IF THE PLAYOFFS STARTED TODAY… September 16, 2010

The playoff picture is confusing and jumbled and seems to be changing by the hour. And trust me it will look different EVERY morning.

So the staff here at Sully Baseball has decided to list the current playoff match ups every morning.

Blink and it will change. The American League teams are pretty much set. The Twins win last night over the White Sox all but did them in and the Rangers’ Magic Number is now in single digits.

But the Yankees and Rays seemed destined to flip flop the top spot in the AL and the Wild Card until the end of the year… and the Twins and Rangers probably won’t know their opponent until the season wraps up.

(And keep in mind Minnesota is only a game back in the loss column for the best record in the AL… they could have the home field when all is said and done.)

While the AL jockey’s for position, the NL has only one no brainer… the Reds and their 7 game in the loss column lead over St. Louis. Cincy’s magic number is 10 and they should take care of business soon.

After that, who knows? The Phillies have a 3 game lead but that could evaporate. And the current match ups include two former front runners who have been slumping but as of this writing are hanging on for dear life.

Right now the Giants and the Rockies are on the outside looking in… but they could BOTH be playing in October if they don’t break their pace.

So here are the match ups as of right now…

AMERICAN LEAGUE DIVISION SERIES

TAMPA BAY RAYS (AL East Champion)
has home field advantage over
TEXAS RANGERS (AL West Champion)

MINNESOTA TWINS (AL Central Champion)
has home field advantage over
NEW YORK YANKEES (AL Wild Card)

NATIONAL LEAGUE DIVISION SERIES

PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES (NL East Champion)
has home field advantage over
SAN DIEGO PADRES (NL West Champion)

CINCINNATI REDS (NL Central Champion)
has home field advantage over
ATLANTA BRAVES (NL Wild Card)

That will probably change while you are reading this.

SOME OF YOU GIANT FANS MIGHT BE CONFUSED

You see when Emmanuel Burris ran across that pentagon shaped thing in the dirt, he doesn’t have to stop there. It is what is called in baseball a “run” and if you get more of those than the other team, you win the game.

18 innings and the Dodgers have 1 earned run off of Giants pitching… And the Giants are lucky they aren’t on the verge of getting swept.

Go for three runs tomorrow Giants.
Why not?

Go nuts.

Why won’t the Reds use Aroldis Chapman as their closer?

I remember when I saw the movie Amistad, I was frustrated that Steven Spielberg didn’t use his cast effectively.

He gave several of the movies biggest and most emotional moments to Matthew McConaughey… and as I wrote before, McConaughey is good at SOME things, but he was out of his element delivering the big moments.

Meanwhile, Morgan Freeman was in the cast and given virtually nothing to do. Now I am going to go out on a limb and say that an actor of Morgan Freeman’s talents were better suited for dramatic speeches than Wooderson from Dazed and Confused.

Well there is a similar waste of talent going on in Cincinnati.

Francisco Cordero is awful. AWFUL and they have a fire baller in Aroldis Chapman just sitting in the bullpen.

The guy hasn’t let up a run yet and chances are any NL opponent won’t have much of a scouting report on him come playoff time.

Think K-Rod in 2002… think Adam Wainwright in 2006… think David Price shutting down the Red Sox inevitable comeback in 2008.

Each of those teams had a steady veteran who had more experience… and each of those managers went with the young kid and bang… each played in the World Series.

And two of them are Cy Young contenders this year. (OK, the other beat up an elderly man, but that’s not important.)

Use the talents properly.

Don’t make the mistake Spielberg made.