Sweet Prelude to Playoffs
By Tom Callahan
Frequently baseball's playoffs upstage the World Series, but for once the ( pressure is on the league tournaments to live up to the regular season. Maybe it is serendipitous, after all, that greed is stretching things this week from best-of-five to best-of-seven. Everyone, certainly everyone in New York City, needs some time to exhale.
During all of the bellowing this summer, back and forth across the country, regarding "subway" and "freeway" World Series, Missourians were characteristically muted concerning the "show me" Series that is now distinctly possible. "It's harvest time," pronounced Dan Quisenberry, an ironic relief pitcher for Kansas City, by way of introducing last week's four- day visit from the California Angels, one of several perfect appointments fizzing all over the map.
Starting with Quisenberry, or rather, stopping with him, Kansas City is a team of pitchers, a gentle way of saying the Royals have the feeblest batting average in the American League and have scored the second-fewest runs. California, on the other hand, is a team of pensioners. From First Baseman Rod Carew to Rightfielder Reggie Jackson, as sure as the Chicago Cubs play in daylight, the California Angels play in twilight. Their manager, Gene Mauch, is the most respected one never to win a pennant. Ahead of the Royals by one game in the West division, the Angels faced downy-cheeked Righthander Bret Saberhagen first, and at the end he dismissed Jackson with three called strikes. "I looked at Reggie and thought of the Dodgers' Bob Welch striking him out in the World Series. It's a good feeling to strike out Reggie Jackson." By doing so, Saberhagen, 21, became the fifth most precocious 20-game winner in major-league history, displacing by a couple of months a young pitcher named Babe Ruth. "Gosh," said Saberhagen. Kansas City's only Ruthian player, Third Baseman George Brett, homered in Saberhagen's behalf, and in following games did the same for Bud Black and Danny Jackson. The Royals waved the Angels away to Texas a game behind, while Kansas City awaited the Oakland A's and the champagne. Of last year's four playoff teams, including the popular Cubs, the promising Padres and the pre- eminent Tigers, only the modest Royals have endured. "It's great to be great," said Dick Howser, a manager whose achievements exceed his reputation, "but there's a joy in being competitive."
Across the state, if the St. Louis Cardinals were to yield the National League's East division, they pretty much had to lose three straight games to the New York Mets, and they pretty nearly did. Cardinals Manager Whitey Herzog rearranged Ace John Tudor's date with Darth Gooden only to lock Tudor and well-bred Yalie Ron Darling into a 0-0 death grip, broken like a windowpane on an eleventh-inning Darryl Strawberry home run that, except for the stadium clock being digital, put spectators in mind of Roy Hobbs. Naturally, Gooden won the second game, his 24th victory at 20 years old, but the third ended in a nervous stream of Cardinal pitchers, a sigh of St. Louis relief and a 4-3 save of the season.
By 30 points, the best hitter in the National League this year, a switch- hitter at that, has been St. Louis Centerfielder Willie McGee, who was not elected to the All-Star game but ought to be voted the MVP. He fields, throws and sprints with anyone, and his two-out single in the sixth inning drove in the fourth run. "I'm a little scared," said this unimposing man afterward, "that all of these numbers could make me kind of step out of myself. I don't want to be thought of as the best of anything, because I know if I start thinking that I'm above other people, I'll never get any better."
The Cardinals now turn to the Los Angeles Dodgers, whose improvement since the bad old days of May has revolved around Rookie Infielder Mariano Duncan, 22, though some thank Angels Second Baseman Bobby Grich. In the final exhibition game of the spring, Grich inadvertently sat on Dodgers Second Baseman Steve Sax, who injured a leg. But for that, Duncan would have been dispatched to the minors. About the time Sax recovered, Shortstop Dave Anderson's slippery back slid out again, and Duncan shifted to short. There he bloomed into an acrobat, sort of a muscular Ozzie Smith. Eventually, Pedro Guerrero could be unshackled from third base. Back in the outfield, Pedro once more was able to while away the idle moments working on his waggle, and he hit 15 homers in June alone.
Over a seven-week stretch, Starting Pitchers Fernando Valenzuela, Orel Hershiser and Welch strung 21 glad decisions. But maybe the most notable Dodgers statistic is that, for all of his five years in the major leagues, Valenzuela has never missed a turn. Renewed defense aside, Los Angeles is a team of pitching and pasta. Mike Scioscia is the first Dodger catcher since Roy Campanella to menace .300. "I don't play Scioscia because he's Italian," says Manager Tommy Lasorda. "I play him because I'm Italian."
A pride of this sort was at work all summer in Toronto, where North ( Americans resented the tone New Yorkers took in botching and booing O Canada. Tantalizing the Yankees last weekend pleasured the whole country, especially New York's discard Doyle Alexander, who pitched the clincher.
Contenders since 1983, the Blue Jays have been patiently forged by Executive Vice President Pat Gillick on the sound right arm of Dave Stieb and the legs and bats of several near stars with increasingly recognizable names, like George Bell, Jesse Barfield and Lloyd Moseby.
Just eight years have blown by since Toronto's inaugural, and not four seasons ago, Canadians celebrated tying Cleveland by chanting deliriously, "We're No. 6!" The 2.4 million customers counted this year are battened down for some small embarrassment over their jury-rigged old football park, Exhibition Stadium, located on an occasionally windblown lake. At a cost of some $500,000, "practically enclosed" auxiliary press boxes are under construction. "When I was managing Kansas City," Whitey Herzog recalls, "I remember an opening day in Toronto when the temperature was 36 degrees and a 30-m.p.h. gale was coming off that lake. By the time they played those two anthems, Lord." Remembering last April and August, here is the baseball season that could begin, recess and end in a snowstorm.