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It seemed that after a win Sunday over Schaumburg the staff (not the coaching staff) was ordered to make a big deal out of moving into a tie for first place in the East Division with Joliet. As far as I know, nobody has ever won a Frontier League division title at the halfway point in a 96-game schedule, but maybe we can learn a little from history.
This is the fourth time in 15 seasons that Washington has been in first place at the all-star break. The last time was two years ago when the Wild Things were 32-19 at the break. That 2014 team finished 57-39 and in third place in the East. It went on to win a wild-card game at Evansville but lost a semifinal series to River City. The current team, though four games off the pace of the 2014 squad, seems to be in better shape. Remember, that 2014 team had manager Bart Zeller resign the day before the all-star break after a dustup in the dugout with the pitching coach, then right fielder Stewart Ijames had his contract purchased by Arizona minutes before the first game after the all-star break.
The 2007 team was sitting in first place with a 28-17 record at the all-star break and cruised to the East title by 8 1/2 games with a 55-40 record. That team beat Gateway in the first round of the playoffs before losing to Windy City in the finals.
The first time Washington was in first place at the all-star break was in 2004. That team went on to win the East at 62-34, eight games better than second-place Evansville. The Otters then swept the Wild Things in three games in the first round of the playoffs.
So history tells us that the three Wild Things teams that were in first place at the all-star break all made the playoffs, with two winning division titles. That doesn't guarantee this year's team anything but, hey, so far the season has been more fun than in 2012, when Washington was buried in seventh place in the East with an 18-29 record and 13 1/2 games out of first place at the break.
posted by Chris Dugan at
8:02 AM
1 Comments:
Friday's game had two teams at the top of the standings playing at CEP and it drew a crowd of less than 2,000. That's more proof that nobody cares about the Mild Things. Ownership has screwed the fans so badly so many times in so many many different ways and that they are showing in the form of empty seats and empty parking spaces that nobody in ole WashPa gives a damn if the Mild Things leave town. Stu is just one step closer to his dream of taking the wrecking ball to CEP and building offices for his lawyer friends on the property. If a corporate sponsor isn't found (how's that going?) to hang its name on the ballpark then my guess is the Mild Things are playing their last season in WashPa. Will anybody care or notice that they're gone? Probably not because nobody has been noticing the Mild Things for years.
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