Ryan Braun. Photo: Steve Paluch.

The “dog days” of summer are over, and for baseball fans across the country this signifies the end of the Major League’s six month regular season, and the impending start of the much anticipated fall Post Season.

Although this year, by mid September, most of the Post Season Playoff contenders have by now been established, and fans of trailing teams have little left to cheer for, there is still a great deal of close scoreboard watching by many of baseballs scrupulous supporters, as the battles for individual honors continue to heat up. One such contest is the race for the national league batting title. This prestigious title is awarded to the player with the highest batting average at the end of the regular season. (As long as he has had a minimum of 3.1 at bats per team games.)

Power slugging outfielder for the Milwaukee brewers Ryan Braun, dubbed the “Hebrew Hammer,” is in hot pursuit of speedy Mets shortstop José Reyes who currently leads the league batting race with an average of .333.

Braun sits a mere four points behind Reyes with an average of .329

A fourth year player out of the university of Miami, and the 2007 NL Rookie of the year, Braun was named player of the month in April and elected by fans to the 2011 NL All-Star team where he lead all National League players in balloting, with an NL-record of 5.93 million votes. He is also one of the top run producers in the league with 28 homeruns and 97 RBI’s on his stat sheet so far.

With only four points separating the top contenders and a mere six games left on the schedule this race will seemingly go down to the wire as all eyes watch the pair battle it out in hopes of being crowned the next NL batting champion.