Week 9: The Thrill of the Chase

 

Paul and his wife, Denise, came to visit Atlanta this weekend with Negative COVID tests and Christmas presents in hand. Paul and Michael got to play some golf on Sunday.

 

2020 Year to Date Power Ranks
TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING
1	Michael	3.21	1	BJ	3.13	1	Michael	2.67
2	BJ	3.79	2	Michael	3.63	2	Dave	4.00
3	Dave	4.29	3	Dave	4.50	3	BJ	4.67
4	Paul	5.00	4	Paul	4.63	4	Dean	4.83
5	Arthur	5.36	5	Arthur	4.63	5	Max	5.00
6	Ryan	5.71	6	Ryan	5.75	6	Paul	5.50
7	Dean	5.71	7	Dean	6.38	7	Ryan	5.67
8	Max	6.29	8	Keith	6.38	8	Arthur	6.33
9	Cory	6.93	9	Cory	6.88	9	Cory	7.00
10	Keith	7.43	10	Max	7.25	10	Keith	8.83

 

With one week left, it is likely a two team race: Michael and BJ. After a disappointing two weeks, Dave has fallen off of pace and angry-dropped his first round pick, Nolan Arenado. Arenado wasn’t his usual self but has by no means been a bad pick, outperforming at least one other first round pick (Bregman) and performing basically the same as three others (Yelich, Bellinger, Lindor). But I digress.

What we’ll talk about today is what it will take for BJ to overtake Michael and claim the trophy. Not trying to slight Dave here, because he could certainly make a run, but the analysis here is far simpler comparing only two teams. Before everyone else stops reading, remember this is a league-wide, season-long, tournament so you still have a major part to play, ALL teams are still contending in at least one category. Also, as I mentioned in the blog last week, next year’s draft slot will be determined by everyone’s finish this year. The better you finish, the better you draft next year. Let’s get into it.

For perspective, Michael is 12 points up on BJ with one week to go, a big lead at face value, but so many categories are so close, there is a lot of movement to be made.

Here is how the offense stands:

Manager	R	HR	RBI	SB	BB	K	AVG	SLG
Michael	345	120	342	28	265	609	0.258	0.473
BJ	347	117	340	40	295	578	0.254	0.471
Dave	341	102	318	40	236	520	0.254	0.45
Paul	319	102	309	27	223	481	0.267	0.471
Arthur	365	107	329	22	248	539	0.254	0.464
Dean	328	96	300	29	264	536	0.251	0.437
Ryan	289	90	285	40	199	479	0.259	0.453
Max	297	82	265	40	209	520	0.252	0.439
Cory	284	78	285	28	182	429	0.262	0.446
Keith	326	88	298	21	248	556	0.26	0.455

 

Runs: Arthur is the leader here. Dave can still catch Michael and BJ easily, knocking one or both of them down a peg. Dean and Keith are both still in range with a good week too. This is a stat that BJ must hold off Michael on.

HR: Michael has a slim lead on BJ here (three), with the two of them likely too far away from the pack to make up in one week, BJ probably needs to out-HR Michael for the week by three to gain a key point.

RBI: It is Michael this time with the slim margin over BJ, but Arthur could play spoiler with a big week. BJ needs to chase down Michael.

Stolen Bases: Michael has done major work in this category the last 3 weeks just to be middling. BJ meanwhile is in a four way tie at the top with Dave, Max, and Ryan. BJ needs Paul, Cory, and Dean to have big SB weeks to knock Michael down a few pegs. This category is very likely to make or break the comeback effort. BJ or Michael can both gain or lose as many as 1.5 points each direction, a three point swing BJ’s way would go a long ways in the comeback.

Walks: BJ is going to win this category, but Michael has a slim lead on Dean here, another opportunity for Michael to lose a point.

Strikeouts: Michael is going to lose strikeouts and BJ is going to come in second to last…shoulder shrug. Good job Cory on your category win!

Batting Average: this one is tough to decipher. Michael appears to be within striking range of gaining up to 4 points (Cory, Keith, Ryan just ahead of him) while having a decent bit of separation from the next pack in Arthur/BJ/Dave. This is one of the more precarious categories for BJ, one that has more downside risk with Michael actually having ground to gain. BJ could finish anywhere from 3^rd to 10^th meanwhile Michael could finish 2^nd to 9^th. A big week here could make all the difference. For perspective, Ryan hit .305 last week and his batting average went up .006 points. Last week Keith his .213 and his average went down.006 points. Those are the ranges I’ve used here to show the upward and downward mobility.

Slugging Percentage: Michael has a slim lead on the field here, with Paul and BJ tied in second. BJ could use a big week and for Paul to have one too to knock Michael down. Arthur is also within striking range to knock down the contenders.

Pitching:

 

Manager	W	K	ERA	WHIP	QS	SVH
Michael	41	641	3.64	1.13	45	32
BJ	37	678	3.82	1.22	35	30
Dave	39	482	3.54	1.2	30	42
Paul	37	528	4.04	1.28	28	39
Arthur	35	598	4.43	1.34	48	12
Dean	37	567	3.91	1.18	38	27
Ryan	26	353	3.28	1.15	27	36
Max	31	445	2.93	1.1	36	11
Cory	16	254	3.65	1.17	14	38
Keith	19	415	5.07	1.29	22	25

 

The first thing to point out with pitching is that Arthur is the only team on pace…or anywhere near pace…to reach 675 innings. Props to him. This volume has kept him afloat in the pitching categories where he really hasn’t performed well, efficiency-wise.

Wins: Michael has a two win lead on Dave and a four win lead on Paul, Dean, and BJ. BJ meanwhile has Arthur right behind them that they will need to hold off. Plenty of room for ground to be gained here.

Strikeouts: BJ leads the league in k/9 with a 10.7 rate, Max is in second at 10.5 and Michael is in third at 10.3, so congratulations to those teams on an effective year. With equal levels of streaming this week, it is not likely that Michael could catch BJ or anyone else could catch Michael. Arthur sits in third place but he is only 75 innings from the innings pitched cap and likely unable to gain enough ground in time to catch Michael.

ERA: this is one that requires some perspective. Arthur threw 67 innings of a 2.80 ERA last week, a very good week, his ERA improved by 0.20. Ryan threw 55 innings with a 5.24 ERA last week and his ERA went up by 0.40 runs (note that Ryan has thrown about half the number of innings that Arthur has). With these bounds in mind, Michael could catch Dave or Ryan in ERA this week or fall behind Cory, BJ, or Dean. BJ could catch Michael and Cory or could fall behind Dean and Paul. Both contenders need to pitch well to win this week. This also shows the importance of everyone else’s performances this week on the championship.

WHIP: perspective on WHIP. Last week Dean’s 1.109 WHIP over 89 innings led the bulk of the league (Cory had better ERA/WHIP but only threw 24 innings), but Dean's YTD WHIP only improved by 0.03. Ryan’s 1.437 WHIP last week over 55 innings cost him 0.02 WHIP. This means Michael, who trails Max by 0.03 WHIP points could still overtake him, he also could still fall behind Ryan and Cory with a bad week. Meanwhile BJ could pass Dave and Dean but doesn’t have much room to fall with a big lead on Paul.

As you can see, there is well beyond 12 points that can be made or lost here in this final week, and many of the points are dependent upon the rest of the league…ALL OF THE LEAGUE to play this out to the final. Your draft slot depends on it, the trophy depends on it; no pressure.