10-1 jts22828 vs 11-0 lillwaws26 a tale of two #1 Seeds
A rivalry of the #1 seeds Pittsburgh Pirates vs Montreal Expos
A Backyard Baseball 2001 Online Junior League World Series Story:
For an online season of backyard baseball 2001, it was like for everyone who got to play in the league, a dream come true. For the first timers like myself, who played the computer game before, never really gotten the chance to play the online mode in the game because they had no Wi-Fi connection setup for the game. But thanks to the website, backyardsports.online and scummVM we all got to play one amazing season in the “Junior League”. And I personally cannot wait to play again. Speaking of the past season, today’s story is about the 2 teams that finished as the #1 seeds in the 2 divisions, the Front-yard Division and the Backyard Division. Many teams used were created and many teams were teams that you heard of because they are MLB teams in real life or were MLB teams in real life. The 2 teams that finished as the #1 seeds in each division of the Junior League were the Pittsburgh Pirates, who were run and played by coach “jts22828” who finished the regular season 10-1 in 11 games in the backyard division and the Montreal Expos, who were run and played by coach “lillwaws26” who went 11-0, undefeated in the 11 regular season games in the front-yard division. Let’s take a look back at each of these teams’ journeys to the postseason and their journey to the World Series. Keep reading to find out who won it all and stay tuned for how I personally grade each game of the World Series.
Pittsburgh Pirates regular season run with coach “jts22828”:
The Pirates as mentioned were the most dominant team in the division. In their regular season matchups, they outscored their opponents 49-9. The Team’s most notable players were Chico Pappas who had 17 hits, and led the team with 9 doubles, Jeff Bagwell who was their only backyard pro on the team (as a real-life former member of the Astros), Ernie Steele their backyard kid who did pretty well in a pitching appearance and had really solid defense (assuming at first base), and Grace Tipton was their best pitcher recording 42 strikeouts with a 1.16 ERA. Also, Fabienne Callahan had a excellent season leading the team with 5 home runs and 10 rbis. So, this team was the master of winning low scoring games. Which is quite interesting. In this team’s first 2 games, they outscored their opponents for their first 2 wins 21-2, crazy. Then over the 7 games, every game was close. In fact, they went 4-1 in games that decided by 2 runs or less. This team’s roughest lost came in their 7th game, losing 2-1, and missing out on the undefeated season. But another win streak later, with 2 shutout victories back-to-back, with both ending 6-0, they ended the regular season 10-1.
Montreal Expos regular season run with coach “lillwaws26”:
The Expos without a question was going to be a nightmare opponent for anyone, they were the super team of the who Junior League. Not only this team went 11-0, undefeated, they dominated their regular season matchups outscoring their opponents, 112-13. How did they do that? On their team they have a ton of talent, from Kiesha Phillips, a backyard kid who has a lot of power, height and speed who tied the team lead with 30 hits and led the team with 23 runs scored. They had Derek Jeter, backyard pro (former Yankees captain in real life) who was third on the team with 27 hits and was second with 21 runs scored, they had another backyard pro in Nomar Garciaparra (who played for the Red Sox in real life) he was second the team with 22 singles, and had 4 other hits in 40 at bats. This team also had another backyard pro in Alex Gonzalez (real life player of the marlins) who had his moments offensively and defensively, and they had another backyard kid, another girl, Jocinda Smith who also did her part for this team. This team’s pitcher was Lance Lambert, he struck out 54 batters and had an ERA of 1.00. That’s nuts. What’s also crazy is that every single player on this team had double digits in hits, that’s unreal! And what’s more unreal, is that in their regular season games, they pretty much destroyed everybody, shutouts to 6 opponents with as high as 16-0 and as low as 3-0. And their closest win was a 5-4 win in their 6th game, almost lost their undefeated season in that game. Overall, this team was super team and you can see why. And they were on there way to try to win It all.
Pirates Run to World Series:
The Pirates run to the World Series started off quite simple with the top 4 teams per division making the postseason. They swept by #4 seed Arizona Diamondbacks winning 6-0 in game 1 and 14-5 in game 2 of best of 3 quarter final series. Then they played the #2 seed New York Yankees. And in that game, the pirates felt like they have seen a ghost, as they blew this first game of best of 3 semifinal series losing at home to the Yankees 7-2. Fun fact, I was the former coach of this exact Yankees team, and because of a planned summer thing I had which was going to make me missed the rest of the season, a sub coached this team the rest of the way. Now to game 2, he… the new Yankees coach, was up 3-2 or 3-1 and was only a few outs away from pulling off the upset, but then with the go ahead run on, and one accidental pitch later, the Pirates took the lead, and went on to win game 2 by the final score of 4-3. And then in a win or go home game 3, the Pirates advance to World Series winning at home 6-2. Overall, this series between the Yankees and Pirates in my opinion is an A, the fact that the Yankees took game 1, and then pirates stun them in game 2 and then it took a deciding 3rd game to decides who plays in the World Series, I mean if you wouldn’t give this an A or any grade close that, then I don’t know what to you.
Expos Run to World Series:
The Expos Run to World Series… well. let’s keep it short and sweet because they went undefeated in their first 4 postseason games making the world series. In round 1 against the Oakland Athletics, they dominated the 2 games outscoring them 28-3 and in the round 2 series against the #3 seed White Monsters, it was actually close in game 1, but the expos got a rbi and won 1-0 and won the 2nd game 17-2. So now the World Series, the #1 Seeds, both of them going at it, to see who wins the World Series.
The World Series:
The World Series between the Pirates and the Expos in my point could go either way because both teams were really loaded. This makes it a perfect matchup for a best of 5 game series to determine a winner, and no matter what happened both guys that made it this far will move on from the Junior League to be a part of the Humungous League for the next season of backyard baseball 2001, so great for them. Here’s how the World Series played out.
Game 1: Because of the record, the Expos had home advantage for the series which included games 1,3 and 5 (if needed). If the Pirates had any chance of winning, they needed to pitch extremely well and get offensive breaks and if the Expos had any chance of winning, they need to continue their strong team hitting and stay focus defensively and offensively. Game 1 went to the Expos quite easily at the end. Final Score, Expos 8-Pirates 3. I grade this game a B+ because both teams got their offensive breaks, but the expos pitch better.
Game 2: The Pirates knew they need a win to keep the series interesting and to force a game 4 which will be at their home. And the Expos knew if they can give the Pirates a loss here then the Pirates are pretty much done unless some miracle happens. Speaking of miracles, the Pirates pitcher(s) and defense came up clutch here and maybe at the same time bad breaks came to the Expos and the Pirates won game 2 and tied up the series. Final Score: Pirates 3-Expos 1. I grade this game a A+ because the pirates made the series interesting and this game in general was low scoring, well-pitched, and well played defensively.
Game 3: This game 3 could be the turning point of the series, because it could end in 4 it could end in 5 games after this. Let’s just say in this game both teams need to come prepare for a battle. But in the end, one did and the other pretty much didn’t. Expos take game 3. Final Score, Expos 7-Pirates 1. I grade this game a C+ because the Expos came prepared and the Pirates look like they fell asleep and went into bad luck at the worst possible time.
Game 4: Looking to force game 5 and make it a winner’s take all was the Pirates, but looking for a road revenge win and a World Series win were the Expos. And I will just cut to the chase and congratulate the Montreal Expos, as the won the World Series. Final Score Expos 8-Pirates 1. I grade this game a B pretty much because the best team in the end win.
For the overall World Series between the Montreal Expos and the Pittsburgh Pirates I will give it a B for these few reasons.
The two #1 seeds did everything they could and made a possible best of 5 world series a winner in 4 games
The fact the Pirates gave the Expos their first loss in game 2 could’ve mean nerves for the Expos or anger in the eyes of the Expos and it turned out to be anger as they got their revenge outscoring the Pirates 15-2 and winning it all.
In the end, the Expos prove the were for real and didn’t choke under any pressure even after losing their first game.
The overall series combined had the following backyard pros… Derek Jeter, Nomar Garciaparra, Alex Gonzalez & Jeff Bagwell. 4 backyard pros for a best of 4 world series, that’s makes its amazing!