During the August 12 sim, the Platonic League playoff race continued to settle out as the Pittsburgh Pisces ran their win streak to 8 games and have taken a 8.5 game lead for the wild card spot. Seattle retains a 10 game lead for the division title.

In the Socratic League though, woo boy. Brooklyn cleaned up in the big series with Helena and has an 8 game winning streak. Brooklyn took the first two games by the identical score of 2-0 before winning the third in an 11-3 laugher. That streak has pushed Brooklyn into the division lead. Jersey City now holds the wild card spot, 2 games behind the Bombers. Helena is another 1.5 games back, in third place.

There were a host of games in extra innings as well. New York beat Winnipeg 4-3 in 12 innings on August 8. Jersey City won 7-5 on August 9 over Marietta. Helena, after blowing a one-run lead in the ninth, redeemed the sim slightly with an 11-6 win in 15 innings over Seattle.

No super significant injury news, although Jersey City had a couple of people dinged up.

On a more individual level, Brooklyn’s second sacker, Miyatarou Takenao, has raised his batting average to .408. Will he be able to stay over .400 for the season? Who knows, but it would be a heck of an accomplishment.

Coming up, Helena has three more games against Seattle in a matchup of the teams with the two best Pythagorean records. The first game of a two-game set between Jersey City will also be played on August 16 in the last day of the next sim.

The league file has been updated by now and the web pages are in the process of being updated. Next sim will be Monday by Nate.

Brooklyn @ Helena for 3 games.

Will Brooklyn sweep????? (I think there is a good chance)

This series will help us clear up the Socratic League playoff picture, both teams are tied for the Wild Card (Helena is .003 up in the standings) and both teams are 1 1/2 games back from division leading Jersey City.

Both teams are on fire:

Helena is 8-2 in the last 10 and has won 5 in a row
Brooklyn is 9-1 in the last 10 and has won 4 in a row

I for one can’t wait

And whoa NELLY, what a sim it was.

In the Platonic League the big news was the injury suffered by Seattle’s #3 starting pitcher Gonsales! He’s day-to-day for six weeks! It’s unlikely that this will impact Seattle’s competing for the title as they end this sim up 10 ½ games on Pittsburgh, who lengthened their wildcard space to 5 ½ games over Sylva. It’s not over yet but things are forming up.

Which is exactly what they are NOT doing in the Socratic League! The top half of the league tightened up with Brooklyn and Helena closing to within 1 ½ games of league leading Jersey City! This one is really all open this time, folks. Two of these three teams are going to the postseason and it’s impossible to predict which one!

In top performances this sim Helena’s Bricio Loera allowed 2 hits and 2 walks in 8.1 innings to turn in he 24th best pitching performance of the year! Well done, Bricio!

The files are being uploaded now. Next sim in Friday by Mack!

I don’t know if you all have notice this so far but Seattle is up by 10.5 games while Jersey City is up by only 3.5 games even though Jersey City has a better record overall.

Normally I would account for this by arguing about depth of talent in a league. Simple enough. But looking at the records at the BOTTOM of each league shows Winnipeg with 35 wins and Cairo with 36. Not a huge disparity at all.

Then I looked in the middle and saw that the Socratic League had 50% of it’s teams with 60 or more wins whereas the Platonic League only had one team in that category. “Ah ha!” says I, “something’s going on here! Quick, to the data cave!”

It turns out that the relative records of the league show something interesting. Even though they’re played very close to the same number of games to date the Socratic League has racked up 315 wins while the Platonic League has only 299. The SL is up 8 games on the PL overall! Since wins and losses are normally a zero-sum game the only means of accounting for the discrepancy is through inter-league games!

Ergo, the Socratic League is beating the pants off of the Platonic League in Interleague Play! Yay for us!

The trading deadline has passed for the 2002 season. The teams on the field now will be the teams battling it out to the end.

In the Platonic League, Seattle has a 10.5 game over second-place Pittsburgh and a magic number of just 42, which all right thinking people recognize as a significant number. Pittsburgh has opened up a 3.5 game lead over Sylva and 4 games over Maryland for the wild card berth. Should be a battle to the end.

In the Socratic League, Pittsburgh did Brooklyn and Helena a favor, taking the last two games of the series against Jersey City. As a result, Jersey City’s lead has been trimmed to a mere 3.5 games over a hard-charging Brooklyn. The Bombers’ seven game winning streak has meanwhile propelled them past Helena, who rests one game behind Brooklyn and just 4.5 behind Jersey City.

On a slightly more morbid note, Winnipeg has taken a negative two game “lead” over Cairo for the first pick in next year’s draft.

In the upcoming schedule, Jersey City and Helena play two more games head-to-head (Jersey City took the first game of the series to salvage something of the last sim). Seattle and Pittsburgh likewise square off in two more games in a Platonic League showdown as Seattle unsurprisingly took game one of the series.

The monthly awards were handed out for July., In the Platonic League, Seattle’s Thomas Holte won the pitcher’s award while “Super-Fogy” Bruce Bremer brought the batter’s award back to Pittsburgh. Marietta’s starting third baseman Constantino Martinez won the Batter of the Month award with Jersey City’s Joseph Silas winning the pitching equivalent.

Sylva’s first bagger Joseph Wadlington suffered a strained PCL. He is day-to-day (aren’t we all), but one wonders if anyone will be able to tell given Wadlington’s .641 OPS.

The next sim will be Wednesday, by Nate. We’re on to the rush to the playoffs now, so stay tuned!

BROOKLYN – In a trade that came down to the trading deadline, Brooklyn added another flame-thrower to their bullpen today. The Bombers added 4.5 star Cuban MR Wilson Abellan along with 3B prospect Kevin Grow. In return the Mammoths will receive 4 Star Prospect Millard Hoar and a second round pick in next year’s amateur draft.

With the earlier additions of Lyman Grimm from New York and Ramon Medina from Jersey City with the current acquisition of Abellan the Bombers bullpen goes from the worst in the league to arguably the best. Bomber manager George Welsh commented, “Earlier in the year I would make the call to the pen and pray for rain to end the game. Now when I make the call with a lead, I have so much faith that I can get in my car and go home because I know we have a W.”

The Bombers are officially ready for the post season push. Abellan adds the needed post season experience as he was part of the World Series championship team in Marietta last year and that experience will help the Brooklyn team know what it is like to be a winner. The one thing we do know is this will be a sprint to the playoffs in the Socratic league.

Seattle and Stockholm are pleased to announce a deadline deal today. Stockholm sends 4.5 star veteran reliever Alberto Hernandez to Seattle in exchange for MR Carlos Prados, Seattle prospects Melvin Lera and Eric Pellham, and Seattle’s third round pick in next year’s amateur draft.

“Yeah, we’re pretty much mortgaging our future, but what the hell, you only live once,” said Seattle GM Matt Macario. “We have decided to live in the now. We’re very happy with the acquisition of Mr. Hernandez and hope he helps us get to the next level.”

No significant movement in the playoff races, except for Pittsburgh extending its lead to three games over Maryland. However, the next sim, on Monday, will take us past the trading deadline. So, the Thanksgiving holiday is the last time to make those deals to bulk up for the final playoff push or to trade those unnecessary veterans to build for the future.

In the latest sim, Jersey City lost ten-game winner Stephen Hawn for seven weeks. Will the Skeeters be looking for starting pitching? Tough break for a team that has had more than its share of luck this year, outperforming its Pythagorean record by an astonishing eight games. (However, Jersey City took the last two games from my Pisces in extra innings, so I’m not really feeling too bad about the Hawn injury.)

Anyway, get your trades finalized by Monday evening! Then, it’s a push to the playoffs and to see who will succeed Marietta and become the second OEL champion.

And time is running out on the trading deadline! What deals will be made and which will collapse? Only time will tell.

This sim features the tightening up of the Socratic League race with Helena just 4.5 games off the leader and Brooklyn just one off Helena. With 10 weeks or so to go anything can happen!

In the Platonic League Seattle continues to have a commanding lead but runner up Pittsburgh is only two games up on Maryland. This could be a tight one.

In injury news Marietta loses Starting Pitcher Wayne Font for a week to a leg injury. Otherwise all is well.

The next sim is Wednesday evening by Mack!

Dateline: Marietta, OH

The Marietta Register is reporting this evening that Marietta and Helena completed a long anticipated deal. Marietta sends star relief pitcher Alfred Wickline to Helena for OF prospect Kenro Yoshii and Helena’s first round pick in next year’s amateur draft.

“This is a great pick up for us”, says Marietta owner Nate Wooley from his spot overlooking the semi-frozen Ohio River. “Wickline has been great for us and we’re pleased with his help taking the title last year. Realistically, though, he’ll not be in a position to help us by the next time we’re competitive. This gives us a decent prospect, even if I can’t spell his name and a shot at a good one in next year’s draft.”

Reached at his isolated cabin Wickline stated, “I’m glad to be getting to enter a race that matters again. No matter what Marietta did this year we never seemed to get traction to get above .500. He’s hoping that Helena can put it all together this year and I can get a second ring.”

Reports and rumors from the Lafayette Hotel in historic downtown Marietta are that Wooley is still looking for the right deals to move starting pitcher Millette, relief pitcher Abellan, and all-world third baseman Martinez. Will he move them before the deadline. Watch this column in The Marietta Register.