The Boys are Back!

Tamales' rookie Jose Abreu sounds off with his bat, in historic start.

8/14/2015

The 2015 Boys of Summer APBA Baseball League is officially off and running, as we enter our 3rd season of our league's existence. We have many of the same faces (in owners) returning with three new faces.

Early on, there has been plenty of parity in the league. While some things have changed as in the (2013 Bos World Champion) South Shore Fighting Imps' dominate days momentarily setting with the sun -- Some have stayed the same as in the Portland Microbrewers looking like they want to make it three consecutive National League Championships.

With the American League East up for grabs, with the Imps no longer grasping onto the divison, early on there seems to be a three-team battle between the Swatara Eliminators (2014 A.L. Wildcard), Corktown Tamales, and the South Side Spartans. The Tamales & Spartans are two new teams with two new owners, taking over for former franchises -- Boston Bravos & Bronx Bombers.

The Tamales are currently in first (12-10), led by rookie Jose Abreu (.407 BA, 9 HR & 21 RBI for a 1.330 OPS), who is putting up MVP numbers early on -- His slugging percentage by the way, is .238 higher than the next player, his teammate Troy Tulowitzki. The Spartans are 11-11, and are led with a formidable rotation in Johnny Cueto, Jon Lester, James Shields, R.A. Dickey (currently 2nd in ERA with 1.61) & Hiroki Kuroda (last season in the states). The Eliminators are led by tag team Victor Martinez and Anthony Rizzo. "V-Mart" is batting .314, 3 HR & 16 RBI (.891 OPS), while leading the league with 11 doubles; Rizzo is batting .310, 4 HR & 15 RBI (.907 OPS). While the top 3 teams are separated by only 2 games, the Imps are noticeably in last, at 7-15, 5 games out of first. The team is loaded with productive vets in the past, in Joe Mauer, Matt Holliday, Shin-Soo Choo, David Wright and Ben Zobrist who are still capable of putting up numbers, but age is setting in. The team's rotation is not what it once was in 2013, led by Doug Fister.

In the A.L. West, we have a another wide open division. The Brooklyn Mets (14-8) hold a two-game lead over the World Champs - Fairgrove Tigers; Brooklyn currently lost 3 straight, while Fairgrove has won 3 straight. The division seems to be loaded with good pitching, as 4 of the 5 top team ERA's are all from the same division; The American League itself, has shown good pitching ranging from top team (South Side) ERA of 2.55 to bottom team (South Shore) at 3.68 ERA -- while hitting has been down, with top team (Swatara) batting .249 & worst team (South Shore) batting .198; Five teams are batting .222 or lower!

The West returns with the same teams in place, but some of the teams have had face-lifts. The Fairgrove Tigers made a few off-season trades, saying goodbye to star Adam Jones, Elvis Andrus, and to Jarred Cosart who played a huge role as a rookie to help Fairgrove win the title -- while they brought in Carlos Gomez, Chris Davis, Shelby Miller & Aaron Loup, The Chicago Nine acquired Jones & Andrus in Gomez/Miller deal with Fairgrove, while trading away Chris Archer (who they acquired from Boston the season below) to another division rival - Buffalo Yankees, along with Ian Kinsler in exchange for Miguel Cabrera and Wade Miley. Miguel's status with Chicago was momentarily, as he then was dished out to Traverse City in a mega deal, that sent Miguel, Josh Harrison, Drew Smyly & Leonys Martin in exchange for Yasiel Puig, Yu Darvish, Brandon Belt & Cody Allen. Buffalo, as mentioned above, got a young ace in Chris Archer, who will help form the top of that rotation with Jordan Zimmermann. The Brooklyn Mets have plenty of young guys in the minors in Jacob deGrom, Maikel Franco, Mike Bolsinger & Billy Burns -- showing that they are certainly a team on the rise. The entire West is separated by three games.

The National League East watched Holland Hitchhikers recently take 5 of 6 from the Traverse City Panthers. The Hitchhikers have already a 5 game lead on the second place Urbana Locomotives. Things have not been going well for the Panthers, as they find themselves at a disappointing 10-12 -- with a powerful lineup, great rotation & strong bullpen, T.C. expected more. Holland has a +31 scoring differential & have also succeeded with a strong bullpen led by Greg Holland. Holland has plenty of young talent with Bryce Harper, Eric Hosmer, Starling Marte and Andrelton Simmons.
The Kingsley Brownbeards (formerly Hannibal Cavemen) lead the league in fielding, an entire 7 pts higher than the next best team in the entire BoS. The Urbana Locomotives have an interesting mix of vets (Cole Hamels, David Price & Adrian Beltre) that have got it done in the past, while adding youth and versatile players to the mix in Yoenis Cespedes, George Springer & Tanner Roark -- remember it's just over a season ago that the Locomotives were just one win away from reaching the World Series.

Out West in the N.L., the Portland Microbrewers are at it again, maybe not as dominant out of the gate as last season's start -- but they once again appear to be the team to beat, and Mike Trout has not really gotten started yet. The Brewers' pitching seems to be the backbone of their success once again; Matt Shoemaker and Dallas Keuchel are off to great starts for them. The Seattle Rainiers made some big improves in the draft, drafting Joc Pederson, 2nd overall, and adding reliever Brad Boxberger in the second round. It's no secret that the San Diego Heroes have plenty of offense, but they are starting to shed some of that offense to make the team a more rounded force, last season they said goodbye to Jose Bautista by trading him to Boston in a deal that brought in better defense in Alex Gordon, and now have said goodbye to Chris Davis, who hit 53 HR's for them last season -- trading him to Fairgrove. The Heroes drafted Daniel Norris, to add to the youth movement in their starting pitching to go along with Tyson Ross & Kyle Gibson. The King Road Kings still have their two-headed monster in Clayton Kershaw & Chris Sale in their rotation, add that to one of the best closers in Aroldis Chapman --They definitely got the pitching, their lineup though needs to improve, and in a league full of pitching, the teams that lack the lineup will have a tough time.

8/16/2015

Early on, there seems to be a lot of parity in the league, a couple teams separating themselves at the top, while a couple teams in the cellar know that this may be a long season. Of course nothing is guaranteed this early, and it may be about who played who so far. Many questions, are the Brooklyn Mets for real? Was the Traverse City Panthers over-hyped? Can the Fairgrove Tigers repeat? Are the Chicago Nine, a playoff contender? It appears many, if not all teams, are trying to find their footing.