Week 15: All Star Break Re-calibration

Paul completed his first triathlon a few weeks ago, coming in 4^th in what he called the ‘old man’ age group. He’s planning to do another one because he can sniff the podium.

Year to Date Power Ranks through this week
TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING				Manager	Team
1	Michael	3.29	1	Dean	3.38	1	Brian/Josh	1.50		Cory	Hebrew Nationals
2	Cory	4.29	2	Michael	3.75	2	Dave	2.00		Arthur	PURE DOMINATION
3	Dave	4.50	3	Cory	3.88	3	Michael	2.67		Dave	I Hate Fantasy
4	Brian/Josh	4.79	4	Paul	4.00	4	Cory	4.83		Brian/Josh	Smoak That Ish
5	Paul	4.79	5	Matt	4.13	5	Arthur	5.33		Paul	AT Tax Man
6	Dean	5.07	6	Arthur	5.75	6	Paul	5.83		Dean	First Future father
7	Arthur	5.57	7	Dave	6.38	7	Dean	7.33		Matt	615 for the win
8	Matt	5.93	8	Brian/Josh	7.25	8	Keith	8.00		Max	Expand the Graph
9	Keith	7.57	9	Keith	7.25	9	Matt	8.33		Keith	Bourbon Street Blues
10	Max	8.64	10	Max	8.75	10	Max	8.50		Michael	The Flooded Farm

Michael pulled back to the pack a little bit. Cory’s breakout of the middle tier took a pause. Dave made a jump. Arthur fell to the bottom of the middle tier. Matt just kees on climbing, about to join the middle tier, himself. Max required another expansion of the graph to be visible.

It’s the All Star Break, also known as the doldrums of fantasy baseball. There are no stats to be accrued for the next 3 days, so it gives us an opportunity to take stock of where things are right now. The year to date power ranks tell the big picture story, but not the hot trends of what’s going on in the league lately. So let’s see what’s up.

Power Ranks over the last 4 weeks
TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING				Manager	Team
1	Matt	3.43	1	Matt	2.75	1	Brian/Josh	2.33		Cory	Hebrew Nationals
2	Dean	3.93	2	Cory	3.63	2	Dean	3.17		Arthur	PURE DOMINATION
3	Brian/Josh	4.64	3	Dean	4.50	3	Dave	3.50		Dave	I Hate Fantasy
4	Cory	4.86	4	Arthur	5.50	4	Matt	4.33		Brian/Josh	Smoak That Ish
5	Dave	4.86	5	Michael	5.50	5	Michael	4.83		Paul	AT Tax Man
6	Michael	5.21	6	Keith	5.63	6	Cory	6.50		Dean	First Future father
7	Arthur	5.93	7	Dave	5.88	7	Arthur	6.50		Matt	615 for the win
8	Keith	6.50	8	Brian/Josh	6.38	8	Max	6.50		Max	Expand the Graph
9	Max	7.00	9	Paul	7.25	9	Keith	7.67		Keith	Bourbon Street Blues
10	Paul	7.50	10	Max	7.38	10	Paul	7.83		Michael	The Flooded Farm

I had to do a double take when these numbers came out, I knew Matt had been trending well, but I had no idea he had been the best team in the league over the last month. Good on him. Over the last month he’s ridden the offensive breakouts of Javier Baez, Anthony Rendon, Trevor Story, and Starling Marte; all top 50 hitters over the last 30 days. He’s stayed alive in the playoff picture, but will need to be nearly perfect over the next 7 weeks to make the playoffs. Matt sits 39 games back of 1^st, 22.5 back of 4^th.

Dean is the far more predictable name to have performed near the top of the league over the last month. His pitching has been lights out and we knew all along he had a great offense…when healthy. One of the best drafts picks of the first round, choosing Mookie Betts over Clayton Kershaw, has minted Dean this year, stabilizing his whole team. He hasn’t had very many breakout players but one of them is Michael Brantley, who carried him over over the last month in this surge. Dean has loaded up on Starting Pitchers, playing the matchups each week and trying to find the hot hand, it’s worked lately.

Brian and Josh sit in third place over the last month, but with a rank of 4.64, they are part of the first team of the middle tier, the ‘replacement level’ team, if you will. BJ has the best pitching staff in the league, and that was the case again last month. They are still looking for their offensive identity but mostly they are just riding the Jose Ramirez wave. After JRam’s breakout last year, he has gotten even better this year. Barring something crazy over the last 2 months he will be the best keeper heading into next March, and BJ still has him for 2 more years. BJ also has the other big first half story, Max Muncy. Like many first half breakouts in years past, time will tell whether he flames out, or carries BJ to the playoffs.

Cory had been the hot hand until this past week, making an attempted breakout from the middle tier. Led by a well balanced and deep team, Cory has staying power with a high ceiling to make any playoff team take notice. Led by breakouts from Alex Bregman (even though his draft price required paying for it), Matt Carpenter, Gerrit Cole, and Justin Verlander, Cory will be a contender through the playoff push. It’s tight in the middle though, he will need to keep playing well to make the playoffs.

Dave has been one of the steadier teams this year, never too high, never too low. He found one breakout player in Jesus Aguilar and has been victimized by an injured Clayton Kershaw and Carlos Correa, but other than that he avoided many draft pick misses. Buoyed by a strong pitching staff led by his late season add last year and keeper, Luis Severino, Dave is a solid team that will be a menace in the playoffs if he can hold his spot.

Michael isn’t in Kansas anymore. His April through June party has ended and now its about righting the ship to keep his playoff spot. Early season breakouts from Jose Martinez, Juan Soto, Andrelton Simmons, and Brandon Nimmo have cooled somewhat, leaving him in this middle tier over the last month. It would take an epic collapse for Michael to lose his playoff spot, but he is far from sitting comfortably with 7 weeks left. Similar to his Braves, he probably wasn’t as good as the ranks showed in April and May, but he is also probably better than he has been the last 4 weeks.

Arthur is a confusing one. Stubbornly holding his Vlad Guerrero Junior prospect in the middle of an incredibly tight playoff push where every game matters, Arthur is still right in the middle of it. He has ridden his Yankee players all year. He is now playing without a catcher (I’m literaly just now realizing this) which has been statistically proven to be a terrible idea in the past. Arthur has both sold and re-boought Bryce Harper in trades this year. Bryce has really struggled lately and will likely never hit for batting average again until he tries to hit away from all the shifts hes seeing. Regardless, Arthur is only 2.5 games out of the playoffs. Teams behind him are playing better than him right now though, he will need to manage well the final 7 weeks to make the playoffs.

Keith. Well. Keith has Scooter Gennett. Keith has his eyese on the Bourbon Street Championship and loading up keepers for next year. Many of his draft picks didn’t work out and he couldn’t find enough luck on the free agent wire to make up for it. It happens.

Max. Well. At least Max didn’t give away his best player for Vlad Jr. Max has gone to the Elite RP strategy lately and it’s worked well for him. He has sruggled most of the year with injuries, some of which he signed up for like Daniel Murphy, but some he didn’t expect like Josh Donaldson and Madison Bumgarner. Bad luck there. Max is managing hard, harder than I’ve evern seen him before. Here’s to hoping his luck turns around.

Paul is a difficult case. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a tide turn so quickly. Paul was first in the power ranks as recently as week 8 but it turned south quickly with a few injuries. Simultaneously, a number of the players that were carrying him to that number one rank stopped producing and the result is a team that was in first place is now precariously holding onto a playoff spot. He is still managing aggressively and has plenty of team talent to stay relevant the rest of the year. It will be interesting to see what happens.

Monster of the First Half: It has to be Michael. Despite his late slide, Michael hit on more draft picks than anyone else and found a few great pickups along the way to build a big Power Ranks lead, two thirds of the way through the season.

Max of the First Half: I don’t want to paint anyone with this brush. Despite being at the bottom of the ranks, Max and Keith are both managing hard and putting the effort in. Matt has by far the fewest pickups in the league, has threatened not hitting 30 IP more than a few times this year, and has carried DL guys in his starting lineup for days to weeks at a time, but he is saved by his recent surge from getting this award. Keep up the good work, everyone.