Black coat, white shoes, black hat, Cadillac

Hats off to Brandon Backe. I thought he was toast heading into Game 4, but he pitched the game of his life with seven shut-out innings. Textbook dominance -- he really seems to turn it on when the situation calls for it. I wish I could say the same for the rest of the Astros squad, who never really got into the game. Freddy Garcia and the Sox relievers kept painting the outside corners with two types of junk: high and low. And the Astros anemic line-up kept swinging and missing. Whiff, whiff, whiff.

It's tough to turn it on in the postseason. Just ask Barry Bonds. And it sorta sucks that Clemens, Bagwell and Biggio -- the latter two cornerstones of this humble franchise -- have to go out like this. If you're an Astros fan, you have no right to be pissed at Brad Lidge. I'm not even second guessing Garner's decision to pull Backe after 100 pitches and throw Lidge (now 0-3 in the 2005 postseason) into the bonfire, because the 'Stros got killed by their Achilles heel: too little depth on the bench and bullpen.

I'd like to say that I predicted this from the onset; the late-season White Sox slide left a few doubts about momentum in the playoffs, but they destroyed the Red Sox and Angels. None of the starters pitched a bad game in the postseason. And after that, there shouldn't have been any doubt as to who the World Champs were. And yet, all of the ESPN braintrust either picked the Astros or (in the case of wunderkinds Neyer and Gammons) the Sox in six or seven. Even the poll on ESPN currently favors the Astros as winners. I guess it's hard finding someone to identify with on a team with 2/5 of a Yankees rotation and one of the most hated men in baseball (catcher AJ Pierzinski). Big Frank? Nah. Paul Konerko? For the week or so before he hits free agency, yeah. Ultra-humble MVP Jermaine Dye? Uhhh....

Oh wait, here's the true MVP: Ozzie Guillen. The only thing more fun than watching Barbara Bush repeatedly making the O-face when the camera panned on her in the stands was seeing Guillen writhe and contort and -- ultimately errupt into paroxysms of joy -- in one nail-biter of a contest. Fox didn't even know how to market this, with Joe Buck and Tim McCarver reading off the neighborhoods on Chicago's South Side that support the Sox (Hyde Park? Not) and zero mention of Nellie Fox during the post-game highlight reel. Here's to the 2005 World Champion White Sox: one of the most dominant postseasons on record and still, regrettably, nobody's team.