Lips a flappin'

Well so I tied last week in my mixed league. 5-5. It was a good comeback by me. But I've got a problem. My opponents are sure to see my bullpen deficiency and exploit it. Being that I have so many starting pitchers on my team, my opponents can see that I will win the strikeout and wins catgories, but will probably finish with a relatively high ERA and WHIP.

Ok, off the topic, but did anyone else see that the Giants are 9-8! (Knocking on my face, which actually is not very wooden at all, so I guess I'm just hitting myself for fun, oh well...it was kind of exciting, slightly painful, but overwhelmingly in dearring to no one else but me) (What if our faces were made out of wood?) (It'd be harder to break your nose, thats for sure)

So yeah, teams can exploit my surplus of starting P's by pitching a bunch of good relievers. The max innings a team must post in a week is 7. To me, this stinks. I didn't realize this before now, and it does add an element to the game, an element that so far has not grown on me (tho maybe it will).

About my mixed league

I am now in a battle for first place, as I mentioned in Tuesday's post. As of now, I am behind 3 to 6, with one tie. My opponent leads in four of the batting categories (HR, RBI, BA, and OPS). Yes OPS is a category in this league, which of course is awesome. I lead in stolen bases, and as long as Jose Reyes doesn't get hurt, I have a good chance to win. I HAVE been helped by Adam Dunn. One day I'll write a whole post on that guy. For now, my food for thought: Has there ever been a player even remotely like him? In the first week, Dunn had a game in which he hit a home run AND THEN stole TWO more bases IN THE SAME GAME! Sounds like Ricky Henderson/Jose Reyes territory, right? Except Dunn is 6-6, 275. Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat??????? Superhuman Superhuman Superhuman Superhuman Superhuman Superhuman. And so much more.

I am trailing in ERA and WHIP, but winning in Wins and Strikeouts. We are tied in saves. It seems his strategy this week has been to start all his relievers, of which he has FIVE. He really has no choice, because he is having severe starter problems. Of his starters, Kelvim Escobar and now Jason Schmidt are on the DL, Brett Myers has been relocated to the 'pen, and Rich Harden is even having shoulder problems. Poor guy, though he is beating me now, he might have a tough time winning the strikeout and win categories for a long time. I think he seems okay with this strategy though. Five relievers will get your team plenty of saves and should keep era and whip low.
His five relievers are
Mariano Riviera
Joe Nathan
Francisco Cordero
Dan Wheeler
Jon Broxton
So I'd say he's in pretty god shape to beat my three of
Takashi Saito
Billy Wagner
Jason Frasor
But maybe I'll get lucky.

I also might come back in the hitting categories, though it'll be tough if A-Rod continues at this insane pace (he's on my opponents team). Don't be surprised if he breaks the home run record this year. A-Rod is possibly the Greatest Baseball Player Ever. Yankees fans better recognize. There was a rumor the Giants might go after him in the offseason. One can always dream. Sweet dreams baby as Roy would say.

My digital story with no audio (yet)

An update (finally)

I know it has been waaaay too long (my apologies), but I've returned to save the earth, as Tom York would say.

One might ask how??

Well, I don't have an answer for that but I will tell you about my fantasy basball teamS!

The first league is an NL-only league. It is a CBS-Sportsline run league called NL Experts; it's a champions league, accessable only by people who have won their league before. That makes me feel speacial.

The second league is a mixed league. I was invited three hours prior to the draft by a longtime friend. Despite the fact that I knew very little about AL players, it was on! I was and still am determined to give it my best. As of now I am tied for first out of eight teams. This week I am engaged in a showdown with my first place comrade.

In my "expert" league, I am in last place. That's right, last. Is it frustrating? Very frustrating it is. Freaked out I am sure not to be. The best thing to do is to play it cool. I have made a few well calculated moves. The best thing I did was to drop Rafael Soriano and pick up Dan Wheeler. I did this before the season started, so when Wheeler slid into the closer job, I was already on it. I got lucky, though. I even had tried to trade for Lidge! That brings me to perhaps my biggest mistake of the draft. Chris burke at 91. Although he has duel elgibility at 2b and Of, and although he has 4 Sb's already, he is hitting under .200! There is talk that he may lose his job to hot-hitting Hunter Pence from the Astros' AAA team. This is ok, for now my last pick has been a gem. Kaz Matsui at pick 211 211 211 211 in the last round. Except for now he has hurt his back and is out for two weeks. That's fine, Burke makes for a suitable replacement. Hopefully Matsui recovers within two weeks and it isn't longer than that.

The place I really blew it was relievers. I failed to pick up a legit closer, and oh how it burned me. So far Wheeler, Linebrink, and Capps have yet to pay dividends, and that really hurts. Wheeler should get a save or two this week, but I'd really like to have about five a week from my team, in the form of two legit closers. I think the chances of Capps taking over for Torres at some point this season are about 50/50, but for now Capps isn't helping me that much. Linebrink will only be a closer if Hoffman gets hurt. I like Hoffman, so I don't really want him to get hurt, but man I just wish someone would drop a bomb on Torres. Giants fans know how that goes. Despite all that, here is a story about Torres written by Tim Kurkjian of ESPN.

Also, I am really hurting at first base. I knew Conor Jackson was only going to be a subpar option at first, but I didn't know we would be this bad. My replacement option Scott Thorman has been much worse, resulting in his being cut from my team. :( I'll think about picking him up later, but for now Jackson is my man at first. I side with Jackson's real life manager Bob Melvin, who says that he will continue to be their number one first baseman despite his hitting struggles.

All yaa'l mofos gotta vote on my poll

I'm just sayin.