IS LIVE CHATTING EAGLES-BEARS
Which pretty much sums up the parity that existed in baseball this year.
"It's nice, isn't it?" Cubs manager Lou Piniella said recently. "There's a lot of parity ... It's good for baseball, in a way."
How much has the middle class grown? Well, no team in the majors will either win or lose 100 games this year. According to Mike Emeigh, of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR), this is only the third non-strike year since schedules were expanded to 162 games in 1961 that's happened. The others were 1992 and 2000.
Not only that, going into play last night there was still a slim chance that no NL team would even win 90 games.
The fewest games won by a league leader in the era of the longer schedule is 91 by the 1974 Orioles and 1983 Dodgers.
Whether this is an entirely good thing is open to debate. There's still something to be said for excellence.
Still, there's no question that having so many teams so close with so few games left this year has created a real buzz and a lot of excitement ... at least for everybody but the people on Park Avenue in New York who had to figure out how to break a possible five-way tie.
-- It's been reported that the Kansas City Royals will have an alternate, powder-blue home uniform top next season and that Tampa Bay will have a new color scheme, drop the "Devil" from their nickname and have only the new logo on the front of their road shirts.
-- It's been reported that the Kansas City Royals will have an alternate, powder-blue home uniform top next season and that Tampa Bay will have a new color scheme, drop the "Devil" from their nickname and have only the new logo on the front of their road shirts.-- After 3 years of rumors, it appears that the Marlins will at least try to gauge the trade value of lefthander Dontrelle Willis this winter.
-- The Braves dispute rumors that next year's payroll will be slashed by Liberty Media, the team's new owner. "It's not true," said club president Terry McGuirk. "The trends will be upward. You don't get anywhere by cutting."
-- Remember when you couldn't get a ticket at Oriole Park at Camden Yards? The actual turnstile count for Monday's game was estimated to be less than 5,000. That's sad.
-- Remember when you couldn't get a ticket at Oriole Park at Camden Yards? The actual turnstile count for Monday's game was estimated to be less than 5,000. That's sad.-- Noted sports psychologist Jack Llewelyn had this observation about the ugly confrontation between Padres outfielder Milton Bradley and umpire Mike Winters last weekend: "I don't know Milton Bradley personally, but it sure looked like somebody knew what button to push ... and then pushed it."
-- When Braves third baseman Chipper Jones opened the front door to get his newspaper last Friday morning, his yardman asked, "Are you going to win the batting title?"
CHEERS: For Devil Rays first baseman Carlos Pena. It's gone largely unnoticed because Tampa Bay might as well be playing on Pluto as far as getting national attention is concerned, but Pena has had a remarkable season.
CHEERS: For Devil Rays first baseman Carlos Pena. It's gone largely unnoticed because Tampa Bay might as well be playing on Pluto as far as getting national attention is concerned, but Pena has had a remarkable season.Going into last night's game against the Yankees, he had 43 home runs and 118 RBI. His OPS of 1.013 was behind only Alex Rodriguez, David Ortiz, Chipper Jones, Magglio Ordonez and Prince Fielder.
