[Syd Thrift]

Only 1 game on the 19th, between expansion teams Sydney and Rio de Janeiro.

3 series left for just about anybody. Chicago faces USA, has a final 3-game showdown vs. Mexico City, then faces the Rio de Janeiro Carnival at home. You'd think this would be an easy way to wrap things up, but Rio seems to have Chicago's number this year. It's going to be really hard for them to fall out of the playoffs. Mexico City bookends their series with Chicago with series against the same two other clubs: Rio and then the US Army. Canada, who needs to win just about everything to get back into the playoffs, faces Japan for 4, Cincinnati for 2, and then wraps up the season in Toronto against the 4th place New York Giants.

Paris has just about clinched the European shield, but there's still a nice race left for the 2nd place slot. The Revolution figure to break out the champagne in their first series vs. Brussels, but if that doesn't happen they can knock out the Berlin Teutonic Knights directly in series number 2 before travelling to Rome for a final 3-game tune-up before the playoffs begin. It's interesting to note that the last weekend of the year features the #1 and #2 teams in each league doing battle.

Berlin faces a couple of creampuffs outside of Paris: Moscow and Madrid. All those games are at home; it will be a monumental task for anybody to get past them. The defending champion London Monarchs do get 6 games against Amsterdam and 3 against Athens, so they aren't exactly facing contenders either. As for Brussels, they start with 3 against Paris, then face Madrid and Moscow. It'll mostly be a matter of not falling prey to the spoilers in Europe.

A/A Standings
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Chicago 93-62 -
Mexico City 91-64 2
Canadians 87-67 5.5

European Standings
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Paris 94-60 -
Berlin 89-65 5
London 88-67 6.5
Brussels 87-67 7

Game Results
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Mexico City 6, Rio 1
Canadians 5, Tokyo 1
Canadians 8, Tokyo 3 (MacKillan Dwywy bruised his wrist in this one; if he's gone, so go the last of the Mounted Baseballists' hopes)
Chicago 9, US Army 4
Amsterdam 5, London 2
Berlin 6, Moscow 4
Brussels 2, Paris 1 (Onne van Den Akker matches Joel Lemoine's 26 wins, outlasts Melvin Hopstaken to keep Brussels in it)

A/A Batting Race
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D Bunch, NY .354 - 2-4
E Diaz, MEX .353 - DNP
H Sato JPN .353 - 1-3, BB
K Martin, AUT .346 - 3-4, 4 R, RBI, 2 BB; a great game to put the Aussie back into the title race
B Young, CHI .344 - 1-4, R

European Batting Race
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S Lenyashin, USSR .355 - 1-3, RBI
G Talboom, GRE .352 - 1-4, 2B, R
K Eckhardt, GER .349 - 0-3, 2 BB, 2 R
B Feveryear, UK .348 - DNP