September, 2024

Chapter Five Recap

Players of the Chapter

The South Philly Gritty won an astounding 22 games last chapter. (More on that story below.) A big reason for that was the performance of Adolis Garcia, our EL Hitter of the Chapter. Garcia hit .326/.383/.821 overall, scored a league-best 26 runs, drove in 28 runs, and hit an astounding 14 home runs. Not bad for a guy who was acquired for Yu Darvish this past winter.

Ronald Acuna was our OL Hitter of the Chapter in Chapter Four. In Chapter Five, the winner of that award, yet again, is Ronald Acuna. (More on that story below.) Like South Philly, Akron also went 22-6 in Chapter Five. A large part of their success was due to Acuna, who hit .400/.448/.708, with a league-leading 30 runs scored and a BDBL-best 40.4 runs created.

The Virginia Sovereigns went an impressive 17-11 in Chapter Five. Unfortunately, they play in the same division as the Gritty. 20 games out of the division lead and 19 behind the EL wildcard leaders, it looks like 2024 is a lost season for Virginia. But at least they can celebrate having the EL Pitcher of the Chapter. Marcus Stroman led the EL with a 2.27 ERA, and held opponents to a .235/.291/.315 batting line.

If you could explain the chapter Florida's Michael Lorenzen just had, I would love to hear it. He was a fairly mediocre pitcher in MLB '23, and was a fairly mediocre pitcher (8-5, 4.33 ERA in 112+ IP) coming into Chapter Five. Then, this past chapter, he flipped a switch and turned into Roger Clemens. Not only did Lorezen dominate in Chapter Five, but he dominated against some of the best teams in the BDBL. He tossed eight innings of shutout ball against the Flagstaff Peaks, held the Darien Blue Wave to just one run over eight innings, and blanked Lake Norman for six innings. He went 5-0 on the chapter, led the BDBL with a 0.50 ERA, and held opponents to a .138/.187/.164 batting line. Sorry, Wade Miley (0.96 ERA, .120/.190/.239), but Lorenzen is the OL Pitcher of the Chapter.

Top Stories of the Chapter

Story #1: The Blue Tsunami

No one is surprised to see the Darien Blue Wave atop the McGowan Division. The only surprise is that it took so long. Darien began the season trailing the Flagstaff Peaks by five games in Chapter One. By the end of two chapters, they somehow found themselves in third place, behind both Flagstaff and the Florida Mulligans. At the all-star break, they were three games behind Flagstaff and Florida, who shared a tie for first place. Coming into Chapter Five, Darien shared first place with Florida.

Finally, toward the end of Chapter Five, the Blue Wave broke out in a big way, and distanced themselves from the rest of the pack. Darien went 22-6 for the chapter, and now own a four game lead ahead of Florida, and five ahead of Flagstaff.

One of these three teams -- all projected to win 103 or more games this season -- will be sitting on the sidelines in November. Of course, all three will play head-to-head next chapter, which more than likely will decide which one it will be. Darien has split a dozen head-to-head games against Flagstaff so far, and has gone 5-7 against Florida. Flagstaff has bested Florida 7-5 in their dozen games. In Chapter Six, Florida will play at Flagstaff's home park and will host the Blue Wave. Darien will play Flagstaff at home.

The strength of schedule favors the Peaks (opponent winning percentage outside of these three teams is just .509). Florida (.536) and Darien (.544) will play much tougher opponents. Yet another advantage held by Flagstaff is that they play 20 of their 28 games in Chapter Six at home. Florida plays just twelve and Darien plays only eight home games. (Dammit, Chamra!)

As far as usage goes, three of Florida's regular hitters are at 90% or higher, along with nearly their entire bullpen. Only one of Darien's hitters is at 90%, but it's Yordan F'ing Alvarez. Corbin Carroll, Austin Hays, and Danny Jansen are all above 90% for Flagstaff.

Can Darien hold on to their four game lead while playing 20 games on the road? Can Florida stay in the race with their backup team? Can Flagstaff take advantage of their schedule to leapfrog one or both of them? Stay tuned!

Story #2: The Amazing Acuna

Akron's Ronald Acuna is having one of the greatest seasons in the history of the BDBL. He leads the OL in all three triple-slash categories: .388/.461/.681. In fact, he leads the entire BDBL in those three categories. The last player to do that was...no one. It's never been done before. Think about that. Barry Bonds didn't do it. Albert Pujols never did it. No one.

We still have an entire chapter to play, and Acuna already has 173.6 runs created on the season. Only 23 players in history has ever racked up 173.6 runs created -- and we still have 28 games left to play! The all-time record of 231.2 (set by Bonds 22 years ago) is probably unreachable, but if Acuna creates another 40 runs this chapter as he did last chapter, that would make him a member of the 200 Club.

200 runs created in a single season has only happened seven times in league history. Bonds did it three of those times (2002, 2003, 2005). The other members: Carlos Delgado (2001), Luis Gonzalez (2002), Jason Giambi (2002), and Albert Pujols (2004).

Did I mention that Acuna also has 33 stolen bases (in 42 attempts)? With 36 homers and 33 steals, he has a chance to join the 40-40 Club. Only three players in BDBL history have ever achieved that feat: Ray Lankford (41 HR, 55 SB) and Alex Rodriguez (40/41) in 1999, and Mike Trout (51/44) in 2021.

Story #3: Break Up the Gritty

The South Philly Gritty went 22-6 last chapter and became the first team in the BDBL to reduce their magic number to single digits (9). South Philly famously lost a one-game playoff to Kansas last year after trading them their best player at the final deadline. They won't have to worry about that this year.

The Gritty own the second-best record (83-49, .629) in the Eck League behind the Lake Norman Monsters (.652). Pitching has carried them to this point. They have allowed the fewest runs, by far, in the EL. The next-best team in that regard has allowed 25 more runs than South Philly. There is only one qualified pitcher in the EL with an ERA below 3.00, but if you reduce the number of innings to qualify, South Philly owns two (Clayton Kershaw and Shane McClanahan) of the five belonging to that group.

J.D. Luhning's job the rest of the way is to coast to the finish line and avoid any dumb usage mistakes like the one I made last chapter. He does have one more important goal remaining, however. If the season were to end today, the Gritty would own the #2 seed in the EL playoffs, which means they would have to face off against Highland in the Division Series. If the Gritty wins four more games than Lake Norman in Chapter Six, their Chapter Six opponent would be Chicago.

South Philly is just 2-6 against Highland this season, and 3-5 against Chicago. On paper, Highland seems like a much tougher playoffs opponent. Don't coast too gently, J.D.!

Story #4: The Undertakers' "Major League" Performance

In the Hollywood movie, the plucky Cleveland Indians, led by crusty old skipper Lou Brown, rally to win the championship, defying their evil owner's efforts to scrap the team and move to Miami. In real life, the plucky Los Altos Undertakers have defied their evil owner's intentions to scrap the team by playing 16-12 baseball in Chapter Five, keeping pace with the South Loop Furies every step of the way. Somewhere in the Los Altos clubhouse is a life-sized cardboard cutout of Jeff Paulson wearing a Speedo.

I am sorry for putting that image in your head.

The Undertakers managed to win 16 games in Chapter Five despite outscoring their opponents by only three runs. They did so by winning four out of five games that were decided by one run, and coming from behind to win four times. Like I said: plucky.

Aside from the teams in their own division (including each other), both teams will face off against the Blue Wave and Mulligans in Chapter Six. Of the remaining two opponents, Los Altos will face slightly tougher opponents (Ravenswood and Akron, combined .485 winning percentage) than South Loop (Las Vegas and South Carolina, .447).

Regardless of who wins this race, they will face a steep uphill battle in the postseason. I don't expect there to be a Hollywood ending to this story, but stranger things have happened in the BDBL.

Story #5: The Highland Underdogs

The Highland Freedom have outscored their opponents by more runs than any team in the Eck League, and yet they are looking up at the first-place Lake Norman Monsters by four whole games. In Chapter Five, Highland played just .500 ball despite outscoring their opponents by 30 runs. Meanwhile, Lake Norman went 16-12 despite being outscored by three runs.

Paging Doctor Pythagoras! Last chapter, the Freedom underperformed their Pythagorean wins by three, while the Monsters overachieved by two wins. On the season, Lake Norman (+5) owns the highest PD in the BDBL, while Highland sits at just +1. We can blame the record in one-run games (29-15 for Lake Norman, 20-21 for Highland) for that. We can also point to Lake Norman's astounding 11-3 record in extra innings.

In Chapter Six, Lake Norman will play 20 of their 28 games on the road, while Highland will play just eight. (Dammit, Chamra!) Lake Norman's road record is 32-26 (.567) so far this year, while Highland's home record is 33-27 (.550). Lake Norman has been much better at home (52-20, .722), but will have that luxury only eight times in Chapter Six. Highland has actually played much better on the road (49-23, .681), but will also have that luxury only eight times.

Regardless of who ends up winning this division, it seems safe to say that they will both make the postseason. Highland currently enjoys a 14-game lead over the North Carolina Iron Spider Pigs in the EL wildcard race. Their magic number for winning that wildcard is down to 15.