Baseball Tri-Weekly: September Cover 2008

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Read the 2008 Playoff Preview

Stolen Season
Conor Intabedd; Reno Weekly Rag writing for Baseball Tri-Weekly


"Can you imagine a crazier situation in the final week of the regular season where all six teams have already clinched playoff spots? I doubt you can," those were the words from Quebec City GM Pat Renaud prior to the Week 22, and just about every other playoff GM must have agreed. Going into the final week of the regular season the only thing that was clinched besides playoff invitations was the Western Division trophy. No seed was safe. No bye had been clinched.



There were plenty of long shots, most Involving the Las Vegas Doggs. They could have had a chance at the Eastern Division crown if Rakeville had faltered against Arlington, but that didn't happen, as the Rockets beat Arlington for the seond time this season by the score of 6-1. More importantly, they could have catapulted themselves to the number 1 seed over both Bridgewater and Quebec City. They needed to beat Bridgewater, and beat them badly. A 9-0 score or better would have jumped them over their division rival and possibly dropping the Weasels down to 3rd place, a seed Weasels' fans couldn't have fathomed being in since Week 5.

"We knew we had a shot at it going in and we knew it would be tough, but we had the squad to do it and with our recent momentum we knew there was a strong possibility we could take it," Doggs' third baseman David Wright was quoted as saying prior to the Doggs-Weasels match up in Week 22.

The Doggs ended up putting up a 9-1 win over Bridgewater, a half a point below their target, leaving them a half game behind the Weasels in the regular season standings. Jimmy Rollins' 7 stolen bases against Doggs' pitchers was the key, and Doggs' newest starter Ricky Nolasco knows it. "He stole 3 on me this week. It was embarrasing. He just knows how to take advantage of situations and make you pay for not paying attention," Nolasco said in a recent press conference.

Not was all lost for Las Vegas as they also had the chance to jump over Quebec City in the standings, thus clinching themselves a 1st round bye in next week's playoffs. This was also a long shot sicne the Piglets had already beaten team Shaddupu in Week 11 by the score of 9-1, not giving the Doggs' too much confidence in a Weymouth squad that had traded one of their biggest bats since that match up.

Going into the final 3 hours of play in Week 22, the Doggs sat a whole point over the Piglets and all the Doggs were ready to start their week vacation. Quebec City starting catcher Russ Martin was ready to ruin the Doggs' party. In his first at bat he singled, stole 2nd, and then scored on a Justin Morneau double. That single at bat brought the Piglets above the Doggs by a half a game. Luckily for the Doggs, Stephen Drew got a timely 2 out single later that game, taking away a point from the Piglets and bringing the Doggs a half point above the Western Division champions, and that's how it ended.

"It was a wild ride from our persepective. Everyone was in the locker room glued to the television. All we cared about was Russ and Drew. No one else mattered. When Drew hit that single and Martin struck out the whole locker room exploded. Most of us had already booked flights home to see our families, thinking we had a week off, so if we lost out on that bye we would have been pretty upset. Needless to say, we were pretty relieved," Doggs' outfielder Adam Dunn told KDOG in a post-game interview.

The top three teams ended up finishing a half a game behind each other, with the Weasels netting the top seed, Las Vegas finishing second, and Quebec City dropping down to 3rd, forcing them to face off against Weymouth in a rematch of their regualr season finale. The Piglets won both of the regular seaosn match ups against Shaddupu by a combined score of 14-4.

Bridgewater end up facing off against the winner of the Rockets-Green Monsters first round match up, while the Doggs will face the winner of the Piglets-Shaddupu rematch.