SBL Notebook, Week 21

The return to intra-divisional play did not yield quite the cutthroat competition that was expected, particularly in the red-hot American division. Instead, everyone seemed to take a moment to catch their breath after four weeks of frenzied interleague play – hitting numbers shriveled, ERAs rose, and numbers that were merely decent translated to great success in the W-L column. Andy’s Badgers were good in only two of six offensive stats (HRs and RBIs), but went 6-0 on the strength of quality pitching. The Patton Inmates were almost perfectly middle-of-the-road in most o-stats (36 runs, 33 RBIs, 34 TB, 8 HR) and posted an unsightly 4.78 ERA, but that didn’t keep them from going 6-0 too. Dan’s Cherry Valley Bombers also overcame some pretty execrable pitching (4.67 ERA, 1.52 BR) to go 5-1 (14 HRs and 49 ribbies didn’t hurt); the BGoff Bammers posted the same record despite not doing all that much on offense (13 HRs and 39 runs, yes, but also 31 RBIs, 22 TB and a .310 OBP). What this all meant in the standings was . . . not a whole lot in the AL, where the Bammers gained one game on Paulo’s Zero’s but still trail by nine. It’s another four games back to the Badgers and the fading Mikee’s Moaners. But the Bombers busted things open a bit in the NL, where they remain the only winning team and now are 12 games ahead of the slip-sliding JP’s Whiteskins. In fact, don’t look now, but the defending division champion Inmates, scuffling along at 18 games under .500, are only five games out of the wild-card playoff spot. The five worst records in ball belong to NL teams.