Would like to see you end up in a league with all 5 boroughs being represented by their own Bombers. Have yet to see Manhattan, Queens, or Staten Island Bombers though.

Ha! I haven't... other boroughs have often tried to imitate the Bronx... however never duplicated :D

All jokes aside, I would love this challenge! :) If the other boroughs see this, let me know and I'll add them to my friends list and we can get this challenge done! ;)

The Raccoons, abjectly, terrifyingly inept since time immemorial, had an 11-game losing streak at the end of June that once and again ruined any hope of them one day, some day, being something else than other team's door mat. Currently 47-57 and with no hope. As usual.

The Rebels continue to make no PP at all. Last season was already terrible, this year somehow is a little worse. They're somehow still over .500, 54-49, six games out.

Accountants have fallen two games out of the lead at 62-42, but hold a wild card by 7 1/2 games, which is little consolation for a team that routinely forgets how to breath come October…

P437: 2/3 of the Way Home
 

Huntley had another great month; Singapore still has the best record and run differential; Carolina, impressively, is still right on the Sluggers' heels (4.5 games off their pace); but the story of July was the San Antonio Cotton Rats, who reminded everyone that they are a 4-time Perfect League champion, thank you very much, with a 21-3 record, including a still-active 13-game winning streak. If neither team can catch the Sluggers, the Dirtbags and Cotton Rats, besides sounding like a band that had a #1 hit on the country charts in the '90s, are primed for quite the Division Series showdown.

For the Red Raiders, newly acquired Ivan Rodriguez is off to a decent start, with an 89 OPS+ and, more importantly, a CS% of 53.8, ZR of +1.3, and CERA of 2.36. But the real story for Huntley is 2-fold:

- The outfield, paced by strong bounce-back seasons from Ken Griffey Jr (last year OPS+/WAR: 105/3.6; this year to date: 161/4.9) and Christian Yelich (last year: 104/2.9; this year, 150/4.3) and the fantastic debut of late-May acquisition Hank Aaron (OPS+ 174, WAR 1.2, in 29 games [18 starts])

- The pitching staff, with the starters sporting 4 of the top 5 ERAs and 4 of the top 6 WARs in the NC, and the bullpen, featuring stellar work from the late-inning trio of Eck (2.01 ERA, 213 ERA+, 11 holds), Gagne (1.85 ERA, 231 ERA+, 21/22 saves), and Smith (10-0, 0.33 ERA, 1309 ERA+ [!!!]...and a blown save and loss in the All-Star Game, but that doesn't count and is totally not an ill omen, so who cares, right? Right?)

Today's Odd 1-Run Fact: Huntley has lost 5 games so far in July. The percentage of those losses that were by 1 run is...100% (5-4, 5-4, 3-2, 3-2, 2-1). So, year-to-date, the Red Raiders are 15-15 in 1-run games.

Standings...

Paragon City Heroes 60-47, only all stars were Cronin and Maddux, bought 96 rated Biggio to play 2b and Live Verlander to replace Clevinger in the rotation

Bad News Bulldogs have sunk to 3rd from bottom in the league at 42-65. Not really much else to say

Neuman Furshlugginers are a real Jekyll and Hyde team, they surge and slump all of the time, currently on a 4 game losing streak but leading the division at 56-48. Suttles and Jefferies were the only all stars, Jefferies is already 20/20 and leading the team in RBI

Let's do a 9-team post-ASB review. This will be painful in some spots.

New York Patriots (G350, OL): 60-44, 1st in NC East. Despite leading their division by 4.5 games, the Patriots have hit the skids lately as losers of their last 4. A prolonged slump could spell doom for this team, so it's of utmost importance that they wake up and start winning again.

Brooklyn Dynasty (P406, Whale Hell 2.0): 54-52, 3rd in NC Central. Brooklyn has seemingly run out of gas after a decent first half, their lack of spending catching up with them. Knowing how loaded the league is this week, the goal was merely to avoid relegation, and while they should do that without too many problems, they will be very disappointed to sink to irrelevance for a second straight season.

Connor Joe Appreciation Society (S291, Meme): 60-47, 1st in NC West. The Society are hanging on for dear life as they essentially try to win games with 8 competent ballplayers in their lineup...and Connor Joe (.176, 3 HR, 29 RBI).

Blitzkrieg Boppers (P407, OL): 38-67, last in NC Central. The Boppers have been relegation-threatened all season, but have come to life in the 2nd half, starting out 7-3. After a sale of J.R. Richard, the Boppers took a gamble on packs. They won by acquiring pitchers Mel Rojas and Johan Santana, as well as acquiring relievers Jeff Montgomery and Phil Regan via auction house. As much as 12 games off safety at one point, the Boppers have fought back to 7 games back of survival, and if they can remain over .500 for the second half, there may be a chance to achieve the greatest of great escapes.

Northeast Corridor Capitals (S313, OL): 49-58, 4th in AC West. To sum it up, this team sucks. The best players for the theme are pretty much unreachable unless the luck is insane, which it isn't. While still above the relegation cutline, they are hurdling perilously close to it. This is just a very bad team across the board, and there's nothing that can be done to fix it for awhile.

Metuchen Mariners (D397, Pack Only): 53-51, 3rd in AC East. After some fortuitous pack acquisitions (100 Mike Schmidt, 89 Barry Bonds, 85 Cecil Travis, 93 Felipe Vazquez, 96 Kirby Yates, and 94 Aroldis Chapman), the Mariners look like a much improved squad, even if their record doesn't show it. The reason for that is the training of Cecil Travis at 2nd base, which has taken a little longer than expected. Once he's reached sufficient competency after this season, the Mariners defense will be a lot stronger. For now, they just have to deal with it.

Raleigh Rage (S262): 61-46, 1st in AC West. Points were hard to come by today for the Rage, but they've managed to jump out to a 3 game lead in their division. Raleigh's been buoyed by their excellent bullpen, which has pitched to a combined 2.90 ERA. Pack acquisition Rich Gossage (96 OVR) has 13 saves and a 2.49 ERA.

St. John's Steelheads (I187, Pack Only): 69-36, 1st in NC Central. Their pack luck continues to be non-existent, but they are still on track for their 5th straight playoff appearance. It's just too bad they tend to forget they're baseball players in October.

Steelport Saints (S313, OL): 47-61, last in NC West. Despite hitting on some packs lately, the Saints have been very disappointing. Their latest hit came tonight as they added Bert Blyleven (97 OVR). If the Saints are to avoid relegation back to bronze, pitchers not named Lefty Grove (13-4, 2.22) will have to show some sort of competence.

As expected my first season in Diamond is a disaster. My team has the worst record in the league and clearly isn't ready for Diamond. On top of that I have only earned about 2k PP so far this week. I guess the only thing I can do now is to hope I get relegated :p

The Mighty Orcins caught up to take a share of the division lead last night. I expect your team to take the division in the long run, your defense & pitching are both better than mine, offenses are both pretty good/even overall. Waittilnextyear should take his division as well.

I swapped to a more offensive team for this season and moved to just 5 guys in the bullpen for an extra bat on top of that. But it's driven me nuts all week to be in the lower 3rd in def_eff/BABIP and to have a negative zone rating as a team, so maybe I'll shuffle a couple of guys around over the next couple of weeks after some cards sell on the AH. Outfield defense should be good enough when position training is completed, but infield defense needs a little help.

You made me take a close look, and it is surprising. The defense looks better on paper than it has performed. Appling and Trammell in particular should have better numbers. Some of those guys might just be having off years, but it would nag at me also to see a negative team zone rating. I'm not sure who I would change there, but I am sure you will come up with something.

I have now lost 21 of 31 1-run games.

I suppose that's OK...because I did go 48-12 in such affairs one season.

New week, new year, new team, something like that. Same manager.

Looks like the Starkville Thunder Cats won't be able to make a late season run with that 11-106 record :p

Chris Carpenter No Hitter. :ohmy::p:laugh:
https://i.postimg.cc/xCb3Vgk4/no41.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/nLNq27dY/no42a.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/hj9Q0YQc/no42b.jpg

From 5th to 1st, but still as tight as it was 2 days ago :ohmy:

I won 21 in a row today and I STILL can't shake those LyinCheatin Senators!

Attachment 646780

They're an impressive bunch.

Racking up the wins almost lately...I believe they were 2-65 or something...one sec...

3-58
...
5-76

so 6-30 in their last 36.

I noticed most of the team is mid-bronzes.

Yeah, they're now 11-118, on a 30-game losing streak, with a history of tanking to get back to Diamond...and now reported because this is just freaking ridiculous; at least try! :angry:

The way I saw it they don't believe they can play in Perfect level.
If they try they might not make it back to diamond.
And you can't fault them for winning diamond/getting promoted.

But I'm not 100% sure about the details of their history.

The proof they might not be able to compete in Perfect is that their "OK" squad almost got to the halfway point of the season with 2 wins.

They are not running an "OK" squad in Perfect. They have 24 Bronzes and an Iron on their active roster, and 2 Perfects, 25 Diamonds, and numerous Golds and Silvers on their reserve roster.

I don't fault them for winning Diamond and getting promoted--I congratulate them! That's an awesome achievement! Plenty of dominant teams have no Diamond League championship icons. I fault them for giving up in Perfect after 1 year, at the most, each time they're promoted and then tanking. They won a Diamond League championship in 2026 with a 104-58 record, and then went 71-91 in their first year in Perfect. The next year? 48-114 and relegated. They were only in Diamond for 1 year before being promoted. First year back in Perfect, they went 80-82. The next year? 45-117 and relegated. Again, only in Diamond for 1 year (went 101-61), and then in Perfect: 41-121 and relegated (tanked right away that time!). Back in Diamond for 1 year, and then in Perfect: 74-88, followed by 33-129 and relegated. It took 4 years for them to get back to Perfect (some bad luck in there--won 100 games 2 weeks in a row in Diamond without getting promoted), and then last week in Perfect, they went 77-85. And this week...yeah.

Starting pitchers on their reserve roster: 98 Mordecai Brown, 96 Ben Sheets, 94 Billy Pierce, 93 Blake Snell, 92 Zack Greinke. Starting rotation on active roster: 67 Mike Harkey, 67 Ken Holtzman, 67 Daniel Mengden, 67 Jacob Waguespack...wait, maybe they're doing a "67" theme team?...nope, 65 Adam Wainwright. Same story for the bullpen and lineup.

I apologize for airing this all out, and I'm sure I will regret doing this in the morning, but this is tanking, plain and simple, and it's a damper on an otherwise very fun P437 league.

I hear ya, Jason! Tanking is tanking.

The 'Glou, with 1 perfect, 8 diamonds, 11 gold, 3 silvers and 2 bronze on their active roster (and 1 diamond on the reserve roster - Bryce Harper, bought for mission purposes; I can't see me ever playing him), are somehow 67-66 with 1 day to play in August, and are actually 2 games below pythag.

We are currently 3 games ahead in the 2nd wildcard, our 664 runs the 3rd-most in our conference. Our pitching has benefited from Dykstra's addition, with Trout now playing LF everyday and backing up CF every 4th day. We have conceded 636 runs, 7th.

Trout leads the league in dingers, with 31, but is only the 3rd-best Trout in the conference in WAR, with 5.3.

I don't expect us to stay above .500 or in the wildcard on the run home. We have 6 games in September against the Cottage Grove Tube Sox, 4-time PL champs and with a 90-42 record so far (only good enough for the first wildcard in our conference, however). We also have 4 games against our division leader, the East Rutherford Swamp Dogs (75-58). In our favor, however, are the 10 games we have against the County Rebels (58-75), and 3 games each against the Vancouver Trailertrash (52-82), the Arizona Blaze (63-71) and the Holy City Saints (61-73).

According to the pennant chase screen, we have a 72.5% chance of making the postseason but I am most skeptical.

Paragon City Heroes have managed to keep rolling and backed up a 16-9 July with a 17-9 August, moving them 7 games up at 78-56. Very happy with the team changes, Lindor ( .788 OPS) is already a 72 rated 3b and Biggio ( .791 OPS) is providing superior defence and speed both are proving big upgrades. In the bullpen we added Eckersley as Closer and he's saved 7 straight. Verlander has started out 4-0. We've just added the final piece to the puzzle hopefully in Erstad, coming in to replace Lonnie Smith who was having a terrible season (.610 OPS)

Bad News Bulldogs had their best month of the season going 13-13 but are still last in their division at 55-78 the 4th worst record in the league. Pitching is still the biggest issue, though Schourek threw his second Maddux of the season and actually has a winning record at 7-5 with a 3.70 era (the lowest era among our other starters is Jim Maloney at 4.98)

Neuman Furshlugginers put together a 17-10 month thanks to a 10 game win streak and are 8 1/2 games up at 74-58 due to great starting pitching and defence. Pretty sure we can still throw away that lead with the way we tend to go on big losing streaks right after a win streak