The final Friday 1:20 game of the year. The final series of the year. The final homestand of the year. It’s always weird when this stuff arrives, because the season invariably will have felt so long and also will have zipped by so quickly …
- At least the finales for the Cubs this weekend will not be permanent. Very sad stuff this week out of Oakland, where the local fans have been saying goodbye to the A’s. The final game was yesterday, and the whole day was full of moments that make you feel sick for all those fans, and angry that the people in charge couldn’t – or didn’t want to – figure it out:
- Throw in what the fans in Oakland have been through the last five years and it’s all the more brutal:
- Bonus, here’s the A’s thanking only THE BALLPARK they are leaving, not the fans or the city, and doing so with replies turned off:
- Strange but true fact:
- The additional pitch clock tweak (that, as predicted, we didn’t even notice) seems to have shaved an additional three minutes of dead time off of games this season, per BA. That change, by the way, was reducing the pitch clock time with runners on base from 20 seconds to 18 seconds. If no one noticed anyway, why not, right?
- Cubs Con tickets are now on sale:
- Not much here, and assuredly agent-nudged, but just so you have it:
- All six division races are now locked up:
- What a 42-degree home run looks like, and no one can quite believe it went out:
- Wild:
- He had kind of a down year, and I wonder if the Twins would be willing to trade this guy to a certain team who wants to use him as their closer: