1916 BBW Replay Week 7 Summary - May 22-28, 1916

Cincinnati Manager
Buck Herzog
Week Seven of the 1916 BBW Replay is in the books, and things continue to be relatively tight up and down the standings in both leagues. Both leagues finished their first cross-country road trip of the year when the AL Midwest teams left the East Coast, while in the NL, it went in the other direction with the East Coast franchises leaving the Midwest. The early analysis says the East Coast franchises in both leagues are the stronger of the two. The pitching remains strong, overwhelming the league at this point, with the occasional offensive outbursts thrown in for good measure.

The end of Week Seven saw the return of the doubleheader. There had been three doubleheaders all season, and one of them was the annual Patriots Day doubleheader in Boston. There were three twin bills on Saturday alone, with two more on Sunday. Next week is a doubleheader-intensive week as well, with another on Monday, and then Tuesday is Memorial Day, with the annual Memorial Day doubleheader extravaganza. Next week will see the end of May as well, so the month will end on a very busy note.

 

In the AL, the Red Sox maintained their steadfast lead, ending the week with a three-game winning streak, all wins coming against the New York Yankees. New York was hoping to cut into Boston's lead, but the Red Sox set the Yankees down abruptly and extended their lead instead. Washington moved into second place to replace New York, and Detroit followed the Nationals as they now reside in third place. The Nationals have plenty of pitching, and this week they just activated another pitcher, Sam Rice, although Rice has a potent bat, so there is already discussion about where he will play in the long run.

 

The White Sox are continuing to struggle. They have allowed the fewest runs to score, but they have also scored the fewest runs and have the league's best ERA. Joe Jackson should be leading the Chicago charge, but he is off to a relatively quiet start. Cleveland is pretty much the same as Chicago. Tris Speaker is having an OK season - for Tris Speaker. The Indians fans are rooting for Speaker to burst out of his shell and to drag the rest of the club with him. Philadelphia is the weakest team in the East and in all of baseball. They did capture their tenth win this past week, the final team to reach that point.

 

1916 Cincinnati Reds
In the NL, Brooklyn ended the week with a seven-game winning streak to secure their place atop the NL. New York started the season towards the bottom of the standings, but now resides in second place, and John McGraw is always looking for an advantage to find a way to move up the standings. Boston had moved into third place temporarily, but ended the week with four consecutive losses and now resides in third place. Offense remains their issue - they could use a little more punch in their lineup.

The Cubs had gotten off to a strong start by playing their weaker Midwest opponents, but the East Coast teams exposed them, and Chicago moved from first place to fourth within the matter of a week. They ended the week in Third place, a full five games out of first place, well behind Brooklyn. The Phillies won the NL pennant just last season and were expected to be a force in the 1916 season as well, and while Grover Alexander is having another strong season, the rest of the team is struggling. It’s too early to say Philadelphia is out of the pennant race, but they are in sixth place, 10.5 games behind Brooklyn, and we aren't even to June yet.

 

All teams have played at least thirty games at this point, with Brooklyn sitting right at thirty games complete. There are plenty of doubleheaders in the queue, though. All the teams have pruned down their early-season rosters, so this influx of doubleheaders could be troublesome. Expect that there will be cases where a manager or two has to go out to the mound and tell their struggling starting pitcher that they are just gonna have to take one for the team and just work through it. Let's go play!





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