The Year of the Sweep: The Wild Results of the MLB Division Series
For only the second time in the division series era in the MLB, three out of four series ended in sweeps. The last time this happened was actually not too long ago.
In the 2007 playoffs, the Boston Red Sox swept the Los Angeles Angels (what a turn of events), the Colorado Rockies swept the Philadelphia Phillies (the similarities here are unreal), and the Arizona Diamondbacks swept the Chicago Cubs (well that ended).
The only other series involved the Cleveland Indians and the New York Yankees where the Yanks went down in four games.
This season the brooms were out again for three major league cities.
The first team to fall was the St. Louis Cardinals. Coming as a surprise to many, the Cards did not even put up a fight against the Los Angeles Dodgers. With their strong starting pitching and stout offense led by sluggers Albert Pujols and Matt Holliday, a World Series win did not seem far away.
But, the Dodgers pitching and offense proved to be too much, and the Cardinals' season ended earlier than expected.
The trend continued as the Los Angeles Angels ended the season of the Boston Red Sox in straight games after Jonathan Papelbon blew the third game in the ninth inning (who clearly was not as jovial as shown).
The Yankees completed the sweeps of the series by defeating the Minnesota Twins. After falling behind in the sixth inning of the final game, the Yankees padded on runs in the seventh and ninth to sweep the Twins and finish the days of the MetroDome.
The brooms have been out early and in force this year, and the Yankees even picked an extra achievement up by going 10-0 against the Twins including both the regular season and the postseason.
While the Yankees await the Angels and the Dodgers await the winner of the Phillies and Rockies series, one can only wonder: will the brooms be out again in the Championship Series?
No seems like the reasonable answer here, but did anyone see three sweeps coming with the matchups in the division series?
This article was first featured on The Sports Sage.
