5 Mid Season Story-lines - National League

National League

1. The Divisional Races.  Giddy-up and hold on to your hats, the National League is up for grabs. On average, each of the three division leaders are clinging to 1.7 game leads and 9 of the 12 teams have legitimate shots at a playoff birth.  Owners of the Cobblers, Hellcats, Walleyes, Lookouts, Batters, Beaters, Toppins, Zeros, and Isotopes hold their collective breaths each night at around 8 PM, anxiously awaiting the results of each sim (I exaggerate, but that is what I picture in my mind anyway).
2. What's wrong with Pedro?  Each draft there is only one option for first overall pitcher taken, and that is Pedro Martinez circa 2000.  He is a beast and clearly the best starting pitcher in our leagues history.  This year?  4 wins in 17 starts and a 4.50 ERA.  Sure, the Spiders are not one of the better defense's in baseball, but it in no way accounts for the the struggles of Pedro and odds say  we are for a stellar second half.
3. How bad are the Red Lectroids?  Their -187 run differential is abhorrent, their 30 games out of 1st in the AL Central is detestable, and their pace for 122 losses is historically....lets say, significant.  I've never seen anything like this, but among their 9 players with the most playing time, here are the batting averages from best to worst:  .261, .236, .201, .191, .184, .168, .159, .158
4. Justin B's Inglorious Batters have a .717 winning percentage since May 15th and sport the second best run differential in all of baseball, thanks in large part to only yielding 3.2 runs per game, best in baseball as well.  I love this stat - by weight of innings, 95% of their pitching staff have ERA's under 3.75 with 6 players sporting ERA's under 3.00. 
5. Will the Hellcats reach 20 team home runs?  This is not a typo, currently Grumman has 7 team home runs and is on pace for for 13.7, so 20 seems like a long-shot.   This might be my favorite stat of all time, and while I know it won't hold, I really need it to.  Only 2 of the 14 Hellcat batters have hit balls over the fence all season long.