phillies baseball

-- Josh Beckett pitched a complete game as the Boston Red Sox beat the Los Angeles Angels 4-0 in the opening game of their American League playoff series.

Beckett, who led Major League Baseball with 20 wins this season, allowed four hits, struck out eight and walked none in recording his third career postseason shutout. The right-hander retired 19 straight Angels batters after Chone Figgins led off the game with a single.

``He went out there and executed his pitches probably better than at any point in this season,'' Boston manager Terry Francona said in a televised news conference. ``That was a great performance.''

The Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Chicago Cubs 3-1 and the Colorado Rockies defeated the Philadelphia Phillies 4-2 in the opening games of their National League series.

At Fenway Park in Boston, Kevin Youkilis hit a first-inning solo home run to give the Red Sox the early lead. David Ortiz had a two-run homer and Mike Lowell hit an RBI single as the Red Sox added three runs in the fourth.

Vladimir Guerrero had two hits for the Angels. Los Angeles starter John Lackey took the loss after allowing four runs and nine hits in six innings.

The Red Sox host Game 2 of the best-of-five first-round series in two days.

In Phoenix, Brandon Webb allowed one run and four hits over seven innings as the Diamondbacks beat the Cubs. The right-hander struck out nine and walked three. Brandon Lyon and Jose Valverde, who earned the save, each pitched an inning to close out the game at Chase Field.

Home Runs

Stephen Drew and Mark Reynolds each hit home runs for the Diamondbacks, who host Game 2 tomorrow night.

In Philadelphia, Jeff Francis pitched six innings and Matt Holliday hit a home run as Colorado opened the postseason with a road win.

Francis struck out the first four Phillies he faced and finished with eight, allowing four hits and two earned runs to get the win at Citizens Bank Park.

The Phillies' first four batters -- Jimmy Rollins, Shane Victorino, Chase Utley and Ryan Howard -- were 0-for-15 at the plate. Utley struck out four times and Howard three.

``Not that I was out there to strike people out, but that's the way it went with the first four batters,'' Francis said at a news conference. ``I was making some good pitches with two strikes and it kind of set us on a good roll.''

Losing Pitcher

Phillies starter Cole Hamels pitched 6 2/3 innings and took the loss, giving up three earned runs on three hits with seven strikeouts and four walks.

Colorado's Garrett Atkins opened the scoring with a second- inning double that scored Todd Helton. Yorvit Torrealba drove in Atkins with a single, and the Rockies made it 3-0 on Hamels's third walk of the inning.

Aaron Rowand and Pat Burrell hit back-to-back solo home runs in the fifth inning for the Phillies. Holliday, who won the NL batting title, then hit a solo homer in the eighth inning to make it 4-2.

Game 2 of the series is tomorrow in Philadelphia.

To contact the reporter on this story: Bob Bensch in New York at There are thousands of ways to look like an idiot in this line of work. Trust us. We've tried out just about all of them.


But writing columns like this opus, which predict who's going to win the World Series, might be at the top of the whole darned list.

Especially heading into an October like this one, when anyone can win.

Especially after an October like the last one, when the team that won it all (the Cardinals) was the only team everybody was convinced couldn't possibly win.

AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast

Cubs manager Lou Piniella, right, looks to lead his troops to the promised land this October.
So when we tell you the Chicago Cubs are going to win the 2007 World Series, we can't help but wonder what you'll do with this invaluable insight.

Will you take it to show your friends? Will you take it to the trash compactor? Will you take it right to Vegas -- so you can bet on everybody except the Cubs?

We wouldn't blame you if you did any of the above. But we still want to assure you that we try to take this awesome responsibility seriously, so that at least we'll have good, sound, logical reasons for positioning ourselves as the King of the Idiots.

Because we're so diligent, we surveyed just about everybody we spoke to in baseball -- players, GMs, scouts, coaches, hot dog vendors -- once late September rolled around.

A lot of good that did.

Not only was there absolutely no consensus, we were amazed by how many people could tell us which teams not to pick, but had absolutely no idea which team we should pick.

"It's like the NCAA Tournament this year," laughed one AL executive. "Too many 5-12 games to pick in the first round."

We heard lots of variations on that theme. But here was our favorite response -- a response that summed up how impossible this is:

"Do me a favor," one National League GM said. "Go talk to everybody else. Then, when you're done with your survey, call me back and tell me which team nobody picked. And I'll pick that team."

Hey, that strategy would have worked great last year. But in this season's survey, every team got a vote. Granted, the Yankees, Red Sox and Angels got more than anyone else. But as soon as we started leaning toward one of those teams, the next expert we talked to would explain why we shouldn't pick it.

So rather than tell you, off the top, why we picked the Cubs, let's run through all the reasons we didn't pick the other seven teams:

It won't be the Diamondbacks
The Diamondbacks are one of the great stories of the season. But who the heck are they? (Go ahead. Name six Diamondbacks.) And how the heck did they outwin every other team in the National League?

On one hand, they did win more one-run games (32) than any team in baseball. And Brandon Webb can beat anybody any time. And they did find a way to win 18 games in which they scored three runs or fewer. But …

They finished next-to-last in the league in runs scored. They batted 10 points lower than anyone else in the league with runners in scoring position. They committed more errors than any of the other seven playoff teams. And …

Has anyone mentioned in the last 10 minutes that they were outscored for the season -- by 20 runs?

If it means anything, three of the previous four nonstrike-year playoff teams to have a negative run differential got swept in the first round. The fourth (the '87 Twins) did win the World Series -- but did it behind two dominating starters (Frank Viola and Bert Blyleven). We can't find a Bert Blyleven on this team. How about you?

It won't be the Indians
Here's another team that's easy to love. A team that went 31-12 down the stretch. A team built for October with two potential dominators (C.C. Sabathia and Fausto Carmona) in the rotation.

A team with two tremendous set-up men (Rafael Betancourt and Rafael Perez). A team that came from behind to win 44 times -- including 11 times when it trailed after seven innings. But …

The Indians also got stuck with a first-round draw against the Yankees, an outfit the Indians have lost to eight times in a row (0-6 this year), by a combined score of 70-24. And …

Nobody but the Indians themselves seems to have much faith in closer Joe Borowski, the first reliever in history to save 40 games despite an ERA over 5.00. And …

It isn't just the roster that's light on October experience. Eric Wedge is the only manager in the AL derby who has never managed a postseason game. The other three (Joe Torre, Terry Francona, Mike Scioscia) have all won a World Series.

It won't be the Phillies
It's possible you were too busy watching the Mets disintegrate to notice the team that blew by them at the finish line. But the Phillies are more similar to last year's Cardinals than you'd think.
Yeah, those Cardinals were brutal down the stretch, and these Phillies were breathing fire. But here's the similarity:


The Cardinals won the World Series last year because the team they ran out there in October wasn't the same mess that nearly blew up their season. The Phillies, likewise, had a million things go wrong. But they now have a healthy Cole Hamels, a healthy Chase Utley, a back-in-sync Ryan Howard and actual late-inning bullpen dependability (via Tom Gordon, J.C. Romero and Brett Myers). So they're a dangerous team. But ……

As great a job as Charlie Manuel did in motivating a banged-up team to play harder than any club in the league, let's just say there are lots of baseball people who question whether he's the best tactician in the postseason managerial field. And …

No team with a 4.73 ERA has ever won the World Series. As one front-office man put it, "It's hard to believe the Phillies could win three straight series with that pitching." And …

Hot as the Phillies are, they aren't even the hottest team in their own first-round series. (Colorado is, obviously.) Since the wild-card era began in 1995, 12 teams have charged into the playoffs off a finish as good as the Phillies' (13-4 or better). Not one of those teams has won the World Series.

It won't be the Angels
Here's why this postseason-prediction racket will fry your brain cells: When we first started polling, nearly two weeks ago, the Angels were the hot pick.

They were such a hot pick, in fact, they were our initial pick. You particularly sharp readers out there might even have noticed that, in the first set of Red Sox-Angels predictions posted on our site, we took the Angels.

Then, however, stuff started happening. Kelvim Escobar came up tender. Gary Matthews Jr. had issues with his ankle and knee. Chone Figgins and Garret Anderson stopped hitting, and Anderson came down with conjunctivitis. Vlad Guerrero still couldn't play the field because of a sore triceps. Scot Shields had two more rocky outings in the last week. And …

Then there's the team's No. 1 starter, John Lackey. Eleven career starts against Boston, one win -- and a 6.27 ERA. And seven of those starts have come at Fenway -- with one win and a 7.46 ERA. So …

We changed that first-round prediction. We're taking the Red Sox now. As scary as the Angels might be in October if they get their act back together, we heard too many people in the last few days say things like, "I loved that team three weeks ago. I don't love them as much anymore."

It won't be the Rockies
There's no worse feeling, here in the Aspiring Nostradamus Division of ESPN.com, than to pick against a team that has ripped off a 14-1 streak in the last couple of weeks.

And the Rockies aren't just hot, either. This is one talented team. Best defensive team in the league. Best ERA in the league since the All-Star break. Second-highest scoring offense in the NL. And unstoppable at home (39-15 since June 2). But …

Didn't the last two Octobers teach us that the hottest teams don't always win the World Series? It's true that the Rockies are only the third team since 1903 -- joining the 1965 Dodgers and 1960 Yankees -- to roar into the postseason with at least 14 wins in their last 15 games. But just one of those other two teams -- those Dodgers -- actually won the World Series. (That's 50 percent, right?)

And in the 12 seasons of the wild-card era, not once has the playoff team that had the best post-Sept. 1 record won the World Series -- not even that 2001 A's juggernaut that went 23-4 after Sept. 1. So beware of that team-of-destiny stuff. That and three bucks will get the Rockies over the Walt Whitman Bridge.

It won't be the Yankees
Mention the Yankees to anyone else in the playoffs, and everybody has the same reaction.

"That's the team that's definitely the most feared," one AL executive said. "If you're up five runs in the eighth inning, the game's not over -- put it that way -- just because of the quality and the depth of their lineup."

Only one team in the American League was within 100 of the Yankees in runs scored. None of the other AL playoff teams was within 20 homers of them. They have Joba Chamberlain now to suffocate you on the road to Mariano Rivera. And they've outwon every team in baseball for the last four months (72-29). But …

There's a difference between being the scariest team and the best team. After all, said another AL front-office man, "We said the same thing about them last year, too." And …

As good as Chien-Ming Wang and Andy Pettitte can be, "they're not unbeatable," said one scout. And after that, said another baseball man, there are "nothing but question marks" in the rotation. And …

Let's remember what makes life in Yankeedom different than life on any other team: They're so consumed with defining their whole season through the events of October, all it would take is a Game 1 four-hitter by Sabathia, complete with an A-Rod 0-for-4, to bring a thousand pressurized plot lines back to life. They didn't react real well under those conditions last October. So who knows how they'd react this October?

It's not the Red Sox
So which Red Sox team are we talking about this month? If it's the team that was 80-51 a month and a half ago, feeding off the most dominating pitching in baseball, sign us up for a big vote for that team.

But if it's the team that didn't win a series against a club with a winning record after Aug. 5, the team that went 1-5 against the Yankees down the stretch, the team that got a 6.15 ERA out of Daisuke Matsuzaka, Hideki Okajima and Eric Gagne after Aug. 1, stop this train. We'd like to get off.

That's how tough it is to make sense of anything heading into this tournament. This is the most schizophrenic bunch of playoff teams ever witnessed. And the Red Sox are as schizophrenic as any of them.

So naturally, just as we were leaping off their bandwagon, one scout told us: "If they play the way they played the last week of the season, they'll be very hard to beat -- especially in Boston. They're on a roll. They can't do anything wrong."

We picked this team to go to the World Series for 4? months. Now we're picking them to do that again. But we can't pick them to win the World Series, because, as you might recall, we've already picked somebody else.

It's the Cubs
Why the Cubs? Hey, why not the Cubs?

"You know what?" one NL GM said. "It's that kind of year. Everybody's flawed. So why not them?"

Exactly. Especially because if they don't win it all this season, you know what that means. It means they'll have to spend an entire season next year hearing about how they've gone a whole frigging century without winning a World Series.

And how many other teams have gone a whole century without winning a World Series? None, naturally. So what more incentive could one franchise possibly need?

"That's the best reason," the same GM said. "It's impossible to go a century. Isn't it?"

Well, you'd think. Except, after all, they are the Cubs.

But these Cubs are better than you think if you stopped paying attention when Carlos Zambrano was throwing that haymaker at Michael Barrett.

Since June 3, they have the fourth-best record in baseball (63-46). That should tell you something.

They had a winning record on the road this year (41-40), and only one other NL playoff team (the Phillies) can say that. That should tell you something, too.

AP Photo/ Stacie Freudenberg

From lovable losers to World Series champions? Good things come to those who wait.
Their pitching was so good and so deep, they allowed the second-fewest runs in the National League (behind only San Diego) and the third-fewest in baseball (behind Boston and San Diego). That's how you win in October, isn't it?

Their manager, that Lou Piniella guy, has won a World Series. None of the other NL managers has ever won a postseason series. And "the manager makes a big difference in the postseason," one AL executive says. "Lou has so much more experience. That should be a big advantage."

We'll admit their lineup is a mystery. Even Piniella is out of explanations for why this group hasn't hit. But wait. They had the highest slugging percentage in the league in September, outhomering both the Phillies and Rockies. So at least we know they can hit.

And if October experience means anything, they can run a lineup out there in which everybody but Ryan Theriot has been there, done that.

So think it through. Why not the Cubs? That's where we're coming from.

We could be wrong about any of these eight teams. So if we're going down, why go down with one of those easy, trendy, convenient picks? Might as well go down riding the best story out there.

And if we're wrong, heck, blame us. Those billy goats deserve the next century off, anyway.

Jayson Stark is a senior writer for ESPN.com. His new In a sport where no team won 60 percent of its games this season, baseball fans are desperate for a "champion." The winning standard in the National League was raised from 2006's 83-win minimum to 85 in the perpetually embarrassing (Comedy) Central division.

Easily the most fascinating aspect to these playoffs is the immediate history surrounding recent champs. In the past seven seasons, we've seen seven different teams win the World Series. Will this year mark the eighth? Chicago, Cleveland, Colorado and Philadelphia would like to hope so. Of this season's seven "newcomers" (teams not in last year's playoffs), those four are not among the trophy passers.

The only other time this "pass the trophy" phenomenon happened in baseball (or any pro sport of the big four, for that matter) was in 1978-1987. Ten seasons with a different champion each year. What do these two streaks have in common? They were both started by the New York Yankees. Enough with these wild stats. Let's kick into playoff predictions! Last year when the playoffs started, I was routinely laughed down at in the newsroom for saying the Cardinals would win the World Series. Yes, now I invite the larger public to laugh along.

AMERICAN LEAGUE

Boston Red Sox vs. Los Angeles Angels

The Red Sox are spoiled. Cheered where ever they go. Still riding on the rotting laurels of their 2004 World Series. They probably have the best manager this postseason in Terry Francona but the team seems to lack that killer instinct. Specifically, Boston lacks quick contact hitters so the offense becomes piecemeal to good pitching. Boston's got great pitching and it will win them Game One. But the Angels respond in a shocking, brutal three game takeover.

Cleveland Indians vs. New York Yankees Aww, those cute little up-and-comers in Cleveland. Welcome to the playoffs. By the way, please lose. Please don't advance to the World Series. Does the state of Ohio really need to lose another championship? Even though the Marlins didn't make the playoffs, you Ohioans learned from San Antonio that threats and humiliation come from outside the state of Florida too. Luckily, Cleveland doesn't have much of an offensive identity due to lack of consistency in any category. Fausto Carmona wins them Game 2 but the Yankees (6-0 against Cleveland this year) win the other three.