Virtual Baseball: The Cole Train Rolls Again! Yanks Harpoon Rays, Move On to ALCS and Rainbow Hose! Mets advance.

 From the desk and mind of HoraceClarke66...

Gerrit Cole, once again fulfilling the hopes and dreams of Yankees fans long-suffering with a surfeit of wins and division titles but no World Series appearances, pitched the Bombers into the league championship series with another superb, complete-game effort.

 

It was Cole against the usual death legion of Tampa Bay pitchers, but the Yankees ace managed to gut it out, slipping out of bases loaded situations in the second and fourth innings, and surrendering a home run only to the suddenly rejuvenated Rays slugger, Randy “Juicy” Arozena. 

 

That almost wasn’t enough, though, as all the Yanks could muster was a home run from their own young slugger, DH Miguel Andujar, “El Matador,” in the sixth. The game seemed headed for extra innings and the huge advantage that would give Tampa with its deeper, superior bullpen.

 

But in the bottom of the ninth inning, “The Machine,” D.J. LeMahieu, suddenly went online, singling through the middle off Rays’ closer Pete Fairbanks, then stealing second and advancing to third when Aaron Hicks accidentally hit a squibbler in front of the plate, while trying to avoid behind hit in the head by a pitch.

 

The ball was quickly scooped up Rays third baseman Mike Brosseau, who turned to look at LeMahieu racing for third and threw to the bag.  No one was covering, though, and The Machine whirred home as the ball bounced down the third base line and some 50,000 Yankees fans went mad.

 

“Well, it was one tough series,” Yankees virtual manager Ma Boone said afterwards. “Why, if we’d had to play everyday for some reason, our pitching would never have held up against theirs. It’s just so much deeper and better—and younger! Thank goodness for those travel days, huh?”

 

In the Rays’ locker room, tempers were running so hot, it was reported, that broadcaster Alex Rodriguez was mixed up in an altercation that soon devolved into a hostage situation. But New York’s Finest were able to negotiate A-Rod released with only minor damage to his suit.

 

The Yankees will now move on to play the Chicago Rainbow Sox for the league championship. With their division series victory, Chicago management announced that continuing to call the team the “White Sox” was “just too exclusionary in today’s more enlightened atmosphere.”

 

As a result, the club not only changed the team name, but issued special, inclusionary socks to each player, based on the color pattern of the “Rainbow Flag,” representing tolerance and enlightenment around the world. Replicas will be available at all Chicago concession stands, for a mere $59.99, with .01 percent of the profits going to save the rain forests.

 

In the National League, meanwhile, the mets won, and will advance to the NLCS against the Dodgers.