Week 9 Summary

The news that shocked baseball and all of America this week was the shooting of Phillies first baseman Eddie Waitkus (bio) at a hotel room in Chicago. Waitkus will miss the remainder of this season but will come back and play through 1955, including playing 140+ games in each of the next three seasons.  Waitkus is currently leading the NL in hitting (.370) and first in on-base percentage (.469), is second in doubles (19), and third in multi-hit games (24). It will take a few weeks yet but eventually, he will fall off the charts due to lack of appearances. Dick Sisler will get his opportunity as the Phillies first baseman.

Joe Gordon

The last two weeks have seen a lot of player movement, including trades and players either called up or sent down to the minors. Injuries have begun to accumulate, affecting lineups choices as well. There are still a lot of tightly bunched spots in the standings and everyone is looking for that little advantage to make their mark. Teams have all passed the 50 games mark and by the end of this coming week will be at the 60 game mark so if teams want to make a charge now is the time before it is too late.

Boston didn't have a particularly good week as they lost three at home to Cleveland but ended the week with the same 9.5 game lead over New York that last week ended with. Ted Williams and Vern Stephens have combined for 41 homeruns, more than all AL teams except New York and Cleveland. New York's pitching continued to show improvement and their slugging is beginning to come around, but they are having a hard time making any leeway against Boston. Cleveland recovered from a couple of bad weeks and is now 1.5 games behind New York. The Indians sluggish offense has shown some signs of life, but they are having problems keeping a healthy team on the field. Detroit is in fourth place but is still reeling from having lost five games to Washington, including being swept in two doubleheaders by the Senators. Philadelphia is right behind the Tigers, but seem to be stuck in neutral as sometimes they play well, sometimes they just roll over. Washington has moved into sixth place based on the strength of their current eight-game winning streak. Senators pitching is third in the AL in ERA … that's gonna be tough to maintain. Chicago is going the opposite direction, having gone 1-9 over their last ten games. The White Sox have made a lot of roster adjustments and they are still sorting things out. St. Louis finally hit an extended rough spot, having gone 2-8 over their last ten games. Wsh9ngton and Chicago are both well within their sites though.

Enos Slaughter

The NL saw some standings shake-up also, but not at the top as St. Louis maintained a 5.0 game lead over second place New York. The Cardinals went 3-3 over the week, but only lost one game in their lead in the standings. New York has plenty of power and starting pitching to go around, but are still looking for answers at second base and shortstop. Boston has been swapping spots with New York recently but are having getting a standard lineup on the field recently. Boston's real nightmare may be what they see in their rearview mirror - Brooklyn went 6-0 this past week as they took three from St. Louis and then three from Chicago and moved up past Philadelphia into fifth place. Philadelphia had been on a slide before Waitkus was disabled, but that certainly didn’t help. Cincinnati jumped past Pittsburgh to take sixth place as their revamped lineup seems to be playing better, but the real story here is Pittsburgh's continued slide down the standings. They too have made a lot of roster changes and are struggling to find some sort of winning combination. The Cubs have changed managers and moved their roster and lineup around, but it probably won’t be enough to get them out of last place.

This was a rough week for batting leaders in both leagues. There are no more .400 hitters but George Kell (.384) still leads the AL, over Ted Williams (.362) and Vic Wertz (.359). Teammates Kell (88) and Wertz (84) lead in hits, just ahead of Eddie Joost (77). Williams has the lead in runs scored (60), leading Joost (54) and Dom DiMaggio (52). In RBI's it's Vern Stephens (63), Williams (62), and Sam Chapman (54). Kell now leads in doubles (18) over Joost (17) and Hank Majeski (16). It's Stephens (23) and Williams (18) on the top of the homerun race, followed by Tommy Henrich (17). There are seven players trailing with between ten and twelve homeruns, but so far it has been a three man race. Boston teammates Mel Parnell (10-2) and Ellis Kinder (9-1) sit on the top in wins, but New York teammates Eddie Lopat (8-2) and Vic Raschi (8-5) are closing in.

Warren Spahn

The aforementioned Eddie Waitkus (.370) leads the NL in hitting over Enos Slaughter (.366) and Harry Walker (.362). Stan Musial, Jackie Robinson, and Richie Ashburn all have 77 hits, with Del Ennis right behind at 76. Ralph Kiner leads in runs scored (55) over teammates Red Schoendienst and Musial, both with 49. Kiner also leads in RBI's but is now tied with Ennis and Robinson, all with 52. Ennis leads in doubles (20) ahead of Waitkus (19) with Marv Rickert and Duke Snider trailing them, both with 15. Andy Pafko (17) took over the homerun lead as Kiner (15) and Hank Sauer (14) have been quiet recently. Warren Spahn (11-1), Harry Brecheen (10-2) and Sheldon Jones (10-2) continue to leads in wins.

This past week was a good one for the pitchers. League ERA's and batting averages tightened up in both leagues. Homeruns are still ahead of projections, but that number is down as well. There are plenty of good pitchers in this replay, but there are more low-graded pitchers and a team's fortunes rise and fall on the vagaries of how a low graded pitcher will perform in any particular game. Boston (AL) has had a lot of good fortune so far, but I am thinking that won’t last. And as the counterpoint of this, Washington only has low graded pitchers, has poor fielding, but is currently third in the AL in ERA and is riding the crest of an eight game winning streak. I don't think that will last either.

Brooklyn finally broke out of their doldrums and went on a winning streak. Now, can they keep it up? They have good pitching, defense, and hitting, but seemed to experience a lot of bad luck early in the season. That has a way of working itself out over the course of a season though, and I am sure Boston and New York can feel the Dodgers creeping up on them. So what's going to happen in Week 10? Let's go find out …