NLCS Archives - All Mississippi Baseball

mettle test

Game 4. However it plays out, Game 4 of the 2016 National League Championship Series is one Chicago Cubs fans will remember. “Teams that win the whole thing always have games that define them,” Cubs outfielder and ex-Ole Miss star Chris Coghlan told ESPN’s Jayson Stark. Game 4 at Dodger Stadium tonight will be such a game. Win it, and the series is even, guaranteed to go back to Wrigley Field. Lose it, and the Cubs are down 3-1 with Los Angeles ace Clayton Kershaw looming either in Game 5 or 6. The Cubs, shut out in Games 2 and 3, haven’t been hitting. Coghlan, a .252 hitter in 48 regular season games, hasn’t had much opportunity off the bench, going 0-for-2 with a walk in the NLCS. He doesn’t face lefties often, so he isn’t likely to start Game 4 against Julio Urias. But he could get an at-bat late, in a crucial spot, a “defining” moment perhaps. An anxious Cubs Nation – and every other true fan – will be watching.

shades of ’86

Anything that happens in the MLB playoffs that rekindles memories of the 1986 postseason has got to be pretty special. And it happened on Tuesday night. The Chicago Cubs’ comeback victory at San Francisco was the biggest in postseason-series clinching history, according to mlb.com. Down 5-2 in the ninth, the Cubs scored four times against the Giants’ tattered bullpen, surpassing what the New York Mets – a team loaded with former Jackson Mets – accomplished against Houston in the National League Championship Series 30 years ago. Davey Johnson’s Mets scored three runs in the top of the ninth to tie the Astros, then won the game and the series 7-6 in 16 innings. Ten former JaxMets played in that epic Game 6. Lenny Dykstra ignited the ninth inning rally with a leadoff triple, and Mookie Wilson knocked him in and later scored himself. Rick Aguilera and Roger McDowell combined for eight innings of scoreless relief, and Jesse Orosco, despite blowing a save in the 14th and yielding two runs in the 16th, nailed down the win by fanning Kevin Bass with two runners on. Ole Miss alum Jeff Calhoun came on in relief for the Astros in the 16th and yielded a hit, a walk and a run and threw two wild pitches during the three-run inning. That NLCS was a thrill ride from start to finish, and the World Series that followed was pretty interesting, too. P.S. Spotted in the Giants’ dugout on Tuesday: former Delta State standout Eli Whiteside, now a bullpen catcher for the club. Whiteside played for the Giants during their 2010 and 2012 championship runs and last played in the majors with the Cubs in 2014.