Week 15 Summary (07/21/1941 - 07/27/1941)

Week Fifteen of the 1941 BBW replay is in the books and the leaders in both leagues continue to enjoy sitting on their comfortable lead while watching the teams directly behind them take turns knocking each other down. Can one of these contending teams rise up and really contend for first place? They are starting to run out of time, and they have a long way to go … it'll be tough. Only two teams have not reached the 90 games played mark, but they will be there shortly. At the end of next week, the replay will be well into August and most of the teams will have passed the 100 games played mark.

Chicago White Sox
In the AL, as Cleveland, Boston, and Chicago all have been taking turns in second, third, and fourth place over the past few weeks, New York has been able to put it in cruise control and continue its winning ways without interruption. Of all these teams it is the White Sox who are the biggest surprise. After having been stuck in second place for most of the first half of the season their mojo has been upended and they have recently had trouble buying a win. Their hitting has always been weak, but it was always enough, just enough, to go along with their strong pitching and good fielding, but their hitting is now struggling, and Chicago had gone 2-8 over their last ten and has tumbled to fourth. Cleveland has gone 8-2 over their last ten games and has managed to hold off Boston, but Ted Williams has now returned to the Red Sox lineup, and they feel their chances are looking good, maybe not to catch the Yankees, but they certainly feel the second place can be theirs.

In the NL, Brooklyn got off to a strong start this season but then fell behind St. Louis and until recently were maintaining a strong second-place position and were waiting for the surging Cardinals to blink so they could move back up to the top. The Cardinals haven't blinked yet, but the Dodgers did and they have struggled over the past few weeks as they fell into fourth place behind the charging New and Cincinnati teams. However, Brooklyn has gotten hot over the past two weeks, having won eight of their last ten and retook second place again. Can they hold it? I think the Reds and Giants may have already had their hot streak, but if the Cardinals don’t have one then the Dodgers will remain stuck in second place.

 

Chicago (AL) Manager
Jimmy Dykes
The other race for consideration is MVP in the AL - Ted Williams or Joe DiMaggio? DiMaggio is leading the Yankees to a runway pennant. Because Williams has missed games with his injured ankle DiMaggio has the advantage in totals stats, but these two are often one and two. Williams leads in average (.483), DiMaggio is second (.367). DiMaggio leads in runs (98) and hits (132), Williams is second in runs (93) and hits (129). Williams is second in RBI’s (89), but Charlie Keller, batting behind DiMaggio, leads in RBI’s (91). DiMaggio leads in doubles (29), Williams is tied for second with Buddy Lewis (26). DiMaggio is tied with four players for third place in triples with 9, and DiMaggio is third in homeruns (20), behind Williams (24) and Keller (22).

This past week featured an unusually high number of ejections and injuries. All the injuries are "rest of game" injuries only, and of course, ejected players return to play the next game as well. I really don't mind these events happening. They add a little bit of unplanned chaos to the replay, plus the bench players need to get in some unplanned appearances as well. These are usually scattered throughout the season and just add flavor to the day-to-day gameplay, but this week the sprinkles turned into a full-fledged rainstorm. I expect that this will level off as we move forward.

 

As we head into the final two months of the season the pennant races may very well have already been decided, but there is still plenty of competitive ball to be played as teams scratch and claw their way up (or down) the standings, so let's get started on Week Sixteen.

 

Comiskey Park 1948 Digital Art by Gary Grigsby - Pixels




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