Post by Reddington on May 11, 2020 0:18:08 GMT -5
Two months are down in the 91 season and here we are to check out the state of Baseball at this the 1/3 mark of the regular season.
Whitey Ford has been elected to the Hall of Fame, the only member of the 66 class to make it in. Early on it looked like the former reliever Don McMahon stood a chance of joining him, but after a flourish of initial votes, the appetite to induct him with Whitey vanished.
In the NL East, once again it's the Blue Jays and the Orioles and Indians are fighting to see if they may be around in September to be a WC contender. Boston again has the worst record in baseball, trying to get the #1 for the 6th year out of 9. The Sox are becoming the antiderivative of the late 90's bulls. The Jays are without their all-star quality closer as he just went down with a season ending injury, so will this have any impact on their 7 game lead? If there was ever a chance for the Tribe or the Orioles to make a move, this would be it.
Over in the Central, much to absolutely no one's surprise the White Sox are again taking it to the rest of the division. The have built a 7-game lead over the Tigers and an 8 over the Brewers, but bot teams are very much in the wild card hunt. The Brewers are trying to start the winning tradition once again after failing to reach 500 for the first time in 16 seasons last year. With Detroit doing as well as they are it could be scary with how good their minors are. It will be interesting to see how long the Sox can hold them off. Milwaukee also has an up and coming team, but right now it looks to be the Tigers that have the edge long term.
Out in the West, so far Seattle has been asserting their dominance, and the Angles that made the playoffs by virtue of the wild card so far have been playing 500 ball until just recently. Could they be turning the corner and become the team they were last year? Currently Oakland has been playing better and so far, has indicated they are not ready to allow anyone to crawl over their tie with Detroit for the upcoming wild card birth. Seattle meanwhile has the best record in the AL, and the most dominant pitcher in the AL with last years postseason MVP picking up where he left off in the postseason, currently 11-1 with a 0.85 ERA.
Over in the NL, the story is the Giants
In the West, the Giants have the best record in all of baseball. They have the hitters, and they have the pitchers. Currently they have the #1 average in all of baseball for hitting, which is ALWAYS reserved for an AL team, but not this year. Couple that with a pitching staff that is only allowing 3.03 runs a game, and you have an insta recipe for the best record in baseball. Right now, the Dodgers have the NL WC all but wrapped up, as they have the second-best record in the NL, and have a 8 game lead on the nearest 2nd place team in the NL
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In the Central, even after trading away multiple studs the Cards are holding down first place, basically just taunting the cubs and Pirates with the fact they can not catch a team trading away all its assets. There is zero chance the wildcard team comes from the Central. It will be interesting to see if the Cubs or the Pirates can come an unseat the Cards.
The NL East once what was the most competitive and dominant division for the last few years is no more. Atlanta is still leading the division, but the team is old and will not be able to keep this group of geriatrics around forever. They do have some amazing young players in Smoltz, Maddux and Javier, but will that be enough to cover for all the elderly players that have 1-3 years max left in them. The Mets have started their rebuild, and the Expos also seem to have thrown in the towel after trying to dethrone the Braves for the last 5 years, will that open the door for the Phillies to finally sneak in and claim the division in one to three years? While that question hangs in the air, the Braves have managed to hold the title so far this year for best pitching staff something they have done for… a long time. While it seems the team will again make it into October, how much gas does it have left?
the #67 rock song of 91
