Among human-controlled teams the White Sox, Royals, Phillies, Pirates, Dodgers, Yankees and Reds have all clinched postseason appearances thus far, with the Cubs and Expos still in it and knocking on the door of the NL Wild Card. The Tigers are 4 games back in the AL Wild Card.
Hokey smokes, Bullwinkle, we’re down to the last 2 weeks of the regular season and the NL and AL central are still up for grabs. The Phillies, Dodgers, Yankees, White Sox and Royals have all clinched postseason appearances. Unfortunately the Mariners, Giants, and Blue Jays are out of contention.
In the AL Central, the White Sox and the Royals are separated by just 3.5 games while facing each other 3 times in their final 9 games.
In the NL Central the Pirates have a strong lead but Cubs and Reds are both just barely still in the hunt for the division, while leading the Wild Card. The Cubs face the Pirates 3 times before it’s all over, and the Reds have 4 games against the Bucs.
It’s down to the wire, folks! With Divergent League you pay for the whole seat, but you only need the edge. Stay with us as we end the regular season this weekend and move into the playoffs. You can catch all of the action on extrafuture.com/tv
— 1977 Sept 17th Standings
Yankees – Liam – 95-57, 1st AL East
Blue Jays – Phil – 70-83, 4th AL East, 25.5gb
Phillies – Ryan – 110-42, 1st NL East
Expos – Chuck – 85-67, 2nd NL East, 25gb
White Sox – Travis – 96-57, 1st AL Central
Royals – Derek – 92-60, 2nd AL Central 3.5gb
Tigers – Tony – 80-72, 3rd AL Central, 15.5gb
Pirates – Austin – 95-57, 1st NL Central
Cubs – George – 88-65, 2nd NL Central, 7.5gb
Reds – Ev – 87-64, 3rd NL Central, 7.5gb
Cardinals – Derek L – 76-76, last NL Central, 19gb
Broadcast live on Twitch yesterday, you can watch the archived stream. Now that the channel is a Twitch affiliate you can spend Bits to play sounds during the game. Drop by for the next broadcast on Friday, August 14th and try it out.
I’ve set up a Google Calendar that will always have the current Divergent League streaming schedule. In the postseason, which starts soon, it will include the names of the teams participating and who is leading the series.
The 1987.B baseball season is behind us and it’s Cubs Win, Cubs Win… 29 years early. The Chicago Cubs, after a savvy trade of Bo Jackson and a Hardship Draft investment in pitching, rose from last in the NL Central to World Series Champions. This is a pretty big change compared to 1987.A (or, I guess, “real life”) where in the Cubbies didn’t win the big one until 2016.
1987 League Leaders / Award Winners
Tragically this information may be lost to history. The folder that contained it went missing.
Ah, about that Hardship Draft…
New Rule: The Hardship Draft
At the 1987 All-Star break the season was looking pretty lop-sided. My New York Mets were mowing people down, which was great, but the rest of the least was either top of the division or in the cellar. There were no teams in the middle. Since Divergent League is meant to be an exciting baseball story generator, not a competitive media empire like the MLB, we decided to add the Hardship draft. From the forthcoming Divergent League rulebook:
The Hardship Draft takes place the weekend of the All-Star Break. Right before the Home Run Derby or All Star Game the bottom 20% of teams (rounded up) are able to select one player from any non-human controlled team or the Free Agent pool to add to their team.
It resulted in a MUCH more competitive season, and a really exciting playoffs. You can watch some of those games on the 1987 Season playlist from our YouTube channel.