A Look at the 2021 World Series

On October 5th, the yearly post season of Major League Baseball began. Especially this year, the long awaited run-up to earn the world’s most prized possession in baseball has been anticipated. In this lead up to the world series, there are two different divisions who compete against each other ultimately testing their skills as a team! These two divisions consist of the National League and the American League, which then again divides into 3 different regional divisions. In these divisions (East, Central, West) is where each individual team is placed. For example, a team like the Dodgers is placed in the National League West Division or the Tampa Bay Rays in the American League East Division. From here, the #1 team from each of the three divisions automatically gets placed in the Division Series. However before the Division Series takes place, there is a Wild Card game between two teams that just missed the cutoff in their respective division. In this Wild Card game, two teams play against each other in order to get to the Division Series. This year, it was the New York Yankees who lost against the Baltimore Red Sox in the American League. As well as the Los Angeles Dodgers who won when playing against the Saint Louis Cardinals. 

From this point on in the postseason, pressure on the teams got more intense as they advanced to the Division Series. This time, we got to see two brackets of games from both the National and American League. Starting in the National League, it was the Milwaukee Brewers versus the Atlanta Braves, as well as the San Francisco Giants versus the Los Angeles Dodgers. These games were highly watched by all, including Dodgers fans from our school. Riley Lashever (24) and Avery Gross (24) comment on the intense games between the Dodgers and the Giants by saying, “the unity right now inside the Dodgers team is incredible; even though Kershaw is out for the season, I think that he will be providing a lot of support for his fellow teammates. I believe that the Dodgers will come out victorious!” Another outlook on the games was given by Audrey Kim (23), “I really couldn’t care less about the World Series, but I hope the Dodgers win!” Following Avery and Riley’s theories, they were proved correct as the Dodgers prevailed through the Giants and the Braves beat the Brewers. In the American League, the Tampa Bay Rays competed against the Red Sox, while the White Sox played against the Astros. After a long series of games, the Astros and the Red Sox proved successful in the matchups. 

Following the Division Series, came the Championship Series. These set of games soon enough became the most prominent games out of the postseason, disincluding the World Series. The four teams playing in the Championship Series can either lose it all, or they can punch themselves a ticket to the coveted World Series. In the National League, it was the Braves versus the Dodgers. The games were very action packed, with multiple home runs and extraordinary plays. Unfortunately, the Dodger’s road to the world was destroyed by the Braves as they beat them 4 games to 2. Alike the Braves, in the American League the Astros swept the red sox off their feet. They ended up beating the Red Sox by 4 games as well! 

Fast forward to now, and the World Series has commenced . The two teams play in 7 matches against each other to determine who the best team out of both leagues is for the 2021 series. For reference, the World Series is equivalent to the Super Bowl in football or Wimbledon in tennis. This significant set of matches tests and demonstrates all the hard work each team put in for the season, and is watched by many! An interesting fact to look at when studying the amount of people that tune in to watch the most prominent baseball game is how 2020 had the least amount of viewers, dropping by 32% in comparison to the last several years. In 1978, there were an outstanding 44 million people watching. Yet in 2020, there were only 12 million viewers which is surprising. Even though I’m not a huge baseball fan, I will definitely watch to see who can claim the infamous title!