Looking Into the American League Championship Series

The sign of a good manager is a person that can get 25 Major League Baseball Players to play team ball with the team coming in front of all and any other individual goals. 25 Professional athletes playing for the name on the front of their jersey's - not the name on the back. The Rays Joe Maddon and the Red Sox Terry Francona are just those type of managers and their teams meet in the best of seven ALCS beginning Friday. In the season series between these teams the Rays have won 10 of 18 including 8 of 9 at Tropicana Field. The Rays home field, Tropicana Field, will play an important role as the Rays have home field advantage and four games will be in Tampa Bay if needed. Tropicana Field is where the Rays compiled the best home record in baseball with a 57-24 mark. Boston was just 8-19 indoors this season and can't buy into the fact that the Red Sox with a questionable Josh Bekett and minus Lowe(3b), Ramirez (rf) and Schilling (RHP) are even close to last season's championship team. On the other hand Tampa Bay now has the luxury of Crawford, Longoria and Pena in the line-up for the first time since August 7th. Expect a great series that should go the full seven games and have a feeling that Major League Baseball Cinderella Team is going to get it done! It's aweful hard to repeat as Champions at any level of competitive sports. This season's American League Champions - Tamps Bay Rays