We are one week - well, a week and a half - in! Standings weirdness will be standings weirdness, although we're already beginning to see the wheat get separated from the chaff. Yikes, the Reds do not look good so far. The Yankees I think have lost some close-ish games but nope, they and the Royals legit have the two worst fun differentials in the American League so maybe they're just not very good. I keep having to say that it's still early because it is. The top of the standings are maybe more indicative - the Brewers are 7-4? The Cubs have the best record in the NL?
April 15: Soo.... correct me if I'm wrong but this does not look like the actual 1974 Topps. It's in the master baseball cards template file and I'm gonna stick with it because it does look very, very 1970s...
The very first AL Player of the Week award goes to the White Sox' Josh Wade (.600, 1, 8). The 30 year old Wade terrorized opposing pitchers to the tune of 13 hits in 19 at-bats, a homerun, 4 runs scored, and 7 RBIs. Even though it doesn't show me having made a card for him in the past, I'm seeing that Wade wonthis award once in the past in the week ending June 22, 1970 (maybe I hadn't been showing cards yet? I think I did that from the get-go though). In any case, Wade had an awesome big week. Good for him!
In the NL, the award winner and wooow Miami Vice star apparently was Atlanta Braves 1B Peter Frampton (.419, 3, 8), who hit .455 (10-22) with 3 HRs, 9 runs scored, and 7 RBIs. Frampton's only a second year guy in this league and so this is his very first - but surely not his last - Player of the Week award.
April 17: In today's game at Veteran's Stadium, Cardinals 1B Lorenzo Martinez (.304, 5, 10) became the 2nd player in major league history to hit 500 homeruns. Unfortunately for his team, neither #500 - a 2-run blast in the top of the 1st - nor his 2nd homer of the night were enough to take down the Phillies, who rallied late to win this one 6-3. "Lorenzo's been a real thorn in our side all these years" said Phillies bench coach Romain Reni. "I'm glad we got past him but man I'd love to, you know, not give up homers." Martinez has a .274 career average with 1,708 hits, 1,313 RBIs, and now 501 HRs.
April 20: Hey hey hey another big hitting streak, this time by the Mets' Barry "The Ritz" Cooper (.367, 0, 5). The Ritz was 2-5 with a double and 2 runs scored in a 4-3 loss to the Pirates. Cooper has hit in all 11 Mets games this year plus the last 9 of last season. "I'd have liked it more if we won the game", said Cooper after the game, "but I'm a million dollar trooper".
April 21: Ah, theeeeeeere's the 1970s Sunday baseball I know and love: everyone's playing and there are 14 games in all including double-headers between the Yankees and Orioles and the Padres and (terrible) Reds (2-10 right now!). I'm not saying I miss double-headers; it seems like a lot of baseball to watch in one day and I'm a baseball fan. I'm just saying, it's an interesting wrinkle to throw into the mix. I have rotations set to 4 man even though the game defaults to 5 man and Sundays are a big part of why - I still have a lot of teams running out 5 man rotations anyway and days like this I'll have to use emergency starters on a lot of teams with 4 man rotations.
Both the O's and Yankees, for example, though, weren't expected to be very good this year and so came out riding with 4 man starting staffs (staves?). As such, boom, no emergency starter required. I still expect them to have to push their starters to not blow up their respective bullpens (that's a thing the game seems to love to do, by the way, murder the pen in Game 1).
April 21: Are the Brewers actually kind of good? They completed a 2 game sweep of the defending world champion Detroit Tigers in Detroit with an 11-1 rout. Newly acquired ace SP Andy Ring (1-1, 3.38) threw a 7-hit complete game and a surprising Brewers lineup knocked Tigers SP Martin Buchan (2-1, 2.00, and that ERA looks low only because 5 of the runs he allowed today were unearned). Singing 2B Lionel Richie (.289, 2, 12) led the way with 3 hits in 4 at-bats, including a 2-run HR off of mop-up man Chris McGranahan (0-0, 11.57), a double, and 4 RBIs in total. "I like to think that when it comes to our team," Richie said after the game, "we are the world." The win, at least for now, puts the Brewers in a virtual tie with the Tigers atop the AL East.
April 21: In other weirdly good early-season news, the Cubs doubled up the Phillies at the Vet today, 6-3, to take a game and a half lead over the Mets in the NL East. Yeah, it's super duper early, but Chicago should be spurred on by the excellent performance of new SP Mick Fleetwood (2-0, 2.78), who struck out nine batters in 6.2 innings before giving way to the Cubs' bullpen. Chicago's hitters KO'd Chris Olivares (0-2, 5.18), who was 19-4 last year, after 5 innings, with 1B Antonio Lopez (.283, 3, 9) belting a 3 run HR in the effort. "They were using a lot of backups today," said Cubs bench coach Sal Sifontes, never one to puff his team up too much, after the game. "I'm glad Mick could get it going tonight though. He's gonna make me eat my words about how rock and roll men can never become effective pitchers in this league."