It's about time this Series got more interesting

A four-game sweep? Where's the fun in that? (It was easily the worst part of last year, I'll tell you what.) I may be rooting ever so slightly for the Sox, but not so much that I want to see the Series go by the wayside that quickly. Seriously - aside from the period between 1998 and 2000 when the Yankees lost just one of thirteen World Series games (gag me), the Fall Classic hasn't been consistently non-competitive (including last year's sweep) since the period between 1988 and 1990 when the losing team took just one total game (4-1 Dodgers, 4-0 A's, 4-0 Reds). These things seem to cycle (that span followed the 1985-1986-1987 corridor in which every Series went seven, and was followed by 1991-1992-1993 in which the first went seven and the next two went six, the latter ending on Joe Carter's home run), so let's hope we're in for some good ones the next couple years. You know, some good ones? In the meantime, maybe the Astros will be able to at least take this six. I'd settle for that. Of course, the Sox could still win this game (as I write this, it's only going into the eleventh, but I can't wait any longer to submit this post), but the Astros could too. And at least it's in extras.

While I'm in a listmaking mood, here's my take on another one:

The Ten Most Overlooked Home Runs in Postseason History

Honorable Mention: Pedro Guerrero and Steve Yeager
With the 1981 World Series tied at two games apiece, the Dodgers and Yankees engage in a pitchers' duel in Game Five. Ron Guidry goes seven and allows just four hits for New York; Jerry Reuss throws a complete-game five-hitter for L.A. With the Yankees up 1-0 in the seventh, Guerrero and Yeager - the #6 and #7 hitters on the team - go deep in back-to-back at-bats for the Dodgers. Los Angeles wins the game 2-1 and finishes the Series in its sixth game three days later.

10. Lenny Dykstra
Dykstra actually has two big - and generally overlooked - home runs on his resume, seven years apart. The first came in Game Three of the 1986 NLCS, a two-run shot in the bottom of the ninth that won the game 6-5 for the Mets and gave them a 2-1 lead in the series. (It was also the last NLCS walkoff home run for 18 years.) Seven years later to the day, Dykstra won Game Five of the 1993 NLCS for the Phillies, 4-3, with a solo home run in the top of the tenth. The Phillies won two nights later as well and returned to the World Series (one which, of course, spawned a much more famous blast.)

9. George Brett
Brett's most famous home run against the Yankees featured pine tar, but his three-run shot off Goose Gossage in Game Three of the 1980 ALCS was bigger. It sent the Royals to their first World Series, turning a 2-1 seventh-inning deficit into a 4-2 win; it came off a prime-of-his-career Gossage, who was largely unhittable at the time and had an ERA under 1.00 the next year; and it embarrassed the Yankees with a 3-0 sweep that closed out at the Stadium. Though they made it back to the World Series in the strike year of '81, this wipeout largely signaled the start of one of the longest periods of dormancy in Yankee history, with not a single playoff appearance between 1981 and 1995.

8. David Justice
We could have been headed for another 1991 Game Seven in the sixth game of the 1995 World Series, but Justice's solo shot in the sixth inning off Cleveland reliever Jim Poole provided the only run of the game. It was just enough to back up eight innings of one-hit ball from Tom Glavine and bring the Braves their first World Series title since 1957 and the only one (to date) of the Bobby Cox era.

7. Sandy Alomar Jr.
The only hiccup in the Yankee resurgence of 1996-2000 came at the hands of the Indians in 1997, and was largely thanks to Alomar's shot. His second of the series, it came in the eighth inning off Mariano Rivera - a year into his run as Captain Unhittable in the postseason - to tie the game. The Indians won that fourth game 3-2 in the ninth and took Game Five the next night to send New York packing.

6. Edgar Martinez
While we're on the subject of the Yankees losing, how about Martinez? The fifth game of the 1995 ALDS is the one everyone remembers, with Ken Griffey Jr. scoring from first on a Martinez double in the eleventh, but that doesn't happen without Game Four. The score was tied 6-6 going into the bottom of the eighth, but after John Wetteland loaded the bases, Martinez smacked a grand slam that all but guaranteed his heroics the next night. (Jay Buhner hit a solo shot two batters later to make it 11-6, and the Yankees picked up two in the top of the ninth, but the slam stood up.)

5. Rick Monday
Monday may be best known for a flag-saving catch he made while with the Cubs, but the biggest home run of his career came in the 1981 NLCS. With a pitchers' duel between Fernando Valenzuela and the Expos' Ray Burris knotted at one in the top of the ninth, Monday came up with two outs and drove a solo home run off Montreal reliever Steve Rogers. Bob Welch slammed the door in the bottom of the inning and Los Angeles eventually won the World Series.

4. Jack Clark
Surely Cardinals fans remember this one, but most casual fans are much more likely to think of the Ozzie Smith home run that ended Game Five of the 1985 NLCS. Clark's shot came at Dodger Stadium and so couldn't end the game as Smith's did, but it did effectively end the series. Facing Tom Niedenfuer - the same pitcher off whom Smith went deep - Clark came up in the top of the ninth with two on and two outs. The Cardinals trailed 5-4 following Mike Marshall's home run in the bottom of the eighth, but Clark's home run made it 7-5, and that's how the game finished. Perhaps if the Cardinals had ended up winning the World Series this would have a more storied place in the lore.

3. Hal Smith
Everyone, of course, knows Bill Mazeroski, but he likely wouldn't have had a chance to be the hero of the 1960 World Series if not for the unlikely Hal Smith. Smith, the Pirates' backup catcher, came up in the bottom of the eighth with Pittsburgh down 7-6, with two out and two on. He had only entered the game in the top of the inning and was making just his eighth trip to the plate in the whole Series, yet took Jim Coates out of the yard. The Yankees would end up tying it in the top of the ninth, but obviously we know what happened next. (Interestingly, Mazeroski - with 11 home runs in 538 at-bats during the 1960 season - was even less of a threat to homer than was Smith, who hit 11 in just 258 trips.)

2. Bernie Carbo
Carbo does tend to get some credit, but it's hard not to be overshadowed by Carlton Fisk. Have you ever seen video footage of Carbo's home run? And if so, were you alive in 1975? Because I wasn't and can't recall doing so. It was only just last week that I saw footage of Dwight Evans' catch on a Joe Morgan drive, pretty important in and of itself. Carbo came up in the bottom of the eighth with the Reds having extended their lead to 6-3 on a Cesar Geronimo home run in the top of the inning. With two on and two out, Carbo came in as a pinch-hitter and took Rawly Eastwick over the wall. Four innings later, cue Fisk. With the exception of Kirk Gibson in the 1988 Series, Carbo's home run may be the biggest moment for a pinch-hitter in, at the very least, World Series history.

1. Don Baylor
In his book Now I Can Die in Peace, Bill Simmons suggests that you can identify a bandwagon Red Sox fan based on his memories of the fifth game of the 1986 ALCS, with the bandwagoners showing their colors by not remembering Baylor's home run. Everyone, of course, remembers Dave Henderson - though my guess is that few people who aren't Sox fans remember that Henderson's shot did not end the game, that the Angels tied it in the bottom of the ninth, and that Boston only finally won in the eleventh - but Hendu can't do it without Don. Baylor came up with one man down and the Angels holding a then-sizable 5-2 lead. Facing Mike Witt, Baylor's two-run shot cut the lead to 5-4 and allowed Henderson's two-run blast off Donnie Moore to give the Red Sox the lead. Even though it took a sacrifice fly two innings later (which, fittingly, was hit by Henderson and scored Baylor) to win the game, the double home run punch in the ninth effectively ended the series for the Angels - they went down quietly in Games Six and Seven despite returning to Boston with a 3-2 series lead, and didn't even make the playoffs again until they won the World Series in 2002.