Knowing they had to win at least once in Florida in order to win the whole thing, the Philadelphia Phillies are up one game to nothing after a 3-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays last night at Tropicana Field. 

The American League champion Tampa Bay Rays will face the National League Champion Philadelphia Phillies in Game One of the World Series tonight.  First pitch is expected to fly just after 8:00 p.m. at Tropicana Field.

1/2 the World Series is set up with the Phillies returning for the first time since Joe touched them all. The Rays came oh so close to joining them last night but blew it like the Jays of the early 80's.

The happiest I've been all post-season was about an hour ago when Matt Stairs took a Jonathan Broxton fastball deep to give the Phillies a 7-5 lead and a 3-1 lead in the NLCS.

Anybody here remember Jeff Lahti? A fine RHRP for the Cardinals in the mid-1980s, he saved 19 games for the '85 Redbirds in a bullpen that also included one-time closers like Bill Campbell, Neil Allen, Todd Worrell and Doug Bair. Lahti turns 52 today -- he is the only major league alumnus born on Oct. 8, 1956.

So, um, you think, who cares? Well, it's as good an excuse as any to call to mind that today is also the 52nd anniversary of one of the most famous games ever pitched.

The playoffs started just two days ago and the Brewers and Cubs look like they may already be done.

The AL just has one game each in their series.  The Rays got off to a nice start and the Red Sox continued their mastery of the Angels.

The Jays bring back all the coaches for 2 more years and the White Sox force a one game playoff with the Twins to be played at 7:30 tonight in Chicago.

There are supposed to be eight teams still standing. There's nine for the moment. The White Sox have a makeup game later today with the mighty ("they could score 1000 runs!") Detroit Tigers, favoured by many pundits to win The Whole Darn Thing. If the Sox win that, the Twins come to Chicago on Tuesday to play a tiebreaker to settle the AL Central title. But the Tigers will be motivated today - after all, if they win they will catch up to the Kansas City Royals and finish tied for fourth.

Anyway - can I actually cheer for any of these outfits?

The season comes to a close with Litsch vs Baltimore. A win today and they reach Cito's stated goal of 10 games over 500.

So fourth place it is.

Six games to go.  Two games back of the Yankees with a 3 game set starting today.

Catch the third place fever!

The Yankees played their final game at the old Stadium last night, because the Yankees won't be in the World Series this year.

Via the Jays website their winners are...

I miss Roy Orbison.

The Jays return to their winning ways. If you tuned in late the 6-4 score looks much like last night, with the key difference being that the good guys one. Far from it, my friend. Both starters were very good, only to see their bullpens implode behind them. Fortunately the Jays imploded the least. Can you say another ten straight? Also, this game featured one of the worst strike zones I think I have ever seen.