Week 9: Strength of Schedule: the first time through the league

From the left: Michael and Michael’s wife, Amina, Josh and Josh’s dog, Polo, Michael’s dog, Buddy, and Josh’s wife Amber. Michael and Amina stopped at Josh and Amber’s house on Sunday in Roanoke, VA on their way back to Atlanta from a wedding in Charlottesville, VA

TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING				Manager	Team
1	Dean	3.64	1	Dean	2.50	1	Dave	2.66		Max	My Story Begins
2	Dave	4.57	2	Arthur	4.25	2	Matt	4.16		Dean	Ender's Game
3	Keith	4.57	3	Brian/Josh	4.25	3	Keith	4.83		Arthur	DOMINATION
4	Arthur	5.00	4	Keith	4.37	4	Dean	5.16		Paul	South Florida Gators
5	Brian/Josh	5.07	5	Paul	5.50	5	Michael	5.16		Dave	I Hate Fantasy
6	Michael	5.35	6	Michael	5.50	6	Arthur	6.00		Cory	Hebrew Nationals
7	Matt	6.14	7	Dave	6.00	7	Cory	6.00		Keith	Bourbon Street Blues
8	Max	6.42	8	Max	6.37	8	Brian/Josh	6.16		Brian/Josh	Alternative Stats
9	Paul	6.50	9	Matt	7.62	9	Max	6.50		Matt	615 for the win
10	Cory	7.07	10	Cory	7.87	10	Paul	7.83		Michael	Pic'em Pelham'ed

There were some unusual developments last week. Dean took a nosedive because his pitching came back to reality and then he streamed poorly leaving him with the highest ERA in a week, 8.02, since the Marcley/Niki team last year put up a 9.09 ERA in week 14 of last year. Dave was the biggest beneficiary of Dean’s topple, jumping from 6^th to 2^nd in the ranks. Dave had a solid week, taking advantage of gaining statistical ground in various categories to make the jump up to number 2 without a stellar overall showing, posting numbers similar to Michael who actually feel in the Ranks, think about that.

We have completed 9 matchup weeks, that means every team has played each other one time. I have an excel sheet tracking each teams’ stats that they have faced, and today I calculated what the combined power rankings of everyone’s opponents have been so far. The lower the number, the tougher your opponents have been collectively.

Through Week 9
1	Max	2.35	1	Max	2.25	1	Cory	2.33
2	Cory	3.85	2	Michael	4.37	2	Max	2.5
3	Michael	4.07	3	Brian/Josh	4.87	3	Michael	3.66
4	Keith	4.85	4	Cory	5	4	Keith	4.66
5	Dean	5.21	5	Keith	5	5	Dean	5.16
6	Brian/Josh	6.28	6	Dean	5.25	6	Dave	6.33
7	Matt	6.71	7	Paul	6.5	7	Arthur	6.66
8	Arthur	6.92	8	Matt	6.62	8	Matt	6.83
9	Dave	6.92	9	Arthur	7.12	9	Paul	7.66
10	Paul	7	10	Dave	7.37	10	Brian/Josh	8.16

You can see that Max has played an unbelievably hard schedule so far, you also may remember that the week Dean had against him in week 4 was out of this world and really kinda messes up this sort of analysis. We are trying to see who has played the toughest overall schedules on a week over week basis and that Dean week throws everything off. So. To make it even I pulled out everyone’s toughest week (likely when they played Dean since he had been putting up a 3.00 Ranking on the year before his week 9 performace) and re-ran the numbers.

Through Week 9 pulling out toughest week
1	Max	3.07	1	Max	3.25	1	Cory	2
2	Cory	3.78	2	Paul	3.62	2	Max	2.83
3	Michael	4.14	3	Michael	4.5	3	Michael	3.66
4	Paul	4.5	4	Brian/Josh	4.75	4	Keith	5
5	Keith	5.28	5	Dean	5	5	Paul	5.66
6	Dean	5.5	6	Cory	5.12	6	Dean	6.16
7	Brian/Josh	6.14	7	Keith	5.5	7	Arthur	6.33
8	Matt	6.78	8	Matt	6.37	8	Dave	7
9	Arthur	7.21	9	Arthur	7.87	9	Matt	7.33
10	Dave	7.64	10	Dave	8.12	10	Brian/Josh	8

This normalization shows that Max has still played the equivalent of the best team in the league every single week…but at least his opponent has not been other-worldly good every week. Cory and Michael have also had a pretty rough go of it; this is not lost on Michael, he led the league last year in Strength of Schedule too. In a contrasting fashion, Dave has played the equivalent of a team worse than the last team in the league every single week. Cory currently sits at a 7.07 rank on the year in last place. Needless to say, Dave has had it pretty easy. Going hand in hand with this data, Dave moved into first place this week. To his credit though, his team is up to second in the power rankings and may be rounding into shape as we have now completed our first time through the league.

Dean and BJ halved their matchup in the flashiest matchup of the week. Both offenses put up great numbers while each team streamed their way to a tie. Dean’s batting average for the year sits at .292. This is an incredible feat, other than Dave’s .284 average 9 weeks into last year (remember this was right around the time when his great keeper-start ended last year), the next best average 9 weeks into the year was .281 by Arthur in 2014, 11 batting average points are a lot this deep into the year. The league average right now is .265, this is down 3 points from last year’s .268 and 6 points down from 2012’s .271…you can see the trend, and Dean is bucking it. He drafted for this, it’s not an accident that he leads the league in average, but it will be interesting to see if some regression happens to bring his team’s average closer to the mean. Meanwhile BJ keeps chugging away, they have been fairly consistent week to week in the league and sit in 5^th in the power rankings, not too much to say here…be more interesting guys.

Dave handled a struggling Cory team that couldn’t muster much of a fight. Letting Dylan Bundy and Elvis Andrus go has backfired for Cory thus far, as Starlin Castro has come back to Earth while Bundy has continued pitching well and Elvis Andrus has been on fire. Dave had a solid .277 AVG with 12 HRs and 85 R+RBIs, his team is trending the right way. It was a far better pitching outing: 2.89 ERA with 6 Ws and 67 Ks in 53 innings. Dave’s pitching is led by a great RP staff and Max Scherzer week to week.

Matt enjoyed playing Max, but put up good numbers in his own respect en route to a blowout win. 16 HRs and 89 R+RBI is a good week but his pitching sealed the deal with a 2.74 ERA over 42 innings. Max wasn’t laying down, but just got edged out in enough categories to look bad on the scoreboard. Max completes this first run through the league 8^th in the power rankings.

Keith edged out Arthur with a very strong offensive week. Who needs Mike Trout, Anthony Rizzo, or Josh Donaldson? Keith has…Jedd Gryko? Keith continues to put great offensive weeks together. Arthur in contrast had an abysmal offensive week, hitting below .200. He was buoyed by his pitching which put up a 2.20 ERA with 46 Ks over 49 innings. Not a great K/9 which shows some scary downside to the pitching staff, but it has put it together for a few weeks in a row now.

Michael and Paul tied their matchup too. Michael got off to a dominant start to the pitching week and Paul benched his starters the second half of the week just trying to touch 30 innings pitched to save the ER category…it worked. The offensive categories were incredibly close, each team put up over 85 R+RBI and 14 HRs. Michael’s average dragged him down a bit to enable the tie.

Monster of the Week: nominees include Paul’s playing of the pitching matchup to save one category when Michael was dominating, Keith’s huge hitting numbers, Michael, Arthur, and Dave’s pitching numbers, and Max for keeping his head up. I’m gonna give it to Max. That schedule he’s played would be a lot to handle mentally, but Max hasn’t given up and will surely keep playing right up to the trade deadline.

Max of the Week: In case you missed it, there was a no hitter thrown on Saturday. Keith was apparently at the game, but we have no evidence of this because he says he didn’t take any photos. That’s right, the lawyer has no visual evidence of any events that transpired. What’s worse is that it sounds like he had pretty great seats. Keith, I’m happy you had a great time, but you’re the Max of the Week for blowing it.