Week 18 - July 23, 2006

Who Does Number Two Work For?

Each has been stuck in 2nd place in their respective divisions seemingly all season long, but that doesn't mean the league's two Number Two teams are conceding anything to the front runners. The best performances by any team this week were turned in by the Vancouver Ironfist (6-1) and the Las Vegas Rat Pack (6-2), who each made up ground on the division leader -- but also, perhaps more importantly at this point in the season, pulled farther ahead of the teams behind them. By virtue of playing one less game this week, the Ironfist -- who are riding a six-game winning streak -- pulled a half-game ahead of Las Vegas for the league's top wildcard seed... The Rats moved 1½ games closer in the standings to the Newark Sugar Bears, who went 4-3 as they continue to whittle down their magic number, now at 31... The Ironfist were able to make up 3½ games in the Morris standings because the Carolina Mudcats could only manage a 3-5 record.

The dogfight continues in the middle of the pack, where five teams continue to struggle for the two remaining playoff spots. The hottest team this week was the Hoboken Cutters, who went 5-2 to claim sole possession of 5th place... Two games behind them, and tied for the final playoff berth, are the Arkansas Golden Falcons, who went 4-4, and the Marietta Mighty Men, who went 3-4... In 8th place, but just a game out of the playoff picture, sit the Philadelphia Endzone Animals, and a half-game behind them are the Hillsborough Hired Hitmen. Both went 3-4... The only other team with a realistic shot at the post-season are the 10th-place South Boston Gang, who remain 3 games out of the final wildcard seed after also posting a 3-4 record this week.

It's all over but the crying for the four teams at the back of the pack. None of them has been mathematically eliminated, but nothing short of a two-week winning streak is likely to save any of these teams from the draft lottery. The Honolulu Sharks went 4-4 to improve from 12th place to 11th, their third straight week of climbing a rung in the standings. Since suffering through a 10-game losing streak last month, the Sharks have won 14 out of their last 22... The Phoenix Dragons fell a half-game behind the Sharks and into 12th place after going  2-5... The D.C. Bushslappers and Westwood Deductions remained in 13th and 14th place, respectively, after each went 3-5.

Up Down Up Down: The Sugar Bears had a 15-game streak... of no streaks! They alternated wins and losses for 15 games in a row (W-L-W-L-W-L-W-L-W-L-W-L-W-L-W). Newark fell into follow-the-bouncing-ball mode two weeks ago with a 10-4 win over D.C. and ended it Sunday when they defeated Philly, 5-2, to finally win a second straight game. The previous '06 record for a streak-less streak was nine games, set by three teams -- Hillsborough (7/21-7/29), Newark (3/28-4/7) and Philly (3/19-3/28). The longest active streak is seven games, being endured by South Boston... Perhaps the most famous "bounce streak" in DMBL history also was compiled by the Sugar Bears, who alternated wins and losses in 10 consecutive playoff games in 2003 -- starting in Game 4 of the second round with a 4-1 win over Carolina and ending with a 5-3 loss to Arkansas in Game 7 of the World Series.

Third and Long: Did you know that Saturday's games marked the end of the league's third quarter? Most teams have about 40 games to go, putting us into the home stretch. But before we start looking ahead, let's take one last look back at how the third quarter unfolded in an all-new edition of Number Crunch With Cecil Fielder.

Ensberg -- For Natural Male Enhancement

Marietta's Morgan Ensberg is only hitting .268, but he's suddenly burst onto the scene as one of the best sluggers in baseball as he's tied for the league lead in home runs (36) and runs batted in (102), plus he's got the league's longest active hitting streak at 22 games! He's not exactly a household name, but Ensberg soon will be if he keeps racking up free steaks. For the third time this season, the Mites' third baseman was named the OmahaSteaks.com Batter of the Week after leading the league in home runs (6), OPS (1.841), slugging percentage (1.308), total average (2.714), secondary average (1.000), extra base hits (9), total bases (34), runs created (18.7), RC/27 (36.0), isolated power (.846) and AB/HR (4.3) -- not to mention a .462 batting average, .533 on-base percentage, 8 runs and 9 runs batted in! "See the ball, hit the ball," is all Ensberg has to say about his streak of hits in 22 consecutive games. He's tied with Honolulu's Johnny Damon for the third-longest streak of the year. The two longer ones, 24 games and 29 games, both belong to Vancouver's Michael Young, who had a pretty good week of his own (.385, 1.139 OPS, 2 HR, 6 R).

This week's other top batters: Arkansas's Kenny Lofton (.412, .944 OPS, 1 3B, 4 R, 5 SB); Carolina's Travis Hafner (.500, 1.590 OPS, 4 HR, 10 RBI); D.C.'s Alfonso Soriano (.345, 1.146 OPS, 3 HR, 7 R); Hillsborough's Ryan Howard (.421, 1.239 OPS, 2 HR, 3 RBI); Hoboken's Omar Vizquel (.368, 1.041 OPS, 2 2B, 3 R, 1 SB); Las Vegas's Pat Burrell (.400, 1.055 OPS, 3 2B, 7 RBI); Newark's Bobby Abreu (.444, 1.373 OPS, 3 HR, 9 RBI); Phoenix's Ichiro Suzuki (.469, 1.025 OPS, 1 3B, 6 R, 3 SB); and Vancouver's David Ortiz (.296, 1.144 OPS, 4  HR, 7 RBI).

Rockin' Roger

Most weeks you can make a case for several hurlers to win the coveted Pitcher of the Week Award, and we're often surprised as the votes come in from around the country at the many candidates selected. But this week, it was nearly unanimous as Roger Clemens cruised his way to the award for the second time this season. The Rocketman was the only starting pitcher to win both his starts this week, and he did so in amazing fashion -- giving up just 1 earned run and 3 hits combined in the two victories! Clemens also walked 5 but struck out 12 and didn't allow an extra base hit. Almost all the damage, such as it was, came in his first start, a 4-3 win against 1st-place Newark. Clemens allowed just 1 run, 2 hits and 1 walk to the powerful Sugar Bear lineup and struck out 6 in 6.2 innings to pick up the victory. He followed that up with a 4-0 win over Westwood, yielding just 1 hit and 4 walks while stirking out 6 in 6.0 innings. Clemens's two starts earned him the How Star Wars IV Should Have Ended Pitcher of the Week Award. On the season, the 43-year-old starter is building a strong case to become the first pitcher to ever win the Ben McDonald Award for two different teams (his won it in '93 with the Austin Outlaws). He leads the league in ERA (2.41), runners per 9 (8.4), quality start percentage (.760) and OPS allowed (.535) -- in fact, he's swept the board, leading the league in batting average allowed (.187), slugging percentage allowed (.296) and on-base percentage allowed (.239). He's also tied for 1st in quality starts (19), is 3rd in innings (172.0), is tied for 4th in shutouts (2), is 5th in strikeouts (143), and is tied for 8th in wins (12) and winning percentage (.667).

This week's other top starters: Hoboken's Jae Seo (1-0, 1.23 ERA, 8.6 R/9, 4 BB, 11 K in 14.2 IP); Honolulu's Roy Oswalt (complete-game win: 1 ER, 7 H, 1 BB, 7 K in 9.0 IP); Marietta's A.J. Burnett (1-1, 4 R, 1 ER, 8 H, 3 BB, 16 K in 16.0 IP; shutout); Phoenix's Noah Lowry (1-0, 2.57 ERA, 10.3 R/9, 5 BB, 11 K in 14.0 IP); South Boston's Chris Carpenter (1-0, 1.42 ERA, 12.1 R/9, 7 BB, 14 K in 12.2 IP); and Vancouver's Jake Peavy (1-0, 2.77 ERA, 11.1 R/9, 6 BB, 15 K in 13.0 IP).

Exit Sandman

After dominating the race for the Dennis Eckersley Award as the Rolaids Reliever of the Year for almost the entire first half of the year, Marietta's Mariano Rivera suddenly finds himself in 3rd place in relief points (45) and tied for 2nd in saves (22). Ironically, Rivera was doing a lot better when his team was struggling to get out of the league basement. In fact, during a recent run when the Mites won 10 out of 11, Rivera had just one save. During that streak, Marietta out-scored their opponents, 91-59... Your new front runner is Philly's Francisco Rodriguez, who was a perfect 3-for-3 this week (0 R, 3 H, 0 BB, 6 K in 4.0 IP) to claim the lead in saves (25) and relief points (49). Also sneaking ahead of Rivera was Las Vegas's Arthur Rhodes, who picked up 3 saves (0 R, 2 H, 1 BB, 7 K in 5.0 IP) to take 2nd on the reliever standings board.

Relief Points Standings - July 23
Reliever	ERA	W	SV	L	BS	Pts
F.Rodriguez,PHI	3.77	4	25	4	5	49
Rhodes, LV	2.37	4	21	2	2	46
M.Rivera,MAR	2.45	5	22	4	5	45
B.Wagner, VAN	2.26	2	21	2	4	40
Isringhausen,HBK	2.96	1	22	4	4	38
C.Cordero, HIL	4.70	2	20	5	5	34
Turnbow, HON	2.47	2	18	5	1	34
Lidge, ARK	2.88	1	18	5	3	30
Ryan, WWD	2.20	6	12	5	1	30
Shields, NWK	3.72	7	11	2	5	29

This week's other top relievers: Arkansas's Brad Lidge (2 SV, 0 ER, 5 H, 1 BB, 8 K in 5.1 IP); Hillsborough's Giovanni Carrara (2 SV, 0 R, 4 H, 0 BB, 1 K in 4.1 IP); Hoboken's Jason Isringhausen (3 SV, 0 R, 1 H, 0 BB, 4 K in 4.0 IP) and Neal Cotts (2 W, 0 R, 1 H, 0 BB, 1 K in 3.0 IP); South Boston's Huston Street (1 W, 1 SV, 1 ER, 3 H, 2 BB, 5 K in 4.2 IP); Vancouver's Billy Wagner (2 SV, 0 R, 1 H, 2 BB, 4 K in 3.0 IP) and Brendan Donnelly (2 W, 0 R, 1 H, 1 BB, 5 K in 3.0 IP); and Westwood's B.J. Ryan (1 W, 2 SV, 0 R, 4 H, 1 BB, 4 K in 6.0 IP).

Trouble At The Top

Several playoff contenders were bit by the injury bug this week. The Rat Pack felt a double-whammy when outfielder Reggie Sanders and pitcher Rich Harden each were struck down for about a week. While the loss of the two key players will be felt, they can at least take solace in the fact that the team they're trying to catch, the Sugar Bears, lost their fourth player in as many weeks when pitcher Chien-Ming Wang joined outfielder Manny Ramirez, shortstop Carlos Guillen and utility infielder Damion Easley on the shelf. Wang could miss the rest of the regular season as he attempts to straighten out a speeding ticket issued by Detective Mick Belker. At least the Sugar Bears got some good news last week when they welcomed back Ramirez. Newark's bad luck with injuries even extends beyond their own roster as the recently traded Orlando Cabrera went absent-without-leave from his new team, the Deductions. It turns out he'd been making regular dental appointments while he was stuck in Newark's minors, and no one seemed to care. But now he's the only shortstop on the Deductions' roster, so he's kind of hard to miss... Meanwhile, Arkansas's playoff hopes took a hit when Coco Crisp went on the 15-day D.L. with a foot problem... All these high-profile players from playoff teams going down with injuries was too much for D.C.'s Matt Holliday to bear. "Who cares about me? It wouldn't even make the papers if I got hit by a bus," he sighed. "We're at the bottom of the standings, I'm hitting .258 and worst of all, I had Wang and Crisp on my rotisserie team. Life sucks."

Hellos and Good-Byes

With the deadline for trades and protectable free agents behind us, several teams decided it was time to cut bait with flunked prospects and fading veterans: The Mighty Men dumped 27-year-old first baseman Lance Niekro, Vancouver released 35-year-old lefty Eddie Guardado, and Philly cut 29-year-old outfielder Jason Lane.

Teams in need of reinforcements called on familiar faces. The Golden Falcons re-signed infielder Abraham Nunez for the third time this season, only to release him two days later and pick up Odalis Perez, who they hope will be more successful in Arkansas than he was in Vancouver. The Sugar Bears brought back reliever Chris Reitsma just four days after cutting him. And the Mighty Men became the third team this year to call on the services of lefty-masher Matt LeCroy. In fact, the only first-timer picked up this week was Dustan Mohr, signed by the Rat Pack.