Week Eight

Something happened to me this week that has never happened before. Something terrible. Something devastating. In a Yahoo league I've been in for two years, and won both of those years, I lost 12-0. A complete shutout. I was dominated. I was crushed. I was destroyed.

I had a chance on the last day to at least save a few points. We were tied in wins and losses (don't get me started on losses being a category. It's stupid. Everybody knows it's stupid) and I had Jeff Suppan going up against my opponent's Jake Peavy. Yes, I really hanging my meager hopes on Jeff Suppan is a statement on it's own. He's not a good fantasy pitcher. I don't want him on my team. But innings minimums exist and with Beckett out, I needed innings.

Of course, Suppan lost, Peavy won (for the record, I was not suprised about this. It's what should have happened, but nonetheless it sucked for me fantasy wise) and my week went from 10-2 to 12-0.

The main reason is simple. My offense fucking blows asshole. And blowing asshole is something only the most shit-eating offenses do. We all start 9 hitters and 5 of mine hit under .200 for the week (thank you Hardy, Berkman, Drew, Atkins and even Hafner). That Hafner (one of my favorite players) has joined Drew, Berkman and Atkins to form a near record breaking futile foursome that no team could possibly overcome.

Francisco Cordero never even pitched. I guess this is a good thing, since I usually find myself bitching once every other week or so about how closers in non-save situations often get knocked around. (Speaking of which, I own Brett Myers in one league and was just tickled pink to see him come into a non-save situation, kill my ERA for the week and then get hurt. Super)

Garrett Atkins is garbage. He is currently ranked 764th on Yahoo's Player Rankings. The following Third Basemen elligible players are ranked ahead of him right now:

• Alex Cora - part time player
• Mark DeRosa
• Jose Batista - He's on the Pirates. I think. Who fucking knows.
• Hank Blalock - the same Hank Blalock who hasn't played in 3 weeks and just HAD A RIB REMOVED FROM HIS BODY
• Nick Punto - Yes, Nick Punto

Atkins is without a doubt the single biggest non-injury bust in fantasy baseball this year. He is currently hitting .220 with an OPS of .628. He's been dropped to 6th in the lineup.

Looking to next week, I have a feeling this team is going to turn it around. This is the week JD Drew breaks out of his slump. Atkins is at home all week so he's got to start hitting right? And Berkman, well I really need Berkman to start hitting, so I'll go ahead and predict that he does. That way, I'll really have something to bitch about next week.

UPDATE: My decision to not add Youkilis played at least a minor part in my loss in that league. I played Bonds instead of Youk and he went 2-14, whereas Youkilis went an astonishing 12-28, getting 2 hits in all 6 games he played. I lost the hits category by so much, it didn't matter, but it would had been a lot closer if I'd had those 12 hits, and my opponent had played JD Drew and his 2 hits.

Week Seven

Week 7 was not as kind as week 6. In one league, I was crushed 9-3 by the team in second to last place. The main culprit was the return to form of Lance Berkman. By "form" I of course mean his season long slump. At this point in the season, he has hit 1 (one) double. Just one.

He's not alone, as this team is just being dragged down by the terribility (new word) of Konerko, JD Drew, Atkins and Berkman. They are killing me. KILLING ME. Felipe Lopez, the leadoff hitter for the worst offense in baseball has more homers and RBI's right now than JD Drew, the number 5 hitter on the best team in baseball.

Lance Berkman is fucking terrible. TERRIBLE.

For the week, this little team hit a mear .248 with an OPS of .766. But hey, at least the team I was playing finished the week with an ERA of 1.78, so that was easy to keep up with. But those things will happen against guys who start Jeff Francis in Colorado and Cliff Lee. Sure. Why not.

Also, Ichiro stole 8 bases this week. 8 bases. That's fun.

Side note: I feel I may have made my first and worst bad roster decision. As I was on my way out the door on Friday, I thought about adding Youkilis, who has been pretty hot these last few days. I was rushed, and I didn't do it, temporarily deciding to hold onto to struggling starter Dave Bush instead. I woke up on Saturday and immediately realized my folly, only to then find that someone else had added Youkilis. Of course, it's the guy I'm playing next week. Hopefully, this won't come back to bite me.

Week Six

Week six saw me dominate fantasy baseball like an all anal Tera Patrick movie dominates adult video sales. Admittedly, a long winded analogy, but a strong one nonetheless.

Three leagues, three victories. How did it happen?

Team #1 was lead by a surprise player and two disappointing starts.
Team #2 was lead by two superstars who are finally starting to carry the load.
Team #3 was helped along by my opponent's inability to hit.


Team #1 got great weeks out of Hardy (3 HR's, 8RBI), Sheffield (2 HR's, 6 Runs), and super slumper Lance Berkman (3 HR's, 8 Runs, 6 RBI) who had his first big week of the season.

Team #2 was lead by Teixeira (10 Hits, 1.143 OPS) and Wright (9-24 and 3 SB's) who are finally giving us fantasy owners what they hoped for when we used high draft picks on them. Those of us who have spent many, many nights swearing at these two guys certainly felt a little bad about wishing Syphilis on these sluggers. As a side note, my replacement catcher Bengie Molina started the week with a two homer, 5 RBI game. As he headed into Colorado for four games, expectations were high. He got 1 more hit. Thankfully, I survived.

Team #3 was lead by Holliday's 3 HR's and 1.33 OPS, but was mostly due to the fact that opponent hit like a bitch. His .613 OPS lead to his quick demise. That and my team ERA and WHIP of 2.67 ad 1.03.

Week Five

Tension.

A simple word. And perhaps, a word that never fully conveys what the user of it is trying to illustrate. For example, a person who is trying to finish the SAT's in time would say that they felt tension, but it's so much more than that. Ditto the person tossing loose dirt over the corpse of another bloodied streetwalker, trying desperately to cover their handywork before sun up. Was there tension? Of course. Was it the same feeling as trying to finish the reading comprehension portion of my SAT's? Actually, it almost was, because, admittedly, while taking the SAT's, my thoughts would often drift toward mudering prostitutes, burying them and planting a garden of pachysandra vines over the corpses. Why? Because I held steadfast to the belief that the pachysandra would act as a metaphysical prison to the souls of those poor ladies of the night. Now of course I know better and understand that we humans don't have souls and that pachysandra is really more of a shrub than a vine. But hey, I went to private school.

Another such example of tension occured during the fifth week of the baseball season, as my opponent in my longest running fantasy league was none other than my wife. It's a rough, sex-free seven days. The trick really, is to just not talk about it. We check our Stattrackers silently and follow our teams without much discussion. Eventually, as the week draws to a close, the one of us in the lead, also known as "me" will casually and very condescendingly say something like "gee, honey, you might win saves." If one of us says something like this to the other, you can rest assured that other person might ONLY win saves.

This week, however, something beautiful happened. We tied. Probably the best possible outcome (other than a 12-0 victory for me). No ill feelings are harbored. I don't have to complain about the 18 hits she got out of Hunter/Rowand and she doesn't have to complain about the 18 K's I got from Sabathia. All's well that ends well. (Though I am a little peeved that my 9 saves in the week weren't enough to win the category)

In my Keeper league this week, I was thankful, as were many others for the stats provided (finally) by Teixeira and Sheffield, who combined for 5 HR's, 13 RBI and an OPS over 1.200. Even David Wright chipped in with a pair of homers. It's been a long time coming. I also learned a valuable lesson: Never think you got a lucky break.I was playing a team with McCann, who re-injured his finger and had to miss a few games. "What luck," I thought. Sure enough, the next fucking day, Piazza fucks up his shoulder and is out for a month. More importantly, he's out for the rest of the week, and as it is a weekly league, all I can do is rip out my pubic hair in disgust.