World Series Preview

Every year I write this post, and every year you eat it up. Simple people. Simple people.

CONTEXT

The Detroit Tigers and the San Francisco Giants will face each other in the 2012 World Series, which begins on Wednesday. The Tigers have advanced this far by defeating the Oakland Athletics and the New York Yankees. The Giants have advanced this far by defeating the Cincinnati Reds and the St. Louis Cardinals. Both the Tigers and Giants managed to defeat their opponents by outplaying them in a short series.

KEY PLAYERS

Detroit:

Roster

San Francisco:

Roster

Both the Tigers and Giants are filled to the brim with possible difference-makers. The 50 listed above will likely be the most important.

KEY QUESTIONS

Can the San Francisco Giants outscore the Detroit Tigers?

They can.

Can the Detroit Tigers outscore the San Francisco Giants?

They can.

Will one of the San Francisco Giants and Detroit Tigers outscore the other four times?

Most certainly yes!

X FACTOR

The Giants will play a maximum of four games at home, while the Tigers will play a maximum of three games at home. The home crowds may or may not help. I imagine there are also intangibles somewhere.

CONCLUSION

Both the Tigers and Giants are good teams. The Tigers are probably better by a tiny bit. If you re-played the World Series a million times, maybe 50-55% of the time the Tigers would be crowned as champions. This World Series will be played once. One of these teams will win four games. The other probably won't. The outcome will mean everything, and nothing.