August 16, 1926
We are down to six weeks remaining in the season and the Brooklyn Kings, last place finishers in the Continental Association each of the past two years, are still holding on to top spot in the loop. I have three things to talk about from this week's sim but unfortunately two of them are bad.
First the good news. It was a short week and we won 3 of our 4 games including a 2-game sweep of the Philadelphia Sailors, who entered the week in second place but are now third. Which brings me to one of the bad things for us. The New York Stars look unbeatable of late. The Stars were 8 games back of us on July 1st but have won 10 straight and 26 of their last 30 now sit just 2 games back of us.
Code:
CONTINENTAL ASSOCIATION STANDINGS
TEAM W L PCT GB
BROOKLYN 75 43 .636 -
New York 71 43 .623 2.0
Philadelphia 66 47 .584 6.5
Toronto 64 51 .557 9.5
Baltimore 53 61 .465 20.0
Chicago 48 68 .414 26.0
Montreal 44 72 .379 30.0
Cleveland 41 77 .347 34.0
We are on the road this week with 3 games in Toronto followed by a 4-game weekend series at Chicago. The Stars have 2 in Cleveland and then visit Philadelphia for 3 games that are very important to each club.
The other bad news is devastating as we lost pitcher Del Plummer for at least a year when he blew out his elbow. The 30 year old, who had never had more than a day to day injury prior to this, was 7-2 since we acquired him from Montreal last month. With Plummer gone, my rotation loses a lot and now the question is do we have enough quality arms to stay in the thick of the race.
It makes the deal for Mose Smith (11-11, 3.33), that cost me a good prospect and my first round pick, much more important as Smith will remain my number one starter. After that it is up to the overachieving Cal Williams (14-5, 3.64) and 3 youngsters including rookies Topsy Moran (9-5, 4.25) and Harvery Rodgers (8-5, 3.97) to see if they can keep doing the job. 24 year old Leon Campbell (10-0, 3.91) continues to get amazing run support and with our offense hopefully that trend continues.
With the injury I kept Art Carlson in Brooklyn rather than send him back to AAA Houston. I also recalled lefthander Karl Mallek, who had been in Houston since return to action from an injury that cost him nearly two months on the DL. Both will go to the pen. I decide to leave my struggling closer Buck Blood in Houston for another week in part to see what Mallek can do as he was pitching well in AAA. Blood is also staying because his big league struggles of late continued with the Bulls last week. Blood pitched in 5 games in Houston, won 3 games but got beat up pretty good in a couple of them and lacked any sort of consistency at all.
I also came very close to calling up second round draft pick Bill Dengler. My top pitching prospect is still just 21 years old. He was outstanding at AA Knoxville to start the season and earned the call-up to AAA in June. He had a slow start with the Bulls but has been very good the last few starts. I would prefer to give him the full year in the minors and look at a big league shot next year but if things get desperate with my rotation he may get the call this year.
With all of the injuries we have suffered I am surprised we are still in contention. Doug Lightbody was the biggest hit as we lost a possible league MVP for the season but we have also been without our starting second baseman and shortstop for over a month each as well as a number of other pitchers for long stretches including 33 year old Jackie Marshall, who has been out since early June with hamstring problems. Marshall, a 15 game winner a year ago, may be back in the next few weeks but the question is how will he perform if thrown right into a tight pennant race. I think you would be hard pressed to find a FABL team that has lost more man-games to key contributor's than the Kings.