 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
12/20/96 The Ghiotto meeting: Candies spend! (with trade rules) 12/23/96 Flowers: The Mob Visited My House! (in Italian) 01/05/97 The Loan Auction 01/19/97 The Trades Deadline 02/01/97 Brokers Win !!! 02/23/97 Freeze Time Coming 03/10/97 Keepers Submitted 05/05/97 Draft Time! 12/20/97 Realignment and the expansion draft plus predictions! |
After three years of domination without any Series title to show for it, the Pontevecchio Mikes eventually put their mark on what increasingly appears to be their game, and destroyed any opposition while landing their first title ever. The Mikes missed their fourth consecutive West Division title and had to settle for the wild card, despite winning 116 games, due to a one-game-playoff loss to Roger Clemens of the Guardian Angel Brokers. The West division rivals met again in the Finals after laboring through seven games to dispose of the Flowers and the surprising Topos, respectively, in the playoffs, and for the second straight year the wild card team won. The Mikes avenged last season's heartbreaking loss in the Finals against the same opponent, and became the fourth different team to win the Campionship in the first four years of our league's existence.Another team with a history of bad luck won the Central Division, as the Mirtilli Flowers played cat and mouse with the Azzarita Candies, capturing the pennant by a 9 - game margin before stumbling against the Mikes in the playoffs.
The Hi-Fly Topos took advantage of the miseries of their division rivals and won the East Division title for the second time in four years. No serious opposition was put up by the St. Lazarus Christians, who will need more luck to win than they have been showing so far.
Last year's Champions Brokers cruised through a triumphant regular season, capturing their first Division title, but were somewhat disappointing in the post-season, and had to rally from a 3 - 1 deficit to beat the Topos before losing the Series 4 - 1 to the Mikes.
Notable also-rans were the Reno Pachos in the Central and the Arno Bucks in the West. The latter continued to put up good numbers against rivals who proved again to be just too strong for them.
Particularly horrendous was the Fools' Corner Burberries' season, and among the lower-tier teams only the Fortitudo Sniffers showed signs of improvement from the past. No good news, once again, for the spare fans of the Telekom Bidons and the Babau Fatties.
As for individual achievements, three hitters distinguished themselves: Frank Thomas of the Brokers, who just missed the Triple Crown (.371 BA, first - .484 OBP, first - .654 SLG, third), Ken Griffey of the Topos, who smashed 61 home runs and 175 RBI while topping the SLG ranking with .670 (he also hit 109 times for extra bases), and quite surprisingly, Matt Stairs of the Candies, who was third in BA (.340), fourth in OBP (.424), and second in SLG (.658).
As for the pitchers, well, Roger Clemens of the Brokers stole the show with a storybook season in which he recorded 30 wins and just one loss in 35 starts (16 complete games), with an ERA of 1.72. He pitched 298+ innings, in which he recorded 308 strikeouts with just three home runs allowed in all season! All the previous numbers represented league highs, but he topped the league in the following categories as well:
Shutouts, 5
Opposing BA, .196
Opposing OBP, .264
Opposing Slugging pct., .250
Hits allowed per 9 innings, 6.34
Runners allowed per 9 innings, 9.35
Batters faced per game, 33.60
Quality starts, 32
Mariano Rivera of the Bucks saved the most games in the league with 36.
The Mikes put together their fourth straight 100-plus win season, raising their four-year record to an impressive 443 - 188 (.702). Nearly everybody was relieved by the Mikes' Series victory, as the owner had repeatedly and publicly stated his intention of committing suicide had the big prize eluded him again.
You can see all the statistics of the 1997 DiamondMind Baseball Championship; they are provided, as usual, by courtesy of the Flowers Home Page.
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Mail me at r.caramelli@bo.nettuno.it.
Thank you.
This page hosted by
Get your own Free Home Page
