Last off-day of the year

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As foul tip commented below, a 3 – 3 split with two division leaders tied with one another for the most wins in baseball (92) isn’t bad. Considering how poor the offense has been for three weeks, if we’re honest with ourselves we might admit we didn’t expect results even that good. Now if they can sweep the Padres before coming home to the beautiful setting of Dodger Stadium to play the Rockies and Giants, there might still be a little hope left. The Cardinals have three with the Astros starting today, and the Houston team is redefining the word hapless in its last season in the National League. But the Cards then have to play the Nats and the Reds to close out the season. The Dodgers could get a little help from those two teams.

Let’s be realistic here. The Dodgers are fighting for the 2nd wild card slot. Winning that buys you the chance to participate in a one-game playoff with the winner of the 1st wild card slot. The winner of that game goes on to play in the five-game NLDS, and from that point on the postseason is the same as it has been since the wild card was instituted in 1995. Unless the offense gets untracked over the next week, they won’t have even that slim opportunity.

Just for fun, from MLB:

If the postseason started today …

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Wild Card: A’s at Orioles
Division Series: Yankees vs. White Sox | Rangers vs. Wild Card winner

NATIONAL LEAGUE
Wild Card: Cardinals at Braves
Division Series: Reds vs. Giants | Nationals at Wild Card winner

• For the 2012 postseason, the team with the better record will play the first two games on the road to start the Division Series.

In the American League I’m rooting hard for the Orioles to overtake the Yankees in the AL East and the Tigers to catch the White Sox in the AL Central. While no Dodgers fan needs to explain why he’d like the Yankees to lose, I used to live in Washington DC when the Orioles were the better team of the two within rooting distance, and I’ve apparently got some residual memory of them. With the Tigers I’d like to see Verlander, Fister, Fielder and Miguel Cabrera in the postseason.

32 thoughts on “Last off-day of the year”

  3. The ‘vote up’ appears to be a bit different to the old ‘like’ button. It pushes the comments higher on the page and out of chronological order which can be a little unwieldy (for instance this went from the top to half way down. I assume the top of the ‘0″ vote up’ section)

  5. Yesterday, I went to the Rangers-Mariners game at Safeco, which I liked a lot. I have seen major league games at all three Seattle Stadiums: the Pilots at the intimate Sicks Stadium, and the Mariners at the appalling Kingdome and at Safeco.

  6. Moved to the DC area myself first in 1978. Had always been intrigued by the O’s since they swept us in ’66 and became a big fan making the trudge up to Memorial Stadium as often as possible over the years and then into Camden Yards “Go See Cal” took on another meaning for me.

    • I lived in NoVa from ’62-68 when the expansion Senators were in DC. They were horrible. I was still trying to root for the Dodgers during those years, but the Os were pretty good into the 1970s. I never saw a game at either Memorial or Camden Yards. Did see an exhibition game between the Dodgers and Senators at RFK one spring training.

  7. It’s improbable, but far from impossible. It doesn’t help that Abad was pitching well for the ‘Stros, then hurt himself, and his replacement started throwing BP.

    • Here, from time to time, at least once a day. But I often can’t/don’t comment during games, which is what this thread mostly seems to be for…

      • No game yesterday, yet there was a post. 😉

        For sure there will be separate threads for each game the Dodgers play and others as off-season Dodger events warrant. I’ll certainly be blogging the playoffs and World Serious® as well.

        After seeing the end of last night’s Monday Night Football I could probably put up a three-page post of nothing but quotes from sports people clamoring for the NFL to stop trying to bust the referees’ union over a lousy $3M and a defined contribution v. defined benefit pension plan and get the regular officials back.

        • Great. I’m all for it. Just thought this was intended mostly for game chats, which I’m not in near as much as some.

          The NFL probably is weighing the damage to its image done by replacement refs much more seriously after continued highly visible and excessive screwups by those poor wretches.

          I wouldn’t be surprised to see a settlement pretty quickly.

  9. I realize that it is still a long shot, but one reason that I am rooting for the Dodgers to make it into the wild card play-in game is because it seems like their birthright. Historically, the Dodger franchise has been in so many extra regular season or additional playoff games that I assumed at the beginning of the year that they would find their way into this one. The years 1942, 1951, 1962, 1981 and even 1995 (first year of with wild card round) dance in my head. Here’s hoping 2012 joins the list.

  10. Don’t recall if people have talked about this already – but has anyone seen the Trouble with the Curve?

  12. Didn’t like TrueBlueLA at all and didn’t care for the language and racial slander on MSTI…This is my new home…Thanks Link

  13. Dodgers also have to stay ahead of AZ to hold onto 2nd in the West.
    Losing out on the postseason is one thing, but if this happened to another team — dump a load of $ and end up dropping down in the standings — I would be laughing at them.

  14. Linkmeister,
    When I added Elysian Fields to my favorites bar, it goes to the earliest post, instead of the most current. The other blogs do not do this. Any thoughts? Maybe it is because the other blog posts run consectutively and you have to press comments to get to the comments section. Therefore it keeps you current. Any help available as I would have to go through many postings in the future to get current? Thanks.