World Series Rocktoberfest 2007: Rockies NL Champs, Bring On The AL!

The Rockies win the pennant! NL Champs!
I almost can't utter the sentence without shaking my head in disbelief--the Rockies are the 2007 National League Champions!

One month ago, as I sat and watched the Rockies losing to the woeful Florida Marlins on September 14, the wild-card spot seemed a possible yet improbable goal for the unheralded and frankly unknown Colorado Rockies. As a baseball fan who had fallen from the one true faith and found solace elsewhere (a long overdue pair of Broncos Superbowl victories, and the incredible run of the Colorado Avalanche), the likelihood of any postseason scenario that included the Rockies was cynically dismissed--the Rox will find a way to blow it. Losing to the Marlins? Check. Fourth place in the NL West? Check. Just two weeks to go--not much hope.

But hidden away from the media and even the ever-dwindling fan base (barely 21,000 showed up for the game on a warm Friday night) was a team whose chemistry had already begun to fuse, bolstered by impressive defensive stats (setting the MLB team record), decent hitting, and a bullpen that could finally be (somewhat) trusted. Sure they had potential, but that would be next year, 2008. Compete for the wild card, maybe the NL West. But not this year.

Fast forward two weeks. The Arizona Diamondbacks are in town, and the Rockies not only need to win their games, but have the teams ahead of them--namely the New York Mets and the San Diego Padres--suffer monumental meltdowns. With Brandon Webb pitching, the Rockies appeared to blow any chances by losing 4-2, and ending their impressive 11 game win streak a few games short--too little too late. Yes, I was at that game (and you wonder why I was so cynical?)

Everyone knows the rest. The extra-innings tiebreaker victory, two consecutive series sweeps. Sunday night was miserably wet, but the Rockies made the cold soaking worth while. Last night, despite surrendering an error and seeing reliever Brian Fuentes return to his old (poor) form, the Rockies bent but did not break.

I will relish the euphoria of attending the decisive game 4, when the NL crowned the Colorado Rockies as the 2007 Champs. I was privileged to share that experience with my parents, and will proudly cherish the memories of the night when the Rockies silenced all those who said baseball at altitude would never work, challenged the myopic East Coast bias of the media, and turned even cynical Rockies fans into true believeRs!

Go Rockies!

Relive the Rockies sweep--Game 4 recap:



Interviews--Todd Helton, Josh Fogg, Troy Tulowitzki:



Local blog reax:
Best Destiny--"Let's just say . . . I like the history of Denver teams facing Cleveland teams in championship games."

Mount Virtus--"ESPN and the like have had a hard time figuring out who these Colorado Rockies are, this true TEAM of champions. Well, pretty soon, they’ll all find out."

ESPN's postgame recap, and 850KOA's postgame show.

Un-be-lievable!

"It's a far-fetched story," said Ryan Spilborghs, the backup outfielder who is such a huge clubhouse presence on this team. "It sounds like the kind of bedtime story you'd tell your 5-year-old son when he wants to hear a fairy tale. But if you told that story to the guys in this clubhouse, you know what? They'd believe you. And there'd be no doubt in anybody's mind that that was a true story.

"This group of guys has always believed we could win. So if you'd told me we'd win 21 out of 22 games with this group of guys, I'd say, 'Yeah. I believe it.'"

Clearly, they had to believe, or they couldn't have done this, right?

Couldn't have become the fifth team in the last 70 years to go 21-1 in any stretch of any season.

Couldn't have become the first team to do that in the middle of one of these mad charges to, and through, October.

Couldn't have become the second team in history (along with just the 1976 Big Red Machine) to sweep its first two postseason series in any given October.

Couldn't have become the fifth team of all time to make it from last place one year to the World Series the next.

Couldn't have become the sixth team in history to fall nine games under .500 and still climb out of that canyon to make it to the World Series.

And, finally, couldn't have become the first team ever to find itself two games out of a playoff spot with two games to play and somehow survive to scramble into the World Series.

That didn't really happen. Did it? That wasn't really possible. Was it?

Rocktober 2007: Rockies One Win From World Series!

I was chilled to the bone, but it was worth it:

Now, want to know who else these Rockies have joined on their Magical History Tour, thanks to their 4-1 thumping of Arizona on Sunday in Game 3 of the National League Championship Series, a game that made them an incomprehensible 20-1 in their past 21 games?

How about the 2001 A's and 1977 Royals. Those are the only two other teams in the past 54 years to roar off on a 20-1 streak -- at any point of any season.

OK, like that group? Let's keep going. How about the 1947 and '53 Yankees. Those are the only other juggernauts since World War II to win 20 of 21 -- again, in any stretch of any season.

Hang on. It gets better. How about Mel Ott, Carl Hubbell and the 1936 Giants. That's the last National League team to understand what it feels like to ride one of these 20-1 tsunamis.

Now hold on one second. Think about this, friends. The 1936 Giants? That was 71 years ago. Heck, that was 57 years before the invention of the entity we know as the Colorado Rockies.

And no team in the National League, in all those years and all those decades, has done what this Rockies team has done? How do we explain this?

"You know what, man? It's crazy," said Sunday's hero du jour, Yorvit Torrealba, the man who shocked even himself with his game-winning three-run homer. "I don't really have words to say because it's been like this every night. I can probably say this to somebody in 70 years and they won't believe it.

New baseball term for the day: eephus pitch.

Had to look that one up!

Rocktoberfest 2007: Go Rockies!

Rockies take Game 1 of NLCS, 5-1; Game 2 3-2 in 11!
NLCS prediction: Rockies over D'Backs in 6 4!

Open thread . . .

The Daily Blogster points out the disrespect for the Rockies (and Fly Over Country) from ESPN.

On winning:

"There's what -- a thousand ways to skin a cat? I'm sure there are tons more ways we can figure out to win a game," said Ryan Spilborghs, the latest in the Rockies' never-ending supply of daily heroes. "We're still waiting for a guy to throw a ball in the stands or something. And if they've got Hail Marys in baseball, we'll take one of those, too."
. . .
So here these Rockies are now, 19-1. And that just isn't possible. Is it? Not this time of year. Well, not to a baseball team, anyway. Let's try to give you some historical perspective on how insane this is:

These Rockies have now become the first team in history to find itself in the middle of any postseason, riding a 19-1 streak that dates back into the regular season. The '27 Yankees never did that. The '36 Yankees never did that. The Big Red Machine never did that. The only team that even came close was the 1970 Orioles. But they never made it past 18-1 -- in part because they won the World Series before they got that chance.

These Rockies have also become the first National League team in 30 years, and only the second in the last 44 years, to run off a 19-1 streak at any time of any year. Last to do it: the 1977 Phillies.

But that's not all. These Rockies are now the first team in 30 years, the first National League team in 72 years and the fourth team ever to win 19 of 20 after Sept. 1. Last to do it in the NL, according to the Elias Sports Bureau: the 1935 Cubs. Last to do it, period: the 1977 Royals -- a team that called up a prospect named Clint Hurdle in the middle of that streak. The only other team in that late-season 19-1 Club: John McGraw's 1916 New York Giants.

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How hot are the Rockies? Only 1 other NL team has gone 18-1 at any point in the season in the last 30 years. That team? The World Series champions--1986 Mets.