MLB Playoffs: Day 1

So for reasons that I don't understand, the folks at MLB have decided that Major League Baseball will be the only sport to decide its championship without televising any of the playoffs on ABC, CBS, NBC, or ESPN.  (Technically, they played one of the Wild Card games on ESPN, but I don't recognize the Wild Card games, so that doesn't count for me.)  Instead, it's all Turner and FOX for the baseball fan, and most sports fans respond to this by simply ignoring the baseball playoffs altogether.  But I love baseball in October, and I've been engaged in this little ritual since about 1972, and I'm not likely to change any time soon.  They could put these games on FX -- and they probably will, at some point -- and I would still tune in.

Today we started with the American League.  For the second straight year, the Rangers are meeting the Blue Jays in the series where all the games are played in the afternoon because MLB has no hope of anyone tuning in.  The Rangers had an odd season -- they finished with the best record in the American League, but they only outscored their opponents by eight runs.  Anyway, today they were humiliated at home by the Blue Jays, who scored five runs in the top of the third and never looked back.  Marco Estrada, who went 9-9 for the Blue Jays in the regular season, dominated the Rangers for 8 1/3 innings, and Team Canada rolled to a 10-1 victory.

The nightcap featured two great old franchises, the Boston Red Sox and the Cleveland Indians.  They met in front of a rabid crowd in Cleveland, and they played a rare old game.  Boston sent out its ace, Rick Porcello -- who went 22-4 (!) in the regular season -- and staked him to a 1-0 lead after one.  But Porcello looked more like the guy who went 9-15 last year than the guy who went 22-4 this year.  He gave up three home runs, and five total runs, in only 4 1/3 innings, and left the proceedings with his team down 5 to 3.  Of course, the Red Sox have an explosive offense, and they kept threatening to explode for the rest of the game.  It finally came down to Cleveland closer Cody Allen against Boston hero Dustin Pedroia in a 5-4 game with two outs in the top of the ninth.  The tying run was on first, and Pedroia himself was the potential lead run.  The Clevelanders frantically waved red towels, hoping to get one more out.  The canny Pedroia put up a huge fight, battling Allen for seven pitches to set up a 3-2 count:  foul, ball, swinging strike, foul, ball, ball, foul.  Finally, just as Allen and the crowd appeared to be exhausted, Pedroia lunged awkwardly at a pitch that was plainly in the dirt.  He acted as though it was ball four, and headed for first -- but the first base umpire ruled that he had swung, and the game was over.  The cameras showed Pedroia and Boston manager John Farrell disputing with the umpires as the Men in Blue walked off the field and roughly 40,000 folks from Northern Ohio went nuts.

Tomorrow the Senior Circuit will swing into action, and the day will look like this (all times Central):

Noon:  Toronto @ Texas (TBS)
3:30:  Boston @ Cleveland (TBS)
4:30:  Los Angeles @ Washington (FOX Sports 1)
8:00:  San Francisco @ Chicago (FOX Sports 1)

So you can go watch a high school football game and still get home in time to catch the end of the Giants and the Cubs -- if you can find FOX Sports 1.

Meanwhile, here's where we stand:

Texas 1 - 10 Toronto
Cleveland 5 - 4 Boston

National League Division Series (best of 5):
Chicago and San Francisco tied 0-0
Washington and Los Angeles tied 0-0

American League Division Series (best of 5):
Toronto leads Texas 1-0
Cleveland leads Boston 1-0