They’re Trying to End Drought of This World

Just as one might have suspected, two last-decade basketball cities, two middle-class payrolls, two skipped-two-generations organizations have reached the final days of a baseball season that will conclude with none of the favorites standing.

And neither will be any Fox network executives.

The Chicago White Sox and Houston Astros find themselves in the World Series, riding hot pitching staffs and seat-of-the-pants managers, ahead of a public just now familiarizing itself with the Central divisions, many wondering what kind of a nuisance A.J. Pierzynski will make of himself over the next week or so.

Game 1 is Saturday night.

The trend started a year ago by the Boston Red Sox, whose championship ended a lifetime of bad breaks and worse baseball, plays out this year from both dugouts.

The White Sox have not won since 1917. The Astros, born in 1962, have never won.

That St. Louis Cardinal fans stood and applauded the Astros’ on-field celebration Wednesday night speaks first to uncommon sportsmanship, but then to a fascination for the historically impaired. Here, Cub fans who have long dismissed the White Sox -- and how bad must a franchise be? -- appear to have become mildly amused by them, if not wholly supportive.

“These guys,” White Sox General Manager Ken Williams said last weekend, sweeping his hand across their clubhouse, “they stuck together. Not just on the field, but off the field. They stuck together.”

Three nights later, Astro icon Jeff Bagwell stood amid similar delirium and said, “We just kept going. Our guys never, ever gave up. And you know what? It worked out.”

So, they are here, teams that reflect baseball’s strategic movement toward sturdy starting pitching and reliable defense, beginning an era when most believe the 50-homer season is going the way of the rotary-dial phone.

The White Sox concluded their American League championship series with four consecutive complete games, by four pitchers, the first time that has happened. The Astros counter with Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte and Roy Oswalt, Clemens and Pettitte combining in their postseason careers for 65 starts and nearly 400 innings. Jose Contreras starts against Clemens in Game 1.

The teams are so evenly constructed, one big league scout surmised, that the World Series could turn on a play made or not made by “some nobody,” which eliminated almost no one.

Even the perceived advantages -- White Sox No. 4 Freddy Garcia over Astro No. 4 Brandon Backe, Pettitte’s cutter over White Sox right-handed batters, Astro closer Brad Lidge over White Sox closer Bobby Jenks, White Sox home run potential over Astro small ball, Astro momentum over White Sox inactivity -- are slight.

Most baseball observers long ago stopped viewing the Astros or White Sox as October flukes. As it turned out, and played out, they were the soundest, healthiest teams left.

It just happened they had similar stories, rebuilt and arrived at the same time, and now they’ll stand inside U.S. Cellular Field together, probably in the cold and rain.

They aren’t the New York Yankees or the Red Sox, or even the Cardinals or Atlanta Braves.

Nor would they want to be today.