LCS Predictions

A friend mine at golf on Tuesday asked why I hadn't posted any baseball playoffs predictions in The Grandstander.  Apparently, some people actually do read this stuff!  Well, sometimes real life gets in the way of fun and games, so, no predictions earlier in this month.  Actually, after the Wild Card games - and isn't that one game playoff just fantastic?  I love it - I didn't see much of any of the four Division Series.  They all went pretty much according to chalk and offered little in the way of drama and suspense.

So, this leads us to the two best-of-seven League Championship Series, and I expect that the drama will ratchet up for all of us out here watching, if for no other reason than for what is at stake - a trip to the World Series.

Great match up in the American League.  The Red Sox won 108 games and blew past the 100 win Yankees in the LDS.  The defending World Series Champion Astros won 103 games and made similar short work of the Indians in the LDS.

I became somewhat familiar with the Astros while watching last year's Series, and I confess to not being all that familiar with the Sox.  I am guessing that Boston will be a slight betting favorite here, but I am going to pick the Astros to win this one for four reasons: Verlander, Kuechel, Cole, and Morton.  Stronger starting pitching triumphs.

In the National League, everything would seem to point to the Dodgers to defeat the Brewers.  Large payroll, great pitching, strong lineup, but I am going to just go on a hunch here and pick Milwaukee to win this one.

In actuality, I admit to picking the Brewers for the simple reason that this is the team that actually want to see win, and I can't believe I am saying that.  For years whenever I would write about the Brewers, I would usually refer to them as the "Hated Brewers", and you all know why - their dominance over the Pirates for much of this century, the steroid cheat Cryin' Ryan Braun....just always a team that I found easy to dislike.

Something changed, though, last off-season, when the Brewers, a team who could have chosen to sing the same "we're a small market and it's hard to compete" blues that the Pirates always sing went out and signed free agent outfielder Lorenzo Cain and swung a trade with Miami for  outfielder Christian Yelich, while the Pirates failed to sign a major league free agent, did sign guys like Josh Smoker, and continued to sing the Small Market Blues.  The Brewers are now in the LCS, four wins away from the World Series, and Yelich is the favorite to win the National League MVP Award.

So THAT is why I am rooting for the Brewers and would be happy to see them win the World Series.  Of course, if the Brewers should win it all, I can already hear Neal Huntington pointing the the Pirates' five game sweep of Milwaukee in July and saying, "See, we CAN compete with the best teams in the league."

As for the Astros, I would like to see them win because I would like to see Charlie Morton playing in the World Series, again, and I would like to see Gerrit Cole get a shot on that stage as well.  Call it a perverse form of baseball fan masochism, but I'd love to see these ex-Buccos holding that Series Trophy.

So, there you are:  The Astros and the Brewers  to face off in the World Series.  As always, watch, but don't bet!