You had 16 teams playing in games of critical importance, the fruits of 161 ball games for the better part of a year came down to one night, September 28th. Unbelievable. You had:
Boston @ Baltimore
New York @ Tampa Bay
St. Louis @ Houston
Philadelphia @ Atlanta
Four of these teams playing for 2 Wild Card playoff spots. 2 of them leading the race for that Wild Card position by 10 or more games at one point in the last 6 weeks. Utter collapse was fulfilled, as coincidently both Boston and Atlanta lost their games, and Tampa Bay and St. Louis won their games. I can't imagine the euphoria among Tampa Bay and St. Louis players and fans, and the despair of those of Boston and Atlanta who thought they had their destinies aligned only weeks ago.
Then, we had:
Detroit @ Cleveland
Texas @ Anaheim Angels
Los Angeles @ Arizona
Pittsburgh @ Milwaukee
Four of these teams were fighting for homefield advantage in the playoffs, adding another 8 teams who were fighting it out yesterday evening to finish the race with a key advantage heading into the postseason. Both Texas and Milwaukee won their games, giving them both homefield games for their respective series' going forward.
2 of these 8 games went into extra innings, adding more chips to the pile of nails probably bitten off by Atlanta, St. Louis, Boston, and Tampa Bay fans. I still can't believe what I watched happened. On to the playoffs...GO RANGERS
