{"id":3987,"date":"2009-09-13T11:37:46","date_gmt":"2009-09-13T10:37:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=3987"},"modified":"2009-09-13T11:37:46","modified_gmt":"2009-09-13T10:37:46","slug":"weekly-hit-ground-ball-e-numbers-and-jeter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=3987","title":{"rendered":"Weekly Hit Ground Ball: ‘E’ Numbers and Jeter"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 numbers provoke much examination, scrutiny, comment and concern.\u00c2\u00a0 In Europe, such deliberations revolve around artificial food additives<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Companies are now proudly proclaiming the lack of artificial additives in their products, blind to the fact that their statements make loyal customers question why they weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t so bold in saying the additives were there in the first place.<\/p>\n

Yet in the U.S., concerns over\u00c2\u00a0‘E’ numbers do not relate to food.\u00c2\u00a0 It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s far more important than that.\u00c2\u00a0 The\u00c2\u00a0‘E’ stands for elimination in sporting competitions and MLB.com\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s official standings<\/a> make fans all too aware of their team\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fate.\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Everyone except for the six current division leaders has an \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 number next to their name.\u00c2\u00a0 It tells you how close or far away they are from having no mathematical chance of winning the division they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re in (it doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t take the Wild Card into account).\u00c2\u00a0 The number is a combination of losses by the team in question and wins by the division leader.\u00c2\u00a0 So if a team has an \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 number of 10 at the start of day and they lose their game, it goes down to 9.\u00c2\u00a0 If the division leader wins their game, it goes down to 8.\u00c2\u00a0 If the team had won and the division leader lost then it would stay at 10 and mentally that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the toughest part: however hard you try, you never really seem to gain anything.\u00c2\u00a0 Twenty-four teams will end with an ‘E’ next to their name and often a good day simply feels like you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re putting off the inevitable.<\/p>\n

In the cases of the Baltimore Orioles and Washington Nationals, they wasted little time in getting that inevitable day out of the way.\u00c2\u00a0 Both slipped into the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 category after the games of 1 September.\u00c2\u00a0 The Nationals\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 46-87 record left them 32 games behind the Phillies in the NL East.\u00c2\u00a0 The Orioles hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t yet made sure of compiling a losing season, but their 54-79 record was enough to leave the Yankees out of reach in the seriously tough AL East.<\/p>\n

By yesterday, four teams had joined the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 ranks: Arizona, Pittsburgh, San Diego and Toronto.\u00c2\u00a0 The Diamondbacks are the biggest surprise of the four considering pre-season expectations in the desert. \u00c2\u00a0Brandon Webb\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s injury and step-backs taken by several of their younger players have made this a lost season, although Justin Upton\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 2009 season has raised confidence that he will go on and live up to his outstanding potential.<\/p>\n

The A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s and Reds entered yesterday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s games on the dreaded \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE1\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.\u00c2\u00a0 Wins over the Twins and Cubs respectively combined with losses by their division leaders (Angels and Cardinals) gave both a stay of execution, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s only a matter of time before their seasons are officially over.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Of course, the division leaders can look at ‘E’ numbers in a much more positive way.\u00c2\u00a0 For them, the ‘E’ number of the second-placed team is their \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcmagic number\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 The Cardinals need any combination of wins or Cubs losses amounting to eleven for the NL Central to be theirs.\u00c2\u00a0 They can count down the number with glee.<\/p>\n

Most other teams will probably be better off ignoring it and instead looking forward to Spring Training 2010.<\/p>\n

Rockies are rolling again<\/strong><\/p>\n

In case you hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t noticed, the Colorado Rockies (‘E’ number of 17) are playing some great baseball right now.\u00c2\u00a0 They had won eight in a row before their 3-2 extra innings loss to the Padres last night and are now just three games behind the L.A. Dodgers in the NL West.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not quite 2007 all over again, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll have to wait a long time for another team to go on such an incredible stretch run as the Rockies produced that year, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s impressive all the same.\u00c2\u00a0 Colorado were 14.5 games behind the hot-starting Dodgers with a 18-28 record when they fired Clint Hurdle and replaced him with former Dodgers and Pirates manager Jim Tracy at the end of May.\u00c2\u00a0 I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t say I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve ever been a big fan of Tracy, but you can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t argue with the results: the Rockies are 64-33 under his stewardship.<\/p>\n

The Dodgers may have won twelve of the fifteen games between the two sides this season, but they know all too well that the Rockies are a big threat to their hopes of retaining their NL West crown.<\/p>\n

Jeter: Yankees\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 hit king<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another seemingly inevitable feat was achieved this week as Derek Jeter surpassed Lou Gehrig to become the New York Yankees\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 all-time hits leader with 2,722<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 You don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to add much explanation to that sentence to get across the magnitude of the achievement.\u00c2\u00a0 Gehrig\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s name is one you quickly learn as a newcomer to baseball, not just as a Yankee legend but as a baseball legend.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

It seems incredible that some people were lining up to issue the last rites on Jeter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s career after his 2008 season.\u00c2\u00a0 A .300\/.363\/.408 batting line wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t up to his normal standards, but to say that was the beginning of the end was pushing things a bit.\u00c2\u00a0 He has truly returned to form this year and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not simply been a result of the hitter-friendly new Yankee Stadium.\u00c2\u00a0 It may well have added some homers onto his total (twelve of his seventeen so far have come at home), but he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s actually hitting better<\/a> on the road.<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a memorable season so far for Jeter.\u00c2\u00a0 For all his achievements this year, nothing would please him more than earning his fifth World Series ring after nine seasons since his last.\u00c2\u00a0 The way the Yankees are playing, you wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t bet against it either.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 numbers provoke much examination, scrutiny, comment and concern.\u00c2\u00a0 In Europe, such deliberations revolve around artificial food additives.\u00c2\u00a0 Companies are now proudly proclaiming the lack of artificial additives in their products, blind to the fact that their statements make loyal customers question why they weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t so bold in saying the additives were there in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[553],"class_list":["post-3987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weekly-hit-ground-ball","tag-mlb-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3987"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3990,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3987\/revisions\/3990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}