## Standings / Recap / Comments
Code:
LEAGUE STANDINGS EAST
Team W L WPct GB R RA
Detroit Tigers 10 4 .714 - 54 32
New York Yankees 8 5 .615 1½ 46 48
Boston Red Sox 7 6 .538 2½ 54 33
Baltimore Orioles 7 7 .500 3 61 52
Milwaukee Brewers 5 6 .455 3½ 47 65
Cleveland Indians 3 12 .200 7½ 48 80
LEAGUE STANDINGS WEST
Team W L WPct GB R RA
Oakland Athletics 8 5 .615 - 58 50
Texas Rangers 6 4 .600 ½ 48 39
Minnesota Twins 6 6 .500 1½ 61 45
Kansas City Royals 7 8 .467 2 61 76
Chicago White Sox 5 6 .455 2 45 48
California Angels 4 7 .364 3 33 48
Code:
LEAGUE STANDINGS EAST
Team W L WPct GB R RA
New York Mets 9 5 .643 - 52 52
Philadelphia Phillies 8 5 .615 ½ 73 65
St. Louis Cardinals 7 6 .538 1½ 63 54
Chicago Cubs 7 7 .500 2 60 59
Pittsburgh Pirates 5 6 .455 2½ 42 40
Montreal Expos 3 10 .231 5½ 65 85
LEAGUE STANDINGS WEST
Team W L WPct GB R RA
San Francisco Giants 13 5 .722 - 85 68
Los Angeles Dodgers 10 7 .588 2½ 56 65
San Diego Padres 8 9 .471 4½ 66 67
Cincinnati Reds 7 9 .438 5 77 80
Atlanta Braves 6 9 .400 5½ 60 58
Houston Astros 6 11 .353 6½ 79 85
Now 2 1/2 weeks in, we can juuuuuust start to see the league shaping out. The Tigers and... Giants(?) are the big boys so far with the Indians, Expos, and Astros in the 10 loss club. Houston to be fair TOOOO BEEEE FAAAAAIR is almost even on runs scored and allowed but to be unfair their ERA is currently sitting at 4.51, 3rd worst in the league and better only than the Reds (4.83) and the Expos (5.57), two teams who've been circling the drain in recent seasons. The Mets are 9-5 with an even runs scored vs against total which even at that seems very ambitious. They did go 6-1 this week including a 3-game sweep of the Expos so hey, good for them.
It's as good a time as any to do my little RECAP of the old LEADERBOARDS, right?
A Minnesota Twin leads the league in average out of the gate... it's Jeff Franks (.383, 2, 5), who did hit .352 in 162 at-bats in 1971, so maybe he's for real, who knows? He's followed, so far, by Red Sox RF Tom Brown (.378, 1, 7) and Tigers SS Rob Curran (.378, 0, 2). Tony Danza so far is hitting .309 - fine, but not "player of the month" levels so far. Twins 1B Angelo Martinez (.286, 5, 14) leads the AL in both HRs and RBIs. 2 other guys have 4 - Detroit's Jose "Joker" Ayala (.340, 4, 10), and the Orioles' Jason Workman (.182, 4, 9), who was supposed to be a big bat so it's nice to see that at least. Oakland's Alex Canales (.324, 3, 11) is the only other ALer with more than 10 RBIs so far. You will be VERY SURPRISED I am sure to know that Alvin Romero (.328, 1, 8) leads the major leagues in steals with 7; nobody else has more than 3 yet.
Pitching of course will be aaaaaaaall over the place early as guys get up here for 2 good starts. Case in point, brand new Twins hurler Ergot Newman (2-0, 0.53), who's given up 1 run over 17 innings so far this year. A familiar face is at #2: Detroit's Jimm Goddard (4-0, 1.07), who's also a co-leader in wins and also has already thrown 33.2 innings in 4 starts. The DH means you never have to pull a starter until they're tired. #3 is of all people Brain Osbourn (2-0, 1.10), the Red Sox' #4 starter. It's hard to see him move up given the awesomeness of the Big 3 but maybe he'll pitch regular innings.
As noted, Goddard also has 4 wins; the only other guy with that many in the junior circuit is Oakland's Vince Akright (4-0, 3.13). Montay Luiso (0-0, 1.26) has pitched a million games so far - okay not literally a million but 9 of Baltimore's first 14 - and he leads the league with 5 saves too, followed by Willis Chavez (0-0, 0.00) with 4. Akright also leads the AL in strikeouts with 22 - the big K guys haven't really shown out just yet, with Edgar Molina (3-1, 2.06) at 19 in 35 IP and 1972 Cy Young winner Michael Pesco (2-2, 1.85) also with 19 (also a weeeeeeird 19 walks - he had control issues last year when he led the league in bases on balls with 134 in 298.1 IP but not like this). Ricky Rosas (2-1, 2.49), the converted reliever who's going for the Twins, is currently 2nd in the AL with 21 Ks.
In the NL, embattled Pittsbugh 3B Alex Flores (.447, 0, 5) is leading the league in hitting and even this is kind of a "slump" because at one point he was I think 15-30 (he's 17-38 currently). That's a whole lot better than the .215 he hit last year, I tell you what. Houston's own 3B Pete Little (.411, 2, 10) is 2nd and yet another third baseman, Mike Morrison (.383, 1, 5) from Atlanta, is 3rd. Morrison is returning from a torn abdominal muscle that forced him to miss all but 20 games in 1972.
Jeremy Taylor (.314, 6, 14) is really picking up from last year with the HRs, leading all comers there and also in RBIs. Several guys are tied at 5 behind him. Luis Martinez (.373, 5, 17) is one of them and is 2nd in the league in RBIs with his work in St. Louis, and Expos LF Willie Ortega (.317, 5, 15) is making things happen himself. He had a good if not super great year in 1970 - .245/16/50 in 457 at-bats between Cincy and Montreal - then got hurt in '71 and just couldn't get PT in '72. Enough about him! Giants LF Jon Berry (.311, 3, 11), the former AL league leader in runs scored, is making the most of a newfound starting job by leading the NL in steals with 6, followed closely by Danny "The Phantom" Seligman (.205, 0, 5), who's picked up 5 in between injuries (he's currently missing games with a strained rib cage that portends to keep out of the lineup for another week).
Fernando Apolonio (3-1, 0.97) is once again sitting on top of the ERA leaderboards and ahead of Jeff Borden's record-setting 1.61. Paz Lemus (1-1, 1.35) qualifying for the ERA crown is probably bigger news than him posting a low ERA but there he is at #2. And in 3rd is Roger Quintana (2-1, 1.53), who's making hay so far in spite of only 12 Ks in 29.1 IP over three starts.
Richard Starkey (4-1, 3.69) is the only man in the NL with as many as 4 wins. He also has 39 IP over 5 games so the man is doing a lot of work early. There's a big old logjam at 3 saves, including but not limited to Lemus. The co-leaders in Ks, at least as of Sunday evening (I say this because one of the guys just started today), are Apolonio and Cincinnati's Steve Waiters (3-1, 2.73), who is also practically the only guy on the Reds who's pitching well. George House (1-2, 4.18) and reigning Cy Young winner Tony Rivera (1-3, 5.17) are tied for 3rd with 23 of them. Rivera just got blown up in the 9th in a 7-5 loss to the Padres; he shouldn't necessarily be completing everything (he threw 20 CGs out of 41 starts last year) but Houston's bullpen is rough.
## Major Transactions
April 16: The Red Sox signed OF/PH Kyle Ship (.232, 3, 20 in 1972). Ship had been the second fiddle as a pinch hitter on the Twins the past few years but they cut him and Mike Grigg down over the offseason. Ship has the rep as a bit of a clubhouse lawyer; hopefully the Red Sox are a tight enough ship that he won't be able to act out.
April 17: The Yankees flexed their budget and purchased SS Akiho Fujimoto (.265, 0, 6). The Giants have been trying to go with youth for a bit now and Fujimoto at 34 doesn't really fit into their longterm plans anyway. The Yankees do already have Jonathan Banks (.370, 0, 1) at short but they don't trust TJ Pritchett (.324, 0, 5) to stay healthy and so they'll do some kind of non-platoon arrangement over there.
April 19: The Dodgers signed OF Greg Cowan (.225, 11, 45). Cowan was pretty bad last year and was a late cut by the Padres out of spring training. He strikes out an awful lot but the Doogs need a veteran left-handed bat off the bench (I feel like he Ks too much for pinch-hitting but we'll see). Brian Eno got just 7 at-bats in so far and will go down to AAA to get more regular PT.
April 19: The Angels traded minor league P Joe Scott (2-1, 4.62 for CAL in 1972) to the Tigers for minor league IF "Ken Kraber" (.242, 1, 4). Scott played for the Angels pretty extensively last year but couldn't make the final cut and, hey, the Tigers could always use more pitching. The Halos get a 234 year old non-prospect utility infielder back. He could eventually find his way into the major leagues, who knows?
April 22: The Braves traded P Roberto Ortiz (0-0, 0.00, 1 Sv) to the Astros for PH/3B Nate Ringstad (.263, 1, 2). Atlanta traded away their longtime third sacker Vicente Luna (.366, 0, 6) to the Mets over the offseason and they're pretty desperate for depth there, so desperate that they'll consider using the career pinch-hitter Ringstad in the mix, and also so desperate that they've decided to trade away their closer in Ortiz. Ortiz is your classic fireballer who at 27 still hasn't learned to actually pitch. Houston's rotation has been reeeeally iffy this year (a 4.62 ERA) so while the price was high, they've got a guy they can slot in in place of Caleb McDonald (2-1, 7.63) at least.
## News
April 16: Excavation begins in South Korea of the Cheonmachong tomb, an ornate internment site for an unknown king who had ruled in the 5th century as a monarch in the Silla Kingdom.
April 16: The first "Player of the Week" award was bestowed upon a MLBer. It had previously been only awarded to NL players. This time, too, an NLer, Jimmy Wynn of the Houston Astros, was awarded the honor. WELL. I've been having PotWs for YEARS, real life! Get with the program!
April 16: SPEAKING OF WHICH, we've got our first-ever Players of the Week of 1973. In the NL it's an oldie but a goodie: Dodgers OF Lou Morgenstern (.406, 2, 5), who went 11 for 21 last week with all of his HRs and RBIs as his team went 6-1. Morgnestern, as you'll recall, was a longtime Twins guy who was traded to California and, after a disappointing year last year, moved on to the other LA team - the first LA team I should say. This is Morgenstern's 5th Player of the Week but his first since 1970. Old dogs can, um, learn to be good!
Also, new snazzy cards! I think I like the 1972 ones better but hey, these are good too.
April 16: I believe I mentioned that Tigers 3B Jose "Joker" Ayala (.357, 4, 7) was off to an unsustainable start. Well, it was unsustainable enough to win him the PotW: Ayala went 9 for 20 with 4 HRs and 6 RBIs. Also 2 errors but look, don't talk about that. This is Ayala's 2nd ever Player of the Week Award; he won his other one in the week ending September 14, 1969.
April 17: Federal Express officially begins operations with the launch of 14 small aircraft from Memphis International Airport. On this night, FedEx delivers 196 packages to 25 US cities from Rochester, New York to Miami, Florida.
April 17: West Germany's counter-terrorist force GSG9 becomes operational. It is created in response to the Munich Olympic disaster last year and will stay in operation after reunification.
April 17: The Morganza Spillway on the Mississippi River is opened for the first time by the US Army Corps of Engineers. Intended to protect the city of New Orleans from catastrophic flooding, it serves to do its job in response to a big flood event this year. I guess it did it because Nawlins won't get flooded out this time, although the opening does flood portions of the Atchafalaya River, which causes the deaths of thousands of cattle and white-tailed deer.
April 17: Some guy named George Lucas (too old lol) begins writing the 13-page treatment for this idea he has called Star Wars.
April 18: Amin al-Hafez is appointed as the new Prime Minister of Lebanon after Saeb Salam's resignation (see above).
April 18: Responding to a shortage of gasoline, President Nixon halts all taxes and regulations on imported oil.
April 18: The Oklahoma Sooners, who went 10-1 and won the Sugar Bowl, forfeit 7 of their wins and the postseason victory after an assistant coach admitted to altering the transcripts of several freshman players to let them qualify for the team. The Sooners will later be suspended by the NCAA from postseason participation for both the 1974 and 1975 seasons.
April 18: The sci-fi flick "Soylent Green", set in the FAR DISTANT FUTURE year of 2022, premiers in the United States. Starring Charlton Heston, it... oh, let's be honest, the only reason I'm noting this is so I can say SOYLENT GREEN IS PEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPLEEEEEEEEEEEE.
April 18: 2B Brian Long (.259, 0, 2) of the Red Sox is also PEEEEOPLLLLLE and he will be out until July with a dislocated shoulder he suffered yesterday. Mike Runfola (.326, 15, 53), a 27 year old post-prospect who nevertheless raked in Louisville last year, will take over the spot.
April 18: New Tigers SP Chris Benavides (1-1, 2.35) is their 4th starter; on most other teams he'd be an ace. In fact, nobody in baseball has stored more games than he has since 1969: 160 in all. Today he showed why, outdueling the Red Sox' Michael Pesco (1-2, 1.80) and throwing a 5-hitter for a 4-0 Detroit win. "It's cool," said Benavides after the game. "I like baseball." (look, the game even says he's boring)
April 18: It's shutout day I guess: Twins rookie Svetislav Pesic, a pro hoops player in Serbia in his spare time, engineered a 1-hitter against the struggling California Angels today. "I am just pretend it is the basketball and I make the shots," he said after the game.
April 19: The Portugese Socialist Party is founded in the... German city of Bad Munstereifel. Look, I feel bad reporting no news in a given day.
April 19: Brewers 2B James Hong (.400, 2, 5) has appeared in here before but it's starting to look like maybe he's the real deal. He went 3-4 against Cleveland today with his 2nd HR of the year, a 3-run blast that put the Brewers up 4-2 in the 3rd inning. He also got himself a walk in this one. Milwaukee is a team that is dearly in need of some good news this year: they were projected to be the worst team in baseball in the preseason rankings.
April 20: Former US Attorney General John Dean tells a federal grand jury that he had attended meetings where plans had been discussed (all this passive tense, ugh) to set listening devices in the Democratic Party headquarters but he had never approved the scheme. Previously, he had testified before the Senate taht he had no prior knowledge or involvement in the "bugging".
April 20: Australian poet Michael Dransfield (not in the game) dies of a drug overdose.
April 20: Someone suggested doing a preseason positional top 10, which, in retrospect I like to get through spring training / preseason as quickly as possible as usually I'm all about getting the games played as quickly as possible at that point. But how about some rankings in-season? Let's start with catcher. To be honest I'm just going to use the OOTPD ratings here; I could have some kind of complex formula or just sort these guys by hand but that feels too hard....
Catcher
------------
10. Brad Reed, MIN (.242, 2, 4). The 3-time All-Star has fallen off a bit the past couple years but he's still the guy (technically number 10 was the guy the Red Sox currently are using as their backup and Reed was 11 but WHATEVER I DO WHAT I WANT).
9. Mike Perez, KC (.111, 2, 6). If you say so, OOTPD. Perez goes through bouts and by bouts I mean entire seasons where he can't hit and this is feeling like it could be one of them. The good news is, he's "only" striking out once every 6 at-bats at the moment; with the White Sox last year when he got cut after hitting .164 to open the year, he struck out 33 times in 110 at-bats.
8. Andres Gamez, TEX (.233, 0, 3). Without looking that hard at the guys ahead I'd probably rank Gamez a little higher. He's nothing flashy but a catcher who can be a league average hitter without giving it all back on defense is pretty darn good if you ask me.
7. John Lennon, CLE (.289, 2, 7). Imagine if the Yankees hadn't had to part ways with Lennon in order to acquire Ernesto Garcia (currently opening the year in a .159, 1, 6 slump by the way). Lennon is already a good enough hitter to bat cleanup for the Indians and he'll only get better. Because, you know, he's so... young. Look. He's hardly the only guy who has a different playing age than his real age in this league.
6. Adam Brwon, MIL (.500, 1, 1). Um, OK. Brown's out for the year with a ruptured MCL. I guess to be fair TOOOO BEEEEEE FAAAAAAAIR this is the overall positional rankings and the Brewers have Eddie Dimmock (.304, 1, 1) and Sam Rahn (.333, 0, 1) there currently; it's a very deep position if nothing else. And TOOOO BEEEEE FAAAAAIIIIR again Brown is a 1st round pick so probably is better than the 208/347/330 slash he put up last year (which, still good eye but he needs to get the average up).
5. Frank Abagnale, BAL (293, 0, 5). The American League has an absolutely embarrassing number of good young catchers. Abagnale's con artistry means he's also an expert at framing pitches, and offensively the only backstop I'd put up with him in the junior circuit is Texas Josh Lewis. OK maybe Gamez wasn't rated too low after all...
4. Doug Connally, PIT (.385, 0, 6). Nice to see Connally hitting again after losing that tool in the 2nd half of last year. He's also thrown out at least 43% of baserunners in each of the last 3 years (not counting '73 yet; he's "only" 1 for 3 so far).
3. John Stuart, STL (.250, 1, 8). Stuart's a good contact guy, kind of a rare trait in a catcher, who is a solid defender and a team captain. If that sounds like All Star material to you then yes, the man has gone to 5 of them, including last year's (weirdly he didn't make it in '69 or '70, I guess because he got hurt).
2. Texas Josh Lewis, OAK (.220, 0, 2). I called him Texas Josh to differentiate him from first baseman California Josh Lewis (.143, 1, 3), recently signed by the Pirates. That nickname might not be needed for much longer but I like it anyway. Lewis is, I don't know... Jason Kendall (who?) with power, a prototypical #3 hitter, and a pretty solid defender as well, as his 2 Gold Gloves in 2 full seasons suggests.
1. Jason Bushon, NYM (.200, 1, 3). His team might be rebuilding but Bushon is a guy you build around rather than trade for the build. Even in the dead ball situation of last year, Bushon set career highs in HRs (19) and RBIs (71) and now will get even more of them in the middle of the Mets order.
April 20: I wasn't expecting to see a game like this, what with everything going up in terms of offense... but Indians SP Robert Rivera (2-1, 2.74) carried a no-no into the 7th and wound up one-hitting the Red Sox en route to a 2-0 win. Troy Brown got Boston's one and only hit in the 7th, and the Red Sox never got a man into scoring position the entire game. "The best kind of wins are the one where I can just kind of cruise", said Rivera, now in his second year in the American League. "This was one of those."
April 20: Add Mike Stuckey (2-2, 4.85) to that list, as he threw a 3-hitter tonight to edge Fernando Apolonio (3-1, 0.97) and the Dodgers, 1-0. His guys only had 7 hits themselves - Apolonio seems like he's picked up right where he left off last season - but a Jimmy Walker (.273, 1, 3) homerun was all Stuckey needed.
April 21: Serial killer Edmund Kemper murders his final two victims, his mother and her best friend. Kemper will drive from Apris, California to Pueblo, Colorado, where he will confess to the murders.
April 21: Merian C. Cooper, the director of the movie "King Kong" and co-inventor of the Cinerama film projection process, dies today.
April 21: Man, I don't want to report on every single shutout but... the Red Sox' Brian Osbourne (2-0, 1.10) had himself a game today. Osbourne struck out a career-high 10 batters and looked more like his new teammates than the Brewers finesse guy he was last season with a 4-hit shutout of the Indians. "Hey, if I strike out guys like Mike Pesco, maybe I'll get paid like Mike Pesco?", Osbourne said after the game with a laugh.
April 21: Sometimes when you play with the DANGER you get the ZONE. Expos closer Kenny Loggins (0-2, 5.68) blew a 6-1 lead in the 9th, surrendering 3 hits and walking one (it was intentional) in a 7-6 loss to the Mets. CF Kjel Isaakson (.349, 0, 6) delivered the final game-winning single with runners on at 2nd and 3rd. "I'm alright," he said after the game. Loggins has some insaaaannely bad luck with balls in play so far: he's struck out 11 men in 6.1 IP (great!) but has still somehow allowed 11 hits thanks to a .524 BABIP.
April 22: A gunman on the south side of Los Angeles kills six people and wounds nine others while on a shooting spree on Easter Sunday. The gunman had become enraged after arguing with a guest in his home, then shot people whom he knew. A security guard pursued him and was misidentified as the gunman by police, who shot nad killed him. The gunman was wounded but taken alive and will eventually be sentenced to life imprisonment.
April 22: The final Singapore Grnad Prix is held before the event is discontinued. It is won by Vern Schuppan of Austria (not in the game).
April 22: Dalip Singh Saund dies. Saund was the first Asian-American, the first native of India, and the first member of a faith other than Christianity or Judaism (Saund was a member of the Sikh religion) to be elected to the US Congress, where he served 2 terms out of California.
April 22: White Sox OF and big-name Mexican League free agent signing Pedro Castrejon (.211, 0, 4) hasn't been all that so far this year and today he got even worse news. Castrejon strained his rotator cuff making a throw in from the outfield and will miss the next month. Chicago expects to employ a platoon of Jon Marsden (.210, 10, 39 in '72) and recently acquired Carl Weathers (.214, 14, 57 in '72) there, with the side effect of pushing Josh Wade (.340, 1, 7) into a full-time role. Chicago's faced very few lefties so far so there hasn't really been platoons but they will happen, I swear!
April 22: Twins 2B Pietro Palmarocchi (.242, 1, 5) took advantage a bad control day by Rangers SP Chad Daugharty (1-2, 4.05) to become the latest Minnesota ballplayer to walk 4 times in a game. The last person to do so was SS Justin Ramey (.275, 1, 4) in 1972. Surprisingly Mike Brookes hadn't reached that threshold in a game since 1969. Nobody's walked more often in one game for the franchise, going all the way back to their time in Washington. Palmarocchi, incidentally, has a .444 on-base percentage now in spite of that low average.
Daugharty and reliever Jake Callaway (0-0, 0.00) incidentally combined for 10 walks, with Daugharty's total of 9 (in 7 innings) one off the Rangers'/2nd-run-Senators' own record of 10, last set by Kent Coffey (1-1, 3.42 with Monterrey in the Mexican League) in 1970. For their part, the Twins, in spite of trading away Brookes this offseason, lead the AL in on-base percentage with a .348 mark.
April 22: You just can't pitch to Phillies LF Alberto Juantorena (.362, 2, 8) nowadays, like, period. The 2nd year guy - he surely would have won the ROY last year had he played for the entire year - went 3-4 with 3 runs and 3 RBIs for the Phillies, igniting their offense in an 8-2 win over the Cardinals in the first game of a double-header. Juatorema hit a double and a solo HR in this game so he wound up a triple away from the cycle. "You would think that because I am so fast, that would be the first hit, not the one I did not get," said Juantorema after the game.
April 22: Pirates SP Jeremy Battaglia (0-3, 4.45) is struggling in maybe the weirdest way possible for him to struggle. The ace, who had a 2.10 ERA last year, is known for not allowing HRs. He gave up 12 all of last year in 321 IP. So far, in just 30.1, he's already allowed 6. He gave up 3 today in a 5-4 loss to the Cubs (to be fair TOOOO BEEEE FAAAAAAAAIR in Wrigley): a game-leader-offer to CF Alex Vallejo (.400, 2, 4), a solo shot in the 6th to reigning MVP RF Jeremy Taylor (.298, 5, 12), and a 2-run shot by 2B Juan Perez (.226, 2, 4) that tied the game at 4 (Battaglia would go on to lose this one in 10, 5-4). Is he hanging his curve? Is he tipping his pitches? Only time will tell.
## Teams in Review
My rule of thumb here is, 20 losses. Obviously that can't happen until teams play at least 20 games.