Naturals outfielder Justin Upton
With just over two weeks remaining in the 2011 season, the DTBL Championship race is fairly clear: either Jay’s Jackalope or Nick’s Naturals will be the 2011 champions (and thanks to last year, I have to add the caveat that they BOTH could win the title). The Jackalope have been at the top of the standings most of the season. About a month ago, the Naturals made things very interesting, getting as close as one half point behind. They currently sit four points back. The next five teams are closely bunched with each other, but are at least 14 points behind the Jackalope.
I don’t have a good mathematical formula to figure this out, but I would put the Jackalope odds of winning the championship at close to 85%. While four points can be made up in no time, the Jackalope are in an envious position because they have a fair amount of space between them and the nearest competitor in most categories. Barring a collapse, the only categories in which I could see them losing ground are wins and strike outs, with strike outs being very unlikely since the chasing Kings pitching staff has fallen apart in recent weeks. Wins is a little more likely, with just two points separating them from the Moonshiners. The interesting thing there though is that the Naturals really need to hold off the Moonshiners in strike outs and perhaps catch them in WHIP. So they somehow need that to happen and have the Moonshiners catch the Jackalope in wins at the same time.
I would be shocked if the Jackalope finished with fewer than 79 points. That leaves a tall order for the defending co-champion Naturals. It is doable though. There are 1 1/2 points to be gained in the batting categories if they can pass up the Demigods for the batting average lead and break their current tie with the Kings in stolen bases. But the best path to the title would be two spectacular weeks from their pitching staff. They have an outside shot at gaining points in ERA and WHIP, but that would depend on other teams faltering as well. Wins and saves are possibilities too. Keep an eye on all four of these categories over the final weeks.
If the Jackalope can stay right where they are, at 80 points, they can rest easy. Not only for the reasons I mentioned above, but history will be on their side. Only one team has ever reached that plateau and not won the title: the 1998 Kings. And that was an expansion season, so there were several really awful teams claiming very few of the available points. Interestingly enough, the Jackalope were one of the expansion teams that year, but they finished a very respectable 6th. 13 years later, they are on the verge of their first DTBL Championship.