MLB NEWS

Monday, April 17, 2017

The Franchise History Books

You may know that I'm a founding member of the Diamond Dynasty, a fantasy baseball league made up of WHS '06 grads.  Entering our 15th year, we've lived through some of the same things The Franchise has; absentee managers, infighting, the 2009 ERA playoff tie-breaker, and general Yahoo ineptitude.  But we also have a rich history of rivalries, rags to riches championship stories, back-to-back titles, and the million other moments that make leagues like these great.  

In a subconscious effort to put my $100,000 journalism degree to use, I've become the de facto blogger/historian for the DD.  They started with match ups of the week, season previews, season reviews, etc, but they were restricted to that season.  I'd try to dive into the Yahoo! record books but they aren't very forgiving.  So I did what any late 20's male would do.  I spent months pulling our fantasy baseball league history off Yahoo! into a spreadsheet where I could spend even more time sifting through the data faster.  It gave the seasons so much more depth and put current seasons into perspective.  We could see career leaders in wins, the best and worst seasons of all time, career records against one another.  Putting seasons into context gave more gravity to the successes and failures. It added a whole dimension to the league we didn't have before.

You probably already figured out where this is going, and yes, I've pulled the entire nine year Franchise history onto a Google doc.  It's been a cool way for me, a non-founding member, to see this league grow from inception to the cluster fuck of 2009 to today (I'll let someone with more knowledge revisit/blog about the '09 season if they want but I will say the tomfoolery corrupts the historical data a bit.)  I'm about 75% done but we have enough of a foundation to start pulling data out of it.

I'll be throwing out some stats throughout the year to highlight exactly how impressive (or terrible) a manager's season is going this year but without further ado, here are some stats worth mentioning!

*Career stats do not include 2017

Career Winning Percentage
Win
Loss
Tie
%
Russ Travers
1078
799
103
0.570
John DeMovellan
1014
850
106
0.542
Dan Alber
771
679
80
0.530
Mark Chirokas
993
881
96
0.528
Chris Pflanz
956
884
130
0.518
Andy Musto
845
808
97
0.511
Roland Zhou
532
519
49
0.506
Eric Rose
301
310
39
0.493
Eddie Perkins
916
951
103
0.491
Richie Travers
396
421
53
0.486
Jeremy Scanlon
290
314
46
0.482
Brad Calandrella
884
980
106
0.476
Greg Thompson
858
990
122
0.466
Bryan Bart
94
116
10
0.450
Matt Keaveney
548
691
81
0.446
Zack Hanrahan
453
574
73
0.445
Matt Pru
80
126
14
0.395
Ryan Fitzgibbon
145
261
24
0.365


Career Wins
Win
Loss
Tie
%
Russ Travers
1078
799
103
0.570
John DeMovellan
1014
850
106
0.542
Mark Chirokas
993
881
96
0.528
Chris Pflanz
956
884
130
0.518
Eddie Perkins
916
951
103
0.491
Brad Calandrella
884
980
106
0.476
Greg Thompson
858
990
122
0.466
Andy Musto
845
808
97
0.511
Dan Alber
771
679
80
0.530
Matt Keaveney
548
691
81
0.446
Roland Zhou
532
519
49
0.506
Zack Hanrahan
453
574
73
0.445
Richie Travers
396
421
53
0.486
Eric Rose
301
310
39
0.493
Jeremy Scanlon
290
314
46
0.482
Ryan Fitzgibbon
145
261
24
0.365
Bryan Bart
94
116
10
0.450
Matt Pru
80
126
14
0.395



By Week
Win
Loss
Tie
Russ Travers
115
54
29
John DeMovellan
100
71
26
Mark Chirokas
99
73
25
Chris Pflanz
95
76
26
Eddie Perkins
84
93
20
Brad Calandrella
78
101
18
Andy Musto
78
79
18
Greg Thompson
75
107
15
Dan Alber
74
63
16
Roland Zhou
47
48
15
Matt Keaveney
47
75
10
Zack Hanrahan
44
55
11
Richie Travers
37
40
10
Eric Rose
29
31
5
Jeremy Scanlon
27
34
4
Ryan Fitzgibbon
11
26
6
Matt Pru
7
13
2
Bryan Bart
6
14
2


And a quick look at how 2017 is stacking up for each team through two weeks of play:

Russ (15-4-1):  Second best start in team history behind his 2010 campaign (15-3-2)

Richie (14-6-0):  Second best start in team history behind his 2014 campaign (14-4-2)

Mark (13-6-1):  Tied for second best start in team history when he had the same start in 2014.  His 2012 season was his best at 14-4-2.

Jeremy (13-6-1):  Easily his strongest opening to a season, besting his 2016 season (9-10-1) by four games

Andy (10-9-1):  Third best two week start in team history, and the third time in team history he’s been above .500 entering week three; he made the 
playoffs in both times prior.

Eric (8-11-1):  Eric has never been above .500 at the start of week three in team history, but he has managed to make the playoffs in two of his first three seasons.

Eddie (8-11-1): Perk sits under .500 at the start of week three for the third time in the last five seasons (he only did that once in his first five seasons).

John (8-11-1):  Under .500 after two weeks for the second straight season.

Pflanz (8-12-0):  A traditionally slow starter, Pflanz is under .500 after two weeks for the eighth time in ten seasons (!).  He’s made the playoffs in all but two of those seasons.

Brad (7-12-1):  Nearly his worst start in team history, edging out his 2016 effort (6-11-3).  Made me double check my stats when I learned he owns the THREE BEST EVER TWO WEEK STARTS IN LEAGUE HISTORY when he was 16-3-1 in 2014 and 16-4-0 in 2011 & 2014.  He missed the playoffs in 2014.

Dan (6-14-0):  Worst start to a season in team history, “besting” his 2010 campaign (7-11-2).  He’s made the playoffs in four of his first seven seasons, but he was above .500 entering week three in each of those playoff years.

Greg (5-13-2):  Not his worst start to a season (yikes!) but close.  At the very least he has avoided the worst start in league history; that honor belongs to 2014 Eddie Perkins who started 2-17-1 (spoiler alert:  he didn’t make the playoffs.)