Wild Card Game & Semi-Final Series Recap

The 2023 WBA Postseason kicked off with the Reds and Rangers playing in a one-game playoff to save their season. Both teams came in limping, literally and figuratively. The Rangers finished their season losing to the Tigers with a chance to grab the No. 2 seed in the playoffs and avoid playing in this game altogether. The Reds on the other hand finished the season 3-7 after a 2-0 start. Both teams would also be without key players Nolan Rivera and Brian Marra. After the game, Casano said that the Reds had not decided on who was starting until the bottom of the first inning. In the top half of the frame, the Red Machine scored two runs off of Rangers' starter and 2023 MVP candidate Derek Astarita. Casano said that he wanted the team to win or lose on his arm and he went out in the bottom of the first for the Reds. With the season on the line, he delivered a masterpiece. Casano threw up zeroes until the bottom of the sixth when Astarita got him for a homer. However, it was too late as the Reds’ timely hitting had already helped them grow their lead to seven runs and send the Rangers home (Reds 7, Rangers 1).

After the regular season we thought that the Cinderella of 2023 would be the Tigers, who started the summer 0-6 and surged late to steal the No. 2 seed in the WBA Postseason. Though, in the playoffs the Tigers found themselves in a new role, the favorites. In game one, the Reds quickly put the Tigers back in their familiar “backs-against-the-wall” position with a 10-0 dismantling of the No. 2 seed. The Tigers opted to start Mikey Ferro and leave games two and three to their MVP Sean McDonnell. After Ferro gave up five Reds’ runs in the first inning, Cincy rolled. Cameron Carey and Shane O’Neill combined for five RBI while Casano threw a one-hit playoff gem to push the Reds one game away from the championship (Reds 10, Tigers 0).

The Tigers did not get to where they are this season without grit and in game two of the semi-final round, they displayed all of it. After the Reds scored two runs in the bottom of the first inning off of the Tigers’ horse, Sean McDonnell, Detroit was staring a long winter in the face. However, in the words of New York Jets legend Sanatana Moss, “big-time players, make big-time plays, in big-time games” and Sean McDonnell has been more than a big-time player in 2023, he has become a bonafide superstar. With his team on the brink of disaster, he put them on his back and hit a go-ahead three-run homerun in the top of the third inning to give the Tigers the lead. And as if that was not enough, McDonnell closed the door on the Reds who threatened in the last four innings but were unable to get any more runs off of McDonnell, who sent the series to a game three almost single-handedly, driving in all four runs and pitching a complete game (Tigers 4, Reds 2).

Like any great trilogy, you want a crescendo to culminate the story that has developed over the three works. Just like Anakin and Obi-Wan’s beautiful lightsaber-duel on Mustafar at the end of Revenge of the Sith, or when Bruce Wayne rises from The Pit in The Dark Knight Rises; this series’ climax was the marathon that may come to be known simply as “Game 3.” McDonnell or Casano would take the mound for the final time in 2023 and each pitched to the seven inning limit nearly without a blemish. Casano gave up a bases-loaded single to Mikey Ferro in the second-inning and the way McDonnell has pitched in the series it looked like it may be enough. The table’s had now turned and the Reds were staring a treacherous winter in the face wondering how they could have lost this opportunity, a one-run lead just innings away from a chance at the title. It was at that moment when veteran Cameron Carey – who has been in the league since its inception over a decade ago – hit a game-tying home run over the left field fence. With the game tied going into the eighth inning, it would now be on Mikey Ferro and Shane O’Neill to decide what team would face the Nationals in the Championship. Each reliever threw a scoreless eighth, and as daylight was running out in the top of the ninth Casano blitzed Ferro on the first pitch with a two-out, two-run homer to give the Reds the lead. As he jumped into the arms of Shane O’Neill, the Reds could taste the champagne. However, they would need to get three more outs. The script could not have been written better, down by two with the bases loaded, two-outs and a full count, Sean McDonnell would not have wanted it any other way. With him up and a chance to be the Dark Knight or Obi-Wan Kenobi, the MVP, the hero. However, like the Joker, some people just want to watch the WBA burn, Shane O’Neill struck out the MVP and sent home the darlings of the WBA. The Reds: no owner, three players, them against the world and they sent everyone home miserable. Just the way they like it (Reds 3, Tigers 1).