Joey's Soapbox: My 2019 Not-At-All Biased Wild Card Game Picks

It's Miller Time!  But are the Nationals going to shut down the Brew Crew's party?  (Ed Leyro/Studious Metsimus)

What's going on, everyone?  This is your favorite fearless forecaster, Joey Beartran.  And I don't know how effective I'll be picking other teams to win, especially since I'm still on a high from the Mets' season-ending walk-off victory.

Finishing ten games over .500 wasn't good enough to get the Mets into the playoffs, as they finished three games behind the Milwaukee Brewers for the second wild card.  But at least they're not the 93-win Cleveland Indians, who became a fringe playoff team themselves when they allowed the small-market Tampa Bay Rays and Oakland Athletics to beat them to the postseason party.

Speaking of fringe teams, the Philadelphia Phillies paid $330 million to Bryce Harper, who led them to the promised land of a .500 record.  That's over $100 million more than the Washington Nationals are offering Anthony Rendon, otherwise known as the player who was the real offensive leader of the Nats all these years.  And the player who could possibly be one of just 25 who can say they helped Washington advance in the postseason for the first time ever.

But will Washington finally celebrate something other than a division title or wild card berth?  Will Milwaukee continue to win one for the Yelich?  How about the Rays, who are making their first playoff appearance with a skipper not named Joe Maddon?  Or will the A's move on for the first time in five trips to the postseason under manager Bob Melvin?

I guess it's time for me to put on my thinking cap (or the hood from my Mets hoodie, since that's the only article of clothing I wear) and share my predictions for the American and National League Wild Card games.  And of course, there's no chance those picks will be biased.  Not at all.


National League Wild Card Game

Milwaukee Brewers vs. Washington Nationals

We all know the Nationals' history in the postseason.  Four appearances, four quick exits.  Meanwhile, every time the Brewers have qualified for the postseason since moving to the National League in 1998, they've won more playoff games than they did in their previous playoff appearance.  Milwaukee won one postseason game in 2008, then followed that up with five playoff victories in 2011.  Last year, the Brewers fell one win short of their second-ever trip to the World Series.

Both teams are hungry.  Milwaukee is hungry for a pennant, while Washington is hungry for their first-ever October champagne celebration (which is weird because how can a team be hungry for a liquid?)

Let's look at the pitching matchup, because as we all know, pitching wins Wild Card Game championships.

The Nationals will trot out Max Scherzer, whose seven-year, $210 million contract has produced zero postseason wins in three starts and one relief appearance.  Scherzer will also be pitching on six days rest, which usually helps a pitcher.  However, this season Scherzer made four starts on six or more days rest.  He won none of them, producing a 3.28 ERA in those well-rested appearances, which was nearly half a run higher than the 2.86 ERA he put up in his other 23 starts.

Milwaukee's starter will be Brandon Woodruff, who has a lifetime 1.46 ERA and 0.81 WHIP in four career postseason appearances.  Those numbers look good on paper.  You know what looks better on paper?  His 0.96 ERA and 0.70 lifetime WHIP against the Nationals in four appearances.  And I haven't even mentioned that he's struck out 23 Washingtonians while walking just two.  (Okay, maybe I just did.)

The face of a philosopher. (Getty Images)

And the pièce de résistance?  The next extra-base hit a Nationals player collects against Woodruff will be the first.  You read that right.  In his four appearances against Washington, Woodruff has faced 68 batters and has yet to allow an extra-base hit to any of them.

I believe it was the great former Mets shortstop Rafael Santana who once said, "Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it."  (I also believe my Studious Metsimus colleague is passing me a note saying that it was actually George Santayana who said this.  What does he know about famous quotes?)  With or without Bryce Harper, the Nationals will always be doomed to repeat their postseason failures.  Scherzer might be a future Hall of Famer, but 'Ol Blue Eye is not a future wild card game winner.  At least not until he signs with another team.

Prediction:  Milwaukee will advance to the NLDS.


American League Wild Card Game

Tampa Bay Rays vs. Oakland Athletics

So remember what I said about pitching winning championships?  Well, we're going to get some pitching in this game.  Unless things change, Oakland will be going with Sean Manaea, who made just five starts this season, but posted a 1.21 ERA and 0.78 WHIP in his September to remember.  Tampa will be going with All-Star Charlie Morton, who went 16-6 and struck out 240 batters in just 194.2 IP.  And if you recognize his name, it's probably because you recall how great he was for the Houston Astros in the 2017 World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, winning the seventh and deciding game to give Houston its first-ever championship.  In other words, he's got what it takes to pitch in a win-or-go-home game.

Manaea was great in September, but his last four starts were against the Detroit Tigers, Texas Rangers (twice) and Seattle Mariners.  Those three teams combined to finish 99 games under .500, meaning Jeurys Familia and Edwin Díaz could probably shut them down as well.

In addition, Tampa's lineup is as consistent as they come.  Nine players had 300 or more plate appearances.  Eight of those players had between 14 and 21 home runs.  (The one who didn't, Austin Meadows, hit 33 taters.)  No one on the Rays had as many as 90 RBI, but eight players drove in over 50 runs.  No player hit .300, but eight of the nine regulars hit over .250, and the one who didn't (Kevin Kiermaier) led the team in stolen bases.  How consistent were the Rays throughout the season?  They had 11 players with a bWAR of at least 2.0, but none with a WAR above 5.0.  And who is the one player worth exactly 5.0 WAR?  Why, it's wild card game starting pitcher Charlie Morton.

The game is in Oakland, but Tampa had the second-best road record in the majors at 48-33.  This team knows how to win on the road.  And their starting pitcher knows how to pitch when the team's season is on the line.

Touch 'em all, Travis.  (Scott Audette/AP)

Oh, and one more thing.  Travis d'Arnaud is on the Rays and he just had that breakout campaign (16 HR, 67 RBI in 92 games with Tampa Bay) we were told he'd have one day as a member of the Mets.  But in addition to his skills with the bat, d'Arnaud also made Charlie Morton better, as evidenced by the opponents' .202/.265/.361 slash line against Morton with d'Arnaud behind the plate.

The Coliseum hasn't seen a playoff victory in six years.  That streak isn't ending this year.  Right, Travis?

Prediction:  Tampa Bay will advance to the ALDS.

Studious Metsimus Presents The Happy/Crappy Recap For 2015

Another year has come and gone, Mets fans.  And for the first time since 2008, we're not saying goodbye to a year in which our favorite team had more losses than wins.  Does that mean this recap will be more happy than crappy?  Not exactly, especially if you've been following the goings-on in the National League East over the last few days.

The 2015 season began with Mets fans hoping the team would play their first-ever meaningful game in September at Citi Field and ended with the team playing their first-ever game in November in any of its three home stadiums.  In between, we saw new arrivals (Noah Syndergaard, Steven Matz, Michael Conforto), some departures (Kirk Nieuwenhuis left, came back and then left again) and some arrivals who departed with dignity and class (we hardly knew ye, Michael Cuddyer).

It was also the year Yoenis Cespedes gave us two memorable months and no one had any memory of Dillon Gee pitching for the team.  What else happened?  Let's see.  Daniel Murphy deep-sixed the Dodgers and Cubs.  Jeurys Familia became a lights-out closer who got lit up to close out the season.  Matt Harvey came back and then became the Pedro Martinez to Terry Collins's Grady Little in the World Series.  The Mets got no-hit by a player who had five career wins at the time and by another player who had two eye colors.  And oh yeah, there were three National League teams that had to supply with Mets with champagne and the extended use of the road clubhouse for party purposes.

Is that all?  Not exactly.  Here's more of what made us all happy in 2015 and what made us feel crappy.  As usual, let's all get happy first.

         
The Mets ripped off 11 consecutive victories in April, tying a franchise record.  When the streak began, New York was three games out of first place.  Eleven victories later, they led the N.L. East by 4½ games.  All 11 wins came at the expense of the Braves, Phillies and Marlins - teams that combined to go 201-285 during the 2015 campaign.  A non-believer in the Mets (let's call them Nationals fans) might say that anyone could have won that many games in a row against those three teams.  A believer (let's call them intelligent baseball fans) would say that one of the reasons Atlanta, Philadelphia and Miami had such poor records was because the Mets pounded them into oblivion early on, giving them no hope to be competitive for the remainder of the season.

Eric Campbell started more games at third base than David Wright.  Kevin Plawecki was behind the plate more times than Travis d'Arnaud.  The team's closer at the beginning of the season (Jenrry Mejia) was suspended not once, but twice, for the same drug.  Juan Lagares replaced his Gold Glove with one made of stone.  Michael Cuddyer reminded us of Jason Bay minus the concussion excuse.  Campbell, John Mayberry, Darrell Ceciliani, Danny Muno and Johnny Monell combined to have nearly 500 plate appearances.  And the Mets still won 90 games.  Just imagine what they could have done had they been healthy, made better decisions on which prescriptions to pick up at Walgreen's, and not been so dependent on Quadruple-A players.

Generation KO delivered a knockout blow every time one of its members took the mound.  Defending rookie of the year Jacob deGrom was better as a sophomore than he was as a Mets freshman.  Matt Harvey showed no ill effects from sitting out a year to recover from Tommy John surgery.  Noah Syndergaard was in character as Thor for the entire season, dropping the hammer on opposing hitters.  And Steven Matz made it back home, bringing his exuberant Grandpa Bert along for the ride to cheer him on after every victory.

The Mets entered uncharted waters in late July when Sandy Alderson decided to be a buyer at the trade deadline for the first time in his five-year tenure as the team's general manager.  First, he brought in Kelly Johnson and Juan Uribe to be super subs.  Then he was hip to be square, deciding to keep the emotional Wilmer Flores, while balking at Carlos Gomez and his medical records.  Finally, as the clock approached midnight in Moscow (that's 4:00pm in the Eastern Time Zone) on July 31, the cold war being staged between Alderson and rival general managers reached a truce when Tigers G.M. Dave Dombrowski agreed to trade Yoenis Cespedes to the Mets for top pitching prospect Michael Fulmer and Luis Cessa.  The stage had been set for a magical summer at Citi Field.

Once the Mets swept the Nationals at a raucous Citi Field, then repeated the feat at Nationals Park a month later, it was a foregone conclusion that the Mets were going to win the N.L. East crown for only the sixth time in franchise history.  And when Daniel Murphy put the team on his shoulders in the division series and league championship series, the Mets played their way to an improbable pennant.

And that's when things got crappy...

The Kansas City Royals remembered all too well how close they came to winning it all in 2014.  This time, they would make sure no Mets lead was safe.  And in fact, the Mets led in all five World Series games and had the lead going to the eighth inning in four of the five contests.  But through poor fielding, a lack of hitting in the late innings and Jeurys Familia doing something completely un-Familia-r (blowing late leads), the Mets couldn't ride their October momentum to a World Series championship.

And once they lost Game Five on November 1, the dominoes started to fall.  Jon Niese was traded to Pittsburgh for Neil Walker.  Wilmer Flores lost his starting job to Asdrubal Cabrera, who had a Wilmer Flores-type season at the plate in 2015 but is six years older and is costing the Mets an extra eight million dollars-plus in 2016.  But hey, at least Bartolo Colon is back to provide comic relief at the plate.

Speaking of walking up to the plate, who will replace Murphy and Cespedes's production in 2016?  With Murphy gone to the Nationals and Cespedes gone fishing for a new team, the Mets have lost the man who tied for the team lead in RBI in 2015 (Murphy) and the neon-sleeved savior who made everyone forget about Eric Campbell and his clueless cohorts.  Will Walker and Cabrera be able to replace them in the hearts of Mets fans, and more importantly, in the stat sheets of those same fans?

Finally, the Mets acquired Alejandro De Aza to platoon with Lagares in center field.  Maybe Sandy Alderson goofed and thought De Aza's last name began with a lower case D and wanted to corner the market on similarly named players (he already has d'Arnaud and deGrom on the team).  But other than the fact that De Aza was probably cheaper than Denard Span, Gerardo Parra or Max Venable and was more likely to sign a one-year deal, why the fudge was he the guy targeted to be Lagares's platoon partner?  De Aza's dWAR hasn't been above zero since 2011 and he's started a total of 13 games in center field since the end of the 2013 season, or eight more games than Darrell Ceciliani started in center for the Mets last year alone and a baker's dozen more than you and I started.

I hope Sandy Alderson knows something we don't.  Then again, in 2015, he had all the right answers to all the question marks surrounding the team, even if he had to cough and clear his throat ten times before uttering each answer.

And there you have it, Mets fans.  You now know what was happy about 2015 and what was crappy about it.  Then again, if you've been following the Mets as carefully as the Studious Metsimus staff has over the past few years, you probably didn't need a 2,000-word blog post to tell you something you already knew.

One thing you may not have known is that our staff is heavily inspired by other Mets blogs.  And as we do every year, we'd like to give a shout-out to those sites in appreciation of their hard work and to thank them for not using a teddy bear as a roving reporter/culinary expert.  We'd like to think we've cornered the market with that.  So give a hand and show your support to each of the following Mets sites: A Gal For All Seasons, Faith and Fear in Flushing, Mets Merized Online, MetsMinors.Net, Amazin' Avenue, Metstradamus, Remembering Shea, The Daily Stache, Mets360, Rising Apple, Kranepool Society, Mets Police, MetSilverman, Converted Mets Fan and Mets Daddy.

On that note, we'd like to wish you the happiest of holiday seasons.  And by "we", we're talking about Ed Leyro (that's the guy pushing the word count of this post up near Bartolo Colon's cholesterol level), Joey Beartran (the aforementioned roving reporter/culinary expert), Iggy Beartran (your source for all things related to Cole Hamels) and Taryn "The Coop" Cooper (she's just here so she won't get fined).

And remember, Mets fans, if you see a team celebrating on an opposing team's field after recording the final out of the game, it doesn't always have to be Chris Heston or Max Scherzer celebrating a no-hitter.  Nor does it have to be the Kansas City Royals whooping it up as a World Series winner for the first time in 30 years.  Sometimes it might be a team decked in blue and orange celebrating a division title, division series victory or perhaps even a pennant.

Thanks so much for your support!  See you next year!

See, players celebrating on the field sometimes ARE the Mets.

An Open Letter To Those Who Don't Like Jon Niese

Photo by Anthony Causi/NY Post

Dear Mets fans,

I've been a Mets supporter for 34 years, investing my time - and occasional money - in the team since the year after the magic was supposedly back (it wasn't).  In those three and a half decades, I've seen hundreds of players come and go.  Some of these players have been universally beloved by the fans, while others are married to Mrs. Armando Benitez.

While some of the vitriol dished out to those less fortunate players has been well-deserved, others have received the hate for reasons unknown.  One such player is Jonathon Joseph Niese.

Was Niese voted "Mr. Personality" in his high school yearbook?  Probably not.  Is he a "rah-rah" type of guy?  Not that I've ever seen.  Does he have a cool super-hero nickname like Matt Harvey?  Only if you consider Super Schnoz to be a sweet moniker.

Are these reasons for Mets fans to dislike Niese as much as they do?  Not at all.  But somehow, in seven-plus seasons as a Met, the 28-year-old southpaw has never been a fan-favorite.  And he's done nothing to make this happen other than be a serviceable pitcher.

Jon Niese is not paid like an ace, so no one should expect him to pitch like one.  But for several years, he's pitched better than an average pitcher.

Since 2012, Niese has a 30-28 record for a team that has finished below .500 in each season.  He has made 85 starts in the last three-plus seasons, posting a 3.47 ERA.  Of all the pitchers who have made that many starts since the start of the 2012 campaign, only 18 have posted a lower ERA, including Clayton Kershaw, Felix Hernandez, David Price, Adam Wainwright, Madison Bumgarner and Max Scherzer - all of whom are considered to be among the best pitchers in baseball.  In addition, 16 of those 18 hurlers have made at least one All-Star team in that time frame, with the two exceptions being Kyle Lohse (3.34 ERA) and Hiroki Kuroda (3.44 ERA).

Going back to August 2012, Niese has also allowed three earned or fewer in 55 of his last 63 starts.  That's just eight starts where Niese gave up four earned runs or more in two and a half seasons, which is amazing when you consider that last year alone, Madison Bumgarner had ten such games and Max Scherzer had nine.  You may know Bumgarner as the most recent World Series most valuable player and Scherzer as the $210 million man.

But those who don't like Niese fail to notice things like that.  Instead, they look at how he gets rattled when his teammates make errors behind him, thereby forcing Niese to record extra outs.  Well, guess what?  That happens to most pitchers!

Including the two unearned runs allowed in Friday night's loss to the Braves, Niese has allowed 25 such runs since 2012.  That's fewer than the number of unearned runs allowed by Stephen Strasburg (30 unearned tallies), Jon Lester (28) and R.A. Dickey (27) over the same time period.  And all three of those pitchers made All-Star teams since 2012 as well.

Finally, for those who are sabermetrically inclined, Niese has a 104 ERA+ over the last three-plus seasons.  Those are pretty solid numbers for a pitcher who, for some reason, is a disappointment to so many fans.  That's also better than the ERA+ posted by Tim Hudson (101 ERA+ since 2012), Matt Cain (100 ERA+) and Scott Kazmir (100 ERA+).  And you guessed it.  Hudson, Cain and Kazmir have all been All-Stars in that time period, with Cain starting the 2012 Midsummer Classic and Hudson and Kazmir both selected for last year's game.

Jon Niese has never blown hitters away, but he still has the ninth-most strikeouts in franchise history.  The eight pitchers ahead of him are a who's who of the greatest Mets pitchers of all-time.  Tom Seaver, Dwight Gooden, Jerry Koosman, Sid Fernandez, David Cone, Ron Darling, Al Leiter and Jon Matlack are the only hurlers in club annals who can claim more whiffs than Niese - a fact that still doesn't get Niese a whiff of respect.

When the Mets were in the midst of their second consecutive late-season collapse in 2008, one of their own pitched eight shutout innings to temporarily halt the bleeding in a mid-September victory over the Braves.  Who was that clutch pitcher?  That was Jonathon Joseph Niese.  But because the Mets didn't make the playoffs, Niese's effort was largely forgotten.

In 1969, Tom Seaver had one of the greatest pitching performances in team history, retiring the first 25 batters he faced in a crucial matchup against the Chicago Cubs before allowing a single to Jimmy Qualls.  He then retired the final two batters and settled for a one-hit shutout.  Forty-four years later, Matt Harvey had his bid for a perfect game broken up on an infield single by Alex Rios of the Chicago White Sox.  The seventh inning roller was the only base runner allowed by Harvey in his nine innings of work - a game won by the Mets in ten innings.  Seaver and Harvey are two of the three pitchers in Mets history to pitch nine innings and allow just one base runner in a single game, facing 28 batters to record 27 outs.  Who was the third?  That would be Jonathon Joseph Niese, who allowed just a third-inning double to the Padres' Chris Denorfia in June 2010.  The two-bagger was all that stood between Niese and a perfect game.

Jon Niese was almost perfect once, even if fans don't have an almost perfect recollection of that game.

People who weren't around in 1969 are constantly reminded of Seaver's imperfect game, just as current Mets fans remember Harvey's gem as if it were yesterday.  But hardly anyone - other than those who were in attendance at Citi Field for the second game of a day-night doubleheader on a chilly June evening in 2010 - can recall Niese's effort.  Perhaps it's because he has never been a must-watch pitcher the way Seaver was and Harvey is.  Or perhaps it's because no one wants to admit that Niese actually accomplished such a rare feat.

Jon Niese came up late in the 2008 season and was immediately thrust into a playoff race.  He has yet to play in a meaningful late-season game since.  That means he doesn't have the big-game experience that fellow southpaws (and more treasured former Mets) Jerry Koosman, Jon Matlack, Sid Fernandez and Al Leiter have.  Perhaps that's another reason why Niese isn't appreciated, even though he ranks just behind all four of those pitchers on the team's all-time ranks for left-handed starting pitchers.

You may think he's boring.  You may also think he doesn't have charisma, talent and various other intangibles.  But what you should really do is reconsider your opinions about Jon Niese, especially when you weigh the facts and realize how much better he's been than what you may have thought.

Since signing his team-friendly five-year, $25.5 million contract at the outset of the 2012 campaign, Niese has performed as well as - if not better than - several All-Star pitchers.  Niese has suffered some nagging injuries over the years, but has still made at least 24 starts in every season since 2010, making him one of only 32 pitchers who has made 24 or more starts in each of the last five campaigns.  In fact, Niese is one of just a dozen pitchers in Mets history to make two dozen starts in five separate seasons.  And if Niese reaches 24 starts in 2015, he'd be one of nine Mets pitchers to reach that total six times.

So what does everybody want from Niese?  He's not Matt Harvey.  He's not someone who's going to strike out 10 or more batters every game.  And he's not going to pitch a shutout all the time.  What Niese will do is keep his team in the game more often than not.  He will also keep opposing teams from putting up crooked numbers on the scoreboard.  And he's not making the money that a perennial All-Star makes.  But no matter what he does, it will never be good enough for Mets fans.

I'm sure many teams would love to have a pitcher of Jonathon Niese's caliber.  And I'd bet fans of those teams wouldn't pick apart everything he does on the mound the way Mets fans do.  Jon Niese will never be the best pitcher on the team.  But he doesn't have to be.  He just has to pitch the way he has over the past three-plus seasons.  And that's probably better than what his haters deserve.

Sincerely,
A Jon Niese appreciator

It's a crying shame that Mets fans don't appreciate Jon Niese more.

Joey's Soapbox: My Confusing 2012 World Series Pick

Hello, everyone.  I'm Joey Beartran and I'm one confused bear.  You see, I had the Cardinals playing the Tigers in the World Series, with St. Louis winning it all.  Although the Yankees obliged by playing dead in front of the Tigers, the Giants did not, winning the final three games of the NLCS to advance to the Fall Classic.

As a result, we're getting our first-ever Tigers-Giants World Series matchup. The two teams have met in four interleague series over the past decade, with the Giants holding a 7-5 edge in their 12 games, although the Tigers have won two of their last three series against San Francisco.

There is no bad blood between the two teams and no hatred between the two cities.  Basically, there's a whole lot of nothing going on, which does not make things easier for me to make my World Series pick.  But since I am Studious Metsimus' resident postseason prognosticator, I suppose I have a job to do.  Here goes (you guessed it) nothing.


World Series


Detroit Tigers vs. San Francisco Giants

As I stated before, there is no connection between the two cities in any sport.  San Francisco doesn't have a hockey team.  The Golden State Warriors play on the other side of the San Francisco Bay.  And the Detroit Lions have only defeated the San Francisco 49ers once in the last quarter century, losing 14 of their last 15 meetings since 1985.  That's not a rivalry.  And neither is Tigers-Giants.

Who would be happy if the Tigers won the World Series?  Kirk Gibson?  Ted Nugent?  Madonna?  Eminem?  Axel Foley?  Magnum P.I.?  Tony the Tiger?  (He would think a Tigers victory would be "grrrrrrrrrreat"!)

If San Francisco won its second title in three years, who would celebrate?  Joe Montana?  Keith Hernandez?  Tony Bennett?  Metallica?  Brian Wilson's beard?

Ha!  You thought this would be a photo of Brian Wilson's beard.  Well, it is Brian Wilson, but before he grew the beard.

Neither team has signature fans.  It's not like the Mets with Jerry Seinfeld, Matthew Broderick, Tim Robbins and Snooki.  In this year's World Series, you'll probably see celebrities in the stands who have no rooting interest in either team.  They'll just show up for five innings and conveniently mug for the cameras that always seem to find them.  Or better yet, if they're on a FOX television show, they'll get to be living, breathing, hot-dog munching advertisements for the shows they're on.

Am I rambling?  You bet your Billy Wagner bobblehead I am!  I'm stalling for time because I have no idea who to root for.

On the one paw, there's the Tigers, who have a strong starting rotation and fearsome middle-of-the-order.  With Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer, the Tigers have three brown eyes, one blue eye and two big-time strikeout pitchers.  And who can match the Tigers' one-two punch of Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder, who combined to hit .322 with 73 doubles, 74 HR and 247 RBI during the regular season.  Not only were both hitters extremely productive, they were also durable, with Fielder playing in all 162 games and Cabrera missing only one game.  Great starting pitching and great hitting goes a long way in the playoffs.

On the other paw, there's the Giants, who also have great starting pitching, a lineup that produces in the clutch, and ten million former Mets.  No, really.  I'm not exaggerating.

San Francisco took an entire team from New York in 1958.  Fifty-four years later, they settled for just a few ex-Mets.

Angel Pagan (a Met from 2008-2011) is the Giants' leadoff hitter and starting centerfielder.  Marco Scutaro (a Met in 2002 and 2003) just won the NLCS MVP Award by hitting .500 in the seven-game series against the Cardinals and playing a steady second base.  Joaquin Arias (a Met for 15 seconds in 2010) has done well off the bench, hitting .375 in the postseason with two doubles.  Even Xavier Nady (a Met for not enough time in 2006) is a Giant.  Okay, so not every ex-Met has done well in the playoffs for the Giants.  I'm talking about Guillermo Mota (a Met in 2006 and 2007), who has allowed four runs on six hits in 1⅔ innings.  But Mets fans would rather forget about Mota, especially ones who remember the Mike Piazza spring training incident when Mota was a Dodger.

So we have the Tigers in one dugout and the Giants on the other.  Both teams have great starting pitching.  The Giants have better relievers.  The Tigers have the big boppers.  The Giants have the most former Mets.  Decisions, decisions.  Which team should I take?  Hmmm...

By the power of Grayskull, I think I've got it!

Prediction:  The World Series will go 7 games and someone will win.


There, that wasn't so hard now, was it?  I didn't want to pick San Francisco because then Ted Nugent would shoot me and claim it was because I was a wild bear.  I didn't want to pick Detroit because James Hetfield and the rest of the guys from Metallica would chase me into Brian Wilson's beard, a place where bears check in, but they don't check out.  So I'll just say the World Series will go the distance and it'll be a fun, competitive series where both teams will fight to the very last pitch.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm about to get ready to watch the Fall Classic with a friend who you might say has a rooting interest.  Maybe it's a good thing I didn't pick Detroit to win it all or else I'd never get the remote control back.  Enjoy the series, everyone!

Lou Seal can have the remote.  I'll keep my paws on the chocolate and corn chips.