Race for 20 wins down to the wire

Dallas Keuchel was denied in his bid to become DMBL's first 20-game winner this season. The left-hander had won six straight starts before Hopatcong's 4-2 win over Arkansas on Saturday.
Keuchel has anchored the defending champion's rotation and with the help of a league-best offense has launched Arkansas into the heat of the pennant race in the last two months.

Keuchel still had a respectable outing, going 7 1/3 innings while allowing 10 hits and 4 runs. He struck out 7 and walked 4 on 120 pitches. At 19-4, he still leads the league in wins, one ahead of San Francisco's Adam Warren, and ranks 5th in ERA (2.67).

Prior to Saturday's start, the 28-year-old went at least 8 innings in each of his last three starts, including a 10-strikeout, complete-game shutout versus the formidable Allentown lineup. The two squads are locked in death match of a pennant race with Vancouver for the Fisk Division. Heading into Sunday's doubleheader, the trio were separated by just 1/2 game, with Arkansas and Allentown tied for the final playoff seed.

Barring injury, Keuchel will have three more opportunities at win No. 20 as 17 games remain on the Golden Falcons' schedule, including two key games at Vancouver.

There still are a handful of hurlers who can reach 20 wins, including Warren (18-6), and possibly Josh Tomlin of Hopatcong (17-5) and Allentown's David Price (17-9). Others have less room for error given the timing of their turn in the rotation, with less than 20 games remaining. Despite a sterling win percentage (.842), Tucson's Jake Arrieta has 16 wins but only 4 scheduled starts remaining.

The power arms in Hoboken -- Clayton Kershaw (15-10) and Max Scherzer (14-14), who rank 1-2 in the league in strikeouts -- don't lack for decisions but a few more wins exchanged for losses would have put them closer to 20.

Keuchel's stiffest competition for the Ben McDonald Award might come from Tucson. Arrieta - who credits much of his success with the Scorpions for a team rule that mandates pitching buck naked - is the league leader in most other pitching categories, including ERA (1.90), quality starts (25) and percentage (.833), with Zach Greinke not far behind in ERA (2.28), and a league-high 5 shutouts.

Despite ranking third in strikeouts, as well as a top 10 showing in ERA and WHIP, Warren's teammate Chris Sale is just 12-10. He recently pitched perhaps the best game of the season in dispatching Empire City, 2-0, with just 83 pitches. A first-inning single by Adam Jones was Sale's only blemish, against 9 strikeouts and no walks.