It was another crazy finish as the last American League Wild Card spot went down to the last day of the season.  That then in turn resulted in a 163rd game for the Tampa Bay Rays and the Texas Rangers.  Alas the Rays won and they will be facing a red hot Cleveland team that won 10 straight games to clinch a playoff spot.  The Reds will do battle with the Pirates in what will be their 7th game in 12 days against one another.  Let October baseball begin.

Cincinnati Reds vs. Pittsburgh Pirates

There wasn’t any doubt that the Reds were going to make it to the postseason.  The only doubt was whether they would stay ahead or keep pace with their division foes, the Pittsburgh Pirates. Cincinnati is a little banged up heading into this game with 2B Brandon Phillips having fouled a ball off his shin in the second to last game of the season.  Their starting pitcher Mat Latos is also unavailable for this game and if they move on to the Division Series he might be out then too.  Either way the Reds will need to go all in for this one.  1B Joey Votto and OF Shin-Soo Choo had good Septembers and with the call-up of speedster OF Billy Hamilton the Reds know they won’t be out of any game any time soon.  Johnny Cueto will be starting this game.  He’ll have to pitch the best game of his career against a Pirates team that has beaten the Reds 4 out of their last 6 meetings at the end of the season.

They are the feel good story of the baseball season.  Twenty years of not finishing above .500 and no postseason baseball in the Steel City.  No more as these Pirates look to erase any memories of the Barry Bonds era and the promise of what could have been.  The Pirates August acquisitions of OF Marlon Byrd from the Mets and 1B Justin Morneau from the Twins have paid off in the final stretch run of the season.  Both had solid Septembers and with the NL MVP favorite in CF Andrew McCutchen the Pirates are flying high. Pittsburgh’s starting pitcher for the Wild Card game, Francisco Liriano struggled in September, but his stats at PNC Park at incredible with a 1.47 ERA in 11 starts this season.  If he plays like that the Pirates will move on to play the St. Louis Cardinals.

Tampa Bay Rays vs. Cleveland Indians

Once again the Tampa Bay Rays have shocked most by making another Postseason appearance when it wasn’t expected.  This will be the Rays fourth Postseason appearance in the last six years. They hope to make another trip to the World Series with the current group they have.  The Rays don’t have the most prolific offense in baseball, but they have a few key pieces that have helped them a lot this season.  3B Evan Longoria is the leader and for the first time since 2010 he has played in at least 150 games. This season he played in 160.  He has had help along the way with 1B James Loney and 2B Ben Zobrist being good run producers behind Longoria.  The biggest help came when AL Rookie of the Year candidate OF Wil Myers was called up and drove in 53 runs in his 88 games played this season.  The Rays claim to fame though has been their pitching.  They have one of the deepest and most talented starting rotations in all of baseball and their starter for this Wild Card game, Alex Cobb is a big part of that.  He had a solid September with 3 wins in his five starts.  His 2.70 road ERA is solid.  The scary thing about Tampa Bay this year is that they would rather play on the road than at home if that makes any sense.

The Cleveland Indians are back in the Postseason for the first time since 2007.  They hope this next go round is a lot more memorable than that one when they had a 3-1 series lead over the eventual World Series champions the Boston Red Sox.  Cleveland is happy to host this one game Wild Card matchup as they had one of the best home records in baseball at 51-30.  The Rays won’t be easy to beat, but the Indians have a lineup that caught fire in September.  One of those players that caught fire was 1B Nick Swisher who is the emotional leader of this team.  His 7 HR and 17 RBI were a big lift down the stretch and OF Michael Brantley has had a career year with 73 RBI for the season.  Their All-Star 2B Jason Kipnis has been a clutch performer for them all year both on offense and defense.  Cleveland’s starter for the Wild Card game, Danny Salazar is a lesser known name than Ubaldo Jimenez or Justin Masterson, but Salazar was solid in September with a 2.52 ERA in five starts.  His home ERA is 3.13 in four starts for the season, but his strikeout to walk ratio of 33-5 is an encouraging sign going into this important game.