by Julian Spivey NBA All-Star voting has been underway for about two weeks now on NBA.com and the NBA app allowing fans a chance to help get their favorite players and the league’s best players into the starting lineup of the midseason celebration, which is returning to the classic Eastern Conference vs. Western Conference format in 2024. Fans may vote once daily between now and Saturday, Jan. 20 but there are a few days during the vote that will count for three times as many votes. The remaining days where your vote will count for three times the number are Friday, Jan. 5, Friday, Jan. 12, Monday, Jan. 15 and Friday, Jan. 19. The starters for the 73rd annual NBA All-Star game will be revealed on TNT on Thursday, Jan. 25 during tip-off of that night’s national broadcast. The 2024 All-Star Game will be held on Sunday, February 18 at 7 p.m. from Gainbridge Fieldhouse, the home of the Indiana Pacers in Indianapolis. That game will be broadcast on TNT. I recently filled out my first ballot for the 2024 NBA All-Star Game and will now reveal my selections. Eastern Conference: Frontcourt: Joel Embiid (Philadelphia 76ers) The NBA’s reigning MVP Joel Embiid is an obvious pick as he may very well be working on his second consecutive MVP award. Embiid is currently leading the league with 34.8 points per game and is fifth in the league with 11.8 rebounds per game. Embiid’s 76ers are currently third in the East with a 23-10 record and are three games behind the Boston Celtics for first place. Giannis Antetokounmpo (Milwaukee Bucks) Former two-time league MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo is once again putting up massive numbers for the Milwaukee Bucks, whom he’s helped to lead to a 24-10 record thus far to rank second in the East, 2.5 games behind the Celtics. Antetokounmpo’s 30.9 points per game are fourth in the league and his sixth in the league in rebounding with 11.3 per game. Jaylen Brown (Boston Celtics) The Boston Celtics have pretty much been the best team in the Eastern Conference all season thus far and have two players who are certain to be All-Stars in Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. Tatum has the better overall numbers this season, as is usual, with 27 points per game (10th in the league) and 8.5 rebounds but the way he consistently falls asleep in the postseason for his team has kind of led to me not believing in him or respecting him so I’ll give my vote to his teammate Jaylen Brown, who is averaging 22.7 points per game this season with 5.1 rebounds per game and 3.6 assists per game. Admittedly, Tatum deserves the spot more based on his numbers, but this is an exhibition game created solely for the pleasure of the fans and this fan would rather see Brown get this starting nod. Backcourt: If you’re looking at overall numbers for your All-Star ballot then your best option of any of the backcourt players in the East is Atlanta Hawks point guard Trae Young with his 28.2 points per game and 11.3 assists per game. But if you look at the standings and see the Hawks are currently in 10th place maybe you’d rather give a starting nod to someone on a winning team at the moment. Young can be a reserve. Tyrese Haliburton (Indiana Pacers) One of the league’s breakout players this season has been Indiana Pacers point guard Tyrese Haliburton, who leads the league with 12.7 assists per game while also scoring 24.7 points per game. He led the Pacers to the championship game of the in-season tournament if that means anything to you and it would also be terrific fan service for Pacers fans to have one of their own in the East starting lineup for the midseason celebration – so Haliburton is on my ballot. There are so many good options for starting backcourt in the East right now with Young, Damian Lillard, Donovan Mitchell and Jalen Brunson that not only are really good players going to miss out on the starting lineup but most likely the All-Star game altogether. Tyrese Maxey (Philadelphia 76ers) I was tempted to vote for Mitchell of the Cleveland Cavaliers here because his numbers are both very good and similar to those of Maxey and it would’ve made for five different starters from five different teams, which is always nice for the fans of those respective teams, but I feel like Maxey has been such a surprising and standout option for the 76ers that he deserved this opportunity a bit more. After all, Maxey has never made an All-Star team and Mitchell has made a handful. Maxey is averaging 25.9 points per game this season with 6.4 assists per game. Western Conference: Frontcourt: LeBron James (Los Angeles Lakers) You honestly didn’t think he wasn’t going to be here, did you? It’s amazing the kind of impact the man, who recently turned 39 years old, is still having on the league. He’s still in the top 20 in scoring with 25.4 points per game, he’s top 10 in assists per game at 7.4 and manages 7.4 rebounds per game, which is more than potential All-Star caliber centers in the league like Kristaps Porzingis and Myles Turner. Yes, the Lakers have been quite the enigma this season looking at times like the best in the league by winning the in-season tournament with a perfect record and then also looking like a team that might not make the postseason with their current record of 17-17 having them as the 10th place team in the West but James is still the face of the game and must be front-and-center at the All-Star game. Nikola Jokic (Denver Nuggets) Many people, including myself, view Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic as the current No. 1 player in the league and with him averaging 25.7 points per game (14th in the league), while also being top five in the game in rebounding (12.3) and assists (9.1) it’s hard to pick against him. Jokic is also the best player on the league’s reigning champion and has the team currently only one game behind the surprising Minnesota Timberwolves as the best team in the West. He’s a lock to start. Kevin Durant (Phoenix Suns) The Phoenix Suns have undoubtedly been a disappointment this season, especially given the fact that they should’ve been considered the favorite to win the Western Conference, but some injury issues have led to the team’s big three (Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal) almost spending no time on the court together. Durant has been Phoenix’s constant this season averaging 29.9 points per game (6th in the league), along with 6.3 rebounds per game and 6 assists per game. Backcourt: Stephen Curry is my favorite player in the NBA and a huge reason for my getting back into the game I had faded away a bit from during my college years and statistically, he’s having a good season – leading the league in three-pointers made per game and in the top-10 in scoring but I have to be a bit more objective here. Curry can come off the bench this time. Luka Doncic (Dallas Mavericks) Luka Doncic is the leading scorer in the Western Conference thus far this season (second in the NBA) with 33.4 points per game and he’s third in the league in assists with 9.4 per game. He also pulls down 8.3 rebounds per game – pretty impressive for a point guard. His team is also three games better at this point than Curry’s so it makes it a slightly easier pick. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (Oklahoma City Thunder) So, most fans should know the name Shai Gilgeous-Alexander by now but because he plays in a small market like Oklahoma City and Thunder haven’t been all that great for most of his tenure in the league thus far maybe some haven’t gotten to know him just yet. But he’s led his Thunder team to the second-best record at the moment in the West at 23-10 and is averaging 31.4 points per game, which is third in the league. He’s also averaging 6.4 assists per game and 5.9 rebounds per game. He might not have the star power to get a starting spot over say Stephen Curry just yet but he certainly deserves a spot in the West’s starting five.
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by Julian Spivey Team of the Year: Denver Nuggets When I’m looking to crown a Team of the Year I’m not just looking for a champion but one that was great for pretty much the entire season of its respective sport and one that feels cohesive, like if you removed a certain piece the team just wouldn’t be the same. For me, that team in 2023 was the NBA champion Denver Nuggets. The Nuggets went 53-29 during the 2022-23 NBA season on the way to clinching the top seed in the Western Conference playoff for the first time in franchise history. Led by two-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic along with stellar point guard Jamal Murray, who had missed the previous season due to injury, and a collection of nice team players like Aaron Gordon, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Michael Porter Jr., Bruce Brown, Jeff Green and more the Nuggets went through the Minnesota Timberwolves, Phoenix Suns and Los Angeles Lakers on their way to the NBA Finals where they would defeat the Miami Heat in five games. The Nuggets were the NBA’s best from start to finish in the season and deserve to be honored as the Team of the Year in sports as a result. Athlete of the Year: Shohei Ohtani There are a lot of athletes, as in any year, who could deserve the title of Athlete of the Year. In my opinion, Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes led his team to a second Super Bowl title in his tenure with the team and is the best player in the NFL. Atlanta Braves outfielder Ronald Acuna Jr. had a season unlike any other player in Major League Baseball history stealing more than 70 bases and hitting more than 40 home runs on his way to winning National League MVP. Nikola Jokic led his Denver Nuggets to its first NBA title in franchise history while averaging nearly a triple-double per night and Max Verstappen has had the greatest season in Formula 1 history with a record 19 wins (in a 22-race season) clinching his third consecutive championship. But my athlete of the year is a guy who continues to be the most unique athlete in all of sports because he can do it all on the baseball field – an MVP hitter and an All-Star pitcher. It’s the absolute unicorn known as Shohei Ohtani of MLB’s Los Angeles Angels. Ohtani hit .304 with 44 home runs and 95 RBI for the Angels this year while going 10-5 on the mound with a 3.14 ERA and 167 strikeouts in 23 games started. These numbers are massive but especially so because Ohtani missed the last month of the season due to injury. Ohtani then finished 2023 off by becoming the most coveted free agent in the history of Major League Baseball and signed a historical (money-wise and how that money is to be deferred) 10-year, $700 million contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers. Coach of the Year: Bruce Bochy My Coach of the Year honor is usually going to go to a man or woman who helped lead their team to a championship, but also not usually a coach that was expected to do so – so that eliminates coaches like Andy Reid of the Kansas City Chiefs and Kirby Smart of the University of Georgia Bulldogs college football champions. If there’s a good story behind the coach's success, like leading a team that wasn’t expected to win a title to a title, it certainly helps their case. For me, the Coach of the Year in 2023 is an obvious choice. It’s Bruce Bochy of the Texas Rangers. Bochy was going to be a future Hall of Fame manager already having led the San Francisco Giants to three World Series titles in Major League Baseball in the early 2010s but his greatest coaching achievement was likely in 2023 when he came out of retirement, something I certainly didn’t expect, to take over as skipper of the Rangers, a team that lost more than 100 games two years ago and over 90 games last season. Bochy led the Rangers team featuring power hitters like Corey Seager, Adolis Garcia and Marcus Semien all having All-Star years to a 90-72 record and an American League Wild Card berth. The Rangers were the hottest team throughout the entire MLB Postseason and claimed the first championship in franchise history with a World Series win over the National League champion Arizona Diamondbacks in early November. Coming out of retirement to immediately lead a team that had been perennially near the bottom of the league to its first-ever championship made Bochy the easy choice for Coach of the Year. Game of the Year: World Series Game One I always find Game of the Year to be the hardest of these end-of-the-year sports honors to decide on because there are so many great games and events throughout the year that it is hard to keep up with and, if you’ve ever Googled looking for such things, it’s something the Internet doesn’t do a great job of keeping up with either. The bigger the event the easier it is to stand out in your mind so the two that I really thought to decide between were Super Bowl LVII between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles and Game One of the World Series between the Texas Rangers and Arizona Diamondbacks. I understand many would go with Super Bowl LVII, which was admittedly an all-timer with the Chiefs coming back from being down 27-21 after three quarters and winning the game on a field goal in the finals seconds but I have an admitted bias toward baseball and Game One of the World Series was one of the greatest World Series games and finishes I’ve ever seen. The Diamondbacks led 5-3 going into the bottom of the ninth inning when the home team Rangers tied the game up on an absolute blast by All-Star shortstop Corey Seager off Diamondbacks closer Paul Sewald, who hadn’t given up a run the entire postseason, to force extra innings. Then on a 3-1 count in the bottom of the eleventh inning, Rangers outfielder Adolis Garcia, who may have had the greatest offensive postseason in baseball history, won the game on a walk-off home run to set the MLB record for most RBI in a single postseason at 22. It was a thrilling comeback and win for the Rangers, who would go on to win the first championship in franchise history in five games. Media Personality of the Year: Dale Earnhardt Jr. There is no one in sports broadcasting right now who does as good at being knowledgeable about the sport they cover – current and past – while bringing forth as much excitement as they do without also being annoying as Dale Earnhardt Jr. on NBC Sports’ NASCAR coverage. Most easily excitable broadcasters I find to be at least somewhat annoying, but there’s something about Earnhardt’s personality, which has a homespun without deviating into a “Hee Haw, aw shucks” aspect like his Fox Sports counterpart Clint Bowyer, who’s the worst in the NASCAR broadcasting at the moment, which comes off as friendly and ingratiating. Earnhardt has also always been a lifelong fan of the sport, as his dad was one of its all-time legends, he is adept at bringing forth knowledge from past eras, not just the modern era or the one he competed in himself. The only issue I take with Earnhardt’s broadcasting is that I wish NBC would mandate or he would take it upon himself to undergo some grammatical lessons to correct some of the frequent mistakes he makes on the mic. Rule of the Year: MLB Adds Pitch Clock This is the part of my annual sports awards where I would discuss the Play of the Year but this year I’m switching it up to discuss something I’ve never done before – a Rule of the Year. There were a lot of baseball fans up in arms – and there are still some and likely always will be – when Major League Baseball announced it would be bringing a pitch clock into the sport for the 2023 season. I was a fan of the addition of a pitch clock from the start. The average length of MLB games had gotten over three hours with many going three and a half and longer. I never would have given up on the sport I love due to the length of the game but I worried that it would lead to younger audiences continuing to tune out, and I also believe a quicker pace would lead to more excitement – after all, games back in the day used to be under three hours and weren’t boring. The pitch clock in MLB in 2023 went smoother than I ever could have imagined and had an immediate impact on the game with the average time of play being two hours and 40 minutes, a whopping 24-minute drop off from the season before. If any fan tells you the 2023 season was less exciting than the seasons before because it was nearly a half-hour shorter they’re simply delusional. Legend of the Year: Megan Rapinoe As with every year in sports, several legends called it quits in 2023. A few notable ones include potentially the greatest NFL player of all time Tom Brady, future first-ballot baseball hall of famer Miguel Cabrera and NASCAR legend Kevin Harvick. But I don’t think any sports figure had as much of an impact on their sport, especially going into the future as United States women’s soccer legend Megan Rapinoe. Now, there are certainly higher-ranking figures in their respective sports who retired this year – I already mentioned Brady – but Rapinoe’s impact on fair pay within women’s soccer, especially when over the last couple of decades-plus the U.S. women’s team has been better than the men’s team, was a huge boost to the sport. Rapinoe’s role, along with her teammates, in getting pay equity for women’s players in the U.S. will be her lasting impact but she was also one of the greatest to ever grace the pitch helping the U.S. women’s team win two World Cup titles (2015 and 2019) and an Olympic Gold Medal (2012), while also winning Ballon d’or Feminin in 2019 as the best women’s player in the world and FIFA’s Best Women’s Player that same year. Off the field, Rapinoe has also been a role model for the LGBTQ+ community and youth. by Eric Fulton The 2023 college football regular season has come to an end. Conference champions have been crowned. Individual awards have been decided. Now it is time for bowl season. There will be 43 games played between December 16th through the National Championship game on January 8th. The majority of fans will not have a chance to watch every single game of bowl season, so here are a few bowl games you should mark on your calendars as “can’t miss.” Honorable Mentions: Goodyear Cotton Bowl: Missouri (No. 9) vs. Ohio State (No. 7) December 29 at AT&T Stadium – Arlington, Texas 7:00 PM CST on ESPN Tony the Tiger Bowl: Oregon State (No. 19) vs. Notre Dame (No. 16) December 29 at Sun Bowl – El Paso, Texas 1:00 PM CST on CBS Vrbo Fiesta Bowl: Liberty (No. 23) vs. Oregon (No 8) January 1 at State Farm Stadium – Glendale, Ariz. noon CST on ESPN Now here are my top five games to watch: 5. Valero Alamo Bowl: Arizona (No. 14) vs. Oklahoma December 28 at Alamodome – San Antonio, Texas 8:15 PM CST on ESPN The matchup between the Wildcats and Sooners is the only non-New Year’s Six bowl game that made the list because of the potential to be a very high-scoring affair. Arizona averaged 34 points per game in the regular season while Oklahoma averaged 43 points per game. The Alamo Bowl has produced some great games in the past and this year’s game should be no different. 4. Chick-Fil-A Peach Bowl: Ole Miss (No. 11) vs. Penn State (No. 10) December 30 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium – Atlanta 11:00 AM CST on ESPN If two teams in college football mirrored each other to nearly a T this season, it would be Ole Miss and Penn State. Both teams won 10 games in the regular season. While there are similarities between the two teams, the key matchup will be Ole Miss’s high-powered offense versus Penn State’s tough defense. Who will have the better day when it comes to strength versus strength? 3. Allstate Sugar Bowl: Texas (No. 3) vs. Washington (No. 2) January 1 at Caesars Superdome – New Orleans 7:45 PM CST on ESPN - College Football Playoff Semifinal A matchup between the Pac-12 champion and the Big 12 champion should be exciting in the Big Easy. Both the Longhorns and Huskies had the best wins in the regular season (Texas over Alabama on September 9th and Washington over Oregon (October 14th and December 1st). Both teams feature two really good offenses led by quarterbacks Quinn Ewers (Texas) and Heisman Trophy Finalist Michael Pennix, Jr. (Washington). A win for either team will make them one step closer to the national championship. Texas last won the national championship in 2005 while Washington last won the national championship in 1991. 2. Capital One Orange Bowl: Georgia (No. 6) vs. Florida State (No. 5) December 30 at Hard Rock Stadium – Miami 3:00 PM CST on ESPN Both Florida State and Georgia had their national championship hopes lost on conference championship weekend. Although they won the ACC Championship, the Seminoles were not picked to be a part of final four national playoff. Meanwhile, the Bulldogs lost in the SEC Championship game against Alabama, which ended their 29-game winning streak and a bid at winning a third straight national championship. Florida State lost their star quarterback Jordan Travis to a serious injury in November, but still managed to go 13-0. But even with the undefeated mark on their resume, the College Football Playoff Committee believed they were not one of the best four teams in the game. Both teams have the motivation factor, but it will come down to who will have the determination to win this game. 1. Rose Bowl: Alabama (No. 4) vs. Michigan (No. 1) January 1 at Rose Bowl Stadium – Pasadena, Calif. 4:00 PM CST on ESPN) Michigan vs. Alabama. Just saying those words should make every college football fan’s hair stand up. Two of the greatest powerhouses in college football history in one of the grandest stages in the sport on New Year’s Day. Think about the history of these two teams from national championships to Heisman winners to the coaches. It is one of those you anticipate being so special that you would forget it is not a national championship. Instead, it is only for a spot in the national championship. We got the ultimate coaching dream matchup between Nick Saban and Jim Harbaugh. What better way to kick off 2024 than a matchup of two iconic college football programs. Which bowl game are you most looking forward to watching? by Julian Spivey The 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season comes to an end on Sunday, November 5 with the Championship race at Phoenix Raceway. The Championship Four drivers competing for the title include 2021 champion Kyle Larson and four young drivers looking for their first championship trophy Christopher Bell, Ryan Blaney and William Byron. Thanks to the sport’s winner-take-all format in the championship race it’s really hard to predict who’s going to win the title because any and everything could happen – if you watched the Craftsman Truck Series championship race on Friday night you’ll understand that (hopefully the Cup race won’t be anything like that embarrassment to the sport). Some things that come into play, though, in making predictions for this event are past success at the track, overall season and playoff success and the mentality of the drivers. Here’s how I think things will go on Sunday … 4. Christopher Bell You can always bank on a Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota driver in the Championship Four and this year that driver is 28-year-old Christopher Bell, who has made the Championship Four in back-to-back years. Last season, Bell finished third in the Championship Four at Phoenix and the track isn’t one of his best on the circuit – which is the main reason I have him in fourth place out of the four drivers. In seven previous races at Phoenix in the Cup Series Bell’s average finish is 14.4, which is four-to-five positions behind his three competitors in this race. However, Bell has been the best average finisher, not just of the Championship Four, but of all drivers in the sport over the last 15 races of the 2023 season with a 9.6 average finish. Bell has the advantage over Ryan Blaney and William Byron in that this won’t be his first go around in the Championship Four, but the success those other guys have at the track is too much for me to place Bell ahead of any of them. 3. William Byron Of the Championship Four drivers this season, I honestly feel William Byron would be the rightful champion – meaning if you took the year as a whole and stripped away both the playoff format and this winner-take-all race he’d be the one most deserving of the title. Byron led all drivers with six wins this season. He also has the best average finish of these four drivers, the most top-10s of these four drivers and is tied for the most top-5s of these drivers. But I have to go with what I’ve been seeing on the track lately and what the numbers say at Phoenix and the mixture of those two things have me placing Byron as the third most likely to win the title. Byron did win the most recent race at Phoenix in the spring, but overall his average finish is slightly worse than Blaney and Kyle Larson’s at the track and his win there this year is his only top-five at the track in seven career races there. Byron also struggled last week at the short track at Martinsville Speedway, and while there aren’t really similarities between there and Phoenix you’d like to see a team clicking a little better than this No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet has been coming into the championship event. 2. Ryan Blaney Ryan Blaney won last weekend at Martinsville Speedway in decisive fashion in what was likely the best overall race of his career to clinch a spot in the Championship Four, though he was likely going to earn his way into the Championship Four on points either way. It is Blaney who has the best overall numbers at Phoenix of the Championship Four with a 9.3 average finish in seven races at the track with four top-5s and 6 top-10s. It’s generally thought that Blaney might have had the winning car at Phoenix last season but played the good teammate and wingman to his Penske Racing brother Joey Logano, who won the 2022 title. His numbers at the track mixed with his recent hot hand have me thinking Blaney will be a huge threat on Sunday. But I can’t have him as the favorite over a guy who’s been there, done that. 1. Kyle Larson It is truly the experience of Kyle Larson having been through one of these winner-take-all championship races before and having come out the victor that has me putting him in the catbird’s seat for this weekend. The 2021 champ has the worst average finish of the Championship Four competitors at 15th, but that has a lot to do with the three did not finishes (DNFs) and other bad luck he’s had this season, some of it while running up front for the win like at Pocono Raceway and Texas Motor Speedway. Larson’s 1,127 laps led this season are the most of the Championship Four drivers, despite having three fewer wins this season than Byron, his Hendrick Motorsports teammate. Larson has won at Phoenix before doing so to clinch his title in 2021. In the nine previous seasons with this winner-take-all format the winner of the race has been a Championship Four driver doing so to clinch the title, so it’ll likely take doing that again on Sunday. At 30 years old, Larson is unbelievably the old vet of this foursome and his ability mixed with his history have me picking him as the driver to beat for the 2023 championship trophy. Who do you think will win the NASCAR Cup Series title? by Julian Spivey Kevin Harvick wraps up his 23-year no doubt first-ballot NASCAR Hall of Fame career this weekend in the Cup Series 2023 season finale at Phoenix Raceway, which happens to be the best track of his career statistically. Harvick’s done just about everything there is to do on the sport’s biggest stages from winning a championship to winning the sport’s crown jewels races like the Daytona 500, the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway three times, the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway twice and the Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway twice. His 60 career Cup Series wins place him as the 10th most-winning driver in the sport’s 75-year history. As we say goodbye to Harvick’s racing career, though if you’re a fan know he won’t be gone long as he’ll immediately join the Fox Sports announcer’s booth at the beginning of next season, we look back on some of his greatest moments in NASCAR and since the car number he’s had the most career success in has been the No. 4 for Stewart-Haas Racing we’ve chosen his four greatest moments. 4. King of Phoenix Anytime you can say you’re the winningest driver in a track’s history, especially if that track has been around as long as Phoenix Raceway, you’ve accomplished quite a feat. At one point not so long ago, you could pretty much pencil Harvick’s name in as Phoenix winner in the Cup Series. It was as sure as night becoming day. Harvick has won nine times at the track, which is once out of almost every four times he’s competed at the track throughout his 23-year career. His 1,596 laps led are the most at the track, as well as his 29 top-10s and 19 top-5s. He swept both races at the track in both 2006 and 2014, showing his dominance at the track had a long span. 3. Daytona 500 Victory For most drivers, if there is one race they most want to win in their career it’s the Daytona 500, known as the Super Bowl of the sport. Kevin Harvick’s Daytona 500 win in 2007 was one of the most dramatic and closest in the history of the legendary race as he raced future NASCAR Hall of Famer Mark Martin, one of the greatest drivers to never win the sport’s biggest race, neck-and-neck to the finish line winning by .020 seconds, which at the time was the closest finish in the history of the race, as a massive wreck broke out in the pack behind him. 2. Championship Kevin Harvick was always a good driver at Richard Childress Racing throughout the first half of his career compiling 25 wins in 13 seasons with the organization, including his Daytona 500 win. But he had never managed to finish higher than third in the championship point standings. As soon as he moved over to Stewart-Haas Racing in 2014 it’s like everything immediately clicked for him and he went from good (he was likely already going to be a Hall of Famer at that point) to great as he tied his career high in wins with five that season, won eight poles (which was more than his entire RCR career) and won his first and only championship in the very first year of the NASCAR playoff format that saw drivers eliminated after every three races and four drivers compete for it all in the final event of the season, which at the time was at Homestead-Miami Speedway where he won the race to clinch the title. He would go on to become the winningest driver in the sport over the next few seasons compiling multiple wins every season from 2014-2020, including eight in 2018 and a career-high nine in 2020 and he was doing all of this in his late-30s to his mid-40s. I don’t think any driver in the history of NASCAR has ever had as great of a back half of their career as Harvick. 1. First Win Helps Heal an Organization and Sport Kevin Harvick was thrust into the NASCAR Cup Series earlier than expected and under the most tragic of circumstances. When Dale Earnhardt, a seven-time champion and one of the five greatest drivers in the history of the sport, died on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500 car owner Richard Childress needed someone to pilot his team’s number one ride. The call went out to his Busch Series (now Xfinity Series) driver Harvick and the next week at Rockingham Speedway in North Carolina he was behind the wheel of the re-branded from No. 3 to No. 29 and re-painted racecar. What happened two weeks later at Atlanta Motor Speedway was a fairytale story that helped in at least a little way heal a hurting organization and sport when he piloted that car to Victory Lane in a tight, hard-fought battle with multiple time champion Jeff Gordon for his first career Cup Series win. It’s a moment nobody who watched the sport at that time will ever be able to forget. Jonny Spurr: Which baseball team has had the worst luck in recorded history? So, there are a few different ways you can look at this. You mentioned “recorded history,” which could easily lead me to say the Chicago Cubs. After all, the Cubs went more than a century without winning a World Series, but I think many people would agree that the World Series title in 2016 and the way they won it coming back from being down 3-1 in the series to defeat the Cleveland Indians (now Guardians) in extra innings in game seven kind of wipes all that bad luck away. So, you can also look at which team has the longest drought in baseball without winning the World Series. And it’s actually the team the Cubs beat in 2016 – Cleveland. The Guardians franchise hasn’t won a World Series since 1948 and has been to four World Series since without winning: 1954, 1995, 1997 and the previously mentioned dramatic game seven loss to the Cubs in ’16. Seventy-five years without a World Series is pretty tough luck. Most Guardians fans have never seen their favorite team win the title and some haven’t gotten over the name change from a few years ago – though it was for the best. Then there are teams that have never won the World Series and one of those teams just got taken off that very list last night when the Texas Rangers defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks in five games to win the title. The Rangers had been in existence for 62 years without a title before this season. That leaves five franchises of the 30 in Major League Baseball without a title now: San Diego Padres, Seattle Mariners, Milwaukee Brewers, Colorado Rockies and Tampa Bay Rays. The Padres and Brewers have been in existence since 1969 and with the Rangers now having won the title are the oldest franchises in MLB without a championship. The Padres are 0-2 in World Series having lost to the Detroit Tigers in 1984 and the New York Yankees in 1998. The Brewers lost the only World Series they have competed in in 1982 to the St. Louis Cardinals. The Rockies began playing in MLB in 1993. Their only World Series appearance came in 2007, in which they were swept by the Boston Red Sox. So, the Rockies are the only team in MLB history to compete in a World Series without ever having won at least one World Series game. The Rays have been playing in MLB since 1997 and are 0-2 in World Series having lost to the Philadelphia Phillies in 2008 and the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2020. The Mariners have been around since 1977 and have never even been to the World Series, despite having the single-best season record in baseball history when they went 116-46 in 2001. The Mariners are the only organization in MLB history to never play in a single World Series. That could make them a worthy option for this “worst luck” title. However, I’m going to take a different route to this question. I’m not going with a team with a three-quarters-of-a-century drought or a team that’s never won the title or even a team that’s never been to the World Series. To me “luck” doesn’t necessarily mean has never been to the promised land of the game. In fact, the team I’m picking for this “worst luck” title actually has barely gone more than two decades without winning the World Series. I think the Los Angeles Angels have the worst luck in baseball. I understand some of you just rolled your eyes because, after all, the Angels won the World Series in 2002 – meaning nearly every one of you reading this likely remembers that happening. But for the last decade-plus, the Angels have had the player in baseball whom most would consider the greatest player of his era: Mike Trout. Trout is an 11-time All-Star and a three-time American League Most Valuable Player and has played in exactly one postseason series in his tenure with the Angels and that was a three-game sweep at the hands of the Kansas City Royals nearly a decade ago. Over the last half-decade-plus, the Angels have also had a freakin’ baseball unicorn on the roster in Shohei Ohtani, the single greatest two-way player the game has ever seen in that he’s both an All-Star hitter and pitcher. Ohtani is more than likely going to win his second A.L. M.V.P. honor in the last three seasons. Trout and Ohtani have arguably been the two best players in baseball over the last few seasons and the Angels haven’t even sniffed the postseason. That’s because they are the most poorly run team in baseball, starting at the top with owner Arte Moreno and trickling down to the front office with general manager Perry Minasian, who somehow still holds his job he’s held since 2020 despite wasting all this talent in the lineup and constantly failing to get the kind of players (mostly pitching) to place around Trout and Ohtani to make the team successful. This is most likely going to lead to Ohtani, the most one-of-a-kind player in baseball history, to leave this offseason via free agency. Oh, by the way, the team could’ve traded Ohtani at the trade deadline this past season (before he injured his arm that will see him unable to pitch in 2024) when he was at the peak of his powers and gotten something in return for him, instead of him walking in free agency for no return. Trout seems to be held hostage by the franchise when he should be demanding the first trade out of Anaheim. I realize much of the Angels' troubles have been self-inflicted, but I’ve always heard that sometimes you have to make your own luck and this franchise seems inept at doing so. - Julian Spivey by Julian Spivey The 2023 World Series may not be filled with many household names or franchises with giant fan bases but it should be a pretty fun, closely matched series featuring two teams with similar recent histories. Both the American League champion Texas Rangers and National League champion Arizona Diamondbacks are merely two years removed from 100-plus loss seasons – marking the first time in World Series history in which such a thing has happened. Both teams have had similar paths throughout the postseason, with each having a 9-3 record thus far and each having to come back and win two consecutive games on the road in the League Championship Series. The Diamondbacks are looking for the second World Series title in franchise history having gone 1-0 in World Series competition beating the New York Yankees in 2001. The Rangers are seeking its first title in franchise history having previously lost two World Series to the San Francisco Giants in 2010 and St. Louis Cardinals in 2011. Let’s take a look at these competitors position-by-position: Catcher OK, if you read my preview and prediction of the National League Championship Series between the D’Backs and the Philadelphia Phillies you’ll remember that I said I didn’t have much knowledge of D’Backs rookie catcher Gabriel Moreno and even though the fine folks at MLB.com in their version of this article took Moreno as an advantage over veteran All-Star J.T. Realmuto, I couldn’t make that same call myself. It turned out MLB.com was right and I was wrong. Moreno is hitting .279 with three home runs and nine RBI in 12 postseason games this October and has been one of Arizona’s most productive bats. The Rangers have a rookie backstop themselves who had an impressive first season and was even an A.L. All-Star but due to a wrist injury had a rougher second half. Heim has hit .250 for Texas this postseason with two home runs and six RBI, with both of those homers and most of those RBI coming in the ALCS against the Houston Astros. This is a tight decision but I’m leaning toward Moreno based on what I’ve seen this postseason thus far. Edge: Diamondbacks First Baseman Both first basemen for the Diamondbacks and Rangers have kind of been scuffling this postseason despite their respective team's successes. Nathaniel Lowe is striking out 40 percent of the time at the plate this postseason for the Rangers. He’s hitting .224 for the postseason but did wake up a bit in the ALCS against Houston with seven hits in the seven-game series, including two of his postseason’s three home runs and four RBI. Christian Walker, who’s the most powerful batter in the D’Backs’ lineup hitting 33 homers and driving in 103 runs during the season, had a really hard time against the Philadelphia Phillies pitching staff in the NLCS with only two hits in 22 at-bats. Since neither first baseman has really done a whole lot in the postseason thus far I’ve got to go with Walker for his regular season numbers and the fact that he’s scarier in his lineup than Lowe is in his. Edge: Diamondbacks Second Baseman Marcus Semien of the Texas Rangers is one of the three best second basemen in baseball. I’m pretty confident in that. I think Ketel Marte of the Arizona Diamondbacks might be one of the most underrated players in baseball period. I’d rather have Semien on my team at the beginning of a season but at this very moment, I’d rather have Marte as my second baseman. Semien hasn’t hit well this postseason with just a .192 average, zero homers and two RBI. Meanwhile, Marte has the longest postseason hitting streak to begin a career in MLB history going at 16 straight games. Marte was 12-for-31 (.387) in the NLCS and 8-for-19 (.421) in the Diamondbacks’ four wins of the series. His 19 hits in 12 games this postseason is pretty insane with five doubles, a triple, two homers and 7 RBI. If Semien gets hot that’ll prove big for Texas but right now Marte is the hottest hitter going for Arizona. Edge: Diamondbacks Third Baseman: This one isn’t even close. The Rangers have rookie Josh Jung, coming off an All-Star season, at third base and he’s had a solid postseason in his first time around hitting .289 with three home runs and eight RBI. The Diamondbacks have easy outs at third base no matter who they threw out at the hot corner in veteran Evan Longoria, whom it’s hard to see how he’s still in the league watching him these days, and the likely even worse Emmanuel Rivera when he’s not playing third. Longoria and Rivera have combined to hit .143 this postseason. Edge: Rangers Shortstop: The Diamondbacks have a pretty solid shortstop in second-year man Geraldo Perdomo, who was an N.L. All-Star this season and had a very solid NLCS against the Phillies with eight hits but Corey Seager has been one of the hottest hitters all season long for the Rangers – as Joe Davis and John Smoltz liked to remind us A LOT in the ALCS he’d probably be the A.L. MVP this season if Shohei Ohtani wasn’t a baseball unicorn. Seager raked this season hitting .327 with 33 home runs, 96 RBI and led the A.L. with 42 doubles and that was incredible while missing more than a month’s worth of action due to injury. One of the great postseason players of this era, much of it with the Los Angeles Dodgers, he’s continued his hot hitting in October with 15 hits in 12 games, including five doubles, three homers and six RBI. Edge: Rangers Outfield: Left field is a curious matchup in the World Series as the Rangers have been going with rookie Evan Carter, who made his MLB debut less than a month before the postseason began. Carter has been tremendous this postseason and the big stage doesn’t seem to be bothering him one bit. The 21-year-old has hit .308 with six doubles, a homer and five RBI this postseason while playing stellar defense that has included multiple highlight reel catches. Meanwhile, the Diamondbacks left fielder Lourdes Gurriel Jr. was an N.L. All-Star this year but cooled off after a hot start. Gurriel hit .261 during the season with 24 home runs and 82 RBI. In the postseason, Gurriel has hit .250 with a couple of homers, six RBI and he stole a couple of bags in the NLCS against the Phillies. The Rangers and Diamondbacks each have above-average defensive center fielders with below-average hitting in Leody Taveras and Alek Thomas respectively. Taveras certainly had the better season hitting .266 with 14 homers, 67 RBI and 14 stolen bases, while Thomas hit .230 with nine home runs and 39 RBI. Thomas’ average has been lower than his season number at .214 but he seems to have found some more pop in the postseason with four homers, including two against the Phillies in big moments in the NLCS. Taveras is hitting .244 this postseason with a home run, three RBI and four stolen bases. The right field matchup features two stars and quite possibly the single player on each of these teams to most watch during the World Series in the hot-hitting Adolis Garcia for the Rangers and the certain to be the N.L. Rookie of the Year in Corbin Carroll. Garcia absolutely owned the Astros in the ALCS with five home runs and 15 RBI while hitting .357 (and that included one game in which he struck out four times). He’s .327 for the postseason overall with seven homers and 20 RBI and is having one of the greatest offensive postseasons in baseball history. Carroll had really hot NLWC and NLDS rounds against the Milwaukee Brewers and Los Angeles Dodgers but cooled off quite a bit in the NLCS against the Phillies, that is until the deciding game seven, in which he went 3-for-4 with two RBI and two runs scored. One of Carroll’s biggest threats is his speed on the basepaths, which includes four stolen bases in 12 games this postseason. The outfielders for these two teams are fairly even, but right now Garcia seems like the most unstoppable hitter on the planet and he alone leads me to give Texas the outfield edge. Edge: Rangers Designated Hitter: Mitch Garver didn’t even play in the American League Wild Card series against the Tampa Bay Rays nor game one of the American League Division Series against the Baltimore Orioles. Then Rangers skipper Bruce Bochy plugged him into the lineup for game two of that series and Garver hit a huge grand slam. He hasn’t left the D.H. spot since. Garver is hitting .294 this postseason with two homers and 11 RBI. Tommy Pham has been the most-used designated hitter for the D’Backs this postseason and has bit a measly .167 at the plate with two solo home runs. Edge: Rangers Rotation: The 1-2 guys in the rotation for the Texas Rangers this postseason have been nearly unbeatable. Nathan Eovaldi and Jordan Montgomery have combined to go 7-0 with 45 strikeouts in 51 innings pitched. The Rangers have truly needed these two aces to go deep into games with dominant control because the team has basically gone with an almost unheard-of three-man bullpen in the postseason. The third starter for the Rangers will be veteran and future Hall of Famer Max Scherzer, who missed more than the last month of the regular season due to injury and has only pitched 6.2 innings in his two postseason starts thus far. If they need a fourth starter in the series it’ll likely be Dane Dunning who’s pitched 4.2 innings in little use in the postseason thus far. The Diamondbacks have two studs at the top of their rotation too in Zac Gallen, who will get the ball in game one of the series tonight, and Merrill Kelly, though they haven’t been quite as lights out as Eovaldi and Montgomery for Texas. Gallen is 2-2 this postseason with a rough 5.24 ERA in 22.1 innings pitched with 13 strikeouts. Kelly is 2-1 for Arizona with a much better 2.65 ERA in 17 innings with 19 strikeouts. The biggest surprise for the Diamondbacks during the postseason on the mound and the real reason the team escaped the big bats of the Phillies in the NLCS is Brandon Pfaadt, who had a nearly 6 ERA in the regular season but has a 2.70 ERA (despite getting knocked around by the Brewers in the Wild Card round) in 16.2 innings. The Diamondbacks are at a bit of a disadvantage in that game four will most likely be a bullpen game, though the team’s bullpen has been solid throughout the bullpen after being almost completely remade during the second half of the season, which includes the acquisition of closer Paul Sewald from the Seattle Mariners at the trade deadline. Edge: Rangers Bullpen: As previously mentioned, the Rangers have basically gone with the three-man bullpen of setup guys Josh Sborz and Aroldis Chapman and closer (and longest-tenured Rangers player) Jose Leclerc throughout the postseason. Those three pitchers have combined for 24.4 innings of relief and are appearing nearly every game. Leclerc has racked up three saves this postseason but has allowed five runs. Chapman and Sborz have been a bit more solid in the run allowing department with only one apiece. The trio has combined for 21 strikeouts. The Diamondbacks have more arms they can go to in their bullpen, which includes Ryan Thompson (10.2 innings pitched), Kevin Ginkel (nine innings) and Sewald (eight innings). Lefty Joe Mantiply, Miguel Castro and Andrew Saalfrank have also seen some time during the postseason. Thompson has allowed three runs to score this postseason, but Ginkel and Sewald have combined for almost two complete games between them and not a single runner has crossed the plate against them. Sewald has six saves this postseason with 11 strikeouts. Ginkel leads the D’Backs bullpen with 13 Ks, while Thompson has added eight. With the Diamondbacks having a few more arms they believe they can turn to and Leclerc having been a little shaky at times for the Rangers I’ll give Arizona the bullpen edge. Edge: Diamondbacks Coaching: I haven’t been doing a coaching edge during these postseason preview and predictions pieces I’ve been writing this month but I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention this was Rangers manager Bruce Bochy’s fifth World Series as a manager and third with a different franchise. He previously won three championships with the San Francisco Giants and no manager in baseball is as successful as he is at winning championships right now. Sorry, Torey Lovullo. That’s just the way it is. Edge: Rangers I think this has the capability of being a really good and really tight World Series. I think the teams are fairly evenly matched and we could be in store for a potential classic series. A lot has been made already that with two fan bases not accustomed to winning a lot lately and being smaller than large market franchises the television ratings on Fox could be the worst ever for a non-Covid (2020) year. But why are baseball fans concerning themselves with what the TV ratings are? This could be a great series. Enjoy it! Prediction: Rangers in a full 7-game series. by Julian Spivey The National League side of the playoffs is looking like déjà vu with the Philadelphia Phillies swinging their way through the N.L. side, including two straight years of beating the Atlanta Braves, a team that finished 14 games ahead of them in the N.L. East Division both years. It’s not quite the same for the Arizona Diamondbacks, but for the second straight year a team that finished well behind the Los Angeles Dodgers in the N.L. West Division shocked them in the N.L. Division Series. I think a lot of people, maybe more familiar with the Phillies from last year’s postseason run, or because they’re an East Coast team or simply because they have bigger names like Bryce Harper and Trea Turner, are thinking the National League Championship Series might be a cakewalk for them, but I think this could be closer than that, especially if the D’Backs two stud pitchers Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly pitch with their A-games. The NLCS begins tonight at 7 p.m. on TBS with the Diamondbacks traveling to Philadelphia to take on the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park. Here’s a breakdown of the series position-by-position: Catcher I just looked at MLB.com’s version of this type of article, and they think the Diamondbacks have the catching advantage with Gabriel Moreno, a 23-year-old rookie that I honestly don’t know a lot about having not caught many D’Backs games this season. Moreno hit .284 with seven home runs and 50 RBI in 111 games. I think MLB.com’s thinking is he’s had a power streak in the postseason thus far with three homers already and he’s really good at throwing out base stealers (and the Phillies have run a bunch in the postseason, especially Turner). I have to go with the old reliable veteran J.T. Realmuto, who maybe wasn’t as good this season as he has been historically (.252, 20,63), but I don’t see him letting the big stage get to him. Realmuto has been one of the best backstops in the game at throwing out base stealers (something the D’Backs do a lot too) and has been one of the best-hitting catchers in the game over the last decade. I’m not going to let a hot postseason start for Moreno sway my opinion here. Edge: Phillies First Base Christian Walker has been one of the Arizona Diamondbacks' biggest offensive producers this season and is likely the team’s biggest power threat but let me ask you one question. Who scares you more at the plate if you’re a pitcher: Walker or Bryce Harper? That’s what I thought. Walker hit .258 this season with a team-leading 33 home runs and 103 RBI. Harper’s power production wasn’t as great with 21 homers and 72 RBI (in about 30 fewer games), but he hits for a higher average at .293 and always seems to step up his game during the postseason. Harper has 14 career postseason homers and his three already this postseason in just six games ties his best for a single postseason. Edge: Phillies Second Base Ketel Marte always seems to be an underrated player, probably because there hasn’t been much reason to talk about the Diamondbacks during his now ninth season with the club, of which he’s already one of the franchise’s all-time best position players. Marte hit .276 this season with 25 homers, the second-highest total of his career, and 82 RBI. Marte has two homers and four RBI in 22 at-bats this postseason. The Phillies have sophomore Bryson Stott at second best moving over from shortstop this season when the time acquired Trea Turner during the offseason. Stott had a quietly good season hitting .280 with 15 home runs, 62 RBI and 31 stolen bases. He has a homer and seven RBI in six games this postseason but has been hitting about 40 points below his season average in the small sample. This matchup is pretty close to being what I’d consider a push, but to keep things from being a little out of hand on the advantages I’ll give Marte’s veteran leadership the upper hand. Edge: Diamondbacks Third Base It’s young versus old when it comes to the hot corner for these two teams. The Diamondbacks have veteran Evan Longoria toward the end of his career and not near the offensive threat he was in his heyday with the Tampa Bay Rays. But his veteran presence must be huge for a young-ish ballclub. Longoria’s regular season numbers were a bit deflated because he wasn’t the team’s main option at third but has started each of the team’s five games thus far this postseason. Longoria only hit .233 when he played this season. For the postseason he’s only 3-for-18. Alec Bohm kind of gets hidden in a Phillies lineup that includes Harper, Turner, Kyle Schwarber and Nick Castellanos but he had a pretty solid season hitting .274 with 20 home runs and an impressive 97 RBI. Another tally in the advantage column for the Phillies offense. Edge: Phillies Shortstop Geraldo Perdomo made the N.L. All-Star team this season for Arizona, but let’s be real here. Who would you rather have on your team? Perdomo or Trea Turner. It’s kind of a tale of halves in the season for these two shortstops – Perdomo had a hot first half but his OPS dropped nearly 200 points in the second half. Meanwhile, Turner after being a major signing for the Phillies during the offseason and looking like Captain America for Team USA during the World Baseball Classic scuffled big time in the first half but really turned it on in the second half upping his OPS by more than 200 points over the first half. Turner’s OPS in the postseason thus far is a through-the-roof 1.455 and he’s had the greatest season in baseball history when it comes to stolen base percentages with a perfect 34-for-34 when you combine the regular season and postseason. Edge: Phillies Outfield The Phillies have sort of been going with a platoon in left field of Brandon Marsh against right-handed pitching and Cristian Pache against southpaws, but Marsh will see much of the playing time in the NLCS, which is probably better for the Phillies from an offensive standpoint. He’s a pretty outstanding fielder too (though Pache is probably better). The D’Backs have Lourdes Gurriel Jr. in left field who started the season on fire and has struggled since. That MLB.com article I previously referenced says the Phillies have the advantage, but I just don’t know about that. Marsh is 2-for-14 in the postseason with a solo homer. Gurriel is 5-for-21 with a homer and three RBI. Johan Rojas, the Phillies center fielder, just made his Major League debut on July 15 this season but he’s been pretty impressive hitting .302 with 14 stolen bases (out of 15 attempts) since coming up. That half-season of play is more impressive than what Alek Thomas has managed to do for the D’Backs this season. Thomas has only hit .230 with nine home runs and 39 RBI and Rojas has managed to double Thomas’ WAR (Wins Above Replacement) in half the time. I’m going to feel bad about right field because I think based on what I’ve written about left and center field, this is the spot in the outfield that sways the outfield advantage as a whole. Corbin Carroll, the 22-year-old who’s certain to win the National League Rookie of the Year honor, has been Arizona’s best player all season. He hit .285 and became the first rookie in baseball history to reach 25 home runs and 50 stolen bases. He also tallied 30 doubles and led the league with 10 triples. He hasn’t slowed down a bit in the postseason with seven hits in 17 at-bats (.412) with two homers, four RBI and two stolen bases to go along with it. Meanwhile, after watching the NLDS between the Phillies and Braves, I am certain that Nick Castellanos is the hottest hitter in the National League at the moment. Castellanos hit two homers in back-to-back games (incredibly all were solo shots) to end that series and hit .467 in that series. Based on the season as a whole, the D’Backs have the right field advantage with Carroll but I wouldn’t want to face Castellanos right now if I were the D’Backs pitching staff. Edge: Diamondbacks Designated Hitter Kyle Schwarber frankly drives me up the wall with his style of play and I cannot believe Phillies skipper Rob Thomson has him hit leadoff in his lineup. His three-outcome strategy at the plate of either hitting a home run, walking or striking out just isn’t the way I believe the game should be played. So, what you can probably expect from him in the NLCS against Arizona pitching is a couple of bombs and then not a whole lot else. The question is – will those bombs mean more in the series than Tommy Pham’s offensive output for the Diamondbacks? Pham is 7-for-22 in the postseason but was 6-for-14 with four runs scored in the NLDS against the Dodgers. I know some people are going to roll their eyes at this but at the moment I’d rather have Pham getting on base than Schwarber possibly hitting a couple of homers this series. Edge: Diamondbacks Rotation: The rotations for both of these teams have been the real deal thus far in the postseason. The casual baseball fan may not know the names of Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly for Arizona, as well as they do Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola for the Phillies, but they have pretty identical numbers to the Phillies top two. Where the Diamondbacks are at a rotational disadvantage is they basically have nothing to follow up Gallen and Kelly with Brandon Pfaadt, who’s only managed seven innings pitched through two postseason starts and had a season ERA of nearly six this season, as their third starter. Meanwhile, the Phillies' third starter Ranger Suarez has a ridiculously good 1.16 ERA in seven career postseason games. The Diamondbacks are going to need to probably win three to four games during Gallen and Kelly’s starts this season to win the series, while anyone the Phillies send to the mound could easily beat you. Philly hasn’t had to use a fourth starter this postseason but they have veteran Taijuan Walker if they need one. If Arizona needs a fourth starter this series it probably should be a bullpen game and their season would probably be over. Edge: Phillies Bullpen Both of the bullpens on these teams have been extremely impressive this postseason. The Phillies closer Craig Kimbrel has been there/done that when it comes to postseason baseball and despite the fact he can occasionally give fans heartburn when he’s on the mound he usually comes out on top. Jose Alvarado is the scariest arm in the Phil’s bullpen to me and Orion Kerkering, who only pitched in three games at the end of the season, has had three perfect playoff innings thus far. The acquisition of Paul Sewald to close for the Diamondbacks at the trade deadline was huge for the team. Kevin Ginkel was demoted to AAA in June but has been top-notch for the D’Backs since returning to the bigs. The biggest thing for the Diamondbacks bullpen this series could be how lefties Joe Mantiply and Andrew Saalfrank handle the scary lefties of Harper and Schwarber in the Phillies lineup. The Phillies relievers throw more smoke, have more postseason experience and the pen probably has more depth, so while it’s close, I think they have the edge here. Edge: Phillies Prediction: Phillies in 6 by Julian Spivey The 2023 American League Championship Series has a Lone Star flavor to it this year with the American League West Division champion Houston Astros taking on the in-state rival Texas Rangers, one of the three A.L. Wild Cards in the postseason. The A.L.C.S. will be the first time the two ball clubs from Texas have met in the postseason and it’s sure to be a helluva fun series between fairly evenly matched teams. The A.L. West division hunt went down to the final day of the regular season just a couple of weeks ago with the Astros winning the division via a tiebreaker as both teams finished the season at 90-72. The reigning champion Astros, who have reached their amazing seventh consecutive ALCS, defeated the Minnesota Twins in four games in the best-of-five American League Division Series. Meanwhile, the Rangers have yet to lose in the postseason sweeping the 99-63 Tampa Bay Rays in two games in the American League Wild Card series and upsetting the league’s best team this season in the 101-61 A.L. East Division champion Baltimore Orioles in three straight games in the ALDS. The ALCS begins tonight at 7 p.m. on Fox with the Rangers traveling to Houston to take on the Astros at Minute Maid Park. Here’s a breakdown of the series position-by-position: Catcher It’s kind of hard to breakdown the position of catcher between these two because when it comes to 37-year-old veteran Martin Maldonado it’s widely known that he’s one of the best game-callers and defensive catchers in the game, but offensively he’s not going to give you much of anything. The Rangers, on the other hand, had one of the A.L.’s All-Star catchers on their squad this season with 28-year-old Jonah Heim having a breakout season in his second year with the team. Heim hit .258 this season with 18 homers and 95 RBI. Maldonado, who split time this season behind the plate with the more offensive rookie Yainer Diaz, hit a measly .191 with 15 home runs and 36 RBI. Edge: Rangers First Base Nathaniel Lowe had a pretty good season for the Rangers at first base with 17 home runs and 82 RBI, while hitting .262, but he’s been scuffling at the plate thus far in the postseason only going 4-for-25 (.160). Astros veteran Jose Abreu, in his first season with the team, struggled to begin the season but finished the regular season as the hottest hitter on the team and one of the hottest hitters in the game. That continued into the ALDS against the Twins, even with the almost week-long layoff since the Astros had a wild card round bye with Abreu hitting three bombs and driving in a postseason-leading eight runs in the four games of that series. Edge: Astros Second Base The closest offensive matchup you’re likely going to get between the Astros and the Rangers is at second base. The Astros have veteran Jose Altuve at second and he’s proven over this last decade to be one of the greatest postseason players in baseball history. His 24 career postseason homers are second all-time to Manny Ramirez’s 29. Altuve missed the first couple of months of the season after hurting himself in the World Baseball Classic before the season but still managed to have a nice season with 17 homers, 51 RBI, 14 stolen bases and a .311 average. Rangers two-bagger Marcus Semien is easily one of the best at his position in the game and had a terrific year hitting .276 with 29 homers, 100 RBI and 185 hits. Semien will certainly be capable of out-playing Altuve in the ALCS but has struggled in his first five games of the postseason hitting just .174 – that and Altuve’s postseason superpower lead many to giving the advantage to … Edge: Astros Third Base Josh Jung came out of the box this season shining at the hot corner for the Rangers as a 25-year-old rookie. He made the All-Star team and finished the season hitting .266 with 23 homers and 70 RBI, which were lowered by missing 40ish games due to injury. The Astros have Alex Bregman, who’s been there/done that in the postseason, and he put up another solid season in 2023 hitting .262 with 25 homers and 90 RBI. Bregman has 16 career postseason homers, but his career postseason average is about 40 points lower than his regular season average. Still, with the experience Bregman has, I’m willing to give him the advantage here but don’t be surprised if Jung outplays him. Edge: Astros Shortstop Shortstop is an interesting matchup in this series because it involves two of the last three World Series MVPs in Astros shortstop Jeremy Pena, who won the World Series MVP last season, and Corey Seager for the Rangers, who was the World Series MVP with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2020. But I don’t think this matchup is very close as Seager is arguably the best shortstop in all of baseball, especially at the plate. Seager was second in the A.L. this season in hitting with a .327 average and hit 33 homers with 96 RBI. He’s also been their hottest bat in the postseason thus far hitting .429 with a 1.537 OPS over five games. His experience from years of postseason play with the Dodgers is something that can’t be denied. For his part, Pena hit .263 this season with 10 home runs and 52 RBI. Edge: Astros Outfield The outfield is hard to prognosticate because Yordan Alvarez, who’s probably the scariest player in the series, has been splitting time between left field and designated hitter in the postseason. He alone could sway the edge in this series when it comes to the outfield. For the purposes of this piece, I’m going to consider him a designated hitter. So, that leaves veteran Michael Brantley playing left for the ‘stros, with Chas McCormick in center field and Kyle Tucker in right field. The Rangers have up-and-comer Evan Carter, who has been a star in the postseason thus far, in left, Leody Taveras in center and Adolis Garcia in right. I know some may scoff at this, but I’m going to consider Tucker and Garcia to be a push. Both had monster seasons for their respective teams. Tucker hit .284 with 29 home runs, 112 RBI and stole 30 bases. Garcia hit for much less average than Tucker at .245 but for more power with 39 homers to go along with 107 RBI. Both team’s center fielders are among the weakest hitters on their respective teams but are both rangy, above-average defensive players. Taveras was +6 outs above average for the Rangers this season, while McCormick was +4 outs above average for Houston. McCormick is a bit better at the plate than Taveras. In left field, Brantley is the veteran with the playoff experience but it feels like Carter may be the bigger threat during the series the way he’s been performing in the postseason thus far. Carter is hitting .429 this postseason with a homer, three doubles and three RBI and is walking twice as much as he’s striking out. Edge: Rangers Designated Hitter So, as I previously mentioned, for the purposes of this article Yordan Alvarez is Houston’s DH and he has a clear advantage over the platoon of Mitch Garver and Robbie Grossman for the Rangers. Alvarez hit four homers in just four games in the ALDS against the Twins and has seven homers since the start of Houston’s playoff run last season and 10 for his postseason career. Rangers pitchers should probably hope no one is on base when he comes to the plate often this series. Edge: Astros Rotation The biggest question regarding the rotations for the ALCS is whether or not Max Scherzer is going to come back from an injury that cost him the last month-plus of the regular season and has kept him out of the Rangers' first two postseason series. It looks like he’s going to make the team’s ALCS roster but that still doesn’t mean he’ll play or how effective he’ll be if he pitches. What I desperately want to see out of this series is Scherzer matching up against his former Detroit Tigers and New York Mets teammate Justin Verlander. The two were teammates for much of the season with the Mets before both being dealt to their current, much better situations before the trade deadline at the end of July. The two don’t really seem like they like each other a whole lot and seeing them go head-to-head on such a big stage would be amazing – but it’s probably unlikely even if Scherzer can go. The Astros would seemingly have the upper hand in the rotation for the series with Verlander, Framber Valdez, who is a quality start machine, and Cristian Javier but damn if Jordan Montgomery and Nathan Eovaldi haven’t been the most dominant twosome of the postseason thus far for Texas. Montgomery and Eovaldi have combined to go 3-0 this postseason with a 2.19 ERA and 22 strikeouts in their four starts (again the Rangers have only played five games so far). Future Hall of Famer Scherzer would likely slot in as the game three starter if he can go, which would definitely keep the Scherzer vs. Verlander thing from happening as Verlander gets the ball for the ‘stros in game one tonight. Other pitchers who could get starts in the series include Jose Urquidy for Houston and Dane Dunning for Texas. The way Montgomery and Eovaldi have been pitching has made them look unbeatable, but let’s be honest – this Astros offense is scarier than those of the Orioles and Rays. I’m willing to get the postseason experience that the Houston staff has the advantage. Edge: Astros Bullpen The Rangers back-end combination of veteran Aroldis Chapman and Jose Leclerc has been pretty amazing this postseason thus far and if you include Josh Sborz into the mix they have combined to allow just one run in 11 appearances between them this postseason. I don’t know much about the rest of the Rangers bullpen because we haven’t had to see much of them this postseason after those three arms. The Astros always have one of the better bullpens in baseball anchored by closer Ryan Pressly and setup man Bryan Abreu. Pressly is an amazing 13-for-13 in career postseason saves, including two this postseason. Abreu has seven strikeouts over three scoreless postseason outings so far this year. If the Astros starter gets them late into the game good luck against those two guys. Again, I feel like the “been there/done that” experience for Houston is the deciding factor. Edge: Astros Prediction: Houston Astros in 6 by Julian Spivey The Arizona Diamondbacks took down the National League Central Division champion Milwaukee Brewers in two games in the National League Wild Card series and now get to travel to Los Angeles to take on the division-rival Dodgers in the National League Division Series. These two teams are pretty familiar with one another and thus this should be a close and fun series, despite the fact that the Dodgers won 16 more games than the Diamondbacks this season. If you rewind the clock one year you’ll remember that the Dodgers were upset in the NLDS last season by the inner-division rival San Diego Padres, who had finished 22 games behind them in the National League West. There’s also reason to be concerned if you’re a Dodgers fan because let’s face it this Dodgers team isn’t near as scary on paper as it has been for much of its decade-long run of success. Walker Buehler has missed the whole season with an injury and Julio Urias is on the ineligible-to-play list due to off-the-field legal issues (he’s a woman-abusing asshole to be more specific). So, what the Dodgers have going pitching-wise after their future hall of fame ace Clayton Kershaw, who’s often been a little wonky in postseason performance, is rookie Bobby Miller and veteran Lance Lynn. Kershaw, despite battling shoulder issues all season, was still one of the N.L.’s best pitchers with an amazing 2.46 ERA and 13-5 record. Miller had a terrific rookie season going 11-4 with a 3.76 ERA. Lynn was solid with the Dodgers going 7-2 with a 4.36 ERA after being acquired before the trade deadline from the Chicago White Sox. The Dodgers have a solid bullpen featuring Evan Phillips, who seems to have fallen into the closer role, with Brusdar Graterol, Caleb Ferguson, Ryan Brasier and Shelby Miller all putting up nice numbers. Merrill Kelly will take the ball for the Diamondbacks in game one of the NLDS, having not had to pitch in the NLWC. Kelly had the Diamondbacks' best ERA this season at 3.29, despite it being his teammate Zac Gallen getting all the potential N.L. Cy Young Award talk. Kelly was 12-8 in 30 starts with 187 strikeouts. He should match up well against Kershaw in game one, which could be a nice pitcher’s duel. With the N.L. side of the division series getting a day off between games one and two, it should set Gallen up to take the mound in game two of the series on normal rest. Gallen was 17-9 this season with a 3.47 ERA and gave up two runs on five hits in six innings against the Brewers in the deciding game two of the NLWC round. The problem facing the Diamondbacks is they don’t really have anything worthwhile in their rotation following Kelly and Gallen, so if they’re going to contend with the Dodgers they absolutely will have to win the games in which Kelly and Gallen start, which is a tough task against the Dodgers offense. Arizona does have a pretty solid bullpen, though, led by closer Paul Sewald and set-up guys Kevin Ginkel and rookie Andrew Saalfrank, who pitched well in the NLWC. The Dodgers clearly have the better lineup 1-9, especially with perennial National League MVP candidates Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman. Betts hit .307 this year with 39 homers and a new MLB-record 107 RBI from a leadoff man. Freeman .331, which led the team, with 29 homers, 102 RBI and was one double shy of becoming the first hitter since the 1930s to reach 60 doubles in a season. The Dodgers had an incredible four hitters reach the 100 RBI mark with Max Muncy (105) and J.D. Martinez (103) joining Betts and Freeman. The Dodgers also have one of the better-hitting catchers in the game in Will Smith, who hit .261 this season with 19 homers and 76 RBI. The biggest threat in the Diamondbacks’ lineup is their superstar rookie outfielder Corbin Carroll, who basically had rookie of the year wrapped up by midseason. Carroll became the first rookie in baseball history to tally 25 home runs and 50 stolen bases and the Dodgers really need to keep him off the basepaths to have success. The Diamondbacks’ biggest power threat is first baseman Christian Walker, who hit a team-leading 33 homers and drove in a team-leading 103 RBI this season while hitting .258. Second baseman Ketel Marte (.276, 25, 82) and outfielder Lourdes Gurriel (.261, 24, 82) will be Arizona’s other biggest threats in the lineup. There isn’t a whole lot after that to get the Dodgers pitching staff quaking in their cleats. This should be a fun series, that I believe might be closer than many probably think it’s going to be, but ultimately I don’t see the Dodgers letting a team so far behind them in their own division beat them two postseasons in a row. Prediction: Dodgers in 5 Game 1: Saturday, Oct. 7 @ 8:20 p.m. (CST) on TBS
Game 2: Monday, Oct. 9 @ 8 p.m. (CST) on TBS Game 3: Wednesday, Oct. 11 @ TBD (CST) on TBS Game 4: Thursday, Oct. 12 @ TBD on TBS (if necessary) Game 5: Saturday, Oct. 14 @ TBD on TBS (if necessary) |
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