Week 20 Summary

Week 20 is in the books so the season is 5/6's (83.3%) complete and teams are working through starting to close out season series against their opponents.  No real changes in the standings, although the big news of the week was that on Monday Washington was able to end it's 23 game losing streak. They went on to win two in a row and ended up with three wins on the week as they try to maintain their hold on seventh place over St. Louis (AL). Tomorrow is Labor Day and every team has a doubleheader awaiting them, so after tomorrow every team will be at least be at the 130 game mark except for New York (AL).

Cass Michaels

St. Louis still maintains an 8.5 game lead over second-place Brooklyn in the NL, with a magic number of 17. St. Louis has been in a bit of a lull lately but they still find ways to come out on top. Brooklyn has now scored more runs than St. Louis (719-710) and has allowed fewer runs than St. Louis (511-512) and they have opened a 3.5 game lead over third-place New York, but despite having won eight of their last ten were only able to make up one game on St. Louis. New York's pitching has remained strong, but their "live by the homerun/die by the homerun" offensive philosophy isn't working so well these days. Boston continues to putt along in fourth place, but their regulars are starting to wear thin and wins are a little hard to come by. Philadelphia's offense continues to struggle and they just got swept in a doubleheader on Sunday by Boston and they have doubleheaders in New York both of the next two days. Three doubleheaders in three days will be rough. Pittsburgh would still like to catch and pass their cross-state rival and are only 2.5 games out of fifth place to start the new week. Cincinnati is still maintaining their hold on seventh place over Chicago by a single game, but the Reds have played four fewer games than the Cubs so the race for next-to-last is still wide open.

Boston's magic number in the AL is down to ten and they are currently on a six-game winning streak and it looks like nothing can stop them and Joe McCarthy shows no signs of letting up. Cleveland finds themselves fourteen games behind Boston but after winning seven of their last ten they still couldn't manage to gain any ground on Boston. Cleveland did expand their lead over third-place New York to 3.5 games as the Yankees had an eight-game losing streak that ended in mid-week. Yogi Berra is out for a few more days and Tommy Henrich and Johnny Mize are out for another week or so and nobody else is really stepping out to help Joe DiMaggio in the interim. If they get healthy and get on a hot streak maybe they can recapture second. Detroit is right at .500 and is working hard to stay there, but they still seem to continue to find ways to lose from time to time. Does a full season of poor middle-of-the-infield play really make that much difference? Philadelphia continues to limp along in fifth place but is keeping an eye out for sixth place Chicago that is only 2.5 games behind them. As mentioned above Washington and St. Louis will spend the final four weeks of the season battling for seventh place.

Ted Williams dominates almost every offensive category by this time. Williams leads in batting average (.376) over George Kell (.346) and Bob Dillinger (.344), leads in hits (184) over Vic Wertz (174) and Dale Mitchell (173), in runs (141) over Dom DiMaggio (117) and Vern Stephens (112), and in RBI’s (155) over Stephens (132) and Wertz (100). Kell and Stephens are tied for first in doubles (32) just ahead of Williams and Mickey Vernon, both with 31. Williams also leads in homeruns (47) over Stephens (29) and Tommy Henrich (30). Ellis Kinder (21-3) is the only AL pitcher with twenty or more wins, but Mel Parnell (19-7), Eddie Lopat (18-5) and Bob Lemon (18-9) are getting close.

Roy Smalley

After Sunday’s doubleheader at home versus Cincinnati Enos Slaughter ended the week at .399, well ahead of teammates Stan Musial (.356) and Red Schoendienst (.335). The same three are at the top of the list for hits as well: Slaughter (191), Musial (181), and Schoendienst (175). Ralph Kiner, Musial, and Schoendienst all have 115 runs scored, but Kiner has a big lead in RBI’s (130) over Musial (115) and Bobby Thomson (105). Del Ennis leads in doubles (36) ahead of Cubs teammates Andy Pafko (32) and Roy Smalley (31). Smalley has been on an extra-base hit tear the past several weeks because he is now third in triples with 11, behind Slaughter (15) and Richie Ashburn (13). Warren Spahn (21-5) is the only NL pitcher with twenty or more wins, ahead of Harry Brecheen (19-5) and Don Newcombe (17-6).

I plan to write more on this after the replay is completed, but it seems clear at this point that I will not get enough errors, by a wide margin, and I will not get enough double plays, also by a wide margin. So basically, the fielding is too good to get me the errors, but not good enough to get me the double plays. This is obviously a bit of a conundrum, as I am generally pleased with the fielding results on a daily basis, but I know that as I begin my preparation for 1901 that even though there are two error numbers per card it just won’t be enough. So if I wanted to add in additional errors numbers to the player's cards … how many, which ones, where, to who, plus I want to ensure proper distribution of error number resultants. I’ve got some thoughts on the matter but I haven’t fleshed them all out into a final plan yet. More to come.