What a week…although there was plenty of action this week, we obviously need to begin by discussing the biggest thing that happened over the weekend: ESPN teasing me on Sunday into thinking I got a win, when in fact I didn’t. Joking only, we won’t lead off with stories about my misguided hard-on from Sunday night. Instead we’ll begin with….
A blockbuster trade between two teams that are heading in very different directions after this deal gets completed. First, I wanna commend the two owners involved in the trade--Ben Sardella & Bryan Paul--for their timeliness in coming to an agreement. There’s nothing better than giving me something easy to write about on my Mondays. So thank you.
While sources confirm that trade discussions had been ongoing between the Dorchestah 34%ers and Beckett List, it seems as though the final trade was proposed by the Becketts Sunday night, and quickly accepted by the Dorchestahs. As most of you probably should know by now, the Dorchestahs--tied for 5th in the standings with 3 other teams--traded away 3B Pablo Sandoval and starting pitchers Francisco Liriano & Stephen Strasburg in exchange for a 4-player package from the 9th-placed Becketts: infielders Derek Jeter & Ty Wigginton as well as starting pitcher Josh Beckett and closer Jonathan Broxton.
Although the Beckett List narrowly defeated the Dorchestahs in week 6, it appears as though Beckett’s owner Bryan is trying to build a strong nucleus for the future. How else can you explain this trade? For instance, if this were a non-keeper league, the trade would clearly be lopsided, right? The payoff for the Becketts comes if and only if both Sandoval & Strasburg are keepers for next year.
On the Dorchestah side, owner Ben made it clear that he wants to make a run at the League Championship this year. Buried in mediocrity with a 3-3 record, Ben’s hoping the addition of 4 veteran players can serve as a wake up call to the rest of his unmotivated roster. Here’s the only problem I see for Ben: not including Broxton, are the other 3 players he’s plugging into his lineup really better than the incumbents? The loose-cannon owner didn’t mince words yesterday when he said, “I’ve wanted Jeter for a while especially because Ryan Theriot sucks.”
But according to ESPN’s player rater, Jeter is the 4th best SS while Theriot is #8. I’m not sure how significant of an upgrade that is, at least until Jeter starts playing better. And how about Wigginton? Does anyone really think he’s going to stay on pace for 35+ HR? And who will Ben sit on the bench for Wigginton? Miguel Cabrera? Ian Kinsler? Mark Reynolds? Those are 3 keepers who are all putting up fine numbers (Kinsler just recently returned)…so no, no & no. At the utility position, the Dorchestahs currently have Matt Holliday & J.D. Drew, both of whom will be tough to sit in favor of a new player. So I guess I’m a tiny bit confused as to how much these 2 offensive players can help out Ben’s team.
As for Josh Beckett, there appears to be at least 7 starting pitchers on the Dorchestah roster who are better than him currently. I’m interested to see if Ben will immediately throw him into the lineup, or stash him away on the bench until he starts producing. My prediction for Beckett is that he gets torched this week with starts against the Yankees & Phillies and then heads to the DL for a few weeks to work things out.
OK, enough trade talk…I think we all get it by now. Two owners making foolish attempts to improve their team either for an immediate run at the title or for the distant future. Congrats.
There was one other key thing I wanted to discuss on the blog…. 4 matchups out of 6 last week came down to the Runs Scored tiebreaker. I really don’t know how to feel about that. Would we rather have all of those games ending in a tie? Is it good that we have a clear winner even though 1 arbitrary category decides who wins? I’m divided on this, but of course we will stick with the current system at least through this season. I just don’t know a better way to solve this. Feel free to let me know how you feel about it via commenting on the fantasy home page or in the blog itself.
The scary thing (for me) was that 2 of the matchups that needed the tiebreaker were only 1 run away from having that category tied as well. As I’ve said before, I have no clue what happens in that scenario, but I imagine some sort of apocalypse to fantasy baseball as we know it.
When I asked Angry Brets’ owner Matt Blanchette (who was affected by the tie situation) how he felt about all this, he seemed to not fully understand the question and responded, “ First of all, I just want to thank God for putting me in the position to play against a team managed by Fred. Second, I would like to thank Chase Utley, needing just one HR, or one run [on the last day], he put together an 0-5 game and cost me the win. Too much hair gel I suppose.”
While several of you are probably disappointed with looking at the scoreboard, seeing that you tied, and then noticing you ultimately lost due to the tiebreaker, I promise you no one is more disappointed than me after last week. On Sunday evening, when I stumbled home drunk, Aaron pointed out that I finally won my first game. After threatening to urinate on his feet if he was lying, he showed me I was winning 5-4-1 and all of the games for the week had finished. I was so happy I even made time to toss out a petty email to my opponent Boston Pancakes making fun of his pathetic team. Upon waking up Monday morning, I find out the score got changed to 4-4-2, and of course I lost the tiebreaker (and of course Matty P took the time to throw a derogatory email back my way). Looks like Soriano’s SB at about 2pm on Sunday didn’t make it into ESPN’s stats until I was happily passed out on Sunday night. Where’s the justice I ask.
Let’s see…what else? Oh, congrats to Za Brah for being the best team in the league last week. He would have beat every team. And whatever the opposite of congrats is, that goes to the Pigeon Boys for being the worst team in the league this week. Now the Pigeons get to face the 5-1 Boats ’n Hoes in a key matchup in week 7. The other big game this week is between the Jew Lovers (1st place) and the Hackin’ Holts (3rd).
Well, you’re welcome for this blog post being about half as long as my typical ramblings. That’s all.
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