Nelson Cruz's performance this year is all-the-more impressive considering that he bats 7th for the Rangers.

Here are the most post-season homers coming from the 7-hole:

One would assume that nobody hits too many homers from so low in the batting order because, if they keep hitting them, they get moved up. We'll see where Cruz bats in the World Series...

The Tigers, last night, were not the first team to have their post-season run shut-down with an ugly loss.  Here are some other teams to have this happen to them.

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If they had known their team would out-homer the Rangers by 13-7 in the ALCS, many Tigers fans would have bet the house on going to the World Series.

Instead, the Tigers became the first team ever to hit 4 HRs while losing a postseason finale.

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Are Joaquin Benoit, Jose Valverde and Al Alburquerque all hurt?

There can be no other excuse for Jim Leyland bringing Brad Penny into game 6, in the 6th inning, trailing by 6.

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Here is the list, to date -

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So, if we get an additional two or more "Sudden Death" games this year, does that make 2011 the "Greatest Post-Season Ever"?

Since 1950, here are the pitchers who have hit a game-winning walk-off homer:

These guys all walked off with the win, meaning that since they were the pitcher of record when they homered, they also got credit for the victory on the pitching side of the ledger. The last time it happened was in 1986 by Craig Lefferts.

Note that this list includes only players who were the pitcher of record at the time of their homer. It does not include guys who normally appeared as pitchers but hit a walk-off pinch-hit homer. (I'm not sure if this have ever happened.)

Also note again that this list goes back to only 1950. I know that Wes Ferrell did it prior to then, as I imagine a few others did as well.

I see that Wally Burnette surrendered two such homers, both in 1957. And...what a great name: Vinegar Bend Mizell.

Thanks to Kingturtle for writing in with the idea.

In game 5 of the NLCS, Tony LaRussa replaced starting pitcher Jaime Garcia with Octavio Dotel in the 5th inning, with 2 outs, 2 on, a 4-1 lead and Ryan Braun coming up.

Since I've often knocked LaRussa for ruining the flow of games with excessive pitching changes, fairness demands that I shout this from the rooftop:

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How many of these efforts do you remember?

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By the way, tomorrow is the 25th anniversary of Game 6 of the 1986 NLCS.

If the Rangers advance to the 2011 World Series, that will be back-to-back appearances for that club in the Fall Classic.

Quick--name the last team to appear in consecutive World Series. Read the rest of this entry »

Nelson Cruz has homered in 4 of the 5 games of this ALCS (games 1, 2, 4 and 5), tying a MLB postseason series record shared by 10 others.

Guess who was on deck today when Mike Napoli made the last out with the tying runs aboard?

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