Baseball’s hot topics as season nears end

For five months, baseball is primarily about the favorite teams in your region of the country and about individual players whose feats draw our attention no matter where they play. The general shape of pennant races hundreds, or thousands, of miles from us catches our attention but doesn’t rivet us.

We focus on the arrival of the Nationals’ Stephen Strasburg or the reasons that a new manager like Buck Showalter can turn the Orioles, in an instant, from a team headed for the worst record in baseball to a possible .500 outfit.

Only the biggest national events grab our attention. Will Joey Votto of the first-place Reds or the Cards’ Albert Pujols get the first N.L. Triple Crown since 1934? Was Armando Galarraga robbed of a perfect game? Or did he pitch an imperfect game that will be remembered longer than any perfect game except Don Larsen’s?

Then Labor Day arrives and everything changes. That’s when the first round of the sport’s playoffs actually start. Except baseball has a different name for it: They’re called the pennant races - it’s not the Long Season, but the 60-day sprint to a title.

• The best two teams in the sport, by records and all stat methods, are the Yankees and Rays, the epitome of wealth and the definition of frugal brilliance. If you used white-out on every roster name and just compared the two team’s performances, you’d have no idea which team to favor. One has five starting pitchers, average size 6 feet 6, 228 pounds, who’ve barely missed a start, and the big-league save leader as well as the fourth-highest scoring team in baseball. Their 153-steal speed drives foes crazy and robs hits everywhere.

That team would be the Rays, with a $73 million payroll. They hold a 6-5 season edge over the Yankees.

• In the N.L. East race, the Braves, who lost Chipper Jones for the season but traded for Derrick Lee instantly, were just one game ahead of the healthy and fully awakened Phillies entering Saturday’s games.

With a top of the rotation of Roy Halladay (2.27 ERA), Roy Oswalt (3.01) and Cole Hamels (3.31), backed by two certified stiffs, Kyle Kendrick (4.72) and Joe Blanton (5.25), the Phillies define a team built for October. But how about September?

The Braves’ last three games of the season are against the Phillies – in Atlanta. Future Hall of Fame Manager Bobby Cox is retiring, so farewell emotions will run high with all hands knowing only a playoff visit will suffice.

• Sure, the Texas Rangers are lucky to have a nine-game gift lead in the weak A.L. West through Friday. But they can hit (fifth in MLB in runs) and their closer, Neftali Feliz, has the second-highest fastball average in baseball behind Strasburg.

• It’s the Twins who are going to have to hold on to their hats, and what was a four-game lead in the Central going into Saturday’s games. Once, the White Sox, who started the year 24-33, weren’t even visible in the rearview mirror. Now, thwarted in getting Adam Dunn at the trade deadline, they’ve just added Manny Ramirez to a lineup that already had muscle.

Oh, and Edwin Jackson, expendable in Arizona (6-10, 5.6), has lit it up in his last five Chisox starts with a 1.47 ERA and three 10-strikeout games.

• So, there you have it - almost everything except the most fascinating stretch-run team in baseball: the apparently collapsing San Diego Padres. Little more than a week ago, they were on pace for 98 wins and a comfortable final month capturing the N.L. West flag behind the lowest ERA in the game. . Then they lost eight in a row. The Giants, depending on humble, veteran bats such as Aubrey Huff, Pat Burrell and Jose Guillen, are just three games back.