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The excitement of the final day of the 2011 MLB regular season has carried over to the early stages of the postseason, despite a much needed day off in between to pause for breath and to catch up on some sleep.<\/p>\nThe excitement of the final day of the 2011 MLB regular season has carried over to the early stages of the postseason, despite a much needed day off in between to pause for breath and to catch up on some sleep.<\/p>\n
We haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t had a thrilling late comeback as yet, but they don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t happen quite as often as the last week would lead you to believe.\u00c2\u00a0 What we have had are some excellent individual performances, some good competitive games and a bit of drama thrown in for good measure.<\/p>\n
Tigers and Yankees<\/strong><\/p>\n Yankee Stadium provided the drama on Friday night as the anticipated pitching duel between CC Sabathia and Justin Verlander was sunk by rain in the Bronx.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Doug Fister and Ivan Nova picked up from where those two left off yesterday and the Yankees prevailed 9-3. Robinson Cano rightfully took the headlines thanks to his Grand Slam and six RBI; however Nova\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s solid \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcstart\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c giving up two runs over 6.1 innings \u00e2\u20ac\u201c should not be overlooked.<\/p>\n Verlander and Sabathia were seen as the crucial players in the series due to the question marks placed next to the names of the other starting pitchers.\u00c2\u00a0 With the two aces now slated to start Game Three, it could well be that the series is decided by the other starting pitchers and the Yankees have to be delighted with Nova\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s performance.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n The Division Series schedule has been shuffled about due to the delayed Game One.\u00c2\u00a0 Game Two of the series will start at 20.07 BST on Sunday, with coverage starting on ESPN America at 20.00. \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n There was going to be a game on BBC 5 Live Sports Extra from 18.00 BST on Sunday, but there now isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t a game starting around that time and the Tigers-Yankees game cannot be squeezed in alongside the NFL coverage.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Rays and Rangers<\/strong><\/p>\n Baseball fans will not miss out though as the MLB on\u00c2\u00a05 Live\u00c2\u00a0team will be bringing us Game Three of the series between the Texas Rangers and Tampa Bay Rays from 22.00 on Monday.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n It will be an important game for both teams with the series\u00c2\u00a0being tied at 1-1.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n The Rays took something of a chance by handing rookie Matt Moore only his second Major League start in the series opener on Friday.\u00c2\u00a0 Boy, did he repay the faith they showed in him.\u00c2\u00a0 He pitched seven scoreless innings, giving up just two hits and two walks in the process against one of the very best offences in the Majors as the Rays won 9-0.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n It was the perfect start for Tampa Bay.\u00c2\u00a0 They had \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcBig Game\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 James Shields on the mound for Game Two and had visions of heading back to Tropicana Field with a 2-0 series advantage.\u00c2\u00a0 A 3-0 lead by the middle of the fourth inning put the Rays on course, but the Rangers had other ideas and stormed back to win 8-6.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Colby Lewis and David Price are the scheduled starters for Game Three and it should be an enthralling match-up.\u00c2\u00a0 The Rays will be back at the scene of their recent heroics over the Yankees, while the Rangers will see this as an opportunity to at least force the series back to their own ballpark for a Game Five.<\/p>\n Diamondbacks and Brewers<\/strong><\/p>\n The energy of a home crowd can help to lift a team and both the Arizona Diamondbacks and Milwaukee Brewers were particularly fond of their home comforts during the regular season.\u00c2\u00a0 The Brewers narrowly beat the D-Backs to home field advantage for this series and that might prove to be pivotal.<\/p>\n Milwaukee took the series opener at Miller Park on Saturday 4-1.\u00c2\u00a0 Yovani Gallardo pitched superbly well for the Brew Crew, striking out nine batters over eight innings with a Ryan Roberts eighth-inning home run being the only blemish on his record.<\/p>\n It doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get any easier for Arizona on Sunday as they will face Zack Greinke.<\/p>\n This is exactly the sort of situation that Greinke was acquired for over the offseason. \u00c2\u00a0He has been unbeatable at Miller Park in 2011 (11-0 with a 3.13 ERA in fifteen starts) and you wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t expect him to be phased by his first postseason appearance.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n There is a chink in his armour for the D-Backs to seize onto though. Greinke will be pitching on short rest for the second straight time and is therefore likely to be on a lower pitch limit than usual.\u00c2\u00a0 Gallardo\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s strong start yesterday means that the Brewers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 bullpen is well-rested, so the game could be decided by when the D-Backs get to those arms.\u00c2\u00a0 If Greinke can get through six innings then Arizona could be in trouble; if the D-Backs knock him out earlier then they could be in business.<\/p>\n Game Two of that series is scheduled to begin at 22.07 on Sunday.\u00c2\u00a0 ESPN America will go straight to the game live once the Tigers-Yankees game is completed.<\/p>\n Cardinals and Phillies<\/strong><\/p>\n One of the many sayings you learn as you start following baseball is that a team has to get to the best starting pitchers early.\u00c2\u00a0 The thinking is that they might not be quite on top of their game at the very start, so you need to take advantage before they get into a rhythm.<\/p>\n The St. Louis Cardinals must have thought they had adhered to this rule perfectly yesterday when they scored three runs off Roy Halladay in the first inning.\u00c2\u00a0 As you expect from a great pitcher, Halladay shook that off and proceeded to dominate the Cards for the next seven innings, but that didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seem to matter through the first five innings as Kyle Lohse was able to limit the Phillies to one run.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n The problem for St. Louis was that they couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t contain the Phillies\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 offence beyond this point.\u00c2\u00a0 A five-run sixth inning, followed by five more runs over the next two innings, left the Cardinals’ early assault a distant memory.\u00c2\u00a0 Even a three-run rally in the top of the ninth off reliever Michael Stutes didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t count for anything, although it did force Charlie Manuel into bringing Ryan Madson into the game.<\/p>\n The fearsome challenge posed by the Phillies is that they can follow up a strong Roy Halladay start by sending Cliff Lee out to the mound.\u00c2\u00a0 He will be opposed by Chris Carpenter, who pitched brilliantly on Wednesday against the Houston Astros to help the Red Birds book their playoff place.<\/p>\n Game Two of the series starts at 00.37 on Sunday night\/Monday morning.\u00c2\u00a0 ESPN America will again be joining the game in progress once the Diamonbacks-Brewers game is over.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The excitement of the final day of the regular season has carried over to the early stages of the postseason. ESPN America will provide coverage of 3 games on Sunday; BBC 5 Live Sports Extra will broadcast Rangers v Rays on Monday night<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[226,225,82,25,70,553,66],"class_list":["post-12073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball-coverage","category-mlb-2","tag-5-live-sports-extra","tag-bbc","tag-bst-guide","tag-espn-america","tag-gamedayaudio","tag-mlb-2","tag-mlb-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12073"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12073\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12088,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12073\/revisions\/12088"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}