What the cool kids will be watching today…

EFL
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB	RS	RA
Canberra Kangaroos	18	9	.660	—	169.0	121.3
Flint Hill Tornadoes	17	9	.660	0.2	174.9	125.5
Portland Rosebuds	18	11	.617	0.9	182.6	143.8
Pittsburgh Alleghenys	15	9	.609	1.7	130.1	104.2
Kaline Drive	16	14	.521	3.7	107.5	103.1
Cottage Cheese	12	14	.456	5.5	134.3	146.8
Peshastin Pears	13	16	.441	6	141.6	159.3
Old Detroit Wolverines	10	16	.385	7.3	118.4	149.7
D.C. Balk	10	17	.387	7.4	124.5	156.6
Haviland Dragons	12	18	.395	7.5	136.9	169.5
Brookland Outs	10	16	.368	7.8	120.0	157.2
Bellingham Cascades	9	15	.355	7.8	115.0	155.0

Canberra: “W”, 6 – 6. (30 PA, .259, .333, .519; 0.3 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA). Rhys Hoskins and Jorge Alfaro homered to salvage a “win” after the pitchers didn’t come to work. Alfaro is doing well at catcher for the Kangaroos, batting .297, .342, .500 on the season. But yesterday Canberra management formally notified the league office: Alfaro is now the backup to Mitch Garver’s .400, .442, .875 presence at the plate.

Flint Hill: L, 11 – 11. (43 PA, .333, .378, .564; 11.7 ip, 12 er, 9.26 ERA). We have a pennant race going, folks, with the Tornados somehow not collapsing despite awful pitching from both Jon Gray and Tyler Mahle (9.7 ip, 10 er) topped off with a Tanner Scott 0 ip, 2 er infinite chulk.   Max Kepler homered twice to lead a very strong Tornado offense in a just-barely-enough 11-run outburst.

Portland: W, 9 – 8.  (34 PA, .387, .441, .677; 17.3 ip, 11 er, 5.71 ERA) Rosebud pitching wasn’t all that impressive yesterday, least of all Brett Anderson with his 6 er in 4.3 ip .  But they were bailed out by massive top-to-bottom offense. The worst Rosebud hitter for the day was Eduardo Escobar, who went 1 for 4 with a double. The best was Carlos Correa (2 for 4 with a homer). Every Rsoebud had at least one hit. With the narrow win, the Rosebuds pulled inside 1 game back in the sizzling EFL race.

Pittsburgh: “W”, 5 – 6. (31 PA, .200, .355, .320; 13.7 ip, 8 er, 5.27 ERA). The Alleghenys certainly are not out of the pennant race, but they did lose ground to the Kangaroos by 0.1 games.  Stephen Strasburg did his part to advance the Alleghenys (7 ip, 2 er) but Derek Holland didn’t (5 ip, 6 er). Nevertheless, the dominant franchise in EFL history lurks just behind the three leaders.  Not a comfortable place for the leaders to be.

Kaline: W (-1), L 2; 2 – 14. (39 PA, .222, .275, .389; 6 ip, 9 er, 13.50 ERA).  The Drive slipped out of the top tier, letting a two-game gap open between them and the fourth-place Alleghenys. Pitching was the main problem, especially AJ Minter’s sextuple chulk (2/3 of an inning, 4 er).  Hunter Renfroe homered and doubled to lead the offense, but only Jesse Winker (2 for 3 with a double and a walk) really followed… and even he hit into a double play.

Cottage: “W”, 6 – 8. (32 PA, .310, .375, .448; 0.7 ip, 0 er, o era) The hitting makes me envious — especially the four batters OPSing 1.000 or more — but the lack of pitching was a bigger deal.  The good news for Cottage fans is this: even with the boss away, the mice have played well enough to draw themselves closer to Kaline than to 12th place. Of course, the Drive getting stuck in reverse yesterday helped out a lot in that department.

Peshastin: W, 6 – 4. (50 PA, .273, .360, .523;  3 ip, 1 er, 3.00 ERA.)  Now here’s the first real clear win of the day in the EFL. Every one of the 11 Pear hitters reached base safely at least once. Brandon Drury was safe all four times he came to the plate, including on his double, for a spiffy 2.333 OPS.

.

By the way, did you notice our featured photo of  Joey Gallo? He has added another distinction to his record.  Dylan Moore, a utility fielder for the Mariners, was pressed into pitching duty in the top of the ninth with the sore 11 – 1 in favor of the Rangers. His first five batters all reached safely, three having scored, when Gallo swung at the first pitch… and flew out. So Gallo is the only player in the EFL who has fallen to the slants of Dylan Moore.

Old Detroit: L, 3 – 5. (28 PA, .222, .250, .296; 5.7 ip, 2 er, 3.18 ERA).  Let the record show that I gave the pennant race at the top of the league full and duly excited coverage.  But that is not where the real action is.  The hottest race in a long time — maybe ever — is happening right now at the bottom of the league.

      By losing, the Wolverines managed to mash 5 miserable teams within 0.5 games of one another in the long race to first place… in next year’s rookie draft.   If it weren’t for Eric Lauer’s uncharateristic-for-a-Wolverine good pitching, and Kyle Schwarber’s uncharacteristic-for-him two doubles, the W’s might be right down in the middle of the melee.

DC:  L, 6 – 12. (32 PA, .323, .333, .484; 8.7 ip, 10 er,10.38 ERA).  Whew! Look at that daily ERA. It’s not Joe Musgrove’s fault. He left his start having held the foe to 3 earned runs in 6 innings. Seranthony Dominguez came in and chulked (2 er in 1 ip).  Then Jarlin Garcia quintuple chulked (1 more inning, 5 more earned runs). It all undid a good day at the plate in which only one Out failed to reach base safely.  That was newly-minted second baseman Omar Narvaez, who went 0 for 1 in the M’s blowout loss last night.

Haviland: W, 6 – 4. (33 PA, .34, .364, .594;  7 ip, 3 er, 3.86 ERA).  Here’s another genuine win near the bottom of the standings, enough to lift the Dragons right into the middle of the maelstrom of mediocrity.  The Dragons are poised to soar above the fray the minute the Mariners fall behind the Astros. It’ll be a nail-biter whether the Mariners or Astros finish April in first, and much in Haviland will ride on that race.

.

Brookland: W, 6 – 2. (40 PA, .258, .425, .355; 14.7 ip, 8 er, 4.91 ERA).  The best day in the EFL belongs to the formerly last place Outs.  They parlayed 7 walks and 2 hbps into the only lopsided win in the league Saturday. 22.5% of their batters reached without putting a ball into play. Zack Godley almost chulked (2.7 ip, 5 er), putting in peril his place in the Arizona rotation.  But Shane Bieber ( 6ip, 3 er) slowed the bleeding and Charlie Morton (6 ip, 0 er) stopped it entirely — and even got some of the blood back into the body by bumping replacements off the bump.

Bellingham: “W”, 5 – 8.  (46 PA, .268, .348, .341; 7.7 ip, 5 er, 5.87 ERA)  It wasn’t a terrible day in Bellingham, just the kind of loss any team might experience on a slightly-off day. Justin Bour went 0 for 5, but the other nine Cascade hitters all reached safely at least once.  Alex Claudio triple chulked (0.67 ip, 2 er), but all the other pitchers did fine (7 ip, 3 er). But the end result was a Bellingham cascade, just baaaaaarely, into last place. But here’s the thing: one day as good as this one was bad could vault the entire Cascade range four places in the standings.

.

That’s why all the cool kids will be watching the teams at the bottom of the EFL standings today.

.

AL East
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Flint Hill Tornadoes	17	9	.660	—
Tampa Bay Rays	17	9	.654	0.2
New York Yankees	16	11	.593	1.7
Toronto Blue Jays	13	14	.481	4.7
Boston Red Sox	11	16	.407	6.7
Old Detroit Wolverines	10	16	.385	7.2
Baltimore Orioles	10	18	.357	8.2

NL East
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Canberra Kangaroos	18	9	.660	—
Philadelphia Phillies	15	12	.556	2.8
New York Mets	13	13	.500	4.3
Atlanta Braves	12	14	.462	5.3
Washington Nationals	11	14	.440	5.8
D.C. Balk	10	17	.387	7.4
Miami Marlins	8	19	.296	9.8

AL Central
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Minnesota Twins	15	9	.625	—
Pittsburgh Alleghenys	15	9	.609	0.4
Cleveland Indians	15	11	.577	1
Detroit Tigers	12	13	.480	3.5
Chicago White Sox	10	14	.417	5
Bellingham Cascades	9	15	.355	6.5
Kansas City Royals	9	18	.333	7.5

NL Central
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
St. Louis Cardinals	16	10	.615	—
Milwaukee Brewers	15	13	.536	2
Chicago Cubs	13	12	.520	2.5
Pittsburgh Pirates	12	13	.480	3.5
Cottage Cheese	12	14	.456	4.2
Cincinnati Reds	11	15	.423	5
Brookland Outs	10	16	.368	6.4

AL West
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Seattle Mariners	18	12	.600	—
Houston Astros	16	11	.593	0.5
Kaline Drive	16	14	.521	2.4
Texas Rangers	13	13	.500	3
Oakland A’s	14	15	.483	3.5
Los Angeles Angels	11	17	.393	6
Haviland Dragons	12	18	.395	6.2

NL West
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Los Angeles Dodgers	18	11	.621	—
Portland Rosebuds	18	11	.617	0.1
San Diego Padres	16	11	.593	1
Arizona Diamondbacks	16	12	.571	1.5
Colorado Rockies	13	14	.481	4
Peshastin Pears	13	16	.441	5.2
San Francisco Giants	11	16	.407	6