It’s October, and that means it’s time for the baseball playoffs. It’s the best time of year. While I follow baseball all season long, I understand that some people only tune in for the postseason. So, I figured I’d write up a quick and dirty rooting guide for those just tuning in.
The National League wildcard game will be the Colorado Rockies traveling to Chicago to face the Cubs. This one is easy, you have to root for the Rockies. In the Rockies favor, they have Charlie Blackmon and Trevor Story, two of the most fun players in baseball. Plus they have Nolan Arenado. Certain players are just so good, you want to watch them every chance you get. Arenado is one of those players. The longer he stays in it, the better it will be for everyone. Add to that the fact that the Rockies have never won a championship and it’s a no brainer.
The Cubs have almost nothing going for them. They just won it all two years ago, even though they probably shouldn’t have. They made a mid-season trade for Daniel Murphy, a vocal homophobe, and seemed to be completely shocked that their gay fans were upset. And they have a pretty sketchy history with domestic abusers the past few seasons. Like I said, this is a no brainer. Everyone outside of Chicago should be rooting for the Rockies.
The American League wildcard game is between the Oakland A’s and the Yankees in New York. This is an even easier call than the other wildcard game, Oakland all the way. The A’s are this year’s surprise upstart team. No one expected them to be good. They are the underdogs, and, all other things being equal, you should always root for the underdog. And the A’s haven’t won a World Series since 1989, so they know a little bit about championship droughts.
The Yankees, on the other hand, are the Yankees. They wouldn’t know a championship drought, because they’ve never experienced one. They are never the underdogs. They do have some young, exciting players in Judge and Andujar. They did do us one good service this year. They got Aaron Boone out of the broadcast booth. But that is completely cancelled by the fact that they have known domestic abuser Aroldis Chapman closing games. There is just no choice here but to root for Oakland.
If these two games turn out right, a fun postseason is almost guaranteed (Houston could still mess things up, but I’ll talk about that later). I’ll be back Wednesday night to talk about the Division Series.
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