According to the standings below, only 10 AL teams and 8 NL teams have a realistic shot (> 10:1 odds) of making the playoffs. Almost half of the teams are effectively eliminated and we're only at about the 1/3 mark of the season. That doesn't sound like competitive balance to me.
In the AL:
OAK 70.4%
CHIW 67.5%
BOS 66.0%
TB 53.0%
LAA 42.5%
CLE 29.1%
MIN 16.9%
TOR 16.3%
TEX 14.9%
NYY 10.6%
In the NL:
ARIZ 86.8%
CHIC 81.8%
ATL 57.4%
STL 35.6%
LAD 35.4%
PHI 32.7%
HOU 27.0%
NYM 13.1%
Pre-season playoff hopefuls Detroit (2.8%) Seattle (0.2%) would seem to prefer not making the playoffs then to sign THE B-POPE. Milwaukee at (2.5%) also needs to kick it into gear and soon or their hopes are dashed. Way to go Bud.
The Gigantes come in at (0.2%) chance of making the playoffs - a 500 to 1 shot. Happy Fiftieth Birthday indeed. Way to thank the fans for their years of unrewarded support. Start taking a page from the Cubs marketing handbook.
FROM WEBSITE coolbaseballstandings.com
http://www.coolstandings.com/baseball_standings.asp?i=1
We've been hearing a lot about how the latest iteration of baseball's drug testing has changed the game from more of a power to speed game or maybe more of a veterans game to a young man's game and this has given teams like the Rays a chance to compete against the more financially gifted Yankees and Sox.
I think the jury is still out on that one, but it is a bit amazing how the tone of the message has changed, a virtual 180 degree shift, from "well testing will never stay ahead of the cheaters" to "wow, it looks like the shame game is more effective than onerous testing".
WHERE HAVE ALL THE HR'S GONE AND WHY. SOMETIMES THE MOST OBVIOUS ANSWER ISN'T THE CORRECT ONE (from SportsEconomist.com)
The commentators are giddy that the number of HR's are down in the early part of the season, even though it seems as if the abnormally cold, early season weather could be more of a factor than the disappearance of some of the big homer BALCO guys (Bonds, Sheffield, etc.)
BALL-BAT COLLISION ILLUSTRATED
A factor that I believe has gone under reported has been the loss of velocity of pitchers. Not just the most notable examples of Barry Zito or Mike Mussina, but across the board. The White Sox commentators are "searching" for an answer to Bobby Jenks loss of velocity from 97-99MPH top speed to 92-93MPH. We're talking about guys in their prime years, without any reported injuries and yet the velocity dropped precipitously. WTF, right? The missing factor in the discussion is the disappearing velocity of the pitchers.
It's interesting to note that you don't see the radar gun readings for pitchers displayed on the screen on any baseball telecasts anymore. Wonder why that is?
As the illustration above shows, in the all important ball-bat collision, a loss of velocity from EITHER bat speed or ball speed, will result in a loss of exit speed of the ball and therefore a loss of distance the ball travels. But pitchers using never really fit the MSM agenda until Roger Clemens entered the fray.
I sense such a seismic shift in the tone and tenor of the debate from the WWLIS that I can only speculate that an ESPN/MLB deal of epic proportions is in the works and that the "you don't shit where you eat" theory is currently in effect.
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