Tournament News, Latest Standings

Media League Commissioner Tom Jones has been a busy man this week. Probably waaay busier than whoever's in charge of that NHL debacle. (Does anyone even remember that there used to be professional hockey in the world?)

First thing's first, scores from last weekend and the latest standings:

8:00 Archway vs Equity (both forfeit)
9:00 Citadel(7) vs KTHV 11 (forfeit)
10:00 Clear Ch (2) vs Got Paper? (20)
11:00 KATV 7 (3) vs Ar Business (10)
12:00 Dem Bums (17) vs KARK 4 (12)

Here are the standings thus far going into the final week.

Dem Bums 7-1
Got Paper? 7-1
Ar Business 6-1
KARK 4 5-3.5
KTHV 11 3-5.5
Citadel 3-5.5
Equity 3-6
KATV 7 2-6
Clear Ch 1-6
Archway 1-8

Remember that the records reflect wins/losses/forfeits. A forfeit is a loss and a half.

Wow, so if you forfeit, you not only lose, you lose another half game! That's weird to me. I can't make the math work. Which is why I write for a living. Anyway, on to this week's match-ups:

Here are the game times for this Saturday

8:00 KTHV 11 vs Clear Ch
9:00 Ar Business vs KARK 4
10:00 Equity vs Dem Bums
11:00 KATV 7 vs Got Paper?
12:00 Archway vs Citadel

Given the hot, hot heat for last week's 11 a.m. game, this 9 a.m. date looks like an oasis in the Sahara Desert. This should be much bearable weatherwise.

The Tourney

We'll let Tom explain how the tournament's going to work and how the league will determine final standings. But note the tournament dates: Friday, July 8, and Saturday, July 9. Time to be announced.

So here is the skinny on how the league champ may end up. Ar Business/Dem Bums/Got Paper? are all tied with each other having 1 loss. Each team has lost to one of the other 2, thus the head to head tie breaker goes to run difference if each team wins again Saturday, and Ar Business would have to win it's make-up game with Clear Ch on June 18th. Here's the Scores of the games that each lost.

Ar Business (7) vs Got Paper? (6)
Dem Bums (19) vs Ar Business (4)
Got Paper? (24) vs Dem Bums (5)

So Tom, what does all this mean?

So what does this mean? It means the tie break goes to margin of victory vs. loss margin, thus it looks like this

Ar Business won by (1) run but lost by (15), difference (-14) runs.
Dem Bums won by (15) runs but lost by (19), difference (-4) runs.
Got Paper? won by (19) runs but lost by (1), difference (18) runs.

This would mean Got Paper? would win league title.

However each team must win out for any of this to matter. So really all I've done is make each team think a little.

Thanks for that, Tom. We love to think over here. In fact, how 'bout shooting us some more stats to mull over?

The Year in Runs
Total runs scored vs. runs given up

Dem Bums 112-79
Got Paper? 129-46
Ar Business 81-62
KARK 4 112-87
KTHV 11 84-102
Citadel 95-91
Equity 74-68
KATV 7 87-120
Clear Ch 43-95
Archway 44-90

Parting Thoughts

A final comment from Tom:

Anyway hope that each team has every player ready for the tournament that still will start on Friday, July 8th and finish on Saturday night July 9th. It's a double game elimination format. The tournament date is set in stone and has been since the begining of the season!!!!!

Glad some things were set in stone, because others seem to be in a constant state of flux. Example: The EH (extra hitter) rule. What we were told early this season was that EHers could only hit and no sub on or off the field. But observed a team doing just that last week as the umps looked on. So we're checking into that rule again with Tom.

Another example: The rescheduled matchup with Clear Channel is set for the 18th, during which will be missing a sizeable part of our team. We've petitioned to change that makeup game to the 25th, telling Jones that it's not fair that the league postponed our original game with Clear Channel when Clear Channel couldn't field a team -- its players were working on the company's "Support the Troops" broadcast -- to another date for which the Newshounds can't field a team.

This is wrong because A) the Newshounds were ready to play on the original game date and B) the league had said it wasn't doing postponed games this year, only those due to rain.

So we'll see what happens on those two points.