It's starting to look like Joe Torre is running away with a 14th consecutive trip to the playoffs as a manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers. They've been straight up dominating the opposition in the NL West. Some might say, "Oh, the NL West has the worst teams in baseball. It's the easiest division." Regardless, the Dodgers are where they're at 79 games into the season. All this and they're doing it without Manny Ramirez. They're hasn't been a superstar in the lineup. Everybody on the team is pitching in. Over the past 14 years, Torres had a knack of making things happen with the players given to him yet still make the playoffs.This team is starting to remind me of Torre’s 1998 Yankees. How’s does this Dodger team compare? Let’s take a look.
These are the 1998 Standings for that record-setting Yankee championship team 79 games into the season:
| Tm | W | L | W-L% | GB | RS | RA | pythW-L% |
| NYY | 59 | 20 | .747 | -- | 479 | 324 | .672 |
| BOS | 51 | 32 | .614 | 10.0 | 453 | 365 | .598 |
| TOR | 44 | 42 | .512 | 18.5 | 409 | 429 | .478 |
| BAL | 38 | 48 | .442 | 24.5 | 420 | 453 | .465 |
| TBD | 34 | 50 | .405 | 27.5 | 307 | 391 | .391 |
Source: http://www.baseball-reference.com/games/standings.cgi?date=1998-07-03
Here are the current standing for Torre’s 2009 Dodgers as of July 1, 2009 after 79 games:
| West | W | L | PCT | GB |
| Los Angeles | 50 | 29 | .633 | - |
| San Francisco | 42 | 34 | .553 | 6.5 |
| Colorado | 41 | 37 | .526 | 8.5 |
| San Diego | 34 | 42 | .447 | 14.5 |
| Arizona | 31 | 46 | .403 | 18.0 |
Source: http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/standings/
As you can see, the Dodgers are nowhere near as torrid now as the Yankees were back then. It would take an impressive win streak for the Dodgers to catch up and beat that single-season record. Manny Ramirez is on the way back soon. Could his bat be the difference maker and help Torre take these Dodgers to the World Series this year? Will it make the team hot enough to beat the record? Let's wait and see what happens.
