PHILADELPHIA -- The Rays' incredible World Series championship dream was finally foiled by the elements, the tough and clutch Phillies and especially their perfect closer, Brad Lidge. But when it was over, there wasn't the usual sort of disappointment, anger and bitterness normally associated with the team that finishes second.
PHILADELPHIA -- Jimmy Rollins, a friend of superstar free-agent pitcher CC Sabathia dating back to their upbringing outside Oakland, Calif., and one of the best prognosticators in the game considering his lofty and correct predictions for his own Phillies, didn't hesitate when I asked him where he thought Sabathia would wind up.
PHILADELPHIA -- Baseball had several tons of dirt stored up and ready to combat the driving, unending rainstorm. And it looked for a while like what little leftover dirt they had might have to be used to bury the amazing Tampa Bay Rays.
PHILADELPHIA -- For a while, Phillies megastar Ryan Howard was struggling so badly that Rays pitchers were looking completely calm whenever Howard strode to the plate. And those pitchers were eating him up with a steady diet of curveballs. But the thing about Howard is that all those strikeouts can turn to home runs in no time. Even when he looks lost, he's a threat to turn a streak around, turn a game around, or in this case, send his team to the brink of their second World Series title.
PHILADELPHIA -- The feel-good Tampa Bay Rays got a rude awakening here late Saturday night and early Sunday morning, much ruder than even V.P. hopeful/hockey mom Sarah Palin received when she dropped the first puck here at a Flyers game to a chorus of boos a couple weeks back. The Rays were greeted with insults and epithets, according to Cliff Floyd, and the Rays young star Evan Longoria, who eventually figured in the key losing play, was serenaded all game with chants of "Eva.'' In contrast to the hard and harsh treatment from the Philly faithful, they were frustrated by tantalizingly soft stuff from the Phillies middle-aged starter Jamie Moyer, who showed his wisdom in holding the young Tampa team at bay most of the night.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Baseball executives envision this country's horrific economic meltdown adversely affecting this free-agent class, though it might not cost three superstars who baseball people believe are too good to be affected. The trio of elite of a pretty fair class -- CC Sabathia, Mark Teixeira and Manny Ramirez -- will still get their cash, baseball people predict.
The Trop was a trip, loud and raucous and ready for the first World Series ever for the worst-to-first darlings. But were the Rays ready to play?
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- The Tampa Bay Rays are four victories from completing the greatest turnaround in baseball history, a worst-to-first move that normally happens only in Hollywood. No one could have believed this was possible so soon.
The National League champion Phillies were built primarily by legendary general manager Pat Gillick plus former draft guru and current assistant GM Mike Arbuckle and a coterie of underrated yet experienced scouts and executives, but they didn't do it alone. They needed an assist from former Phillies executive Ed Wade, who last November contributed perhaps the most crucial player of all to this World Series-bound team.
Just a minute or two into Game 5 of the NLCS (Recap | Box Score), Jimmy Rollins, the diminutive Phillies leadoff hitter known for his big talk and even bigger stick, sent one over the same right-field wall that teammates Shane Victorino and Matt Stairs cleared two days before. The game wasn't quite over eight pitches in ... but it sure felt that way.
BOSTON (AP) -- The Boston Red Sox's season isn't quite up in flames, but a small fire at a landmark near Fenway Park can't be a good omen.
History tells us that hope is not completely lost here in Mannywood. The Red Sox of Manny Ramirez came back to win a league championship series from this far down, and from even further down than this.
LOS ANGELES -- The recommended book on Phillies 45-year-old pitcher Jamie Moyer is to exhibit patience aplenty at the plate. Perhaps the thinking is this: the longer you wait, the older he gets.
PHILADELPHIA -- The franchise-transforming hitting savant Manny Ramirez shot his right index finger into the sky as he rounded first base on his three-run home run in Game 2. Nobody can be sure what the finger signified, but it couldn't possibly have meant that his Dodgers are No. 1. The opposing Phillies take a well-earned two-zip lead in games to Los Angeles despite their strange stubbornness in continuing to pitch to the unconscious Ramirez.
PHILADELPHIA -- In the transparently obvious coast-to-coast hope to see the storyline win out and have Manny Ramirez return to Boston to play in a most venomous World Series, some of us forgot that there's another team playing in the National League playoffs. Despite their combination of pitching and punch, plus their penchant for the comeback, the Phillies are the forgotten team of the NL.
What's strange about baseball's final four is that there's one surprise entrant, and it's definitely not the previously perennially pathetic Tampa Bay Rays. No, the Rays played all year like they belonged with the best. And they do.
How big a difference has Joe Torre made with the Dodgers? One Torre intimate said the great manager possibly called more meetings this year with the Dodgers than during his whole 12-year tenure in New York with the Yankees.
The rising small-market Milwaukee Brewers are seriously considering a surprise run at keeping superstar pitcher CC Sabathia, but while Sabathia said he enjoyed his time in Milwaukee very much after the Brewers were eliminated by the Phillies, Brewers people also understand they'd be in over their heads if the bids go well beyond Johan Santana's pitching record $137.5 million, six-year deal.
MILWAUKEE -- Longtime beloved Brewers announcer Bob Uecker threw out the first ball for the first playoff game here in a generation, baseball commissioner Bud Selig spoke emotionally about his long-ago days as Brewers owner, then the current Brew Crew capped the great night by raising the quaint and nostalgic notion that they could possibly repeat their great playoff comeback of 1982.
They're crying in their beers at Murphy's Bleachers on Sheffield and Waveland, out beyond the real bleachers, as well as at various other watering holes around this town famed for its raucous bars, its broad shoulders, its corrupt politicians and especially for its unlucky Cubbies. Barring that long-awaited miracle, the 100th anniversary of their beloved team will turn out no differently than the previous 99 years -- that is, with someone else winning the World Series.
Manny Ramirez, who sleepwalked, sat out and complained his way through the first part of the season with the Red Sox, transformed the storied but struggling Dodgers franchise in the second part. The man can play just about any character he wants, and he's well into Act III now. In Game 1, Ramirez reprised his role of October dynamo, which led of course to a just a familiar ending for the lovably predictable home team.
CHICAGO -- Tuesday night's playoff before the playoffs between two classic Cinderella stories lasted scarcely longer than an Ozzie Guillen filibuster. Two hours and twenty minutes. It was a beautiful sight for the South Side team that was once proud to "win ugly.''
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