AL 3, NL 2

So the AL wins for the tenth year in a row.

Today in the Washington Post, Tom Boswell makes two salient points. The first is that this game is part of the cyclical nature of the sport: the American League dominated from 1933-1949, then the National League from 1950-1987, then the American League through last night, and counting.

Breaking down the years, one can partly see why this was so. Early years, the AL: Yankees, plus Ted Williams. 50s and 60s, the NL, with the Dodgers, Giants, and Cardinals achieving superiority by snapping up the best black talent. 1970s, the NL again, with the Reds' contingent (Rose, Bench, and Morgan every year; Concepcion, Foster and Perez some years) laying down the law to their brethren that this was serious business. 1980s, mostly the NL, with the Dodgers, Phillies, Cardinals, Cubs and Mets taking turns being the best two or three teams in baseball. Then, post-1986, the AL goes harder and faster than the NL (the Dodgers excluded) for intenational talent; then--starting mid-nineties--the huge gap in talent represented by Torre's Yankees, plus (at alternating times) the Orioles, Indians, Mariners, A's, Rangers, and Red Sox.

As Boswell points out, in his second point, the obvious superiority of the AL represented by the first six batters: three certain Hall-of-Famers if they dropped dead tomorrow (Derek, A-Rod, Pudge), plus three probables (Papi, Vlad, Ichiro), all six known by either their first name or nickname.

Having the Hammer of God (aka Mo Rivera) to close out the game didn't hurt, either. And had the game gone into extra frames, Papelbon. To be followed by Jenks. To be followed by R.J. Ryan . . .