League Updates

Notes on getting the hang of it

Ben and I arrived home yesterday (Sunday) at about 4:45 in the afternoon, a day later than originally planned but still in time to catch the baton Jamie dropped — either on the fly, or on the first bounce, I’m not sure which.  (It wouldn’t have mattered in baseball 150 years ago, as I was reminded recently by two Halls of Fame.)

We added a day to the trip so we could swing a little bit south and see some country neither Ben nor I had ever seen. This added Tennessee (length-wise), Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas (panhandle only), New Mexico, Colorado (specifically the wonderful Mesa Verde National Park, where I discovered my advanced age entitled me to a lifetime National Parks pass for only $80! I snatched up that deal, and will proudly show you my beautiful pass card when next we meet), Utah, and Nevada to Ben’s list of states visited.  After two days at the Hall of Fame (and my earlier visit to the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame), this was not a baseball-centered leg of the trip.  Nevertheless, there were baseball grace notes:

  1. While traveling westward in east Tennessee, we listened to part of an Atlanta Braves home game. The announcers were marveling at the temperate weather — only 79 degrees at game time in late July! That was apparently unprecedented in their experience.  It was a little bit cooler than that in Tennessee.  Apparently God was just loosening up with the surprisingly not-roasting temperatures we had in Cooperstown.  (When Ryan commented in Cooperstown on the 20th that the intermittent clouds almost made the heat and humidity bearable, I tried to cover for God by saying “Cut God some slack. He’s doing the best He can.”  Which led to some uncomfortable questions about my theology of a not-quite-all-powerful God.  Fortunately, Sunday the 21st, the day of the induction ceremonies, was notably cooler despite being almost completely cloud-free. See? God clearly was getting the hang of it.)
  2. Cell reception is unreliable in Arkansas and Oklahoma, where my attempts to listen to games were frustrated by gaps and jumps in cell coverage. I used the old-fashioned radio some, but Ben didn’t grow up going on long road trips with a ham-radio fanatic father like I did.  He could not stand fuzzy reception from far-off stations skipping their signals on the ionosphere, whereas for me it evoked long-ago childhood memories, adding to the pleasure of the experience.
  3. As a result I only caught snatches of the Mariners’ series sweep of the Tigers. That was an important series, since it settled so decisively which team is the worst in the American League!
  4. I made the (poor) choice to come back to Oregon via Winnemucca and Burns rather than Idaho and the rather boring I-84.  Poor because:
    • It put us in Sisters, OR early on Sunday afternoon.  Sisters was overwhelmed with traffic, with lines a mile long in both directions of people trying to get into town, law and order on the brink of collapse.  We needed gas, and I needed to use the restroom pretty urgently.  We satisfied both needs… at Detroit Lake.
    • There aren’t as many hotels along the Winnemucca-Burns route. Most of them are in Winnemucca, and there are a lot more Californians than there are Pacific Northwesterners. So we had to settle for an off-brand motel in Winnemucca.  Ben insists it was a real dive, but he is a little bit spoiled.  I thought it was OK.
    • I might have said it was better than OK, except the proprietor had a conspicuous shrine to the Yankees set up in her lobby. She spoke with a New York accent, and was vociferous in her support of the evil empire. Otherwise she seemed like a nice lady. However, she unwittingly fed some of my anti-Yankee-fan prejudices:
      • When I told her I wasn’t a Yankee fan, she assumed I was a Red Sox fan.  (Prejudice: Too many Yankee fans think there is only one other team arguably in their league.)
      • She whined about how she was suffering because the Yankees “haven’t won anything in ten years, not even a pennant!”  Reminder: I am a Mariners fan. (Prejudice: Too many Yankee fans are entitled.  Way more entitled, even, than Ben about motels!)
      • She said it was ok I was a Mariners fan since the M’s are “in the other league” and “don’t play the Yankees.” (Too many Yankee fans, even living in Winnemucca, don’t know much about that little bit of the country west of the Hudson.)
      • When I told her we’d been to the Hall of Fame and saw Edgar and Mariano inducted, she didn’t seem to know the induction had just happened. (Too many Yankee fans’ knowledge of baseball is truncated by their New York blinders.)

Andre says he is a Yankee fan, and I already know none of these things apply to him.  I feel sort of bad about my un-Christian attitude toward Yankee fans… So, by way of a tiny down payment on the restitution I owe Yankee fans everywhere, I will now share with you, Andre, the name of the OK motel in Winnemucca which is a haven for Yankee fans: The Winnemucca Holiday Motel. (Not to be confused with the Winnemucca Holiday Inn, which tends to be full of Californians on summer weekends, in my experience.)

If you ever find yourself needing economical lodging in Winnemucca, check it out.  Be sure to specifically check out the room they assign first, though.  I did ask to see the first room they offered us, a supposedly non-smoking room with smoke smell and ashes in an ash tray.  I think that soured Ben on the next room they offered us, which was fine and provided the best night of sleep I got on the entire trip.

 

 

The following standings are as of the close of play Saturday, July 27.  Jamie did a GREAT job as update writer, but he seems to have broken Baseball Prospectus.  So it’s probably good that we give the hard-working BP staff a break from whatever mischief Jamie was doing.

EFL Standings for 2019 through July 27
EFL
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB RS RA
Portland Rosebuds 69 38 .648 641.4 473.3
Flint Hill Tornadoes 66 39 .628 2.3 661.9 505.6
Old Detroit Wolverines 60 45 .569 8.5 598.7 518.4
Haviland Dragons 55 52 .514 14.3 586.4 561.9
Pittsburgh Alleghenys 54 51 .513 14.4 503.7 488.9
Canberra Kangaroos 54 52 .510 14.7 590.1 581.3
Peshastin Pears 53 54 .494 16.4 547.9 554.7
Kaline Drive 52 55 .484 17.5 502.2 521.1
Cottage Cheese 48 57 .455 20.5 598.5 639.3
Bellingham Cascades 46 59 .442 21.9 500.4 564.9
Brookland Outs 42 63 .401 26.2 518.0 635.8
D.C. Balk 41 65 .388 27.7 470.3 594.2
No daily results possible today, at least for a decidedly microcompetent person like myself.
Combined MLB + EFL Standings for 2014
AL East
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB
New York Yankees 67 38 .638
Flint Hill Tornadoes 66 39 .628 1
Old Detroit Wolverines 60 45 .569 7.2
Tampa Bay Rays 60 48 .556 8.5
Boston Red Sox 59 48 .551 9
Toronto Blue Jays 40 67 .374 28
Baltimore Orioles 35 70 .333 32
NL East
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB
Atlanta Braves 62 44 .585
Washington Nationals 56 49 .533 5.5
Philadelphia Phillies 55 50 .524 6.5
Canberra Kangaroos 54 52 .510 7.9
New York Mets 50 55 .476 11.5
Miami Marlins 40 63 .388 20.5
D.C. Balk 41 65 .388 20.9
AL Central
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB
Minnesota Twins 64 41 .610
Cleveland Indians 62 43 .590 2
Pittsburgh Alleghenys 54 51 .513 10.1
Chicago White Sox 46 57 .447 17
Bellingham Cascades 46 59 .442 17.6
Kansas City Royals 40 67 .374 25
Detroit Tigers 30 71 .297 32
NL Central
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB
St. Louis Cardinals 56 49 .533
Chicago Cubs 56 49 .533
Milwaukee Brewers 56 51 .523 1
Cincinnati Reds 48 55 .466 7
Cottage Cheese 48 57 .455 8.2
Pittsburgh Pirates 46 59 .438 10
Brookland Outs 42 63 .401 13.9
AL West
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB
Houston Astros 68 39 .636
Oakland A’s 60 47 .561 8
Los Angeles Angels 55 52 .514 13
Haviland Dragons 55 52 .514 13
Texas Rangers 53 53 .500 14.5
Kaline Drive 52 55 .484 16.2
Seattle Mariners 46 63 .422 23
NL West
TEAM WINS LOSSES PCT. GB
Portland Rosebuds 69 38 .648
Los Angeles Dodgers 69 38 .645 0.3
San Francisco Giants 54 52 .509 14.8
Arizona Diamondbacks 53 53 .500 15.8
Peshastin Pears 53 54 .494 16.4
San Diego Padres 49 56 .467 19.3
Colorado Rockies 49 57 .462 19.8

 

 

3 Comments

  • Thanks for the update and glad you arrived back safely.

    Just to make you jealous Cindy got her lifetime National Park Pass at age 62 for $10. I wasn’t 62 yet so I couldn’t get one, and the price went to $80 before my birthday. I guess I’ll just need to take Cindy with me whenever we visit a National Park.

  • Welcome back, Ron. It’s great to have TWO interesting and creative writers capable of giving us our daily updates. And especially thanks for news of the $80 bargain. Like Cindy, I got mine for $10 a couple of years ago and am feeling pretty good about it right now. Actually, now that I think about it, it was probably five years ago.