Week 15: The Superlative Extravaganza

Paul is off on his reason number one trip since ‘quitting’ on fantasy this year: Ragbri. Ragbrii is a week-long bicycle trip, which is more like a Tour de Iowa. He’s been training for months for this bad boy.

TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING				Manager	Team
1	Brian/Josh	3.64	1	Brian/Josh	3.00	1	Dave	2.83		Max	Poorly* Managed
2	Arthur	4.79	2	Arthur	3.13	2	Michael	3.17		Dean	Ender's All Stars
3	Michael	4.79	3	Dean	3.63	3	Matt	4.33		Arthur	PURE DOMINATION
4	Dean	5.00	4	Max	5.25	4	Brian/Josh	4.50		Paul	South Florida Gators
5	Dave	5.00	5	Michael	6.00	5	Cory	5.50		Dave	I Hate Fantasy
6	Max	5.71	6	Keith	6.13	6	Keith	6.00		Cory	Hebrew Nationals
7	Matt	5.93	7	Dave	6.63	7	Max	6.33		Keith	Bourbon Street Blues
8	Keith	6.07	8	Paul	6.75	8	Dean	6.83		Brian/Josh	Smoak Ish
9	Cory	6.43	9	Cory	7.13	9	Arthur	7.00		Matt	615 for the win
10	Paul	7.14	10	Matt	7.13	10	Paul	7.67		Michael	Pic'em Pelham'ed

There were some shakeups in the ranks this week. Michael made a big leap into a tie for 2^nd place with Arthur, but they’re still a full point behind Brian and Josh. Michael now sits in 2^nd in the power ranks and 7^th in the standings. Awesome. Keith was the other big mover on the week dropping to 8^th in the rankings. A middle class of Arthur, Michael, Dean and Dave has emerged behind Brian and Josh, but ol’ BJ stopped pulling away from the field for at least a week here. The door is open for the next team to make their run.

In honor of the great analytics hiatus of 2017, let’s honor some of the weirder things that happened last week.

Monster of the week: We haven’t called out a player for this award in awhile but something caught my eye last week that I’ve never seen before, Edwin Diaz of the Mariners recorded 5 saves in 6 days. That’s crazy. Most RPs don’t get to pitch 5 times in 6 days anymore.

The Throw up your Hands in Disbelief of the Week: Max. Max didn’t have a bad week last week, but he was playing Michael who was hitting 290 with a ton of HRs and a sub 1.9 ERA with a ton of strikeouts heading into Sunday; 14-0 was on the table. Max made some commendable, well-thought-out, aggressive moves on Saturday night well after midnight to ensure he got the Wins category. Max and Michael were tied in wins, so he added 5 Starting Pitchers to add to Robbie Ray to make sure that he got at least one category for the week. Sunday comes, Corey Kluber nearly threw a shutout for Michael, netting him a win and Max’s 6 SPs gave up 31 runs in 33 innings…and did not get a win. That’s right, Max sold out for the win, and couldn’t get it. The good news is he had a ton of Runs on Sunday and enough SBs to net a couple of categories, no 14-0.

I quit, but I can’t quit, but I want keepers, but I can’t get any good keepers…of the week: Paul. Since quitting fantasy for the year he’s made one major trade, 9 ‘Moves,’ and won his matchup 11-2 last week. Paul is still in the thick of the playoff hunt right now. His team has not performed well this year, sitting last in the power rankings, but ol’ Gators CWS Champs just won’t go away.

The C’mon Man of the week: Michael. 2^nd in ranks, 7^th in standings…but I’m not bitter about it at all.

Arthur was too much for Dean last week in a week that Arthur had a very strong offensive week (note I won’t quote too many totals this week, because there were 10 days to accrue stats so the numbers themselves would too odd to mean much). Dean was able to hit HRs but only put up a .250 average. Neither team pitched well but Arthur edged out enough pitching categories to really set Dean back in the standings here. Statement win for Arthur.

Speaking of statement wins, Paul put a beat down on Matt. This one probably knocks Matt out of playoff condition (in a week that probably took Cory and Max out of it too: too many games back, too many teams to jump). Paul’s numbers weren’t Earth-shattering but it was enough to beat a weak offensive output by Matt. Both teams pitched well, in fact Matt’s numbers would have played well against the rest of the league, just not his opponent. Tough luck on that front.

Brian and Josh kept winning as they beat Cory who couldn’t get much going other that Stolen Bases…he had 11. That’s been a pretty high number for this year, even in 10 days. Oddly, it was BJ’s pitching that carried them. They have found a resurgent Rich Hill to follow their anchor, Jacob DeGrom. Also, 15 weeks into the year they finally have their 14^th round pick, Yoan Moncada. It will be pretty damn hard to justify that high of a draft selection and no productivity for 14 weeks, but they clearly found a way to keep it together so far illustrating that any draft strategy can be the right one if you pick the right players.

Dave beat Keith with a strong offensive week and Keith deciding to lay low on the pitching side. Dave had the worst offense in the league two weeks ago, but has made a sharp gain in the offensive ranks since then. His pitching left much to be desired this week but Keith barely hit 30 innings while Dave piled up the innings pitched, Ws and Ks.

Michael beat Max in a very fun matchup. Playing Max is always a good time because he’s so damn spirited about it. He instigates trash talk and it seems to fire your team up. This year, Max has the hardest strength of schedule, every week he plays a team that catches fire, it’s rather incredible. So, from my team to you, thank you Max.

We’re in a great competitive place in the league right now, there are a solid 7 teams contending. No team has a lock on a playoff spot (despite what Brian and Josh or Dave would like to think); the best team in the league seems to shift every 2 or 3 weeks; and no team has kept up an elongated stay at the top of the power rankings Every week can make or break your year.