If you read my respective AL and NL Previews, you should know that I have the Red Sox and Phillies representing their respective leagues in the World Series. Much of the advantage, unfortunately, will come down to the All-Star game, as the outcome of this game sadly determines home-field advantage for the World Series. As I mentioned before, I think the AL has the goods on the NL again this season. Of course, a lot of that depends on who plays in the All-Star game, and who has an unexpected first half, but for the sake of simplicity I am going to assume that the AL wins the All-Star game, giving the Red Sox the home-field advantage in the playoffs. Let's go game-by-game, assuming that the matchups will break so that #1 pitches against #1, #2 vs. #2, and so forth:
Game 1: PHI Jon Lieber at BOS Curt Schilling
Game 2: PHI Brett Myers at BOS David Wells
Game 3: BOS Matt Clement at PHI Randy Wolf
Game 4: BOS Wade Miller at PHI Cory Lidle
Game 5: BOS Bronson Arroyo at PHI Gavin Floyd
Game 6: PHI Jon Lieber at BOS Curt Schilling
This is how it should look. However, when Boston gets up 3-1, winning games 1, 3, and 4, Philly will get desperate, changing the matchups to:
Game 5: BOS Bronson Arroyo at PHI Jon Lieber
Game 6: PHI Randy Wolf/Gavin Floyd at BOS Curt Schilling
This ploy will work in game 5, as the Phillies will send it back to Boston. There the Red Sox will get the chance to do what they did not last year: celebrate a World Series clinching win at Fenway, in front of the faithful. As the green weirdo on the cars.com ad says, "it's a thing of beauty."
Brett Myers will come of age, outdueling David Wells in Game 2, and it will be a close series, but the Red Sox are the deepest team in baseball, and that will help them immensely as the series progresses.
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