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(This post gets +1, and if it gets on base the next post also gets a +1, or +2 if it’s an extra base hit.)
Hey, look at that, I’m not about to collectively murder my diceball team this week! Winning 5 of 7 and two straight series will do that. It beats a (checks notes again) 1-5 midseason road trip that at one point put the Nocturnes in dead last! With 3 games left, Brooklyn is still 1.5 GB of the last wild card spot, where Lincoln (6 games left) and Anchorage are tied (4 games left). We would also need to jump Boston (7 games left) and their MVP candidate Bert Hilderbrand, who has already set the single-season home run record with 16. In 23 games thus far. The previous record was 14. (Hilderbrand also leads the league in: runs (T-1, 29, 2 away from breaking the record), RBI (33, 5 away), slugging (.888, over 100 points ahead of the record), and OPS (1.305, over 60 points ahead), so yeah, I’d say he’s the position player to beat.) Boston, if you recall, was the other team in the 17-inning game I mentioned way back when I actually did these monthly. Buuut, they took the other two games in the series, so unless I manage to pull just a two-way tie with Anchorage out of those teams, I’d be SOL. (As part of that 1-5 road trip was getting swept by Lincoln. No Nocturnes starter made it out of the 3rd inning before being removed due to 6-run rule.)
So, do you have anyone leading the league in anything?
As a matter of fact yes!
-Ritzy Chambers leads the league in walks with 23. (Lloyd Days of Hazleton seems the most game challenger with 21, and 4 games in hand to make up the deficit.)
-Smokey Roberts leads with 13 doubles, one ahead of Anchorage’s Dallas Fairchild (who has 1 in hand, 4 games left).
-Elton Hallenback might not get one of the three All-Dice SP slots after a rough start in Game 3 agains Harrisville bumped his ERA outside of the top 5 (where he gave up 4 runs in 6 innings, but did get the win, his 6th, tying him for 2nd), but he does lead the league in strikeouts with 74.
-Thanks to Roberts and others in the top 10, Brooklyn leads the league with 61 doubles, though Fayetteville and Lincoln, with 3 in hand, may catch up.
-On the pitching end of things, thanks to the 17-inning game we’ve thrown the most innings. This is not saying very much, because again, most games played so far due to our bye being at the end of the season. (That’s why other teams have so many games in hand—Brooklyn has in all 9 series of the season, having the bye at the end in Series 11. The only other teams that haven’t had their byes yet: Delco, Anchorage, and New York.)
-But it does mean we’re the first team to 300 pitching strikeouts! (We’re also leading with the most strikeouts at bat, but that’s a lot closer and will no longer be the case by the end of this series unless Anchorage doesn’t strike out at all their next game.) But the 300 Ks are legit, as the staff leads in K/9.
So, what’s needed now?
Well, being where we are playoff wise, it’s not looking ideal and some of those 1-run losses being wins would have gone a long way—4-7 in 1-run games is rough looking at a pennant race, where flipping the record is a 3-game swing and would be the difference between the outside looking in and a little bit of a cushion not only in the wild card race but the division. Realistically, it would take a sweep in the final series, plus Anchorage losing their last series, plus Lincoln losing their last two series, plus Boston would need a split or worse in their final two series, for me to sneak in as the 6 seed. Which would earn Brooklyn… a one-game playoff against the 5 seed (currently Hazleton), for the winner to play a 3-game Wild Card series against the 4 seed (currently the River Heights Sleuths, if anyone can guess the reference!), just to get into the playoffs proper. And yes, a loss doesn’t automatically doom me, but it would make the math just so much harder. So, into this final series, the Battle On Long Island against the New York Titans, it’s basically going game by game. We play today, we win today. Das it.
Speaking of playing today and winning today…
NHL Playoffs
Ice Alouettes vs. Icedacteds (MTL vs. WSH, 7:00, ESPN) (ELIMINATION GAME: Capitals lead 3-1)
Florida Men vs. Other Florida Men (FLA vs. TBL, 7:30, ESPN) (ELIMINATION GAME: Panthers lead 3-1)
Play Gloria, I guess? vs. Playoff Helly… (STL vs. WPG, 9:30, ESPN) (Series tied 2-2)
NBA Playoffs (where we aren’t firing Thibs… yet)
…Who’s on the Rockets anyway? (No seriously) vs. Steph, Jimmy, & Pals (HOU vs. GS, 7:30, TNT) (ELIMINATION GAME: Warriors lead 3-1)
Justice for Julius Randle! vs. Luka’s Food Bill (MIN vs. LAL, 10:00, TNT) (ELIMINATION GAME: Timberwolves lead 3-1)
Pierre Polievre’s Political Career Memorial Canadian Championship (Prelims)
Toronto FC vs. CF MONTRÉAL (like the REDBLACKS) (7:00, FS2)
CONCACAF Cup: Until we’re excluded from the rest of CONCACAF, doing like our new best friends just west of the Bering Strait. Yes, even though the World Cup is here.
Bitin’ Suarezes vs. Vancouver (8:00, FS1)
Enjoy, until we’re all sent to Urinetown! Which is to say there is no Urinetown, you just kill them. (In El Salvador, for “legal” reasons.)
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