Power Rankings - 2nd to 6th June 2021

 


The wait was finally over last week and the Men’s Superpesis returned for another exciting season. Unlike 2020, one or more teams will be relegated at the end of the season, so there is even more pressure at the bottom of the table.


1st Vimpelin Veto 

Vimpeli wasted no time in proving that they are serious contenders for the championship and picked up where they left off last year, where they beat JoMa in the bronze medal series. In the opening 2 games, Vimpeli took the full 6 points, out scoring Kempele and Kitee

So far, the batting lineup at Vimpeli has looked solid and Perttu Ruuska looks strong in the role of pitcher.


2nd Manse PP

Everyone anticipated Manse to be powerful this season, as they had completely transformed their lineup from the 2019 team that blitzed Ykköspesis. Manse had a good start to their season with a 3 point win over Hyvinkää before turning their attention to PattU and taking a further 3 points. Whilst Tahko and PattU are teams that the new Manse lineup would be expected to do well against, Tahko’s bats were virtually silenced and PattU’s defence was broken in their games against Manse - the two areas those teams excelled in in 2020. Both Tahko and PattU have the ability to hassle and take points away from top teams and, on good days, they can walk away with wins... so Manse’s opening games were pretty strong results.


3rd Imatran Pallo-Veikot

Surprisingly, IPV makes the top 3 in the power rankings after their 3 point victory over Koskenkorva. Yes teams like Sotkamo and Joensuu turned out some key wins last week, but they were expected to win those games... IPV on the other hand are in a fight with Koskenkorva for the same positions in the table.  


Worst performance - Kouvolan Pallonlyöjat

Although there were only a few games in the first week, the biggest shock came as KPL opened their season with a loss against SiiPe, who finished bottom of the league in 2020. KPL didnt just lose the game due to an unlucky bounce or in extra innings; they lost both jakso and quite frankly did not look like a team that I expected to challenge for the championship in 2021.

 have the unpleasant situation of being the only team in the league (at the time of writing) without any points. Koskenkorva managed to put 12 runs on the board across 2 jakso against Vimpeli; however Vimpeli were firmly in control of the game. Whilst the score line did not suggest this particularly, Vimpeli had a staggering 70% success rate at moving the point runner compared to Koskenkorva’s (still decent) 58%. 


Worthy of note - Siilinjärven Pesis

SiiPe earns special mention in this post due their significant win over KPL, but they also suffered a massive 25 run drubbing at they hands of Sotkamo last week. Will SiiPe put out more performances like they did against KPL? Or will they suffer more crushing defeats like they did against Sotkamo? Only time will tell, but one thing is for sure - they don’t intend to face relegation without a fight!

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