!!! Colorado ROCKS Philadelphia !!!

National

League

Playoffs 

!!! Colorado ROCKS Philadelphia !!!

Saturday night the Colorado Rockies completed their

three game sweep of the Philadelphia Phillies to

advance to the National League Championship Series.

This is the Rockies second appearance in post season and will mark their first appearance in the NL finals during their 15 years as a Major League ball club. The Rockies will challenge the Arizona Diamondbacks in the finals to determine which team will represent the National League in the World Series. The Diamondbacks advance after sweeping the Chicago Cubs in three games.

Colorado may be the hottest team in this year's playoffs. The Rockies turned up the heat in September as the rest of the league cooled off. Including the closing weeks of the regular season when the Rockies won 14 of 15 games, plus the first three games of the post season, they are now on a 17 out of 18 game tear! Colorado took 2nd place to Arizona in the NL West, and secured the National League wild card playoff berth with a one game regular season playoff win over their division rival San Diego Padres. 

Colorado advances after tonight's medical weight loss philadelphia 2-1 win over the Phillies. The Rockies stole Philadelphia's series advantage by winning the first two games of the series on the road in Philadelphia 4-2 and 10-5. The upcoming National League Championship series against the Diamondbacks will be the first time in playoff history that two teams from the NL West have vied for the coveted spot in the World Series. 

A long time coming. The start of Saturday night's game was delayed 15 minutes by a computer foul-up that shut off the lights in Coors Field. But that was a short wait compared to the decades Denver was Major League baseball's bride's maid. Denver had a long and storied baseball tradition at the Triple-A level, the top level of the minor leagues, with the Denver Bears who often won the Triple-A crown. The major leagues continued to overlook Denver during expasion from the '60s through the '80s, even though the minor league team had better attendance than half of the major league teams and baseball was the only one of the four elite professional sports franchises that was not represented in Denver. Finally in the '90s MLB teamed up with the sports-crazed capitol of the Mountains and 1992 marked the inaugural season of the Colorado Rockies.

Known for wild displays of batter firepower in their early years with hitters such as Andres Galaraga, Dante Bichette, Vinnie Castilla, and Larry Walker. The Blake Street Bombers lit up opposing pitchers like a pinball machine both at home in Mile High Stadium and then Coors Field and on the road in hostile stadiums. The double-digit boxscores often looked more like field goals and touchdowns from the football gridiron than runs scored on a baseball diamond. The Colorado Rockies are still known for their often ferocious offensive outbursts and hitters occupying the statistical thrones for hitting average, RBIs, and homeruns; but, they have also been generally a top quality defensive team, and now they are a complete team with greatly improved pitching.

While venerable teams such as the Indians, Red Socks, and Yankees continue to slug it out to be the American League representitive in the World Series, the National League will be sending one of the younger teams, either the Arizona Diamondbacks or the Colorado Rockies. This reporter now lives in the Sierras, but I am originally a Mountain Man from high atop the Continental Divide - Colorado - so you know where my loyalties will be:

!!! Go Rockies !!!