Cloverland Leagues: 26 April Update

Today's an off-day, so it seems like a particularly good time for an update. I was due to post one anyhow. :)

Since the last update, Boston has been absolutely on fire, going 12-1 with all 12 of those wins in a still-active streak. Here--let me post the standings:

Boston going 12-1 combined with Cleveland scuffling and the Yankees treading water has put the Red Sox in excellent shape. Of course, we're still in April.  Elsewhere, the standings haven't shuffled too much--the best teams last time (Pirates, Atlanta) have continued to play well, the teams struggling last time (San Diego, the entire AL Central) have continued to struggle.  I will call out Charlotte as hanging in there, taking 2 of 3 from Atlanta and Arizona before getting swept by the Pirates just before this post.

Boston's streak has been built on sweeps of the White Sox, Twins, Blues, and Rays. Of these teams only Tampa has a winning record, but it's early enough that that may be tautological. Their next three series are against the Yankees, A's, and Rangers, the first and last of which are playing well.  Beyond Boston, the Mets have also turned it on, with 8 wins out of the last 9 as they swept Colorado and Chicago and took 3 of 4 from the Reds.

Looking at individual statistics, Chipper Jones continues to lead the NL in batting but has "cooled off" to only .414. Meanwhile, Carlos Correa has been on an amazing hot streak (do I hear trash cans getting banged?) and is batting .453 on the season--.650 with 13 hits in the past week.  As far as the other Triple Crown stats, George Brett has 15 HR and 37 RBI. Ichiro Suzuki has a 23-game hitting streak active. Sid Fernandez has a 1.26 ERA on the season, several folks have 4 pitching wins at this point. Randy Johnson has an astonishing 81 Ks in 39 innings pitched (yet he's only 3-2). Johnson is now on pace for "only" 506 Ks. The projected batting records have also come down, though are still way above record pace--Brett is on pace for 94 HR and 231 RBI.

As a bit of a reality check on things, the league is averaging 5.4 runs per team per game. In 2019 the real number was 4.83, and only once in history was the number as high as 5.4 (it was 5.5 in 1930). So my expectation of a high-scoring league is being met as of right now. Again, it could settle down...