Playoffs: Day 1

Wednesday, October 06 2010 @ 06:30 AM EDT

Here's an all-purpose thread for day 1 of the Phil Cuzzi-free 2010 Division Series.

1:30 pm: Rangers at Rays

		GS	IP/GS	K%	BB%	HR%	GB%	BABIP	ERA
Cliff Lee	L	28	7.6	21.9	2.1	1.9	41.9	.302	3.18
David Price	L	31	7.0	21.8	9.2	1.7	43.7	.279	2.72

Pretty good matchup, huh? Good thing plenty of great seats are still available at raysbaseball.com. Montreal Devil Rays, anyone? Josh Hamilton makes his first playoff appearance. Of course it just had to be against the Rays. That's how baseball works. Price's track record against current Rangers is weak. Elvis Andrus is 6/10 with three walks; Nelson Cruz is 2/4 with a homer and two walks. Price's only 2010 outing against the Rangers was a quality start, but it was a Matsuzaka special: 6 IP, 2 R, 5 BB, 5 H, 8 K. It was still a big improvement over his earlier Texas efforts. Texas' starter Lee has the lowest walk rate in the AL, but the Rays are the AL walking champs, with a team walk rate of 10.7%. It'll be interesting to see whether they come out swinging.

5:00 pm: Reds at Phillies

		GS	IP/GS	K%	BB%	HR%	GB%	BABIP	ERA
Edinson Volquez	R	12	5.2	24.4	12.7	2.2	53.9	.326	4.31
Roy Halladay	R	33	7.6	22.1	3.0	2.4	51.2	.298	2.44

After 320 regular-season starts, Roy Halladay finally gets to play October baseball. The Phillies are heavy favourites, but Cincinnati has a secret weapon: 2008 all-star starter Edinson Volquez, who's quietly rounded into form in September. Voltron's last four starts: 27.2 IP, 6 R, 31 K, 8 BB. His changeup should serve him well against the left-leaning Phils; he does have reverse splits over his career. If Volquez turns the game into a battle of bullpens, and it comes down to Chapman/Rhodes against Madson/Lidge, the Reds might just be able to steal it. Of course, it's hard to knock Halladay out. The man has 31 decisions in 33 starts. It's even harder when you only see 3.72 pitches per PA, as the Reds have this year.

8:30 pm: Yankees at Twins

		GS	IP/GS	K%	BB%	HR%	GB%	BABIP	ERA
CC Sabathia	L	34	7.0	20.3	7.6	2.1	50.7	.285	3.18
Francisco Liriano	L	31	6.2	24.9	7.2	1.1	53.6	.340	3.62

The Twins have won 3 of their last 19 playoff games. How much of this has to do with the repertoire of the typical Twins starting pitcher? I'll leave that up to the philosophers. Liriano is clearly an atypical Twins starter, though, and this will be his first playoff start. Liriano's devastating slider gives him serious  splits (lefties hit .218/.250/.267 against him this year), so the Yankees might be well advised to start both Marcus Thames and Austin Kearns, even if they are ill-suited to play anywhere other than DH in the Twins' spacious new park. Maybe even Greg Golson in center. As for the Twins, Alexi Casilla is 9/13 off Sabathia. The Minnesota climate may come into play in this series, but tonight it shouldn't be too bad. The forecast calls for a low of 45 degrees and a clear sky.

Braves and Giants are idle.

By my count, that's three intriguing matchups today. Let the crapshoot begin...

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