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It’s rare when David slays Goliath twice in one week, but that’s what happened in baseball’s League Championship Series. In the American League, the Texas Rangers followed the tried and true formula for reaching the World Series – make sure Cliff Lee is in your starting rotation. Of course, the Rangers did much more than that. They outplayed the defending champion New York Yankees in every phase of the game. Lee continued his post-season mastery, putting his name up there with Sandy Koufax, Jack Morris and Bob Gibson as pitchers who excel under pressure. The surprise was the performance of the other Texas starters, especially C.J. Wilson and Colby Lewis. Not being a fan of pitch counts and coddling of pitchers in general, I hope the Rangers’ example of expecting the starters to finish what they start, an old school approach that mirrors what their team president, Nolan Ryan did, becomes a trend in baseball. It’ll improve the quality of the game. The Yankees’ starters were mostly ordinary. Even C.C. Sabathia, who won a start to keep his team from being eliminated in game 5, wasn’t dominant in that start, his teammates bats just came alive. Josh Hamilton, Vlad Guerrero and Yankee killer Bengie Molina all had timely hits in the series for Texas, while the vaunted Yankee lineup mostly went cold.

In the National League, it was a similar story. On paper, the Philadelphia Phillies had a much more potent lineup than San Francisco. However, the Phils’ bats went silent when it counted, and the Giants combined great pitching with timely hitting to win. The Phillies were a heavy favorite based on their starting rotation being the best in baseball, and their lineup far outclassing the Giants’, but the Giants pitchers and hitters got the job done. Ryan Howard’s last at-bat, which ended the Series, summed up Philadelphia’s effort overall. Every kid who has ever played Little League baseball has heard it a thousand times – “if you’ve got 2 strikes, protect the plate”, “if it’s close, get your bat on it”, “go down swinging”, etc. but Howard watched strike 3 pop into the catcher’s glove doing what too many major leaguers do these days that make the game too long and exasperating – he took the pitch, the most important pitch in the most important at-bat of the series. The Phils already had the tying run in scoring position and Howard is paid to drive in runs. Drawing a base on balls in that situation did nothing to help his team, and the pitch was way too close to take.

In picking a winner in the World Series, I have to go with Texas, based mostly on the presence of Lee. While other pitchers, Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels, Phil Hughes, Andy Pettitte, Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain, Jonathan Sanchez, etc. have had great playoff outings this year, they’ve also had average ones. Lee has been consistently spectacular in every start, and there’s no reason to believe he won’t continue to be. Texas has a better overall lineup also. So, assuming that Lee will beat the Giants’ best starter, Lincecum, probably twice, I’ll pick the Rangers to win in six games.