Week 5: Mediocrity, thy name is everyone but Max

 

Paul went fishing this weekend, or as he put it, donating shrimp, because no fish were caught. Paul’s selfie game has come a long way over the years. Look at that capture: the lighting, the angle, the headroom…just gotta keep the eyes up next time. Good lookin, Pops.

2021 Year to Date Power Ranks
TOTAL			HITTING			PITCHING				Manager	Team
1	BJ	3.21	1	Dean	2.75	1	BJ	2.33		Michael	G and RE
2	Michael	3.29	2	Michael	3.25	2	Michael	3.33		Dave	Small Legs Big Balls
3	Dean	4.21	3	BJ	3.88	3	Keith	3.83		Keith	Bourbon Street Blues
4	Paul	4.50	4	Paul	4.75	4	Paul	4.17		Dean	Who's your daddy?
5	Keith	5.50	5	Max	5.00	5	Cory	5.50		Arthur	[ALL CAPS TEAM]
6	Carl	5.57	6	Carl	5.38	6	Carl	5.83		Carl	Boston Running Sox
7	Max	6.14	7	Dave	6.63	7	Dean	6.17		Cory	Hebrew Nationals
8	Dave	6.50	8	Keith	6.75	8	Dave	6.33		Max	Small Legs Big Stomach
9	Cory	6.93	9	Arthur	7.00	9	Arthur	7.67		Paul	2nd Act
10	Arthur	7.29	10	Cory	8.00	10	Max	7.67		BJ	Smoak That Ish

 

Despite unenthusiastic weeks, BJ and Michael maintained their edge on the field in the Power Ranks. They’re basically a full point up on the field right now. Paul, Max, and Dave were the big movers up on the week. We’ll get into each of these stories below, but it’s a very tight pack in the bottom half of the league right now; even though that ‘bottom half’ isn’t all that far behind the top half of the league in performance right now. For teams to move up, some teams have to move down and this week it was Arthur and Cory that now lag the field. Both teams have shown flashes though and are by no means in trouble this early in the season.

The headline of the week is that Max took down first place, BJ! Max for two weeks in a row now has had his offense carry him to victory. This time, he had 14 HRs and a .319 AVG to lead the league. His pitching wasn’t terrible either with a 3.33 ERA and 5 SVH over 48 IP, but BJ’s pitching is just on fire right now. With a 1.69 ERA over 80 Innings Pitched…seriously…BJ’s pitching was untouchable this week. Max appears to be legit at this point, even doing all this with very little from Acuna this week and his prospect Kirilloff leaving early this week with an injury. Jared Kelenic is probably a week or 10 days away from being called up and we’ll get a closer look at what Max’s ceiling is. Guys, he even streamed pitchers this week. What is this world? Keep it up, Max. The league is more fun with you competing.

It was a lot of womp womp across the rest of the league’s matchups this week so we’ll talk about the other teams that moved up the power ranks first.

Paul hit .297 with 50 Runs on the week and had 7 QS to lead him to victory over Cory. Cory has some life distraction going on right now, but at least he’s setting his lineup, keeping IL guys inactive, and hitting the 30 IP minimum; so thank you for that. But until he has more time to churning the roster a bit more, Cory is going to be a fairly easy weekly matchup (Michael writes as he plays Cory this week, destined to have awoken the beast). Go focus on that house, girlfriend, and competitive golf career, buddy; please, just for one more week. Paul is maintaining his solid 4^th place Power Rank and has a steady base of talent to carry him through the summer. Watch out when he gets a hot streak.

Dave came to life a bit this week hitting 12 HRs with a .308 AVG, there is no truth to the rumor, though, that this was more HRs than he’s hit all year to this point. Somehow having 6 wins with a 4.0 ERA and 2 QS, Dave also wins the rabbit foot award for the week. Arthur just wasn’t quite able to get anything going this week but streamed well enough to win a handful of the pitching categories. Arthur has been wavering near the bottom of the league for most of the year and just hasn’t been able to find his footing. Juan Soto is back now which should provide a boost. It’s certainly too early to panic.

Keith and Dean tied and that’s good because no one really played well enough to win. Dean did hit 14 HRs and Keith did have a 2.64 ERA with 5 wins over 58 innings, but not much else went right for these teams. Dean is riding steady in 3^rd place in the Power Ranks, which is scary that he’s so high after seemingly not standing out at any point this year. Lot of ceiling left on this team. Keith has been steady in the middle grouping of the league. Good pickups like Cedric Mullens and Huascar Ynoa should give this team a breakout edge on the league, but a number of his draft picks are hurt and not much else is standing out. As I’ve said before though, this team is plenty good and he should be around most of the summer to compete.

Michael and Carl tied. Carl overcame German Marquez giving up 8 runs in less than an inning…earned…unlike Dean skirting by with Charlie Morton’s 6 first inning runs being unearned despite getting nearly equally shellacked. Baseball scoring rules are something. Carl had streamed well after the Marquez flop making the pitching categories quite competitive through Saturday until Jhonny Cueto ate it Sunday afternoon and Aaron Nola took a dive on Sunday night. Neither team left this matchup with much to be excited about, Michael was just excited to get it close by the end of the weekend, other than walks. Carl was very proud to edge Michael in walks. Carl sits in the middle of the Power Ranks right now. He’s had the quickest trigger finger on high end player cuts like Luis Castillo and Cavan Biggio. So far, his cuts have been prescient and not over-reactionary. Long ways to go.