It was the best of days, it was the worst of days

 

EFL
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB	RS	RA
Flint Hill Tornadoes	24	12	.677	—	156.5	107.3
Haviland Dragons	24	12	.673	0.1	165.9	118.0
Peshastin Pears	24	11	.674	0.3	155.7	108.1
Old Detroit Wolverines	24	12	.656	0.7	199.8	141.1
D.C. Balk	20	9	.692	0.8	152.4	102.0
Kaline Drive	22	14	.604	2.6	157.8	130.0
Portland Rosebuds	18	17	.526	5.5	181.5	172.2
Canberra Kangaroos	14	15	.488	6.7	154.1	158.2
Cottage Cheese	16	19	.471	7.4	193.1	211.1
Bellingham Cascades	15	17	.457	7.8	125.5	142.1
Pittsburgh Alleghenys	14	18	.447	8.1	146.4	162.7

 

Flint Hill: “L”, 5 – 4. (5 PA, .400, .400, 1.200;  1/3 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA).  Tyler Naquin had the best day at the plate of any of the 31 EFL batters, according to Baseball Reference, going 2 for 5 with a double and a home run.  (It wasn’t the best in baseball: Jared Walsh’s 4 for 4 with a double and a homer and a walk was better.)  Tanner Scott had a good appearance against one batter, striking him out.  This was not so much a game as an expert Tyler-and-Tanner commando raid, cutting the twisty-tie that had the T’s tied (in games behind) with the Dragons yesterday. 

 

Haviland: DNP, 0 – 0. ( 7 PA, .167, .286, .167; no pitching).  The Dragons slipped that 0.1 game back despite having all its players getting a hit. Jonah Heim’s was an actual single.  Maikel Franco’s was a Steiner hit — ie, a walk counted as a hit so the play-by-play guy could say everyone has a hit.   No one else played in Haviland yesterday, 

 

Peshastin: W, 5 – 2. (5 PA, .400, .400, 1.000; 7 ip, 1 er, 1.29 ERA).  Alex Wood had the second best pitching day in all of MLB yesterday — the entire Peshastin pitching line is his work.  Ryan Mountcastle tried to match the Tornado’s offense, but fell just short.  Mountcastle had the 6th best hitting day in MLB with his 2 for 4 with a homer, but he let Willie Calhoun take the 5th plate appearance.  Willie wasted his at bat, making an out. Even so, the combined efforts of these three stout Pears cut the Tornados’ lead in half. . 

 

Old Detroit: “W”, 3- 4. (13 PA, .182, .231, .273;  1.7 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA).  I don’t even know what MLB team Duane Underwood Jr.  pitches for.  I could look it up, but I kind of like having a mystery player who shows up every few days to face 6 batters and get 5 of them out, surrendering only one harmless hit.  Kind of like the Wolverine batters, who formed one-third of a full team’s lineup. Nate Lowe was the best of the three: a double and  walk in 4 plate appearances, only 43rd out of 105 batters yesterday, according to Baseball Reference (but ahead of #44, Mike Trout).   Lowe did his best, and so did the mysterious Mr. Underwood, but it wasn’t enough to stop the Woeverines’ slow, steady, inexorable decay in the standings.                                                                                                                                                 

 

DC: DNP; 0 – (-1).   (16 PA, .286, .375, .500, 5 ip, 1 er, 1.80 ERA).  With no help whatsoever from star Joey Gallo (0 for 4, 96th out of 105 on the day, just behind Lewis Brinson…. ouch!), the Balk had a great day at the plate. All three of the other Balky hitters knocked doubles, with Myles Straw (18th on the day) adding a single, Asdrubal Cabrera (26th) adding a walk, and Xander Bogaerts (#38) adding a hit by pitch. (Apparently HBP is a little less valuable offensively than walks, since Asdrubal and Xander otherwise had identical batting lines.)  Add in Martin Perez’ 6th-best-in-MLB pitching line, and you have a pretty good day, which should be worth a tenth of a game or so in the standings, but wasn’t this time. 

 

Kaline: DNP, 0 – 0. (23 PA, .261, .261, .391;  no pitching).  That mediocre batting line was still enough to keep the Drive from losing runs on the day. Jesse Winker had the best day (2 for 4 with a double, 19th in MLB), and Yuli Gurriel was just behind him (2 for 5 with a double, 35th in MLB).   The Drive slipped 0.1 games further from the 5th place team, the Balk, whom they now trail by 1.8 games, more than twice the distance from the Balk to the Tornados.  But the Drive maintained their 2.9-game lead on the Rosebuds, who are 2.9 games ahead of the last place… well, let’s not embarrass the last place team unnecessarily. 

 

 

Portland:  “L”, 5 – 5.  (9 PA, .250, .333, .375;  no pitching).  As we move into the ground tier of the EFL, we find two unique facts: 

  1.  The Rosebuds are the only member of the ground tier above .500,  and

  2.  It was all Nicks in Portland yesterday. 

One Nick went 2 for 5 with a double (#9 in the Baseball Reference rankings).  The other Nick went 0 for 3 with a walk (#80 ).  Only one of these Nicks is a EWIE (Ex- Wolverine Infielder Extraordinaire).  Can you guess which one? (Hint: he had a better day at the plate than any current Woeverine. As one would expect.)   

 

Canberra:  DNP, 1 – 0. (15 PA, .300, .533, .500;  no pitching).  The Kangaroos kept pace with the Tornados, and bounded past the Cheese, with the best offensive day in the EFL yesterday, ranking #s 25, 32, 40 and 44. 

 

Cottage: W (-1), L 1; (-2) – 6. (17 ip, .176, .176, .176;  3.3 ip, 7 er, 19.09 ERA).  Mitch Keller continued to tarnish the Wolverine Trading Post brand by chulking. Baseball Reference rated this the 10th best out of 42 pitching performances — but this is only because they list the starters first.  Keller was the 10th best of 10 starters yesterday.  He compiled a game score of 18 (on a scale that sort of maxes out at 100). The 8th and 9th best starters both scored a 35.  

    Anyway, Mitch sabotaged the Cheese.  Shredded the Cheese. Toasted the Cheese. Burnt the Cheese.  Who were already not in the greatest shape.  Pedro Severino went 3 for 4, all singles (#21), but Isan Diaz (#91) and Alex Verdugo (#94) went 0 for 4 with no strikeouts.  And wunderkind Shohei Ohtani went 0 for 5 with three strikeouts to earn the showpiece rating of  all the EFL:  105th out of 105 MLB batters. 

     When you have both MLB’s worst starting pitching performance, and its worst hitting performance, it’s not likely to be a good day. The Cheese fell to 9th place, 1.1 games further from the lead. 

 

Bellingham:  W 1, L (-1);  (-1) – (-6). (8 PA, .125, .125, .250;  6.3 ip, 1 er, 1.43 ERA).  The Cascades gained 1.2 games on the Cheese yesterday, building their gains entirely on some good pitching. Tyler Mahle allowed only 1 earned run in 5 innings, the 5th best start in MLB yesterday.  Kevin Newman’s 0 for 4 was the 93rd best in MLB (putting him at the front of the Newman/Verdugo/Brinson/Gallo section).  But Corey Dickerson did better: a double in four PA’s, for a middle-of-the-pack 51st ranking. 

 

Pittsburgh: DNP, 0 – (-5). (13 PA, .333, .385, .417;  6.3 ip, 0 er, 0.00000 ERA).  For a team taking the day off, the Alleghenys did the best in all the EFL, gaining 0.2 games on the leaders.  Luke Weaver had the #1 rated start in all of MLB with those 6.3 scoreless innings.  Jose Altuve had the 16th best day at the plate (2 for 4 with a double and a walk), and Mike Moustakas backed him up with 2 more hits in 5 trips (#20).  Christian Vazquez’ 0 for 3 with 2 strikeouts was only the 90th best, but that tucked him in front of Isan Diaz, and clear of the Newman/Verdugo/Brinson/Gallo gang of infamy. 

 

 

 

AL East
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Flint Hill Tornadoes	24	12	.677	—
Old Detroit Wolverines	24	12	.656	0.7
Boston Red Sox	22	14	.611	2.4
New York Yankees	18	16	.529	5.4
Tampa Bay Rays	19	17	.528	5.4
Toronto Blue Jays	17	16	.515	5.9
Baltimore Orioles	16	19	.457	7.9

NL East
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
D.C. Balk	20	9	.692	—
New York Mets	16	13	.552	4.1
Philadelphia Phillies	18	17	.514	5.1
Atlanta Braves	17	17	.500	5.6
Canberra Kangaroos	14	15	.488	5.9
Miami Marlins	15	18	.455	7.1
Washington Nationals	13	17	.433	7.6

 

AL Central
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Chicago White Sox	19	13	.594	—
Cleveland Indians	18	14	.563	1
Kansas City Royals	16	17	.485	3.5
Bellingham Cascades	15	17	.457	4.4
Pittsburgh Alleghenys	14	18	.447	4.7
Minnesota Twins	12	20	.375	7
Detroit Tigers	10	24	.294	10

NL Central
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
St. Louis Cardinals	21	14	.600	—
Milwaukee Brewers	19	16	.543	2
Chicago Cubs	17	17	.500	3.5
Cincinnati Reds	16	16	.500	3.5
Cottage Cheese	16	19	.471	4.5
Pittsburgh Pirates	14	20	.412	6.5

 

AL West
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Haviland Dragons	24	12	.673	—
Kaline Drive	22	14	.604	2.5
Oakland A’s	21	15	.583	3.2
Seattle Mariners	18	17	.514	5.7
Houston Astros	18	17	.514	5.7
Texas Rangers	18	19	.486	6.7
Los Angeles Angels	16	18	.471	7.2

NL West
TEAM	WINS	LOSSES	PCT.	GB
Peshastin Pears	24	11	.674	—
San Francisco Giants	21	14	.600	2.6
San Diego Padres	19	16	.543	4.6
Portland Rosebuds	18	17	.526	5.2
Los Angeles Dodgers	18	17	.514	5.6
Arizona Diamondbacks	16	19	.457	7.6
Colorado Rockies	12	22	.353	11.1