Weekly Matchups (Week 4)

So I'm not just doing these weekly matchups coincidentally the week I happen to be in first place for the first time since 2012, thanks to Richie's commish note, but simply because I just did one in my other league and I was bored at work and realized we needed some more blog fun.

So speaking of me, yeah, I'll say it, I'm in 1^st place after all of y'all said I had a shitty team…"Wow Greinke, bad pick" "bad keepers," "Cespedes is going to suck this year," "Holliday is the same as every year (which is admittedly true)," "You'll be lucky to make the playoffs," "I'll have a bye and you'll lose round 1 if you get lucky enough to make it"- Last two courtesy of Alex. Hey, maybe some or all of these things are true, but for now, I'm Ross Gloating while I can!

Now onto this week's matchups:

Matchup of the week—Colin (3^rd) vs. TJ (2^nd)

Colin might have the worst outfield in the league aside from Trout, but other than that, his team looks good from top to bottom. He's fully healthy, recent pickups Danny Salazar and Brandon Morrow are hot, Miggy, Todd Frazier and Sal Perez are turning it on, and usual suspects, Archer, Sale and McHugh are dominating. After a tough title belt loss to Jarrett in week 2, Colin bounced back nicely with an 8-1 drubbing of the defending champ, the Holy Camel.

TJ has some injuries, but aside from Lucroy, they aren't too costly. After two wins to start the season, TJ took his first hit last week against the streaking Kurt, but is still locked into 3^rd place. After a 15 hr 10 steal week 2, TJ cooled off with just 4 hr last week, but looks to rely on power bats Freeman, Bautista, Upton, Pujols and JD Martinez to help him get back on track. Lorenzo Cain and Stephen Vogt have been nice little pieces for TJ this season, and with another good week from them, TJ could grab some hitting categories. TJs starting pitching has been struggling bit lately, with just one pitcher posting a sub-3 ERA (Burnett).

Based on season totals thus far, my prediction is TJ wins a tight one, 5-4.

Next Best Thing—Kurt (5^th) vs. Alex (9^th)  

The next best matchup this week without a doubt is Kurt vs. Alex. The smack talk scrap, the former commissioner confrontation, the somewhat Slingtown scuffle, this could be the bloodiest battle we see this season. Alex appeared he'd pick up his first win of the season last week, but thanks to a late Ben comeback, Alex is still Jose Al 0-2ve-1. Alex is leading the league in HR, as expected, but the AVG and speed are down, and the pitching is very hit or miss.

Kurt's starting pitching is solid, led by youngsters Dallas Keuchel and Trevor Bauer (both sub-1 ERA), and if those guys fall off at all, Pineda and Teheran should be getting back on track. Kurt's hitting is middle of the pack for the most part in all categories, but has the potential to bust out at any time.

I like another close score line here, in fact, I'm thinking 5-5 tie with Kurt taking pitching by a somewhat wide margin and the nippley one narrowly edging out Kurt in 3-4 hitting categories and working his second straight draw.

Ho-Hum—James (1^st) vs. Ben (8^th)

On paper, this should be a walk in the park for James, who hasn't dropped more than three categories in any of the first three weeks so far. Ben on the other hand, sits last in HR and RBI and hasn't seemed to find his rhythm yet...but it's coming, just hopefully not this week. No one in Ben's lineup has surprised yet, except Anthony Rizzo on the base paths (5 SB), but it's only a matter of time before Brantley hits his first jack, Cano gets back over .300 and Encarnacion gets back over .200. Plus, if Pence is back within the next week or two, that could give Ben's offense a much-needed boost. Scherzer and Arrieta have kept Ben's pitching afloat, with Zimmerman and Hutchison trying their best to bring it as far down as possible. Ben's had some tough luck closing games this year as well, but if Ottavino keeps capitalizing on his opportunities, some of his other closers will get the message.

James currently has the No, 1 (A-Gon) and 2 (Adam Jones) players in Yahoo in addition to No. 15 (Dee Gordon), who's keeping James in the steals game. The hitting has been balanced all year, and might even be a bit better if he didn't make some bad benching decisions. With the addition of the white hot Jimmy Paredes, James' hitting should continue to put up solid numbers across the board. The starting pitching is where he has struggled and has been the beneficiary of some favorable matchups to this point. Aside from Greinke, the starting pitching might have the worst ERA in the league, but thanks to solid efforts from the closers, the ERA has been brought down slightly. Coming off an 8-1 win over Tim, James looks to continue his early-season dominance.

It's looking like a 7-2 win for James, with Ben dropping 4 of 5 hitting categories. The pitching will be closely mediocre with a tie mixed in somewhere, but James should take the matchup convincingly.  

Battle for the Belt/Upset Watch- Richie (10^th) vs. Jarrett (4^th)

Jarrett retained the belt last week with a 5-5 tie against Adrian. He had a mediocre week all around, which has kind of summed up his first three weeks. Nothing too impressive so far from Jarrett, except Billy Hamilton, Kazmir and his relievers. Maybe once Kershaw and Bumgarner realize they are cy-young caliber pitchers and get off their asses, Jarrett will be back in the saddle where he feels he should be. We'll also see if his pickup of my second favorite shortstop in the league (Hechavarria) will help get his bats going.

It looks like the commish might be spending too much time making surveys and trying to better the league but at what expense? Is there a correlation…I don't know, just speculating. But by all means, please keep up the blogs, surveys, messages, etc. it keeps me going at work similarly to this. Richie has had some bad keeper luck, with Gomez down, Springer slumping early and Kulber having a similar championship hangover. Aside from Felix, Richie's pitching has been subpar. Liriano and Colon have been doing a nice job, and when Jesse Hanh decides to strike someone out, maybe he'll add a bit of value. Longoria hasn't hit a home run since Opening Day, and Machado and Phillips need to start hitting again. Richie's team isn't horrible, and certainly not worthy of last place, it's just not where it should be at the moment when trying to defend a chalice.

I think this is a big week for Richie…he takes the belt and picks up his second win of the season, 6-4. Also, just looking back, it appears that Richie is second in ERA and first in WHIP so far, which amazes me, but with five starters going tonight, meaning two starts from each of them, pitching should be a breeze. It's going to come down to who's hot with the bats this week for both teams.

The "I Only Care if I'm Adrian or Tim" Matchup

Adrian's hitting is struggling big time, from Ortiz to Dozier to Beltre to Reyes to Rollins. Kemp and Dickerson are hitting and Mesoraco is somewhat healthy again and should be beck in the lineup for the better part of this week (minus tonight). So hopefully that gives Adrian a bit of a boost. Cueto and Fister are running show atop the rotation, with the rest of the staff either inconsistent or just bad. Aside from his loss to James, Adrian has been able to hang around in matchups, putting him in 6^th place, dead center of the middle-of-the-pack shuffle.

Tim, with one less win than Adrian and the same win percentage, finds himself in 7^th. A tough loss last week to James (in which he failed to reach the innings limit), dropped him from 2^nd, 3^rd or 4^th, whatever he was, down to 7^th. Tim is in a world of hurt right now, as his ace Wainwright just went down for the season, Puig is gone, Verlander and Ryu remain out indefinitely and his active hitting keepers (Blackmon and Posey) haven’t hit their stride yet. A-Rod and Nelson Cruz are clubbing, but without a supporting cast, their stats go to waste. Tim needs to rely on his starting pitching situation (Price, Odorizzi, deGrom, Lincecum), find some sort of replacement for Waino and not let the minimum innings thing cause him lose another category again.

This matchup will be very close…before the Puig and Waino injuries, I'd have said Tim 6-3, but now I'll thinking a 5-5 tie. These teams are too evenly matched to call a winner and nothing should change after this week.