Giants and Rangers Set for World Series

The Giants are now past party mode, and have re-focused on baseball, as they prepare for Wednesday's Game 1 showdown at AT&T Park, as the Giants send Tim Lincecum to the hill vs. Cliff Lee.

Both Lincecum and Lee have been very good this postseason and their numbers in their 3 starts are nearly identical. In 3 starts and 24 innings, Lee's gone 3-0 while allowing just 2 runs, 13 hits and 1 walk. He's also struck out 34 batters, and allowed just a .151 BAA. In Lincecum's 3 starts this postseason, he's gone 23.1 innings, allowed 5 ER and 14 hits with 30 k's, good for a .145 BAA... Game 1 is going to definitely be a good one and are just as enticing as the Lincecum-Halladay match-up's were, especially since it's the World Series. After Lee, the Rangers starters drop off a little, but not much. The Giants will probably face C.J. Wilson (15-8, 3.35 era, 170 k's in 2010) in game 2, Tommy Hunter (13-4, 3.73 era, 1.24 WHIP) in game 3 and Colby Lewis (12-13, 3.72 era, 192 k's) in game 4. The Giants definitely have the advantage, starting pitching wise, on paper, but the Rangers high-powered offense obviously surpases the Giants' starting 8. Many people are hyping this series up as the Giants dominant starters vs. the Rangers high octane offense. We'll truly get a gauge as to what wins in the postseason, offense or pitching. These teams match-up very well. The Rangers starting pitching has been very good in the playoffs, and the Giants offense has been very clutch, so it's going to be good match-ups all around.

The real wild card for me in this series, will be the Rangers speed. They have a bunch of guys in that lineup who can steal bases, and put pressure on defenses. Young Giants' catcher Buster Posey has a cannon arm, but you can run on the Giants starters, and I think Texas is going to work the running game into their gameplan quite often. We've already seen what's happened this postseason when the Giants don't play fundamental baseball, and the Rangers will try and get them to do just that. This Texas team really showed me something by not only defeating the Yankees, but doing it in a near dominant fashion. They won game 6 in a blowout, and really outplayed a Yankee team that was heavily favored. Now I'm curious to see who "experts" are going to favor in this series. I haven't really heard any predictions yet and I myself don't even want to make one because these teams are so darn evenly matched. If the Giants can get that middle of the order going (Buster Posey especially), play good defense and pitch well, then they can really beat anyone, as they showed against Philly.

Rotation Note: Bruce Bochy anounced his World Series starting rotation Monday, and there is a slight change from the NLCS. Matt Cain moves into the 2 spot behind Lincecum, dropping Jonathan Sanchez into the 3 spot. There was some talk that Barry Zito would get a look with his knowledge of the AL coupled with Sanchez's recent struggles, but Bochy said that was never seriously considered... As far as the DH goes, the logical choice, Pat Burrell, never faired well in that role with Tampa, so I don't think the Giants are going to use him there much. Tim Kawakami thinks it will be Pablo Sandoval getting the nod at DH and I'd say that's probably accurate. There is a chance we could see Aubrey Huff there for a game too with Travis Ishikawa moved out to first base as Huff has made a few defensive blunders at first this postseason.