Lats night's game made me very happy. Because SF won? Well I confess I like the idea of an august old franchise like the Giants fielding a team filled with potheads (Lincecum), American League rejects (Uribe, Burrel, Huff), the former leader of the Beach Boys, who is now sporting a fake, halloween beard for some reason (Brian Wilson), a young star with the single lamest name in baseball (Buster Posey), and most important of all, no Barry Bonds in sight. But no, that's not it. Is it because the Rangers lost? No, although I  do hate to see the smug, corpulent face of the most overrated pitcher in baseball history, Nolan (I never won a thing) Ryan, smiling in triumph. Is it because at the outset of the postseason, I blogged that contrary to conventional wisdom, hitting (or the lack thereof) would decide the championship? Well, we're getting closer. In lighting up Cliff Lee, the Giants proved just how inept the Yankees' offense was in making Mr. Lee, not to mention Colby Lewis (who?), look unhittable.

But the reason I most satisfied is that all of the hype surrounding this year's hurlers has been belied. Before game one of the series, ESPN senior writer Jim Caple, admittedly a Red Sox rooting tool if ever there was one, compared the pitching match-up to Koufax and Gibson. And he wasn't the only one. The analogy cheapens baseball history and the achievements it documents. Lincecum first of all is not in Gibson's league, certainly not Gibson in his prime. The Freak  is a good pitcher, who on his best nights can be truly great. Gibson was a truly great pitcher who on his off nights was merely good. Big difference. In his prime, hell even out of his prime, Gibson never had a month as remotely disastrous as Lincecum's August. And Lincecum's duels with Halladay and Lee, though both resulted in wins, showed the young man to be decidedly less than a lights out postseason pitcher.

 That of course is precisely what Lee had seemed: 7-0, with a 1.25 ERA, he had been hailed not just as the second coming of Sandy Koufax--the only starter of 5 plus postseason games (all World Series!) with an ERA under 1.00 (0.95)--people were actually arguing he was the greatest postseason pitcher of all time. Never mind that the stats of a Gibson or a Koufax were all amassed against the single best team in the other (American) League, while many of Lee's starts were against the third or fourth best team in his own league. Never mind that Koufax and Gibson were completely dominant  over a number of regular seasons, as well as the postseason, while Lee was actually been  sent to the minors the year before last and had a 4-6 record for the Rangers this season, including some brutal beat downs. So desparate are sports pundits and sports fans generally for this moment in time to be the moment  of all moments, that Lee was anointed the greatest with just 2, that's right TWO, World Series games under his belt. Now that he has three, a 2-1 record, a postseason ERA over a run higher than Koufax, a World Series of almost FIVE RUNS per game, can we put the  recently circulated idea that Lee is the best postseason pitcher ever-- better than Koufax, better than Lefty Grove, better than Gibson, better than Rivera--where it belongs, in the garbage?