Open Thread: RAB Fantasy Baseball League Final Update
ByWell, technically it’s the first update, but that’s neither here nor there.
For the third straight year, I won my league’s regular season title, but fell short in the playoffs. This time it was out of sheer stupidity though, not because I had an inferior team. I forgot to set my lineup one day during my matchup in Round One of the playoffs, and missed out on this Zach Greinke start. The ERA and WHIP wouldn’t have mattered, but the five extra strikeouts would have tied me in that category, and given me the win that week. It’s not as bad as the Rafael Furcal Stolen Base Incident of 2007, but it sucks none the less.
Anyway, RAB regular A.D. won the league, beating Jamal G., another regular. So congrats to him. Here’s the team I drafted, and here’s the team I finished the year with:
C: Russ Martin
1B: Derek Lee
2B: Brian Roberts
3B: A-Rod
SS: Gordon Beckham
OF: Jason Kubel
OF: Andrew McCutchen
OF: Julio Borbon
UTIL: Carlos Gonzalez
BN: JD Drew
BN: Rafael Furcal
BN: Brad Hawpe
BN: Casey McGehee
BN: Conor Jackson (DL)
SP: Felix Hernandez
SP: Zach Greinke
SP: Josh Johnson
SP: Freddy Garcia
SP: Sean West
SP: Jered Weaver
SP: Gil Meche (DL)
RP: Ryan Madson
RP: Matt Thornton
RP: Kiko Calero
Power pitching wins, folks. I struck gold with Felix (5th round), Greinke (7th), and Johnson (11th), and Weaver was decent for a 16th rounder. I picked up Garcia and West late in the season when I needed strikeouts and they were starting on a Sunday. Madson and Thornton racked up the holds (the league used Saves+Holds, not just Saves). Assuming Greinke wins the Cy Young, I will have had three of the last four Cy winners on my fantasy team (I traded for Tim Lincecum early last year, and grabbed Cliff Lee off waivers in April).
Don’t read too much into the outfield alignment, I played the matchups pretty much every day and could have had Drew or Hawpe starting. That’s just how I had my roster set yesterday. My first rounder – the uberslumping Jimmy Rollins – was jettisoned along with Aubrey Huff in a trade for McCutchen and Furcal. I had a mid-season outfield crisis and needed the help, plus I had Beckham starting at short. I shuffled in guys like Jack Cust, Kosuke Fukudome, Matt LaPorta, Scott Hairston, and David Murphy all summer until Borbon and Gonzalez stabilized things.
Did you know Derrek Lee finished the year with a .972 OPS, 35 homers, and 111 RBI? I almost traded him for Edwin Jackson in early August. A-Rod was the man, as usual, but Martin hit for zero power all season. Regardless, it was a good team and I won my final six regular season matchups.
Final standings for the league are after the jump, but feel free to use this as your open thread for the night. Brett Favre takes on the Packers in Minnesota on Monday Night Football, and you’ve also got the Rangers and Devils facing off in New Jersey. There’s also a new House on, which is where I’ll be. Talk about whatever you want, just follow the guidelines and be nice.
- RAB Mike A. (159-97-20)
- Team A.D. (159-103-14) – League Champ
- New York Highlanders (149-109-18)
- Bulletproof Tiger (145-121-10)
- Team Jamal G. (138-118-20) – Runner Up
- Team Thomas (127-127-22)
- Rafi Silverman (126-128-22)
- Team McCarty (130-132-14)
- Team CalvinBall (121-137-18)
- Forging Genius (120-138-18)
- Team Ney (118-141-17)
- Dirty Mark Sanchez (117-142-17)
- Congressman Mondesi (105-155-16)
- Team Manimal (95-161-20)
For the third straight year, I won my league’s regular season title, but fell short in the playoffs.
Man, you sound like a Dallas Maverick Fan in 06 and 07 who swore to me that the mavs would steamroll to championships…
well i shouldn’t have said “sound like” but i bet it felt that way
‘06 was a great year for us heat fans.
wtf drew? Skins Yanks and Heat?
***Obligatory “Did A-Rod choke again?” Post***
In all seriousness, have you heard much of that stuff this year? I haven’t. Maybe it finally set in how valuable he is when it looked like we could lose him for the year back in Spring Training. Also, off the top of my head I could name 4-5 games that he won almost single handedly this year, with the most recent one being yesterday vs the Rays. Beckett-Burnett, First pitch 3 Run HR, and his other walkoff vs MIN are some others.
He had a wonderful season and to Alex’s credit, he finally had a nice quiet season off the field. All the drama that constantly surrounded him (much of it self inflicted) seemed to finally be gone this year.
Another thing worth looking at is how he wasn’t afraid to draw that base on balls. He wasn’t showcasing his 5 run home run swing every time in a big spot. People fail to realize how big of a rally killer that can be. Sometimes the more quiet contribution is the best one.
Hey Mike, i bet you would get a kick out of this:
So today in class, my professor was talking about something, and then he then said “and that’s the fallacy of the predetermined outcome” and i literally almost choked on my water. I totally thought this was michael kay talking to me… haha
I would’ve burst out laughing.
i almost did. I couldn’t believe my ears
Professor: Why are you laughing?
Dela G: Well there’s this blog, see, where we talk about basebal, the Yankees really. And we get realy into the indepth statistics of the game. It’s fascinating really. Anyway, aboout the fallacy of the predetermined outcome…
[Watches social life cumble and die before his eyes]
Oh please, that’s nothing.
I’m being nice.
haha rocky road you are very funny
i like
What do you all make of the Miguel Cabrera incident that happened this past Saturday morning.
Apparently the guy got home ant 6:00am and a fight with his wife ensued. Police showed up and he blew a 0.26
We all know how he played that evening.
Very stupid, 0.26 is twice as much as what Joba had (0.134) too. That’s nuts.
Yea except, ummm Joba was driving a car
We know. We didn’t say that what he did was any worse than Joba, just that what he did was nuts. And it was regardless of Joba.
Yea except, ummm Joba was driving a car
true, but….it was also the offseason, not the night before your team plays a must win or your season is over game.
Joba’s infraction was worse from a, you know, “real life” POV….but if we’re just talking baseball, Miggy’s actions are beyond inexcusable.
yea and homie was beating his wife
Link for anyone who wants to read it:
http://www.freep.com/article/2.....ullarticle
This has nothing to do with my greatness.
Anybody else watching Devils-Rangers?
GO DEVILS
Amen.
I still say Devils-’Canes last year was quite possibly the best (and most heartbreaking) series in hockey history.
Ew.
Of course I am.
For those of you who don’t have Versus, the feed is here:
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/team-teal-channel
I’m going to the Knicks game on Nov 4th and the Rangers game on Dec 6th, YAY ME!
People still watch the Knicks?
idk I hate basketball to be honest, but hey, cheap tickets + high school field trip = who cares. Not often do people go to sports events for school field trips.
I’m going to try and follow hockey this year. Someone convince me to root for his or her team. Go.
Devils! They have the best goalie in league history in Marty Brodeur, the best GM, and an MVP candidate in Zach Parise. They’re always in coontention for the cup, sort of a small-market Yankees, if that makes any sense. Besides, we need more fans.
I did go to a bunch of Devils games in middle/high school…
Any Rangers fans want to make the case?
Sean Avery sez haii
There’s the clincher. Now you have to be a Devils fan.
Before the Devils were around, Yankee fans were just about always Ranger fans. They go together..
But the Devils ARE around. And they’re always really good.
Yea, and whenever the Devils play the Rangers in Jersey, it’s a 50/50 split in fans. Think that would ever happen at MSG?
That’s why we need Matt!
You also need a farm system.
Granted, Lamoriello is probably one of the best GMs in the game.
Not one of the best, THE best.
If we’re going on a need basis, the Devils need fans more than the Rangers.
The rookies on D (Gilroy and DelZotto) looking pretty good so far
Gilroy puts the Rangers up 3-2
Reasons to like the Rangers over the Devils:
1) Rooting for King Henrik instead of Uncle Daddy
2) Original cheers:
Ranger fans – “Let’s Go Rangers”, “Potvin Sucks”, “Uncle Daddy”
Devils fans – steal “Potvin sucks” chant and make it “Rangers sucks”
3) The Rock is OK… the Garden is the Garden
4) Newark vs Manhattan – ’nuff said
Devils can win w/o Brodeur, they won w/that Clemson dude or something last year.
Plain and simple, if you go to a Devils regular season game that isn’t against the Rangers, the place is empty. Sure, the arena is nice, but they don’t have many real fans.
Which is why we need Matt’s help.
FACT: The Devils play a defense first system that is like watching linoleum curl.
FACT: The Rangers play an aggressive, fast-paced, risk taking, offense first system that is extremely entertaining.
Watching the Devils will deter you from hockey. Watching the Rangers will bring you in.
Zach Parise has become one of the more exciting players in the league.
Who will not come anywhere near his numbers last year because Jacques Lemaire is his coach.
Jacques Lemaire won a Stanley Cup, that counts for something.
I agree Mike, but some people love watching defense.
It’s like Soccer, to me its the most boring shit on the planet, and yet there are probably 10 Soccer fans for every 1 Baseball fan worldwide.
Go Devils!
Anybody else think that if the season ended today Eli would be very much in the running, and perhaps the favorite for, MVP?
Gotta go with Brees from the NFC. or Adrian Peterson. Eli is certainly in the discussion though, but I’d probably have him at #3 right now. Eli has a history of 2nd half collapses, so lets give him more than 4 weeks.
2nd half semi-collpase last year, and I don’t care as long as he picks it up come playoff time. Still, this is the best I’ve seen him play since that playoff run in 07′.
I’m with you on that.
1. Peyton Manning
2. Drew Brees
3. Everyone else
Brees had that one insane game then he’s just been very good.
I had Pujols and Hanley but I lost in the finals in my league. ;_;
Does anyone know if the Tigers/Twins game tomorrow is going to be blacked out on mlb.tv?
I believe it will be like the rest of the postseason, but don’t quote me on that. But it will be nationally broadcast on TBS.
So the postseason isn’t blacked out like most nationally televised games are?
For all those in support of Molina catching AJ in the playoffs: how do you feel about the possibility of AJ matching up with Verlander in Games 2 and 5 of the DS if the Tigers win tomorrow night? Runs will certainly be at a premium in those games, so I’m not sure why anyone would be willing to put an automatic out in the lineup against one of the best pitchers in baseball, in exchange for the chance that AJ might throw a good game with him behind the plate.
Stats from a smart poster on lohud:
the real facts as they relate to AJ is that, from May 27th through July 27th, in 11 starts, he put up the following numbers:
W 8
L 2
Innings: 69
Earned Runs: 16
ERA 2.10
The catchers in those 11 games:
Posada: 8
Cervelli: 2
Cash: 1
with this string of success I can’t buy into any theory that says AJ can’t pitch to Posada. His best year, 2008, where he won 18 games, he pitched to Rod Barajas 25 times and Greg Zaun 12 times-neither of these guys is going to be nominated for a Gold Glove in the near future.
Didn’t Mike post those numbers here the other night?
Maybe the lohud poster is Mike. He calls himself MG.
Forgot we had Kevin Cash……
-Since were cherry picking stats, AJ’s 4-2 and has had a 3.40 ERA with Molina over the past 6 starts, which is equally meaningless. Full season numbers tell the story, and they all point in Molina’s direction.
-Jorge is 1-11 in his career facing Verlander, which is Molina-like.
-Nobody scores much off Verlander, he’s one of the best pitchers in all of Baseball. Therefore RUN SUPRESSION is at a premium. When facing a great pitcher, you want to match zeros with him, that’s why your #1 starter often gets weak run support, since he usually faces the opposition’s #1 starter. Trying to outscore a pitcher like Verlander is a fabulous way to lose a Baseball game.
No, full season numbers mean nothing. cERA means nothing.
Ask any scout or baseball guru, anyone, and they laugh when you mention cERA. We’re not outscoring Verlaner, we’re making sure our best lineup is in the game when he pitches.
I didn’t mention cERA, you did. It’s a flawed stat. I’m looking at his game logs and splits from this season.
http://www.baseball-reference......;year=2009
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t cERA just catcher ERA, as in, the ERA of of a cther, through his career? So looking at his splits w/A.J. is looking at his cERA splits, which is a stat that is more or less denounced completely as useless.
cther is catcher, obviously.
Yeah, exactly. They also have ‘By Catcher’ splits on BR, which is at least more specific than the over generalized and meaningless cERA. But both of those numbers are bad because they don’t normalize for the opposition.
But other splits get interesting, like K/BB ratio. What’s most persuasive to me is you can pick any number you like, and they all get worse with Posada than they do with Moina across the board.
There’s also the other stuff. The Ortiz blowup, the clubhouse rumblings, some of AJ’s post game comments, there’s seems to be a lot of smoke here both anecdotal and statistical.
Then it’s time they learn to work through them, or else they’re being petty and selfish and not maximizing their team’s chances to win.
They tried all through August, and AJ pitched horribly.
Ballplayers are like anyone else, they’re people and they don’t all have the same ideas about things. It’s like asking a Democrat to pitch to a Republican.
Then how come from May to July they had no problems? Isn’t it possible that Posada, by virtue of at least at first catching more games with Burnett, caught him first during one of his good streaks, then during one of his bad streaks?
It’s the playoffs. Work it out. And the democrat and republican analogy doesn’t work because they don’t alwys share the same goals. A.J. and JoPo do.
“Isn’t it possible that Posada, by virtue of at least at first catching more games with Burnett, caught him first during one of his good streaks, then during one of his bad streaks?”
That’s an excellent point and you may be 100% right. But I just don’t want to risk it at this point of the year. 3 ABs from Jorge isn’t worth risking a blowup by AJ to me.
BTW-Of AJs worst outings this year where the opposition scored 6 runs or more, 5 of 6 were with Jorge. It seems like things can spin out of control at times with those two.
You risk an A.J. blowup at any time, if he does blow up I want Posada in the lineup to at least try and hit my way out of it.
Right, but I just want to minimize that possibility. Nothing is ever guaranteed.
“We’re not outscoring Verlaner, we’re making sure our best lineup is in the game when he pitches.”
I’m sorry, but this sentence makes no sense whatsoever. I’ve read it 5 times and its made less sense each time.
All right, here goes:
By “outscoring” you made it sound as if I thought we’d “pund” him for five or more runs because our best lineup was in. I assumed you didn’t just mean “score more runs” since “scoring more runs” is the goaal of baseball, in very game, rgardless of the pitcher.
So you want the lineup on the field that maximizes your chance of scoring more runs, right? Molina is not in that lineup.
I understand that you believe that A.J. pitches better with Molina, but you know what? Now is the time for them to meet, make a game plan, and work past that, or else both are looking at their own selfish issues instead of giving the team the best chance to win.
When facing a team’s #1, your main goal is to suppress runs, since no matter who you play you don’t figure to score many. That’s the whole idea of having a #1 starter, to match him up with the other teams best pitcher.
Ideally would you like you best lineup? Yes, but it’s not your first priority.
Your priority should be to put the best team on the field, pitching and hitting wise. S unless they’re both more selfish thnan I thought, A.J. and Posada will (or at least should) work out their problems for the greater good of the team.
Jorge can hit HRs, molina cannot.
There is nowhere near enough evidence to say that Molina/jorge increases/decreases the likelihood of an AJ blowup. Most of AJ’s career shows that he has always been prone to randomly blowing up. In a matchup against verlander, we need as many HR hitters (hitters at all, tbh) as possible. If AJ brings his a-game, the only chance the tigers have is if the yankees don’t bring their a-lineup. I don’t like the idea of verlander being able to pitch around Cano or Swisher to get to Molina in a tight spot.
The Yankees have probably looked at that and though if AJ feels more comfortable throwing to Molina then thats what you have to go with.
With AJ hes prone to blowups regardless of whoevers pitching. They should have kept having Posada catch him.
I don’t see why you have to go with it though. The Yanks should tell AJ to suck it up. They’re paying him $82 million, and he’s thrown several good games to Posada. Jorge’s bat is crucial to this lineup, especially when you’re facing playoff caliber pitching and you’re talking about the absolutely massive offensive downgrade from Jorge to Molina.
“The Yanks should tell AJ to suck it up.”
They did, actually. For most of August he threw to Jorge and pitched to an ERA over 6.
Here’s some other pitchers who have reportedly had problems with Posada over the years:
-Roger Clemens
-Mike Mussina
-Randy Johnson
All HOF type pitchers, who got to the point where they wouldn’t throw to him and now we can AJ to the list. The common denominator here isn’t AJ, it’s Jorge.
BTW-CC Sabathia has only thrown 15 of his 35 starts to Jorge. Why is nobody talking about the fact that CC has has different Catcher far more often (Jorge-16/Molina-10)than AJ has?
…Did you see my post before? You point to a time where he struggled with Posada catching, I pointed to a time where he was Ace-like with Posada catching.
Posada was the primary catcher in the playoffs, regardless of the pitcher, all those years. A.J. better not be selfish and work out his issues, or he’s being petty and compromising his team’s chances to win.
Yeah, I did. I just replied, check it out.
Saw it.
Those pitchers seemed to fare pretty well in the postseason when they knew it was best for the team having Jorge catch. How many of Moose’s outstanding playoff games during the ‘01 run did Jorge catch? Ditto Clemens during his postseason tenure here. Ever think that maybe AJ just slumped in the month of August?
Also, if HOF pitchers were able to suck it up and pitch to Jorge in the postseason, why can’t AJ?
how do you feel about the possibility of AJ matching up with Verlander in Games 2 and 5 of the DS if the Tigers win tomorrow night?
you misspelled “Pavano”
Did you know that E-I-E-I-O is actually a gross misspelling of the word “Farm”?
I don’t get it. Am I missing something?
yes, there is a very strong possibility that the Yankees are going to play the Twins and all this hand-wringing over Molina taking 2, maybe 3, ABs against Verlander will be for naught.
Yeah, I’d be surprised if Jorge didn’t start against any of the Twin pitchers. For me, the whole idea is matching zeros against a great pitcher like Verlander.
Unless the two of them simply don’t want to work together anymore, but I don’t think it’s that bad.
Right, which is why I said IF the Yanks play the Tigers. And if the series went 5 games, that could be 5-6 very big ABs vs. Verlander in a short series. I wouldn’t have as big of a problem with Molina catching aganst Pavano naturally, which is why I asked IF the Yanks play the Tigers
I was just blown out again in my fantasy league thank to Adrian Peterson’s commanding score of 9.
Are you in the future?
hahah
That one flew over my head. I don’t get it.
Adrian Peterson hasn’t played yet, how were you already blown out based on what he did?
Click.
That was the sound of the lightbulb clicking on in my head.
lol. Though I wished you were in the future and could have told me if I’m going to win or not. Close game, I have Harvin and Grant, opponent has Favre/Pack D.
Wow, my stupidity just clicked. I was fooled because ESPN was acting like the game was over (which, considering the blowout nature of the score, it is for all intents and purposes). Oops.
I really hope the Dodgers upset the Cards in the first round, although with Wainwright and Carpenter pitching, I doubt it.
This has nothing to do with me liking the Dodgers (although it would be fun to beat Torre and Manny), more that I would hate facing Wainwright and Carpenter in a row like that.
I would actually feel sorry for St. Louis if they lost, they did so much this season, acquiring top-notch talent, superb pitching, etc… it would suck for them to lose. I actually want a Cards-Yanks WS.
You should have traded him to me asshole. Then I wouldn’t have gotten absolutely raped by Rafi at the deadline.
I’m Dirty Mark Sanchez, btw.
As a Packers fan, I cannot believe it has come to this.
No kidding, I hope Aaron Rodgers crushes Favre and can get my fantasy team another win, I’m 3-0 at the moment.
Just want to say, this is my last day posting until the Yankees get out of the playoffs. Blogs are gonna be insane come playoff time, and I want no part of it.
It’s not particularly important, but I thought it worth mentioning on an open thread.
Spillover Thread Count prediction: 5
The World Series (if the Yankees get there) will be worse.
how many did the 15-inning sox game have?
I think it got up to 7 or so.
5 spillover threads. So, including the original thread, that is 6 threads for a single game. Wow.
Yeah, that’s the record. Original game thread plus five spillovers.
http://tinyurl.com/ycrat9o
Damn, I just found out A-rod homered twice yesterdatand got to 30/100 (too bad it wasnt 35/100 but whatever, this was hard enough). Awesome.
Was the rock you were living under nice?
nah, I was in NY for the weekend. No time whatsoever to catch upto Yanks news. Didn’t even have time to use my computer.
you were in NY city?
yea, went to go visit my family. I had my Twitter updates on and I knew he got 100 RBIs but I never saw the tweet that said he got 2 HRs, especially with the 2nd one being a GS (because Twitter doesnt/cant text all of the tweets)
They have newspapers in New York. TV, too!
Kissing Josh McDaniels’ rings yet Salty?
Nope. I never disliked him. In fact, I wanted him as the coach after Shanny got fired. I still don’t like Orton much, though he has been decent and hasn’t thrown any picks, which is important. However, I absolutely LOVE our D. I had no confidence in it last year late in games but now I do. It’s kinda like the confidence I had in the offense last year. However, I am still not as confident for late in games in the offense. The defense’s turnaround is key though.
Yeah, funny how the D has turned out, hire an offensive coach and the D dominates(with a good hire there). Orton has played well, and if the D keeps it up and Orton continues to play mistake free football they won’t be going away any time soon. Yesterday was Orton’s best day, still can’t believe he hasn’t thrown a pick or fumbled.
To me, it wasn’t that funny. The under the radar signings we had combined with the players we already had and the switch to the 3-4 and the hiring of Nolan, I had a feeling that the D would surprise some people. It has even surprised me and I actually had some expectations for it.
The broncos have been great in beating those power houses of the nfl in cincy, oakland, cleveland and dallas. real super power.
How do you call tripping and diving on the same play? It makes no sense.
Minnesota’s center went to my high school.
Aaron Kampman went to mine.
Nice; Steve Young also went to mine. Apparently he (on the down low) paid for the football field’s lights a few years ago.
Bah. Can’t top Steve Young. All we have is lineman. Casey Weigmann, Jared Devries, and Brad Meester along with Kampman.
I applaud Lundqvist. He’s heated up and is playing crazy good.
Nights without Yankee games are so fuckin’ boring.
Can’t get into Favre and AD vs the pack
I’m into it, with the mute on of course.
Your loss missing Gruden.
I won my fantasy league.
It was my first time playing, too!
anyone going to the game on weds?
Yes!
I want to thank all the little people that helped me get here today, especially the guy who traded Longoria for Tex & CC & Sandoval for Hill & Zambrano. Critical.