Game One

By Staff

They say that this is a pair of Cinderella teams in the World Series. A pair of wild cards, who really shouldn't be here. Yet in the first round of the playoffs, both teams defeated the Old Guard of their respective leagues, the Yankees and the Braves. For their next trick, they took out so-called teams of destiny, the contraction-rumored Twins and the star-crossed Cardinals. And now the Angels and Giants will settle it all for the 2002 title.

Perhaps these teams are seen to have pumpkins hanging over their heads because of their past histories. The Angels, 42 years in the league with no World Series appearances. In the distant past they were a Donnie Moore blown save away, the past decade saw a sure playoff appearance collapse to Seattle, and Tim Salmon was the player with the longest tenure in the bigs without a playoff appearance. The Giants haven't been to the World Series since Will the Thrill and the Earthquake Series. But they hadn't won a game there since 1962 when McCovey's liner was a foot or two too low, and their last title was in 1954 when a young Willie Mays got out of the Army and helped them in their upset of the mighty Indians. Tim Salmon may not have seen the playoffs before this year, but Barry Bonds has, and in the past it has been a fairly brutal experience. Now in the seventeenth year of his Hall of Fame career, the Barry of September has been sighted in October.

Barry's first World Series at bat was certainly memorable. Jarrod Washburn went right after Barry - give the Angels their due, they didn't roll over and walk Bonds with four in the dirt. Bonds took Washburn deep, providing the 1-0 lead and the eventual margin of victory. A batter later, Reggie Sanders, a person who has ghosts of his own this postseason, also took Washburn deep for a 2-0 lead. The Angels, as they have all year, came right back with the first of Troy Glaus's two home runs to close the score to 2-1.

Despite the homer-heavy second inning, both the Giants' Jason Schmidt and the Angel's Washburn pitched as would be expected from the two team's aces. The Angels had men on base against Schmidt almost every inning he was in there, but he managed to overpower the Angels until they got to him in the sixth. Washburn didn't have the same stuff as Schmidt (few do), but he also was masterful. Kent, Bonds and Santiago, the meat of the Giants order, went a combined 2-9 against Washburn, and they didn't have much to drive in as the table-setters went 0-5.

In the end, it was like the earlier stages of the playoffs. Tip your hat to Barry, he got his part of the job done, but the other guys did a lot of heavy lifting too, this time around Reggie Sanders and J.T. Snow.

Not only did Sanders hit a homer in the second, but with two outs in the sixth he slapped a single to left to bring Snow to the plate. J.T. faced a Washburn near the end of his rope, the first three pitches were taken for balls. After a strike, J.T. unleashed a homer that just barely cleared the wall in left. That pushed the lead to 4-1, things looked good for the Giants.

At least they did for a few pitches. Troy Glaus lead off the bottom of the sixth with his second homer. Brad Fullmer walked and was sacrificed to second. With two outs Adam Kennedy sent a single ringing to right, scoring Fullmer and bringing the total to 4-3. That was it for Schmidt, who didn't even get to 100 pitches. The Giants brought in Felix Rodriguez and he got the Giants out of the inning, getting David Eckstein to line out to short.

After that the Giants bullpen took over. Rodriguez may have slammed the door, but Worrell and Nen hammered nails into it and then sealed it in concrete. The bullpen was trusted with a one-run lead and ten outs. Over those ten outs they allowed only one base-runner, a seven-pitch walk to Scott Spiezio with two outs in the eighth. Washburn's replacements were just as impressive, with only a walk to Barry over their last ten outs, matching the Giants' feat. The walk to Barry was from a pitcher brought in to face only him. While the pitches weren't too close, it certainly wasn't a case of not pitching to Barry, it was just being very very careful with a one-run lead.

So like in Atlanta and St. Louis, the Giants take the first game in the series, on the road. Tonight the Angels must win, or they might not make it back to Anaheim.