Last night, we saw a lot of things happen. Amazing things, in fact. We saw four teams fighting to make their last six months of hard work mean something, to keep their season’s alive. We saw two teams complete two of the most epic collapses in Major League history. We saw the Rays win a game in which their WPA once stood at 0.3%, and we saw one of the best closers in baseball give up consecutive hits to Chris Davis, Nolan Reimold, and Robert Andino.

But there was also one thing I didn’t see last night – a single player on any of those teams who gave less than maximum effort. I didn’t see one single player show signs of apathy. I saw players win and I saw players lose, but I didn’t see anyone who won or lost because they lacked the internal moral fiber to make it happen.

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From Dirk Hayhurst’s Twitter:

“You know what would be really cool…”

~Baseball Gods, right before THIS all happened.

They’re calling it “Wild Wednesday,” and it was, but it was also Wild Twenty-Aught-Eleven. The Tampa Bay Rays closed the books on their 2011 campaign with one of the craziest nights in baseball history and one of the most absurd paths to the postseason ever.

At 12:03 a.m. ET this morning, Robert Andino hit a sinking line drive to left field off Jonathon Papelbon. Carl Crawford charged the ball, but it popped off his glove and Nolan Reimold dove onto home plate, giving the Orioles a 4-3 win. The first Orioles player to reach Andino chest-bumped him to the ground — maybe knocking the wind out of him — as the cameras watched the Baltimore bench fall onto his seemingly-frightened and breathless face.

At 12:05 a.m., Evan Longoria reached out — almost into the other batter’s box — to foul off a slider from New York Yankees pitcher Scott Proctor, holding the count at two balls, two strikes. Longoria exhaled deeply, puffing his cheeks like a trombone player, as Scott Proctor wound for the next pitch. It was a fastball away that got lost and asked Longo for directions.

“Two-two and line SHOT! DOWN THE LEFT FIELD LIIIIINE! THAT BALL IS GONE!!!” Rays television announcer Dewayne Staats called, presumably leaning out of the booth to watch as Longoria’s 31st homer ricocheted around behind the Crawford Cutout — a low wall added so then-Ray Carl Crawford could rob a few extra home runs.

Last night’s (and this morning’s) Rays game was beyond spectacular (for non-Red Sox fans, that is; my condolences to the northeast). It was parts Spring Training game (with the parade of Yankees pitchers), parts Little League World Series (with the Rays using nearly the entirety of their bench in key roles), and all parts unbelievable.

The 2011 Rays season has shown that though baseball is about probabilities, it is probabilities with replacement — truly any event can occur with the very next pitch, even if it happened just a few innings ago — or if it has never happened before.
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Below, you will find a graph detailing the probabilities that the Rays or the Red Sox would represent the American League as the Wild Card as the wild night of September 28th, 2011 progressed, based on Win Probability. Although we could never truly quantify whatever it was that happened yesterday, let these numbers be a handy guide as we highlight 16 of the key moments (with video links when possible) that ultimately resulted in the craziest night — and the craziest five minutes — in my baseball life and probably in baseball history.

Odds are calculated assuming a 50% win probability in a one-game playoff.

Click to embiggen as we dive into the night that was.

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What in the world happened last night? Even this morning — while reviewing the box-scores — I’m not sure I can believe what I’m seeing. A seven-run comeback — capped off by an incredible walk-off homerun — catapulted the Tampa Bay Rays into the post-season just minutes after the Boston Red Sox lost on a walk-off single. Over in the National League, the Philadelphia Phillies forced extra innings against the Atlanta Braves in a must-win game. Last night, the stakes were incredibly high — and the teams involved in those games did not disappoint. As a fan of the game, you couldn’t ask for more.

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Dan Johnson just saved the Tampa Bay Rays season. This Dan Johnson.

Before tonight, he had a -7 wRC+. As noted in that leaderboard, the only Major Leaguer with a worse offensive season in at least 90 PA was Roy Halladay, who isn’t exactly in the big leagues for his bat. Johnson hit worse than both of the horrible Twins catchers. He hit significantly worse than Jeff Mathis.

And he hit a game-tying home run with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning of the 162nd game of the Rays season. They might not make the playoffs, but that was the kind of moment that will go down in baseball history.

This is why we all love this sport. Dan Johnson.

Update: Holy crap.

Managers rarely have an easy decision on their hands when it comes to choosing their postseason rotation, and Ron Washington would seem to have a more difficult decision than most. This season, his five starters — C.J. Wilson, Matt Harrison, Derek Holland, Alexi Ogando and Colby Lewis — have started all but five games. It’s the kind of durability that we rarely see in today’s game, and telling one of them that they will just be a highly paid spectator can’t be easy.

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Tonight, the Braves are essentially playing for their lives. If they lose and the Cardinals beat the worst team in baseball, their season is over. It’s possible that the Astros could help them out and beat Chris Carpenter, but Atlanta shouldn’t count on it, and thus, they should treat their contest with the Phillies this evening as an elimination game.

That kind of situation requires a different kind of managing. While they have their best healthy starter on the mound, Fredi Gonzalez should still be willing to go to his bullpen extremely early tonight.

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Going into tonight’s action, the common assumptions seems to be that the Yankees are going to coast on into the playoffs. They have already clinched the division and home field advantage, and since they got most of their regular starters and bullpen arms work yesterday, they have little incentive to play their hardest on Wednesday night. Why work yourselves hard in a meaningless game? Why risk injuries to your players when you have nothing to play for?

But I’m not sure that the predominating narrative is correct in this case. Joe Girardi has already said that he’s planning on starting many of his regulars tonight — although who knows how long he’ll keep them in the game — and he seems to be practicing some “gamesmanship” by choosing not to announce his starter until closer to game time. Could it be that the Yankees are treating tonight’s game more seriously than many people are assuming?

If they are, I have to tip my cap to the Yanks for looking past their history with the Red Sox and realizing the larger fact: it’s in their own best interest if the Red Sox to make the playoffs.

That’s right, Yankees fans. As horrible as it may sound, you should probably be rooting for the Red Sox tonight.

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All that stands between the St. Louis Cardinals and (at the very least) a 163rd game playoff for the National League is Brett Myers, a 31-year-old pitcher with all of 1.3 wins above replacement on the season, a 4.31 ERA, and a 4.30 FIP. No problem for a lineup like St. Louis, this year’s National League leader in runs scored, right?

On the other hand, Myers enters tonight’s start on fire, recording five straight starts of at least six innings pitched and only one run allowed. He’s now a full three months removed from a 16-start stretch spanning April, May, and June which saw him yield 22 home runs and a 4.82 ERA. Since then, Myers has settled in a bit, recording a 78-to-23 strikeout-to-walk ratio and a 4.00 ERA, roughly league average in the hitters’ environment in Houston.

Which pitcher should the Cardinals expect to show up tonight?

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