New Runner Advance Chart & Team Cards for Min vs. Sea vs. Pit Pool

Seattle 6, Minnesota 3 - the exciting Pool I play continued as Cal Raleigh's 3-run game winning homer gave inproved the defending AL champs to 1-1 and within half a game of the 2-1 Twins, who will now play their final game vs Pittsburgh.

Minnesota 6, Pittsburgh 1 - The Twins did bounce back in their finale, eliminating the Pirates with a 6-1 win to finish pool play at 3-1 with a +5 difference after Jeffers and Roden hit doubles in a 4-run first inning, then Wallner added a 2-run homer in the fifth inning.

Seattle now needs to win the final two games, both against the Pirates, or the Twins win the pool. The Mariners have a great shot though because they have two PB 2-8 pitchers starting to give them a big edge, and they only need to win the two games by a combined 4 runs to win the tybreaker and advance to the wildcard pool against the Braves and White Sox.

Preview

bove we show the new chart we've subbed into the Free Statis-Pro game to use when a runner wants to take an extra base on a double or single. The big change is that I was noticing how often players seem to be going home from second on singles, and the recent stats bear it out—it happens most of the time.

As for the last Pool Play remaining, below are the key Statis-Pro card items for the three lineups, pitching rotations and top five relievers for the three teams in Pool I. Below that is a picture of all the cards for each team, and then the scoresheets from the first two games in pool play, back when the Minnesota Twins won great back-and-forth, close games over the aces for both the Mariners and the Pirates to start 2-0.

We will play the rematches of both games, with the Twins hosting Seattle and throwing a new card—Kendry Rojas, who is having a good year but, as a lefty against a Mariners lineup that has no lefty batters, may need a bit of bullpen help. However, because the Mariners threw their ace in the game at home against Minnesota, they have their only non-PB 2-8 pitcher in PB 2-6 Bryce Miller, so that makes the Twins a slight favorite to go to 3-0.

If the Twins win that, then they can clinch in a matchup of average (PB 4-7) starters, as they throw Taj Bradley against the Pirates' Braxton Ashcraft, who can only go five innings. If the Twins win both to go to 4-0, then they advance, but if not, the Mariners and Pirates will need to play at least once and perhaps twice to see who advances.

Because this Pool I ended up with by far the lowest overall strength of schedule (none of the three teams have winning records in real MLB play, and none are among the top 18 teams, while the other eight pools all had at least one team in the top nine of the Power Rankings), the winner of this pool still needs to go into the Wild Card Pool against the second-best team in the best pool—the Braves, who lost on the tiebreaker to the Red Sox. The Wild Card Pool has already started, with the Braves hammering the third team—the Chicago White Sox, who have stunned the baseball world by going from a Power Ranking of 28th (thus one of three teams not assigned a pool) to 11th (to deserve a shot).

The winner of Pool I joins the White Sox and Braves to try to make the semifinals.

     

Pos	Minnesota Line-up	Bats	Home Run!	SP	OPS	Notes for Pool I
2b	Luke Keaschall	RN	31 to 32	A	0.750
CF	Byron Buxton	RP	23 to 28	B	0.802
RF	Matt Wallner	LP	21 to 25	C	0.777
3b	Royce Lewis	RP	26 to 31	B	0.757
C	Ryan Jeffers	RN	26 to 28	D	0.746
LF	Trevor Larnach	LN	26 to 28	D	0.745
DH	Alan Roden	LN	27 to 28	D	0.727
1b	Kody Clemens	LP	24 to 27	D	0.716
SS	Brooks Lee	RN	27 to 31	D	0.711
PB-	Min Rotation	Th	Strikeout!	Max IP	ERA	Notes for Pool I
2'-9	Joe Ryan	Right	24 to 54	7	3.81	already pitched, beat Pitt
2'-7	Zebby Matthews	Right	27 to 46	5	4.01	already pitched, beat Sea
4'-7	Kendry Rojas	Left	25 to 44	5	3.96	NEW, will start vs. Sea
4'-7	Taj Bradley	Right	26 to 45	6	4.23	will start vs. Pitt Gm 2
PB-	Min Top Relievers	Th	Strikeout	Max IP	ERA	Notes for Pool I
2'-8	AJ Minter	Left	22 to 52	2	3.3
2'-8	Jeff Hoffman	Right	21 to 56	2	3.4
2'-7	Cole Sands	Right	25 to 46	2	3.92	out both games
2'-7	David Festa	Right	25 to 46	3	3.92	out v Seattle
2'-7	Tommy Nance	Right	26 to 44	2	3.76	new card
Pos	Pittsburgh Line-up	Bats	Home Run!	SP	OPS	Notes for Pool I
DH	Marcell Ozuna	RP	24 to 27	D	0.775
1b	Spencer Horwitz	LN	28 to 31	D	0.775
rf	Ryan O'Hearn	LN	31 to 33	D	0.766
CF	Oneil Cruz	SP	23 to 26	A	0.763
2b	Brandon Lowe	RP	24 to 28	D	0.754
LF	Johnathan Rodríguez	RN	27 to 31	E	0.73
C	Endy Rodríguez	SN	26 to 28	D	0.704
3b	Jared Triolo	RN	27 to 27	B	0.688
SS	Konnor Griffin	RN	31 to 32	A	0.713
PB-	Rotation	Th	Strikeout!	Max IP	ERA	Notes for Pool I
2'-9	Paul Skenes	Right	22 to 53	8	2.92	Lost to Minnesota
2'-7	Jared Jones	Right	24 to 51	6	3.83
4'-7	Mitch Keller	Right	27 to 44	7	4.35
4'-7	Braxton Ashcraft	Right	27 to 44	5	4.08	will pitch vs Minn
PB-	Top 5 Relievers	Th	Strikeout	Max IP	ERA	Notes for Pool I
2'-8	Camilo Doval	Right	21 to 52	2	3.41	acquired from NYY
2'-8	Gregory Soto	Left	23 to 47	2	3.57	out vs Minnesota
2'-8	Kirby Yates		27 to 45	1	3.4	acquired from LAD
2'-7	Luke Weaver	Right	23 to 48	2	3.69
2'-7	Evan Sisk		25 to 44	2	3.81	new card
Pos	Seattle Line-up	Bats	Home Run!	SP	OPS	Notes for Pool I
CF	Julio Rodríguez	RP	28 to 34	A	0.825
LF	Randy Arozarena	RN	24 to 28	A	0.812
1b	Josh Naylor	RP	28 to 33	B	0.78
C	Cal Raleigh	SP	17 to 24	C	0.778
RF	Taylor Ward	RP	24 to 27	D	0.765
DH	Rob Refsnyder	RN	25 to 27	D	0.726
3B	Weston Wilson	SN	27 to 31	C	0.725
SS	JP Crawford	SN	26 to 27	D	0.697
2b	Cole Young	RN	27 to 27	C	0.697
PB-	Rotation	Th	Strikeout!	Max IP	ERA	Notes for Pool I
2'-8	Logan Gilbert	Right	23 to 51	7	3.4	Lost to Minn
2'-8	George Kirby	Right	25 to 47	7	3.51
2'-8	Bryan Woo	Right	25 to 47	8	3.6
2'-6	Bryce Miller	Right	26 to 44	7	4.2	start vs Minn Gm 2
PB-	Top 5 Relievers	Th	Strikeout	Max IP	ERA	Notes for Pool I
2'-8	Andrés Muñoz	Right	21 to 52	2	2.93
2'-8	Matt Brash	Right	22 to 51	2	3.05
2'-8	Gabe Speier	Left	22 to 53	2	3.21	out vs Min
2'-8	Jose A Ferrer	Left	25 to 47	2	3.11	out vs Min
2'-7	Eduard Bazardo	Right	23 to 46	2	3.71

set up