It was Sterling Hitchcock vs 20-8 Rheal Cormier in game 1 and we jumped on him for 4 runs over just 4 1/2 innings and added 4 more runs off Denny Neagle in the 8th, but we really only needed 1 run. Hitchcock only allowed 5 hits and 1 walk while striking out 6 in a 8-0 win. Clark and Stanley each knocked in 2 and rookie Daniel Varnell continued to rake, going 2-3 with a walk.

Game 2 wasn't much more difficult than game 1. Andy Hawkins finally surrendered a run with 2 outs in the 9th, but the Dodgers took game 2 5-1. Clark smacked a 3 run home run off William Jester in the 4th to open up a 4-0 lead and so far it seems like the Sox aren't up for the challenge

In game 3 back in Chicago, catcher Trent Hubbard hit a 3-run home run off David Cone in the 2nd and Gregg Jefferies added a 2-run shot off Sid Fernandez in the 6th, and the Sox had a 8-1 lead with 2 outs in the 9th and nobody on......until....

Stanley-single
Hayes-walk
Meulens-single
*change of pitcher to Denny Neagle
Varnell-Grand Slam 8-5
Kelly-double
*change of pitcher to Rick Huisman
Lynn-strikeout-------but a passed ball, so he reaches 1st.
Larkin-single to score Kelly 8-6 and we somehow had the winning run at the plate
Clark..........pop out to shor

That would have been the greatest World Series comeback ever...but instead, it's 2-1 and we have a series

Andy Hawkins and William Jester had themselves a pitchers duel in game 4, with only Hawkins allowing a single run as the game entered the 8th 1-0 Chicago on a Hubbard single. The White Sox went to closer Kevin Ryan in the 8th, but Clark hit sac fly to tie the game at 1, but the White Sox scored the game winner in the bottom half as Kevin Houston allowed a lead off double to Lou Whitaker and that man Hubbard knocked him in with 2 outs off Steve Bedrosian and the series is now tied at 2

Hitchcock and Cormier matched zeros through 5 innings in game 5, but we solved him in the 6th as Clark, Meulens and Valentine had RBI singles and Hayes hit a sac fly to give us a 4-0 lead. Hitchcock went into the 8th with a shutout, meaning he had thrown 16 1/3 shutout innings so far in the World Series, but he went the distance after allowing RBI's to Jefferies and Mike McDonald. We now lead 3-2 going home to LA.

We can't do anything easy this season.

We touched up Jack Morris for 4 runs in the 2nd on 4 straight hits, but Hubbard hit another 3-run homer off Novoa in the 2nd and then Jefferies hit a 2-run shot in the 5th to give them the lead 6-5. Von Hayes tied things up with a solo shot in the 7th, but the Sox scratched across a run on a single, wild pitch, ground out and sac fly in the 8th and it's going 7 games, the Sox won 7-6

It was David Cone vs Jack Armstrong in game 7 and after a Dave Clark single scored Daniel Varnell, that man Trent Hubbard tied it up in the 2rd with an RBI single of his own. Varnell broke the tie with a sac fly in the 3rd and it stayed 2-1 Dodgers until the 8th.

With the bases loaded, Hayes yanked a double inside 1st to clear the bases and a Mike Stanley single later, we took a 6-1 lead into the 9th and we won another World Series 4-3 over a game White Sox team.

This is my 4th World Series in 6 season in LA after winning 4 World Series in 17 years in California. I am 8-1 in the World Series. Not bad.

Rookie Daniel Varnell ended up winning the MVP hitting .390 with 1 HR and 8 RBI. I had him on the bench for game 1 against the Mets but started him the last 13 games and he had a 13 game hitting streak. He only has 20 regular season games under his belt and was not awed by anything in the majors.

I backed up my game and as the season ended, the Marlins and Rockies have been created now. My plan to take over the Marlins can begin.

.....I am going to miss Southern California. And winning. This rookie Varnell may be a superstar and it would be fun to coach his career. I've managed Fred Lynn for the last 12 years and this Dodger club has my DNA all over it.

But unless I change my mind in the next day or so, I'm going to take the Marlins job and get ready for the expansion draft.

Hello Florida!

That was SO much fun........doing a full expansion draft to build a team for less than $15 million when my last payroll in LA was $55 million. LOL

But first we did the amateur draft and we got the last pick in the 1st round. What I did was draft 1 player at each position and 6 pitchers in my first 14 picks to try to get a young player at each position and a handful of pitchers early and then just fill out the best I could.

I then started signing some minor league free agents. I have to build 1 AAA, 2 A and 2 rookie teams from nothing, so about 150 players to sign. I have 85 signed as of now with spring training starting in 2 weeks.

I managed to draft 36 players at a spend of $9 million. After the draft, I tempted CF Kevin Reimer with a $1.4 million a year deal. He has a good glove and has a little pop and at age 28, it's nice to have one position "up the middle" be a better than average.

I have a rating system of 20-80, 50 being bang average and I have a projected lineup as of now of:

RF-Darryl Hamilton Contact-60/Eye-50/Power-35/Speed-70/defense 50
2B-Luis Alicea-50/50/35/70/55
1B-Jeff King-50/45/60/55/50
CF-Kevin Reimer-50/40/55/50/60
3B-Kelly Gruber-45/40/60/60/45
C-Tony Barron-45/45/55/75/45
LF-Wes Chamberlain-45/35/50/70/65
SS-Scott Leius-40/45/45/70/55

We have 5 of 8 who have a steal rating of at least 70 including a catcher at 75. I think we are going to be running to score runs this year.

I only picked 1 player in the Expansion Draft with a salary over $1, and that was starter Al Leiter at $1.4 million. He's been a closer 4 of the last 5 years, but he's going to be my #1.

1-Al Leiter Stuff-60/Movement-45/Control-40/Stamina 65
2-Michael Jackson-55/45/45/55
3-Joe Beckwith-40/40/55/70
4-James McIntosh-45/40/55/70
5-Mike Roesler-45/65/50/65

I picked a lot of decent minimum salary middle relievers and spent a little on closer Bryan Farmer who was the closer in Cincinnati last year and is cheap enough where I could flip him at the deadline for some futures.

I still have a payroll of less than $11 million with $4 million to spend. I could make the team better, but there really is no reason, I'm not going to contend. I'd rather leave the budget space there in case a team is trying to dump a big salary.

Before I go into the season, I am so 'angry' that the AI GM for the Dodgers has messed up my old team. LOL

Our 23 year old rookie World Series MVP Varnell is in the minors after hitting over .400 in AAA and tearing up the majors after a recall. Not only that, I don't have single player the Dodgers want for him, so I can't trade for him.

They benched Von Hayes and Hensley Muelens and signed sub-par players. They left the pitching pretty much alone, but the biggest sin is they benched Fred Lynn.

How dare they.

Our team was 8-9 in Spring Training and we stayed healthy, so I can't complain about that. We played as expected, we pitched ok and didn't hit much, but we barely allowed more than 3 runs a game, so we were competitive.

Our bullpen looks to be pretty strong, I wanted to make sure we won the games we had chances to win. To instill a winning culture, we can't blow late leads. We need to learn how to win.

I selected a bunch of "good guys" in the expansion draft. Not a single disruptive player. Not a single outspoken player. Not a single selfish player. We are going to get along and have fun.

I knew I would be able to get a player or two on waivers when spring training broke. I raided my old Dodger bullpen for lefty Chris Nabholz and grabbed 25-year old catcher Rick Wilkins from the Mets and they should both have sizable roles.

Ironically, we open the season at home against the Dodgers. :)

After 1 week we were 4-1 and I thought, "I really hope the sim doesn't 'let' me somehow have a good team right away." I wanted a somewhat realistic sim of an expansion team from day 1 and not some easy to solve game where it's easy to win.

11 straight losses later and safe to say, no worries about that!

So we are pretty bad. LOL Our bullpen, which was supposed to be a strength and was great in spring training has an ERA of over 8. Not that our starters are burning down the house with an ERA of 5.51,

The one thing I couldn't do prior to the season was hire coaches or trainers, they were already hired and I am worried our trainer is clueless. 17 games in and we have had 5 day-to-day injuries and 2 players placed on the DL. Our base coaches are subpar as well. I'm going to get improvements in after the season at the latest.

We are 5-12 and Colorado is 4-13. In addition my minor league teams are stinking things up. I hope I live long enough to turn things around. Hopefully the #1 or #2 pick next year will be a player who can star quickly...I think A-Rod may be in next years draft.

We went 3-3 the rest of the month to give us a 8-15 record in April for our 1st month in the big leagues. 13th in offense and 14th in pitching. We do play decent defense and we run ok, but we're bad. :)

We keep getting day-to-day and 1-2 week long injuries, so I am doing the AAA shuffle quite a bit, which makes sense given we are an expansion team. We've already had 32 players this season and I have a feeling we will end up in the 40's before the expansion in September once we trade some of our assets for younger ones

Colorado is worse than we are, 6-17. A few other teams are about as bad as we are, but I hope we can make the race for the #1 pick a 2-team race soon enough