Baseball actually developed some late-season races

Baseball actually developed some late-season races.

Believe it or not, there are eight important games today. (It could be nine if you include the Mets, and you could do that because Reyes is battling for the batting championship.)

Both wild card races are tied. Out of nowhere, the Rays managed to tie the Red Sox and the Cardinals managed to catch the Braves.

There's only one game left, and the rival teams are not playing one another, so both races could end in ties. This sort of tie is not decided by a tie-breaker rule, but by head-to-head competition. The tie-breaker does determine the location of the game. St Louis would host the NL game, having won the season series against the Braves, 5-1. Tampa Bay would host the AL game, having trounced the Red Sox 12-6 during the season.

But it's not a tie yet. There's the matter of one more regular season game.

Boston would seem to have the scheduling edge in tomorrow's AL games. They play the Orioles, while the Rays have to take on the first-place Yankees. But Tampa has Price on the mound, and the Yankees don't give a crap about this game, so who knows? The Cardinals have the scheduling edge in the NL, since they play the lowly Astros tomorrow, while the Braves are up against the mighty Phillies. But the Phillies have Blanton on the mound, so they're not themselves, and they'll be facing Tim Hudson, so you'd expect the Braves to win the game.

ESPN's playoff likelihood matrix shows the Red Sox with a 60% chance to make the post season, and St Louis at 61%.

Also playing for keeps on the last day: the Brewers and the D-backs. They are playing for home field advantage. That's especially important for the Brewers, not just to avoid playing the Phillies if the Braves make it, but because the Brewers are spectacularly good in Miller Park (best home record in baseball), but are a losing team on the road. They want this game today. They have a one-game edge on the D-backs, but can't afford to drop back into a tie because the D-backs have the tie-breaker, so they're starting Greinke at home, where he is undefeated for the entire year. It's too bad for them that they play before the D-Backs tonight. If the D-Backs were to lose first, then the game would no longer be a must-win, and the Brewers could start some schmuck and save Greinke for the playoffs. They will not get that luxury, so they will do everything they can to get that W.

Also playing to win: the Tigers and the Rangers. It's exactly the same deal as Milwaukee and Arizona. The Rangers have won one more game, but if they lose today and Detroit wins, they will lose the home field edge because the Tigers won the season series. The team which has the better record will get to face Boston or Tampa at home instead of staring down the Yankees in Yankee Stadium. The Tigers don't seem to be taking the whole thing as seriously as the other clubs which are in the same boat. As opposed to Milwaukee starting their ace, the Tigers are starting Rick Porcello, who hasn't reached puberty yet, and has a 4.76 ERA and a 1.41 WHIP. They are in the same situation as Milwaukee in that they wish they could see the result of the Rangers game before selecting a line-up. If the Rangers win, Detroit's game is meaningless. Unfortunately for them, they start an hour earlier than Texas.

The batting championships will also be determined by the last day of play. Cabrera (.343) seems to have the AL sewed up, but he could still lose it with a bad day for him and a spectacular day for either Michael Young (.340) or Adrian Gonzalez (.338). In the NL, there's only one point between the leaders (Reyes .336, Braun .335), so it will depend on who does what today. I'm not even sure whether Reyes will play. Braun will for sure.

Kemp will not win the triple crown. He leads in HRs (tied) and RBI, but cannot make up .012 in batting average in a single day. If he were to go 5-for-5 while Braun and Reyes each go 0-for-5, Kemp would still finish third.

He did make a great run at it.

No National Leaguer has won the triple crown since Ducky Medwick in 1937, when there were only eight teams, therefore far fewer competitors than in today's league. Medwick also led the league in doubles and runs scored that year. He was a great hitter, but wasn't really a great triple crown contender. He did lead the league in RBI several times, three in a row to be exact, but never led in BA or HR in any other year. In fact, he never hit more than 23 homers in any other year, and hit only 31 in the year when he led the league. (He actually tied Mel Ott for the HR lead.)

The last National Leaguer to win all three categories outright (no ties) was Chuck Klein in 1933, but that triple crown was total bullshit. Klein played in a park called Baker Bowl, the Coors of its day. Klein hit .467 at home, with 20 homers, but was a .280 hitter on the road with only 8 dingers. The team was so impressed with his triple crown year that they immediately sent him to the Cubs for three nobodies and cash. He then performed in Chicago exactly as one would have expected from his previous road stats. He batted .293 and .301, with 20 and 21 in the homer category - a good player, to be sure, but not a triple crown guy.

To find the next guy in line, you'd have to go back to 1925, when Rogers Hornsby won all three categories by a country mile. He batted .403 with 39 homers and 143 RBI. His own teammate, Sunny Jim Bottomley, finished a distant second in all three categories, with .367, 21-128. But sound the alarm and raise the red flag! Why did two teammates dominate the stats so convincingly while their team went 77-76? Same deal as Klein. Home park. Hornsby hit .478 at home in Sportsman's Park, .332 on the road. Bottomley hit .410 with 16 homers at home, but .327 with a meager 5 dingers on the road.

There is no controversy over Hornsby's other triple crown in 1922. Although he hit better in Sportsman's Park than he did on the road, he also hit .400 with 18 homers and 69 RBI on the road. If you simply doubled his road numbers, he STILL would have won the triple crown.

The point of all this is for you to realize what a great year Kemp just had. In the past 90 years, since Hornsby ran away with it fair and square in 1922, the only NL players to win the crown have needed some fluke to do so, and have won in 8-team leagues. Kemp, on the other hand, almost won the triple crown in a 16-team league, while playing in a pitcher's park. (Actually it was a neutral park this year.) On top of all that, he stole 40 bases. I don't know whether he'll win the MVP. Some voters are prejudiced against guys with crappy teammates. But I can't make any argument against Kemp except that Ryan Braun was almost as good and had better teammates. Not much of an argument, as I see it. Braun was great. Kemp was better.

Helluva year.