This is not 1986. This is not 2004. This is not 2007. The 2008 Halos are 100-62 and, on paper, the most complete team in baseball. Orange County limped into last year
This is not 1986. This is not 2004. This is not 2007. The 2008 Halos are 100-62 and, on paper, the most complete team in baseball. Orange County limped into last year
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I’m confident in the Red Sox, but this is going to be one ugly ALDS/ALCS. I remember in 2005 after the triumphant win of the WS, Chicago took us to school. Now I fear it may be the Angels and if not them the Rays. Then again, the ALDS/ALCS has always been ugly for Boston while the NL competitor was a joke.
The Angels have a stellar lineup. They made us look bad and the Yankees even worse. That being said…I’m not as worried about our offensive prowess as much as I am our pitching. Lester and Dice-K are good, but they need to be 100% focused. We’ve seen what happens when Lester loses his cool…he gets butthurt and raped twice over by batters. This cannot pass in these playoffs. Beckett must regress into 2007 October Beckett otherwise all is lost. That’s about it.
On Paper. Go Sox.
Oh, come on. A Sarah Palin joke? Leave politics out of this, please. Baseball should be an escape.
this aint the 2005 season- that rotation was far less imrpessive than this season (as long as beckett can pitch effectively)
“Leave politics out of this, please. Baseball should be an escape.”
ryan, dont listen to the cranky old warmonger- its a free country, write what you want :)
Oh and I forgot one reason why the Angels took us to school. Two of the games had Clay Suchholz as the SP so that’s two default wins for LA already. Every other game save for the 9-2 loss with Beckett (probably injured at the time), there has been a two-run difference. 6-4 Angels, 7-5 Angels, 4-2 Angels, 5-3 Angels, and 7-5 Angels. The only one we won was a 7-6 barnburner with Timlin getting the win.
We need to get those bats hot otherwise we’re doomed. Close the run gap even more and we’ve got the Angels. We don’t have Craig Hansen or Buchholz to fuck this up and MDC has gotten slightly better.
The Angels are the better team right now. But we don’t need to be the better team, we just need to win 3 games.
Remember the poll about what was the most important thing entering the playoffs? I was one of those who vote for “getting hot”, and this is why…
And Tessie’s Dad is right. Let’s not talk about politics in here. I am from South America, and no one needs to scape from politics more than me :(
If you gentleman need an escape- I would encourage you to avoid watching this particular series…because as a Sox fan you hope for advancement to the ALCS- but as a baseball fan I am confident you will not get it…hold tightly to last seasons victory and make way for a new champion…the rest of the baseball world is more than ready to see you knocked off the pedestal.
Game 1 is huge. Lackey has always been a Red Sox doormat so it would be nice if history repeats itself. It works against us that Escobar got hurt and Weaver has been ineffective because the Sox always owned those two also and may not get to see them. The Red Sox haven’t really faced Saunders or Santana that often so they’re more wildcards than anything.
Hey Ryne,
Quick question…where’d the 44-16 coming from? Didn’t the Red Sox win 4-0, 6-3, and 9-1? By my count that’s 19-4, still a huge margin, but not quite 44-16. Maybe I’m just misunderstanding what you were saying though.
Enjoy the game tonight!
On paper? I’m not so sure that they look better on paper at all. The won 100 games, but in a weak division. Our strength of schedule was good for the 3rd toughest in baseball (.515) while LA’s was 9th (.502).
Then look at our expected W-L records. Both the Sox and the California LA Angels of Anaheim and Orange County allowed, basically, the same number of runs, as reflected in the fact that our team ERA’s are virtually identical. But the Sox scored the 3rd most runs in all of baseball (845) while the Angels were a mediocre 15th, scoring about 100 fewer runs than we did. Our pitching is just as good as theirs, and our offense is much better. Our team defense ain’t to shabby either.
All this means that our Expected W-L record blows theirs out of the water. The Angels are the 100-game winners in the standings, but if you do the math, you find that the Sox were expected to win 97 games and the Angels only 89.
On paper, I have to say, the Sox are clearly the better team. But the irony in all this, of course, is that the Angels get homefield advantage, regardless of the numbers, simply because they won more games, regardless of why they won them.