IT’S A MADD MADD WORLD. . .

Of all the trade deadline deals, it’s safe to say none was more impactful than the Dodgers’ blockbuster with the Nationals for Max Scherzer (5-0 with a 1.05 ERA in his first seven starts for them) in place of the injured Clayton Kershaw. Equally important, however, was getting Trea Turner, who’s provided needed offense at second base, at the same time Cody Bellinger — two years removed from his MVP season — continues in his horrendous, mystifying batting slump in which, going into the weekend, he’d gone 11-for-125 (.088). Safe to say, if the defending world champions hadn’t made that trade, they’d probably be hard-pressed to even make the wild card game. But what’s even more impressive from the Dodgers’ standpoint is that none of the four prospects they gave up for Scherzer and Turner are considered to be anywhere near elite. At the same time, the Padres were said to have offered the top three prospects in their organization for Scherzer and Turner and were willing to sweeten the offer beyond even that only to be rebuffed by Nats GM Mike Rizzo. The suspicion is Rizzo only wanted to deal with the Dodgers because L.A. president

Kasten was the man who first hired him in Washington when Kasten was president of the Nationals . ... At their private dinner Wednesday after the induction ceremonies I’m told the Hall-of-Famers gave Commissioner Rob Manfred an earful about the increasingly unwatchable aspects of the game. “You better fix it,” they told him. But in addition to the lack of action, it’s uncertain as to what Manfred or anyone else can do about the runaway emphasis on relief pitching which is at the crux of the stifled offense and long games. According to the Elias Bureau, teams are averaging 8.77 pitchers per game this year, which is actually a tad less than the 8.86 in the COVID-shortened season in 2020. It was 7.72 pitchers per game in 2011, 6.26 in 1991 and 4.98 in 1971. This past Wednesday, there were five games in the majors in which the two teams combined for 11 pitchers or more. Last Sunday, Phillies manager Joe Girardi used NINE pitchers to eke out a ten-inning 4-3 win over the Marlins. Meanwhile, the firstplace Rays, who invented the “bullpen/opener game,” have allowed their starting pitchers to pitch seven innings only eight times this year, four of them by Glasnow, their ace who was lost for the season because of injury on June 15.