Jose Mourinho - We think it, he does it

He's a wily one, that Jose Mourinho. The Real Madrid manager has built his reputation on thinking outside the box, approaching the game from an angle few others would consider.

While most other bosses feel resigned to doing little more than ranting and hollering impotently in their technical area, the Portuguese coach is always thinking up ways he can have an extra effect on proceedings from his dugout beyond his three allotted substitutions.

Mourinho, like many of his counterparts, loves a bit of 'mind games' from the safety of the press conference, but he'll just as gleefully get his hands dirty during a match too.

He's not averse to grabbing and holding on to the ball for a little too long when it goes out of play just to deny the other team a quick throw-in, and once got Francesco Toldo to remonstrate so vehemently at the officials over a perceived injustice that Inter reserve keeper got his marching orders from the dugout, just to eat up a few valuable seconds and spoil the opposition's momentum.

But Mourinho has now been accused of taking his cheeky tactics to a whole new level after appearing to instruct Xabi Alonso and Sergio Ramos to get sent off during the 4-0 win at Ajax on Tuesday.

Both players were one yellow card away from suspension, but their shameless time wasting earned them second bookings which will see them miss their final group match - having already qualified for the knockout phase - and wipe their disciplinary slates clean in time for the last 16.

Mourinho once again enlisted the help of his reserve keeper, this time Jerzy Dudek. The pair were caught on camera muttering away with hands over mouths on the sidelines, before Dudek relayed a message to Ramos via Iker Casillas.

Real were as smugly indignant as their manager in their statement responding to the news, saying: "Real Madrid expresses its surprise at this decision on the understanding that it does not conform with UEFA's disciplinary rules".

No denial, no contrition, just a goading 'catch us if you can'. Los Merengues and their manager really were made for each other.

Alonso and Ramos's expulsions were met with little surprise in Spain, where the practice is simply put down to 'good housekeeping', a victimless crime. UEFA don't see it that way, though.

Real host Auxerre on the final matchday in Group G, and they are still fighting it out for a Europa League place with Ajax. The French side may be bottom of their group, but their cause will be seen to be greatly helped, and Ajax's hindered, by them not having to contend with two of the best players in the world in their respective positions when they visit the Bernabeu.

It's the old 'playing your strongest side' argument, a stick so often used to beat smaller clubs with.

But would Real have played their top men for this match anyway? They are already confirmed as group winners, and Milan will join them in the next round as runners-up. Why would they bother bringing out the big guns?

Someone who knows all about fielding weakened sides in cup competitions is Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger, and the moral guardian of the beautiful game was scathing of Mourinho's underhand tactics.

He said: "You never say it doesn't cross your mind but when you see how it looks on television it is the best demonstration to think 'never do that again'.

"It looks, frankly, horrible. It's a pity to see that from a big club."

Of course, you rarely see such practices from a small club because they are more likely to be battling for their place in the last round come the final group game than the richest sides in Europe, but Wenger is right - it is not something that anyone who paid to watch the game would have appreciated.

But, then again, since when did that matter? The whole concept of the league structure is built around having more matches to broadcast, even if that means there will be plenty of games which are little more than an inconvenience to at least one of the sides.

As long as the current format remains, it will be impossible to avoid clubs fielding half the youth team once they have qualified with one or even two games to spare. Mourinho's meddling is worthy of reprimand, but it has served to highlight that fact.

Formula One - Season in review

An amazing Formula One season produced its final twist at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix when Sebastian Vettel, who had never led the title race, won his first world championship.

Those who say he doesn’t deserve the title will find it difficult to support their stance. The German had more poles (10) than any other driver and shared the most wins (five) with Fernando Alonso.

The Spaniard had a four-point lead going into the final race of the season and only needed a fourth-place finish to assure himself of the title. However, a poor decision from the Italian team’s strategists to react to a pit stop by Mark Webber left the two-time world champion behind Renault’s Vitaly Petrov and ultimately ended his title hopes.

According to Alonso, Petrov “protected like it was the last lap, in the last race in the championship, fighting both for the championship, so he was very aggressive”.

McLaren looked good at the end of a difficult and disappointing season and will be a force to reckon with in the 2011 season if they can finally produce a reliable car capable of performing at the top level consistently. Meanwhile Mark Webber must wonder whether he will ever get another chance such as this to win the title.

Here are my key topics of interest which emerged during the recently concluded season:

Webber vs Vettel:

The rivalry between teammates Vettel and Webber, the Anglophile Aussie who was the favourite among most neutrals to win the title, dominated headlines for most of the season.

Webber was involved in a spectacular crash when he ran into the back of Heikki Kovalainen and the most famous of his four wins, at Silverstone, when after being incensed that a new front wing was removed from his car and given to Vettel, complained loudly that Red Bull are backing the German and said to his team at the end of the race: "Not bad for a No2 driver."

The two drivers had previously faced-off in Turkey.

Intra-team divisions first appeared during the Turkish Grand Prix after Vettel collided with Webber as the pair vied for the lead in Istanbul. Vettel was forced to retire and Webber managed to make the podium, finishing third.

But they key point then was Red Bull's backing for Vettel on that occasion, even though the German was the driver most at fault. Their support for Vettel told Webber everything he didn't want to hear and confirmed his status as the team’s number 2 driver, leaving many to speculate that the Australian’s future will not be with Red Bull Racing.

The Germans:

Michael Schumacher was memorable for not being memorable. But just look at the pedigree of young Germans out there. One feels that if given the right car and support by a competent race engineer, the world could very well see a period of German dominance in the world of Formula 1.

The most notable young German, other than Vettel of course, was Nico Rosberg, who consistently out-drove his Mercedes team-mate, the legendary Michael Schumacher.

Three podium finishes and 7^th place in the World’s Driver Championship is no mean feat for a driver who many long ago dismissed as a nepotistic pretty boy. Add to that the fact that Mercedes GP gave up on their first car model months before Rosberg did, and his regular upstaging of Schumacher, it’s impossible to review the 2010 season without heaping some praise on Nico Rosberg.

Then there was Nico Hülkenberg's stunning pole in Brazil. The world knew that pole belonged to Red Bull, but the German rookie blew the accepted convention into smithereens when he piloted his FW32 around Interlagos in a time that beat Vettel’s best by over a second.

Williams may have improved their car dramatically towards the end of the 2010 season, but Hulkenberg’s pole lap owed as much to driver skill and outright bravery as it did to the car’s abilities.

There were other strong performances from the rookie driver this year – as early as Malaysia, three races into the season, he out-qualified his teammate for the first time, made it into Q3, and finished in the points (the last thanks to Alonso’s engine failure two laps from the chequered flag).

But in the end there was only one young German who mattered. It was the remarkable Vettel. This is expected to be the first of a clutch of championships for him. However, the rise of McLaren coupled with Ferrari’s want for revenge and world-class opposition will make it very difficult for Vettel to retain his title.

Final Thoughts:

Ultimately, though, this will go down as one of the greatest seasons in the 61 years of Formula One, the year where the stories, mostly, happened on the track and not off it.

There have been are some epic races and manoeuvres from what is arguably the strongest field that has even been seen on the same grid. Certainly a number of these drivers felt that this year's championship carried more weight than in recent years, simply because of the class of the opposition.

One can only expect the opposition to get better as technologies develop and this could signal a new golden age for Formula 1 where new legends will be born.

Manny Pacquiao - Greatest of All Time?

Manny Pacquiao defeated Antonio Margarito by unanimous decision during Saturday night’s bout in Arlington, Texas, pushing him to the forefront as the number one boxer in the world, according to HBO Boxing.

Pacquiao, who has now won eight divisional world titles (Oscar De La Hoya is trailing the Filipino with six divisional titles), can now make his claim to be the best in the world.

Even though Pacquiao made the fight look simple, he said that the fight was one of his toughest in memory.

"Margarito was my toughest fight,” he said, according to the Wall Street Journal. “He hurt me badly to the body and head in the sixth round. He is very strong and has a great heart.”

Despite that, the way Manny Pacquiao dominated over Antonio Margarito on Saturday night teaches upcoming boxers across the world a lot of lessons. The Filipino fighter attacked Margarito with unparallel determination and will-power, knowing absolutely and also sincerely admitting the inherent fighting talents of his opponent, Pacquiao dominated Margarito.

Pacquiao's dominance against a taller, heavier opponent also prompted some boxing observers to go a step farther, and ask: Is Pacquiao the best boxer of all time?

“Yes he is!”

"Manny Pacquiao should be declared the greatest fighter of all time, even greater than Muhammad Ali," says boxing analyst Dennis Principe, as quoted in ABS CBN News.

What sets him apart is his versatility. While other boxing legends established their greatness by "beating fighters in the same division, in the same weight level," Pacquiao demolishes "great champions who are heavier and supposedly better than him," and he does it over and over again.

But it is not just one’s skill in the ring that determines his place in history.

Pacquiao's attitude showed he is a cut above every other boxing champ that has entered the ring but cutting the trash talk and displaying true sportsmanship by placing the well-being of his opponent ahead

Several times in the 11th round, Pacquiao looked at Cole as if to ask that the fight be stopped. He later told broadcaster Mario Lopez that he took compassion on Margarito after the Mexican was allowed to continue the fight.

“I didn’t want to hurt him because boxing is not all about killing each other,” Pacquiao said.

By saying that he did not want to hurt Margarito, some would it proves that he is the greatest fighter ever. He has done the sport a great favour by showing us that it can be a gentleman’s sport and technique and attitude is more important than the amount of blood shed in the ring. He could be the greatest fighter of all time but he is without a doubt, the classiest fighter the world of boxing has ever seen.

“No. But he is one of a select few.”

Who was better? Sugar Ray Robinson, probably. Sugar Ray Leonard, possibly. Muhammad Ali, perhaps. Joe Louis? Little Jimmy Wilde? Henry Armstrong? The debate just got more heated.

"Manny Pacquiao, surely, has every right now to be considered among the top two or three greatest fighters of all time," says Kevin Mitchell at The Guardian. What the "little man" did on Saturday night to a much bigger opponent was "extraordinary in many ways" — his commitment to his craft went "beyond mere boxing." Sugar Ray Robinson was "probably" a better figher, but Pacquiao is "already worth his place among boxing's all-time elite."

But is it fair to compare boxers from different eras?

Ideally, all-time lists in any sport should be era independent. But that is not possible in most cases. Athletes are reviewed even though they fought or played in different eras, with different game rules.

Boxing has not always been the same. In the earlier days, boxers endured throughout 15 rounds, if the fight lasted that long. Gloves have evolved. So have mouthpieces.

Fighters did not always inject their hands with Xylocaine, or have effectively engineered mouth guards or hand wraps to help them cope with the brutality inside the squared circle.

Different eras are just that: different. Other variables can distort the comparison. Athletes that played before the 1960s often enjoyed less media coverage. Thus, there tends to be less video footage of their feats. That makes it harder for fans and critics to conduct a true comparable analysis across eras, from "prehistoric" to modern.

Top athletes today have much more media coverage. Their athletic performances on the field are well documented, and videos of their accomplishments proliferate on sites such as YouTube.

Finally, there is an imperfection caused by lack of records. Boxing has existed for centuries. Records have not always been preserved. Is it possible that fights took place in which no one recorded the event.

“There is still one man he has to face.”

"It's hard to argue" against Pacquiao's sparkling record, says Andreas Hale at DrJays.com. But among current boxers, Floyd Mayweather, Jr. is still "the man to beat."

His gaudy 41-0 record and boxing brilliance is everything that could give Pacquiao trouble in the ring. Considering the two have yet to come together in the ring, due to potential fights being delayed by drug-testing controversies, the boxing world will have a hard time deciding which one is the best of this era.

And while many say Pacquiao doesn’t need Mayweather, the truth of the matter is, boxing needs this fight to know who is the better of the two fighters, and the best of this era. Mayweather has every right to claim he is one of the best ever. How can he not when he’s still undefeated? But if he dodges Pacquiao, his entire career will be in question.

In Pacquiao’s case, he has to beat the one man everyone knows is the “other” best fighter in the world. It would be tough to go to sleep at night wondering “what if.”

This fight needs to happen before either one of these fighters can be considered the greatest of all time.

Why Manchester City won't win the BPL

Armed with the wealth of Sheik Mansour, Manchester City has been able to get their hands on the best players from around the world by offering them astronomical wages in the hope the club’s 34-year wait for professional silverware can finally end.

The club has made some decent signings this season. After purchasing Jerome Boateng, David Silva and Yaya Toure, Manchester City possess a squad full of options, with world class players at their disposal, a great balance of experience and youth and 6 lethal strikers who should be playing regularly.

The team has reliable goalkeepers, solid defenders, hard working midfielders and a lethal attacking front-line. Manager Roberto Mancini has everything any team would desire and require, surely Manchester City will win the title? Maybe if you were playing Football Manager.

Remember the Galaticos?

Manchester City reminds us of the infamous and unsuccessful Real Madrid Galactico era where Florentino Perez signed some of the world’s greatest footballers but made history for all of the wrong reasons. They won the Champions League in 02, league title in 03, sacked their best coach Vicente Del Bosque in the same year and didn’t win a major trophy for 3 years until the president departed.

The team looked like a bunch of stars with diverse personalities, who spoke different languages which were trying to play football for one of the world’s best teams. Furthermore, they let go of important players such as Makelele and Cambiasso because ‘they couldn’t sell jerseys’.

Since the new ownership took over at Manchester, the side is looking almost identical to the Galactico team which failed to conquer and dominate football. Man. City haven’t stopped spending and started developing, they must understand that success is not instant. More players are coming in, more players have to learn English and adapt to life in the country which isn’t easy for Brazilians or Spaniards. The team has no history, home grown players or club symbols. Where is the Raul of Man. City?

They have become a better side with the summer signings and improved their style of play, last season they scored 73 goals but suffered 45 goals. Furthermore, recent reports constantly link Michael Johnson with an exit from the club and Stephen Ireland has been sold to Aston Villa, two talented players who played a key role in the growth of the club. Does this resemble any similarities to Makelele and Cambiasso?

Quality Individuals, Poor Team

Manchester City's squad looks absolutely huge at the moment, and while there is talk of players being offloaded, it's unlikely they'll get rid of every potentially disgruntled bench-sitter over the next month, which doesn't bode well for team spirit. The club appear to be approaching the rebuilding process in the wrong way too.

Midfield is the area where they look most bloated while there are reports that Emmanuel Adebayor and Roque Santa Cruz could all leave, which would leaves them short up front, even after the acquisition of Mario Balotelli.

Despite possessing a quality selection of individuals players, Man City lack the experience, team work, organisation and champion mentality of clubs such as Chelsea and arch-rivals Manchester United. Money can’t buy those factors which take time to be developed and refined.

Furthermore, a team needs hours of correct training and match experience to become a compact unit. The players need to understand each other and most importantly, it takes time for a side to play football as a team with a distinct personality.

Roberto Mancini

Mark Hughes was sacked because he wasn't on course to reach targets, however Mancini hardly fared much better - they were the sixth-best Premier League performers from his first game on Boxing Day onwards.

Hughes’ City side were only going to reach a points total of 64, 6 shy of the desired target, a total that would have got them sixth place in the final Premiership table. Mancini’s finished total was 67 points, with easier games in 5th. He’s failed to stamp his authority on the team, constantly tinkered with positions, tactics and formations.

His policy of playing three defence-minded midfielders was baffling and not exactly successful, his intensive training program left player of the year Carlos Tevez frustrated and he supposedly doesn't get on with another star performer of last season, Craig Bellamy, who has since been sent away to Cardiff on loan. Despite a brilliant record in Serie A, the Italian has yet to shine in England, and another mid-season sacking isn't unimaginable.

Final Thoughts:

The pressure and expectations for Manchester City to perform may not be at the same level during the Galactico days, but it would be a disappointment for the fans, players and owners if they don’t win a competition this year. They are one of the favourites to win the Europa League and are still in contention for a domestic treble.

However, winning the title should be a long term objective for the club. It is attainable for next season once the players develop, begin to gel as a team and finally adopt a formation which allows for more midfield creativity and adventure. Also, each, manager introduces their own project to a team and it’s crucial that Man. City don’t plan on sacking their third manager in 3 years as this will not help development at all as Real Madrid have proven.

S-League 2010: Report Card

The 2010 S-league season has given us one of the closest title races in the history of the league which saw French side Etoile FC become the first ever foreign team to win the Singaporean domestic league. They were pushed hard by the highly experienced Tampines Rovers and a brilliant run of form by Home United in the second half of the season but the Stars still managed to beat Albirex Niigata for the first time this season to clinch the title.

But the season was not just about team. All 12 teams played a part in the highlights and disappointments experienced this season. Some have performed beyond expectation and some have fallen short of the mark and some have been simply disgraceful.

Here's my pick on who has impressed and who has not.

The Bright Lights:

Etoile FC:

In their debut season, the French had to deal with abusive fans, off the field and financial problems as well as a bogey team they just couldn’t seem to score against. Despite that, the Stars were by far the most entertaining team this season and managed to secure a good following after their first few games. And they got the results. Winning the Championship and League Cup double and reaching the semi-finals of the RHB Singapore Cup in their first season in Singapore is truly an achievement to be proud off and local teams will do well to adopt their professionalism and free flowing style of football if they want to be competing for honours next season. Pity the financial problems are forcing the team to sell of their best players but don’t be surprised if Etoile are amongst the title chasers in the 2011 season.

Tampines Rovers:

Every year Dad’s Army are criticised for their lack of youth and pace and written off before the first ball is even kicked. And every year they prove us wrong by showing the value of experience and how it goes a long way to ensure consistent performances. Pairing veterans like Aleksander Duric with the youth of Khairul Amri, Qiu Li and Jamal Ali proved to be a masterstroke by coach Vorawan Chitavanich as the Stags were in contention from round one all the way to round thirty three. They may have missed out on the league title by a heart-breaking one-point margin but they are due to play Thai side Bangkok Glass in the final of the RHB Singapore Cup so they may still earn some respect for local teams by being the only one to win any silverware this season

Home United:

The performance of Home United in the first half of the season would have definitely gotten them a rating no higher than a C but their second half performance was so impressive that they managed to get an A from me. The Protectors were languishing in the lower half of the table before the signing of Chun Jae Woon and the regain of form by Shahril Ishak, who won three player-of -the-month awards in a row, provided the team with the much needed creativity and midfield steel to mount a title challenge.

Disappointments:

SAF FC:

As the defending champions and the Singapore’s sole representative at the Asian Champions League, you would really expect the Warriors to finish closer to the top. Instead, they ended the season a whopping 17 points of the summit. They did help make the title race a little more exciting with a 3-0 win over champions Etoile FC in the third last game of the season but other than that did little else of note. With a budget and infrastructure superior that of any other team, they really should be competing title every single year and reduce their reliance on foreign players and focus on grooming local talent to replace the big boots Therdsak Chaiman has left behind.

Woodlands:

After 33 games, the Rams accumulated a mere 19 points, winning just four games and scored just 18 goals along the way. Perennial cellar dwellers Sengkang Punggol managed to finish the season 6 points ahead of Woodlands and even Beijing Guoan and the Young Lions, who both had five points deducted for their on-field fracas, were hardly threatened by the team from the north. For a team with such a rich cup tradition, it was a truly disappointing season and coupled with the loss of key sponsor SembCorp, the 2011 season could prove to be another long and hard one for Woodlands Wellington FC.

Beijing Guoan and The Young Lions:

In one match against each other, Beijing Guoan and The Young Lions lost their goodwill, placed the reputation of the game into question and showed to the world the ugly side of the beautiful game. The lengthy bans for the players were justified given the severity of their offence even though the points deduction was somewhat insignificant in my opinion. The actions of both teams were condemned throughout the world of football and posed an important question to the football world. Are teams based solely on youth mature and composed enough to mount a serious title challenge regardless of which league they belong to? Hopefully the 2011 season has some answers for us then.

The Bundesliga Model - Can it save European clubs from bankruptcy?

Manchester United’s Champions League quarter final at Bayern Munich gave the world an opportunity to have a close look at two very different financial models of how clubs should operate in order to obtain long term viability. Many calls have been made for English clubs to emulate the way that clubs like Barcelona and Real Madrid are run, but Germany’s Bundesliga provides another alternative which should at least be given close consideration.

While in England the talk is of takeovers by multi-billionaires, supporters of Bundesliga clubs like Bayern Munich are safe in the knowledge that such a scenario is unlikely to ever unfold at the Allianz Arena. The system by which Bundesliga clubs are regulated, with an emphasis on strict financial rules and licensing. This results in Bayern being debt free, allowing the club to offer some tickets for as little as 12 euros, a third of the ticket price to watch a Barclays Premier League (BPL) game.

50 + 1 Model:

At the heart of the German model are the fans, rather than owners or shareholders. Until the late 1990s all Bundesliga clubs were 100% owned by members – fans who pay to be part of the club. However, the clubs recognised the need to compete with their European rivals and giving fans full autonomy might not have been the best way to do it. So some of the clubs, led by Bayern Munich, spun off their professional football “sections” into outside limited companies separate from the parent club to attract investment.

Under Bundesliga rules, members must own 50% of the shares plus one extra vote. This is the so called 50+1 model, which makes it impossible for private investors to take over a club. It is this model that many view as the best in Europe – and a far cry from the Premier League, where most clubs are struggling with debt.

Lizenzierungsordnung:

A Uefa report in February revealed that the total debt of Premier League teams, £3.4bn, is greater than that of the rest of Europe’s top flight clubs put together. And although the Premier League clubs make up more than half of club assets in Europe, Manchester United’s debt is almost more than £150m higher than that of the 36 clubs in Germany’s top two divisions. That is because Bundesliga clubs follow a set of rules known as the Lizenzierungsordnung, where they must submit information about their budgets and expected expenditure, and prove they are financially stable in order to play in the league.

There are also check ups during the season and licences can be withdrawn. Second Division club Arminia Bielefeld were deducted four points by the Bundesliga for breaching the terms of their licence after suffering a financial shortfall and were fined 50,000 euros (£45,000) in February for the violation. A tough punishment but the club is still in business and financially stable today.

The Price of Prudence:

Arguably, this financial prudence has come at a price, having limited the ability of German clubs to compete with their big spending English counterparts who can offer astronomical wages to players in the Champions League. Bayern were the last German side to be crowned Champions of Europe in 2001, having lost to United in dramatic fashion two years earlier. English clubs have triumphed twice since 2001 and appeared in the final on six occasions in the last decade, a period in which only one other German club has reached the final, Bayer Leverkusen losing to a Zinedine Zidane inspired Real Madrid in 2002.

There are also concerns over how strictly the rules are enforced. In recent years, Borussia Dortmund have racked up considerable debt following their glory years in the Champions League. Meanwhile, their neighbours and fierce rivals, Schalke 04, are currently feeling the pinch with stories coming out in the the German media of tight financial constraints and even talk of bankruptcy.

Final Thoughts:

So the 50+1 approach to club ownership is not necessarily a guarantee of good governance and Bundesliga clubs are still quite capable of shooting themselves in the foot. Furthermore, it has very vocal critics with Hannover 96 President Martin Kind leading the charge. He argues that Hannover would be well placed to compete for honours and thereby make the Bundesliga more competitive, if he could attract more investors by giving them a larger slice of the pie.

There are also exceptions and anomalies. Bayer Leverkusen and the Wolfsburg club have their genesis as factory clubs owned by Bayer and Volswagen respectively. Hoffenheim’s rise through the leagues to the Winter Championship in 2008 was funded entirely by former player and software billionaire Dietmar Hopp. It still remains to be answered if any of the three clubs would survive if the vast resources from their key sponsors were to withdraw their funds.

Having said that, the system does seem to work. Just recently in the 2008-2009 season, the valuation of Bundesliga clubs broke the 2bn euro level for the first time in its history and secured a European high of 573m euros in sponsorship. Furthermore, ticket prices are affordable, averaging 20.79 euros a match and for the seventh season in a row, average attendances have exceeded 42,000.

We may never see English clubs adopting the 50 + 1 model and handing power over to the fans as such a system is unheard of in England. However, what is more important for them in the short term is the need to be financially responsible to prevent themselves from going into administration. Leeds United and Portsmouth have tasted the bitter pill of bankruptcy and prominent clubs with large fan bases such as West Ham and Liverpool have come close to financial ruin. The reliance on billionaires doubling up as sugar daddies for the clubs has to stop and for that to happen, the Football Association has to seriously consider their financial regulations.

Ending of a 56-year curse: How the San Francisco Giants upset the world of Baseball

Here's one for you Baseball Fans,

It was their first championship in 56 years, and their first as a San Francisco team. And The San Francisco Giants won it as a team. Not a consortium of superstars, but a cohesive blend of rising stars and rejects from former World Champions Florida Marlins and the Tampa Bay Rays.

In five games, the Giants cruised past the high-powered Texas Rangers for the franchise’s first World Series title since moving out west from New York 52 years ago. Apart from the 4-2 loss in Game 3, the Giants controlled the entire series, defeating ace Cliff Lee twice. Lee had never lost in the postseason prior to this series and for a team that smacked the cover off the baseball against the Rays and the Yankees, the Giants’ pitching was too much for Texas to handle, as the self-described “group of misfits” was victorious.

The Giants became the first team since the 1966 Orioles to throw two shutouts in the World Series, giving them four for the postseason. Only two other teams, both legendary, ever threw that many in a postseason - The 1998 Yankees, winners of a record 125 games, and the 1905 Giants, the franchise's first championship team.

But not only did the Giants end their 56 year barren run, they also showed the world of Baseball that championships can be won by simply sticking to the basics. They did not have the big hits of 8-time Golden Glove winner Barry Bonds and did not spend insane amounts of money to poach talent from other Major League teams. Instead, they stuck to the one key principle which would please any Baseball purist. Good batters win games, good pitchers win championships.

The Giants' win was the payoff for years on an organizational emphasis on pitching. Not only drafting them in spades but also developing them with counter-culture ideas that run in sharp contrast to the training of other pitching prospects across the league. San Francisco has only one blanket rule for its minor leaguers - no more than 100 pitches in a game. The organization also puts a heavy emphasis on throwing fastballs, believing that young hurlers should add or refine secondary pitches later as they are needed to get major league hitters out. "One thing the Giants are great at is pretty much leaving you alone and working with what you have," Matt Cain says. "A lot of organizations might try to change guys right away. Not the Giants."

As they stand today, the Giants are different. Though they managed to beat Lee twice and C.J. Wilson once, their offense was at one point the reason why they seemed bound to fail. And this leaves the Giants in a unique position. They don’t need that 40 plus home run or 70-steal guy to spark their offense. With their pitching, they need a cohesive unit that can complement each pitcher’s talents properly and effectively. San Francisco is a well-put together team. They have dominant pitching and the mentality that any guy can come in and help this team win.

And as we all know, in order to win championships, one must first have the belief that they can do. That’s what the Giants have and will continue to develop on as the years go on by. The Yankees will still be the favourites for the title in 2011, but the Giants can spring yet another surprise if they can find a batting team to complement their young and impressive pitching rotation.

Source of image: http://yankeeschick.mlblogs.com/tim-lincecum-giants.jpg