A twofer

Amazingly (to me) both the Angels and Dodgers are now winners of of their respective AL and NL Western Divisions.

The Angels were expected to be terrific this year, but stumbled around doing everything almost right and winning despite having some of their established stars spend a lot of time wearing plain clothes. For the first time in forever, an Angel free agent actually worked out and Vladimir Guerrero has been a huge part of this team.

The Dodgers weren't expected to do much of anything. As a bonus, there was plenty of angst surrounding the teams purchase by the apparently poorly financed Frank McCourt. And then Jamie McCourt opened up on the press and made things worse (and I piled on).

Jon Weisman was a bit more optimistic and wrote On Paper: 2004 vs. 1988 a few weeks earlier, in retrospect, he was right (I think). I can't tell how they did it. Smoke and mirrors like the 2002 Angels. 7 runs in the bottom of the 9th? I don't know what else to call it. Adrián Béltre has been a huge part of it. The midseason trade generated lots of discussion amongst friends and pundits. Opinion was divided, it seems like a wash and the end result can't be judged until the season is over.

The next couple of weeks (at least) will be interesting.