Baseball Regular Season Wrap up

Today marks the last day of regular season play in baseball and it’s great to reflect on how amazing of a year it has been. We’ve seen dominance from the usual suspects, careers develop and standings look like a contrast from the normal.

Yesterday we saw the dominance of Johan Santana pitching a complete game three hitter to keep the Mets in the playoff hunt. This guy went from small market to large market and did not suffer a lapse in his ability, truly showing off his stuff. Speaking of pitching in a not so talk about local in the north, Roy Halladay is going to lose the Cy Young to Cliff Lee. Halladay is working so many complete games and just shuts down every offense powerhouse, but he suffers from playing on a team that does not have it to be a playoff team in the AL East.

That brings us to Cliff Lee, who will win the Cy Young, hands down. He went from being a mediocre 3-4 starter on what should have been a pennant contender to being an ace on a collapsing AL Central team looking to stay above five hundred. Due to an intense off season work out schedule and hunting wild animals, he is in amazing shape and posting up the stats, winning 22 games.

The greatest thing about this season has got to be the teams going to the playoffs. For the first time since 1993 (well 1994 since there were no playoffs) the Yankees will not be in October. So since 2000, there will be another year with no Yankee World Series wins. It is so sweet, because its nothing against the players, it’s their fans. They have the dumbest/ignorant/self-righteous/warped fans in the world of organized sport. Boastful hockey parents and soccer moms are better informed than Yankee fans.

Tampa Bay, the team Yankee fans always bragged about being better than, are going to the playoffs. It had to eventually happen, the Diamondbacks won the World Series, along with the Marlins. Last years NL Champions were the Colorado Rockies, so who knows maybe the young, versatile Rays might beat the perennial power house Red Sox and Angel teams for the pennant. They got my favorite player, Evan Longoria doing wonders as a rookie. To think that last year the buzz was about rookie Dustin

Pedroia being tops amongst AL rookies and doing so on a World Championship club.

The Sox are back in the playoffs. Honestly this team is as good as last year, while not having Manny being Manny. These are 25 guys who are just out there to win, a great feeling for those paranoid Boston fans.

Paranoid, but not in a sadistic way, Cub fans won the division again. It’s nice to see Pinella doing a great job with that team, especially with all the expectations placed on Fukudome. Even with Fukudome not playing as well, everyone else has stepped up.

This year has been an amazing ride. Tampa Bay can finally have fans find pride in their team before maybe they get moved to Montreal or some other city in America that has no need for Major League Baseball. Maybe they will move the Marlins to Los Angeles and turn them from a baseball team to a football team.

Sal Says: “I was the starting tailback for the 1999 San Francisco 49ers.”