Playoff picture now as clean as the sport

Beneath the murky waters flowing from America over the past week, whereby 13 players have been implicated and banned for steroid abuse, the British Baseball Federation’s 2013 regular season is drawing to a close in what has been a roundly successful summer.

Matched to a perfect record from the Great Britain team in the European Baseball Championship Qualifiers at the end of last month and the opening of the National Baseball and Softball Facilities in Farnham Park in July, things are looking positive, even outside of the laboratories!

Let’s start with the easy ones, where positions have already been confirmed, getting greyer and greyer the further down we go.

AA South. Hove Tuesday go through to playoffs as league winners (14-2), London Mammoths take second (13-3) and also take a bye into the regional semi-finals. Guildford Mavericks (12-4) will almost certainly play Herts Hawks (7-7) in a repeat of last year’s semi-final, in which the Hawks surprised their hosts, while the Sidewinders (11-5) and Daws Hill Spitfires (8-7) are set to square off for the other semi-final spot. The winners of these games face Hove and London, then the winners there do battle at Farnham Park in the NBCs.

AA North. Hull Scorpions have all-but won the league with a 18-2 record, while Harrogate Tigers (14-4) are the only side that can stop them. Realistically, they’ll both go through to the AA playoffs, while Manchester As (10-8) are likely to join the pair if they can hold off any charge from defending division champions the Sheffield Bladerunners (8-10). Once again, the Oldham North Stars (4-14) and Newton Aycliffe Spartans (5-13) miss out, but they’re beating teams other than themselves and are sure to feature sooner rather than later.

AAA Midlands. Although the league hasn’t been decided (Nottingham Rebels and Milton Keynes Bucks square off this weekend for that honour, both currently at 15-3), they’ll both go through to the playoffs, with whoever finishes second needing to overcome the Trojans to proceed to the NBCs. Stourbridge Titans (1-17) and Birmingham Maple Leafs (7-13) are both staying at home this August, while Leicester Blue Sox will be travelling as their 8-10 record, which could still be built on, places them third and in the AA playoffs position.

AAA North. The Liverpool Trojans have won the league. Again. This headline could have been written before the start of the season, but thankfully it wasn’t as they were challenged in a number of games like they’ve not been for the past three years. But it was business as usual as they sewed up their fourth straight crown. Given their run-in, the Cartmel Lions (7-9) will likely fancy their chances of joining Liverpool in the playoffs again, but Halton hold the advantage for now (10-8) and next week’s double-header between the two clubs will confirm how that ends. Menwith Hill Patriots struggled for the second season in three to get a team out regularly.

AAA South. Though the London Metros (19-4) are nearly guaranteed finishing top, three games ahead of the Cambridge Royals (16-8) and London Mets II (17-9), the final playoff place is properly up for grabs. With six games still remaining, the Bristol Badgers (14-8) are just edging perennial NBC-attendees Oxford Kings (11-9), but they themselves have eight games yet to register. A shortage of free dates means Bristol are probably going to squeak through, but if they win a few of their remaining fixtures they may even take preferential seeding. The Herts Ravens (6-14), Richmond Knights (5-17) and Leones de Feltham (2-20) barely figured after mid-season, except to deliver a few unexpected difficulties.

In their debut season, the Essex Redbacks are the strongest team in the National Baseball League…holding up the other eight, as they lie rock-bottom and cut adrift. Both the South London Pirates (7-17) and Essex Arrows (8-16) over the last fortnight of the season need results to go their way if they’re to pip the Lakenheath Diamondbacks (9-13) for the sixth spot, and NBL quarter finals, else the US Air Force team will head back to the playoffs for their second appearance in three years.

At the top, the Herts Falcons (20-4) and Southampton Mustangs (21-5) remain locked in first spot, with the London Mets (19-5) just a game behind, but with four games to play,  chasing a chance to go through to the NBCs automatically. Whoever finishes third will likely play the Dimondbacks, while the Bracknell Blazers (11-13) and Harlow Nationals (13-13) have quietly gone about their business this year en route to guaranteed playoff berths, in which they’ll face each other, it would appear, for a chance to go through.

While picking two from three might be tricky in the NBL, it’s a handful and a half down in Single-A.

The Herts Raptors (10-4) and London Marauders (9-2), as winners of Pool A and C respectively, will need to play one game fewer than their opponents in their playoff campaigns, while the Haverhill Blackjacks (7-5) have suffered a few late defeats to mean they’ll only be able to grab a wild card spot despite being a pool winner. The Milton Keynes Coyotes (7-5) are set to finish second in Pool A, but alongside the Guildford Mavericks II (also 7-5) have the same record as the Blackjacks and the three of them will make up four of the Single-A quarter-finalists. The final playoff place could go anywhere; Richmond Dukes (7-6) and Tonbridge Bobcats (6-6) are best placed for the final berth, while Old Timers and Essex Archers (both 5-7) and Essex Redbacks II (4-8) are probably going to miss out unless results go their way. Herts Eagles (3-9) and Leicester 2Sox (2-8) are the only two teams in this league definitely not making the post-season.

And qualification is just half the battle.

Stay tuned for updates as things progress. Follow #bbfscore and #britishbaseball on twitter for immediate results, and watch this space…