Week 17: The ol’ Okie-Doke

Keith had some great seats at the All Star Game this year. He even made it onto the video board and somehow was able to snap this photo of himself without holding a phone or camera…those are some real skills

TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING				Manager	Team
1	Brian/Josh	3.79	1	Arthur	3.13	1	Michael	2.83		Max	Poorly* Managed
2	Michael	4.29	2	Dean	3.25	2	Dave	3.33		Dean	Ender the Season
3	Dean	4.64	3	Brian/Josh	3.25	3	Matt	4.33		Arthur	PURE DOMINATION
4	Arthur	4.64	4	Max	4.75	4	Brian/Josh	4.50		Paul	South Florida Gators
5	Max	5.14	5	Michael	5.38	5	Max	5.67		Dave	I Hate Fantasy
6	Dave	5.29	6	Keith	5.63	6	Cory	5.83		Cory	Hebrew Nationals
7	Keith	5.86	7	Dave	6.75	7	Keith	6.17		Keith	Bourbon Street Blues
8	Matt	6.29	8	Paul	7.25	8	Dean	6.50		Brian/Josh	Smoak Ish
9	Cory	6.71	9	Cory	7.38	9	Arthur	6.67		Matt	615 for the win
10	Paul	7.43	10	Matt	7.75	10	Paul	7.67		Michael	Pic'em Pelham'ed

Michael continued his rise towards the top, but BJ was able to stop their bleeding long enough to hold onto the number one spot for another week. The other big mover of the week was Max. Max is now in 5^th in the power rankings ahead of Mr. number 3 in the Yahoo Standings and co-worker/arch enemy, Dave. The standings crunched in a little bit this week: team BJ lost, and the bottom of the competitive teams won. Paul and Keith are still realistically alive….albeit with a large hill to climb with the 7^th and 10^th most talented teams (per the Power Rankings). There are 5 regular season weeks to go (I may have misquoted this last week).

I’m kinda running out of non-analytics topics…even going into the success of the ‘Elite Relief Pitcher’ strategy that was unveiled last offseason feels too number-y. So we’ll just jump into the week’s recaps to continue the Great Analytics Hiatus of 2017 (yup, that’s a thing now).

Last week’s marquee battle between Michael and Arthur was an incredible matchup. Arthur had one of his biggest weeks of the year offensively and came up just short on the pitching side thanks to a 6 ER blowup from a relief pitcher. Michael streamed well enough on Sunday and had a damn good hitting week of his own to pick up the very tight win. Arthur’s 19 HR and 109 R+RBI were the most notable numbers from the matchup where both teams were very Monstrous. The HR total tied a league high this year with Max’ 19 HRs in week 1. Both teams survived a scary matchup that could have done major damage to their playoff plans.

In the other matchup with heavy playoff implications Dean edged Keith despite a strong push from Keith on Sunday. Dean is getting quite bitter about teams putting up very good weeks against him and losing close categories time after time, this matchup  was no different. Ketih edged Dean in H and W…but also on Sunday Dean was able to tie Keith in SB and edge him in HR…sounds like a wash to me. Dean is precariously holding the number 4 playoff spot as Michael is charging and Keith and Paul are lingering. In case you didn’t notice his team name the last two weeks, he’s ready to ‘Ender the Season’ and get into the playoffs with him in them.

In OTHER news, last place Max beat first place Brian and Josh with some creative managing over the weekend. With pitching categories close, Max picked up a number of pitchers to start Sunday…except they were late game pitchers. Max juked BJ to start their starters…which they did…as he later benched his so that he could secure the ER category. Not sure I’ve ever seen the move before but I commend the creativity. Brian and Josh have been scuffling a little bit here since week 14. Nothing to panic about…just…ya know they’ll need to step it up down the stretch. Their playoff berth…while likely, is far from secured.

Matt beat Dave behind some fantastic Kershaw-free pitching. Matt could have done even better if he had streamed a pitcher on Sunday. Hey Matt, let’s work on this, but for now, good job getting back to the 30 IP total. Dave fell to 6^th in the power rankings and is the most vulnerable ‘current’ playoff teams per the yahoo standings. He has had flashes of brilliance this year but nothing has stuck. Looking ahead to his schedule he has 3 matchups against lower half teams before playing Dean and Arthur the last 2 weeks. He’d better get while the gettings good.

Paul beat Cory to continue to keep playoff hopes alive. Paul hit another 16 HRs with a 2.29 ERA showing some team talent. Cory couldn’t muster much but threw a ton of innings at Paul to get to 5 Wins. The big news on his week was Cory cutting bait on once-high-end-keeper Jonahtan Villar. Last year indeed was the career outlier. Sorry bud.

Monster of the Week: Max, that pitching okie-doke move he pulled was awesome. Congratulations on beating the first place team and continuing to move up the power ranks. Max will be a strong contender in the BSC this year.

Max of the Week: Nothing caught my eye, Keith probably misplayed some aspects of the matchup against Dean but we won’t knock him too hard. Remember to keep submitting observations you have for Monster and Max observations.