September 7, 2005
NL West

Aah September. It’s baseball heaven as teams from Boston to Oakland make the stretch run toward the “Fall Classic”, unless you happen to cheer for any National League located west of St. Louis.  Were President Bush half the baseball fan we’re told, he’d declare the National League West a disaster area.    

To say our Rockies are the worst of a bad lot is like mentioning Mike Tyson occasionally has issues.  The 2005 version of the Blake Street Bombers have spent the season dead last in a division where San Diego, the leader as of this writing, is in first by a huge margin while still having lost more games than they’ve won.  Were San Diego in the National League East, their record would have them in last place looking up. 

MBA programs are filled with case studies, cash flow projections and market analysis.  But one of the greatest guarantees of business success is to have incompetent competition.  Example A is the San Diego Padres. 

How bad is the National League West?  In the LA area the Dodgers are only the 4^th best team ranking somewhere behind not only the cross-town Angels but also the college boys at Cal State Fullerton and the minor league Rancho Cucamonga Quakes.  

North of LA, in Baghdad by the Bay, the Giants are woeful. Team management claims the orange and black would be among baseball’s best, except for injuries and a talk show host demeaning their Caribbean players.  The Giants are currently 15 games under water and in danger of being caught by the Rox in the race for the NL West anchor position.  Possibly Giant players should practice hitting and fielding more and listen to the radio less. 

In Arizona where the Diamondbacks are 12 games to the bad side of the ledger, the company line is, “We’re still in this thing”. Baseball hope must spring eternal in the Valley of the Sun where all one can anticipate after baseball are the woeful football Cardinals.  

And then there’s our hapless Rockies who, we’re told, are turning it around.  Really?  The Rox currently have the second worst record in baseball while playing a schedule featuring almost 70% of their games against teams with a losing record. 

Could the Bronco’s ever be so fortunate to schedule nothing but losers?  It would be like playing Keokuk Community College, the South Dakota School for the Athletically Challenged and the Raiders week after week.  Looking back on August we’re told the Rox youth movement is beginning to jell.  Last month the Rockies shouted to the skies about a winning month going 15-14.  Of those 29 games 24 were against teams with a losing record.  Some turnaround.  September promises more of the same, 6 games against winning teams and 22 against their fellow losers from the National League West. 

A couple of weeks back I watched the Little League World Series.  They have a wonderful “Mercy” rule.  Should one team get more than 10 runs ahead, the game is called and players retire to the stands where the Team Mom’s serve Kool-Aid and cookies.  Wouldn’t baseball be better off if Major League Baseball used the “Mercy” rule in the National League West?  “Boys” Commissioner Selig could say, “Maybe it’d be best if you took your bats and balls and went home to get an early jump on hunting season.”  

Sadly they play on because somebody, it’s a rules dictate, has to advance to the Major League play-offs.  The question is not whether a team from the NL West can win a playoff game, it’s could any team from the loser division win the Pacific Coast League?  After all, the PCL leading Albuquerque Isotopes feature players who can hit, run, catch and throw, qualities mostly absent in the NL Worst.