SBL Notebook, Week 8

It was the damnedest thing. The American division won the interleague tussle for the second straight week, which was surprising enough in itself, just from looking at some of the semi-ugly numbers accumulated by several AL teams. And the margin of victory, a fairly decisive 24-12, that was a surprise too. But the way all this came about, how the wins and losses broke down, well that was just seriously weird. Two National division teams, the front-running Cherry Valley Bombers and runners-up DamianUnited, just rolled over all six AL foes; nobody really came close to beating them. But then the other four NL clubs combined to go 0-24. Which means, as you advanced mathematics aficionados have no doubt already figured out, that all six AL squads posted the exact same WL ledger for the week, 4-2, keeping the division standings the same as last week (except for win-loss totals and percentages). Not so in the NL, where what had been a more-or-less competitive three- or four-team race was blown wide open. DamU remained three games behind the defending champion CVBs, of course, but the Inmates, Whiteskins, Godfathers and Derelicts all lost six games to the leaders and suddenly trail by 12, 15, 18 and 20, respectively. . . . The hard-luck award for the week probably should go to the Batfaced Barristers, who continued their horsehide-abusing ways with 12 HRs, 50 RBIs and 41 runs, only to see those incredible numbers bettered by the CVBs (16 HRs, 54 BI, 42 R), the key difference in the Bombers’ 7-4 victory. DamU was simply ultra-solid across the board – league-bests in OBP (.383), saves (8) and K-rate (1.05), and good-to-very-good numbers in every other category – to best the triple-Bs by the same 7-4 count. But it seemed just a little unjust that the Batfaces’ prodigious numbers could produce no more than four wins, the same number of Ws posted by the far more pedestrian Zero’s, Moaners and Puny Pontiffs. Had this been a week of intra-division competition, the Barristers would have obliterated those three teams by 9-2, 8-3 and 7.5-3.5 scores, respectively. But life, and baseball, ain’t always fair, and it just so happened that the other four NL teams were unable to offer much resistance against anyone this week, even the AL’s lesser achievers. The Godfathers were undone by puny hitting in almost every stat, the Inmates, Whiteskins and Derelicts by horrific pitching (8.02, 7.11 and 5.16 ERAs, respectively).

SBL Notebook, Week 7

The first week of the first month of pure interleague play this season went to the American division, 21-15. Nothing particularly unusual about that; the AL has been the dominant force in cross-divisional competition for at least the past decade, with the exception of last year when the National division turned the tables. What was unusual, just a little bit, was the identity of the team that did the heavy lifting for the AL with a scorched-earth 6-0 sunburst. The team in question are the Batfaced Girls, one of two AL franchises that have never appeared in the SBL postseason. The other of those longtime down-on-their-luck clubs, the Puny Pontiffs, had served notice the previous two weeks that it just might have the personnel to make a serious run at its first playoff berth, and this time it was the Batfaces’ turn in a no-doubt-about-it performance that featured one 11-0 whitewash, a 10.5-0.5 thumping, a 9.5-1.5 win and three 9-2 triumphs. Talk about dominant: the BFGs’ offense, heavily dependent on the Baltimore Orioles (of all teams) with Adam Jones, J.J. Hardy and Matt Wieters, and spiced up by MLB batting leader David Wright, led the SBL this week in RBIs (42), TB (42) and OBP (.396) and was second in runs (35) and third in HRs (10) and SBs (7). If that wasn’t enough, they also had perhaps the league’s best pitching, topping the week with a 2.06 ERA and posting the second-best BR stat (1.10) -- thank you, Roy Halladay, Ted Lilly, Colby Lewis and James McDonald. . . . The unbeaten week lifted the BFGs alongside the Pontiffs as legit factors in the AL race – the Girls now occupy third place at 24-20, a game ahead of the PPs (who backslid with a 2-4 ledger after going 11-2 in weeks 5-6), four behind the pacesetting Zero’s and one back of the Badgers, who went 5-1 and moved up to second. The bottom of the AL deck features the somewhat jarring sight of the Moaners and the Bammers, who between them claim a dozen SBL championships, holding down the next-to-last and last spots, respectively. . . . Nothing much happened in the NL race, where the top three teams – the Cherry Valley Bombers, DamianUnited and the Inmates – all went 4-2, leaving the top of the standings unchanged. The CVBs, however, did nose ahead of the Zero’s for Best Record In Ball, by one game, while maintaining their three-game edge in the division. Another mildly jarring sight – the Derelicts, a playoff team last year, continuing their residence in the NL basement, an 0-6 week dropping them to 15-29.

Zero's and Pontiffs Strike Deal

Seeking a quick fix for injured C Wilson Ramos, the American Division-leading Zero's made a deal with the Pontiffs today, trading Ramos and OF Nick Swisher for C John Buck and OF Shin-Soo Choo.

Ramos, who sustained a torn knee ligament in a game on Saturday, May 12, is out indefinitely.

The Zero's, reigning SBL champions, seemed to be intent on making a move before Monday's Free-Agent Draft No. 3, in which they have the 12th overall pick.

The Pontiffs, 6-1 last week, have Josh Hamilton and you don't.

SBL Notebook, Week 2

It was another jailbreak week for the mighty Inmates, who have leaped out of their cage and fired a shot across the collective bow of the SBL with a scorching 13-0 start. Just eyeballing the ’Mates’ hitting numbers these first two weeks, you might think they’d been playing full seven-day schedules while the rest of the league was playing half-weeks. Led by fast-starting Matt Kemp, David Ortiz, Ian Kinsler, Corey Hart, Alex Avila and others too numerous to mention, the Inmates' ball-busters mashed 11 HRs this week – bringing their two-week total to an astonishing 23 – and accumulated 36 runs, 34 TB and 33 RBIs . . . all in 174 plate appearances, fewer than all but three other teams in a truncated five-day schedule. All that offense papered over some truly gruesome pitching – it’s hard to envision any SBL team this season throwing up an ERA as bad as the 8.01 the Inmates just left splattered on the dugout wall – and kept the Mental Defectives unbeaten, with a three-game lead on the Whiteskins. And, good grief, look down there at the poor Godfathers, winless and already 13 games out of first place in the National Division – after TWO WEEKS! Things are more competitive in the American Division, where the Badgers went 5-2 to supplant one-week wonders the Moaners at the top of the heap – but at a mere 9-4, one game better than quick-recovering Zero’s (who went 6-1) and two up on the Moaners, who experienced a 1-6 stumble after their 6-0 start. . . . Statistically, only the Z’s (33 BI, 30 runs, 7 HRs) and the Puny Pontiffs (8 HRs, 33 BI, 32 runs) were able to hang out anywhere near the Inmates’ high-rent neighborhood in a semi-short week when the league average for PAs was about 50 to 60 shy of what a typical SBL team would get in a typical SBL week.

SBL Notebook, Week 24

Strange, sometimes, the way things go in the SBL. One week the National division race is as hot and heavy as Brangelina and the American division race is looking as dry and lifeless as a lunar landscape, and the next week everything is turned upside down. Now it's the NL pennant chase that's starting to look a little more like a foregone conclusion, and the AL race that has suddenly taken on a more up-for-grabs appearance. Could it really have been only two weeks ago that the NL standings featured a three-way deadlock at the top, with a fourth team only three games back? That's a true story . . . but as the Cherry Valley Bombers continue their late-summer rampage, and their pursuers struggle to keep up, the distance between hunted and hunters keeps growing. A second consecutive 6-0 week by the CVBs, combined with a 3-3 by the Derelicts and a 2-4 by the Godfathers, left the Bombers with a four-game bulge on the Double-Ds and six up on the G-Daddies, with only 13 games to play. Meanwhile, an AL race that stagnated for months as the Zero's maintained a death grip on the best record in ball has grown unexpectedly uncomfortable for the Z's, who went 2-4 while the runners-up Moaners cobbled together a second successive 6-0 week and crept to within three games of the top. The good news for the Zero's: They clinched a playoff berth (as did the Moaners), because the third-place Bammers went 0-6 for the second straight week and were eliminated from the postseason picture -- 17 games behind the Z's and 14 out of the wild-card spot occupied by the M's. The bad news for the Zero's: Their sustained period of mediocrity -- 17-20 over the last six weeks -- allowed the Moaners to hang around, staying close enough for their 12-0 mini-surge the last two weeks to make things interesting. The Zed's have been the BTIB since Week 14, enjoyed a season-best 13-game lead at the Week 18 milepost, were cruising with a nine-game advantage as recently as Week 22 and never led by fewer than seven in the nine weeks preceding this one. Now they may need to shake out of their doldrums fast or risk being overtaken at the wire. That, or hope that the Moaners experience a week in which their win-loss totals are more commensurate with their stat line. The M's, who took the scorched-earth route to their Week 23 perfecto, this week went 6-0 with what looked more like 2-4ish numbers. Not the first time that's happened this year, either. The M's were lights-out in two stats -- SBs and saves (8 of each) -- and pedestrian pretty much everywhere else. Nevertheless, 32 runs, 28 RBIs, 29 TB, a .308 OBP, 8 HRs, a 3.48 ERA, 1.23 BR ratio and 2-1 WL added up to two 6-5 wins, three 7-4 victories and another unblemished ledger, taking them past the 90-win threshold. All the earth-scorching in Week 24 was done by the Bombers, who've been doing a lot of that lately -- going 29-2 over the last five weeks to surge from eight games behind to four ahead. This week they once again made like the tripods in "War of the Worlds," vaporizing everything in their path with 53 TB, 43 runs, 43 BI, 12 HRs, a .397 OBP . . . and, as if that wasn't enough, a 1.49 ERA, .83 BR rate, 6-0 WL and five saves. That's league highs in seven stats and second-best totals in two others. No wonder they won four games by 10-1 scores and the other two by 9-2. If the CVBs had played the Moaners this week -- a game that might actually become reality in the playoffs -- it would have been Bombers 9, M's 2. As it was, both teams got to celebrate the same outcome, a 6-0 run. . . . In the bad news department, the Batfaced Barristers suffered their 100th defeat, joining the Puny Pontiffs in the Triple Digit Loss Club (the "good" news there -- no other team will be earning that dubious distinction this year). . . . Hard-luck award for the week goes to the Godfathers, whose numbers suggested something better than 2-4, but who were undone by two close (one of them excruciatingly so) tiebreaker losses. Still, the 'Daddies are only two games out of the NL wild card -- the closest race we've got going at the moment.

PaulO's Notes: Week 21

A fairly wretched week for these three. The Z's had a tragic week from their bullpen, which surrendered more ER (12) in 6.2 IP than did their SPs (10) in 34 IP. An 0-5 record in the pen, with 22 BR. Delightfully awful, as Leonard Pinth-Garnell would have put it. The Z's managed a bit of offense, led by the resurgent Ryan Braun, who was 10-for-30 with 10 runs, 7 BI, 3 doubles, 1 triple, 2 homers, 6 steals and 4 walks. ... Team Bat-Face scrounged up a bit of offense despite the continued absence of top pick Hanley "Fourth-Rounder in 2012" Ramirez and 2B Brian Roberts, who missed all but the first month. Sketchy pitching, however, including four hit batsmen. Maybe the Barrister hurlers are going all Carlos Zambrano, out of frustration. ... The Holy See was practicing non-violence toward the baseball, putting up one of the feeblest offenses of the season. Didn't help that the club got to the dish 61 fewer times than the Zs because the club has no active 1B; sees its starting 3B losing ABs to Sean Burroughs and is missing No. 1 SS SDrrew and top OF CBeltran. One homer this week, on a Tuesday sub-in by Duda, 2 steals, 13 RBI. ... The Vatican's revolutionary no-save bullpen did what it does, and all this resulted in the waste of some typically solid starting pitching.

Bams Take Desperate Measures

Coming off the SBL ticker tape (We're f*ing old school around here):

"The Bammers send SP Haren and 2B Walker to Pontiffs for SP Latos and 2B Cano"

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The Pontiffs, the abyss of the league, heard the cries of the fast-approaching Bams and sent up its last surviver, Robinson Cano, to help right the Bams' beleagured mancraft.

It's a risky move for the Bams, who trade SP Dan Haren and 2B Neil Walker, two of the team's most consistent players. For the Pontiffs, strictly a cash dump. Cano wanted too much to re-sign.

Also, why hasn't this league considered "keeper" players? Or has it?

PaulO's Note: Week 17

Some notes (somebody must be on vacation) ... Some quirks from the puny pod. All three clubs round off to a 1.17 BR pitching stat. Odds of that must be long. To be exact: For the Jurists, 1.1679; for the Vatican, 1.1707; for the Z's, 1.1748. ... For the second week (not) running, the Holy See stole zero bags. Taking seriously that Seventh Commandment in papal lands. ... Z's offense fell of steeply from recent weeks, but rallied to get to mediocrity in the Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday "weekend" of the new and loathed sked. ... The revivied Bristow offense, led by Dustin Ackley (who knew?) is not awful, aside from the two dingers. Valencia has helped at 3B, too. ... Not that the D-Popes have had some bad luck, but they drafted this Presley guy (from Tupelo, Miss?) on Thursday and by the next day he was on the DL. Also, SDrew broke something or other (those Drew boys must not have gotten enough iron in their diets), reducing the club to Alcides Escobar at SS (who hits in the 9 hole for the Royals for a reason), but he is losing time to the backup DPope 3B, MAviles, who is just back from Triple A and sucks pretty hard, too. Also, Kirk Gibson down in AZ apparently thinks a 3B with pop like Ryan Roberts isn't something he really needs, and Roberts played only five games. Mauer went dead again, till Wednesday, when he hit his first homer of the season! And it took the SBL draft's No. 15 pick only till July 27 to get it! ...The Z's were helped by Eric Hosmer (6 runs, 8 BI, 13-for-29 with 1 walk, 4 doubles, 1 big fly and 1 steal) and by Li'l Dustin Pedroia (8 runs, 3 BI, 14-for-27, 2 walks, 2 doubles, 1 triple, 1 dinger, 2 bags). ... Oh, and the papacy got their first "save" since Week 12 (hmm, Jonathan PAPEL-bon?), which seems like a pretty low save total for a worldwide religious organization. Thanks, Mitchell Boggs, for showing up, three months later.

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This from a man recently recouping in the United States after time abroad. The SBL Blog thanks him for making time while he lounges somewhere in the LBC, drinking caffiene-free soda (during the day).

Derelicts, 'Tiffs Make Deal

From the Office of the Commish...

"For those who missed it, there was a trade over the weekend between the Derelicts and the Puny Pontiffs:

RP Papelbon and 3B Alvarez to the Double D's; RP Lyon and 3B Roberts to the Poontiffs."

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The trade was a fairly even swap. The 'Licts bolster their already stout bullpen with a Papelbon-er, and the 'Tiffs get a warm body at third base.

SBL Notebook, Week 10

Up was down and down was up in the final week of interleague play, though the end result was essentially the same as the previous week -- the National division pushing the American division right through the looking glass and down the rabbit hole. Following up on last week’s 24-12 shellacking of the junior circuit, the NL administered a 25-11 beat-down in Week 10. Boy, is the AL glad that’s over. And the cherry on top of the National sundae was a decisive 83-61 victory for this four-week interleague period -- the first such triumph for the senior circuit in, well, who knows how long . . . most of us old farts can’t remember back that far. The odd aspect of this week’s outcome was that the primary damage was done by the bottom half of the division. While the three leaders -- the Derelicts, the Inmates and the Godfathers -- each went 3-3, the fourth-place DamianUnited, the fifth-place Bombers and the cellar-dwelling Whiteskins combined to go 16-2, led by the 'Skins 6-0 rampage. The ’Skins blasted 11 HRs, drove in 48 runs (league best this season), scored 39, pilfered eight sacks and posted a 2.83 ERA and 6-2 WL, and how was anybody gonna beat that? If the ’Skins could just generate a little consistency, they might yet be a factor in the race. So far, though, they’ve been all over the map -- 6-0 this week, 4-2 last week, 6-0 in Week 1 . . . and 8-36 in the seven weeks in between. . . . While the NL race remained tight -- the Double-Ds remained one game ahead of the Mental Defectives and three up on the G-Daddies -- the AL race blew wide open again, with the Bammers going 5-1 and inflating their lead from six games to 11. Three AL teams went 0-6, and one of those was the mercurial Zero’s, alone in second after going 6-0 last week, but now tied there with the Badgers and staring at a double-digit deficit. (Also going 0-6 were the Batfaced Barristers and the Puny Pontiffs, two luckless franchises that, incredibly, have combined for only 21 wins -- fewer than any other single team.). . . . The offensive revival hinted at last week seemed to pick up steam this week -- the league averaged a respectable 8.75 HRs per team (five reached double figures, the most in a week all season), an impressive 34.9 RBIs (three teams in the 40s, also for the first time this year) and 32.4 runs. It was almost like a time warp had taken us back to 1999. And think what those averages would’ve been if the Moaners hadn’t dragged them down by contributing only five HRs, 16 RBIs and 30 runs to the aggregate!

SBL Notebook, Week 9

As Clint Eastwood, portraying the cold-blooded killer William Munny, said in “Unforgiven” -- “We’ve all got it coming, kid.” And it’s safe to say the American division has had this coming for a while now. Long dominant in interleague play, the AL got a taste of its own medicine this week as the National division dished out a 24-12 whuppin’, giving the senior circuit a 58-50 overall edge with one week to go in this four-week cycle. Every NL team posted a winning record except the Inmates, whose 2-4 stumble cost them their grip on first place, now occupied by the Derelicts (4-2), though by only one game over the Mental Defectives and three over the Godfathers (5-1). On the other side of the standings, the Zero’s and the Moaners were the only teams to carry the AL banner high this week; while they were going a combined 12-2, the other four clubs were conspiring to go 2-22. The Zero’s’ 6-0 week, combined with twin 1-5s by the pace-setting Bammers and the (former) runners-up Badgers, catapulted the 2009 champions into second place, six back of the Bams and three up on the Badgers. The Z’s did it with some better-than-fair offense (10 HRs, 33 RBI, 9 SBs, .351 OBP) with a pitching week that can best be described as pristine -- a 1.37 ERA, a league-best this season, built on the back of a rotation that in five starts surrendered only 3 ER in 31.2 innings. . . . There was a noticeable uptick in offense this week, and we’re wondering whether there’s a correlation between that and an apparent decrease in strikeouts. Much has been made of the soaring strikeout rate among major league hitters the last two years, as the balance of power has shifted toward pitchers. But Week 9 in the SBL was the worst all season for K-rates, with no team getting to 1.00 (only the second time all season that’s happened), and seven checking in with rates of .80 or lower. Perhaps not coincidentally, increased contact translated into better hitting numbers. Still nothing like we saw in, say, the late ’90s, but a lot better than last week. The average HR total was 7, almost two more than in Week 8, and the average RBI count was 31, a damn sight better than last week’s 25. Leading the way were the revived Godfathers, who finally have their team back together with the return from the DL of sluggers Josh Hamilton, Evan Longoria and Aaron Hill, and this week put up some crooked numbers that reflected the infusion of hitting talent –- 39 RBIs, 38 runs and 38 TBs. Kudos, too, to the Derelicts for their 47 RBIs; it’s the first time all season any team has even gotten into the 40s in that stat, believe it or not. And condolences to the pitching staffs of the Bammers and the Puny Pontiffs, which seemed to absorb the lion’s share of the damage, combining to give up a staggering 73 earned runs, resulting in ERAs of 5.75 and 6.89, respectively.

SBL Notebook, Week 7

The first week of interleague play was . . . oh, let's say inconclusive. The commissioner's office was kinda sorta halfway semi-expecting the NL to gain the early upper hand in the lid-lifter to four weeks of cross-divisional squabbling, based on six weeks' worth of anecdotal evidence that suggested the senior circuit, after years of second-fiddle status, really did appear to be the stronger division this season, with more good teams than the AL, including two or three that look like legit contenders to win it all. But when the dust cleared in Week 7, it looked like something closer to business as usual, with the AL winning the week, 20-16. Although only two American teams posted winning records, those two, the Zero's and the Bammers, combined to go 11-1, more than offsetting the 9-15 mediocrity of the other four. Another factor that swung things the AL's way: its Bottom Two, the Batfaced Barristers and the Puny Pontiffs, who had combined for only 15 wins in the first six weeks, managed four victories between them this week, while one of the NL's more consistent clubs, DamianUnited, saw six weeks of mostly solid results unravel in an uncharacteristic 0-6 crash that pushed them below .500 for the first time. . . . The mercurial Zero's -- 13-0 in Weeks 4-5, followed by an 0-6 Week 6 -- reverted to take-no-prisoners mode this week, and the turnaround could essentially be summed up in three words: Jose F***ing Bautista. The late-blooming Toronto slugger, who led the majors by a mile with 54 homers last year in helping the Moaners cop the SBL crown, was conspicuously absent during the Z's winless Week 6 due to some sort of neck issue that sidelined him for all but one game. But he was back with a vengeance this week -- six homers, nine RBIs, eight runs and a .516 OBP (11 hits, five walks in 31 PAs) -- and not coincidentally so were the Z's. Think one measly player can't make a major difference for an SBL team? Try to imagine where the Zero's might be without Bautista, who, by himself, beat or tied five entire SBL teams in the HR category this week. Actually, you don't have to imagine it -- just take a look at those Week 6 results. . . . The Bammers were a bit off their game, particularly on the pitching side (4.12 ERA, 1.55 BR) -- but, typical of good, well-rounded SBL teams, they proved tough to beat, finding enough ways to win to go 5-1, improve the Best Record In Ball to 35-9 and stretch their AL lead to seven games over the Badgers, who continue to tread water (10-9 the last three weeks) while dropping further behind. . . . Another balanced, weakness-free aggregation, the Inmates, also introduced some distance between themselves and their many pursuers, with the Derelicts, the Godfathers and DamU combining to go 5-13 while the Mental Defectives were going 5-1, including the NL's only win over the Bammers. That opened things up a bit in a division where the top three teams had been separated by only two games; the 'Mates now lead the Double-Ds by three, the G-Daddies by five and DamU by 11.

SBL Notebook, Week 6

In honor of the Mother’s Day we just celebrated, all we can say is “WOW.” Which is MOM, upside-down, and also succinctly conveys our astonishment at the continued shriveling of offense in baseball and, by extension, the SBL. Acknowledging right from the top that we’re starting to sound like a broken record on this topic . . . we’re seriously starting to wonder if this season is going to end up breaking records for offensive futility. You can’t spell “puny” without “P.U.,” and hitting numbers don’t get much tinier, or stinkier, than what we saw this week. There was a time not long ago – even as recently as last year – when, if you went into battle with 26 runs, 26 RBI, 6 HR and 24 TB, you held little hope of success. This week, those were the league averages—26.2, 26.2, 5.75 and 23.9, to be exact. The average on-base percentage in MLB is down to .319, and many of our SBL “all-star” teams are struggling to reach even that benchmark -- five teams failed to get there this week, and three couldn’t even make it to .300, the OBP version of the Mendoza Line. Only one team reached double figures in homers -- the Derelicts, with a mighty 10. The trio whose stats are compiled by Paul Oberjuerge was monumentally feeble -- the Zero's, the Puny Pontiffs and the Batfaced Barristers combining to average 19 runs, 20 BI and 3.6 HRs. Elsewhere in the American division, the Moaners raked to the tune of 29 runs, 23 RBIs and 6 HRs -- and went 5-1. Good times! . . . We’ve speculated ad nauseam about the causes of the Incredible Disappearing Offense. But it can’t just be post-steroids shrinkage (both anatomical and statistical), can it? If, let’s say, 30% of MLB players were juicing and are now off the stuff, why is it that the malaise seems industry-wide, affecting even the 70% presumed to have been clean in the first place? Plus, weren’t some pitchers on the needle too, and wouldn’t those pitchers be more hittable now? Yet it seems like nobody’s hitting much of anything, or anyone. The ever astute Mr. Oberjuerge suggests that the massively underperforming Red Sox lineup, in which numerous SBL teams are invested, is a meaningful factor in this; the Bosox were expected to be a run-producing machine after adding Adrian Gonzalez and Carl Crawford to an already potent lineup, yet here they are in the bottom 10 in MLB scoring six weeks in. Another owner, Gregg Patton, theorizes that the primary culprit is simply better pitching—bigger, stronger athletes with harder, nastier stuff—and more specialized pitching roles, with one strong, fresh arm after another marching in from the bullpen from the sixth inning on . . . and all of these guys throwing to less-disciplined free-swinging hackers. If that’s true, then perhaps we’re in the early stages of a new, pitching-dominant era. Are we heading back to where the game was in 1968, the year of Drysdale’s 58 straight scoreless innings, McLain’s 31 wins and Gibson’s 1.12 ERA? Baseball lowered the mound after that season, to reduce pitchers’ advantage. Will this season be remembered as the one that compelled MLB to do away with the mound entirely and have them pitch off flat ground, like in softball? . . . OK, enough of our complaining about crappy offense, for, like, the rest of the season. On to the races: The Inmates put together a HUGE week by new-era standards (34 runs, 34 BI, 38 TB, .372 . . . fuggetaboutit), combined that with the week’s finest pitching (1.96 ERA) and cruised to a 6-0 week that left them alone atop the National division—though by only one game over the Double-Ds and two over the Godfathers, with whom the ’Mates were locked in a three-way tie a week ago. In the AL, the Bammers rebounded from last week’s 2-5 blip to also go 6-0 and inflate their lead from two games to five over the second-place Badgers. . . . The Bombers and the Whiteskins announced a trade Monday: C Santana to the Bombers in exchange for C Ruiz and the No. 3 pick in that day’s supplemental draft. . . . Four weeks of interleague play commence this coming week. Is the NL really, finally the stronger of the two divisions this year, as early-season indicators hint? We’ll find out what’s what.