The Frogs (114-48, +369) easily won their division by 30.5 games, with the 2nd place finisher Newark Peppers winning a G163 to make the playoffs as WC #2. 114 wins is good enough for 3rd best in Frog history and the pythagorean expectation (122-40) would've tied the franchise W/L record.
Team MVP would have to be Ed Walsh (like usual). Walsh has yet to dip below 7 WAR in a full season. This time he went 22-5 with a 1.81 ERA (a new career best) and 7.8 WAR. He generally doesn't need the help, but was aided by a .260 BABIP. The guy is a machine. He doesn't have any chance at PoY though because a bunch of 100 Cy's and Walter's had even more ridiculous stats. 100 Seaver and SE Brecheen joined Walsh in the team's 20+ win club. The pitching was the strongest iteration the Frogs have put on the field so far, setting a new team record of just 432 runs allowed. That was only good enough for 3rd in the conference (lol). Singapore allowed 413 runs and Exeter allowed 428.
This postseason is going to be a grind. The Frogs go into the NC bracket as the #2 seed, but actually had a worse record than the WC #1 Exeter Blue Hawks (120-42, +502). The Blue Hawks had the misfortune of playing in the same division as the NC's #1 seed Singapore Sluggers (131-31, +639). Those teams will almost certainly get back together to mix it up in the Divisional Round, unless the Newark Peppers can upset Exeter in the WC game (very unlikely). The Frogs went 4-2 against Exeter and 1-5 against Singapore, so we'll be rooting for Exeter to make the Sub-League Series.
The Frogs will host the NC #3 seed Coffeyville Golden Tornado (110-52, +288). Coffeyville have been in Perfect for 19 seasons. They've won their division 7 times. They've won 100+ games 13 times. They have won zero PL titles. It's a good team and a hard luck team. It'll be tough for them to break through this week--they'd need to go on the road and upset the Frogs and then take out the winner of Exeter/Singapore. And that doesn't even factor in the 3-headed monster that is Westvleteren/Slumberton/Battery Park City in the opposing conference.
Coffeyville's starting pitching scares me the most. They rotate through 100 Lefty Grove, 98 Don Sutton, SE Vida Blue, 98 Carl Hubbell, and 98 Kevin Brown--it's the full mini-whale special. They've added a couple of the Astros SE cards into the bullpen as well (Dipino and Dotel). If they do have a weakness, it's that they don't really platoon their offensive players. They play the exact same 9 against RHP and LHP, which I hope to exploit! With 6 righty batters, I am loading up my rotation with RHPs. Walsh will open the DS (obviously). Then, 99 Coveleski and 100 Smoltz are being moved into the rotation to start games 2 and 3. 100 Seaver will get game 4 (if necessary). Brecheen, Vida Blue, and Mathewson all go to the bullpen to form a quad-stopper unit alongside PEAK Satchel Paige. So, I'm sure all these moves will backfire...
Good luck to everyone in the 2050 postseason (unless you are also in P442, in which case
you are going down!)
