Some people will blurt out “merciful heavens!” when surprised by peril. Maybe this is a thing dying out with the Greatest Generation, or even the generation before that which came too early to be named. I think of it as something a grandma or great aunt of mine might have said. It’s either a plea for mercy, or a praise that mercy prevailed and no one was hurt.
We are not likely to start blurting out “merciful Dragons!” as an involuntary imprecation any time soon, but I will make a case for it in this post. Although I suppose some Puddleglums among you will react as skeptically as he did when told of the “Gentle Giants” he was about to meet. (Narnia reference, The Silver Chair.)
Standings: Week 27, Game 5 (Sept 27, 2024)
| Team | Wins | Losses | WPct | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Haviland Dragons | 101.79 | 59.21 | .632 | 0.0 |
| Portland Rosebuds | 91.00 | 70.00 | .565 | 10.8 |
| Peshastin Pears | 89.70 | 71.30 | .557 | 12.1 |
| Pittsburgh Alleghenys | 82.18 | 78.82 | .510 | 19.6 |
| Salem Seraphim | 80.68 | 80.32 | .501 | 21.1 |
| Flint Hill Tornadoes | 78.94 | 82.06 | .490 | 22.9 |
| Canberra Kangaroos | 75.47 | 85.53 | .469 | 26.3 |
| D.C. Balk | 71.79 | 89.21 | .446 | 30.0 |
| Cascadia Glaciers | 71.35 | 89.65 | .443 | 30.4 |
| Old Detroit Wolverines | 67.29 | 93.71 | .418 | 34.5 |
| Kaline Drive | 62.82 | 98.18 | .390 | 39.0 |
Haviland: 0.90 [4.83 – 0.17) v. Portland: 0.10 (0.17 – 4.83]
The Rosebuds are obvious candidates for a Puddleglummy response to any talk of “merciful” Dragons. For five straight days the Dragons have shredded the Rosebuds. Not just pruned them; practically uprooted them. Pushed them ever closer to being overtaken in the garden by the Pears. What’s merciful about Friday’s 7.7 scoreless innings from Dragon pitchers? Or a .357, .357, .619 batting line, including three players with three hits and singles hitter Luis Arraez showing off with two doubles and a triple? Especially when the Rosebuds aren’t abusing anyone (only 3.3 scoreless innings, and a restrained .277, .327, .447 batting line)? And the season is already over — the Dragons clinched six days ago!
I don’t want to minimize Rosebud suffering. It’s gotta hurt. It’s not like teams in 10th place are celebrating, either — but the pain does have its special poignancy when your team was in first place just over two weeks ago. However, I want you to consider an alternative scenario for a team picked by our own league commissioner as the pre-season favorites.
In the last 8 days (not games, days) since September 19, the Dragons have gone 7.65 – 0.35. That’s a gain of 7.3 games in 7 games over 8 days. (Possible only in the EFL, by having a huge bonus day last Sunday.) What if the Dragons had done this starting with Opening Day — we’ll give them 8 games to do it.
ONLY ONE TEAM HAS EVER BEEN 7.3 games ahead of the Dragons this season. Not the Rosebuds. Not the Pears… Not the Wolverines (no shocker there!). That team was the Kangaroos — who for a grand total of TWO days led the Dragons by 7.8 and 7.5 games on May 4 and May 5.
If the Dragons had started the season like they’re ending it, those would have been the only two days they trailed anyone. The peak of Rosebud glory would have come on August 15, when the ‘Buds would have been in second place, 2.4 games out of first. The entire season would have been a slog for every team in the league, not just our original Sedimentarians. We’d all have been Sedimentarians, essentially.
Only Dragon restraint, holding back, not putting it all together until mid-September, gave us any chance at a pennant race. Without Dragon restraint, there would have been no seven straight weeks of Rosebud fun atop the standings from late July until 17 days ago, nor the earlier stints in the lead in May, June, and July. No moment of Glacier Glory (and delicious league-wide terror) for Two Days in May. No early season Pear dominance, perhaps the longest the Pears have ever been in first place. Ditto and ditto for the Kangaroos, who succeeded the Pears this year for 3 wonderful weeks. Neither Kaline nor DC would have spent any time in second place, like they both did early in the season.
No pennant winner in the history of the EFL has shown the mercy the Dragons did this year. True, they will win with a double-digit lead, only the third time in EFL history this has happened. The most recent was 2017 when the Alleghenys went 114 – 47 to win by 10.7 games over the Tornados. My memories of that season are dim (the W’s finished in 8th place, 30.8 games out), but I believe that race was pretty much over in August.
The only other double digit win was in 2007, when the Alleghenys kicked off their 4-year dominance of the league by going 101-61 and winning by 19.1 games over the Wolverines, who (at 82-80) were the only other EFL team over .500. That was the Dragons’ first season in the league, giving us seven members. The 2007 race was effectively over by early August, as I recall – maybe even earlier. The Wolverines had to rally in the last week to get the Allegheny lead back under 20 games.
So let us all thank the Dragons. They could have ruined our season had they timed this hot streak differently. There has never been a more merciful EFL champion.
Peshastin: 1.03 [4.32 – 0.68] v. Canberra: (-0.03) [0.68 – 4.32]
A case can be made that the Pears need to learn something about mercy. Their pitchers were even more ruthless than the Dragons’: 10 ip, 0 er, a combined effort by Taj Bradley and Garrett Crochet. Their hitters moderated the effect a little, going .239, .271, .413, without any Arraez-like showboating. And we need to take into account that, unlike the all-conquering Dragons (who don’t even have any MLB teams to catch up to), the Pears are trying to reach an ambitious and meaningful goal: finishing in second, which might be a first for them (we don’t have a clear record of who finished second in the EFL’s first season). The Pears are now just 1.3 games out of second place, with one game to go…
… and here’s a lucky break that might help the Pear’s quest: this season will have an extra day in it, because on Monday the Braves and Mets are scheduled to play a doubleheader which is likely to determine their playoff seedings. Dave has cleverly accounted for this possibility by defining our Week 27 as ending on Monday.
Is there any consolation here for the Kangaroos? They got good pitching, too — not shutout pitching, but a solid 17 inning, 5 earned run output. They didn’t hit as well (.207, .200, .241) which doomed them to winning a little less than nothing Friday. They aren’t likely to fall (or rise) in the EFL standings, so that’s not an issue. In fact, they gained one spot in the Spring Rookie Draft, moving in front of the Texas Rangers and into a “tie” with the Cincinnati Reds. That’s not nothing.
Pittsburgh: (-0.13) [2.41 – 2.59] v. DC: 1.13 [2.59 – 2.41]
Other than maybe the Pears, the Balk are probably the team most desperate to achieve a reachable goal in the standings: finishing ahead of the expansion team. (Admittedly, I may be projecting here since I’ve never heard the Balkmaster say anything of this sort. I would be desperate if the Wolverines had been blessed with the Balk’s position in the standings.)
The Balk’s desperation (if it exists) wasn’t enough to motivate them to send any pitchers to the mound. Nor was it enough to get them to hit like crazy (.179, .294, .393 doesn’t sound crazy to me). So now I am beginning to think maybe they aren’t desperate. Or maybe they are crazy… like a fox! Maybe they saw the Allegheny pitching line — a nasty 3 ip, 6 er chulk by Jose Berrios — and opted not to take the risk of matching it. And maybe they saw the respectable Allegheny batting line (.258, .309, .419) and decided it wasn’t going to eat much into the Balk’s offensive advantage so far this week. Whatever the calculus, it worked, and the Balk got the boost they needed to move back in front of the Glaciers.
Salem: 0.08 [3.16 – 1.84] v. Kaline: 0.92 [1.84 – 3.16]
Was it angelic mercy? Or did they just not notice what was happening to the Alleghenys? On a day the A’s went backward, had the Seraphim kept up their prior pace this week, they’d have moved into position to mover into 4th place before the week is over. Instead they only gained 0.2 games by letting the Drive dominate. Salem were lax at the plate (.209, .306, .349) and skimpy on the mound (2.3 ip, 0 er). Kaline proved (once again) they are not to be trifled with, pitching well (6 ip, 1 er ) enough to make up for their own less impressive hitting (.183, .308, .409), Mitch Garver’s home run included.
Flint Hill: 0.63 [3.20 – 1.80] v. Cascadia: 0.37 [1.80 – 3.20]
It was all pitching for the Tornados, with Jameson Taillon going 7 scoreless innings. T-ball hitters went only .129, .182, .226, largely (but not entirely) undermining Taillon’s gem. Taillon’s work did so much good for the Tornado bottom line, the team still won the day even though the Glaciers batted better (.219, .306, .344) and pitched pretty well themselves (7.7 ip, 2 er).
Old Detroit: 0.89 [3.03 – 1.97].
Wolverine fans, God bless ’em, even though their team is in 10th place, entrenched in the Sediment and not going anywhere, still look at yesterday’s solid win against average MLB opposition and pine for what might have been. Their team batted .313, .378, .500. (Actually, given Bo Naylor’s demotion to Toledo, the rest of the team went .345, .412, .552 — a Happy Edgar Martinez Day!) And their pitchers completed 7.7 innings at the cost of only 2 earned runs for a 2.35 daily ERA.
