed.  The 1959 Cubs had won Regional #112 despite a mediocre 74-80 record and a one-dimensional offense consisting of MVP Ernie Banks; Art Ceccarelli (5-5, 4.76) had a decent WHIP but had some issues with the long ball, although bad Cubs teams seem to play over their head in this project out of spite for this Sox fan.  Jeff Frye leads off the top of the 1st with a double and he scores on a Mo Vaughn sac fly to spot the Red Sox to a 1-0 lead.  However, 3B Tim Naering gets injured in the 2nd, and in the bottom of the inning Sammy Taylor rips an RBI single under the glove of Naehring’s replacement, young Nomar Garciaparra, and the game is tied.  It’s then Mo Vaughn’s turn to get injured in the 4th, this time for four games knocking him out of the super-regional and perhaps the tournament, and my dislike of these Cubs elevates even further.  Sammy Taylor then swats a solo shot in the bottom of the inning to give the Cubs a lead that they probably would not relinquish, a prediction that seems infallible when Irv Noren adds a three-run homer later in the inning that sends Gordon to the showers in a flash.  Rich Garces does no better, yielding RBI singles to George Altman and Al Dark and then a 2-run double to Lee Walls, and Garces is pulled after ⅓ of an inning.  Stan Belinda finally gets the final out, but the Cubs now lead 9-1 and Boston’s main excitement is waiting for someone else to get injured.  An RBI single by Frye in the 7th narrows the gap slightly, and in the 8th it’s Ceccarelli’s turn to get hurt, knocked out of the game to be relieved by Moe Drabowsky, who dispatches the Red Sox and the Cubs continue their upset ways, cruising to a 9-2 victory in which Banks was held hitless.  

The survivors:  round five

After watching StratFan lead the 1930 Yankees to a rout in round four, I dreaded playing them solo against the 2006 Dodgers because I had already driven every other Babe-led Bombers team into the ground in this tournament, and I was fairly certain I would jinx them here.  Although their starting CF Harry Rice was still out with injury, ace Red Ruffing (15-8, 4.38) had recovered from one that had knocked him out of his first round start, and he was ready to go here against Derek Lowe (16-8,, 3.63).  It doesn’t take long for the jinx to manifest as the second batter of the game, Andre Ethier, swats a solo homer to put the Dodgers up, while the Yanks roll three straight X-outs in the bottom of the inning and fail to respond.  The Dodgers then draw two straight walks to begin the 2nd and Wilson Betemit clears the bases with a solid homer and it looks like a rout.  This is further confirmed when Ethier leads off the 3rd with a triple, and Olmedo Saenz follows with another long home run and it’s 6-0 LA and Ruffing is hearing the Bronx cheers.  Saenz hits another 2-run homer in the 5th for good measure, and 1930 not being a good year for relief pitching, the Yanks just decide to let Ruffing go until he drops.  The Dodgers load the bases in the 6th, and after Russell Martin drives in one on a sac fly, a walk sets things up for Nomar Garciaparra–but he misses the HR 1-8 with a 9 split, still clearing the bases with a double and the Dodgers lead hits double digits.  Ethier doubles in the 8th, putting him a just a single away from a cycle, and although they try the Dodger fall just short of garnering enough baserunners to bring him up again.  Regardless, Lowe finishes up a 7-hit shutout against a collection of Hall of Famers and the Dodgers eliminate Babe and Lou from the tournament with the 12-0 blowout.

After watching my jinx play out in characteristic form in the previous game, it was time for the reverse jinx to manifest on behalf of the 1959 Cubs, as these north side teams typically overperform just to bedevil this south sider.  The probable victims were a near-contemporary 1960 Indians, with both of these sub-.500 teams playing over their heads in reaching round five of this tournament.  Both teams were sending out their top starters, Jim Perry (18-10, 3.62) for Cleveland and Glen Hobbie (16-13, 3.69) for the Cubs, and both pens were in good shape although 3B Bubba Phillips remained on the DL for the Indians.  Cleveland gets off to a good start in the top of the 1st as Tito Francona misses a HR split but still drives in two with a 2-out double, and Harvey Kuenn adds a sac fly in the 2nd to make it 3-0 Indians.  However, the Cubs show their persistence as a two base error by RF-3 Kuenn leads to a big inning with an RBI single from Al Dark and two run-scoring fielder’s choices tying the game after two.  Both pitchers then settle down, but in the 7th Mike de la Hoz gets the first Indians hit in five innings in the form of a solo homer; however, Ernie Banks matches that in the bottom of the inning and Perry is pulled for promising young reliever Johnny Klippstein, who ends the inning without further mishap but the score is again tied after 7 innings.  A couple of Cleveland hits put runners at the corners in the 8th, so the Cubs gamble on the strikeout pitch of reliever Bill Henry, but Francona greets him with a three-run homer onto Waveland Avenue and the Indians regain the lead.  In the 9th, Cleveland hopes to preserve Klippstein for a possible super-regional final and veteran Don Newcombe comes in and assures that they will make the trip, wrapping up the 7-4 victory and earning a date with a modern Dodgers team in the final.  

Super-regional finals

Although I had somehow rolled the 1960 Indians into the super-regional final, I thought it was time to turn over the reins to Cleveland partisan ColavitoFan (even though these Indians had just traded Colavito away) for the Zoom game of the week.  They faced the 2006 Dodgers, manned by brother Chuck who had no dog in this fight, although he did have an aging Greg Maddux (15-14, 4.20) on the mound to go against Cleveland swingman Bobby Locke (3-5, 3.37).  Both of these pitchers started off strong against offenses that had put up big run totals in the previous five rounds, but in the top of the 4th LA’s Jeff Kent managed to convert a HR split for a solo shot and the Dodgers take the lead.   Maddux is not dominating, but he’s crafty and although he’s allowing hits, the Dodgers use the double play ball to keep Maddux out of trouble, including one DP on an attempted sacrifice bunt that drives several Indians fans out of the park vowing to set the Cuyahoga River on fire.  With the game riding on every pitch, the Indians summon round five victor Johnny Klippstein to see if he can pull the same magic, and he provides his two hitless innings to keep the Dodgers at bay.  With dominating LA closer Takashi Saito burnt for this game, Chuck wants to stick with his Hall of Fame starter but the hits keep mounting, and so he opts for Jonathan Broxton to try to close out the game.  He does so, with any threat of a Cleveland rally wiped out by yet another DP in the bottom of the 9th, and the Dodgers earn their spot in the final group of 32 winning the 1-0 nailbiter–the second straight shutout recorded by a pitching staff that was really below typical Dodger standards. 

Interesting card of Super-Regional N:   Well, this one wasn’t featured in their regional writeup, but I felt obligated to present the lovely die-cut, old-school patterned card of the Bambino here. Unfortunately I probably won’t get another such opportunity; the loss of the 1930 Yanks in round five here eliminated the last version of the Babe from the tournament, unless the game company defies my expectations and finally releases another season from the pre-war era.  We can only hope.  In the meantime, at least we have 1930, one of my favorite Strat sets of all time.  The 1930 season is not necessarily regarded as one of the Babe’s best, and he finished a distant 10th in the voting for MVP, but he led the league in homers, walks, OBP, SLG%, OPS, and WAR, and at the end of June he was ahead of his 60-homer pace of 1927, but injuries slowed him down and he finished with 49.  His 1930 Yankees were an offensive juggernaut but they finished a relatively distant third to the Philadelphia A’s dynasty of those years, with the Yanks not having pitching to match that of Lefty Grove and company.  In fact, even the Yankees’ ace, Red Ruffing, came up short in this tournament, getting mauled by the eventual super-regional champs.  In the meantime, it’s sadly back to the storage drawers for the Babe and his teammates, but if someone needs an outfielder for their pickup team, this card should do the trick.

SUPER-REGIONAL M:   Of the five pennant winners that began the tournament in this group of 64, only one had managed to put together three wins in a row to reach this level.  Even so, this batch looked like a group of very competitive teams, although there was a Reds team that didn’t really seem to belong here.  There would be old school greats like the Babe and Willie Mays rubbing shoulders with more modern stars like Jimmy Rollins and Kris Bryant.  I thought the upper half of this division was extremely tough, and although I was pulling for the older squads, I suspected that the Cubs from the season following their historic championship would make the finals just to spite me; I predicted that they would get their comeuppance from a Phillies team from an era that had been uncannily successful in this tournament.  The ELO ratings didn’t account for the tendency for the Cubs to torment me, and predicted Babe’s Yankees would top the Phils to move on to the final 32.

Round four action

Two strong teams from very different eras meet as the 92-60 1934 Yankees of Ruth and Gehrig face off against the 92-70 2017 Cubs, a year after they had broken the curse of the billy goat.  The Yankees had serious injury problems, with their top two 2B both out and a rotation thrown into chaos by a 10-game DL trip for Red Ruffing, so their defense would be dismal behind an already hittable Jimmie DeShong (6-7, 4.11).  On the other hand, the Cubs would be at full strength with C Wilson Contreras returning from injury and a deep and rested bullpen available to support an already capable Jake Arrieta (14-10, 3.53) as the #4 starter.  In the 3rd, Earle Combs doubles past CF-3 Jon Jay to drive in a run and Gehrig adds another with a sac fly, but the Yanks leave the bases loaded and fail to improve upon the 2-0 lead.  However, the Cubs get a setback when LF Ian Happ hits into a DP to end the bottom of the inning, and gets injured for 8 games in the process, meaning he’s gone for the tournament.  Of course, the dice gods can’t permit the Cubs to be disadvantaged, so immediately in the 5th Ruth gets hurt, he’s out for 6 games, and it’s farewell to the Sultan of Swat most likely for the remainder of the project, although George Selkirk takes out some of the sting with an RBI single for a 3-0 lead.  The inevitable Cubs comeback begins in the 6th with a 2-run double by Contreras, and when Ben Chapman leads off the 7th with a single, the North Siders yank Arrieta and the largely unhittable Carl Edwards Jr. comes in, but he issues a walk and then Bill Dickey drives an RBI single to provide an insurance run.   Edwards then holds the Yanks, and the Cubs get the tying runs aboard in the bottom of the 9th with two out, courtesy of a walk and a Jay single, and then a Javier Baez base hit scores one and Jay is at second with imposing Kris Bryant at the plate.  And yes, predictably he singles, 1-14+2 Jay races home to tie the game and Baez takes third to put the game winner 90 feet away for injury replacement Albert Almora.  And yes, he rolls the 4th straight single with 2 outs and the Cubs walk it off scoring three runs with two out in the bottom of the 9th for a 5-4 win, proving that the dice just love to have the Cubs torture me while any decent White Sox teams were eliminated in the first round.

The Zoom game of the week features two strong squads, with Toronto’s own Eaglesfly at the helm of the 89-win, AL East winning 1989 Blue Jays, with me rolling the dice on his “behalf”, while the Friday Night Strat College of Coaches would guide the 90-win 1964 Giants and brother Chuck would provide his dice-rolling skills on their behalf.   The Jays send out Mike Flanagan (8-10, 3.93) , while after some debate the College settles on Ron Herbel (9-9, 3.07) as their #4 starter.  And, it appears that the College chose unwisely, as Herbel fails to record a single out, with five straight hits punctuated by an intentional walk to load the bases for Junior Felix, who looks more senior in swatting a grand slam and Herbel exits after allowing 6 runs for an infinite ERA.  The College then opts for one of the other starter alternatives, Bob Bolin, and it looks like they should have gone with him to start with as he retires the side without further damage.   Tom Haller drives in a run in the bottom of the 1st and the long comeback trail begins, and while Bolin holds off the Jays Haller nails a three-run homer in his next at-bat, and Orlando Cepeda singles in a run in the 4th and suddenly we’re looking at a one-run game and Eaglesfly yanks an ineffective Flanagan as he’s confident in the Jays strong pen, with Duane Ward coming in to end any further threat.  The Giants move to veteran Billy Pierce in the 6th and he continues to take advantage of my terrible dicework, but Ward holds the fort until a single in the bottom of the 8th is a cue to move to dominating Toronto closer Tom Henke.  And….that doesn’t go well, as Cepeda doubles in the tying run to bring up NL home run leader Willie Mays; Chuck rolls right in the midst of a fat group of homer results and it’s a 2-run shot for the Giants first lead of the game.  That’s it for Henke, but the horse has left the barn and Jim Duffalo sets down the Jays in the 9th as the Giants complete a remarkable comeback for an 8-6 win, and a return to the top of the rotation for round five.

The 2008 Phillies were the only pennant winner still surviving in this super-regional, as they won 92 games and the World Series over the Rays.  However, they had been hit by the injury bug in winning Regional #101, losing star 2B Chase Utley for the entire duration of this super-regional and in the regional final an early injury to SP Brett Myers had taxed the bullpen, meaning that a hittable Joe Blanton (9-12, 4.69) needed to put in some useful innings.  Still, they had to be considered as favorites over the 1941 Pirates, but these Pirates had outscored their opposition 21-3 in their regional, and those three complete game wins meant that they could use their best reliever, Dutch Dietz (7-2, 2.34) in his spot starter role here.  But in the top of the 1st Dutch watches his LF-4 Maurice Robays turn a Shane Victorino liner into a double, and then Jayson Werth smacks a hard single to bring the runner home.  A rattled Dietz then grooves one to Ryan Howard who puts it over the Forbes wall for a rapid 3-0 Philly lead.  However, the injury bug hits the Phils again as Werth is lost until the super-regional final, and when LF-4 Pat Burrell misplays an Elbie Fletcher single to allow a run to score in the bottom of the inning, it feels like the momentum is shifting.  Although Dietz holds the Phils hitless for 4 straight innings, Jimmy Rollins leads off the 6th with a walk, steals 2nd against the strong arm of C-1 Al Lopez, and then scores on a Victorino to add to the Phils lead.  Lopez then throws AA Victorino out trying to steal to end the threat, and when the Pirates begin the bottom of the inning with a walk and a single, the Phils opt to try the deeper recesses of their bullpen and try JC Romero, and despite a walk that loads the bases Romero strands all runners to sustain the 4-1 lead entering the 7th.  Victorino then blows the game open with a 3-run homer in the top of the 7th, although yet another injury, this one to DH Greg Dobbs, hits the beleaguered Phils in the 8th.  Armed with a six run lead, the Phils send out mop-up reliever Tom Gordon to begin the bottom of the 8th, and he is helped when Pedro Feliz leads off the 9th with an insurance homer.  From there, Gordon closes out the 8-1 win without incident and the Phils advance to round five, but with a third of their starting lineup injured.  

Two contemporary teams meet in this round four game, although pretty different in their rankings.  The 2017 Cardinals were a decent 83-79 team that underperformed their Pythagorean prediction, and they had knocked off two stronger teams in Regional #103 on their way here.  The good news for the Cards was that DH Matt Carpenter was back from an injury suffered in the regional semifinals; the bad news was that uninspiring #4 starter Mike Leake (7-12, 4.21) did not have their best relief pitcher available after a crucial stint in the regional final.  Still, they should be favored over the 95-loss 2018 Reds, who managed to win their regional as the #8 seed, but in the process had lost their starting SS and 3B to injury for the remainder of the tournament.  Also, befitting a 95-loss team, their #4 starter options were gruesome, with Anthony DeSclafani (7-8, 4.98) hoping to make it five innings to turn things over to a fully rested bullpen.  This one had the makings of a high-scoring affair, and that seems confirmed when the first hitter of the game, Kolten Wong, hits a solid HR result on DeSclafani, and three hits later Jose Martinez drives in a run to make it 2-0.   Tommy Pham finds and converts DeSclafani’s split HR result to lead off the 3rd, but the Reds starter manages to get through five innings without further damage and they move to David Hernandez in the 6th to try to keep within reach.  However, in the 7th Dexter Fowler drops a 2-run single in front of LF-4 Jesse Winker to add to the Cards lead, and the Reds don’t get on the board until Scott Schebler leads off the bottom of the 9th with a long homer.  Joey Votto then misses a HR split, but he scores anyway when Dilson Herrera follows with a tape measure shot and suddenly it’s a 2-run game with nobody out, and the Cards find that their lead is Leake-ing away.  They bring in Samuel Tuivailala to try to get the save, and he slams the door on the Reds retiring three in a row to preserve a 5-3 win for the Cards that didn’t come without a scare.  

The survivors:  round five

This round five matchup features two squads that had posted dramatic come-from-behind wins in round four against very strong opponents, and it was back to the top of the rotation for both teams.  That meant that the 1964 Giants would have Hall of Famer Juan Marichal (21-8, 2.48) on the mound against Jose Quintana (11-11, 4.15) of the 2017 Cubs in a freezing but sold out Candlestick Park.  The Giants get off to a rough start when in the 3rd C-3 Tom Haller commits the second error of the game for SF and that runner scores on a Javier Baez single; the Cubs plate another on an Anthony Rizzo sac fly and Chicago moves out to a 2-0 lead.  However, the Cubs return the bad fielding favors with an error from 2B-3 Ben Zobrist that scores one in the bottom of the inning, and then 3B-3 Kris Bryant drops another run-scoring grounder in the 4th and the game is tied.  In the 5th, Baez gets only the second hit against Marichal, both by him, and this one is a long solo blast to put the Cubs up once again, but Tom Haller does the same in the 7th and when Willie McCovey doubles on a missed HR 1-14 split that would have been back to backs, Quintana gives way to Wade Davis who hits the hole in Harvey Kuenn’s best column to end the inning, but the game is tied heading into the 8th.  After Davis gets Willie Mays to hit into a double play in the bottom of the 9th, the Cubs bring in Justin Wilson to record the last out and the game heads to extra innings: the second start in a row Marichal has headed into the 10th inning.  As he did in round one, Marichal does his job in inning 10, completing his eligibility with only two hits allowed and nine strikeouts. However, the Giants can’t score in the bottom of the inning and their heavy use of the bullpen in round four now haunts them as Jim Duffalo comes out and holds serve in the 11th.  In the bottom of the inning, offensive replacement Jim Davenport walks with one out and Jesus Alou singles him to third, so Wilson now must face the heart of the Giants order with the winning run 90 feet away.  The infield comes in for Orlando Cepeda, who responds with a gbA to put the runners on 2nd and 3rd, Mays up, two away.  For a team to advance in this project, their stars need to come through in the clutch, and Mays does so, ripping a single for the walk-off 4-3 win that pushes the Giants into the super-regional final.

With injuries to 2B Chase Utley, RF Jayson Werth and DH Greg Dobbs, the 2008 Phillies had to look on the bright side as they returned to the top of their rotation for Cole Hamels (14-10, 3.09) and closer Brad Lidge was fully rested if needed for extended service.  Still, the 2017 Cardinals also had their top starter, Carlos Martinez (12-11, 3.64) on the mound who had tossed a 2-hit shutout in round one, and they were completely healthy behind him.  Martinez strikes out the side in the top of the 1st to the delight of the Busch Stadium faithful, while the Cards look like Lady Luck is on their side as Paul DeJong rips a gbA++ RBI single thanks to the held Tommy Pham, and although the roll is also an injury, the 3 split keeps DeJong in the game.  Jose Martinez then converts a SI* 1-6 for another run, and although Hamels finally ends the frame by turning a DP himself, the Cards lead 2-0 after an inning.  However, replacement DH Matt Stairs ends the Martinez streak of strikeouts at four with a single, and then Pedro Feliz discovers that Martinez sports a juicy 6-5 HR result that he converts to tie the game. Then, in the 3rd it’s Ryan Howard’s turn as he crushes a long 2-run blast to put the Phils ahead, and when Pat Burrell leads off the 6th with a double and scores on a base hit by Stairs the Cards yank Martinez for Tyler Lyons, but he’s not the answer either as Geoff Jenkins adds an RBI single and Lyons loads the bases up for a 2-run single from Shane Victorino as the Phils take an imposing 8-2 lead.  With nothing to lose, the Cards bring in closer Trevor Rosenthal to begin the 7th, but Burrell greets him with a triple and he trots home on a Stairs single to pad the lead further.  Fortune finally smiles on the Phils as Burrell rolls an injury in the 8th, but the 2 split means he’s able to stay in the game, although the Phils feel they should wrap the remainder of their lineup in foam padding to keep them healthy.  Hamels shows some signs of tiring in the 8th, as Pham doubles in a run but Hamels strands three runners to end the inning still in command.  He proves that convincingly by striking out the side in the bottom of the 9th to finish with 11 Ks in the 9-3 win that sends the Phils to the super-regional finals, where they will be rejoined by Werth and Dobbs in their quest to make the final round of 32.  

Super-regional final:  round six

The super-regional final was also the Zoom game of the week, with Philadelphian Tall Tactician assuming the reins of the 2008 Phillies and the 1964 Giants helmed by ColavitoFan, who had led the College of Coaches that gave the Giants their come from behind victory in round four.  It was 25-year old Gaylord Perry (12-11, 2.75) on the mound for the Giants, while the Phillies went with the other end of the age spectrum in 45-year old Jamie Moyer (16-7, 3.71), and the Philly faithful were happy that Jayson Werth and Greg Dobbs were back from injury, although MVP vote-getter 2B Chase Utley would still be on the DL for a few more games.  Even so, the returning Phils make their presence felt quickly, with Werth and Dobbs taking advantage of an error by lead-gloved 3B-4 Jim Ray Hart to drive in runs that stake their team to a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the 4th.  Meanwhile, Moyer seems to have discovered the fountain of youth, but in the 7th Jesus Alou finds Moyer’s HR split for a solo shot that makes it a one run game.  However, Perry allows a hit and a walk to begin the bottom of the 7th, and ColavitoFan decides Perry has run out of Vaseline, but the Giants bullpen has been severely depleted in their previous come-from behind wins.  So, in a controversial move CF summons a startled Ron Herbel, who had started round four but got nobody out while allowing six runs.  Herbel, given a chance to redeem himself, does anything but:  between more Giant errors and Phils hits, Herbel once again fails to record a single out, allowing both of Perry’s runs to score and adding two more tallies of his own, and he’s yanked for Bob Shaw.  Shaw promptly grooves one to Ryan Howard, who has done nothing before this point other than strike out, and Howard finally makes contact for a 3-run shot to cap a 6-run inning.  Herbel thus amasses the impressive numbers of 0 innings pitched, 10 runs allowed, which would have to be the worse ERA in the tournament if it were possible to calculate it.  Shane Victorino adds an RBI double in the 8th, and Chad Durbin holds off the Giants in relief of Moyer as the Phils take the easy 9-1 win, as four errors help send the Giants back into storage.  The Phils thus move on to the final group of 32, needing just two more wins to get Utley back at 2B in time for the Elite Eight.

Interesting card of Super-Regional M:  This all-time great carried his team to the super-regional final, but ultimately he couldn’t do it alone, and some terrible fielding and pitching by a few of his teammates doomed the Giants after five straight wins.   The 1964 Mays didn’t get featured when they won the regional, so I figured I’d make up for it here, with the added bonus of having an opportunity to compare the ORIGINAL ‘64 Mays with the more modern presentation.  Given the 40-some odd years of tweaking the Strat formulas that likely occurred between the printing of these two cards, the similarity is pretty striking–although as usual I prefer the old card look to the newer one.  As for 1964, despite leading the NL in homers, SLG%, and OPS, Mays only finished 6th in the MVP voting, perhaps because of his teams’ 4th place finish despite being only three games off the pennant.  One interesting footnote to this season is that these Giants were rife with tension resulting from racist comments offered by their manager, Alvin Dark, during the season–comments that obviously did not sit well with a team stacked with black and Latin players.  By all reports, Mays played a critical role in attempting to mediate the relationship between the manager and the players, but it’s hard to imagine that these issues did not impact the team in the midst of a tight pennant run.  Dark was ultimately fired on the last day of the season, and under new manager Herman Franks Mays won his 2nd and final MVP award the following season–although the Giants still fell short in the pennant race, this time by two games. 

SUPER-REGIONAL L:  Although seven pennant winners had begun this round of 64, they went a combined 5-7 and not a single one won their regional.  Nonetheless, the surviving squads here were a solid bunch, with the sole mediocre team, the 1977 Angels, having triumphed in a regional that included three of those seven pennant winners, so they were hardly afraid of being underdogs.  However, I doubted that they would be able to sustain their success against high quality opponents; my guess was that a modern Yankees team would best a 70s Orioles team to go on to the final field of 32.   The ELO rankings predicted the same result in the finals, which would be an interesting matchup of modern power hitting vs. the great rotation of the O’s from those years.  Even so, I was also looking forward to seeing how the two pre-war entries from the Tigers would fare against some tough modern competition. 

Round four action

Two Orioles teams from very different eras must face off in round four to see which one will represent the franchise going forward in the tournament.   The 1975 Orioles won 90 games courtesy of a strong rotation, and Doyle Alexander (8-8, 3.05) was about as good a #4 starter as you could ask for.  The 2013 Orioles won 85 but were built very differently, riding Chris Davis’s 53 homers but Wei-Yin Chen (7-7, 4.07) had an unnerving tendency to allow extra base hits.  That tendency becomes obvious in the bottom of the 1st as Lee May converts Chen’s hefty HR split for a 2-run lead, and in the bottom of the 5th it’s elderly Brooks Robinson taking advantage of that result for another 2-run homer.  However, an error by 1B-4 May sets up a 3-run blast by Davis in the top of the 6th and suddenly it’s a ballgame, so the 2013’s pull Chen and give it to Darren O’Day to keep it close.  The 75’s get men on 2nd and 3rd with two out in the bottom of the 7th but O’Day whiffs Don Baylor to keep the 2013’s hope alive, which turns out to be key when Matt Wieters homers to lead off the 8th.  A following single by Brian Roberts and it’s the 75’s turn to go to the bullpen, and Dyar Miller comes in and retires three straight and the game is tied heading into the 9th.  Miller gets into trouble immediately in the top of the 9th with a walk followed by an Adam Jones double; 1-12 Danny Valencia is held at 3rd and the infield comes in with nobody out.  But Manny Machado lofts a sac fly and the 2013s take the lead for the first time heading into the bottom of the 9th; with nobody else decent in the pen, O’Day will be burnt for the super-regional but it’s his game to save.  Veteran Tommy Davis comes up to pinch hit but he fails to convert a HR 1-2/flyB, and that’s one out.  But PH Al Bumbry draws a walk and another PH Doug Decinces follows with a single–but the 1-17 Bumbry is cut down trying for 3rd with a 19 split roll.  Jim Northrup then grounds one to 2B-2 Roberts, who fields it cleanly and the 2013’s pull off a come-from-behind 5-4 win, despite only recording five hits.

In the Zoom game of the week, Jonathan would lead his hometown 2012 Nationals who had powered through Regional #92 despite a rash of injuries, and although SS Ian Desmond would be returning to the lineup for this round four game, C Kurt Suzuki was still unavailable, meaning that #4 starter Ross Detwiler (10-8, 3.40) would have an unfamiliar batterymate.   Still, they had a manageable opponent in the 88-loss 1977 Angels, who rode two very good starting pitchers through their regional, but Ken Brett (7-10, 4.25) looked far more generous with the hits.   And Brett shows his generosity quickly, allowing four hits in the bottom of the 2nd to set up a Ryan Zimmerman sac fly and a two-run homer by Danny Espinoza provide a 3-0 Nats lead.  The Angels retaliate in the top of the 3rd when Bobby Bonds walks, steals second, and scores on a Don Baylor single, but Zimmerman launches a solo shot in the 4th to make it 4-1, and as manager of the Angels I am itching to get Brett off the mound as soon as rules permit.  That happens in the 6th, and Mike Barlow does somewhat better although Zimmerman slams his second solo shot of the game in the 8th.  In the meantime, Jonathan calls upon Craig Stammen and Drew Storen to preserve the lead, and they do so–however, not everything is roses in the capital as SS Desmond and 2B Espinoza both go down with 7 game injuries, meaning that the Nats must try to manage the remainder of the tournament without their very strong double play combination.   Still, they get by the Angels, who can put together only six hits as Washington cruises to the 5-1 win and advance, battered and bruised, to round five.

After a few recent rough outings managing some Indians regional winners, ColavitoFan was willing to forego a Zoom game with the 2000 Indians, letting me roll for the 90-game winners who had an all-1 infield; if there are other teams that had this, there aren’t many.   However, he did submit a recommendation to use Steve Woodward (4-10, 5.85) as the #4 starter, preferably as briefly as possible.  The 75-79 1941 Tigers would call upon Schoolboy Rowe (8-6, 4.14) and hope that their all-4 DP combo could stop a few balls from getting through the infield.  The Tigers show their stuff in the bottom of the 1st, leading off with two straight singles that set up a Bruce Campbell sac fly; Pinky Higgins then misses Woodward’s HR split but a run still scores on the resulting double.  After a walk, Birdie Tebbetts doesn’t mess around with splits and finds Woodard’s solid HR result for a 3-run shot, and it’s to the bullpen for Paul Shuey as Woodard lasts two-thirds of an inning.  The Indians start to dig out of the hole with a Manny Ramirez RBI single in the 3rd, and Jim Thome adds a solo shot in the 8th to gain a little more ground.  But although Shuey and Justin Speier hold the Tigers hitless in 7+ innings of relief, the damage is done as Rowe scatters 11 hits and Detroit moves on with the 5-2 win.

Two regional winners from 90+ years apart face off in this round four game, testing the mettle of their #4 option in their rotations.  The 2019 Yankees won 103 games but fell short in the ALCS; they were the top ranked team in this super-regional, having made it through Regional #96 with heavy support from a deep bullpen, but they might need those bullpen arms with a very hittable JA Happ (12-8, 4.91) on the mound.  The 1927 Tigers went 82-71 and didn’t use a single bullpen inning in winning their regional, probably because their bullpen was largely useless, but Ownie Carroll (10-6, 3.98) looked like he might need some help himself.  He gets some in the top of the 1st from .398 hitter Harry Heilmann, who nails a solo homer in the house of the Babe, but the pinstripers respond immediately with an error by 3B-3 Jack Warner setting up a sac fly from Aaron Judge and a 2-run triple by Gleyber Torres for a 3-1 Yankee lead after one.  However, in the 3rd Heilmann adds a sac fly, and then a two-out rally erupts with RBI singles by Jackie Taverner, Heinie Manush, and a 2-run single from Warner give the Tigers a lead and the Yankees an excuse to pull the hapless Happ, with an unhittable Luis Severino coming in for long relief.  But he walks the bases loaded and Johnny Neun singles for another two runs, and when the dust clears the Tigers now lead 8-3.  Judge responds with a solo shot in the bottom of the inning, and you get the sense that this game is a long way from over.  An RBI single from Warner and a run-scoring double by Larry Woodall and the Tigers hit double digits in the 4th inning, but a Yankee run scores on a fielder’s choice in the 5th to narrow the gap to 10-5, although Torres ends the inning by getting injured.  However, in the 6th Carroll walks the first three batters of the inning, then allows a run-scoring single to Mike Tauchman and a fielder's choice from Brett Gardner scores another.  Another walk loads the bases again and a Gio Ushela sac fly makes it now a two-run game.  Seeking to keep the momentum, New York turns it over to Adam Ottavino and his 1.90 ERA to begin the 7th, and he holds off the Tigers while in the 8th an error by Detroit SS-1 Taverner leads to a Gio Urshela sac fly and it’s a one run game entering the 9th.  Ottavino holds, and although Carroll walks PH Cameron Maybin to put the tying run aboard, Carroll gets a DP ball out of DJ Lemahieu and the Tigers hold on for the 10-9 upset, sending the powerful Yankees back to the card catalogs.  

The survivors:  round five

The 2012 Nationals remain alive despite having a third of their starting lineup injured, including both halves of their very good DP combo; the good news was that their ace Gio Gonzalez (21-8, 2.89), who came in third in the Cy Young ballots, would be on the mound.  On the other side of the Beltway, the 2013 Orioles would be sending out Scott Feldman (12-12, 3.86) who was decent but not in the hunt for any pitching awards.  However, it’s Gonzalez who starts off terribly, not recording an out until after RBI doubles from Nick Markakis and Danny Valencia, and even that out comes from 1-12 Chris Davis getting thrown out at home.  JJ Hardy adds an RBI single and the O’s lead 3-0 before the Nats can swing a bat.  Things get worse in the 2nd when injury replacement 2B-2 Steve Lombardozzi drops a Markakis grounder to allow another run, but in the bottom of the inning Adam Laroche converts Feldmans’s HR split to make it 4-1 Baltimore.  The Nats get a run on the fielder’s choice in the 3rd to cut the lead to two, and Gonzalez begins pitching like an ace.   The Nats threaten with two baserunners in the 7th, and Baltimore looks at their pen but their best reliever is burnt and the alternatives aren’t encouraging, so Feldman is left in but he surrenders an RBI single to Tyler Moore and it’s a one-run game entering the 8th.  However, a triple by Matt Wieters gives the Orioles an insurance run in the top of the 9th, which proves fortuitous as Bryce Harper crushes a solo shot in the bottom of the 9th to draw back within one.  Injury replacement Jhonatan Braxton then rips a double to put the tying run in scoring position with one out, and again the O’s look at the pen but opt to stick with Feldman.  He’s bailed out with a fine play by 2B-2 Brian Roberts for the second out, but up comes Tyler Moore, who’s gonna make it on his own with a 6-5 roll, converting the HR split for a walk-off 6-5 win to send the battered Nats to the super-regional finals.  

A distinctly feline aura surrounds the round five matchup between the 1927 Tigers and the 1941 Tigers, with the sole commonality between the two squads being the Mechanical Man, Charlie Gehringer, manning second base.  Both were back to the top of the rotation, with 27’s Earl Whitehill (16-14, 3.36) and 41’s Al Benton (15-6, 2.96) sporting nice cards, so a pitching duel might be in order.  But it doesn’t take long for the 27’s to get on the board, as a 2-run homer by Bob Fothergill in the bottom of the 1st stakes Whitehill to a 2-0 lead.  However, he walks the first three batters of the 4th inning, then allows a Frank Croucher single for one run and then walks the elder Gehringer for another; after recording two outs he then issues his 5th walks of the inning to Pat Mullin to score another, and then Bruce Campbell strokes a 2-run single when he finally get a ball over the plate and the 41’s take a 5-2 lead.  They then put together a 2-out rally in the 8th and get an RBI single from defensive replacement Tuck Stainback, and things look bleak for the 27’s going into the bottom of the 9th down by four and having only one hit since the 1st inning.  However, with two outs they refuse to go down, and score a run on a Jackie Tavener double that was a missed HR split that would have put the game within one.  A walk loads the bases, and PH Marty McManus delivers a single that makes it a two-run game, and the winning run is now at the plate in the form of Lu Blue.  The 41’s don’t have anyone better in the pen than Benton, so they stick with their ace and Blue lofts a fly towards the best fielder on the 41’s, LF-1 Barney McCoskey, and he makes it look easy as the 27’s leave the bases full and the ‘41 Tigers move on by holding on for the 6-4 win.  

Super-regional final:  round six

The tattered remnants of the 2012 Nationals somehow limp into the super-regional finals despite having suffered four injuries for a total of 18 games in their five previous tournament wins.  Although they would still be missing both halves of their DP combo, starting C Kurt Suzuki would be back from the DL, which upgraded their defense but downgraded the offense provided by his replacement; Stephen Strasburg (15-6, 3.16) would be on the mound for the Nats.  They faced a healthy 1941 Tigers team who had somehow managed five straight convincing wins without benefit of any defense or bullpen, but sporting the best nicknames in the bracket.  After his round five walkoff homer, everyone in DC wants to marry Tyler Moore, and he keeps it up with an RBI single under the glove of aged 2B-4 Charlie Gehringer for a Washington lead in the top of the 3rd.  Michael Morse then drives in Moore with a single past 3B-3 Pinky Higgins, and a passed ball by C-2 Birdie Tebbetts allows another run to score as the Tiger nicknames prove better than their gloves.  The Tigers do respond in the bottom of the inning with a 2-out rally to load the bases and a walk to Bruce Campbell scores a run, but they leave the bases jammed and it’s 3-1 Nats after three.  When the Tigers begin the bottom of the 6th with two straight hits, Strasburg is relieved by Craig Stammen, who gets a DP ball out of Higgins but a run does score to cut the Nationals’ lead to one.  The Tigers defense holds in the top of the 7th with two straight successful plays from 4-rated infielders, and in the bottom of the inning Stammen walks the bases loaded with two away, but Rudy York whiffs to end an inning with three men on for the second time in the game.  Drew Storen comes on in the 8th to try to wrap up the game for the Nats, but he promptly commits a 2-base error to put the tying run in scoring position, and Detroit sends out HOF PH Hank Greenberg.  Storen gets him out as Greenberg avoids injury with a 4 split roll, but then Gehringer walks and offensive replacement C Jhonatan Solono drops a popup and the bases are loaded for Rip Radcliff–who pops out and Washington clings to the one-run lead entering the 9th.  Bridges holds in the top of the 9th, so the game rests on Storen’s arm, but singles by York and Tebbetts put the tying run in scoring position and the winning run at 1st, although with no replacements on the bench the Tigers can’t pinch run for the slow York.   That makes it up to Higgins, but it’s on Storen’s card for a lazy fly ball and the injury-riddled Nationals continue their improbable run, with the 3-2 victory sending them to the round of 32.  Note that if they can keep it up and make the Final Four–they will get their DP combo back!

Interesting card of Super-Regional L:   The 1927 Tigers made it through five rounds of this tournament, and it was in no small part due to the efforts of this Hall of Famer.  It is because of players like Harry Heilmann that I am disappointed that the game company seemingly refuses to print any new pre-WWII seasons, because I think that there are so many greats in that golden era of baseball that fly under the radar of contemporary fans.  Obviously, Strat is banking on a nostalgic desire to play with the players we remember from our youth, with endless reprints or reimaginings of seasons from the 1970s and 80s, but as someone who’s been playing the game since that time, what really captured my imagination even back then were the old-timers, guys like Heilmann who died before I was born.  Strat was how I learned about them, and to this day I can remember the lineup of the 1927 Yankees or 1934 Cardinals better than I can any contemporary teams, even the one that I pull for (the 2024 White Sox?  Give me a break).  But greats like Heilmann fade into obscurity, despite feats like batting .400 and winning batting titles every other season throughout the 1920s.  Come on, Strat, throw us history lovers a bone–how about a new prewar season like 1939, or 1929, or  ‘21 or ‘22, or maybe even a centennial edition of 1925?  

SUPER-REGIONAL K:   This group of 64 began with only two pennant-winners, and neither of them made it to the super-regional stage, leaving an eclectic mix that included the only deadball-era team to win a regional, the Astros squad from immediately before their first (and presumably last) NL pennant, and two different Indians teams from 60 years apart.  One of those Cleveland squads was one immediately prior to the 2013 version that fell one run short of winning the prior super-regional and my hunch was that they would get another shot in a final, this time against those Astros, but I suspected that the Killer Bs on the Astros would sting the Indians with another near-miss.   The ELO ratings indicated that this group had some of the worst squads to win regionals in this tournament, one of which was apparently those 2012 Indians.  In other words, it looked like I had put my money on the wrong Indians team by far, as they predicted those 1951 Indians who were midway between two great Cleveland pennant-winners would best the Astros in the final.

Round four action

The 1968 Reds were a few years away from the machine that they became, going 83-79 but winning Regional #81 with a couple of upsets; George Culver (11-16, 3.23) was decent enough, but closer Clay Carroll had to rest following two straight saves to clinch the regional.  For the 88-win 1997 Dodgers, it would be Tom Candiotti (10-7, 3.60) and his knuckleball getting the start, with their steroid-era power going against a Reds lineup enfeebled by the Year of the Pitcher.  The Dodgers open the bottom of the 1st just like they drew it up:  AA stealer Eric Young singles, steals second on C-2 Johnny Bench, and scores on a Brett Butler single for a quick lead.  However, Bench doubles in the top of the 2nd and scores on a 2-base error by LA LF-2 Roger Cedeno to tie the game, and from there both starting pitchers settle in.  It’s not until the bottom of the 8th when a 2-out rally puts runners on 2nd and 3rd for the Dodgers that the Reds call for submariner Ted Abernathy out of the pen, but he issues a walk to bring up the top of the order in Young.  He brings the depth charges and finds a double on Abernathy’s card, scoring two but 1-12+2 Eric Anthony ends the inning at the plate trying to score a third run.  The game now rests on Candiotti’s knuckles, and he’s tossing a 3-hitter.  However, he walks Tony Perez to begin the 9th, and then a knuckler doesn’t as Bench finds that solid 6-5 homer on Candiotti to tie the game and Darren Dreifort comes in and avoids further damage.  It’s now on Abernathy, but he’s still not fooling anybody, as singles by Piazza and defensive replacement Tripp Cromer put the winning run in scoring position with two away.  Up steps Eric Karros, and he lines a single and 1-9+2 Piazza sets sail for home for the win;  the split is a 6, Piazza is safe, and the Dodgers walk off with a 4-3 win, outhitting Cincy 13 to 5 but committing three errors in the process.

The 92-win 2004 Astros came within Game 7 of the NLCS of winning a pennant, a feat they would accomplish the following season.  Unfortunately, they were ravaged by injuries while winning Regional #84, and they would still be without 1B Jeff Bagwell, SS Adam Everett, and 3B Morgan Ensberg for this round four game.  To make matters worse, their last eligible starter, Tim Redding (5-7, 5.72) was terrible, and supercloser Brad Lidge had to rest after heavy use in the regional final.  So, it was hard to consider them favored over the 1996 Mets, even though the Mets lost 91 games; the Mets at least had no injuries, but they had also burned their closer John Franco in the regional final and Bobby Jones (12-8, 4.42) looked like he should have stuck with golf.  The Mets get four singles in the top of the 2nd, two of them on low split die rolls, and turn that into a 2-0 lead, and an RBI in the 3rd for NY’s Jeff Kent, who is in the lineup for both teams, adds to the lead.  The Mets miss an opportunity in the 4th when 1-12 Edgardo Alfonzo is thrown out at the plate, and the Astros sense that they can’t afford the hole to get any deeper, so Andy Pettitte comes in to begin the 6th.  The Mets get to Pettitte in the 8th for a run driven in by a Lance Johnson single, but the Astros finally solve Jones in the bottom of the inning with three straight hits to break the shutout, and Jones is pulled for Dave Mlicki.   But Houston’s not done yet, as Carlos Beltran singles in another run, steals second, and then it’s the Astros version of Jeff Kent who raps a 2-run single and the game is tied 4-4 heading into the 9th.  Pettitte retires the side for his last inning of eligibility, and Mlicki goes out to start the bottom of the 9th.  The first batter is injury replacement Jason Lane, who rolls a 6-5, HR 1-12/flyB on Mlicki; the split is a 1 and Minute Maid Stadium is feeling the juice as the Astros complete a furious comeback to walk off a 5-4 win.

With #1 son Michael in town visiting, it seemed only right to get him involved in the endless tournament, as it may be his responsibility to finish the project if I drop before it’s over.  Of the choices available, he opts for the 2000 Twins, a 93-loss group of misfits who managed three straight upset wins while capturing Regional #86, although I had to inform him that he was stuck with Joe Mays (7-15, 5.56) as his lone remaining eligible starting pitcher.   As the old man, I would be managing the old team, the 1911 Senators who were the last remaining deadball era squad still afloat in the tournament.  The Senators were a 90-loss team themselves, but at least Bob Groom (13-17, 3.82) was a decent starter, even though the Nats’ leading HR hitter, Doc Gessler, managed only four.   My chances at a tightly pitched game were quickly dashed as the Twins start with a hot hand, rapping five hits in the bottom of the 1st with RBI singles for Corey Koskie and Denny Hocking and a sac fly for Jacque Jones providing a quick 3-0 lead.  However, I was willing to bide my time with Mays providing many tempting targets, and an error by Twins 1B-3 Ron Coomer sets up an run-scoring single by Gessler to cut the lead to 3-1.  Then Mays falls apart in the top of the 5th, with multiple walks and a 2-run double by Tilly Walker result in four Washington runs and a 5-3 lead; Michael pulls Mays for Travis Miller who quiets the Senator bats in his two remaining innings of eligibility.   In the meantime, Groom is keeping things tidy, helped when I suggest that Michael pinch hit AJ Pierzynski for Matt Lecroy, which he does and promptly rolls a 3-2, an out that would have been a Lecroy homer.   But Groom gets into some trouble in the bottom of the 8th, putting two runners on with two out for SS Christian Guzman.   This time I keep my managerial suggestions to myself, and Michael decides to pinch hit with Luis Rivas, who promptly delivers a triple on a missed HR split and the game is tied heading into the 9th.  Bob Wells, pitching for the Twins with an alluring solid HR result at 6-5, manages to escape with a few 6-4 outs and things move to the bottom of the 9th.  Groom is let down by his defense as errors from 3B-3 Wid Conroy and C-2 Gabby Street put the winning run in scoring position with one away.  Up to the plate steps David Ortiz, and the Young Papi singles; 1-12 Koskie heads home with the potential winning run and….he’s out!  Groom now needs to retire Hocking to send the game to extra innings, but Hocking laces a base hit and the winning run trots home to walk off with a comeback 6-5 win as the son beats the father, while also ending the last gasp for the deadball era in this tournament. 

With Cleveland’s own ColavitoFan in attendance, it only seemed natural to have the Zoom game of the week involve the round four matchup between the 1951 Indians and the 2012 Indians, with ColavitoFan opting for the 1951 version, who happened to be the favorite in the super-regional.  They certainly deserved to be favored in this game, as they won 93 games in the regular season and had the great rotation of that era, with Bob Lemon (17-14, 3.52) as an enviable #4 starter.  On the other hand, the 2012 team lost 94 games, had suffered injuries to Travis Hafner and Michael Brantley in the regional that continued to keep them out of an unimpressive lineup, and as their manager I was forced to start Josh Tomlin (5-8, 6.36), who might have had the worst ERA I’d seen out of a starting pitcher in any super-regional.  But they had proved their pluck while battling to win Regional #87, and on lead guitar they had Carlos Santana, whose legend continues to grow in this tournament as he has been mentioned in the historical records of this project 25 different times.  Unexpectedly, a pitching duel broke out as the game was a scoreless tie after five innings, with the two teams only mustering a total of 5 hits during those innings.   After Tomlin survives those five strong innings, I drew jeers from the onlookers by pulling him with a shutout going, and closer Chris Perez took over to begin the 6th.   Perez became the pitcher of record in the 7th when none other than Carlos Santana samba pa teed off with a solo homer, and then when Lemon allows back to back doubles in the 8th for another run ColavitoFan goes to his pen for Lou Brissie.  Now with a 2-run lead, I try to preserve Perez and call for Vinnie Pestano, but he get off to a rough start allowing an RBI single to Luke Easter; however, the 51’s leave the tying run stranded at 3rd, and Pestano dispatches the bottom of the order in the bottom of the 9th as the plucky 2012s down the favorites with an unlikely 2-1 win to move on.  

The survivors:  round five

This round five matchup featured two solid teams that each would have the benefit of their #1 starter, the 2004 Astros and Roy Oswalt (20-10, 3.49) against the 1997 Dodgers and Chan Ho Park (14-8, 3.38), and although Roy O. won 20 and finished 3rd in the Cy Young votes that season, he would have to be at the top of his game as the Houston lineup was suffering from devastating injuries to half their lineup, including 1B Jeff Bagwell, SS Adam Everett, 3B Morgan Ensberg and C Brad Ausmus.  Early indications suggested that he was not at his best, as Raul Mondesi and Mike Piazza launch back-to-back tape measure solo shots in the top of the 1st for a quick 2-0 Dodger lead.  In the 5th, Eric Young gets on, steals second, and scores on a Brett Butler single to extend the margin, but in the bottom of the inning the Astros finally get it in drive against Park, as injury replacement Eric Bruntlett crushes a 2-run homer and later Carlos Beltran adds an RBI triple to tie the game, although Lance Berkman strands the go-ahead run at third.  The tie is short-lived as Piazza leads off the 6th with his second homer of the game, and when the Dodgers reel off three straight singles to load the bases Houston has a problem and turns to Brad Lidge to solve it.  Lidge comes through with a big strikeout and prevents further damage, and then Jeff Kent leads off the bottom of the inning with a triple and it’s the Dodgers turn to eye their pen.  They opt to stick with Park and bring the infield in, a strategy that works perfectly as Kent is stranded on three grounders and LA clings to its lead.  In the 8th, Eric Karros homers off Lidge and it seems like the lights may be going out in Houston, and in the 8th Young singles, steals second, and scores on a Mondesi single, and Lidge falls apart and walks the bases full for a Greg Gagne single that scores one although 1-10+2 Todd Zeile is out at the plate to bring the inning to a merciful end.  Park then wraps things up against a slew of injury replacements at the bottom of the lineup and the Dodgers head to the super-regional final with the 7-3 victory.

In a Zoom game characterized by “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”, Cleveland’s own ColavitoFan would manage the 2012 Indians, who had defeated him in round four, while I would lead the 2000 Twins, who had walked off a win against me in that same round.   On paper, these were two fairly bad teams who had both lost 90+ teams their respective seasons, but they had both proved to be remarkably persistent and both were coming back around to their top starter in the rotation, although neither Eric Milton (13-10, 4.86) for the Twins and Justin Masterson (11-15, 4.93) for Cleveland were particularly good pitchers.  As they had in the previous round, the Twins got off to a fast start with Denny Hocking and Torii Hunter driving in runs in the top of the 1st, although it could have been much worse for the Indians as the bases were left loaded.  Matt Lawton’s RBI double in the top of the 4th makes it 3-0 Twins, but Adrubal Cabrera locates Milton’s solid 6-5 homer for a solo shot in the bottom of the inning to keep things within reach, and Milton is informed that his leash can’t get much shorter.  However, in the 7th the Twins provide him with some slack; a leadoff walk by Masterson and he’s pulled for Carlos Perez, who then walks two more to load the bases; then the hits begin and it’s Hunter and Ron Coomer each driving in a pair to push the Minnesota lead to 7-1.  In the 8th Casey Kotchman converts Milton’s 6-6 HR split to regain a little ground, so I move to the pen for Latroy Hawkins, and he’s able to shut down the Indians to preserve the 7-3 Twins win that sends them to the super-regional finals.

Super-regional finals

While the 1997 Dodgers were a decent team that was not a total surprise to see in a super-regional final, the 2000 Twins had come quite a ways for a team that lost 93 games.  As might be expected, the Dodgers appeared to have the advantage in pitching with Ismael Valdez (10-11, 2.65) having much better numbers than the Twins’ Brad Radke (12-16, 4.45) with a fully rested bullpen available for support.   Both pitchers start out strong; the Dodgers manage to load the bases with two out in the top of the 5th with imposing Mike Piazza at the plate, but Radke gets him out to quash the rally.  But in the 6th, PH Darren Lewis leads off with a single, and Eric Young follows with a double and the speedy Lewis races home for the first run; the Twins summon Latroy Hawkins and although he gets two outs quickly, Raul Mondesi crushes a 2-run shot and the Dodgers take a commanding lead, although in the process they lose CF Roger Cedeno to injury for the remainder of the tournament.  LA adds a sac fly from Young in the 8th but they leave the bases loaded once again; in the 8th the third error of the game by the Twins, this one by 2B-3 Denny Hocking, sets up a 2-out 2-run double from Young and Valdes closes out the 9th to wrap up a 4-hit shutout as the Dodgers capture the super-regional with the 6-0 win to earn their spot in the final field of 32.

Interesting card of Super-Regional K:   I had already featured Mike Piazza as the interesting card of Regional #82 and although he probably still deserved recognition here, I try to avoid reruns.  As a result, I decided to go with a player from the last deadball-era team to be eliminated from the tournament, the 1911 Senators:  the immortal Walter Johnson.  Although the Big Train didn’t get to pitch in the super-regional, he did toss a 5-hit shutout in the regionals to help get his mediocre team that far, although to be honest I think they might have short-changed his 1911 card a little, as winning 25 games for a squad that only managed 64 victories might deserve an even more dominating card than this. Perhaps one like his 1913 card, which was printed as part of the original Basic-only Hall of Fame set; that set is one of my favorite Strat products of all time and this seems like a good excuse to show one of the cards.  Johnson was one of the classic examples of the good player on a bad team; during the decade of the 1910s he posted a winning percentage of .650, while other Senators pitchers accounted for a .452 record.  Backed by the Senators’ mediocre batting and fielding, he holds the major-league records for number of 1-0 wins as well as losses; unfortunately, the Senators lost a walk-off game to their modern descendants, the Twins, to fall one game short of giving Johnson his second shot at a start in the tournament.

SUPER-REGIONAL J:  This group of 64 had initially featured 5 pennant winners, but only one of them had won their regional:  the 1960 Yankees, the predecessor to the famed ‘61 M&M boys that had meekly exited in the first round in this tournament.  Not the 1960 version, however, who had blown through Regional #73 outscoring the opposition 17-4 and were substantial ELO favorites here.  However, one of the representatives here, the 1990 Giants, had defeated two of those pennant winners in their regional and certainly weren’t afraid of ELO rankings, which indicated that they were the most likely opposition for the Yanks in the super-regional final.   Judging by those rankings, other major obstacles would include Reds and Angels teams that both won more than 90 games; the rest of the bracket included middling teams that had each pulled off some upsets to get this far.  The Yanks were my sentimental favorite here, as they would add star power to the final field of 32 if they could pull it off, but being my favorite tends to be the kiss of death.  Furthermore, they were on the more challenging side of this bracket and would need those stars to produce if they hoped to advance.

Round 4 action

The 1960 Yankees won 97 games and the American League before losing the Series to Maz’s infamous walk-off homer in Game 7.   However, they had powered through their regional and although there was a little wear on their bullpen left over from the regional final, Bob Turley (9-3, 3.28) was a fine #4 starter as long as he could get the ball over the plate.  However, although the Yanks had the top ranking in the super-regional, their opponent had the second best:  the 1989 Angels who had gone 91-71, although a 2nd inning injury to starter Kirk McCaskill in the regional final had decimated the Angels bullpen, so they were putting their hopes on the arm of Jim Abbott (12-12, 3.92).  A Tony Kubek RBI single and a Roger Maris sac fly stake Turley to a 2-0 lead in the top of the 3rd, and Hector Lopez adds an RBI double in the 4th to extend the margin.  Abbott settles down some, but two walks to begin the 7th and he’s out for Angels closer Bob McClure; Kubek then misses a HR 1-10 for a double that scores one but 1-12 Clete Boyer is out trying to score from first.  In the bottom of the inning, the Angels finally get to Turley, loading the bases with two away, and then Devon White hits a grounder that SS-2 Kubek muffs and California is on the board.  Wally Joyner adds a sac fly in the 8th and the Yankees lead is down to two entering the bottom of the 9th, which makes them quite nervous given their prior experiences with that inning.  But there are no Mazeroskis in the Angels lineup, as Turley sets them down in order to wrap up a 4-hitter and a 4-2 win.  

The 2012 Reds won 97 games, the NL Central, and Regional #76 despite losing HOF 3B Scott Rolen in round one, a lingering injury that would persist through this super-regional if the Reds were able to survive.  For their #4 starter, they had Bronson Arroyo (12-10, 3.74) whose stats looked a lot better than his card, but their bullpen was in decent shape if they were needed.  The 1969 Astros had an even split at 81-81, but went 3-0 in Regional #75 and I liked the looks of the card for starter Don Wilson (16-12, 4.00) better than that of Arroyo.  Regardless, the Reds take a lead when injury replacement Chris Heisey leads off the bottom of the 2nd by converting Wilson’s HR split, and Wilson then issues four straight walks in the 2nd to add to the lead although he strands the bases loaded to prevent further damage.  A two out RBI single by Joey Votto in the 7th gives Arroyo some insurance, and the Astros don’t get on the board until the top of the 9th, when Marty Martinez begins the inning with a triple and Jim Wynn cannons a sac fly to bring him in.  Hoping the rest their pen, the Reds stick with Arroyo but a single by Denis Menke puts the tying run at the plate with one out, and Cincinnati moves to the nearly unhittable Aroldis Chapman to try to get the final two outs.  However, a Curt Blefary single puts the winning run at the plate and the Reds are starting to see how these Astros won a regional.  Chapman whiffs Doug Rader, but Norm Miller delivers a single to score Menke and the tying run is 90 feet away, while the winner is on first.  Up to the plate comes Jay Alou, and the roll is 5-5:  a solid homer on Arroyo, but a strikeout on Chapman and the Reds survive with a 3-2 win despite being held to 5 hits by Wilson.  Key to the victory were three inning-ending DPs initiated by Reds 2B-1 Brandon Phillips

The 2013 Indians won 92 games to make a brief postseason appearance as a wild card; they had only been the #5 seed in a strong Regional #78 but they had prevailed against a couple of very good teams to reach this super-regional, and Corey Kluber (11-5, 3.85) was a decent option for a fourth starter.  The Tribe faced the 1996 A's, who assembled a mediocre 78-84 record in real life but they had mashed their way through Regional #75 with 10 homers in the three games–five of them by an imposing Mark McGwire.   However, what steroids giveth, they also taketh away, and their pitching options bore the scars of the era, with Don Wengert (7-11, 5.58) serving as cannon fodder until the bullpen can come into play.  The A’s immediately load the bases with nobody out in the top of the 1st with a single and two walks, but Kluber somehow gets out of the jam with a whiff and a DP ball.  The Indians also load the bases in the bottom of the inning, but they also come away empty.  However, they break through for a two-out rally in the 3rd, taking advantage of Wengert’s generous card with run-scoring hits including a Mike Aviles double, a 2-run single by Michael Bourn, and another RBI single from Jason Kipnis for a 4-0 lead.  In the 4th, Nick Swisher finds Wengert’s solid HR result for a 2-out 2-run shot and Oakland tries to stop the bleeding with closer Billy Taylor.  It takes an unexpected error by LF-1 Michael Brantley for the A’s to get on the board, and after another 2-base error in the 8th, this one from P-3 Kluber, the A’s get another on a Rafael Bournigal sac fly.  But Kluber finishes out a 3-hitter and allows no earned runs (and no home runs) in a 6-2 win to propel the Indians to round five.  

Two of the three teams that the 85-77 1990 Giants defeated in Regional #80 were pennant winners, although every game was decided by a single run; they were hoping that a shaky Don Robinson (10-7, 4.57) would be able to keep things that close and turn the game over to a deep bullpen.   The 1991 Expos, on the other hand, lost 90 games and although they pulled off some upsets in Regional #79 with some young players who were a few years from greatness, those were against less formidable teams; even so, Oil Can Boyd (6-8, 3.52) could grease the path to victory.  The first blow of the game is struck in the bottom of the 4th when Matt Williams sends one deep into the fog at Candlestick Park for a solo homer, and Will Clark’s double in the 5th scores another although 1-14 Dave Anderson is out at the plate trying to pad the lead further.  A homer by Robby Thompson in the 6th and Boyd goes to rust in the showers as Jeff Fassero is called upon to try to keep the Expos in the game.  Robinson is meanwhile exceeding expectations, but then two doubles off his card in the 7th, the second by Dave Martinez breaking the shutout, and he’s out of the game for Jeff Brantley. Brantley yields an RBI single to Andres Galarraga and it’s now a one-run game.  However, in the bottom of the 8th a 2-out RBI single from Anderson is followed by a 2-run Will Clark triple, so Steve Bedroisan is brought in to finish out the 9th for the Giants.  He’s greeted by Tim Wallach who converts Bedrock’s HR 1-8/flyB split for one run, but 1B-1 Will Clark makes a highlight reel snag to end the threat and the Giants advance with a 6-3 win.  

The survivors:  Round 5

This round five game features two postseason teams each swinging around the rotation back to their number one starters.  For the pennant-winning 1960 Yankees, it would be Hall of Famer Whitey Ford (12-9, 3.08) who had tossed a 2-hit shutout in round one; the 2012 Reds were down a Hall of Famer with Scott Rolen still out with an injury, and they needed Johnny Cueto (19-9, 2.78) to improve upon his rather shaky first round performance because closer Aroldis Chapman only had one inning left in him.  Ford looks rough from the start, escaping some jams but finally yielding a run in the bottom of the 3rd when a Joey Votto double sets up a Jay Bruce sac fly for a 1-0 Reds lead.  Zack Cozart leads off the 4th for the Reds with a home run, although it could have been worse as Brandon Phillips misses Ford’s HR split and gets stranded at second.  The Yanks then lead off the 5th with three straight singles, one from Kubek driving in a run, but Maris and Mantle then combine to kill the rally and NY still trails by one.  Disaster strikes for the Reds in the 7th as Votto is injured for four games, meaning that Cincy is now missing two corner infielders, but Cueto is still hanging in there.  Finally, with two out in the bottom of the 9th and a pinch runner on 1st, I send up Johnny Blanchard to pinch hit for #9 hitter Clete Boyer.  The roll…..3-9, a solid homer on Boyer but a lazy fly on Blanchard and I personally kill the Yankees chances as the battered Reds hold on for the 2-1 win.  However, I refuse to accept full responsibility, as Maris and Mantle do nothing in the game but hit into DPs and it’s up to the stars to come through if you want to advance in this tournament.  

Although the 2013 Indians had the better record in this round five game, the 1990 Giants were higher ranked by the ELO rating, so this looked like a pretty even matchup between two teams sending out their top starters, Justin Masterson (14-10, 3.45) for Cleveland and John Burkett (14-7, 3.49) for San Francisco.  The Indians start off big in the top of the 1st with a 3-run homer from Nick Swisher, one that might have been a grand slam if leadoff hitter Jason Kipnis hadn’t been nailed by Giants’ C-4 Terry Kennedy trying to steal second.  Kennedy then throws out Michael Bourn attempting to steal in the 2nd to kill a rally, but Swisher knocks a 2-run shot for his second homer of the game in the 3rd and the Indians lead is 5-0.  Will Clark responds in the bottom of the frame with a 2-run blast of his own, but the Indians keep dumping lighter fluid on Burkett, who allows three straight hits to begin the 5th and SF moves to Jeff Brantley to try to end the rally.  But Swisher records his 6th RBI with a run-scoring grounder before the inning is over, and although Robby Thompson puts up an RBI single in the 7th for the Giants, Swisher crushes yet another 3-run homer in the 9th and Masterson is sufficient to close out a 10-3 complete game win to send the Cleveland Swishers to the super-regional final. 

Round 6: super-regional finals

The 2013 Indians had pounded their way through the super-regional, outscoring the opposition 16-5 behind the suddenly Ruthian Nick Swisher, and they would try to sustain that momentum with Zach McAllister (9-9, 3.75) on the mound.  The 2012 Reds came limping into the final with two of their best players injured, Scott Rolen and Joey Votto,  but they had Mat Latos (14-4, 3.48), who had tossed a 3-hit complete game in round two and they hoped he could be an equalizer.  McAllister allows four baserunners in the top of the 1st but is fortunate to escape with only one run on a Jay Bruce double, as 1-12 Ryan Ludwick is tossed out trying to score on the play.  The Indians get it back quickly as they lead off the bottom of the 1st with two straight hard singles, and although Ryan Raburn hits into a DP it scores a run to tie the game.  In the second the Reds walk Swisher, who gets singled to third and scores on a Michael Bourn grounder and the Indians take a 2-1 lead after two, but weak-hitting injury replacement Wilson Valdez raps a single past P-4 McAllister to drive in a game-tying run in the 4th.  The Reds load the bases with nobody out in the 5th, but McAllister recovers his control and whiffs one and is bailed out by a key DP turned by 2B-2 Jason Kipnis to sustain the tie.  The Indians lose RF Drew Stubbs (not to be confused with Reds CF Drew Stubbs) to injury and his only replacement is terrible with the glove and the bat, and when McAllister yields a single to begin the 6th the Indians quickly move to the pen for Bryan Shaw and he quickly ends the threat.  Sensing that this is going to be a struggle, the Reds bring in closer Aroldis Chapman in the bottom of the inning after Latos yields a hard 6-7 single for the third time of the game, and he does his job, while Ryan Ludwick puts the Reds ahead with a 2-out solo homer in the 7th.  However, in the bottom of the 8th, Carlos Santana, who has been Supernatural all tournament, continues to require guitarist puns with a clutch 2-run double, and Astrubal Cabrera follows with an RBI double of his own and the Indians have grabbed a two run lead against the previously untouchable Chapman.  The Indians go to Matt Albers to begin the 9th, but he fares no better against Ludwick than Shaw did, as Ludwick crushes another solo shot to make it a one-run game.  After Jay Bruce walks, it’s Chris Heisey’s turn, and he converts a HR 1-5 for a two run shot and a Cincinnati lead; Albers leaves with a 27.00 ERA and Danny Salazar ends the inning but the damage is done.  The Reds now try to preserve the ineffective Chapman and turn the game over to Sean Marshall for the bottom of the 9th; he retires the Indians in order and the battered Reds continue to perform their magic to repeatedly come from behind in the 6-5 win, capturing the super-regional and taking their place among the 32 most persistent Strat teams ever printed.

Interesting card(s) of Super-Regional J:  Two relievers in the group, linked through literature:  "Afterward in the outfield we talked about one-pitch pitchers.  Ryne Duren was a one-pitch pitcher.  His one pitch was a wild warm-up.  Ryne wore glasses that looked like the bottoms of Coke bottles, and he'd be sort of steered out to the mound and he'd peer in at the catcher and let fly his first warm-up pitch over the screen and the intimidation was complete.  All he needed was his fastball and hitters ducking away."   Jim Bouton, Ball Four, p. 67. 

SUPER-REGIONAL I:  There had been 8 pennant winners starting out in this group of 64, but the only one of them to reach the super-regional level were the purveyors of the “shot heard round the world”, the 1951 Giants.  However, there were some other top flight teams in here, including a Tigers team that included many of the members of their great 1984 team (which did not make the super-regional level), a very good Blue Jays squad, and one of the two Phillies teams represented here was strong.  The remaining teams had middling records but had proved unbeatable during the regionals, so it seemed to me that any of them could win it.  The ELO rankings had the Bobby Thomson Giants as slight favorites over the Jays in the finals, although I remembered those Phillies teams of the aughts as extremely tough in this format and I wouldn't be surprised to see them make the next level.

Round 5 action

The 1986 Tigers won 87 games and marched through Regional #65 defeating the formidable 1930 A’s in the regional final; Randy O’Neal (3-7, 4.33) would get the round four start and he was happy to see that Darrell Evans had recovered from an injury suffered during the regional, bolstering a strong lineup.  The 2014 Phillies were a 73-89 team, down to their last option in the rotation, Kyle Kendrick (10-13, 4.61), and CF Ben Revere had still not recovered from an injury in the regional final, so they were decided underdogs although they had many of the same guys who had made magic in the tournament thus far–including another Phils entry in this super-regional.  Alan Trammell quickly discovers Kendrick’s solid 5-9 HR result in the top of the 1st and two batters later Kirk Gibson rolls one on his own card;  Darnell Coles singles and Lance Parrish smacks yet another solid HR, to be fair to Kendrick on the batter’s card, but the Phillies phans have no desire to be fair to Kendrick and are calling for his head.  However, by tournament rules Kendrick has to remain in the game for 5 runs or 5 innings, but he cooperates with the wishes of the fans as after SS-2 Jimmy Rollins drops an Evans grounder, singles from Chet Lemon and Dave Collins produce another run.  That means Kendrick can exit with 2/3rd of an inning pitched, and 35-year old Cliff Lee, with insufficient innings to start, gets a shot at long relief; he strikes out Lou Whitaker for the latter’s second out of the inning and Philadelphia finally gets a chance to bat, down 5-0.  They do nothing, and Lee holds off the Tigers until the 5th, when Evans triples and the Phils summon Ken Giles, but 2B-2 Chase Utley drops out #3 to score Evans and extend the Detroit lead.  However, O’Neal’s no-hitter through 4 innings abruptly ends in the bottom of the 5th with three straight hits, and RBI doubles from Ryan Howard and Domonic Brown quickly cut the margin to 6-3.  A sac fly by Chase Utley in the 7th and it’s now 6-4 and the Tigers go wholesale with defensive upgrades, although they decide to stick with a tiring O’Neal for the time being.  In the 8th, Rollins makes his second error of the game (and the Phils’ 4th) and Gibson follows by crushing his second homer of the game.  At that point the fight seems to go out of the Phils and their fans, and Chet Lemon gloves the final out of the game to send the Tigers on with an 8-4 victory.  

The 1951 Giants were one of the few pennant-winners to survive a regional, perhaps because they demonstrated an ability to survive in live-or-die games in real life.  Their rotation had provided three complete game wins in the regional and Jim Hearn (17-9, 3.62) was a strong option as the #4 starter, while 2B Eddie Stanky was now ready to go after getting hurt in the regional semifinals.  They had defeated a pennant-winning Mets team in the regional final, and now they moved on to face a more humble 82-80 1975 Mets.  However, these Mets had pulled off three straight upsets over good teams, although Hank Webb (7-6, 4.07) would be on a short leash with the Mets hoping to be able to hand the game off to a good bullpen.  In the top of the 1st, young Willie Mays doubles to score one but 1-15 Monte Irvin is nailed at the plate; Mays himself scores on a Bobby Thomson single and the Mets are down 2-0 before they can bat.  Thomson records another RBI on a single past LF-4 Mike Vail, with Mays taking 3rd and then scoring on a Don Mueller fielder’s choice; the Mets don’t get a hit until Del Unser’s single in the 4th but that leads to nothing.  Mueller adds an RBI double in the 5th and that’s the cue for the Mets to clear the Webb for Skip Lockwood and his 1.50 ERA who ends the inning but the Mets now trail by five.  Mays is robbed of another RBI in the 6th when 1-16 Al Dark is cut down trying to score on a double from the Say Hey Kid, but once again it’s Thomson with another shot, a single under the glove of SS-3 Bud Harrelson and Mays scores easily.  However, Hearn abruptly falls apart in the bottom of the inning, with RBI singles from Felix Millan, Ed Kranepool and Rusty Staub suddenly cutting the lead to 6-4, and the Giants realize that the reason they have all those CG wins is that they have no bullpen to speak of.  But in the top of the 7th Al Dark converts a TR 1-4/flyB with two outs and two more Giants runs are plated, so they hope that Hearn can hang on with the additional insurance.  Staub drives in another run in the 8th with a double and the tying run comes to the plate in the form of Dave Kingman, who rips a single that scores two and it’s now a one-run game.  The Giants have to admit that Hearn has become the Hit Man, and Al Corwin is summoned from the pen and he immediately induces a DP ball to send the game to the 9th.   With Lockwood now burnt for the super-regional, the Mets move to Bob Apodaca, but Whitey Lockman finds and converts Bob’s HR 1-5/flyB for a solo shot and the Giants hand Corwin a 2-run lead to hold in the bottom of the 9th.  The persistent Mets get two singles with one out to bring the winning run to the plate, but Corwin puts down Harrelson and Millan and the Giants survive the 9-7 battle to advance.

The 1985 Blue Jays won 99 games and the AL East before going down in seven games in the ALCS, and they had ridden their well-rounded combination of pitching, hitting, and defense to take Regional #70 as the favorites.  The depth of their rotation was in evidence here with Jim Clancy (9-6, 3.78) getting the start.  They faced the 1973 Twins, who were a .500 team with an 81-81 record, but were fortunate to have a solid #4 starter in Bill Hands (7-10, 3.49) although that was about the only Hands the team had, because the dreadful Twins defense was enough to give any pitcher nightmares.  In the bottom of the 1st, George Bell rolls a two-out gbA++ with Tony Fernandez held at first;  Lloyd Moseby then misses a HR split but drives in both runners with the resulting double.  The Twins threaten in the top of the 2nd but 1-15 Larry Hisle learns firsthand about Jesse Barfield’s arm and he’s cut down trying for the extra base to end the threat.  In the bottom of the inning, Rance Mullineks doubles and he dashes home on a two-out single from Tony Fernandez that extends Toronto’s lead to 3-0.  An RBI single from Tony Oliva puts Minnesota on the board in the 3rd, but in the 5th the Jays respond with an RBI single from George Bell and a Moseby sac fly that further extends the Jays lead.  An Ernie Whitt single in the 6th and it’s Hands off, with the Twins bringing in their lone decent reliever in Bill Campbell and he keeps any runs from plating.  Oliva drives in his second run with a 2-out single in the 8th, but he can’t do it by himself and the Jays wrap up a 5-2 win and punch a ticket to round five and the top of their formidable rotation.

The Zoom game of the week had two partisans at the helm of their favorite teams, with TT taking on the 2005 Phillies and ColavitoFan manning (Rick, not Payton) the 1976 Indians.  The Phils won 88 games, but their teams from this era have had remarkable success in this project; however, #4 starter Vincente Padilla (9-12, 4.71) had some frightening results on his card and CF Kenny Lofton was still out with an injury suffered in the regional.  On the other hand, the Indians only managed an 81-78 record, but again Cleveland teams of that vintage had outperformed expectations, with the ‘75 team winning the very first regional of the tournament; spot starter Stan Thomas (4-4, 2.30) had an imposing card and looked to be a great equalizer.  Both managers quickly tired of my terrible dice rolling, and requested that my brother Chuck roll the bones in the hope that the issue was not a heritable trait.  Sure enough, Chuck manages to convert a HR 1-5/flyB split on Thomas’ card and the Phils jump to lead in the 2nd on the resulting Jimmy Rollins solo homer.   However, some sloppy fielding by Rollins in the bottom of the 5th helps load the bases, and Rico Carty draws a walk to tie the game; Chuck’s dice-rolling seems to be cooling off and the game has developed into a pitcher’s duel.  When Padilla gets into a little trouble to begin the 6th, TT decides that dueling with him is asking for trouble, and Aaron Fultz is summoned and he snuffs out the threat.  In the 7th, Pat the Bat Burrell puts the bat on one and sends it deep into the recesses of Cleveland Stadium to put the Phils ahead, and Dave Laroche comes out of the Indians pen; although Laroche ends that threat, injury replacement Jason Michaels raps an RBI single in the 8th for additional insurance.  Billy Wagner then comes in to pitch the final two innings and although he makes things more exciting than he should have, he escapes unscathed and the Phillies move on to round five with a 3-1 victory.

The survivors:  round 5

By the time teams reach round five, those survivors are usually pretty good, and the 1986 Tigers and 1951 Giants were no exception.  These squads were also back to the top of their rotation in a matchup of 20-game winners; the Giants’ Sal Maglie 23-6, 2.93) would attempt to barber the Tigers, while Detroit would have Jack Morris 21-8, 3.27) trying to avoid any Ralph Branca impressions, a valid concern given Morris’s gopher ball tendencies. The Tigers get three baserunners in the top of the 2nd but come away empty-handed when AA Kirk Gibson is tossed out trying to steal on C-1 Wes Westrum.  But NY is less fortunate in the 3rd, as Maglie surrenders an RBI double to John Grubb, but he strands two Tigers in scoring position to keep the Detroit lead at 1-0.  Detroit quickly relinquishes the lead in the bottom of the inning, as a 2-base error by SS-2 Alan Trammell sets up an RBI single from Hank Thompson that ties the game.  In the 4th, Monte Irvin misses Morris’s HR 1-11 split with a 12, but Morris apparently feels bad for Irvin and lets him score by committing a two-out two-base error on a Westrum grounder.  However, the Tigers respond in the top of the 5th when Trammell finds and converts Maglie’s 6-5 HR split for a 2-run blast, and then RF-3 Monte Irvin misplays a Grubb single to put a runner in scoring position, who scores when Lance Parrish raps a single off Maglie’s card to put the Tigers back on top by a 4-2 margin.  Hank Thompson immediately responds by leading off the bottom of the inning by converting Morris’s HR split; that seems to send Morris into a tailspin, as three straight baserunners culminate in a Willie Mays RBI single that ties it, and then Don Mueller finds Morris’s solid HR result this time, good for a 3-run homer and a trip to Branca-ville for Morris as Bill Campbell has to come in to record the final out of the inning.   However, the Tigers aren’t done yet; two straight hits to start the 7th and a Kirk Gibson sac fly cuts the GIants lead to 7-5.  But Mueller also isn’t finished making his statement, leading off the bottom of the 8th by converting Campell’s HR split for his second homer of the game, and Sal the Barber clips the Tigers, and there are no heroics this time from Gibson as he makes the final out of the game.  And so the bracket favorite Giants gain a berth in the super-regional final with a back and forth 8-5 win.  

With two teams representing favorites for some of the regular Friday Night Strat participants, this round five matchup had to be saved up for Friday night Zooming:  the Tall Tactician managing the 2005 Phillies and Brett Myers (13-8, 3.72)  against Eaglesfly and the 1985 Blue Jays and perennial trivia answer Dave Stieb (14-13, 2.48).  In the pregame conference at home plate, TT wins the coin flip and selects my brother Chuck to roll the dice for the Phils, while the Jays will be stuck with my terrible rolling, and it’s easy to spot the looks of concern in the Toronto dugout.  Still, with both teams returning to the top of their rotation, it looked like a pitching duel might be forthcoming, but neither starter looked sharp out of the gate.   Rance Mullineks singles home a run in the top of the 2nd to put the Jays ahead, but the Phils keep pace as Pat Burrell converts Stieb’s HR split for a solo shot, thanks to some nifty dice rolling from Chuck.  Not to be outdone, George Bell drives in two more in the top of the 3rd and the Jays retake the lead, but it doesn’t last long as Bobby Abreu counters with a two-run double in the bottom of the inning and once again the game is tied.  At that point, Myers settles down but Stieb continues to be plagued by control problems, and the normally sharp Toronto defense doesn’t help either as an error by Damaso Garcia in the 5th sets up an RBI single by Burrell that puts the Phillies ahead for the first time in the game.   When Chuck converts a TR 1-3 off Stieb in the 6th, Eaglesfly has seen enough and Tom Henke and his solid 6-column of strikeouts is summoned; he bears down and strands the runner at third to keep it a one-run game.  Trying to keep pace in the sibling rivalry dice department, I manage to convert three straight stolen base attempts for the Jays, albeit with the highest successful roll possible, but none of them lead to runs as Myers becomes increasingly dominant as the innings roll on.  Still, the font on Myers’ solid 5-9 home run result seems to get larger as the game gets later, so TT moves to Aaron Fultz in the 8th to try to bring it home, hoping to preserve Billy Wagner for future rounds.  And Fultz turns out the lights on the Jays, who didn’t record a hit after the 4th inning, as the Phillies take the 4-3 win and earn a berth in the super-regional final.  

Super-regional finals:

With the Tall Tactician having led the 2005 Phillies in two previous Zoom games to the rarefied atmosphere of the super-regional final, an emergency Zoom had to be called to provide the Phils with their best shot against the favored 1951 Giants, who had been cruising through the tournament proving that the shot heard round the world was just part of a larger barrage.  Taking no chances, TT also enlisted my brother Chuck to roll the dice on his behalf, a strategy that had worked against the Blue Jays in round five, while here in the finals it was going to be my usually uncooperative dice on behalf of the Jints. Still, I liked my pitching chances, with Larry Jansen (23-11, 3.04) winning 20+ for the Giants facing off against the Phils’ Jon Lieber (17-13, 4.20), who had both a solid and a split homer for the Giants to aim for.  And in the top of the 2nd the gophers moved in to Citizens Bank Park, as Wes Westrum crushes a 3-run homer and Eddie the Brat Stanky follows up a few batters later with a 2-run shot–both of them on the batters’ cards, and both of them on splits that I actually converted for a change.  Then, in the 4th Al Dark turns the lights out in Philly with another 3-run homer on another converted split, and even the Phanatic was seen heading for the exits.   Meanwhile, Jansen holds the Phils hitless until the bottom of the 4th, when the bats come alive with three hits, the third by Placido Polanco to get them on the board, although they strand two men on to squander an opportunity to decrease the gap further.  When Willie Mays fails to convert Lieber’s HR split in the 5th, TT sends Lieber packing and Ugueth Urbina comes in, baffling both the heart of the Giants order and the spell-checker, to end the threat.  He and Billy Wagner proceed to lock down the Giants’ bats, and a Ryan Howard RBI single in the 8th provides a little spark of hope for a comeback, but it’s not going to happen as Jansen wraps up the complete game 8-2 win, sending the Giants on to the final group of 32.

Interesting card of Super-Regional I:   Back in the days of the old, beloved card looks, there was one particular pattern that only seemed to occur among players of a particular type.  The player type in question usually involved some slugger who belted quite a few homers, but suffered from a dismal batting average, typically accompanied by a bunch of strikeouts.  The pattern itself involved hiding all of the home run results at obscure spots like 11 & 12, or 2 & 3, with large expanses of real estate in the middle of the card dedicated to whiffs.  Although even as a kid I understood the probability underlying the roll of two six-sided dice, I still never liked having those homers stuck in the nether reaches of the card, so I probably avoided these types of guys more than I should have back in those days. One of the prototypes of this type of player was the infamous Dave Kingman, but in 1975 he finally managed to avoid that pattern and get a card with home runs in "reasonable places", although he didn't find those places often enough to keep the Mets alive in the tournament.  Since the adoption of the ugly current patterns roughly 30 years ago, we don't see the old-school looks any more; I guess one upside is that the combination of power with low batting average and lots of strikeouts seems to describe 50% of all contemporary major leaguers, so at least they don’t have to give everyone this same pattern in modern card sets.  Still, I miss the variety of looks on the old cards, as well as the variety of different types of players we used to see, who just seemed more colorful to me than the big leaguers of today.