I did so well with my preseason predictions—remember when the Tigers looked oh so good?—that I will deign to give my opinion on the postseason.

That said, I at least know enough not to pick the Twins to win it all. But before I give the hardware to the ex-D-Rays—Oops!—here are some ramblings on the postseason in general. Enjoy:

The Brewers' game one starter "Don" Yovani Gallardo becomes just the third pitcher in major-league history to start a postseason game after not winning even one game in the regular season. Gallardo had a 1.88 ERA in the four games he started spending almost five months on the DL, but had no decisions on the year. He has just one start since May 1, and that was a four-inning, one-run stint against the Pirates in a 5-1 win last Saturday. Long story short, C.C, Sabathia he aint.

The other two with no regular season wins to start a postseason game are Tiger Virgil Trucks in 1945 and Chicago White Stocking Jimmy "Pony" Ryan in the 1886 NL-AA World Championships. Ryan was an erstwhile outfielder who pitched just 5 games out of the 84 he played that year. Ryan had no record in the postseason, but Trucks was 1-0 in two starts. Mind you, Trucks pitched just one game in the 1945 regular season, spending almost all of the previous two seasons in the Navy.

A friend of mine latched onto the idea of shared players and therefore shared history haunting postseason series. Whereas a Ray-White Sox meeting might not conjure up that much shared history, the Cubs-Dodgers which he dubbed the "Codgers" evokes a certain Ron Cey/Bill Buckner/Grudzy kind of familiarity.

In this postseason, the "Codgers" had 249 shared players going into this season, the "Redgels" had 100, the "Phillers" had 69, and the "ChiRays" had 24. Here are the top ten players in combined games for both teams in each series:

Codgers:

Redgels:

Phillers:

ChiRays—And guess who's #1:

OK, enough of my arcana, let's boogie:

LDS: Phils over Brewers 4, Cubs over Dodgers in 4, Angels over Red Sox in 4, Rays over White Sox in 3

LCS: Cubs over Phils in six (dammit!), Angels over Rays in five (again dammit)

World Series: Angels over Cubs in 5 (It's a theme--Dammit!)

Mike Schmidt's 1978 typified his team, the Phils', season. It was a major disappointment. Schmidt batted .251 with a mere 21 homers and 78 runs batted in, those were miniscule numbers for Schmidt even given they came in a pitcher's era.

The '78 Phils followed up two straight 101-game win seasons with a meager 90. The postseason results were also the same with the Phils losing in the NLCS. The team overhauled its lineup in the off-season, bringing in record-breaking free agent Pete Rose, of the "Three Point Two Mill-Lee-Un Dollars" of Chico Escuela fame, to play—ah, well we don't have a position for him so stick him at first.

Little did we know that 1978 would represent a high watermark of sorts for the team. The Phils would have to wait thirty years—until Saturday to be precise—to win back-to-back division titles. In 1978, we had just witnessed back-to-back-to-back division titles for goodness' sake.

The Phils' 30-year wait between consecutive titles, division or league, is not unprecedented, but it is pretty rare. It's just the eleventh time it has happened in baseball history. It's nothing compared to the 68 years that the Pirates waited to raise two straight pennants, from 1902-03 to 1970-71.

Here are the longest waits in baseball history between consecutive division or league titles for any franchise. Note that the Phils mark is the seventh longest wait between consecutive titles since the advent of World Series play:

Mike Mussina completed his renaissance and may have gotten his crown jewel for the Hall of Fame plaque, winning his twentieth game today, 6-2, over the Red Sox. Mussina is now 30 wins shy of 300, which he would reach by 2011 with just two of his average years.

He also became the oldest first-time 20-game winner in baseball history, edging the still-Methuselan Jamie Moyer by one year. Here are the pitchers 35 and up who won twenty games for the first time (By the way, ESPN screwed up this list missing Federal Leaguer McConnell and adding two years to Allie Reynolds's age, but if they bother to acknowledge baseball during football season, we should be pleased):

As the Phils start looking farther in their rearview mirrors, I am left wondering if this mini collapse is even worse for the Mets than the monumental, historic collapse of 2007.

Sure, the Mets are watching the floundering Ned Yost-bereft Brewers fade in their own Wild Card rearview mirrors. But I cannot help but wonder if the Mets are wasting the collective talent like Bill James said the Milwaukee Braves did in the late Fifties and early Sixties. Now, I don't think this will lead to the Mets relocating as the Braves did (breaking the "heart" of a young Bud Selig prior to his metamorphosis into Gallum). However, they are not exactly building momentum as they move to a new stadium.

The Phils will have won two straight division titles while having nary a major-league starting catcher or third baseman either year. The 2007-08 Phils will rank among the worst back-to-back division winners ever:

Meanwhile, the Phils have again passed the Mets, albeit in not as dramatic fashion as in 2007. However, should they hold the lead again, it will be just the second time baseball history that a division or league rival has passed the same team two straight years in September.

The only other time this occurred was in 1965-66 when the Dodgers passed the Giants two straight years in September. And they passed the Giants Sept. 2 in 1966 so that barely qualifies.

The Phils are really doing something historic, which makes it all the more poignant when they end up losing to the Dodgers in the first round and the Mets meet the Rays in the World Series.