1993 NLCS Replay & 'What If' 93' World Series

So this December, I have decided to take it easy, take in the holidays, and just do random quick fun APBA projects to play. I was kicking around the idea of playing the 1982 World Series ('The Suds Series' - Battle of the beer towns).

Then the morning after Thanksgiving, in the early hours of Friday, I was sitting back with a snack and watching the MLB Network. I fell upon the final minutes of 'Eight Men Out', followed by the Johnny Bench story, Tony Gwynn story & the 1990's Atlanta Braves story. I figured God must have been telling me to take it easy, I knew he knew that I was watching the MLB Network in those wee hours since he put Tony Gwynn (my favorite player) and the 1990's Braves, as back-to-back shows...

He was like "Take it easy man, you've been doing a lot the last few months."

The last few months will be detailed more in this upcoming post on "Thankful for my APBA family", but to put it shortly, my wife had bronchitis in early August, which x-rays revealed a small, mysterious growth in her right lung. Since then, she has had the operation to remove the tumor, which it, along with one of her 17 lymph nodes removed, turned out to be cancerous. The surgeon and oncologist both agree that she is now 100% cancer-free, which of course was excellent news!

Things are getting back to normal somewhat with her recovering from the operation (she is really sore right now), with her hoping to be back by January 2nd to work. With all the runs to the hospital (she was in there for 10 days), the housework, errands & working full-time -- God, wants me now to just relax. He also knows that I want to get into my more-involved projects, but he believes that shorter, fun projects like series replays and what if series may be what's in store for December.

So I listened...

Influenced by the Braves special on television, I decided to replay the 1993 National League Championship Series and do a "What If" World Series between the 1993 Toronto Blue Jays and 1993 Atlanta Braves. So it will be a chance for the Braves to get twice the redemption, getting revenge on the Phillies for being a roadblock to the 1993 Fall Classic, while the Braves can get revenge on the Blue Jays for the 1992 World Series.

In real life, the 1993 NLCS was decided by 1 run in three of the six games, while the Phillies would win 2 of those games in extras, both in the 10th inning, and both by the score of 4-3. The Atlanta Braves had a 2-1 series lead, with John Smoltz prepared to pitch Game 4 in Atlanta, with another game in Atlanta to follow. I remember as a fan of those Braves, thinking Atlanta should have this one with Smoltzie on the mound, but it was never mean't to be.

The replay will be played with the Basic APBA Baseball boards, along with the APBA Baseball Error Card and Unusual Play Card (from the APBA Journal). Along with actual lineups and game starters, and home locations.