“A whole new world of Wolverines awaits you”

Yesterday I got an email with the headline for this update: “A whole new world of Wolverines awaits you.” And they should know! The email was from Michigan, the home state of the Old Detroit Wolverines.

Given the steady stream of dismal news from Old Detroit this month, you can imagine how that email uplifted me. Things are over for this year. The Wolverines dreamed of upsetting the overwhelmingly favored Rosebuds and thought it might be within their grasp when the W’s took over first place on July 31 and held on to it well into September. But now the dream has withered and crumbled. There will be no Wolverine championship this year.

But this time “wait ’til next year” isn’t just an empty invocation. If anything, it’s an understatement, a failure to appreciate the whole new Wolverine world awaiting us. At a minimum it has to mean a Wolverine championship is coming up next year. But would that really be a whole new world of Wolverines? Old Detroit has won championships before, many a time (4, actually). Doing it again would be very pleasant, but it would be a whole old world — a better world from a Wolverine point of view, but not a new one. So what is awaiting us now must be different (and presumably better) than an isolated championship.

Let’s get this season over with. I can hardy wait for what awaits us!

….

Dear EFL Answer Man:

Clearly you’ve misunderstood the prophecy. The New World of Wolverines is awaiting us. It doesn’t say anything about us having to wait for It! We can still win this year, is what it’s saying.

If the National League has ties at the end of the regular season and has to have tie-breaking games, all those games will count as regular season games, right? That could give the W’s more time to catch the Rosebuds, who are all that stands between us and the Whole New World of Wolverines!

— Pre-Postseason Wolverine Millenialist

Dear Pre-Possessed:

We count all stats from regular season games just as MLB does. I believe MLB will count stats from tie-breaking games as regular season stats. I have tried to confirm or disconfirm this, to no avail so far, so the default is that tie-breaker game stats will count in the EFL unless it becomes clear that MLB is not doing that. All this will become clear after any tie-breaker games.

But either way this is of no value to the Wolverines. Max Muncy will not save us. Nine Max Muncies will not save us. Don’t sell all your possessions just yet.

— EFL Answer Man

EFL Standings for 2018

EFL
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB	RS	RA
Portland Rosebuds	105	54	.661	—	887.5	617.8
Old Detroit Wolverines	99	60	.625	5.7	782.8	599.1
Canberra Kangaroos	89	70	.560	16	733.3	653.4
Brookland Outs	87	72	.546	18.3	827.9	763.7
Pittsburgh Alleghenys	87	72	.545	18.5	845.9	778.3
Flint Hill Tornadoes	82	77	.517	22.9	745.7	717.0
Haviland Dragons	78	80	.492	26.9	753.2	762.8
Kaline Drive	74	84	.471	30.1	696.6	739.8
Cottage Cheese	75	84	.469	30.6	749.6	796.2
Peshastin Pears	72	87	.453	33.1	683.6	755.0
D.C. Balk	70	89	.440	35.2	676.9	766.0

Portland: W, 4 – 4. (16 PA, .071, .176, .071; 1 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA). The Rosebuds set a new team record for biggest lead in the EFL standings at 5.7 games. This had nothing to do with the Rosebuds’ performance, and almost everything to do with them getting a game in while the Wolverines were idle.

Old Detroit: W (-1), L 1; (-1) – 0. (23 PA, ,227, .261, .273; 0.3 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA). The Wolverines outhit the Rosebuds, but it still wasn’t pretty. They fell back under 100 wins… but, really, they were probably only at about 99.6 then, and are probably about 99.4 now.

Canberra: W, 5 – 4. (23 PA, .176, .391, .353; 1 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA).

Brookland: W, 5 – 5. ( 4 PA, .250, .250, 1.000; 7 ip, 3 er 3.86 ERA).

Canberra is doing to Brookland what the Rosebuds are doing to Old Detroit: zipping past and then burying them. Brookland’s CJ Cron did all he could to stop the bleeding, but no one else came out to help him. I don’t know whether to be proud of the Captain Kangaroo for so successfully emulating the Rosebuds’ successful blitzkrieg approach, or to be appalled at the Captain Kangaroo for so successfully emulating the Rosebuds’ ruthless blitzkrieg approach.

Pittsburgh: W, 6 – 4. (16 PA, .213, .313, .357; no pitching). At least the W’s don’t have to worry about another team running them down. The Outs, on the other hand, now have the league’s most feared franchise — the mighty Alleghenys — breathing down their necks. Even on such an unimpressive day, the A’s gained ground on the Outs.

Flint Hill: DNP, 4 – (-1). (21 PA, .350, .381, .850; 1 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA). Except for the Outs, every EL team so far has had 1 inning or less of pitching, and surrendered 0 earned runs. The Tornados combined their one scoreless inning with dynamic, successful pitching to have by far the best Thursday of any EFL team.

Haviland: DNP, 3 – 3. (16 PA, .133, .188, .200; 0.3 ip, 2 er, 54.00 ERA). Perhaps the Dragons could have managed their pitching to more closely resemble the Tornados’. But it doesn’t matter: Haviland has seventh place nailed down.

Kaline: DNP, 3 – 3. (22 PA, .111, .182, .111; 6 ip, 3 er, 5.40 ERA). Notice how the Drive’s ERA is exactly one-tenth of the Dragons’? That’s an indication of a rather sizable chulk going on in Haviland. But then, the Drive don’t necessarily have 8th place nailed down yet, so they have more incentive to avoid chulks.

Cottage: “W”, 5 – 8. (17 PA, .375, .412, .500; no pitching). It was Edgar Martinez Day in the Cottage, although this is a rather slender Edgar with only 17 plate appearances. Still, it was enough to keep the Drive in range in case the Cheese would like to do better than 9th place.

Peshastin: L, 3 – 4. (23 PA, .150, .261, .200; 2 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA). A few days ago the Pears were threatening to advance to 9th or even 8th place. That’s all history now.

DC: L, 3 – 9. (12 PA, .200, .333, .200; 3.7 ip, 5 er, 12.27 ERA) I suppose there’s still a chance the Balk could catch the Pears and for the first time escape ending the season in the cellar. But it’s going to take some real fireworks this weekend to make that happen.

Combined MLB + EFL Standings for 2018

AL East
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Boston Red Sox	107	52	.673	—
Old Detroit Wolverines	99	60	.625	7.6
New York Yankees	98	61	.616	9
Tampa Bay Rays	88	71	.553	19
Flint Hill Tornadoes	82	77	.517	24.8
Toronto Blue Jays	72	87	.453	35
Baltimore Orioles	46	112	.291	60.5

NL East
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Canberra Kangaroos	89	70	.560	—
Atlanta Braves	89	70	.560	0.1
Washington Nationals	81	78	.509	8.1
Philadelphia Phillies	78	81	.491	11.1
New York Mets	75	84	.472	14.1
D.C. Balk	70	89	.440	19.1
Miami Marlins	62	96	.392	26.6

AL Central
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Cleveland Indians	89	70	.560	—
Pittsburgh Alleghenys	87	72	.545	2.4
Minnesota Twins	74	84	.468	14.5
Detroit Tigers	64	95	.403	25
Chicago White Sox	62	96	.392	26.5
Kansas City Royals	57	102	.358	32

NL Central
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Chicago Cubs	93	66	.585	—
Milwaukee Brewers	92	67	.579	1
St. Louis Cardinals	87	72	.547	6
Brookland Outs	87	72	.546	6.2
Pittsburgh Pirates	80	78	.506	12.5
Cottage Cheese	75	84	.469	18.5
Cincinnati Reds	66	93	.415	27

AL West
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Houston Astros	100	58	.633	—
Oakland A’s	96	63	.604	4.5
Seattle Mariners	86	73	.541	14.5
Haviland Dragons	78	80	.492	22.3
Los Angeles Angels	78	81	.491	22.5
Kaline Drive	74	84	.471	25.5
Texas Rangers	67	92	.421	33.5

NL West
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Portland Rosebuds	105	54	.661	—
Colorado Rockies	89	70	.560	16.1
Los Angeles Dodgers	88	71	.553	17.1
Arizona Diamondbacks	81	78	.509	24.1
San Francisco Giants	73	86	.459	32.1
Peshastin Pears	72	87	.453	33.1
San Diego Padres	64	95	.403	41.1