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2007 World Series Game 2: COL at BOS

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Rockiesat.jpgRed Sox

So, um, yeah, Game 1 was sure interesting. Josh Beckett struck out the side in the first, Dustin Pedroia led off the game with a home run, and the Red Sox steamrolled the Rockies in a game that was decided before the halfway point. I turned it off in the fifth inning and missed absolutely nothing.

The two teams square off in Game 2 of this series, and believe it or not, if the Rockies win this game, they will be in pretty good shape. The last time I checked, the World Series are the best of seven games and not some total goal formula. How many Twins fans were down in the mouth after the 14-5 shellacking the Twins took in Game 5 of the 1991 World Series? Remember that game? Remember how decisive that outcome turned out to be in the grand scheme of the World Series?

That said, I think that the Rockies need to win Game 2. The Red Sox are sending “Ol’ Bloody” Curt Schilling onto the mound. Twins fans may remember that in 2004 there was some fear down the stretch that Schilling might steal the Cy Young Award from our guy Johan Santana. Of course, Johan had a brilliant September and won the award with a unanimous vote, with Schilling coming in second. I wouldn’t have been too happy if he had won the award, but it’s hard to argue that Schilling wasn’t at least arguably the second best pitcher in the American League. In fact, he’s had a near Hall of Fame career. However, he’s now 40, and no longer the same guy. He misses fewer bats (75 fewer innings and 101 fewer strikeouts than in 2004) and he doesn’t induce many ground balls (and his rate is going down), which leads to a fairly high homerun rate. He’s still got pretty darned good control (< 1.4 BB/9IP), though. All of that adds up to a darned good pitcher, but one that is less than great.

In the post season, too, he’s been darned good, but not great. He started with seven innings of shutout baseball against the decimated Angels lineup, but got knocked around by Cleveland in Game 2 (9H 2HR 5ER in 4 2/3 IP). Schilling came back, though with a good outing (2ER in 7IP) in Game 6 against Cleveland. So, while he’s “gettable” sometimes, he can be pretty tough, too.

The Rockies’ starting pitcher is Ubaldo Jimenez. Jimenez is a fireballing 23 year old who has pitched in 17 just regular season games. He’s got good stuff, reportedly throwing up to 100 MPH and possessing a good curve, and his strikeout rate for a young kid shows that (which, actually, is only slightly better than Schilling’s rate), but he has problems with his control. He had 37 walks in just 82 innings – contrast that with Schilling’s 23 walks in 151 innings. Facing “the most patient lineup in baseball” could pose some problems for Jiminez and if he’s wild early, watch out. Jimenez gave up 8 walks in 11 1/3 innings so far in the post season, but he allowed just 8 hits and 2 runs. If he gives up walks at that rate to this lineup we could be all looking for something else to do by about the fifth inning.

I look at this matchup and I see a chance for the Rockies, but if I was forced to gamble my mother’s life savings on this game, I’d plunk it down on the Sox.

This entry was posted by SBG on Thursday, October 25th, 2007 at 6:00 pm and is filed under 2007 World Series. It is one of 3094 entries by the author. We are no longer accepting Letters to the Editor on this post.

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