The exciting first round of baseball came to an end last night when the St. Louis Cardinals came back from trailing two games to one to improbably upset the World Series favorite Philadelphia Phillies.
The Milwaukee Brewers nearly met a similar fate to the Phillies. However, they held on to beat the Arizona Diamondbacks in ten innings, winning their series 3-2.
The ALDS was similar. The Detroit Tigers beat the New York Yankees in Yankee Stadium to win their roller coaster series in five games.
Meanwhile, the only ALDS series that didn’t go all five games was the Tampa Bay Rays and Texas Rangers’. The Rangers quickly advanced past Tampa Bay and into the ALCS with a 3-1 series win that included two straight wins on the Rays’ home lawn.
So why am I telling you the results? Because some of the better starting rotations got wiped out in the first round.
The Phillies rotation consisting of Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt will be hitting the golf courses much earlier than they expected. They were clearly the most dominant rotation in the playoffs, and even the league.
The Rays had a great rotation too, with James Shields, David Price, Matt Moore and Jeremy Hellickson.
There are still some good rotations out there, though, and unlike the first round, the better pitching rotation may be a key in the second round.