An appreciation of our cuddly league leaders. (I apologize to the Drive for the photo adorning this post. I had to go with a second-place Kangaroo because it’s going to take more time than I have to find a cuddly image of a Drive.)
EFL Standings for 2018
| EFL | ||||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB | RS | RA |
| Kaline Drive | 11 | 7 | .612 | — | 82.5 | 65.7 |
| Canberra Kangaroos | 10 | 7 | .595 | 0.4 | 85.5 | 70.6 |
| Portland Rosebuds | 10 | 7 | .568 | 0.9 | 79.3 | 69.2 |
| Cottage Cheese | 10 | 8 | .563 | 0.9 | 90.6 | 79.9 |
| Pittsburgh Alleghenys | 7 | 6 | .553 | 1.3 | 66.3 | 59.6 |
| Old Detroit Wolverines | 9 | 8 | .512 | 1.8 | 62.7 | 61.2 |
| Haviland Dragons | 9 | 9 | .507 | 1.9 | 83.0 | 82.0 |
| Flint Hill Tornadoes | 8 | 9 | .492 | 2.2 | 69.6 | 70.7 |
| Brookland Outs | 8 | 10 | .462 | 2.7 | 92.2 | 99.6 |
| D.C. Balk | 8 | 9 | .447 | 2.9 | 62.3 | 69.4 |
| Peshastin Pears | 6 | 11 | .347 | 4.6 | 67.2 | 92.1 |
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Kaline: L, 3 – 5. (.185, .241, .370; 1 ip, 1 er). I really appreciate our current kinder, gentler leaders who hold back from just running away with the league. The Drive and the ‘Roos remember when they, too, were modest franchises scrambling for crumbs of hope. They aren’t like SOME people who think nothing of winning by 10 or 20 games, leaving the rest of the league choking in the dust of a vast desert of hopelessness.
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So the Drive drove gently Wednesday. Jorge Soler had the best day (2 for 4 with a homer), but everything was calibrated to kindness. Kaline accepted a small loss taking solace, I trust, in the life they breathed into everyone else’s dreams.
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Canberra: L, 3 – 5. (.194, .359, .226; 6 ip 3 er). The Drive and the Kangaroos matched each other step for step like a lovely pas de deux. Canberra reminded us of its puissance by unchaining Jose Abreu (3 for 6 with a double), but the rest of the team treated the league with kid gloves.
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Cottage: W, 7 – 3. (.355, .394, .548; 7 ip,. 2 er). By contrast, the Cheese seem a little… sharp. Note only did Corey Seager go 4 for 5 with two doubles and a walk, but two of his sidekicks (Thames and Trout) also OPSed in four figures. Cheese pitchers were not entirely dominant — they allowed 15 baserunners in 7 innings — but they were ungenerous with the earned runs. If they keep barging ahead, thoughtless like this, they are going to spoil the welcoming mood set by our current leaders.
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Portland: W 2, L (-1); 9 – 0. (.368, .390, .544; 13.7 ip, 2 er). And I have to say there’s no evidence that the Rosebuds will be courteous leaders if we ever let them have the privilege. Roses are prickly in my experience, even when they smell sweet. Jose Berrios pitched 7 vengeful innings, only 3 baserunners. And Teoscar Hernandez clearly does not know his place: newly called up to the Rosebud roster, he immediately went 4 for 6 with a triple and a homer… these stats sound neither kind nor gentle.
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Pittsburgh: W (-1), L (-1); (-8) – (-9). (.360, .396, .520; no pitching). The Alleghenys are currently trapped in a time vortex. They had possibly the league’s first quadruple header Tuesday. Thursday they split what I believe may be the first negative double-header ever in any league. The A’s piled up a ton of offense — we’re looking at 54 plate appearances here — but the physics or the math works in ways I don’t understand over there in the anti-universe of negative double headers. I am afraid, though, that somehow the A’s are storing up huge amounts of offense to unleash on the world like a decidedly uncuddly A-bomb.
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Old Detroit: W, 5 – 2. (.286, .342, .571; 7 ip, 1 er). See, this is what I thought would be an average day in Old Detroit this year: solid offense, outstanding pitching. It’s not like I wanted to use that formula for evil. I’d still say all those nice things about Kaline and Canberra — I’d just be making these observations from somewhere above them in the standings. Rick Porcello was the pitching star again today (6 scoreless innings), but I don’t want to say too much about him lest I jinx him — after all, I got him in the Rule 5 draft from a team three places ahead of the W’s in the standings.
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Haviland: L, 4 – 4. (.176, .300, .265; 9 ip, 5 er). The score in Haviland was actually 4.4 – 4.5. The loss was so close it didn’t make a noticeable difference to the Dragons’ circa-.500 winning percentage. Ian Kinsler went 2 singles for 2 AB with a walk. You can pooh-pooh this for being uninspiring offensive leadership, but a team that mimicked Kinsler would score more runs than one batting .999, even if they were all homers.
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Flint Hill: W, 8 – 2. (.300, .356, .525; 7 ip, 2 er). Yangervis Solarte went 3 for 4 with a homer and a walk to lead the forceful Flint Hill offense, helping the T’s storm past two teams on their way toward the top. What accounts for all this sound and fury all of a sudden? I suppose they are trying to dissuade me from renaming them the Flint Hill Ferrets, but, man, that’s such a good name…
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Brookland: L, 4 – 8. (.353, .353, .471; 0 ip, 0 er). I know, I know, it was stupid of the W’s the other day to try to make up in volume what they lacked in quality. But you do need SOME volume. That spiffy batting line isn’t much good when it only covers 4 players and 17 plate appearances.
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DC: L, 0 – 4. (.138, .219, .391; 8.7 ip, 4 er). Carson Fulmer quadruple chulked (1 ip 4 er) to ruin fine performances from Carlos Carrasco and Aled Wilson, who combined for 7.7 shutout innings. It didn’t help that the hitters were mostly absent. Eight showed up, and they accumulated 32 plate appewaerances — but only 4 hits and 5 total bases — but mostly they were present in body only.
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Peshastin: L, 3 – 8. (.211, .250, .263; 7 ip, 6 er). Offensively, the creative Pears decided to try the rarely-recommended “neither quality nor volume” model: only 20 plate appearances, producing a sub-replacement .513 OPS. Who knows? Maybe it would have worked… except not with Tyler Skaggs doing the downside of his normal ERA EKG routine: 4.3 ip, 6 er.
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Combined MLB + EFL Standings for 2018
| AL East | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Boston Red Sox | 15 | 2 | .882 | — |
| Toronto Blue Jays | 12 | 5 | .706 | 3 |
| Old Detroit Wolverines | 9 | 8 | .512 | 6.3 |
| New York Yankees | 8 | 8 | .500 | 6.5 |
| Flint Hill Tornadoes | 8 | 9 | .492 | 6.6 |
| Baltimore Orioles | 5 | 13 | .278 | 10.5 |
| Tampa Bay Rays | 5 | 13 | .278 | 10.5 |
| NL East | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| New York Mets | 13 | 4 | .765 | — |
| Canberra Kangaroos | 10 | 7 | .595 | 2.9 |
| Atlanta Braves | 10 | 7 | .588 | 3 |
| Philadelphia Phillies | 10 | 7 | .588 | 3 |
| Washington Nationals | 9 | 10 | .474 | 5 |
| D.C. Balk | 8 | 9 | .447 | 5.4 |
| Miami Marlins | 5 | 12 | .294 | 8 |
| AL Central | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Minnesota Twins | 8 | 5 | .615 | — |
| Cleveland Indians | 9 | 7 | .563 | 0.5 |
| Pittsburgh Alleghenys | 7 | 6 | .553 | 0.8 |
| Detroit Tigers | 6 | 9 | .400 | 3 |
| Chicago White Sox | 4 | 11 | .267 | 5 |
| Kansas City Royals | 3 | 13 | .188 | 6.5 |
| NL Central | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Pittsburgh Pirates | 12 | 6 | .667 | — |
| St. Louis Cardinals | 10 | 7 | .588 | 1.5 |
| Cottage Cheese | 10 | 8 | .563 | 1.9 |
| Milwaukee Brewers | 10 | 9 | .526 | 2.5 |
| Chicago Cubs | 7 | 8 | .467 | 3.5 |
| Brookland Outs | 8 | 10 | .462 | 3.7 |
| Cincinnati Reds | 3 | 15 | .167 | 9 |
| AL West | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Los Angeles Angels | 13 | 5 | .722 | — |
| Houston Astros | 12 | 7 | .632 | 1.5 |
| Kaline Drive | 11 | 7 | .612 | 2 |
| Seattle Mariners | 9 | 7 | .563 | 3 |
| Haviland Dragons | 9 | 9 | .507 | 3.9 |
| Oakland A’s | 9 | 10 | .474 | 4.5 |
| Texas Rangers | 7 | 13 | .350 | 7 |
| NL West | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 12 | 5 | .706 | — |
| Portland Rosebuds | 10 | 7 | .568 | 2.3 |
| Colorado Rockies | 11 | 9 | .550 | 2.5 |
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 8 | 9 | .471 | 4 |
| San Francisco Giants | 7 | 10 | .412 | 5 |
| Peshastin Pears | 6 | 11 | .347 | 6.1 |
| San Diego Padres | 7 | 13 | .350 | 6.5 |