The National League Championship Series began last night, with the No. 6 Phillies beating the fifth-seeded Padres in San Diego. The American League Division Series starts tonight in Houston, with the top-seeded Astros hosting the No. 2 Yankees. The contrast between the two championship series matchups is one of the great joys of the baseball playoffs. That these four teams are the last remaining is an indication that anything and everything can happen when the calendar turns to October, and that the 162 games played in the regular season truly aren’t enough to determine a winner.
The other day, I wrote about the unpredictability that has always been part of the MLB postseason and that it’s too soon to say whether the latest expansion, to 12 teams, provides an unfair disadvantage to the best regular-season teams.