Monthly Archives: September 2017

MLB Sleepyhead Summary: Nationals clinch the NL East

On Sunday, the Washington Nationals became the first team to win their division in 2017.

The Nationals completed a 3-1 series win over the Philadelphia to bring their NL East magic number down to 1 and then had to wait for the conclusion of the ongoing game between second-placed Miami and Atlanta.

The Marlins scored three runs across the eighth and ninth innings to lead, only for Atlanta to draw level 8-8 with three runs in the bottom of the ninth.

The Braves then walked-off in the eleventh to ensure Washington couldn’t be caught and could start their celebrations.

It’s the fourth time in six years that the Nats have won the NL East, but they’ll be hoping this time they can turn that into more than just a brief play-off run, as they’ve been dumped out in the Division Series stage the previous three times.

Dodgers’ dip becomes a downward spiral

For weeks it looked as though the Los Angeles Dodgers would be the first team to clinch their division, but the once seemingly-unstoppable team are now making very hard work of getting over the NL West line. They were just swept in a four-game series by the Colorado Rockies to make it ten losses in a row and 15 losses from their last 16 games.

The Dodgers still have the best record in the Majors at 92-51 and a nine-game lead in the division, which shows how incredibly well they had been playing prior to the last two weeks.

It really is curious how a talent-laden team like this can suddenly go into such a tailspin. Still, when the Dodgers were threatening a historic win total it was noted that for many ultimately their play-off results would determine whether the season was a total success or not. They’ll come out of this bad spell soon enough, complete the formality of booking their play-off place, and if they go on to win the World Series at the end of it these regular season losses will seem a distant memory.

Elsewhere in the National League

The Arizona Diamondbacks had their winning run ended at 13 on Friday as they lost two of three against the San Diego Padres. The D-Backs still have a five-game lead over Colorado for the first NL Wild Card, despite the Rockies’ broom-wielding ways against the Dodgers, and the two teams will face each other at Chase Field for four-games starting on Monday night.

On Friday I pretty much had the Chicago Cubs pencilled-in as the NL Central champs, but then they were swept by the Milwaukee Brewers in a three-game series at Wrigley and the St Louis Cardinals also won three games against Pittsburgh to make it close once again. The Cubs have a two-game lead over their two rivals, whilst the Brewers and Cardinals are three behind the Rockies for the second Wild Card.

Milwaukee now host three games against Pittsburgh but will have to play out the season without starting pitcher Jimmy Nelson who unfortunately injured his shoulder in a freak accident when diving back into first base. St Louis host the Cincinnati Reds for a three-game set, whilst the Cubs host the New York Mets.

Cleveland – 18 and counting

In the American League, the Cleveland Indians are going to lose again one day but they’re determined to put it off for as long as possible.

They swept a three-game series over the Baltimore Orioles to increase their winning run to 18 games, three behind the all-time MLB record of 21 held by the 1935 Chicago Cubs.

The American League record is 20 and set by the Oakland A’s in 2002, as featured in the film adaptation of Moneyball, and the A’s decided to honour that streak by sweeping a four-game series over the Houston Astros this past weekend.

That was good news for Cleveland too. The Astros had won seven straight heading into their series, but the A’s sweep plus the Indians’ continued run means they have edged ahead for the best record in the American League, 87-56 to 86-57.

Others chasing play-off spots

The gap at the top of the AL East remains at 3.5 in Boston’s favour over the New York Yankees after both teams won their respective series 2-1 (Red Sox over the Rays, Yankees over the Rangers). The Yankees now have a 3.5 game lead over Minnesota for the first AL Wild Card after the Twins split a four-game series with the Kansas City Royals.

The Mariners lost the finale of their three-game series against the Los Angeles Angels, but took the first two to gain a little ground in the Wild Card race and they now have the cavalry coming in the form of Felix Hernandez (Thursday) and James Paxton (Friday) returning from the Disabled List. Seattle are three games behind the Twins for the second Wild Card, as are the Orioles. The Mariners now head into Texas for a crucial four-game series against the Rangers.

The Angels are the closest competitors to the Twins, trailing by one game, and have a home series against the Astros up next, with Kansas City and Texas 2.5 back.

The Rays are now at the back of the pack trailing by 3.5 games and will play their home three-game series against the New York Yankees at the Mets’ Citi Field due to the devastation caused by Hurricane Irma.

MLB Sleepyhead Summary: Arizona and Cleveland Continued …

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The MLB Sleepyhead Summary is a regular column that helps British baseball fans keep up to speed with MLB despite the time difference!

In Monday’s column it was the Cleveland Indians and Arizona Diamondbacks who took centre stage.

The results over the past few days mean they deserve top billing once again.

15 wins for Cleveland

The Indians swept a four-game series over Detroit to extend their winning streak to 15 games. Their win on Thursday showed why they are such a formidable opponent, with Corey Kluber dominating on the mound and the batting lineup launching five home runs.

I still think they get overlooked a bit simply by virtue of them not being a ‘big-name team’ such as the Red Sox or Yankees. Make no mistake, the reason they got so close to winning the World Series last season, and are surely heading back to the post-season again this year, is that they are a very good ballclub with a very good manager.

Things are going so well for Cleveland (84-56) that they are now just a couple of wins worse off than the Houston Astros (86-53). It’s looked almost certain for the past couple of months that the Astros would take the top seed in the AL with the best regular season record, but Cleveland are going to push them close.

The Astros are not giving up their position lightly and have put together their own seven-game winning streak, the most recent three coming at the expense of the Seattle Mariners.

In the American League East, the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees both won their recent series 2-1 (over Toronto and Baltimore respectively) so the former’s lead remains at 3.5 games. The Yankees have a 2.5 game lead over the Minnesota Twins for the first Wild Card, with the Twins being hunted by the LA Angels (1 game back), Baltimore (2), Texas (2.5), Tampa Bay and Kansas City (both 3.5) and Seattle (4).

Coming up this weekend in the AL

The Mariners will host a crucial weekend series against the Angels as they try to stay in the Wild Card race. Given the number of teams ahead of them, Seattle ideally needs an 8-2 or 9-1 stretch over the next ten games to give them a good chance and sweeping a series against the Angels would be a great way to start it.

Texas are hosting the Yankees, whlst the Royals host the Twins, the Rays are in Boston and the Orioles will look to stop Cleveland’s winning run.

13 wins for Arizona

Just as Cleveland have carried on their winning ways, so the Arizona Diamondbacks have decided that this winning thing is a habit worth sticking to.

The D-Backs swept a three-game series over the reeling LA Dodgers this week to stretch their consecutive winning streak to 13. They now have a seven-game lead over the Colorado Rockies for the first Wild Card and you can now all-but mark down the NL Wild Card game for Chase Field.

The Dodgers are still a long way ahead in the NL West and on the verge of mathematically clinching a post-season place, but their recent run has shown how even a ridiculously hot team can suddenly go cold. They’ve lost seven straight, the latest against Colorado on Thursday night, and 12 of their last 13 games.

Another team that hasn’t had much luck of late are the Miami Marlins. Unfortunately for them, their recent three-game sweep at the hands of the Washington Nationals, followed by a walk-off loss to the Atlanta Braves on Thursday night, has basically ended their hopes of a Wild Card spot.

The Chicago Cubs split a four-game series against Pittsburgh and, with Milwaukee losing all three games against the Cincinnati Reds, that leaves them 5 games ahead in the NL Central. They’re not quite over the line, but that’s a good lead at this time of the season and with the talented roster they have you would now expect that race to be over.

That means there are three teams battling for one final NL play-off spot (Washington having the NL East almost sewn-up): the Rockies, Brewers and Cardinals. St Louis took three of four against the Padres during the week to draw level with Milwaukee and the two teams now trail Colorado by three games.

Coming up this weekend in the NL

The Rockies continue their four-game series in LA, having beaten Clayton Kershaw on Thursday, by facing Yu Darvish on Friday night.Â The Milwaukee Brewers have a huge series in store at Wrigley Field against the Cubs, whilst the Cardinals are hosting the Pirates.

BGB Fantasy League 2017: Week 21

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Two more teams have booked playoff places in the BaseballGB Fantasy League – but four places are still up for grabs with just one week of the regular season left.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Cheshunt Maltsters	32	13	36	4	.308	.937	5	2	59	3	5.49	1.46	11
Jesmond Dennings	23	2	13	5	.287	.778	0	3	12	0	3.27	1.27	1

The Maltsters continue their march to the playoff after defeating Jesmond 11-1. Once again, Jesmond failed to meet the 20-inning minimum limit, forfeiting all the pitching categories. Altuve scored eight runs while Castillo and Jose Ramirez (.538) each belted four homers. Kluber won twice, Sale struck out 17 and Reed had three holds. Bregman salvaged steals for Jesmond.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Iron Men	22	6	31	3	.285	.919	1	3	25	2	2.35	0.96	8
Weston-Super-Sox	21	4	16	8	.317	.838	3	0	37	1	5.16	1.31	4

Iron Men picked up an 8-4 win against the Sox as Encarnacion scored seven runs, hit two homers and joined Rendon in driving in six. Giles had two saves, Lorenzen and Kintzler had a hold each and that Kershaw guy returned to help take ERA and WHIP. Gordon and Gurriel each hit .500 for the Sox while Betts swiped four bases. Morton had a win and struck out nine.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Norwich No II	28	9	25	2	.236	.709	3	8	48	2	3.00	1.13	7
The Cheddar Chasers	37	8	27	4	.282	.850	2	1	43	1	4.89	1.28	5

Norwich needed a pitching sweep to defeat the Chasers 7-5. Nola had a win and struck out 13 while Hand and Kimbrel had three saves each and Vincent notched a pair of holds. Gausman helped take ERA and WHIP. Bellinger and Freeman had multi-homer weeks.

Benintendi hit .360 and stole three bases for the Chasers, while Dozier scored nine runs and was one of three players to knock in five.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Beckenham A&E Dept	36	8	35	0	.343	1.031	4	6	56	0	1.30	1.01	7
Mighty Slugs	34	12	32	5	.326	.988	5	2	70	2	2.55	1.04	5

The A&E Dept had two reasons to celebrate – a 7-5 win against the Slugs and the confirmation of their playoff place. Posey hit .500 for the week while Rizzo scored nine times and drove in eight. Davis, Rodney and Allen each had two saves while Bundy did not allow an earned run and posted miniscule WHIP numbers.

Domingo Santana hit three homers for the Slugs while Trout stole two bases. Usually a .326 team average would be enough for a category win, but not this time. Godley won twice, Marquez struck out 19 and Yates had two holds.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Orpington Isotopes	23	9	26	2	.180	.604	7	0	66	1	2.41	1.12	5
Durham Riverkings	31	6	37	10	.315	.847	2	2	36	2	3.92	1.15	7

The Riverkings hit their way to a 7-5 win against the Isotopes, as Baez scored six runs and stole three bases, Morales knocked in 10 and Inciarte batted .448. Vizcaino, Jansen and Swarzak took care of saves and holds. The Isotopes had power from Ramirez, who hit three homers, while Weaver won twice, struck out 19 and Teheran helped take ERA and WHIP.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Richie’s RBI’s	27	8	24	2	.246	.761	4	1	54	0	5.82	1.41	5
The Bath Bombers	22	3	24	5	.250	.697	2	3	35	1	2.64	1.17	6

Both teams will be happy with this score as the Bombers picked up a 6-5 win but the RBIs did enough to book their playoff place. The Turners got the job done for Bath as Trea stole three bases while Justin hit .391. Strasburg helped take ERA and WHIP while Britton had two saves and Shaw collected the lone hold.

Severino had a win and struck out 18 for the RBIs while Lamb scored four runs and Zunino and Villar each had two homers and helped take OPS.

Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OPS	W	SV	K	HLD	ERA	WHIP	Score
Batteries Essential	31	9	34	5	.289	.861	3	3	37	0	5.40	1.44	5
Newcastle Knights	29	11	33	6	.255	.840	3	1	40	4	2.28	1.06	6

Finally, the Knights are ahead of Batteries essential in the race for the final playoff place after a 6-5 win. Four Knights had multi-homer weeks, including Stanton (again). Marwin Gonzalez and Rosario each had two steals. McHugh helped take ERA and WHIP while Dickey struck out nine and Bradley had three holds.

Andrus scored seven runs and knocked in nine for Batteries Essential while Morrison hit double digits in RBIs. Blackmon hit .409 for the week and Neris had three saves.

The final playoff push

Four playoff places are still up for grabs with one week of the regular fantasy season left. It’ll be a nervy week for the teams in 5th to 11th.

Here are the matchups

Maltsters (1st) v Slugs (6th)

Norwich (2nd) v Isotopes (7th)

RBIs (3rd) v Chasers (5th)

A&E Dept (4th) v Knights (8th)

Batteries Essential (9th) v Riverkings (10th)

Bombers (11th) v Sox (12th)

Iron Men (13th) v Jesmond (14th)

MLB Sleepyhead Summary: Eleven and counting for Cleveland

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The MLB Sleepyhead Summary is a new regular column that helps British baseball fans keep up to speed with MLB despite the time difference!

The Cleveland Indians swept a four-game series over Detroit over the past weekend, including getting two helping hands from the Tigers on Sunday, to make it 11 wins in a row.

The Tribe are in rare form despite having several key players on the Disabled List. Pitcher Danny Salazar is scheduled to make his return from the DL this week and if Cleveland are only going to get stronger over the next couple of weeks, they could be front-runners to win the American League pennant that they captured a year ago.

Houston swept an emotional home series against the New York Mets to celebrate the capture of Justin Verlander. The current plan is for their new star recruit to make his Astros debut on Tuesday.

In the AL East, the New York Yankees needed to take advantage of their final season series against the Boston Red Sox and they did just that. The Yankees won three of four, including the finale against Chris Sale on Sunday, to cut the Red Sox’s lead to 3.5 games.

Those wins also kept the Yankees in pole position for the first AL Wild Card spot. They have a two-game lead over Minnesota after the Twins lost two of three against Kansas City (their one win was a good one though: 17-0). Among the other Wild Card contenders, Seattle swept the slumping A’s 3-0, Texas got the better of the LA Angels 2-1 and Baltimore split a four-game series with Toronto.

The losers on the weekend were Tampa Bay who not only dropped two of three against the Chicago White Sox but also saw pitcher Chris Archer leave his start early with foreram tightness. An update on his condition is expected early this week.

Coming up

The Rays will pray for good news on the Archer front whilst hoping for a strong home series against the Twins to try to get themselves firmly back into the Wild Card race. The Rays are currently 4 games behind the Twins for the second Wild Card.

The Yankees are in Baltimore to take on the Orioles, with the Angels facing the A’s and the Mariners hosting the Astros. Texas are on the round playing an inter-league series against Atlanta.

D-Backs make it 10

In the National League, it’s the Arizona Diamondbacks who can’t stop winning. They’ve won ten in a row and the latest three came at the expense of the Colorado Rockies who have been their closest NL Wild Card rivals all season so far.

The Rockies now sit 6.5 games behind the D-Backs for the first Wild Card and have Milwaukee right on their tail at just 0.5 games further back.

The Brewers won three of four games against the Washington Nationals over the past weekend, although the Chicago Cubs matched that (against Atlanta) so the gap at the top of the NL Central is still 3.5 in the Cubs’ favour.

St Louis are still on the case following a 3-1 series win over the San Francisco Giants, whilst Miami suffered a blow by losing three of four against the Phillies.

The big shock of the weekend came in San Diego where the Padres recovered from losing their series-opener against the Dodgers (Clayton Kershaw’s successful return from the DL) by winning the next three games.

Coming up

The Dodgers will now take on the D-Backs in an intriguing three-game series, whilst the Rockies host the Giants, the Brewers travel to Cincinnati and the Cardinals are in San Diego knowing that the Padres will be no push-over.

Miami need to get back on track with some home games against Washington and the Pittsburgh Pirates are arguably in the last chance saloon for their distant Wild Card hopes. They have a four-game series against the Cubs are really need to get the brooms out and sweep the set to keep their hopes alive.

MLB This Week: Early games on Monday and Wednesday

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Monday is Labor Day in the States and that sets the agenda for the early games in MLB this working week.

Ten games begin before midnight UK time on Monday and they include plenty of teams in the play-off place race. The Yankees-Orioles series will be important for Baltimore if they want to claw back a few games in the AL Wild Card race and Dylan Bundy is slated to be the home starter against the Yankees on Monday.

Meanwhile the Rockies host the Giants at Coors Field knowing that they need to start picking up some wins as they’ve seen their NL Wild Card gap whittled down over the past few weeks.

It’s slim pickings for early games for the rest of the working week, though. Wednesday is the only other evening to catch some live baseball at a convenient time. All three early games include a Wild Card hopeful: the Brewers, Twins and Angels.

All times are in BST.

Monday 4 September

18:10 Royals at Tigers (Junis (6-2), Lewicki (0-0))
18:10 Brewers at Reds (Anderson (8-3), Bailey (4-7)) *BT Sport/ESPN
18:10 Phillies at Mets (Leiter (2-4), Montero (3-9))
19:05 Yankees at Orioles (Garcia, Bundy (13-8))
19:10 Indians at White Sox (Bauer (14-8), Shields (2-5))
20:10 Giants at Rockies (Moore, Bettis (0-2))
21:05 Cubs at Pirates (Arrieta (14-8), Kuhl (6-10)) *BT Sport/ESPN
21:05 Angels at Athletics (Bridwell (7-2), Smith (0-4))
21:40 Cardinals at Padres (Martinez (10-10), Perdomo (7-8))
23:40 Astros at Mariners (Keuchel (11-3), Ramirez (5-5))

Tuesday 5 September

No early games

Wednesday 6 September

17:35 Brewers at Reds (Nelson, Castillo (2-7))
18:10 Twins at Rays (Slegers (0-0), Snell (3-6)) *BT Sport/ESPN
20:35 Angels at Athletics (Skaggs (1-4), Manaea (9-9))

Thursday 7 September

No early games

Friday 8 September

No early games

All of these games are available to watch or listen to live via an MLB.TV subscription. TV coverage of MLB in the UK comes courtesy of the BT Sport channels and these are highlighted above, as are any games that are available to view online for free via MLB.com. The above list of games just shows those starting before midnight UK time. The full schedule of MLB games can be found on MLB.com.

MLB Sleepyhead Summary: Sweeps and Waiver Deals

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The MLB Sleepyhead Summary is a new regular column that helps British baseball fans keep up to speed with MLB despite the time difference!

I’m writing up the Sleepyhead Summary with the Braves-Cubs game live on the TV on Friday evening.

The calendar hitting 1 September is a sobering reminder that we have just one month left of the MLB regular season and the daily dose of ballgames that we get to enjoy.

Best make the most of them.

American League Sweeps

The main story in the American League over the past few days has been sweeps.

The Boston Red Sox swept their three-game series in Toronto to all-but put the Blue Jays out of realistic Wild Card contention, whilst the New York Yankees were swept off their own field by the charging Cleveland Indians. That put the Red Sox 5.5 games ahead of the Yankees in the AL East before they started a four-game series on Thursday night.

New York took the opener 6-2, catcher Gary Sanchez hitting his 12th home run of August, to bring the gap back down to 4.5 and they’ll be hoping to continue that trend over the rest of the weekend.

There were also sweeps for the Minnesota Twins (over the White Sox), Baltimore Orioles (Seattle) and the LA Angels (Oakland), whilst the Tampa Bay Rays and Texas Rangers won their respective series over Kansas City and Houston 2-1.

Where that leaves us

All of which has kept the Yankees out in front for the first AL Wild Card but by just a single game over the Minnesota Twins. The Twins then have a 1.5 game lead over the Angels, 2.5 over the Orioles, 4 over the Rays and Rangers and 4.5 over the Mariners and Royals.

The key AL weekend series (on top of the aforementioned Red Sox-Yankees) see the Angels and Rangers meeting in Arlington and the Royals facing the Twins in Minnesota. Baltimore will look to gain ground with a four-game series against the Blue Jays although they dropped the opener on Thursday night thanks to a three homer barrage by Kendrys Morales.

D-Backs Down the Dodgers

In the Senior Circuit the sweep of the week saw the Arizona Diamondbacks defeat the LA Dodgers 3-0 to hand the Dodgers their first sweep of the season. Arizona have won seven games in a row before starting a three-game series against fellow current Wild Card spot holders the Colorado Rockies.Â The Rockies have stuttered a bit of late and lost their mid-week series against Detroit 2-1.

The Chicago Cubs swept their three-game series against the Pittsburgh Pirates, pretty much knocking the Buccos out of contention in the process, with the Washington Nationals also getting the brooms out to deal a blow to the previously-hot Miami Marlins. Giancarlo Stanton was able to tie the record for most home runs hit in August (18) during the series to take his season total to 51.

The Cardinals and Brewers split their short two-game series 1-1, leaving Milwaukee 3.5 games behind the Cubs in the NL Central and 2.5 games behind the Rockies for the second Wild Card.

The weekend series in the NL include the Brewers hosting the Nationals, Miami hosting the Phillies (the Phils won the opener on Thursday 3-2), the Cardinals heading to San Francisco and the Dodgers heading to San Diego.

ALW – W for Waiver deals

Away from the games, the off-field action took place in the AL West on Thursday as the Astros, Angels and Rangers all made late-night waiver deals before the end of August (and the cut-off for new additions to be eligible for their potential post-season rosters).

The Astros made the big splash many thought they’d make before the non-waiver deadline by acquiring Justin Verlander from the Tigers. He didn’t seem overly keen on the idea by all accounts, but – as a parent says to a doubtful child heading to school for the first time – I’m sure he’ll enjoy it when he gets there.

Detroit continued their tear-down by sending Justin Upton to the Angels, with Anaheim also acquiring Brandon Phillips from the Braves. The Rangers didn’t want to be left out and therefore added starting pitcher Miguel Gonzalez from the White Sox.