SBL Notebook, Week 15

We’ve reached the All-Star break, a nice little three-day cooling-off period offering us the collective opportunity to catch our breath, or simply take one, as the case may be. Not that our pennant races show any signs of cooling, but they can stand to wait a few days too . . . we know they’ll still be there when we get back. What we’ll find when play resumes Thursday is a hot and heavy American division race, featuring the two best teams in ball at the moment, separated by only one game . . . and a National division chase with the second-, third-and fourth-place teams only two, four and seven games out of first, and even the fifth-place entry a manageable 10 games back. AL leaders the Zero’s continued their recent power surge with 13 homers (that makes 29 in the last two weeks), 41 runs and 35 RBIs, and rode that, plus some presentable pitching, to a 5-1 record. They were trumped, however, by the Bammers, who snapped out of their recent funk with a 6-0 week built on the sturdy foundation that has propped up the House of Bam all season—lights-out pitching, to the tune of a 6-0 WL and 1.67 ERA. The remarkable thing here is that those numbers really aren’t all that remarkable for the Bammers this year; they’ve actually had lower ERAs . . . several of them. Honest. So, the Z’s lead was shaved to one game over the BBs, then it’s another six back to the Moaners, and four more after that to the Badgers, who’ve been bitten by the same injury bug that afflicted the Godfathers earlier in the season. No sooner did the Badgers welcome back No. 1 overall draft pick Albert Pujols from his much-shorter-than-expected DL stint, then his second- and fourth-round picks, Alex Rodriguez and Jose Reyes, were shelved by disabling injuries . . . joining his third-rounder, Buster Posey, who’s out for the year. If it wasn’t for bad luck, Andy wouldn’t have any luck at all. . . . The Inmates maintained their grip on first place in the NL despite a second consecutive 2-4 week, as the teams below them continued to jockey for position. The Godfathers also went 2-4 to stay two games back, while the Derelicts rediscovered their prolific hitting to go 5-1 and jump into third place over DamianUnited, who suffered their second 0-6 boo-boo in the last three weeks. Meanwhile, the Cherry Valley Bombers continued their slow, steady recovery from a 1-12 start, going 4-2 (17 HRs and 40 helped a lot) to climb within a game of .500 – and within 10 of first place.