|
September 9, 2008
Wake me up when September ends... Sure, it’s a Green Day lyric and not an altogether great one at that, but as I sit here and crunch Major League Baseball standings like it’s my life's ambition, Billie Joe Armstrong’s words ring truer and truer. The point? The three-odd weeks that remain in this month and thus in the MLB regular season will probably not rank among the most fascinating baseball’s given its fans. The reason? The playoff field's all but set, with the exception of who’s playing who and one or two potential pitfalls. Explain? Sure. Keep in mind; these aren’t predictions any more than they’re plain old observations. Let’s call them obserdictions. Starting with the American League. The Los Angeles California Angles of Anaheim are in. That’s it. The West is won. The Boston Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays are sitting pretty. The Yankees and Blue Jays are, I don't know, standing hideous. In the Central the Minnesota Twins and Chicago White Sox are separated by a mere two games. They’re in a race for the division, but not exactly looking great for the WC. Chicago leads the pack, but is still five games behind the Rays/Sox for that all-important fourth berth. That means the Twins are seven back with 19 to play. Possible, not probable. But even giving the Twinkies a fighting chance, you’re still looking at five teams for four spots. Anaheim, Boston, Chicago, Minnesota and Tampa. Everyone else should be booking tee times. In the National League things are a little more interesting, but I emphasize the word “little.” In the East the Mets and Phillies are dueling admirably, much as they did last year although this time the boys from Queens are actually winning the occasional game. In the Central: Bartman be damned, the Cubs are making the playoffs and more than likely winning the division. They have a 99 per cent chance of earning a berth according to Coolstandings.com, a mark bettered only by Anaheim’s 100 per cent lock. The Brewers, for their part, are 4.5 back of Chicago but hold the Wild Card seat over both the Mets and Philly, meaning they’re in pretty good shape, especially with C.C. Sabathia all but guaranteed to stop any lengthy losing streaks. Out west the Diamondbacks and Dodgers are separated by less than two games, but neither has the faintest hope of a Wild Card berth with each hovering around .500. The Dodgers are surging and Arizona's fading fast, but it’ll be win or go home in this incredibly weak division that somehow produced last year’s league champs. So here’s what we know about the NL Field: Chicago in. Milwaukee, probably. Then you have the Mets and/or Phillies, but probably not both and the Diamondbacks or/Dodges but definitely not both. Six teams for four spots while one is all but locked up and two are mutually exclusive. I’m not saying the races in the AL East and Central or NL East and West won’t be interesting, but ESPN’s Jayson Stark isn’t likely to have the kind of work load he probably grew accustomed to down the stretch in ’07. Of course any team could go on a tear the way Colorado or Philadelphia did last year during the final two weeks, but I’d suggest that’s highly unlikely. There’s a reason those stories made major headlines – because they don’t happen very often. As for whether something similar winds up occuring this year: you’ll have to fill me in when I wake up from my nap. Just remember, not until October folks.
|
