|
The Oakland Telegraph
26 October 2031
Oakland are back in the World Series! Cardinals await after A's regain American League championship with dramatic 7-game win over Tampa Bay
By Bree Thout, utter relief correspondent
Sometimes, just sometimes, the two best baseball teams successfully navigate their way through the nerve-jangling maze of the postseason, and go head-to-head in the final series of the season. And so it is this year, after Oakland, who finished the regular season 13 games better than anyone else in the American League, and St. Louis, who were 15 games better than the rest of the National League, made it through to the 2031 World Series for a heavyweight clash and a half.
For the A's, it took a dramatic comeback to get the better of a tenacious and in-form Rays team and win the American League championship pennant for the seventh time in nine years. Oakland's star pitcher Karl Dickson has, as sod's law demands, followed a superb second half of the season with a poor postseason, and was belted for 5 runs in 7 innings as Tampa Bay took the opener in California. Nathan Hamilton was unlucky to lose a tight game the next day, and the A's suddenly found themselves in a 2-0 shaped hole as the two teams headed off to Florida. And that hole got excavated even deeper when the Rays jumped out to a 4-1 lead after 2 innings of game three. Finding themselves staring down the barrel, the 2031 vintage A's proved they have character and resilience as well as talent. Shortstop Liam Brown hit a bases loaded double and left fielder William Morris a 3-run bomb, as Oakland replied immediately by smelting 7 runs in the top of the 3rd, and they eventually won the game 11-5. The series was squared when Pepe Rios's 2-run homer in the 9th grabbed a late win in the next, and Oakland earned a 3-2 lead and a sweep of the games in Tampa when Dennis Hawkins's 3-run home run proved decisive in game five.
Finding themselves one game from elimination after not so long before having one foot in the door of the World Series, surely the Rays were too demoralised to fight back? Wrong. Gonzalo Avila gave a rather untimely demonstration of why he lost the closer job as Tampa Bay waltzed to a 14-4 victory in the next game. The series was going the distance. Nearly 35,000 crammed into the Coliseum for yesterday afternoon's rubber game. It was as tense as many expected. Pitchers Antonio Perez for Oakland and Robert Hayes for the Rays kept things tight for both teams. But that man Luis Trujillo somehow squeezed out a solo home run and an RBI single to put the A's 2-0 up heading into the 9th inning. If the home crowd were nervous before, they were left biting fingernails, toenails, and anything else made of hair they could find, when 2029 American League MVP Vicente Rosado blasted a tiring Perez into the stands for a 1-out solo homer. 2-1. Field manager Phil D'Manager turned to closer Jose "Duran Duran" Duran, who calmly induced a ground out and a fly out to see Oakland home.
It was all rather more serene for repeat National League champs St. Louis, who are 7-1 so far in the playoffs and in ominous form. With their history under GM Paulie Beane, the A's have the World Series pedigree and experience. But the Cardinals are the favourites of many neutrals. It should be fascinating to watch, unless, of course, one team runs away with it and it's not.
|