For once, at least relative to expectations, the pitching didn’t disappoint us this week. The hitting did though, and because of that we just continue to spin our wheels and can’t gain any real traction. Hoping that a long reset over the break will be just what we need to hit the ground running in the second half.
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Hitting Review
The week on the hitting side was… not great. The good news is that we were still able to get to a solid total of 315 at-bats despite all of the injuries and lack of flexibility that we were dealing with. The bad news is that a lot of those at-bats were empty and our targets in the power departments came up very short.
We got what we have come to expect from the catcher position as each Contreras brother homered, scored four runs and drove in three or four runs. Willson did so with a strong batting average, while William got through the week hitting just .130.
We got one of those rare strong weeks from Paul Goldschmidt, who hit .280 with a pair of homers, four runs and four RBI. If he could just do that every week, that would be insanely appreciated.
Xavier Edwards stepped in as our second baseman this week with Rengifo and IKF on the shelf, and he responded with a strong week – hitting .409 (9-for-22) with three runs scored, two RBI and three stolen bases. That’s more than worth what we paid for him last week in FAAB and should earn him more opportunities on our squad.
After going hitless in Week 15, Ezequiel Tovar bounced back in a major way this week, hitting .379 (11-for-29) with a pair of long balls, four runs scored and a team-leading five RBI. Welcome back.
We rely so much on Jose Ramirez for his power production, and every time that he doesn’t provide it we seem to struggle in those categories. He had a solid batting average on the week and swiped a pair of bases, but the zero homers and one RBI aren’t ideal.
The good version of Randy Arozarena showed up this week, hitting .227 with a homer, two RBI and three stolen bases. We’d like him to put it all together and have a few monster weeks, but we’ll take a repeat of his performance every time out. Tyler O’Neill had a down week with just three hits, two runs scored and an RBI.
David Fry found his way into the lineup for the entire week and gave us a nasty 0-for-17 with zero counting stats. Woof. I’ve said that I still like his profile and spot in the Guardians’ lineup, but yikes.
Jarren Duran hit .400 (10-for-25) on the week, but it came with just three runs scored, one RBI and one stolen base. Not going to complain, but would like to see a bit more category juice there.
We also had a very rare empty weekend from Jurickson Profar, with just two hits in 13 at-bats and zeros across the board. He’s done enough to earn our grace on that one. Max Kepler had a rough half-week with just one hit and a pair of runs scored.
Rowdy Tellez smacked another home run, scored three times and drove in three. That’s all we need from you buddy, keep it up. Anthony Rendon had a run scored and an RBI, but I’m not sure how he really fits into our plans going forward, and he’s unlikely to help in HR/RBI.
Chris Taylor failed in his one-week audition, contributing a poor average with two runs scored and one RBI. We really need Rengifo or IKF back. Justin Turner went hitless over the weekend and could be on his way out as well.
Looking at our weekly targets, it’s pretty ugly. We missed on four of the five hitting targets, with our only green showing up in stolen bases (+1.3). That’s encouraging at least as it was with Rengifo on the shelf.
We came up red in runs (-5.1), homers (-3.6) and batting average (-0.020). We fell insanely short in RBI yet again (-12.3) and that now has to be the absolute focus of the offense going forward.
Looking at the yearly targets, we’re on the good side in runs (+27) and stolen bases (+6). We’re slightly under the pace in average (-0.006) and we need to sprint to catch up to the number in homers (-19) and RBI (-63). Yuck.
Pitching Review
We knew coming into the week that things were going to be a bit rough on the pitching front. We knowingly went in with only seven starts for the week, making it extremely unlikely that we would be able to make our targets in wins and strikeouts. The hope was that we could scratch out close to what we needed while protecting ratios as we head into the All-Star break.
The week also had a very different feel to it as we didn’t have most of our starts stacked up on Monday and Tuesday while rolling out a bunch of sketchy doubles. It was a slow grind throughout the week instead.
Things actually started out very promising. Ryan Pepiot was our first hurler to take the hill on Tuesday and he pitched extremely well – giving up just one run on four hits and three walks over 5 2/3 innings of work. He also punched out seven on the day while earning our first victory of the week. That’ll play every single time.
We also had Josh Hader take the hill on Tuesday, working a scoreless ninth to close out the Marlins and snag our first save of the week.
It was more good news on Wednesday as Erick Fedde took the hill against the Twins. After navigating a tumultuous first inning in which he loaded the bases with nobody out and threw 35 pitches, he settled in and did some serious work. He gutted out five shutout innings, allowing four hits and a pair of walks while striking out five batters. The White Sox even pushed a single run across for him with two outs in the fifth inning – and the White Sox’ bullpen miraculously held on for him. Two starts, two wins. Let’s go.
Things weren’t quite as good on Wednesday evening as Corbin Burnes struggled in a loss to the Cubs – surrendering three runs on nine hits while punching out five over his six innings. Not a complete disaster, but we’d like more from our ace.
On Thursday we had Shane Baz take the hill for the first time. The Rays scored him some early runs and he carried a 5-2 lead into the fifth inning. He allowed a leadoff single to Oswaldo Cabrera though and then a one-out walk to Juan Soto before Kevin Cash gave him the quick hook at only 68 pitches (48 strikes). Ugh. He was ultimately charged with three runs on six hits and one walk while striking out five over 4 1/3 innings. The gut punch was that the Rays held on the remainder of the game – meaning the early hook cost him a victory. Fun stuff.
Hader came out again and did work against the Marlins though, once again working a scoreless ninth to rack up his (and our) second save of the week.
Friday’s lone start didn’t go well either. The wrong version of James Paxton showed up against the Tigers in Motown, giving up three runs on nine walks+hits over 3 2/3 innings while recording one measly strikeout. Might be time to punt him back to the waiver wire.
We saw Alexis Diaz for the first time of the week on Friday as well – in a non-save situation with a four-run lead against the Marlins. As usually happens in those situations, Diaz struggled and gave up a run on two hits and a walk with zero strikeouts. Lovely.
Hader picked up the slack yet again though for Diaz (and Megill who we haven’t seen yet this week), striking out a pair of batters in a perfect ninth inning to close out a three-run lead against the Rangers.
Through Friday night we were looking at 28 2/3 innings of a 3.45 ERA, 1.47 WHIP, 29 strikeouts, a pair of wins and three saves (all Hader). The WHIP is obviously very hurtful and the strikeouts are light, but it’s not a complete disaster – yet. Two starts left on the week, we just need Kutter Crawford to come up big again on Saturday and then have Pepiot finish strong on Sunday. Would also be nice to see Megill once or twice before he gives the closer’s gig back to Devin Williams after the All-Star break.
Crawford definitely delivered in his start on Saturday. He fired seven scoreless innings against the Royals on just two hits and one walk while punching out four to earn our third victory of the week. Megill’s first appearance of the week didn’t go as smoothly, as he suffered a blown save when he served up a two-run bomb to CJ Abrams in the ninth inning.
Pepiot came through in a big way yet again on Sunday, firing six scoreless innings against the Guardians while allowing just two hits and striking out four. It was a close game, and the win was in jeopardy, but the Rays managed to close it out for him and get our fourth win of the week.
Diaz finished the day with a scoreless inning in a non-save situation, though he did allow a couple of baserunners.
Overall, given the corner that we painted ourselves into with only seven starts, we have to be thrilled with how the week turned out on the pitching side.
Glancing at our weekly targets, we came up basically even in wins (+0.2) and saves (-0.3) while falling short in strikeouts (-15.1) as we anticipated. The ERA came in way ahead of the number (+0.728) and the WHIP was only slightly behind (-0.03).
When looking at the season-long numbers, it’s not as pretty of a picture. We’re trailing in four categories and are exactly even in saves despite rolling three closers for most of the season. Our deficit in strikeouts (-43) is manageable and we’ll start attacking that after the break. The ratios are lagging behind (-0.48 in ERA and -0.081 in WHIP), but they’re trending in the right direction. We can get back in the game there. It’s the wins number that continues to stand out (-14). Especially if we’re losing Megill as a closer, we’re going to have to hammer starts for much of the second half of the season while trying to gain ground in ratios. That’s a tough ask.
FAAB Plan
Heading into one of the toughest FAAB periods of the entire season it’s really tough to know what to do on this team for a variety of reasons. One of them is uncertainty. Obviously our biggest problem is still victories on the pitching side, though we’re building a substantial deficit in RBI on the hitting side as well. The uncertainty problem, is that as of now we really don’t know how most MLB teams are going to structure their rotations coming out of the All-Star break.
One thing that we do know is that Fedde is going to pitch in the fourth game for the White Sox, which means that he’s not someone we can use next weekend. That means that we need to have nine active pitchers that we can use – and Fedde can’t be included among them. That means we need to add at least one arm to the mix – assuming that all of our remaining active starters do in fact pitch next weekend – which is highly unlikely. Even adding two arms may not be sufficient.
The problem with finding potential drops is all of the stashes that we’re currently carrying. We added Clarke Schmidt and Walker Buehler last week with the intent to gain more information on when they may return – potentially giving our pitching staff a pair of impact arms that it desperately needs. It seems unlikely that Schmidt returns before the start of August – but it’s also likely that he’s that impact arm that we need and could provide ample wins for us down the stretch. I’d hate to cut him loose just yet. Buehler is fully recovered from his hip injury and has been working out at Cressey Sports Performance on his own to work on his mechanics. There’s no word on when he’ll return to the Dodgers’ rotation, but given their recent struggles it wouldn’t be that surprising if they tried to slot him back in coming out of the All-Star break. I’d hate to drop him prematurely and miss out on the benefit if he’s able to get right. We’re also carrying an injured Justin Verlander who could potentially rejoin the Astros’ rotation out of the break, but will likely need a minor league rehab start first.
Crawford will pitch for the Red Sox coming out of the break. It seems likely the Burnes will. You’d think that at least one of our Rays’ starters will – probably Pepiot and probably not Baz. Paxton could go either way, but do we even want to hold and start Paxton against the Red Sox even if he were to go – unlikely. He’s one drop. We’ve already noted that Fedde won’t go that first period.
That gives us three starters that we think are going to pitch, plus our three closers. Although Megill may no longer be the closer in Milwaukee if Devin Williams returns. Regardless though, any high-leverage RP is better than taking a zero. So let’s call it six spots filled, and if Baz happens to pitch we would have seven. That means that we should be trying to add three arms to the mix – starters if we know for sure they’re going to pitch, but relievers are definitely in the mix as well.
Do we have any drops on the hitting side? I’m glad you asked. The really tough thing is that we’re holding two injured super utility options in Luis Rengifo and Isiah Kiner-Falefa. There really hasn’t been much information in terms of updates on either over the past week, though it’s possible that both could be ready to go coming out of the All-Star break. I think it’s a fair enough assumption to hope that one of them returns, which would make Chris Taylor expendable. If we have to take a zero somewhere, I’d rather it be in the MI spot than on the pitching side if neither of those MI options happen to be ready to go next weekend.
Another easy drop looks like Rendon. He’s fine for what he is, but given the current state of our roster, we simply need the spot more on the pitching side. We could always look to add him back on the cheap after the weekend if we feel like he has something to offer.
That gives us three total drops so far, but as we’ve mentioned we really should be looking to add three pitchers to cover us for the weekend. But what if there are hitters that we want to add as well? That does make it tough. If we’re looking for potential drops outside of those three that we already noted, one name that comes to mind is Justin Turner. I’m not sure that I want to drop him – as he has quietly slashed .255/.383/.337 since the beginning of June and hits in the cleanup spot in the Jays’ lineup – which should lead to RBI opportunities. The issue though, is during that time he has just one homer and nine RBI to show for it, though he has scored 14 runs. He’s a viable bench bat – but if we need the spot or would like an upgrade, he’s someone that could go, especially with the emergence of Rowdy Tellez who we think could be our CI for the duration of the season potentially.
It’s also possible that David Fry’s usefulness has come to an end, but he’s still hitting fifth for the Guardians on most days and if he gets hot again he’s going to be a valuable asset for someone.
So let’s take a look and see what’s out there. The big name on the wire this week is Rece Hinds, who has absolutely lit the world on fire since he joined the Reds from Triple-A Louisville. The 23-year-old has gone 11-for-22 (.500) with five homers, 11 RBI, seven runs scored and two stolen bases through his first six big-league games. That’s unbelievable. He’s obviously not going to continue at that pace, but he could be a legitimate power/speed threat for the duration of the season if he continues to see everyday action in the Reds’ outfield – which he’s likely to do. He also has shortstop eligibility to go with the OF that he’ll gain soon. We don’t have the funds to go crazy, but we’ll try to put in a legitimate bid there at least – likely in the $50 range.
The next target would be Lawrence Butler. He went absolutely bonkers over the final week of the first half, crushing five homers with 13 RBI and a pair of stolen bases. That included a trio of home runs on Sunday. I had hoped that there was a chance that with all of the attention on Hinds – and with it being a funky free agent bidding period before the ASB, with most teams looking to add arms to avoid zeroes – that Butler could slip through cheaper than he would normally coming off of a week like this. Not after Sunday’s three-homer game though. We’ll have a real bid in on him as well.
After those two, it drops off quite a bit. I’m still kicking myself over not adding Jose Iglesias last week. We had him on the list for the same amount that we had Chris Taylor, but had the Dodgers’ utilityman higher as there was concern Iglesias was only playing against LHP and probably wouldn’t play over the weekend. Well, a couple of homers and four RBI later, and it looks like Iglesias is now a regular in the Mets’ lineup while Taylor didn’t do much for us in his week of action. Angel Martinez, Jorge Polanco, Sam Hilliard are all players that I have some level of interest in, whether or not I like them more than Turner though remains to be seen.
On the pitching side, it’s a mess. Yilber Diaz has pitched well through his first two starts with the Diamondbacks, but there’s no word yet on how they’ll structure their rotation coming out of the break. He could be worth an add regardless, but if he doesn’t go that would mean taking a zero most likely. Cal Quantrill will probably pitch for the Rockies that first weekend, but it would be at Coors against the Giants. Mitch Spence should pitch for the A’s that first weekend and would get a nice matchup against the Angels. Carlos Carrasco could start against the Padres. Nothing for certain on any of them, and that’s basically what’s available in terms of starters.
When looking at bullpen options to potentially nab a win or a save, or a couple of strikeouts, it’s Daniel Hudson, Alex Vesia, Ben Joyce, A.J. Puk, Joe Jimenez, Shelby Miller, Trent Thornton, Scott Barlow, Luke Weaver, etc. Keep in mind that we’re trying to get three arms here to use. Yikes.
My prediction from last week nailed all five players that I thought we would get. I do not expect that to be the case this week. My prediction is that we land Jose Iglesias ($3), Mitch Spence ($2), Carlos Carrasco ($1), Luke Weaver ($1) with Turner, Rendon, Paxton and Taylor as the drops. Would be thrilled if we somehow landed Hinds or Butler, but don’t expect things to go that direction.
FAAB Review
Ugh. So we put in a real bid on Rece Hinds thinking that maybe he’ll go cheaper than anticipated and we’ll be able to add the hot impact addition bat to our roster. We came up one dollar short, losing $77 to $76. Not going to lie, that stings. Thanks a lot Grey Albright.
We had also played around with our bid number on Lawrence Butler, and were probably high enough at one point, but again finished as the runner-up bid, this time $57 to $47. Fun times. League leader Griffin Benger gets to enjoy Butler’s services. I hope he goes hitless in his next 40 at-bats.
The next two names off the board were Pete Crow-Armstrong ($27 to $7) and David Peterson ($21 to $9). We weren’t in on either. We also weren’t in on Joshua Palacios ($21 to $7), Luis Ortiz ($18 to $11), Parker Meadows ($13 unopposed), Esteury Ruiz ($11 to $1) or Ryne Nelson ($8 to $1).
We did have interest in Yilber Diaz, and once again finished as the runner-up bid, losing $7 to $2. Angel Martinez ($7 to $7), Mickey Moniak ($7 to $3) and Austin Wells ($6 to $4) we didn’t have bids in on. We liked AJ Puk as a top RP target for next weekend, but missed there as well. Once again the runner-up ($6 to $2) and once again losing to Benger.
There would be several other players off the board before we get to our first win – and one that I thought we would get – Jose Iglesias at $3 ($1). Turner the drop on that one.
We also added Mitch Spence ($2 to $1), Ben Joyce ($2 to $1) and Luke Weaver for $1 (unopposed). Rendon, Paxton and Taylor as the drops. Three of the four that I thought we would get, and we could’ve had Carrasco also if I had him higher on the list.
Looking around the league at the drops, here’s what piques my interest this week: Trevor Larnach, Jeff McNeil, Donovan Solano, Nolan Jones. Honestly, nothing too exciting to see here.
With this week’s moves we’re now down to $206 remaining. It would have been down to the $120 range had we been successful in securing Hinds instead of coming up $1 short. Here’s what the other contenders in our league have remaining:
1) Benger - $184
2) Gill - $108
3) Shovein - $206
4) Dussault - $215
5) Faye/Albright - $246
6) Gialde - $185
7) Ramon - $82
8) Pell - $374
9) Francis - $422
10) Giese - $373
11) Cameron - $119
12) Reed - $384
13) Shmalo - $986
14) Autler - $532
15) Talley - $94
Shoutout to the manager in 13th place that has spent a grand total of $14 FAAB the entire season. Some may be asking, what did he spend that $14 on? Good question, let’s take a look:
In the FAAB period before the season started he made two $1 additions – Jhony Brito and Cavan Biggio with Chris Flexen and Zach McKinstry as the drops. The following week he also made two additions – Matt Waldron ($1) and Alec Marsh ($2) with Michael Lorenzen and Kyle Hendricks as the drops. So far, so good. He sat out FAAB on 4/7 and 4/14 before adding Yimi Garcia for $3 (unopposed) on 4/21 with Ryan Pressly as the drop. He went back to the reliever pool on 4/28, adding Reed Garrett for $5 ($1) with Marsh as the drop. The following week (5/5) he added Ben Brown for $1 with Brito as the drop. He then sat out each of the last 10 FAAB periods, choosing instead to sit on his large pile of money. He still appeared to be checking his team regularly and made regular roster moves up until this week. He has taken a complete zero from Ezequiel Duran at MI each of the last two weeks.
Alright, that’s far enough down the rabbit hole. Hopefully he’s doing well and has just shifted his focus to football.
Looking Ahead
We don’t have a lineup to set this week, at least until Friday, so there’s really no work to be done in this section here. Instead, I’m going to take a quick look back at the biggest mistakes and misses that we had from the first half of the season.
Every fantasy manager makes mistakes, every season. Sometimes it can be holding onto a player for too long, sometimes it can be cutting them too quickly. It can be not being aggressive enough on players that you know could help you, or being too aggressive and over-bidding on players that weren’t really expected to be long-term fixes.
Just glancing back over the ins and outs from the free agent bids this season, here’s a quick recap of my biggest regrets from the first half of the season:
We’ve talked about it a few times already this year, but so far my biggest regret of the season has been cutting Brent Rooker after the first week. He had been struggling and didn’t look to be an everyday option in the A’s lineup. That’s back when it looked like Esteury Ruiz was actually going to have a role. He was someone we had drafted after round 20 as a reserve outfielder, and I thought it would be better to churn that spot and try to land on something more helpful. That has come back to haunt us in a major way. Rooker homered twice on Sunday and finished the first half hitting .291/.369/.573 with 21 homers, 62 RBI, 44 runs scored and five stolen bases. We absolutely could have used that production – especially in the HR/RBI departments.
I had almost forgotten that Shane Bieber was drafted as our SP2 this season. That was fun.
I’m noticing way too many early-season bids that were higher than they needed to be. Players that we were thinking would only be weekly streamers that we were spending $11-$30 on. You always want to add the hot new thing and hope that it turns into something, but there were similar players available in the single digits every week and most of those bids didn’t have a runner-up. Even a lot of our $6-$8 bids went unopposed. Those add up. If we had been more conservative early in the season, we wouldn’t be in as bad of a place as we have been with FAAB over the past month.
In the third FAAB period after the start of the season we put a big bid in on Kirby Yates ($107) that came up just short ($127). Had that one gone our way, it would have changed our outlook in saves, though it probably would have cost us Trevor Megill.
The constant churning of the bottom of our roster paid dividends in that April 14 FAAB run though, as we were early on dropping Jose Abreu. We used that spot to add Jurickson Profar ($38 to $22) and he has been a fixture in our lineup ever since.
A couple of weeks after we dropped Rooker, he came back up for bid on 4/21. We did have a bid in on him to bring him back into the fold, but we fell short of the $23 that he went for and were unable to correct our quick trigger mistake. That’s also the week that we snagged Megill ($14 to $13) who has been huge in keeping us competitive in the saves category. Hindsight being 20/20, it would have been really nice to be looking for starting pitching help that week, as Taj Bradley ($8 to $5) was plucked from the wire by Rob Giese for basically nothing.
During the 4/28 FAAB run we took a shot at adding an impact contributor in the outfield in Jo Adell ($73 to $68). For the first couple of weeks it looked like that was going to be one of our best moves of the year, as he had major contributions in power and speed and looked like he could be a mainstay in the lineup. He would end up logging 145 at-bats in our lineup with a miserable .145 batting average, hardly making it worth the cost even with the eight homers, 19 RBI and four swipes.
Not that it’s necessarily a mistake or a regret, but we dropped a slumping Jarred Kelenic during the 5/5 FAAB run. That’s before the injuries to Ronald Acuna Jr. and Michael Harris moved him up into an everyday role in the leadoff spot for the Braves. Would have been nice to have him, but I think that one was understandable at the time.
During the 5/12 run, we were looking for middle infield help but landed on Whit Merrifield instead of Paul DeJong (who was also on our list). He went to Carter Gill instead for $14 and has been slugging homers against us ever since. At least on an interim basis, the addition of David Fry that week ($9 to $3) proved to be a good move and stemmed the tide at second catcher while Willson Contreras was shelved.
The 5/19 run we took our biggest shot of the season, adding Alek Manoah for $167 ($75). He would go on to throw just 6 2/3 innings over two starts for us before suffering a season-ending elbow injury. Perhaps it was bad process to place so much trust in a volatile player like Manoah, but we needed to add an impact arm to our rotation and it really looked like he had figured it out. It could just be bad luck on that one, but our FAAB budget is still hurting because of it. As far as a missed opportunity from that 5/19 run, Heliot Ramos was picked up by Rob Giese for $18 ($16). On the surface, that looks like one of the stronger additions on the season.
During the 5/26 run, Anthony Gialde added a pile of stolen bases with a $5 (unopposed) David Hamilton. As long as he kept him that is.
During the 6/9 run, we added Shane Baz for $34 ($33). It remains to be seen whether or not that one works out for us, but we’re hoping that he has a big second half in our rotation. We also added Justyn-Henry Malloy that week for $7 (unopposed) and cut him the following week. I’m starting to feel like that may have been too soon.
Phil Dussault added Michael Toglia for $9 ($8) during the 6/16 run and that’s looking like a strong move at the moment. The biggest regret from that week though is still letting Colt Keith slide by for $5 ($5). Had we gone the extra dollar there we would be in a much better place overall.
We threw some FAAB away on Tyler Black on 6/23 with a $16 ($8) bid, thinking that he would actually get playing time after starting four straight games. Silly Pat Murphy.
We didn’t have much money to spend on 6/30, but I really hope we don’t end up regretting letting Noelvi Marte get by for only $128 ($121) – and to Griffin Benger of all people. Also hoping that our addition of Rowdy Tellez ($1) continues to shine brightly.
I’m also strongly hoping that this week’s $1 miss of Rece Hinds doesn’t end up being the difference in how our season goes. That would be brutal.
One last thing that I wanted to look at this week as we head into the All-Star break, I wanted to look and see who has delivered the bulk of our overall production – our own All-Stars if you will. Here’s who has really given us the most juice in each of the 10 categories:
Runs - Ramirez (70), William Contreras (65), Duran (62), Goldschmidt (47)
HR - Ramirez (23), O’Neill (15), Tovar (14), Goldschmidt (13)
RBI - Ramirez (77), William Contreras (55), Profar (43), Tovar (42)
SB - Duran (22), Rengifo (19), Ramirez (18), Arozarena (13)
AVG (min 100 AB) - Rengifo (.324), Profar (.290), William Contreras (.286), Duran (.282)
K’s - Burnes (110), Crawford (107), Pepiot (91), Fedde (80), Hader (62)
Wins - Burnes (9), Crawford (6), Pepiot (6), Fedde (5)
Saves - Megill (18), Hader (17), Diaz (16)
ERA (min 30 IP) - Burnes (2.43), Crawford (2.75), Fedde (3.31), Pepiot (3.78)
WHIP (min 30 IP) - Hader (1.00), Burnes (1.04), Crawford (1.04), Pepiot (1.06)
Where we Stand
We finished last week at 101.5 league points, which had put us 15.5 behind Griffin Benger at the top of the league and just nine points behind Carter Gill for second place. We used a strong day on Sunday to finish the week with a slight gain in the league standings at 103 points. Unfortunately we still lost ground on the top two teams, as we now trail Gill by 13.5 points and Benger at the top by 17.5. There’s still a lot of work to be done. We have a 14 point cushion on fourth place heading into the break.
We had also been in 121st place out of 855 teams in the overall competition coming into the week. We spent most of the week down in the 180 range, but crawled back up to 151st place with a strong showing on Sunday. It’s time to stop worrying at all about the overall standings.
We finished last week a disappointing 38th place in the CLQ standings. Now I would kill to be back up at 38th place. Another brutal week for the OC and DC squads and we have fallen to 55th place. The dream is likely over there.
For me personally, this All-Star break is hitting at just the right time. I’m stepping away for a few days and taking my two oldest sons camping up in Canada, completely unplugging from all news and information. Hopefully I return on Friday refreshed and ready to start charging up the standings.
As always, I would love to hear your feedback on what you think of the article, the team, my decision making, the emotional roller-coaster, etc. If you’d like more insights into the CLQ or why those other two teams are struggling to keep us going there, let me know. Those that have reached out so far, I can’t tell you how much it’s been appreciated. This has probably been my favorite column to write in the 12+ years that I’ve been doing this. Just drop me a line on X (@DaveShovein) and I would be happy to discuss.