Road Birds Win One-Game Baseball Playoffs

After grinding it out for a long, 162-game regular season, two of the wild card baseball teams found themselves suddenly booted out of the playoffs after losing the one and only game they had against their opponent.  The Texas Rangers, last year's American League champion, and the Atlanta Braves, the team in the National League that I was pulling for the most, lost their respective games to the Baltimore Orioles and the St. Louis Cardinals.  So now I am left with trying to decide who to root for on the National side.  I think I'll pick the San Francisco Giants, who begin their series against the Cincinnati Reds today.  And my second choice will be the Washington Nationals, who are still trying for their first World Series appearance going back throughout the franchise's years as the Montreal Expos. They will be playing against last year's Series champs the Cardinals.

On the American side, my New York Yankees are going on strong and will begin their series against those Orioles tomorrow.  Meanwhile, the surprising Oakland Athletics will face off against the Detroit Tigers.  I like the Athletics here.

I am looking at potential World Series match-ups and see a few interesting possibilities:

New York Yankees vs. Cincinnati Reds: rematch of the 1976 Series swept by the Reds.

New York Yankees vs. San Francisco Giants: rematch of the 1962 series won by NY in seven games.  Also, the Giants, formerly in New York, have a Series history against the Yanks.

New York Yankees vs. St. Louis Cardinals: the Cards won an exciting seven-game series in 1964 against the Bronx Bombers, after which the Yanks hired the victors' manager and then went into an instant decline, not returning to the World Series until 1976.

Baltimore Orioles vs. St. Louis Cardinals: battle of the bird teams.

Baltimore Orioles vs. Cincinnati Reds: rematch of the 1971 Series convincingly won by Baltimore in five games.

Baltimore Orioles vs. Washington Nationals: the I-95 Series, just a short drive down this road connects these two cities.

Detroit  Tigers vs. St. Louis Cardinals: rematch of the 1968 Series won by Detroit in seven.

Oakland Athletics vs. Cincinnati Reds: this would be the "rubber" rematch series between the two, with Oakland winning 4-3 in 1972 and Cincy winning 4-0 in 1990.

Oakland Athletics vs. San Francisco Giants: another match-up between two close teams, this time separated by a bay.