PEOPLES DIVISION
Kolkata Cobras 38 26
Santa Barbara Laws 35 29 (3)
Beijing Waves 32 32 (6)
Tokyo Mist 27 37 (11)
LA Gamers 26 38 (12)
Rabindranith Tagore, pitching ace of Satajit Ray’s Cobras, recently added a new pitch to his repertoire—a knuckle curve nearly impossible to hit.
Unfortunately, Rabindranith hasn’t been able to throw it consistently for strikes, and he’s been leaving his fastball up in the zone when behind in the count.
Tagore has lost five in a row, including a 10-1 loss in his last start. Manager Rupi Kaur insists she’s not worried, but the last time Tagore pitched a gem was in the middle of May, shutting out the Waves, 3-0, part of a four game sweep of Chairman Mao’s team in Kolkata. Hermann Hesse is slowly coming around for the Cobras as their no. 4 starter, with 5 wins; Rumi and Gandhi each have 9 wins. Vikram Seth, Jadoo Akhtar, and George Harrison continue to be the big three in the Kolkata lineup. Seth’s 16 homers is the most in the Peoples Division; Akhtar has 14, and Harrison 12. The Cobras are also playing great defense, and their bench is deep.
The Laws trail the Cobras by only 3 games. Laws center fielder John Donne is on fire, and now has 16 round-trippers, tied for the division lead. Thomas Hardy has 11.
Ferdinand Saussure has joined the Laws bullpen—so far he’s 0-2, but he’s shown good stuff, and he might just be the stopper the Laws need. The Laws and Cobras, the top two teams in the division, have been trying to find a bullpen ace all season. Good news for the Cobras: great outings by both new addition Ramavtar Sarma and Kabir Das in relief—shutout innings leading to wins.
But what should concern the Cobras is the performance of the Laws top two starters—Aristotle and Francis Bacon. Aristotle has won 4 of his last 5 starts, the only loss when he was out-pitched by the Waves Voltaire, 2-1. And Lord Bacon is 9-1 in his last 11 starts, including 3 shutouts. Horace is still not pitching well for the Laws, and Oliver Wendell Holmes has been up and down, but if Saussure works out as a closer, Dick Wolf’s Laws from Santa Barbara are the team to beat in the Peoples Division.
The Beijing Waves are solidly in third place, but they’ve lost 9 of their last 16. Like the Cobras, the Waves have a murderer’s row—Tu Fu (12 homers), Li Po (14 homers), and Karl Marx (11 homers), but they have a porous defense and all of their starters have struggled at one time or another. Voltaire (6 wins) seems to be turning it around, you never know what you’re going to get with Lucretius (7-7), Rousseau hasn’t been too bad, but he has 2 wins, and Lao Tzu (8 wins) has been their best so far. Confucius (6-2) has been a godsend in the bullpen for Mao’s team, a bullpen otherwise shaky, though Khomeini finally got a win with three scoreless innings. Pitching coach Nancy Pelosi: “We just need Voltaire and Rousseau to win.” Manager Jack Dorsey: “We have the best team in the league. I really believe that. Neruda is making too many errors at third. We’ve talked. Brecht has been playing hurt at catcher. We’ll turn this around. Watch us in the second half.”
Kurosawa’s Mist and Merv Griffin’s Gamers are the bottom feeders in the Peoples Division.
John Lennon and Hilda Doolittle are hitting for the Mist, but no one is pitching well, except for new bullpen addition Haruki Murakami. Kobe Abe is 2-7 and D.T. Suzuki is 0-4 in relief—the Mist are plugging other pitchers into the bullpen: Takaaki Yoshimoto, Murasaki Shikibu, Mitsuyo Kakuta, Heraclitus. Basho has 1 win in his last 9 outings, Issa 2 in his last 11. It’s bad. Yukio Mishima has 7 wins and Yone Noguchi has 6.
Eugene Ionesco leads the Gamers with 13 homers; Billy Collins is the Gamers no. 2 slugger with 12. But Collins has 6 errors in left field. Lewis Carroll is walking too many hitters; the ace is 7-6. Democritus (1-2) has replaced E.E. Cummings (2-4) with mixed results; he lost 2-1 to Rumi in his first start. And manager Bob Hope has gone with Garrison Keillor for James Tate as their no. 3 starter; Keillor (1-2) hasn’t exactly been lights-out. Antoine de Saint Exupery (0-1) is now the fourth starter in place of Derrida (1-7). Clive James (1-0) and M.C. Escher (lefty with a good curve) join Menander (5-3), Charles Bernstein (0-4), and Christian Morgenstern (1-2) in the bullpen.
The Gamers have lost 11 of 18 in their fall to the bottom of the division.
Pitching coach Lorne Michaels: “Let’s give the new pitchers a chance. Democritus, Keillor, Antoine. Clive James. Escher. Our problem is simple. Too many walks. We need to throw strikes. Walks slow down the game and lead to errors in the field. I’m telling my guys, brevity is the soul of pitching; go right after the hitters. We’re being too cute.”
“We’re never giving up,” said third baseman Joe Green, who slammed his 6th homer yesterday, fourth on the team behind Ionesco, Collins, and Thomas Hood.
Rumor has it the Gamers just signed Woody Allen. They will need all the help they can get.
Scarriet had a chance to talk to the Laws’ John Donne.
Scarriet: Hello, I’m here with the excellent poet, John Donne.
Donne: The excellence is disputed.
Scarriet: Your reputation is beyond dispute, Mr. Donne.
Donne: My poems are dipped in disputation, and by that comes their reputation.
Scarriet: You are most subtle.
Donne: Against my will. In heaven nothing is subtle. Make plain your interview.
Scarriet: Well. You have sixteen home runs. Congratulations.
Donne: Those home runs belong to the pitchers who threw them. They are not mine.
Scarriet: Will the Laws catch the Cobras?
Donne: No law says we will. I would sin against God to say one way or the other.
Scarriet: What’s the most challenging aspect of Scarriet Poetry Baseball?
Donne: The metaphysics—when poetry meets philosophy—sometimes calls into question the geometry between home plate and center.
Scarriet: You have emerged as one of the best fielding center fielders in the league. I know Laws pitchers like Aristotle and Francis Bacon owe a lot to you.
Donne: Defense pitches, and pitching plays defense. (standing)
Scarriet: Good luck the rest of the year!
Donne: God has given me all the luck I need. But thank you.
Scarriet: Thank you, Mr. Donne!
Scarriet 
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