The 2009 Playoff Preview : April 14th Edition

With the 2009 Major League Baseball Season now over, I present Rational Mets Musings' 2009 Playoff Preview. I'm a tad surprised about which teams survived the 7 or 8 game grind (depending on the unbalanced schedule), but these matchups are intriguing and should be classic.

American League-

Kansas City @ Toronto

Baltimore @ Seattle

National League-

Florida @ St. Louis

Atlanta @ San Diego

.......First, try to get over the fact that the Red Sox (Beckett was never the same after the brawl), Rays (year after effect), Yankees (CC ate too many burgers and Wang retired after 2 bad starts), Angels (Torii Hunter forgot how to play CF), Phillies (Lidge blew too many saves), Mets, (Reyes didn't hit any triples this year) Cubs (Piniella threw a base in disgust and broke Rich Harden's arm) and Dodgers (Torre didn't utilize the bullpen enough) will all be watching the 2nd season from home. Now, Rational Mets Musings' LCS and World Series Picks:

LCS-

Kansas City OVER Baltimore

San Diego OVER Florida

World Series-

San Diego over Kansas City

......................................................And now, we return to reality............................................................

It's incredible how every year, people react to the first week of baseball as if it's the last. The 1986 Mets started 2-3, the 1998 Yankees started 0-3. Those teams ended up doing OK. The last few losses for the Mets have been disgusting. Not because the team lacked fire, or because the bullpen failed, or because they didn't score, or because the starting pitching crashed and burned. None of that happened. They lost one game because an inexperienced Left Fielder dropped a fly ball in the sun, and another because an experienced Right Fielder dropped a fly ball and a pitcher flinched. If Murphy catches that ball, and Felciano doesn't flinch, the Mets are 5-2, not 3-4. They'd be on their way to the Canyon of Heroes instead of the Pit of Doom.

It could be worse. The Mets could've lost 15-5 last night in Tampa.