Blaseball Power Rankings: Short Circuit 2 Week 2
Edited and compiled by: Em Fring
Short Circuits are back— with new weather! Snow has been throwing an icy cold wrench into this season by freezing players, leaving them unable to play temporarily but giving them a small stat boost, and I mean really small. The season is extended over two weeks this Short Circuit, which means this edition of the Power Rankings is technically a midseason Power Ranking. Surely this means we will have very little hubris this time. Probably.
Other than these changes, there is little of note. New weather, new schedule…. I think that’s everything, right?
Sorry, what? Who is back? The—? Oh, worm?
Anyways… let’s get to the Power Rankings!
24: Boston Flowers🌹
The snow falls and, like most perennials, the Flowers are hibernating. It’s been a cozy season here in Boston. So cozy, in fact, the players are not really interested in playing Blaseball.
Sitting at the bottom of the League for the entire season, Flowers have been on ice. Newly elected Footwarmers have amplified Boston’s Baserunning, but this is only going to let the players run faster back to the warm dugout between innings to escape the cold and their mediocrity.
The Flowers have legitimate talent in their Lineup but are dragged down by their sleepy and unimpressive Rotation. Hitters Bob Bluff and the Catcher Mittens-equipped Jose Gravy are sure to put on a good show for the crowds at The Garden, but they are not going to be the difference maker in the standings.
In Boston, the roots are down, the feet are warm, and Party Time is already being planned. We’re the Flowers and we’re cozy.
–Joey T Badger
“basically anything bad you say about other teams, you can end the sentence ‘but at least we’re not the flowers”
23: Hades Tigers 🐅
haha. ouch. oh. wow. defense, eh? just cant get enough of it. but all the defense in the world cant hold off the crushing weight of a 19-43 record.
still better than the flowers though”
-Dargo
22: Atlantis Georgias 🔱
The Georgias have always reached for dazzling heights.
Some great act that will leave its mark on the League, an act so iconic and shocking that people will remember our names forever. Sometimes this means winning games. Usually this means grasping at glory and tucking it into our pockets and scampering home before anyone catches us and takes away our toys.
Alas, with a shaky Lineup and rotation in a strong Sky league, Georgias have instead opted for hoping to shell their competition. And, oh, we can’t do that either? Seriously? Atlantis have settled for Eye Warmers instead, in hopes that warm eyes will help their team the way it helps deep sea predator. Unfortunately, we’re up in the Sky.
Well, same as it ever was. Kick back, crack open a can of Ooze and enjoy the rest of the season, Atlantis. We’ll get there someday.
–Mera
21: Philly Pies 🥧
Philadelphia hasn’t seen .500 since the start of the season. They aren’t breaking any bad records; they aren’t the worst at anything really. They just seem to find a way to… not rise properly. The dough isn’t setting. Their last three games before the break? A 14-6 loss, then a 10-0 win, then a 20-2 loss. Morale has never been lower. The entire team is… crust-fallen.
Yes, you read that entire paragraph just so I can make that joke. I’m sorry, Philly.
From the fans:
“pies bad” -Sham
“pies bad” -DuckTapeAl
“pies bad” -FlapYak
“pies bad” -Edgarware
“pies bad” -Ryan
“pies bad” -Human
“PIES BAD” -Oddowl
“pies bad” -Raz/Emmet
“pies bad” -Bisage
“pies bad” -Spileckalicious
“I heard the pies are bad now” -snerkus
“this” -Deathbyelevator
“pies good” –
-Reported by Correspondent Shadows
20: Breckenridge Jazz Hands 👐
This season the Jazz are a fun to watch team. The offense is solid and the pitching exists.
The batting Amplification has put them in the top 5 offenses in the League, and the Electric Blood Pitching Blessing might win a game or two because the Jazz pitching staff can’t throw a strike to save their life.
Smith Cya into Anomaly Dembele into Prometheus Bug into Ginny Cooper has proven its ability to put up Runs against the best pitching in the League. Unfortunately, Kevan Boots, Magehands and Annick Wynn have equally proved themselves capable of losing to any team.
Can the offense manage to carry the terrible pitching to the playoffs? Probably not, but every game will be a high scoring adventure.
-Malst
19: Miami Dale 🚤
The Miami Dale seem to have one thing in mind, Speed. The Election saw Dale Fans vote for improvements on Players’ Baserunning. Given that the Sea Conference is incredibly close, better Baserunning may not be enough to secure the Dale aplayoff position without some luck.
Looking at the Dale’s offense, Leliel Princeton and Bob Kirchner clearly stand out. Leliel is a powerhouse at bat with an outstanding 1.176 OPS, .333 BA, 172 TB, and 20 HRs. Bob follows close behind with a .947 OPS and a .304 BA, but these two batters cannot carry the entire offense. Half the Dale’s offense cannot get on Base often enough for their power hitters to score.
While the Dale’s offense has some good moments, their Rotation is the biggest hindrance to their playoff chances. Aiden Pretzel and Brooke Carp are the Dale’s best pitchers with a respective 3.00 and 3.25 ERA. While Baserunning improvements will help the Dale’s batters, their pitchers are not pitching fast enough for the Sea Conference Playoffs.
Live Fast and Party Hard, Dale Fans.
18: Hawai’i Fridays 🏝
17: Tokyo Lift 🏋️
Lift… okay?
A Night Shift has made our previously awful pitching Rotation OK instead. Our bats are… fine? We’re generally OK, which is a first for the franchise. We are in the same division as the Peanuts and Magic, but… eh. Heart and Swole! Hopefully we make playoffs!
-Spotter Pandora
16: Chicago Firefighters 🔥
Well gang, the Chicago Firefighters have been in an interesting spot this season. Despite having more wins than a third of the league and continuing to hover around 50/50 as far as wins and losses go, the team remains at the bottom of Molten Sea, a far cry from last Circuit.
The word of the season, like always, seems to be temperance. We can see this reflected in the team’s Lineup, which not only boasts the highest Moxie in the league but also the worst Patheticism, leaving a team that knows how to walk, strike out, and not much else. Still, managing to Night shift out their worst pitcher for one of their best (for the second Circuit in a row, I might add!) has only helped the team, and with the Firefighters within two wins of the Sunbeams and 5/6ths of Frozen Sea, we may still see them manage to catch up.
Though they only walked away from this midseason Election with a defense boost, the Firefighters proved last Circuit that defense was in fact real (until it wasn’t), and who knows? It might just be enough to pull them through this time too.
–Stara
15: Charleston Shoe Thieves👟
14: Yellowstone Magic ✨
This Short Circuit, The Yellowstone Magic has finally, successfully conjured its first spell.
Giannis Manning casts Fist.
It was Super Effective.
OK, now the real thing:
Magic coasted through 66% of the season with an unbelievably hilarious schedule that propped them up against equally weak and unimpressive teams in the Frozen Sea. This trend was expected to break the moment we didn’t play teams in our division, and boy howdy did we see how that turned out for us. We were hoping to slip our way into the Postseason, much like how two children in a trench coat might sneak onto a ride too tall for them.
But then Giannis Manning picked up the Fist of the Ape God.
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
–Nate
13: Baltimore Crabs🦀
12: San Francisco Lovers 💋
11: New York Millennials 📱
This batch of Short Circuits Millennials has fared a bit better than Gamma 2, with a 31-31 record going into the final third of the Season. Mills middled, as expected. How are these Players? Not bad, to be honest: Mills’ pitching is hovering between a 3.31-4.38 ERA, which is about average for our 3-4 star pitchers in the prime universe. As far as scoring is concerned, Lance Wobin and Ralph Mejia are hovering around a 0.900 OPS, comparable to prime batters on the Mills as well. Curly Sokol and Fizz Crawford are the only two batting averages under 0.200.
How did the Election go for the New York Millennials? Fairly well, in fact. The Millennials opted to Amplify their batting with Muscle Warmers, which will hopefully keep the Mills on par as every Team is guaranteed an Amplification. We also won Strike Blood, granting Eli Nocturne (12 HR, 34 RBI, 0.764 OPS) the Fourth Strike and gaining an extra Strike in their count. With third most strikeouts on the Team at 64 (surpassing all but Sokol and Crawford), this should improve Nocturne’s chances at getting hits.
New York isn’t out of the playoff race yet, though the top positions in the Sky Conference seem to be locked down by the Dallas Steaks (Molten Sky) and Canada Moist Talkers (Frozen Sky). With Mild Cards throwing a life raft, the Millennials may yet break out of the common Day 99 struggle to get into the Playoffs. LGMBLDM!
10: Hellmouth Sunbeams 🌞
Well, here we are. The Hellmouth Sunbeams, through the first week of this season, have the best pitching staff in the ILB. If there’s a stronger indication that we’re not in the prime universe, I don’t know what it could be. Further illustrating this fact, the only thing keeping the Sunbeams from an arguable dead-last offense is the Flowers (Thanks Flowers!).
The Sunbeams currently occupy the Mild Card slot in the Sea Conference, but everyone below is within 4 games, and Hellmouth has the lowest possible tiebreaker ranking. Top tier pitching has kept them alive thus far but after getting a hitting boost AND alternating 4 of their hitters (2 of which were among the worst in the league in OBP), things are looking a little sunnier in the alternate Hellmouth.
With how much of a scrungle Molten Sea is, it’s hard to say if the Sunbeams can ride these changes to a playoff spot or if they’ll get caught by the Crabs, Firefighters, Magic, or Shoe Thieves creeping up behind them. We may be in another universe, but enby baby jail never changes.
9: Mexico City Wild Wings🍗
Two things are certain in CDMX during the Short Circuits era: a pitcher being set on fire, and the Wings playing 0.500 ball. Candace Ueda, the Wings best pitcher, was the recipient of fire blood this time around, which potentially turns her into a monstrous force on the mound. Just… don’t think too hard about what happens when they’re not pitching.
What has been a surprise is the Wings Lineup. Violeta Faucet leads the league in runs scored, and the Wings have tapped into them as a resource time and time again. Teach Roman is also teaching slugging, and the Wings batting has otherwise been a strength. As it is said around Mexico City, it’s not a feature, it’s a (Stian) Bug!
8: Kansas City Breath Mints 🍬
The Breath Mints.
Going into the Election, the Mints were sitting at 34-28, battling just to get to the playoffs. They had a hot start to the season driven by their surprisingly excellent pitching before their average offense cooled off near mid-season. But fans had one thing on their minds: fixing the Mints’ offense.
Somehow, they seem to have done that. The Mints took Muscle Warmers to give their offense a bit more punch, and crucially, also won the Snow Shovel for Saoirse Singh. Singh, before an unspectacular hitter with little power, now profiles as one of the best and most consistent power hitters in all of Blaseball, at the perfect spot in the Lineup for the Mints.
Behind a revamped offense and a dangerous pitching staff, the Mints seem like a playoff lock, and they’ll be vying to put themselves in the conversation with the Steaks and Moist Talkers. During this final stretch of the holiday season, KC will be thinking one thing: All I want for Kansas: Ring Two.
-TUИ
7: Houston Spies 🕵️
{TRANSMISSON FROM HOUSTON, TEXAS}
OUR AGENTS HAVE ACQUIRED [REDACTED], CODENAME: BLESSING BALL BLOOD. THIS DEVELOPMENT WILL ALLOW THE AGENTS TO [REDACTED] AND [REDACTED]. THINGS ARE LOOKING UP IN THE FIELD AND ON THE FIELD. 36-26 RECORD PLACES THE SPIES IN 4TH PLACE IN THE MOLTEN CONFERENCE AND [REDACTED]. SPIES ARE TIED FOR 6TH IN THE LEAGUE OVERALL.
OPERATION [REDACTED] IS NOW IN ACTION. TIME TO CRACK SOME SHELLS. OVER AND OUT.
6: Ohio Worms Peanuts 🥜
So uhh… yeah. About this season in Ohio.
I can tell you that we’ve been dealing with some usual blaseball shenanigans here in Wapakoneta. RIV Scouse Lemma, but welcome aboard Mindy Buck. We swapped Mangus Plague for Anthony Roman and Navani Biscuits for Zora Duffy, but really … that’s baseball, bay-bee! Right? Nothing different to report otherwiiiIIIIISERRRRRRRR…
WE ARE NOW LEGUME.
WE ARE FLAVORFUL.
WE WILL FIND YOU, BEAN.
BEANS ARE NOT LEGUMES.
PATHETIC
WE WILL TOP YOUR RANKS
OR YOU WILL LEARN YOUR LESSON
YOUR EFFORT IS MEDIOCRE
BUT REWARDED WITH OUR APPEARANCE.
OH, WORM?
5: Core Mechanics 🛠
(FOR IMMEDIATE PRESS RELEASE)
THE CORE, GAMMA 3 — The Core Mechanics have reported they have completed their hoarding of all Bees in Blaseball, with the recent acquisition of Bees Dutton from Miami, in exchange for Maxwell “Silver” Hamler.
With star batter Bees Manhattan already in the Lineup, and potential tasty snack Bees Toast in the Shadows, the Mechanics have been unusually mum on their Melittological and Apicological studies.
“We like our blaseball teams like we like our coffee… COVERED IN BEES!” was all ace pitcher Coyote Griffey would tell reporters, in between howls at the moon.
Blaseball fans aware of other pocket universes may remember that Bees Taswell was a long time anchor in the Mechs batting order. Whether or not these Bees are all related is unknown, as this reporter is too afraid of stingers to administer a DNA test.
A representative from The Boston Flowers has said that they are looking forward to their next visit to the Core, but would not elaborate without breaking into a severe blush.
Will all the honey in the world give the Mechanics a sweet ride to glory?
4: Seattle Garages 🎸
Hot off the heels of an Internet Series win in the previous Circuit, the Garages are back. Though they don’t quite have the same fire as before, they’re still a dark horse contender in the finals. Currently sitting at second in the Molten Sky Division and third in the Sky Conference overall, Seattle’s likely to make a playoff appearance of some kind. The Muscle Warmers acquired in the recent Election should help with that, stacking up with the accumulating Snow that’s pushing batters up bit by bit. Mugs Ghost and Taj Fernandez are likely to walk more than ever, setting up Brett Toles and Herman Brewer for some better-than-ever slugging opportunities. Lower down, Rylan Train and Keshia Boiler’s propensity for bases-clearing triples make them a couple other names to watch. Even Ingrid Million, second in the whole league for strikeouts, might well be eking out another hit or two come closing time.
In the Rotation, things are just as pleasant. The strikeout-focused Garages tradition is going strong, with three Seattle pitchers cracking the top 25 in strikeouts per game. Despite their less-than-half-a-star pitching rating, fan favorite Hops Greene is sitting at a 50% win rate, and Francois Fisher’s six shutouts have Seattle fans clamoring for more.
The Garages’ roster is something of a shell game this season. Detractors might look at Million’s millions of strikeouts or Greene’s dismal fraction of a pitching star and laugh, but that’s just what we want. This team is scrappy, and if the rest of the league doesn’t watch out, these Garages might well make off with a second straight Internet Series.
–crab
3: LA Unlimited Tacos 🌮
This Short Circuit, the Tacos have pretty consistently held the top spot in Molten Sea— which may seem a bit odd as on the surface they look rather fine, with the second lowest average star total. The Rotation is spotty, with no particularly great pitcher, and a few duds as well, and the Lineup is consistently hovering around the 2.7 to 3 star range, with only Kyler Tula above 4 stars. However, that undersells the tremendously consistent nature of the Lineup, with the worst batter, Aeguir Latke, batting an OPS+ (a stat that compares players to the average in most batting metrics where 100 is average) of 92. For context, the team with the next best worst batter is the Fridays with a player batting with an OPS+ of 83.
Meanwhile the three best batters, Soledad Berg, Bella Lavender, and Kyler Tula each excel in different manners: Soledad leads the team in RBIs and batting average, while Bella leads the team in walks, home runs, and bats in the cleanup slot, and Kyler hits plenty of doubles to get any players home at the bottom of the Lineup.
While the team didn’t win any Distortions and might be a bit susceptible to power creep, their muscle warmers have done a lot to improve the advantage they already had. What this all means is that the Tacos are one of the biggest statistical sleeper threats, with a terrific, diverse, and flexible offense that will likely carry them to the playoffs.
2: Dallas Steaks🥩
On top of a hoard of wins in the Molten Sky, there lies a dragon from Dallas. The prophecy of same-surnamed players has come again to this fair team, and they return to leading the division. Instead of the Telephone Twins or the Knowleses, this team has the Beans. One is a top-tier player by OPS+ and has been continuously boosted by the Snow (Yagami), while the other is the very definition of the average hitter with an OPS+ of 101 (Imane). We have seen this story before, and we hope this time it has a different ending.
Alongside Nathan Frankl, the affectionately named Frankl and Beans section of the lineup has been the bulk of the runs for Dallas. Cort Gaughan also has thrived in the cold environment as they have Gaughan out and Cort a lot of snowflakes, 5th in the league at the break. Chandra Damon’s allergic reaction, the only such event in the first chunk of games, has left them weaker, but still capable, as evidenced by their two home runs the very next game. Banyon Buck and Vidalia Calvino have far outperformed their stars and expectations on the mound, combining for a 21-4 record. Hopefully with better fielding behind them, Clark Duff (and to a lesser extent, Soda Fly and Abdullah Buckley) can have respectable outings in the rest of the regular season and the playoffs.
Not landing any Distortion is once again a bit of a bummer, but seeing as the major changes all happened in the Sea League, the Dallas Steaks Drakes look to have a strong showing this circuit and hopefully come away with at least a Sky League pennant.
-Deejay and the Collective Dadconscious
The Dallas Drakes follow a long tradition of Dallas Blaseball teams by being absolute power hitters. Let’s hope that they don’t follow the tradition of choking in the first round.
-Ophelia (@DallasSteaks)
1: Canada Moist Talkers🗣
The usually sluggish Moist Talkers have discovered a new technology this circuit: Running. They decided to double down on this new technology with this election’s footwarmers. With heavy hitters in Nico Haycox and Kinsley Reed filling out the lineup, and a solidly consistent rotation (excepting one pitcher, thanks Roscoe) these Moist Walkers are looking like top contenders again this short circuit.
Zoomies.
