… let’s take a brief step back and look at the betting odds of all four teams to win the American League pennant, and then some of the storylines that might emerge by any of the four potential matchups in the American League Championship Series.
The New York Yankees had to breathe a sigh of relief last night, as 25-year-old David Phelps got his fourth start of the season against the Texas Rangers and pitched five solid innings, letting the Yankee bats beat up on Ryan Dempster and deliver New York an easy 8-2 win that kept them five games up on the surging Tampa Bay Rays in the AL East. Phelps got the start when staff ace C.C. Sabathia was put on the disabled list. With the rotation heavily dependent on Sabathia, Tampa coming hard and postseason play just seven weeks out, TheSportsNotebook looks at how worried the Yankees need to be.
Is there any hope left for the Toronto Blue Jays and the Boston Red Sox in the American League wild-card race? The two AL East teams were on the fringes of contention when the week began, hanging 5 and 4.5 games out respectively. But each has missed significant opportunities to capitalize. The Jays were swept by Tampa Bay when the last three games gave Toronto a chance to gain ground on one of the five teams that are packed within a game or so of the two wild-card spots in the American League playoffs. Boston wrapped up a 10-game homestand by losing two of three to Texas and finishing 4-6 for the sequence of games that was supposed to kickstart an August push. Both teams began 2012 with October expectations. TheSportsNotebook examines what went wrong and whether we should indeed stick a fork in both teams…
The offense has been Texas’ calling card over the years, even when they were a bad team and they lead the American League in runs scored. It’s a testimony to how good the offense was for three months, because in July the bats were positively atrocious. Josh Hamilton’s slump got media attention and a little public jab from team president Nolan Ryan, but he’s far from alone. The only noteworthy month was turned in by Nelson Cruz, who hit four home runs and slugged. 541 while getting on base consistently. In fact home runs in general weren’t a problem—Hamilton also hit four and catcher Mike Napoli hit five. But Napoli was like Hamilton in that he batted sub-.200, and the team was more like them then they were like Cruz. Texas finished dead last in the AL scoring runs for July