As much as I'd like different results, I can't see LA or St. Louis losing. I like Detroit, so everything else is uninteresting.

Playoffs rarely go according to expectations, there have to be some surprises, right? 

It's easy to find reasons to dislike most of the remaining teams:

Boston and LA - big budget teams, let the little guys win

Atlanta - the chop, (amiritepeople?)

Detroit and St. Louis - tired of seeing them in the playoffs all the time

Tampa - Delmon Young and Josh Leuke

 

That leaves Oakland and Pittsburgh.  Go A's, go Pirates!

When the Reds got eliminated, was surprised that initially Walt Jocketty indicated that Dusty Baker would be back - he had his shot, needed to go.
When AA became GM, I mentioned that I was hoping the Jays would become the Rays with a bigger budget - he just didn't have the patience, now in a young man's game, the Jays have an old roster, poorly spent  money & not much flexibility - anyways It's my way of saying I'm rooting for the Rays, that organization deserves a championship - when they won in 2008, people said it won't last because they have no money - but this is their  6th winning season in a row, in a tough division & with no money - look at  what they've turned Kazmir/Garza/Shields into & they keep mining the scrap heap so well - what a FO - GO RAYS.
Maybe as a christmas gift, Rogers can have AA attend a course on how to build a contender from Andrew Friedman.

No question the Rays are the model of how to contend with a low budget.  Their old high picks for years helped, but right now the oldest guys on the team who were developed by the Rays are David Price and Evan Longoria both drafted in the late stages of the terrible years (2007 and 2006 respectively).  So those high picks did help (as those are key members) but the influence is dying off.  The 3 26 year old draftees are all later round picks, as was Cobb (4th round) and Moore (8th round).  That teams haven't raided that front office more blows my mind.  I still don't understand why the Jays didn't steal their bench coach (Dave Martinez) at the very least.

As to the playoffs...
Red Sox vs Rays: cheering on the Rays - the management deserves a WS, even if the city doesn't
Tigers vs A's: cheering on the A's, much the same reason plus still need to boo Detroit over the 80's
Pirates vs Cardinals: Pirates here, as the Cardinals got too lucky over the years with TLR's teams (worst team to win a WS)
Dodgers vs Atlanta: Ugh, don't like either club so guess I'll go for entertainment value of the Dodgers and hope they get knocked out next round.

Maybe as a better Christmas gift, Rogers can steal away Friedman

I'm pretty excited just to see Craig Kimbrel pitch, and see for myself whether he's really human.

Mariano Rivera was 26 year old when he saved his first game in the majors. Kimbrel, who turns 26 next May, already has 139. And Rivera never - never - pitched as well as Kimbrel has in the last two seasons.

That would be a Hanukah gift.

I don't know why Kimbrel doesn't throw the fastball more. It's a plus, plus pitch.

The double play started by Avilon was the key to the game. I was surprised when he turned to throw to second, I thought he would come home, or freeze the runner and go to first.

Anyone but the Braves please. Dump those sanctimonious enforcers of Playing Baseball The Right Way into the bin.

Pretty interesting omissions from the Braves post season roster including Dan Uggla, whose been replaced at 2B by utilityman and waiver pick up Elliot Johnson.  Old friend Scott Downs was hammered as a Brave and is off the roster as well.  
Interesting excerpt: "Uggla battled vision problems while hitting .179 -- the lowest batting average recorded by a qualified player since 1900 -- with 22 home runs and a .362 slugging percentage, which is the lowest mark produced by a player during a 20-homer season in baseball history."

Sound familiar?  it seems SOMEBODY was worse this year than JPA ... I guess a team can make the playoffs with a sinkhole in the lineup.  There are at least 3 AAAA calibre players on the Braves playoff roster, and that's not even counting BJ Upton ...

Nah. Uggla was bad. He was still miles better than JPA, since he actually took walks. Uggla turned in a .309 OBP en route to a poor but not extraordinarily bad 91 wRC+. JPA managed a .227 OBP, which is so bad I'm not sure what adjective can be used to describe it. His wRC+ was just 57, which makes Uggla looks like a demigod of hitting.

I'm not sure what adjective can be used to describe it

Charles Barkley might call it turrible.

all with two years and $26 million left on his contract.  I'll take JPA anytime. 

I'll take JPA anytime

Going once.  Going twice.  Do I hear any better offers for a catcher with tremendous power? I can't believe this... Sold to the fan in the 1st row wearing the #9 shirt. 

Buck Martinez doing colour commentary...I had forgotten that he's much better in that role.

Al Alburquerque in a tie game is poor roster management.  I'm still surprised Detroit didn't do more try to improve that bullpen before the playoffs.

Go As! 

Kershaw to start on 3 days rest for the first time in his career tonight.  Greinke if necessary on regular rest to follow.  The post-season is not for the faint-hearted.

Stat of the day: Oakland's Games 2-4 starters are all 24 or under, all made the league minimum this year and have 14 combined years of team control left.

...and Michael Wacha for the Cards.  He's had an awfully fast ascent.

Clay Buchholz works soooo slowly.

Atlanta turned to David Carpenter for one of the most crucial innings of their season. Amazingly, it didn't work out.

Carpenter's been beyond lights out this year.  i know reliever performance is pretty hard to predict, but it's also pretty hard to argue with a WHIP below 1 and 74ks and 65 IP. 

AA just missed the boat on Carpenter. 

jerjapan

The only person who missed on Carpenter is you.

Check Carpenter's stats, check A.A.'s career path and remember the 2002 offseason.

Complain all you want about A.A. Just be accurate.

???

Richard, we are talking about Braves reliever David Carpenter, who had a brief, unsuccessful stint with the Jays last year, coming over in the Happ trade and included in the Aviles / Farrell swap.  The power arm that intrigued AA in the first place emerged in Atlanta (who got him on waivers).  Had we kept him, the Happ deal would look a fair bit different right now.  I was complimenting AA for almost getting him.

I assume you are talking about Cardinals pitcher Chris Carpenter, who hasn't pitched in the bigs this year, and certainly didn't pitch in the Braves / Dodgers series .  Criticize posters round here all you want, but please get your facts straight. 

If you haven't noticed by now jerjapan, Richard SS never responds to emails where he is called out for rudeness (a phenomenon for which we have a regrettably large sample). Instead, he will blithely post another comment in another forum as though nothing happened.

My apologies. David Carpenter was not in consideration.
I'm working more than normal so posting here or sleeping is usually a choice.

Just because David Carpenter has found a modicum of success in Atlanta doesn't mean he would have in Toronto. The Red Sox waived Carpenter after acquiring him in the Farrell trade. By my count, 25 teams passed on him before being claimed by the Braves.

Some coaches can fix some players some of the time. I'm sure there were some tweaks done to Carpenter that seem to have been successful thus far. These fixes may last or may not.

Finally, I remember last year posters were pointing out the foolishness of the Jays giving up on Darin Mastroianni. Haven't heard a peep about Mastro this year and for good reason.

straw man much?  many posters (myself included) felt that the Maestro could be a decent 5th OF / pinch runner.  While I'm no stats guy, David Carpenter's PWARP this year is ahead of RA Dickey and Aaron Loup, among others, and is tied with Jansenn, all while pitching for a playoff team.  this is quite clearly more than a 'modicum' of success. 

sure, the other GMs passed on him.  my point remains that AA saw something of value in him and we nearly got the benefit of this.  Had he had a good few appearances to start his Jays career, he could very well be a key member of our pen, with 4 to 5 years of control at a minimum salary.  more value than the Maestro, to be sure. 

On a different note, Justin Verlander is a good pitcher.

But with Pittsburgh and Oakland out, who's left to cheer for?  I'm pulling for a Dodgers / Tigers world series, although that's a tough sentence for me to write. 

"David Carpenter's PWARP this year is ahead of RA Dickey and Aaron Loup, among others"

I would hope so. Look at the quality of competition. Compare Carp to Loup.

Going by FG's offensive numbers, 24 of Carp's 65.2 IP were vs the 6 worst offenses in baseball, including 10.2 innings vs the woeful Marlins. He pitched all of 1.2 innings vs the 6 best offenses.

Loup did pitch 13 innings vs the 6 worst, 8.2 of those vs the Yankees. But he also pitched a whopping 30 of his 69.1 IP vs the 6 best offenses in baseball.

Of course there was something of value in Carpenter. But to think he would have had the same, or even similar, success in Toronto is a failure of logic. He may have, but odds are that he wouldn't have.

Carpenter has 65 innings of success, much vs very challenged offensive teams. In baseball terms that is a modicum.

The Mastro analogy is no straw man. He had success last year in a SSS. He's been brutal this year, also in a SSS. Carpenter may well follow that path. Let's see in a few years what Carpenter does rather than rushing to judgement.

Good points on the quality of opposition, I hadn't dug into those stats.  although it was telling that Carp was still out there pitching in a critical moment instead of Kimbrell.  (stupid, stupid bullpen usage).  Time will tell I suppose if he's a one-off or if he really has turned the corner - he certainly has the power arm to believe he may have.