After going one-for-two in my wild card game picks, and three-for-four in the divisional series predictions, my crystal ball went as cold as the Cubs bats. As you may recall, I had the Cubs beating Toronto to become World Champions. Instead, the Kansas City Royals dispatched the New York Mets last night in five games. A few observations:

• There was quite a bit of turnaround in the play of the National League teams. Chicago dispatched the Pirates in the wild card game, the Cardinals in the division series, and then were themselves swept by the Mets in the League Championship Series, who in turn went down in five games to the Royals.
• Daniel Murphy’s error in Game 4 was a tougher play than it looked. Lorenzo Cain ran between Murphy and the ball and the hop looked flatter than what he expected, certainly than what I would have expected.
• On average, through the post season, Murphy pretty much played to his reputation: decent bat and less than average defense. Of course, he arrived at his average by being really hot, then really cold.
• It’s too bad that Yeonis Cespedes didn’t foul that ball off his knee in Game 4 instead of Game 5. That way he would have been in too much pain to inexplicably head for second base on a little broken bat liner that everyone at Citi Field saw would be caught. Well, everyone, but Yeonis.
• The Mets clearly weren’t as good a team although their starting pitching kept them close. Still, they had no margin for error and lost the Series by their inability to add runs in the later innings. Kansas City’s primary relievers pitched 17 innings and surrendered only 2 runs. Only Franklin Morales faltered, giving up four runs in one inning in the Mets’ Game 3 victory.
• I would have sent Matt Harvey out to start the ninth inning of Game 5. It’s not as if Jeurys Familia was blowing people away in his previous Series contests. In any case, Harvey didn’t lose that game, not scoring more than two runs, lost that game for the Mets. That and the Hail Mary heave from Lucas Duda in his attempt to cut down Eric Hosmer at home. The announcers kept saying a good throw would have had Hosmer. A mediocre throw would have had Hosmer. Almost any throw, but that one would have had Hosmer.
• Congratulations to the Kansas City Royals.

Fifteen weeks from today, February 15th, pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training.