The young and the old

Yadier Molina was happy Monday with the work of
rookie starter Michael Wacha.

The NL Division Series on Monday offered a contrast too obvious to ignore: Two teams, Atlanta and St. Louis, in elimination games. One's starting pitcher was about as inexperienced as they come; the other's was a crafty veteran who offered almost nothing but his veteraniness.

St. Louis won its game. Atlanta lost its. But both pitchers did quite well, thank you, establishing yet again that there is no pat answer to this game.

Michael Wacha is indeed an impressive young pitcher. He's 22, a rookie out of Texas A&M, the 19th overall pick in the 2012 draft, and his major league resume entering the series boasted less than 65 innings in just 15 games and nine starts. On Monday, he carried a non-hitter into the eighth inning (when Pittsburgh's Pedro Alvarez hit a long homer) and came away credited with the 2-1 win that forced a decisive Game Five back in St. Louis. He threw almost nothing but fastballs and changeups, and why bother with a third pitch when two are that effective?

That game will feature the Cardinals' best in Adam Wainwright — and Pittsburgh's own rookie sensation, Garrett Cole, who is being moved ahead of veteran A.J. Burnett in a youth-over-veteran move.

Freddy Garcia's been there and done that in the postseason,
and even without the fastball he had in his youth
he still got the job done on Monday.

Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, with the Dodgers bringing Cy Young favorite Clayton Kershaw (league leader in ERA and strikeouts) back on short rest to try to close out Atlanta, the Braves countered with Freddy Garcia — at age 37 a veteran of 15 major league seasons with seven teams. Monday's outing was Garcia's 11th career start in playoffs and World Series (6-3, 3.25 in postseason play).

"I don't panic," Garcia was quoted as saying on Sunday (which, as it happened, was his birthday) after the Braves were pushed to the brink. "I just make pitch." Which pretty much sums up the appeal of age and experience in a crucial situation.

Garcia made his pitches on Monday: Six innings of two run ball. He navigated his way around eight Dodgers hits, struck out six and left with the lead.

Garcia was hardly as overwhelming as Wacha, but he gave the Braves all they could ask for, and more than should have been expected from a guy who brought a 5.77 ERA over from the American League in midseason.

Nice work by both of them.

Details of defense

David Freese gets out of the way after tagging
Chase Utley on a rare 6-3-5 fielders choice. The
umpire is Chris Guccione.

I'm not a fan of Tony LaRussa — mostly for the constant belligerence, but also because he, more than any other manager, created the seven-man bullpens and nonstop pitching changes that drag out games. I also suspect that, if a truly accurate history of steroid use in baseball could be compiled, TLR would be a near-constant figure.

But there's no denying his record. The man has been, and remains, one of the great managers in the game's history, and his infield on Wednesday night provided a couple of plays that I think illustrate the attention to detail that LaRussa demands.

Play One: sixth inning, Cardinals up 3-2, Chase Utley on first with no outs. Utley runs with the pitch, and Hunter Pence hits a grounder to the left side. As shortstop Rafael Furcal throws to first, Utley rounds second and heads to third.

Two things happen here: First, Albert Pujols sees Utley make his move to third and comes off the bag to shorten the throw from Furcal. Second, third baseman David Freese doesn't stand around admiring the play — he's in position to take the throw from Pujols. Utley is out by several feet — a 6-3-5 fielders choice.

There are a lot of teams that wouldn't have cut off Utley. Some first basemen would have clung to the base to get the sure out, then tried — doubtless too late — to throw to third. Some first basemen wouldn't have the arm to make that throw. (Inability to throw makes outfielders first basemen.) Some shortstops might have made a higher throw to first, forcing Pujols to hang back. Some third basemen wouldn't have anticipated the play coming his way.

The Cardinals played it as if they knew it was coming. By doing so, they turned man on third, one out into man on first, one out. In a one-run game, that's significant.

Play Two: Eighth inning, Cardinals up 5-2, pinch-runner Michael Martinez on second, no outs. Jimmy Rollins hits a hard grounder to second. Ryan Theriot holds Martinez at second, then gets the out at first.

This is a more subtle play than the previous one, but remarkable in its own right. It's virtually automatic — grounder to the right side, a runner on second is taking third. Maybe a second baseman will occasionally be able to check a Jim Thome or one of the Molina brothers — but Martinez is hardly immobile.

It was a bit of a perfect storm. Theirot didn't have to move left to make the play. Martinez didn't get a good jump off the base. And while Theirot doesn't have a great arm, he throws well enough to have spent most of his career at the position, so he probably throws a bit better than most second basemen.

Martinez wound up scoring anyway. The point is, Theriot and the Cardinals didn't concede that base.

The better team doesn't always win

And that's the case for the Philadelphia Phillies, who were clearly the best team in the National League all season but failed to play that way in the NLCS.

Ryan Howard averaged 136 RBIs over the past five
season, but he had zero in the NLDS.

This outcome doesn't bother me. I rooted for the Giants mainly because I'm picking up a Yankee-like entitlement vibe from the Philly fans, a sense that the Phillies are so good that this World Series should count as one-and-half championships for the red pinstripes.

On the other hand: This is a truly outstanding team, and its claim to greatness, like that of the Atlanta Braves of the 1990s, is at risk of being lost through October failure.

The Giants — even after their mid-season remodeling (they have turned over five regulars since the Opening Day: catcher, shortstop, left field, center field, right field) — are a clearly inferior team. The only position at which the Giants are better than the Phillies is catcher. The Giants' strength is in its starting rotation and the power arms therein — but the Phillies are at least as good  there as well.

But the Giants won four games, and they get to face Texas in the World Series. Nobody who rooted for the 1987 Twins can begrudge them that.

Still ... I said yesterday that the Texas Rangers won the ALDS more than the Yankees lost it. In this series, I think the Phillies lost more than the Giants won.

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Poll stuff: Forty-eight people participated in last week's poll, in which you were asked to pick the middle infielder you most want back on the 2011 Twins.

The winner is J.J. Hardy, who had 24 votes (50 percent). Second was Alexi Casilla (12 votes, 25 percent). Orlando Hudson had 10 votes (21 percent), Nick Punto two (4 percent) and Matt Tolbert zero.

New poll up.

The promised land in sight

The two league championship series are taking rather parallel paths.

In both, the favored team (Phillies in the National, Yankees in the American) split the first two games, then lost Games Three and Four — and then, with elimination looking them in the eye, won Game Five.

In one of the key plays of the game, Raul Ibanez beat
Pedro Sandoval to third base on a force play on a bunt
Thursday night.

There are differences, of course, most notably that the Phillies get to fight out the rest of the series in their home park, while the Yankees have to go to Texas.

But the fact remains that both are still breathing, still dangerous. And in fact, I rather expect the Phillies will pull this one out.

Back in 1985 — so long ago that I not only hadn't started writing the print column yet, I hadn't been with The Free Press a full 12 months — I predicted that the Kansas City Royals would win the World Series against the St. Louis Cardinals. The Cards took a 3-1 series lead, and I continued to believe that the Royals would win. My logic: as I saw it, K.C. had the better of every pitching matchup the rest of the way.

Kansas City did win (with a little help from a blown call). And I see a lot of similarities between their win and the Phillies current situation. The Phillies will be at home, they have Roy Oswalt and Cole Hamels lined up — and it doesn't hurt any, either, that they are clearly the best team in the National League.

The Giants might have had their best chance to wrap this up last night. Tim Lincecum was better than Roy Halladay. But the defensive liabilities in the San Francisco lineup — the Giants have a lot of them — emerged at the wrong time, and the Phillies are alive. Alive and, in this corner of the world, favored.

The Yankees are another matter. They have the slight disadvantage of going on the road, and this bigger disadvantage: Cliff Lee awaits in a Game Seven. Texas would rather wrap it up tonight, but that trump ace is a comfort.

Quotes, notes and comment

"It was about as cold as it gets. It was pretty nasty today."

—CC Sabathia after Game One of the ALCS

You ain't seen nothin' yet, CC.

The official temperature at game time in Yankee Stadium on Friday was 45 degrees. But it was windy and rainy and pretty darn miserable — and it's probably going to be worse for tonight's scheduled Game 2.

I'm willing to chalk up the lousy weather so far this postseason to bad luck. But we're in mid-October now, and the prospects for Indian summer are waning fast. Bud Selig wanted a schedule that pushed the World Series into November, and he got it. He deserves all the snow, ice and frostbite a Phillies-Yankees series can offer.

*It's not really the playoffs unless Torii Hunter overruns a single to turn it into extra bases.

He did it twice while with the Twins, and he did it again Friday night for Anaheim. This time he did it on a grass field, so the ball didn't roll on to the outfield fence for four bases. And at least this time he got charged with an error.

Officially, Anaheim was charged with three errors. But that doesn't count the first inning popup Erick Aybar and Chone Figgins neglected to corral. That was counted as a hit — and a two-out run.

* The Yankees plan to work Sabathia on three days rest in Game 4; if the games are played as scheduled, that will allow them to go with just three starters in the ALCS while not working anybody else on short rest. A postponement tonight would change that.

Sabathia should be able to handle a start on short rest. He had a lighter workload this season (231 innings, as opposed to 253 last year and 241 in 2007), so the weariness factor that seemed the likely cause of his playoff implosion the past two years shouldn't be a factor.

* A great job Friday by Pedro Martinez, who tossed seven shutout innings on 87 pitches against the Dodgers. After which the Phillies middle relief spent the eight inning demonstrating why it's not easy to be Charlie Manuel. It took five relievers to get three outs.

Of course, things might have worked out had Chase Utley made a routine double play pivot. Second time in as many games that Utley — regarded as a superior defensive second baseman — has thrown away a DP ball.

And for that matter, the Phillies scored just one run off former Phillie Vincente Padilla. I think they expected to crack Padilla like a bag of roasted peanuts. Didn't happen. Should have. He's not that good.

So the NLDS is tied at one game apiece — and the series moves to the chill (I assume) of Philadelphia.

The crybabies are out

A few quick examples:

* The St. Louis Cardinals lost Game 2 of the NLDS Thursday when (a) the always-overrated Matt Holliday let a routine fly hit him in the belly button with two outs in the ninth (above) and (b) closer Ryan Franklin apparently decided that absolved him of the need to throw strikes.

So the Cardinals, rather than blame their supposed stars, blamed ... the fans in Los Angeles. Starting pitcher Adam Wainwright:

I mean, that ball got lost in 50,000 white towels shaking in front of Matt’s face. It doesn’t really seem fair that an opposing team should be able to allow their fans to shake white towels when there’s a white baseball flying through the air. How about Dodger Blue towels?

Someday I'd like to see a Tony LaRussa team lose with some class. It may take a while.

* Jim Leyland is still moaning about the no-call on Brandon Inge in the top of the 12th inning Tuesday:

I'm really upset that it ended the way it did, having Brandon get hit by a pitch, because that totally changes that game. I can understand how the ump didn't see the pitch hit him, but to say video was inconclusive upsets me, because everybody in America saw that it did.

OK, Mr. Leyland. I'm willing to concede umpire Randy Marsh blew that call if you're willing to admit Marsh missed the call on Alexi Casilla's slide home in the 10th. It he gets that one right, there's no 12th inning anyway. For that matter, perhaps you would acknowledge that letting Gerald Laird swing away on 3-1 with the bases loaded was a mistake.

Oh wait. That would be your mistake. Better to pin it on the ump.

* Speaking of the Detroit Tigers: Detroit GM David Dombrowski, who had the pleasant chore of fetching his $153 million first baseman from police custody last weekend, implied during his end-of-season press briefing that (a) this isn't the first time Miguel Cabrera has had too much to drink and (b) that he urged Cabrera, in a meeting Wednesday with the slugger and his agent, to get treatment. Implied rather than stated outright, with a lot of talk about the team's obligations and limitations under the collective bargaining agreement and employee assistance program. In other words: We can't make him do anything about his problem.

It wasn't sweet Tuesday night hearing fans chant "al-co-hol-ic" at Cabrera. The only defense for it is that it's true.

Meanwhile, there is serious speculation that Cabrera may still have been legally intoxicated at the start of Saturday's game against the White Sox, in which he went 0-for-4.

Cabrera wasn't the first big star to play in a key game hungover or drunk or otherwise self-medicated, and he won't be the last. That doesn't mean he doesn't have a problem. And when the team's got a $153 million commitment to the player, the team has the problem too.