Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Nice Knowin' Ya

And now, a salute to the managers eliminated from their quest for the 2013 Diamond Dynasty Chalice for Fantasy Baseball Excellence:

Drew Donovan (10th) – Injuries to keepers and high draft picks is excusable. Bad adds and drops are expected. But what Drew did this year is the stuff that ruins fantasy leagues. Donovan failed to check (let alone update) his roster for DL's and under-performers. From May 9th to July 3rd – a stretch spanning and affecting 10 weeks – he failed to make any moves as he plunged deeper and deeper into last place. And when he finally did update his roster, he fucking won! Considering two teams made the playoffs with sub-.500 records, his 3-5-1 record in the last 9 weeks makes you think that had he not checked out in May he might have had a shot at the playoffs. Hope you enjoy the first pick next year, because you damn well don't deserve it.

Weeks 1-7: 0-6-1
Weeks 8-15: 2-5-1
Weeks 16-22: 1-5-1

Streaks:
    Wins: 2
    Unbeaten: 2
    Losses: 8
    Win-less: 13

Richie Travers (9th) – Richie has to be honest. Richie is dumbfounded that his team didn't challenge for a bye. Richie felt so good about his team and it just...ah....he doesn't know. Looking back on it, there's probably a reason why the phrase “career year” exists, and there's definitely a reason why you're not supposed to expect those guys to do it back to back. Richie's season effectively ended 8 picks into the 2013 draft, taking B.J. Upton in the first round. His offensive keepers were injured most of the year (Hanley Ramirez and Aramis Ramirez) or performed below expectations (Prince Fielder). His draft was riddled with mediocre picks like Ben Zobrist and Adam LaRoche as well as bad picks like Roy Halladay and Danny Espinosa. He hung in there as best he could but he fell out of contention by early August. Richie picked up three extra draft picks for next year but lost Felix Hernandez in the process, which makes his keeper situation a little cloudy.

Weeks 1-7: 0-5-2
Weeks 8-15: 2-5-1
Weeks 16-22: 1-3-3

Streaks:
    Wins: 2
    Unbeaten: 2
    Losses: 4
    Win-less: 8

Jarrett Staaf (8th) – Jarrett pushed harder than anyone this year to make the playoffs, trying to strike a deal with a number of managers to bolster his roster for the final weeks. He unfortunately dug himself too deep a hole in the middle of the season to get out of. The bottom line is 2013 Jarrett was nothing but a big bully. Check this out:

Record vs first-fourth place: 1-9-1
Record vs fifth-tenth place: 6-3-2

Record vs playoff teams: 3-11-2
Record vs non-playoff teams: 4-1-1

Now I would expect most of the teams to have good records against the non-playoff teams, but for a team to finish outside the playoffs despite dominating the bottom of the league is peculiar. Jarrett made a decent push toward the end of the year but just couldn't string wins together as he followed a win with a loss from weeks 13-21. He had a chance in the final week of the year as he played Colin straight up, but a 7-3 loss was the final nail in the coffin of Jarrett's 2013 season.

Weeks 1-7: 3-2-2
Weeks 8-15: 1-6-1
Weeks 16-22: 3-4

Streaks:
    Wins: 3
    Unbeaten: 4
    Losses: 4
    Win-less: 7

Adrian Macdonald (7th) – If memory serves me correctly (and I'm not too drunk yet), Adrian sat between 6th and 8th pretty much all year. He was never a big threat to anyone, but he was always within a few games of a playoff spot if he wasn't already in. A late-season 5 week win-less streak turned out to be a back breaker despite closing the year on a 3 week winning streak. He finished the year with only one pitcher in the top 100 (Cliff Lee, 30). A healthy Matt Kemp would have probably made up the 2.5 games that he needed to get to the playoffs, but Kemp was essentially useless all year.

Weeks 1-7: 3-2-2
Weeks 8-15: 2-5-1
Weeks 16-22: 3-3-1

Streaks:
    Wins: 3
    Unbeaten: 3
    Losses: 3
    Win-less: 5

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