Anything You Can Do...
Brooklyn Goes 22-5 After Manhattan's 21-5 April

The Brooklyn-Manhattan relationship often plays out like a sibling rivalry, both on and off the field. After their crosstown rivals recorded one of the best months in UL history, the Brooklyn Superbas' did them one better.

The Screaming Bats were 22-5 in May, one win better than the Gray Sox' red-hot April, and joined their archrivals tied for the best record in the league at the one-third point. Fourth starter Masato Yoshii tied (or broke) a record with seven wins in seven starts, posting a 2.93 ERA and 1.02 and claiming his first Pitcher of the Month award. The second-year Japanese righthander was key to the Superbas' title run last year, along with fellow late-season callup Brian Moehler, who is 7-1 so far this year. Brooklyn leads the league in runs allowed, with the third best starting rotation.

Manhattan leads the league in scoring with 6.3 runs per game. Four regulars are batting north of .300, led by SS Tony Graffanino's .330 and RF Jon Nunnally's .324. Graffanino also leads all fielders in ZR with +9.5. Third year CF Richard Hidalgo is having a breakout year with .294-16-39, .940.

After their 26-6 start, which saw them with a rare 5.5-game lead on May 4, the Gray Sox lost four straight, including a sweep in Philadelphia by the red-hot Starlings, who were busy putting together an 11-game winning streak, which coincided with Brooklyn’s 15-game tear. By April 16, Manhattan, Brookyn, and Keystone had the best three records in the league. But in the second half of May, Manhattan stumbled, going just 7-7 and opening the door for Brooklyn to close the gap. By June 1 the clubs were tied at 37-18 atop the East and atop the league as a whole.

The 1999 season is playing out as yet another chapter in what is arguably the best rivalry in the league. Throughout all the various iterations of number of divisions and geographic alignments, the Superbas and Gray Sox have competed in the same division since Manhattan joined the league in 1962. When Brooklyn’s run of 13 consecutive winning seasons ended in 1968, it was the Joe Torre-Willie Stargell-Pete Ward-Vada Pinson Gray Sox who seized the opportunity and rolled to their first UL title. The following year, Brooklyn regained the East pennant, edging the Sox by four games as the two clubs finished 1-2 in their division for the first of six times.

In 1976, Craig Robinson led Manhattan to second place in the East, and defeated Brooklyn in their first and only World Series meeting. The Superbas were the first victims of the Gray Sox dynasty that claimed four straight titles from 1976-79. [They were also one of the last, falling to the C-Rob-led Sox in seven games in the 1979 Semi Series.] In 1984 and ‘85, during the mini-division era, Manhattan topped Brooklyn for the Atlantic Division title, only to crash out in the Hex Series.

Brooklyn faded in the late ‘80s and Manhattan did in the early ‘90s. In 1996, the two clubs tied for first in the East, but both were merely speed bumps on Boston’s run to the title, as Sammy Sosa homered to team past the Atlanta Hilltoppers for the Federals’ second title. In 1997, Brooklyn and Manhattan spent most of the summer tied for first before the Sox pulled away in September. The teams met in the 1997 Semi Series, with Manhattan defeating their rivals for the third time in as many playoff meetings.

In the almost half-century history of the league, the only other rivalries that reach the level of sustained greatness as the Brooklyn-Manhattan duo are Brooklyn-Chicago and Manhattan-Los Angeles. The Superbas and Colts met in four straight Fall Classics from 1961 to 1964, and again in 1966 and 1993. The Gray Sox and Outlaws came of age and won their first pennants at the same time, meeting each other in the joint-first World Series appearance in 1968. They have booked repeat engagements roughly once a decade ever since, meeting again in 1977 and 1986. Manhattan won all three.

St. Louis, Los Angeles, and Chicago formed an excellent menage a trois in the early ‘90s. For four straight years from 1990 to 1993, the three clubs locked up the West’s three playoff spots, with Los Angeles and Chicago winning titles in 1991 and 1993, respectively. Chicago and St. Louis are natural rivals, but have only finished in the top two of the same division thrice—in 1965, 1972, and 1992—though they met in the playoffs three years in a row from 1990 to 1992, with the Colts winning all three times.

One Third or One Turd?
Speaking of the season milestones, here are some of the circuit's top underachievers at the one-turd mark:

• Golden Gate's Mike Benjamin has the lowest OPS among qualified batters (.495). Oh, and he has a -2.3 ZR at shortstop.
•  Cleveland SS Craig Grebeck has the lowest SLG in the league (.234) and just 7 RBI in 199 PA. But at least he can field.
• Golden Gate’s Jamey Wright leads the league in ERA… if you sort in descending order. But his 8.53 ERA is not that bad when you consider his May ERA was 9.68 and his daytime ERA is 10.98.
• Who has the highest WHIP among qualified starting pitchers? Jim Abbott (GG) has a 1.88 WHIP. Oh wait, Jamey Wright’s is 2.07.
• Who is the worst ace so far? By ERA, that would be Denver’s Greg Mathews at 5.14. Oh wait, Jamey Wright is an ace.
• Curt Schilling (ATL) leads the league with 8.4 W/9, a full 2.1 more than the next walkiest pitcher, teammate Al Leiter, and is well on his way to winning his second most-walks-allowed title.
• Puerto Rico’s Joey Hamilton has the lowest quality start percentage, with just 1 in 14 GS. But that's a definitional problem more than anything. A quality start requires six innings. Joey has three starts of 5+ innings allowing one run, and four more allowing two runs.
• Roger Clemens has made a career of being a .500 pitcher. Including his 14-15 rookie season in 1984, he has finished within two games of .500 nine times. Not this year. Roger is 2-8 in his first 11 starts with a 6.88 ERA and 1.62 WHIP.
• Which $10 million pitcher has the lowest WAR? Portland’s Tom Glavine (0.6).
• Which $10 million batter has the lowest WAR? Atlanta’s Tony Gwynn (-0.5). Runner-up: Montreal’s Ivan Rodriguez (0.6)

Streaker Season
UL Clubs Running Hot and Cold

Pick a random day and look at the standings and you are likely to see crooked numbers in an unusual place: the Streak column. There have been 16 win streaks and 12 loss streaks of at least six games, and we are only one-third of the way through the season. Manhattan has put together three win streaks, of nine, eight, and six games, on their way to the joint-top record in the league. Not to be outdone, Brooklyn has the season’s longest winning streak, and the longest in recent memory, a 15-game tear through May 14. And it is not only the dominant teams getting in the act: Cleveland and Denver—.500 teams—have both had nine-game win streaks.

In the L column, Los Angeles holds the record for futility with nine straight losses through Apr. 25. But many of the streaky winners also find themselves on the streaky losers list. Seattle lost 7 in a row through May 15 then started an 11-game win streak four days later. Florida stacked consecutive seven-game losing and winning streaks in late May, and Portland did the same with back-to-back six-game win and loss streaks from Apr. 18 to May 3.

Longest Streaks, April 1 to May 31
MAN W9 thru 4/9 BOS W7 thru 4/9 CLE W9 thru 4/12
KEY W11 thru 5/16 DEN W9 thru 4/21 POR W6 thru 4/24
BRO W8 thru 4/26 MON W7 thru 4/27 MAN W8 thru 4/29
FLO W7 thru 4/29 BRO W15 thru 5/14 KEY W8 thru 5/13
MPS W6 thru 5/17 STL W7 thru 5/21 MAN W6 thru 5/20
SEA W11 thru 5/29

BRO L6 thru 4/17 TOR L7 thru 4/21 FLO L7 thru 4/21
LA L9 thru 4/25 POR L6 thru 5/3 ATL L7 thru 5/8
GG L6 thru 5/10 SEA L7 thru 5/15 POR L8 thru 5/17
PUE L6 thru 5/17 FLO L6 thru 5/20 STL L8 thru 5/29

Expansion and the dilution of talent is surely a factor. With three expansion teams (plus Los Angeles), the disparity between the good teams and the bad teams has arguably grown. But that explanation only gets us half-way there. How do you account for teams like Florida, Portland, and Seattle that are stacking winning and losing streaks? And will the streaking continue into the dog days of summer?

Erstad Ties Hitting Streak Record
Denver's Darin Erstad hit safely in 34 consecutive games, tying the UL record set by six-time MVP Craig Robinson in 1977. Erstad's record ended with a pinch-hit flyout on May 3. He batted .392 during the run, trailing only teammate Tim Raines on the batting table.