Baseball: 2004 MLB Playoffs - Predictions???

Boston has won, 3-0

Yanks & Twins knotted at 1-1, currently 3-1, bottom of the 3rd.

Cards over LA, 2-0

Houston and Atlanta are tied at 1-1

Looking good so far.

The yanks are struggling a bit then or did they win the last one?

This is what i want to happen

Boston Bt Anaheim
Twins Bt Yankees
Braves Bt Astros
Cards Bt Dodgers

Boston Bt Twins
Cards Bt Braves

Boston Bt Cards

This is what i think will happen

Boston Bt Anaheim
Yankees Bt Twins
Astros Bt Braves
Cards Bt Dodgers

Boston Bt Yankees
Cards Bt Astros

Cards Bt Boston

[Edited on 10/9/04 by AdyBaby]

A couple of new Killer Bs have the Houston Astros one win away from ending 43 seasons of playoff failure. As the Astros batter the Braves and take a 2-1 series lead.

Carlos Beltran hit a two-run homer and Brandon Backe pitched six solid innings in his postseason debut to lead the Astros to their 19th straight home win, 8-5 over Atlanta.

It's Lima Time baby! :party-smiley-018: Dodgers win 4 to 0!

5-hit shutout, complete game by Lima. What a pitching performance!

I know we still have an uphill battle but Odalis is better at home than on the road. If we can somehow win tomorrow I think Game 5 is anybody's game. All the pressure would go back to St. Louis because they had the best record in the Major Leagues and would have just blown the 2 to 0 lead. I think that would balance out them having home field for a deciding Game 5.

And it's nice to see Shawn Green with 2 solo shots. Maybe he can get hot now.

Also thank you! Finally we won a postseason game for the first time since 1988. At least that monkey is off our backs.

Cancelling out St Louis Home field?? LOL.

Well ok, I hope it happens too.

Originally posted by Cannon

Cancelling out St Louis Home field?? LOL.

Yeah I know. That's wishful thinking on my part.

But after seeing not much positive after the first 2 games, I'll try to turn anything into a positive now.

Fox it would be tough but anything can happen yet.....

Looks like the Yanks got through with a win in the 11th innings.

It sets up a date now with Boston for the AL pennant....

Originally posted by TRD
Looks like the Yanks got through with a win in the 11th innings.

It sets up a date now with Boston for the AL pennant....

not much of a surprise...d@#%!t!

I'm not sure who I'd like to see win the NL series. Probably the Dodgers, since rolen the traitor is in St Louis.

houston's up, 5-2, borttom of the third

Looks like the Braves won today.

red sox to sweep the yankees......

Originally posted by toejam
red sox to sweep the yankees......

we can only hope so...

I'd be happy if they just won the series.

Originally posted by toejam
red sox to sweep the yankees......

Yes please cos if it goes to 7 you know what will happen don't you

YANKEES ALL THE WAY. In 7, the only way a red sox and yankees series should go

nah, Sox in 6...

What a difference a year makes to 2003 ALCS' losing club

These Boston Red Sox aren't worried about what happened in New York last year because they think they're better than the team that lost to the Yankees in the 2003 AL Championship Series.

"We're playing good ball now. I think we're the best team," outfielder Johnny Damon said Sunday before the Red Sox headed for New York. "Hopefully, the best team wins. But we know they're no slouches."

The Red Sox haven't won the World Series since 1918, and the Yankees are the biggest reason why. While bringing a record 26 titles to the Bronx, the Yankees have handed Boston some of its heartbreaking defeats, making Bucky Dent and Aaron Boone much-cursed names in New England.

But this year's Red Sox think they can change all that by ignoring it.

"Sometimes I'm not real sure they know how many outs there are in the inning," manager Terry Francona said. "So I don't think that other stuff is going to be a factor."

What is going to be a factor are pitchers Curt Schilling and Keith Foulke, who came to the Red Sox in the offseason after they lost to the Yankees on Boone's 11th-inning homer in Game 7 off Tim Wakefield. Francona replaced Grady Little, who was run out of town for failing to lift tiring ace Pedro Martinez in the final game, allowing the Yankees to tie the score.

With Orlando Cabrera and Doug Mientkiewicz, the Red Sox are also playing better defense than they were a year ago -- or even at the beginning of this season, when they led the league in unearned runs. Disgruntled shortstop Nomar Garciaparra is gone, and the clubhouse is happier because of it -- a bunch of self-proclaimed "idiots" who don't see any reason why they can't knock off the Yankees.

"Idiots worldwide are thrilled. They've never had such great p.r.," general manager Theo Epstein said. "The personality of this team is a big plus. We've never had to look at the other dugout and see a team that's looser than us."

The Red Sox won 98 games during the regular season, three more than last year, but finished second to New York in the AL East for the seventh consecutive year. But this year they beat New York 11 times in 19 games -- their first victory in the season series since 1999.

"It's hard to imagine two more evenly matched teams," owner John Henry said Sunday.

Asked if he thought the team's history put it at a disadvantage, he told reporters, "You've been in the clubhouse. Do they appear to be psyched out?

"I think they're ready," he said. "Psychologically, emotionally, physically."

CBS

"mystique and aura are dancers in a nightclub schilling says"

Schilling set to silence Yankees

By RONALD BLUM, AP Sports Writer
October 12, 2004
NEW YORK (AP) -- For Curt Schilling, Yankee Stadium is best when silent.

``I'm not sure I can think of any scenario more enjoyable than making 55,000 people from New York shut up,'' the Boston Red Sox ace said Monday, a day before starting the opener of the AL championship series against Mike Mussina.

Before the first pitch was even thrown, the series had players buzzing. They thought back to the 45 intense meetings between the rivals during the past two years, to the on-field fights and the clubhouse boasts, to the Yankees' 26 World Series titles and Boston's quest to win one for the first time since 1918.


But in a series that seemed predestined since Aaron Boone's Game 7 homer off Tim Wakefield won last October's playoff in the 11th inning, there was an element of uncertainty for the Yankees this time. It centered on the status of closer Mariano Rivera, who returned to Panama on Sunday after two of his wife's relatives -- a cousin and his son -- were electrocuted in his swimming pool.

Though Rivera said he'd be on hand for Tuesday night's game -- ``I am going back to New York tomorrow, after the funeral, and rejoin the team'' -- manager Joe Torre wasn't taking anything for granted.

``If he's here tomorrow, obviously, it would be wonderful,'' Torre said. ``If not, we understand that.''

Tom Gordon, his left eye still a little blurry after it was hit by a champagne cork in Saturday's clubhouse celebration at Minnesota, would take over as the closer if Rivera is absent. Tanyon Sturtze and Paul Quantrill would replace Gordon as the setup man.

While Gordon's good, he's not Rivera. No one else is.

``I never had a problem with it. I enjoyed closing,'' Gordon said. ``Whatever it takes for this team to get a win.''

Following Boston's first-round sweep of Anaheim and New York's 3-1 win over the Twins, Schilling and Mussina are rested heading into the opener. The Red Sox rotation has Pedro Martinez pitching Game 2 on Wednesday night, followed by Bronson Arroyo on Friday night at Fenway Park and Wakefield the following night in Game 4.

Jon Lieber and Kevin Brown follow Mussina for the Yankees, who still haven't decided between Orlando Hernandez or Javier Vazquez in the fourth game. El Duque, bothered by a tired arm, felt better Monday, when he threw about 60 pitches in a bullpen session, according to pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre.

Major league baseball decided Monday to move Game 5, the only scheduled afternoon contest of the series, into prime time, bumping the NLCS to the earlier time slot.

The Yankees and Red Sox are the two biggest spenders in baseball, New York at $186.4 million and Boston at $128.1 million, according to the Aug. 31 payroll. Judging by the TV ratings, baseball fans are captivated by New York's Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez and Boston's Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz.

``I know this is what everyone was hoping for, I imagine,'' Mussina said. ``I think it's the way it should be.''

Schilling, acquired by the Red Sox from Arizona last November, plays for moments like these. He has won six straight postseason decisions since 1993, allowing two earned runs or fewer in all nine of his starts. He beat Mussina for the Diamondbacks in the 2001 World Series opener, then defeated him again on April 15 this year at Fenway Park.

``I don't know that I've ever pitched in a game that will have the atmosphere that tomorrow's game has. In Arizona during the World Series, it was electric,'' Schilling said, ``but I think the Yankees and the Red Sox is a step above everything else.''

Wearing a T-shirt with the words ``Why Not Us?'' Schilling talked about how he likes to quiet fans when he pitches on the road -- especially Yankees fans' still giddy following the seventh straight AL East title for New York (101-61) and the seventh second-place finish in a row by Boston (98-64).

``It's going to be loud,'' he predicted. ``It's going to be thunderous.''

Schilling, who went 21-6 to lead the major leagues in wins, threw short tosses Monday, a day after testing out an injection of painkillers on his right ankle.

Three years ago, he said the Diamondbacks weren't intimidated by the Yankees because ``mystique and aura, those are dancers in a nightclub, those are not things we concern ourselves on the ball field.'' Then he watched New York hit tying two-run homers in the bottom of the ninth on consecutive nights to win Games 4 and 5 before Arizona rallied against Rivera in Game 7 to stop New York's streak of three straight titles.

He knows games like these define careers.

``You can make a name for yourself in one inning, one play, one pitch that you can't make in another series with any other teams,'' he said.

Schilling came to Boston primarily because of Terry Francona, his former manager in Philadelphia. Francona, who took over the Red Sox after Grady Little left Martinez in too long in Game 7, knew right away there was something special to this rivalry.

``I started to feel that in spring training when there was a line at 6 a.m.,'' he said. ``I had people yelling at me because we didn't play all our regulars.''

Hey first time i have see the Redsox's favourite to win and the Yanks have gone out to 3rd favs to win the World Series....