Joe Blanton for NLDS MVP

Danville, Kentucky -- Folks, I've always resented the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Brooklyn Dodgers were a classic team. They gave us Ebbets Field, and iconic players like Jackie Robinson, Don Newcombe, and Sandy Koufax. The Brooklyn Dodgers were like a '57 Thunderbird: effortlessly elegant, classy, timeless, yet understated. Most importantly, the team's fans were great, salt of the Earth people: heavily-accented, hard-nosed, unpretentious.

The Dodgers franchise has been irreversibly altered for the worse by relocating to the Hollywood hills in Los Angeles, the land of Jack Nicholson and the Kardashians. California sports teams are universally over-hyped and overpaid, earning far more media attention than they actually merit. When most people think of Californian athletes, they think of over-rated softies like Mike Trout or Steph Curry.

Yet, the 2016 Dodgers are a break from this unfortunate trend. This iteration of the Dodgers is notable not for its superstars, but for its role-players. I've already profiled Rich Hill -- the team's unheralded ace -- here. Old Richard Hill will be toeing the rubber for the Trolley Dodgers in the pivotal win-or-go-home NLDS Game 5 in D.C. against the Washington Nationals. Rich Hill may not have Kobe Bryant's superstar status, but he's got more than enough dark-horse spirit for one city.

The NLDS is currently knotted at two games a piece. The winner of Thursday's match-up between Rich Hill and Max Scherzer will advance to NLCS to face that team of destiny from the North Side of Chicago. Thus far, the heroes of the Dodgers post-season have caught the sabermetric world by surprise. Clayton Kershaw has continued to stumble in the postseason, allowing 8 earned runs in 11.2 innings so far in the playoffs. Former phenom Yasiel Puig hasn't done much. NL Rookie of the Year front-runner Corey Seager has been a non-factor outside of a few 1st inning knocks.

Corey Seager would be the obvious MVP choice for the #Dodgers, but he needs to prove he can hit after the 1st inning. #NLDS

— The Will To Win (@TWTWsports) October 10, 2016

Corey Seager is 0-10 in the 2nd-9th inning this series. #NotClutch #Dodgers #NLDS

— The Will To Win (@TWTWsports) October 10, 2016

The Dodgers are not on the precipice of advancing to the NLCS because of the usual star-powered suspects. The Dodgers are, in my opinion, likely to advance to the NLCS because of two unsung heroes: Chase Utley and Joe Blanton. That's right folks: the best hope for the 2016 Dodgers is the 2008 Philadelphia Phillies.

The 2008 Phillies were a blue-collar team, unlike the business-casual/formal attire ethos of Los Angeles. Los Angeles is a city of Thai-fusion and deconstructed molecular gastronomy dishes. Philadelphia is a city where humble folks eat cheese-steaks out of tin pails on their lunch break.

You won't find this in LA, folks

Fortunately for the Dodgers, Utley and Blanton have brought a fierce sense of urgency to a Dodgers team that stands on the brink of October glory, but that also stands on the brink of elimination. Blanton, in particular, has all but single-handedly saved the Dodgers' bacon. He's the grittiest guy to come out of Pennsylvania since "middle-class Joe" Biden, and a key reason the Dodgers have been able to withstand the loss of clubhouse stalwart A.J. Ellis.

In total, Joe Blanton has pitched 3.2 scoreless innings so far in the NLDS. But his 0.00 post-season ERA doesn't tell the whole story: he's entered the game in crucial moments and kept the Nationals off the board. In Game 3, Blanton entered the game with the bases loaded, immediately after the shaky Dodgers bullpen blew a 5-2 lead. The game was knotted at 5-5. Allowing a run could mean watching Swaggy P sink meaningless buckets in Lakers' preseason games for the rest of October.

He was never touching that: https://t.co/7T91VFyWCv @TheHartford #PrevailingMoments pic.twitter.com/oRZlGCSD0Y

— MLB (@MLB) October 12, 2016

Blanton did not give in. He quietly recorded an out to escape the bases-loaded jam and then recorded 3 more outs for good measure, bridging the gap to LA's lock-down closer, Kenley Jansen. Blanton saved the Dodgers' season from spiraling out of control and notched a post-season W for his heroic effort. How did he get it done? Pinpoint command and a slippery slider nastier than Chinese food you forgot about and left in your car for a few days.

Blanton is the definition of a Most Valuable Player: without him, the Dodgers likely blow the lead in Game 1 and fail to rally in Game 3. Blanton's maestro relief-pitching efforts are the common thread running through the Dodgers' two victories in the NLDS so far. If they win the make-or-break Game 5 this Thursday, you can bet Blanton's sweaty fingerprints will be all over it.

Joe Blanton, the Dodgers' relief ace, likely won't receive much consideration for NLDS MVP, but he deserves it. Unfortunately they don't even give out an MVP award for the NLDS, folks. They should make one, and give it to Blanton.

Blanton isn't a man suited to the bright lights and flashing cameras. Being overlooked is nothing new to Mr. Blanton. He retired from baseball in 2014, turning his back on the game after ascending to its pinnacle with the Phillies team that won the World Series in 2008. He left baseball with a bitter taste in his mouth, posting a 2-14 record and 6.04 ERA with the Los Angeles Angels in 2013. After getting chewed up and spat out by baseball, Blanton has regained his elite status by sheer force of will. If the Los Angeles Dodgers win their first title since 1988 and regain some of the Brooklyn team's charm, you can sure as hell bet Big Game Blanton will have alot to do with it.

Rich Hill: LA's Last Best Hope

Danville, Kentucky -- In his 1949 treatise titled The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell forwarded the concept of the monomyth. In Campbell's estimation, all human storytelling follows a universal narrative. An every-man hero abandons his mundane, familiar lifestyle to embark on a mysterious and dangerous adventure. Eventually, the hero discovers within himself strength and might beyond his imagination, culminating in the ultimate defeat of his nemesis.

But every hero requires a mentor: Obi-Wan Kenobi, Gandalf, Doc Brown, Optimus Prime, or the biblical John the Baptist. Baseball teams hungry for postseason glory are no different. Show me a World Series champion, and I'll show you a wizened, grisly old veteran who taught the team how to rub dirt on their wounds and never stop fighting. Just take a look at the rosters of the past three World Series Champions. The 2013 Boston Red Sox had David Ortiz, John Lackey, and Jake Peavy as its emotional anchors. The 2014 San Francisco Giants had the aging finesse pitcher Tim Hudson, and also Jake Peavy. The 2015 World Series Champion Kansas City Royals™ didn't have Jake Peavy, but they did have the towering Chris Young and consummately professional Ryan Madson.

Folks, Rich Hill can be the Los Angeles Dodgers' Jake Peavy.

In this Danville man's expert opinion, a showdown between the Dodgers and Chicago Cubs in the National League Championship Series is looking increasingly likely. The over-hyped Bryce Harper has been in hibernation for several months, clearing a path for the Dodgers to defeat the Washington Nationals. Meanwhile, the Cubs hold a commanding 2-0 series lead in the NLDS over the seemingly un-killable Giants. Don't count out the Giants until their pulse is gone and the corpse has gone into rigor mortis, but I like the Cubs' chances to win that series too. The real question is: do the Dodgers have the veteran presence of mind to get past this historically excellent Cubs team?

I know nerds are getting hot and bothered about the Cubs. They're the odds-on favorites to win it all this October and ride back to the North-Side of Chicago atop a celebratory parade. Nate Silver and company, the folks who have continually bungled 2016 presidential election forecasts, have all but crowned the Cubs as World Series champs.

 We've all seen the saberphiles drool about their run differential.

ICYMI: that cubs run differential... pic.twitter.com/86KbmTNMtv

— Ben Dilday (@BenDilday) October 5, 2016

But don't sleep on the Dodgers. The Cubbies may have David Ross and Ben Zobrist to provide veteran leadership; but don't underestimate what sagacious slugger Adrian Gonzalez brings to the table for the Trolley Dodgers, especially when combined with the supernatural phenom talent of ace Clayton Kershaw.

The Dodgers' true ace-in-the-hole is Rich Hill, a 36-year old left-handed pitcher who is craftier than the lawyers who keep getting Hillary Clinton acquitted for manslaughter and purgery. Rich Hill seemed to be destined for the glue factory after hitting free agency last off-season, consigned to irrelevance like the Randy Wolfs of the world. But then he did something that the spreadsheet gazers didn't expect: he had a career season with the Oakland Athletics, pitching like some sort of 'Clayton Kershaw-lite' when he wasn't battling blisters and other random health issues. After being snubbed by most MLB teams last offseason, Hill is now poised to make bank when he hits free agency this offseason, especially in a market mostly devoid of good pitchers.

Now, 'Clayton Kershaw-lite' and the real Clayton Kershaw have an opportunity to lead the Dodgers to their first championship since the heroic Kirk Gibson wore Dodger blue. A 1-2 punch of lefties Kershaw and Hill can match anybody in the league.

Old Richard Hill doesn't overpower hitters; he has what old-school scouts would call a 'Bugs Bunny' curveball that loops and droops across the strike-zone as if he's pulling it with a string. Velocity alone doesn't get it done in the postseason. You need grit, skill, and wiliness, like Mr. Hill has.

Rich has been around the block: been there, done that. He's played on the East Coast with the Red Sox, and on the West Coast with Billy Beane's team. He's peed on his blisters, like all men of a certain age eventually do. And at age 36, he isn't getting any younger. He wants a ring, and he wants it now. Clayton Kershaw, a mythic hero in the Campbellian sense, may be the team's spiritual leader. But to accomplish his mission and discover his own inner powers he will need a mentor, just like Luke Skywalker and Marty McFly did. Kershaw needs Rich Hill. The Dodgers need Rich Hill. He's their only hope.

Role Reversal: TWTW's Zimmermann vs. Scherzer Preview

credit: Fox Sports

Danville, Kentucky -- "What are the odds the gods would put us all in one spot?," asked the young Alexander Hamilton to his co-patriots, Aaron Burr, Hercules Mulligan, John Laurens, and Marquis de Lafayette, the feisty French freedom fighter. Jordan Zimmermann will ask himself a similar question as he returns to our great nation's capitol, a city built by the unceasing labor and determination of Treasury Secretary Hamilton and our nation's other founding fathers.

Indeed, the stars have aligned for a fortuitous pitching match-up, a showdown as unlikely as America's democratic experiment itself. Jordan Zimmermann will return to Washington D.C. -- the city named for the nation's first commander-in-chief that Mr. Hamilton served so loyally -- to pitch against Max Scherzer. Both pitchers will toe the rubber against their former teams. It is a duel between former teammates, more dramatic than Hamilton vs. Burr. I hold this truth to be self-evident: that all pitching matchups are not created equal.

The prospect of competing against the organizations that nurtured and raised them will arouse a host of mixed emotions in both Mr. Zimmermann and Mr. Scherzer.

Scherzer has bantered about his desire to compete against the Triple Crown-touting Miguel Cabrera, but internally feels apprehension. Nonetheless, Scherzer's anxieties will be tempered by the superhuman-slugging 6′ 2″, 23-year old native of Las Vegas that now sits in his corner.

Jordan is a more stoic man. In Auburndale, Wisconsin, boys are raised not to lose their cool or show emotion. If you get hurt, you dust yourself off, rub salt on your wounds and get back on the horse. To Jordan, pitching is just another job. As a child, Jordan worked from dusk till dawn on cold, northern farmlands. He approaches baseball with a similar stubborn Bulldog-like work ethic, but will nonetheless feel nostalgia upon returning to the beltway.

A time may come when the radical potential of American democracy is fulfilled via a Donald Trump presidency, but for now we'll have to settle for this game. America is a land where anything is possible. Where two franchise cornerstone pitchers can switch franchises and compete against each other. Where even mild-mannered utility infielders like Andrew Romine get to play hero once in a while. Where a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a Scotsman can wind up on the ten-dollar bill. As fans of the Washington Nationals and Detroit Tigers converge to watch this serendipitous game just footsteps away from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, we should take time to appreciate the sheer splendor of America's centuries-old experiment with democracy and our national pastime.