Western teams fight for wild card

Heading into the final week of the Major League Baseball season, two of the four National League playoff spots have been clinched by the St. Louis Cardinals and the Atlanta Braves, with the third spot waiting for the Arizona Diamondbacks, barring a total collapse. Despite the lackluster division races, the wild-card battle between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Francisco Giants, currently separated by two games, will go down to the wire.

Last week, the four-game series between LA and San Francisco provided an event worth watching in the National League. The teams split the series with the Dodgers winning the Monday and Thursday games and the Giants prevailing in the Tuesday and Wednesday contests.

After their series, the Dodgers took two of three from the last place San Diego Padres, while the Giants swept the Brewers to put them another game up on the Dodgers. As they enter this week with the Giants two games up, the Dodgers have three games left against the Colorado Rockies and three games against the Padres. The Giants have a two game series against the Padres and finish their season against the recently eliminated Houston Astros. Will the duo of Barry Bonds and Jeff Kent power the Giants to the postseason or will Shawn Green carry his Dodgers to the playoffs? Stay tuned.

In the East, the Braves have been leading the National League in wins since the first month of the season and have hardly been tested within the division. Now leading the east by 19 games, the only drama left for them at this point is whether first year closer John Smoltz, a former Cy Young winner as a starter, will break Bobby Thigpen's MLB record of 57 saves. With six games left Smoltz has 53 saves.

At the other end of the spectrum, the New York Mets have had quite possibly the most disappointing season in all of baseball. Coming into the season with one of the highest payrolls and World Series aspirations, the team ran its record to 18-11 before beginning a down world spiral. The Mets' season reached rock-bottom in the month of August when they did not manage to win a single home game.

If the losing wasn't enough, their season got even worse, this week, after a Newsday reporter claimed that at least seven Mets smoked marijuana this season. The reporter named Grant Roberts, Mark Corey (since traded) and Tony Tarasco but did not have sufficient proof to submit the names of the other four players. A picture of Roberts smoking up accompanied the article.

It was early in the summer when the Cardinals stole the Central division lead from the Cincinnati Reds. Since then, they have continued to lead the division with only minor threats from the Houston Astros and the Reds, who have since dropped off the radar screen.

With their 9-3 victory over the Astros last Friday, the Cardinals clinched the NL Central division, culminating an emotional season in which they lost long-time voice of the Cardinals, Jack Buck, and pitcher Darryl Kile who died suddenly in July. After their division-clinching win, Cardinals third baseman Albert Pujols carried Kile's #57 jersey around the field.

The Diamondbacks took hold of their division lead mid-summer and have never had to look back. Yet even with their sizeable lead, they have had trouble locking up their division, although they will likely clinch a playoff spot early this week. This past week Curt Schilling had his worst outing of season in which he allowed eight earned runs and 14 hits. The Diamondbacks, however, must be pleased that he got the poor start out of his system before the playoffs, as they will need him and Randy Johnson to be in top form if they want to defend their title