MLB NEWS

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Strength of Schedule

The beauty of a 12 team league is that everyone plays everyone twice.  The schedules are balanced and fair, with the understanding that some teams look vastly different post-trade deadline.  That being said, some have an easier path to the playoffs than others.  The following is the strength of schedule for the remainder of the season:

Top 6
opponent
*Opponent
Proj W%
Opponent
Act W%
Opponent
Avg W%
Jeremy30.5500.5540.552
Russ30.5340.5260.530
Mark30.5210.5290.525
Andy10.5170.4980.507
Eric20.5000.5070.504
John20.4820.5130.497
Perk30.4940.4930.494
Dan20.4990.4810.490
Greg10.4750.4890.482
Richie20.4830.4720.477
Brad20.4780.4660.472
Pflanz10.4680.4720.470

From top to bottom:

Jeremy has the most difficult schedule down the stretch as 3 of his final 4 regular season opponents are currently in the top 6.  What's more, he catches Russ (1st) and Andy (2nd) in weeks 20 & 21.  All four of his opponents were buyers at the deadline.  

Russ also catches 3 playoff teams including a pivotal season finale against Andy in what could determine the regular season champion.  He's in no danger of falling out of the playoff picture but there are others lurking in the bye week waters threatening to make a move.

Mark checks in with the third toughest remaining schedule as he plays Jeremy (9th), Russ (1st), Richie (8th), and Perk (3rd).  He has a chance to bury the playoff hopefuls and he might be catching The Commissioner at the right time, but if he falters he could have a nerve-racking week 22 on his hands.

Andy closes with the fourth toughest schedule, though only one of those teams is a current playoff team (Russ, 1st place).  Andy sits only 3 games behind Russ for first place and has the easier schedule.  As previously mentioned, Andy and Russ look to be on a collision course for a week 22 showdown.

Eric has a slightly difficult schedule down the stretch but he's already waived the white flag on 2015.

John holds a small lead over 7th place and will have to earn his playoff spot in 2015.  He finishes with Russ (1st), Richie (8th), Perk (3rd), and Brad (11th).  The match up with Brad at the end of the season could be his life-saver.

Perk catches the "weakest" playoff teams but they're right on his tail.  With 7 games separating 3rd-6th there will be a lot of jockeying for position.  Every win and every loss has essentially twice the impact...Cabrera couldn't have resurfaced at a better time.

Dan sits 3.5 games out and has a favorable schedule down the stretch.  If he can put up a respectable number against Andy this week he finishes with Eric (10th), Pflanz (4th), and the golden goose, Greg in the season finale.  If Pflanz stumbles in the next two weeks it could set up a loser-go-home playoff match in week 21.

Greg has 4 more opponents.

Richie is staring down the barrel of a win-and-you're-probably-in scenario, as he plays Greg (12th), John (6th), Mark (5th), and Jeremy (9th).  Any wins or losses against John and Mark will be amplified in the chase for the final playoff spot.  One more loss and it could be curtains for the league's best looking manager.

Brad, like Greg, has 4 more opponents.

Pflanz wins the strength of schedule lottery.  After this week (Perk, 3rd) he has no current playoff opponents and two sellers.  Pflanz is 8 games out of a bye right now but with the top 3 teams facing difficult opponents down the stretch, it's not unfathomable that Pflanz could challenge for a bye.

*The opponent projected winning percentage was taken from my Luck Calculator.  I was only going to include that piece if I could prove it's validity.  Take a look:

ManagerWk 12 W%VarianceHe wasExpected W% toWk 19 W%W% isResult
Perka0.6090.083luckyWorsen0.564WorseExpected
Brad0.4320.060luckyWorsen0.394WorseExpected
Russ0.5450.052luckyWorsen0.603ImprovedUnexpected
Andy0.6230.036luckyWorsen0.586WorseExpected
Mark0.5320.007NeutralNeutral0.533NeutralExpected
Greg0.450-0.007NeutralNeutral0.372WorseUnexpected
John0.468-0.010unluckyImprove0.525ImprovedExpected
Pflanz0.500-0.012unluckyImprove0.542ImprovedExpected
Dan0.514-0.028unluckyImprove0.506WorseUnexpected
Richie0.450-0.051unluckyImprove0.492ImprovedExpected
Jeremy0.405-0.078unluckyImprove0.458ImprovedExpected
Eric0.473-0.078unluckyImprove0.425WorseUnexpected
8 of the 12 teams regressed to the mean.  Of the 4 results that went against the predictions I think we can justify 3 of them:

- Russ had CarGo and was a buyer so he got better
- Greg didn't start a UTIL for over a month (and sold) so he got worse
- Eric sold at the end of July and has gotten rocked the last few weeks because of it

And Dan just seems to be an unlucky SOB.

Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Week 18 Preview & Predictions

Just 5 weeks to go!

Russ vs. Greg Russ is using this as a 'healing' week to pray to the God of fantasy that Fernandez, freeman, Holliday, Smyly, and Kipnis heal quicker. Still, less than 7 wins here would be a massive disappointment. Russ 8-1

Richie vs. Pflanz Despite the loss, Pflanz still has one of the best teams right now. Richie is will be lucky to get 4 wins here. Pflanz 7-3

Perk vs. Eric Just what the doctor ordered for Eddie, a nice easy week to grab a win and countdown the days until Cabrera's return. Perk 7-3

Dan vs. Brad One of many chances Dan will have to beat up on a seller, and fight his way into the playoffs. Dan 8-2

John vs. Jeremy Jeremy gets a chance to prove he belongs, John gets a chance to show him the door. John 6-3

Andy vs. Mark Two teams in need of a spark, Andy is at risk of losing the #1 seed, Mark is at risk of losing his spot in the playoffs. Tie 5-5

Week 17 Recap

Ok, that last one was confusing, now we're back in real time. Here's what went down last week:

Richie 7 - Eric 3

Buyer vs. Seller, and we got the expected results. I'm sure Richie was hoping for something better, but he'll take 7-3 after a tough loss last week. On the batting end, he won 4 of 5 categories and saw good weeks from Victor Martinez and Adrian Gonzalez. On the mound, he somehow collected 8 quality starts with an ERA of 5.43, thanks I guess to Lackey and the rest of the guys who helped out. Sale got knocked around for the second week in a row, but Strasburg held his own and Lester threw another good outing. Also it was hilarious to see Lance McCullers 162.00 ERA after lasting a third of an inning in Texas. Probably not going to waste a lot of time on the seller lineups unless there's a particularly impressive individual week, not the case this week for Eric. This win is meaningful for Richie, but it's still not enough to get him into the playoff picture. He's still 3.5 back of 6th place Mark.

Russ 7 - Pflanz 3

In a battle between the league's two hottest teams, Russ came out on top and edged closetr to the #1 bye week. Commish came into this one after three consecutive weeks of winning 8-2, a 24-6 record over the last 3 weeks. Pflanz was 26-10 over his last 4, and was coming off an 8-0 shutout. Russ' offense was overpowering while Pflanz's was underwhelming, and that's what really made the difference in this one. Longoria, Crawford, CarGo and Granderson all had multi homer efforts, and Pflanz got very little out of his studs. The real battle was on the mound in this one, as every ratio was ridiculously close. Russ' ERA of 2.25 ranked first in the league, Pflanz's 2.28 ranked second, Russ' whip of 0.88 ranked first in the league, Pflanz's 0.95 ranked second, and both K/9 were in the top 5, with Pflanz narrowly edging Russ out. Price, DeGrom, and Bumgarner led Pflanz on the mound, while Russ was carried by Harvey and his closers (Holland, Uehara, and new closer Ken Giles had a combined 8 NSV). Those crazy numbers give Russ his second straight 'Pitching of the Week' award. A lot has been discussed about the crazy amount of injuries to Russ' team, but in true next man up fashion, Giles is thriving in his new closer role just as Uehara gets shut down. This battle was one of the best of the year, and could definitely be a playoff preview.

Dan 7 - Perka 2

A lost phone on trade deadline day could be directly responsible for the decline of Perka's team. He's 13-25 in the last four weeks, with his only win coming last week against 11th place Brad. After spending essentially the entire season in a bye week spot, this team is falling FAST. Another powerful week from Nelson Cruz (7-4-4-.552-1) was wasted as Dan stole 4 offensive categories thanks to Chris Davis and rookie Kyle Schwarber. As for Pitching, Perk got decent stuff from Verlander, and great stuff from Carrasco and Chapman, but the sample was small, and the rest of his below average pitching washed it away. Dan had help all over from a plethora of randoms on the pitching staff, but this team belongs to one man: Jake Arrieta. With a 14.2-0.00-0.75-6.75-2-0 line, he locked up this win for Dan, and it now puts him 4 games back of 6th place. For Perka, he's still in third, but clearly trending the wrong way.

Andy 7 - Brad 3

Another Buyer vs. Seller matchup, another expected result. Andy really needed this matchup to get back on track and retain the #1 seed. As the only the buyer to not make a move at the deadline, there's added pressure on this team. This win was actually a pretty ugly one for Andy, especially on the pitching side. Greinke and Liriano ran into serious problems this week, but Andy still took 4 of 5 offensive categories just because Brad's ratios were so bad. Andy's pitching line was 5.32-1.36-10.64-1-2. That line went 4-1 in pitching, and he was 2 more QS away from sweeping. Jose Baustista (7--3-7-.323-1 played excellent and Josh Donaldson (9-5-8-.484-1) was the player of the week, and helped Andy to some strong offensive numbers. The win kept Andy in first, but the ,margin of victory and quality of opponent definitely raises some eyebrows, in a bad way.

Jeremy 7 - Greg 3

Scanlon takes this one and gets back on track. A very average offensive week was enough to take 3 of 5 categories, although he had no shot of catching Greg's 10 NSB, and Jeremy was able to sweep the pitching categories thanks to weird 1 game rental David Price. Even with the win, Jeremy is a long shot for the playoffs and running out of time.

John 6 - Mark 3

Special announcement: John has not lost in 7 weeks. The offense that exploded for him last week went quiet again this week, with only Carpenter staying hot at the plate, but pitching won him this matchup. Wacha pitched excellent, and although Kershaw and Kulber weren't lights out, they did enough for him to win all but NSV. For Mark, The offense was decent, with Abreu staying hot and new addition David Ortiz carrying his weight (lol), but as has been customary this season, his starters could not stay consistent, and he taked this tough loss. For John, the win helps him leapfrog Mark in the standings, and puts Mark on the cusp of elimination.


Power Rankings
1. Russ (1) - He's 31-9 in the last 4 weeks, but injuries have put a damper on the winning streak
2. Andy (2) - Beats a lesser opponent here, but 4 of his final 5 opponents are contenders
3. John (5) - The champ is back to defend his title, no losses in last 7 weeks
4. Pflanz (3) - Tough loss to #1 on this list, but has a nice looking schedule to finish the season
5. Dan (7) - great win and plays all 3 sellers in the final 5 weeks
6. Perk (4) - Still fading fast, but will play Greg and Eric in 2 of the next 3 weeks
7. Richie (8) - 25-12 in the last 4 weeks, definitely in the hunt
8. Mark (6) - Only wins in the last 7 weeks are against the 3 last place teams
9. Scanlon (9) - Can't really expect a jump when you beat 12th place, very tough schedule to end the year includes Andy, John, Russ, and no pushovers
10. Eric (10) - Time to play spoiler
11. Brad (11) - Time to play spoiler
12. Greg (12) - Time to play spoiler

Week 16 Recap (Late)

Apologies for no week 16 recap, was traveling all week with limited access to wifi and unlimited access to beer and food. I’ll run down a brief week 16 recap first, then we’ll look at week 17. And yes, there’s still a trade deadline recap in the works, hopefully later this week.


Week 16 mini-Recap


Dan 5 - Richie 4


Strong offense helped Dan to win this matchup by a small margin. Chris Davis (5-4-12-.393-(-1)) was the offensive player of the week, and made a huge difference here. Richie got great pitching from trade deadline prize John Lester, but Chris Sale had his worst week of the year, and only won 3 of the pitching categories. Big matchup between two teams fighting for a playoff spot, but neither got to do much moving in the standings.


Russ 8 - Eric 2


This matchup looked dicey early in the week but the buyer ended up trouncing the seller in the week after the deadline, which was to be expected. Russ’ pitching staff looked* dominant, with a team line of 1.81-1.09-9.06-5-5, good enough for the ‘Pitching of the Week’ award. Fernandez (sniff), Harvey, and Salazar were all brilliant, and Cueto was able to pitch well against his former manager. The offense was there too, as Russ was top 5 in the league in every category except NSB, thanks again to another spectacular week from CarGo (6-3-6-.483-0). Eric was busy filling his roster with spare parts off the waiver wire, as the climax of his season is over at this point.


Perka 7 - Brad 2


Big win for Perka, . But looking closer, it really wasn’t an impressive victory. He won three offensive categories with mediocre numbers (at best), and took 4 pitching categories, including winning with a 4.74 ERA and just 2 NSV. Nelson Cruz had a nice week posting 4-4-5-.406-0, but the rest of the offense was cold. It was his first win in 3 weeks but quality of opponent has to be acknowledged.


Pflanz 8 - Jeremy 0


We finally got our first shutout of 2015. In this league, shutouts are basically equivalent to no-hitters, with the 10-0 shutout serving as the ‘perfect game. This 8-0 shutout came much later than usual in the season, although we do usually see more of them in the months of August and september (with buyers and sellers having been established). It’s Pflanz’s 2nd career shutout, and first since 201. He was able to take 4 offensive categories thanks to strong performances from Machado (7-2-4-.313-1) and Cespedes (6-3-6-.400-0), and despite an average looking pitching line, he won 4 categories on that side as well, thanks to good stuff from Archer and bumgarner. Pflanz continues on his Scanlon continues to confuse the league as to why he decided to buy.


Mark 8 - Greg 2


No big surprises here. Mark continues to do well against lesser opponents, and definitely needed this big victory. It was an average offensive week for Mark, with the exception of his 6 NSB, which has become the norm for this team (Billy Hamilton contributed 5 of those 6). But even an average performance was enough to sweep, Mark’s Jose Abreu had one of the best performances of the week posting a 7-3-10-.500-0 line. Greg Sported team pitching ratios of 6.70-1.55-6.52, not tough to beat. Mark, despite a pretty ugly week on the mound, grabbed three of the 5 categories, and got a much needed win over the basement team.


John 8 - Andy 2


Huge statement win for Johnny, who is trying to establish himself as a contender. Tough loss for our oddly complacent leader in winning %. No moves were made bny Andy at the deadline.John was able to win with some overpowering offense, an ‘Offense of the Week’ award winning line of 29-17-37-.351-0 and a dirty pitching line of 1.61-0.91-8.40-5-2. Mark Teixeira(7-5-9-.500-0), Ben Zobrist (4-3-6-.375-(-1)), Matt Carpenter (5-3-5-.433-0), and Carlos Correa (4-4-5-.423-0) led this record-setting homerun barrage while Kershaw, Kluber, and Wacha continued to be one of the scariest 3 headed monsters in The Franchise. Andy didn’t put up bad numbers, Rizzo hit for 6-4-10--.393-0, but it wasn’t enough.Big win for John, big loss for Andy.

Week 16 power rankings (put yourself in last Monday's mindset)
1. Russ - Did't beat any great competition, but he moved up while those around him moved down
2. Andy - Big loss to the champ closed the gap between 1st and second
3. Pflanz - Continues to stay dominant, adding a shutout to the recent hot streak
4. Eddie - Finally got the win he needed
5. John - HUGE win over the first place team
6. Mark - A win is a win, even over a last place opponent
7. Dan - He's not out of this race yet
8. Richie - A tough loss leaves him behind the recent movers and shakers
9. Jeremy - Almost ranked below a seller
10. Eric - Football season's pretty much here!
11. Brad - see above!
12. Greg - Finally woke up and made some deals at the deadline, good to see