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Acuna, Soto Highlight Round One

Saturday, March 9th, 2019

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The first round of the DTBL Draft almost always features a crop of young up-and-coming stars.  But this year’s group is especially notable for their youth.  Eight of the ten players selected in the first round are under 25 years old, including the first seven picks of the draft.  And two players, Ronald Acuna and Juan Soto, are among the most accomplished players at their age to ever enter the league.  Acuna and Soto just turned 21 and 20 respectively over the offseason.  All ten first round selections are DTBL rookies.  A trade of two marquee players also highlighted an excellent start to the 2019 DTBL Draft.

For the second straight year, the reigning National League Rookie of the Year was the first pick of the draft.  Ronald Acuna joins the Jackalope coming off a stellar rookie campaign.  He hit .293 with 26 home runs and 16 stolen bases, flashing all of his plus tools.  The Braves outfielder became a star almost immediately upon promotion and helped lead his team to an unexpected division championship.  He could help the Jackalope make a similar jump in the standings this year.  The Jackalope offense was especially disappointing a year ago, but the pieces are still there to be one of the best teams in the league.  Acuna was a pretty clear choice here.

Last year, the Komodos took a young Dodgers star with the first pick of the draft (Cody Bellinger).  This year, they took another young Dodgers star with the second pick.  Walker Buehler should give a significant boost to a pitching staff that really struggled a year ago.  Buehler was pretty clearly the best pitcher available in this draft.  In 137 big league innings, he struck out 151 while posting an impressive 2.62 ERA and 0.96 WHIP.  That ERA is a full point lower than any Komodos starting pitcher posted in ’18, when they finished dead last in the league in that category, by a healthy margin.  Buehler will immediately become the Komodos best pitcher.

Juan Soto has already put himself in rarefied air based on his accomplishments in the big leagues as a teenager.  Nobody was expecting Soto to reach the majors for another year or two, but a series of injuries to Nationals outfielders caused them to bring him up last May. He was an immediate success and made it impossible to send him back down.  He was so good in his rookie campaign that the Nationals decided to only make a halfhearted attempt to retain Bryce Harper this winter.  Soto hit .292 with 22 homers in just 414 at bats.  The Naturals selected him with the third pick and he could have joined his Nationals teammate Victor Robles to form an exciting young duo for the Naturals as well.  But Soto was immediately traded to the Mavericks in a blockbuster swap of outfielders.  In return, the Naturals acquired Andrew Benintendi.  These are two of the best outfielders in the game, so this is quite a swap.  Benintendi is more established and is a little more well-rounded, offering a stolen base threat as well.  But Soto has a nearly unlimited upside in the power categories.  It will be very interesting to compare these players as their careers progress.  For the Mavericks, an outfield of Soto, Mike Trout and Aaron Judge is pretty darn scary.  But the Naturals have no shortage of young star hitters either.

With the fourth pick, the Moonshiners selected this year’s most interesting player, two-way star Shohei Ohtani.  Coming over from Japan, Ohtani was expected to be an immediate star on the mound, but many questioned if he would really be able to hit big league pitching.  In fact, some thought if he truly wanted to be a two-way player, he may need some time in the minors.  Well, turns out he can hit major league pitching.  He hit .285 with 22 home runs in just 326 at bats.  An injury limited him to just 51 innings on the mound, where he struck out 63 with a 3.31 ERA.  Unfortunately, he needed Tommy John surgery and will not pitch in 2019.  He does intend to hit, but probably won’t see action in a big league game until May.  The Moonshiners have all sorts of options with Ohtani.  First, they can use him at 1B or OF this year since he didn’t play a non-pitching field position last year.  And looking forward, they will have the option to use him as either a pitcher or hitter next year, assuming he is a keeper.  The sky is the limit with this pick, but the Moonshiners probably won’t get their money’s worth until next year and beyond.

The Mavericks aren’t used to picking in the first half of the first round, at least not with their own pick.  Last year was the first time they finished in the bottom half of the standings since 2011.  They took advantage of the rare positioning to acquire two of the top five players selected in this draft.  In addition to the trade for Soto, they selected pitcher Jack Flaherty with the fifth pick.  The Mavericks have an absolutely loaded offense, but the once undisputed top pitching staff in the league was anything but that a year ago.  Injuries destroyed the staff and caused them to finish dead last in pitching points.  Flaherty is the first step to try to rebuild that group.  Overshadowed a bit by the players already mentioned above, he had a rather dominant rookie campaign as well.  182 strikeouts in 151 innings is great for any pitcher, much less a 22 year old rookie.  The Cardinals hurler also had a strong 3.34 ERA and 1.11 WHIP.  He should provide stability for this revamped staff.

The Cougars have had a pretty good recent track record of selecting hitters in the first round.  Second baseman Gleyber Torres is the next in line.  The Cougars will likely open the season with their offensive lineup featuring their past five first round picks.  Torres is younger than all of his predecessors though at the time of joining the squad.  He hit .271 with 24 home runs during his age 21 rookie season.  That combination of ability and age should make him a fixture on the Cougars roster for a very long time.  The Yankees have a lot of options in their infield this year, but one thing is certain.  Torres will be playing virtually every day, whether it be at second base or shortstop.

Speaking of impressive young Yankees infielders, another one was selected with the seventh pick, with the Choppers taking third baseman Miguel Andujar.  Andujar hit .297 with 27 homers and 92 RBI, to finish second in the American League Rookie of the Year vote, behind Ohtani.  The only knock on him is his glove, but that matters not at all in fantasy.  The Choppers will look to Andujar to replace team legend and future Hall-of-Famer Adrian Beltre, who retired over the winter.  If Andujar can provide a spark to the Choppers offense, they could have a chance of ending their 20 year title drought.

For the second straight year, the Demigods took the old guy of the first round.  But in this case, it is still a league rookie.  Jesus Aguilar started the 2018 season as a bench player for the Brewers.  But the first baseman immediately showed off his incredible power, quickly earned a starting job, and then made the NL All-Star team.  He slugged 35 homers with 108 runs batted in.  He did cool off a bit in the second half of the season, with only 11 of those homers coming after the All-Star break.  Outside of maybe Acuna and Soto, he was probably the safest bet for power in this draft.  The Demigods finished eighth in home runs last year, the biggest weakness for an otherwise strong offensive team.

The Darkhorses selected Braves pitcher Mike Foltynewicz with the eighth pick, making this the first time since 2015 that more than two pitchers were taken in the first round.  Foltynewicz had a breakout season a year ago, which earned him an All-Star appearance.  He struck out 202 hitters in 183 innings with a sparkling 2.85 ERA and 1.08 WHIP.  His previous best ERA season was 4.31, so ’18 saw quite a dramatic improvement.  While he has spent parts of five seasons in the majors, he is still just 27 years old.  The Darkhorses barely missed winning the championship last year, with a mediocre pitching staff holding them back.  Foltynewicz could be exactly what they need to get over the hump.

Sitting with the last pick in the first round, the Kings believed there was one player remaining who was clearly the best available, but he was at a position in which they were already well stacked.  So instead, they swung a trade with the Jackalope to move up a spot to grab that player.  The Kings received the Jackalope 2nd round pick (11th overall) along with a swap of 4th round slots.  The Jackalope then took Royals shortstop Adalberto Mondesi to close out the first round.  Mondesi is a rare breed in that he is an elite base stealer, but also has surprising power.  He managed to steal 32 bases and hit 14 home runs despite not making his big league season debut until late June.  While he’s unlikely to maintain a pace like that for a full season, he still could be an above average contributor to the power categories while potentially leading the league in steals.  Once considered an elite prospect, Mondesi had slipped under the radar a bit before his 2018 breakout.  Slight spoiler alert for my upcoming season preview articles, but you definitely won’t see the Jackalope projected to finish last again.  They managed to acquire the two players with the highest projected PAR in the entire draft pool.  So the Jackalope started and finished the first round with a bang.  Meanwhile, the Kings selected starting pitcher Zack Wheeler with that pick they acquired from the Jackalope, the first pick of the second round.

Thanks to all of you for the excellent pace to the first half of this draft.  At this rate, we’ll be done with plenty of time to spare before the Japan openers.  Let’s keep up the good work!

Posted in Choppers, Cougars, Darkhorses, Demigods, Draft, Jackalope, Kings, Komodos, Mavericks, Moonshiners, Naturals | No Comments »

Kings, Darkhorses Vie For Title

Thursday, September 27th, 2018

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As usual, I have gotten lazy with my DTBL News articles as the season has worn on.  I thought about skipping this one altogether, but decided it would be good to get a least some of the following out of the way before the season ends.  Scroll to the bottom of the article if you have been waiting weeks to find out who the best players of August were, as we near the end of September.  But first, a brief look at what is in store for the final weekend of the season.

The Kings have been in first place all but four days this season.  The only time they were lower than second place was the day after Opening Day.  They held a share of the lead every single day from April 18 through September 16.  And yet, with just three full days remaining on the calendar, they are hardly a sure thing to win their seventh DTBL Championship.  They dominated the league for the first three months, but faded badly in July and especially August.  It was not a huge surprise when the Darkhorses finally caught them a couple weeks ago.  But the Kings picked a good time to get hot again as their offense has had its best stretch in several months over the past week or so.  With one weekend to go, the Kings lead over the Darkhorses is four points.  That is, by no means, a safe lead.

The final week began with the Kings leading the Darkhorses by 1 1/2 points.  The Demigods were just five back and the Choppers were in striking distance as well, seven points behind.  But since then, the Kings have picked up 3 1/2 points and have increased their lead over all of the challengers.  I think it is safe to say that the Choppers and Demigods are probably out of it now, barring something miraculous.  But the Darkhorses have several paths to claiming the title.

The categories that present the best opportunities for the Darkhorses to pick up points are batting average, ERA and maybe home runs.  If Jacob deGrom were slated to pitch one more time, I might have thrown strikeouts in there too.  But realistically, 71-72 points is probably the Darkhorses’ ceiling.  In other words, they are going to need a little help as the Kings sit at 73 points.  But the Kings could very easily spit back some points they’ve gained this week.  They are very vulnerable in home runs, RBIs and ERA.  The game I will have my eye on will be Jon Gray facing a resurgent Nationals offense at Coors Field on Saturday night.  If Gray were to get lit up, a loss of an ERA point would be very possible for the Kings.  On the flip side, the Kings have some suddenly hot power hitters, like David Dahl and A.J. Pollock.  The Darkhorses will be rooting for a power outage from the Kings this weekend.

Keep in mind that our league does count stats from tie-breaker games.  There is a very good chance that at least one tie-breaker will be required to settle the National League playoff races.  So this thing may not be over on Sunday.  However, no roster moves will be processed before Monday, so the current active rosters will remain in effect until the season is officially over.  If the championship remains up for grabs on Monday, I’ll be live blogging the action.

Now it is time to play catch-up on all of the weekly and monthly awards I missed.  Since I’m so late with these, I’m not going to bother with write-ups.  But here are the weekly award winners from August and September (so far).

Batters of the Week:

Week 19 (7/30 – 8/5) – Matt Carpenter, Choppers
Week 20 (8/6 – 8/12) – J.D. Martinez, Demigods
Week 21 (8/13 – 8/19) – Justin Turner, Darkhorses
Week 22 (8/20 – 8/26) – Javier Baez, Mavericks
Week 23 (8/27 – 9/2) – Christian Yelich, Darkhorses
Week 24 (9/3 – 9/9) – Trevor Story, Cougars
Week 25 (9/10 – 9/16) – Whit Merrifield, Choppers
Week 26 (9/17 – 9/23) – Tommy Pham, Cougars

Pitchers of the Week:

Week 19 (7/30 – 8/5) – Jon Gray, Kings
Week 20 (8/6 – 8/12) – Trevor Bauer, Choppers
Week 21 (8/13 – 8/19) – Jacob deGrom, Darkhorses
Week 22 (8/20 – 8/26) – Kevin Gausman, Kings
Week 23 (8/27 – 9/2) – Corey Kluber, Demigods
Week 24 (9/3 – 9/9) – Robbie Ray, Moonshiners
Week 25 (9/10 – 9/16) – Justin Verlander, Kings
Week 26 (9/17 – 9/23) – Hyun-Jin Ryu, Choppers

And now, here are the Batter and Pitcher of the Month from August 2018.

Batter of the Month:

Matt Carpenter, Choppers
J.D. Martinez, Demigods
.373 AVG, 7 HR, 25 RBI, 24 R, 2 SB, 2.69 PAR

Pitcher of the Month:

Jacob deGrom, Darkhorses
1.24 ERA, 0.985 WHIP, 3 W, 0 SV, 60 K, 3.29 PAR

FYI, Carpenter Martinez just barely edged out the Darkhorses’ Christian Yelich, who is probably a strong contender for this award again in September.  Speaking of guys who are strong contenders for September honors, deGrom’s unbelievable ’18 season was finally rewarded in August.

It should be an exciting final weekend, both in the DTBL and MLB.  May the best teams win!

TWO YEARS LATER EDIT:  When going through these articles to retroactively populate the honors table with past monthly award winners, I discovered I completely botched this one.  J.D. Martinez was the actual Player of the Month for August 2018.  My spreadsheet of monthly stats clearly states that, and I verified that the stat line above matches what Martinez produced in 8/18, not Carpenter.  I do not know how I got this wrong.

Posted in Awards, Darkhorses, Demigods, Kings | 1 Comment »

Lindor Caps Epic Comeback

Saturday, July 28th, 2018

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On paper, the National Division appeared to be the stronger squad in the 25th Annual DTBL All-Star Game.  But it took a comeback for the ages for them to prove it.  The American Division broke out to a 7-0 lead in the game’s first two innings and maintained a six run advantage at the seventh inning stretch.  But then the script flipped and the National All-Stars stormed back.  Francisco Lindor completed the comeback with a go-ahead two run homer in the bottom of the 8th.  The National Division won the silver anniversary mid-summer classic at Kings Park by a final score of 8-7.

The game could not have gotten off to a much better start for the American Division.  Facing Corey Kluber in the top of the first, the American team scored three runs.  Paul Goldschmidt started the scoring with a two run home run, knocking in Jean Segura who had singled to start the game.  Giancarlo Stanton followed the Goldschmidt blast with a single and reached third on a double by Eddie Rosario.  Nelson Cruz knocked in Stanton on a groundout to give the American squad a three run lead before the National Division stepped to the plate against American starting pitcher Luis Severino.

Things appeared to unravel for the National team in the top of the second with Max Scherzer on the mound.  Whit Merrifield reached on an error by National shortstop Javy Baez.  A Jose Ramirez single and Goldschmidt walk loaded the bases with two outs for Stanton.  On an 0-2 pitch, Stanton launched an opposite field grand slam home run, increasing the lead to 7-0.  All four runs were unearned.

The American Division seemed to have this game under control.  Severino completed two solid, scoreless innings.  The National All-Stars did get one back in the third off of Chris Sale though, on another opposite field home run.  Manny Machado’s blast to right cut the lead to 7-1.  That would be it for the scoring until the seventh as both teams scattered a few hits but never really mounted any great scoring opportunities.  In the top of the seventh, Brad Hand hit the first batter he faced, but then struck out the next three hitters to send the game to the seventh inning stretch.  That’s when everything changed.

Craig Kimbrel came on to pitch for the American Division and promptly walked Aaron Judge.  Then Freddie Freeman hit yet another opposite field home run.  Like Stanton’s grand slam, this Freeman blast came on an 0-2 pitch.  Lindor followed with an impressive nine pitch walk.  After a one out single by Jose Altuve, Kimbrel was relieved of his duties.  In came Josh Hader.  His rough week continued.  Mookie Betts greeted Hader with a three run home run to center, capping off a five run inning that cut the American lead to one run.

Sean Doolittle pitched a perfect top of the eighth with a pair of strikeouts, allowing the National All-Stars to maintain their momentum.  In came Aroldis Chapman to try to protect the one run advantage.  He did not.  Aaron Judge reached on a walk for the second time in the game.  With two outs and a runner on first, Lindor came up to the plate to face Chapman.  He launched a two run homer to left, completing the epic comeback and giving the National Division an 8-7 lead.

Kenley Jansen got the call for the National squad in the ninth and retired the side in order to close out the stunning victory for the National Division.  Doolittle was credited with the win, Chapman took the loss and Jansen recorded the save.  Lindor was named the game’s Most Valuable Player, mainly on the strength of his game winning homer.  But the Demigods shortstop also played a role in the big seventh inning with a key walk.

There were six home runs hit in the game, four for the National and two for the American.  14 of the 15 runs in the game were knocked in on home runs.  As has been the norm in DTBL All-Star Games in recent years, there were lots and lots of strikeouts.  National pitchers struck out an incredible 20 American hitters.  American pitchers recorded 11 strikeouts too.  Amazingly, no individual hitter struck out more than twice.  But of the 14 American hitters who played in this game, Segura was the only one who didn’t fan.

Not to be overlooked was the impressive pitching by the National squad after the first two innings.  In the final seven frames, National pitchers allowed just three hits, no runs, one walk and 17 strikeouts.  The only base-runner of the final four innings for the American team was via a hit by pitch.  Perhaps the most notable performance came from Blake Treinen, who struck out all three hitters he faced.

This was the third straight All-Star Game victory for the National Division.  They now hold a 14-11 lead in the all-time series.  Click here to check out the box score from the 25th edition of the DTBL Al-Star Game.

Posted in All-Star Game, Demigods | No Comments »

2018 Season Preview: Part I

Wednesday, March 28th, 2018

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Welcome to the 2018 DTBL season!  This will be our 26th season, but also a year-long celebration of our 25th Anniversary.  In case you forgot what happened in 2017 after a long winter, here’s a quick summary:  the Mavericks dominated.  They led the league most of the season and won the championship by 11 1/2 points over the Cougars and Naturals.  After the Mavericks, very little separated the rest of the league.  The Cougars and Naturals had very good years, but it wouldn’t have taken much more for any of the other teams to have been right up there with them in the standings.  So, how do things look heading into 2018?  I’m glad you asked.

As has become an annual tradition, I am going to preview the upcoming season by using standings/stats projections to tell most of the story.  For the second straight year, I will be using FanGraph’s Depth Charts projected stats of players to generate projections for each DTBL team.  These are a blend of ZiPS and Steamer projections, with playing time adjustments done by the FanGraphs staff.  The reason I made the switch to Depth Charts last year is because I think it gives a more accurate guess at playing time so that players who are expected to play less than an every day role in the big leagues this year don’t disproportionately affect these prognostications.

Additionally, I have made one other change for this year.  In the past, I’ve scaled all the pitching stats so that the number of projected innings are the same for each team, no matter how many pitchers are on the roster.  For hitters, I have attempted to do the same, but rather than scaling to a certain at bat or plate appearance target, I would scale based on the number of hitters on the roster.  This year, I decided it would make more sense to do the same thing for hitters as pitchers.  So now the team totals in hitting categories will be scaled such that each team is projected to accumulate 8285 plate appearances.  I came up with this number by looking at the team totals in at bats the past five seasons and then applying the PA/AB ratio that has existed in MLB over that same time period, since I don’t keep plate appearance data for DTBL teams.  I figured this would be more accurate than simply using at bats since some teams may be high on guys who walk a lot while others may have a bunch of free swingers.  So team plate appearances are more likely to be similar across the league than at bats.  Anyway, the main reason for this change is so that teams who have players projected to spend far less than full seasons on major league rosters don’t kill the team’s projections across the board.  For instance, Victor Robles is only projected for 90 plate appearances this season.  In the past, including his modest numbers in the Naturals projections would have really hurt the “per player” totals.  With this change, his numbers simply won’t make up as significant of a percentage of the Naturals totals, which is logical since he probably won’t be on their active roster much of the season.  So the end result, I think, is that these projections will do a better job of predicting which players will actually be on major league rosters for DTBL teams.  Having said that, I’m still not making any personal predictions about how much time each player will spend on the active roster.  Stats for all 28 players on the post-draft rosters are included in these projections.

Anyway, let’s get started.  As usual, I’m going to break this into four parts.  Normally, each of these posts previews two or three teams.  But you get a special treat to kick things off this year:  four teams!  The reason?  Three teams are projected to tie for 7th place.  So here are the four teams that the numbers say will be near the bottom of the standings.  Two of these four were among the top four finishers a year ago, so perhaps we could see some major shuffling in the standings, which of course winds up happening every year anyway.

Kelly’s Cougars

Category – Projected Rank (2017 Rank)

  • Batting Average – 6th (5th)
  • Home Runs – 8th (6th)
  • Runs Batted In – 9th (5th)
  • Runs Scored – 6th (2nd)
  • Stolen Bases – 7th (5th)
  • Earned Run Average – 9th (3rd)
  • WHIP Ratio – 8th (7th)
  • Wins – 9th (8th)
  • Saves – 5th (3rd)
  • Strike Outs – 8th (5th)
  • Total Batting Points – 8th (5th)
  • Total Pitching Points – 9th (4th-T)
  • Total Points – 10th (2nd-T)

Summary:

We kick off the team previews with what is probably the most surprising result my spreadsheet spit out.  Last year, the Cougars tied for second place, which was their best finish in over 20 years.  These projections don’t like their chances of duplicating that result.  One possible explanation for this dreary outlook is that the Cougars current roster consists of 13 pitchers, which is more than any other team and two more than most.  This means that a good chunk of their pitching totals are made up of numbers from pitchers who won’t actually contribute this season and waters down the impact of the numbers from their best pitchers.  However, on that note, their best pitcher is clearly Madison Bumgarner who will spend the first month of the season on the DL with a broken finger.  Chris Archer, Jameson Taillon and Luke Weaver will look to pick up the slack.  The Cougars have a bunch of interesting young pitchers who they will be able to shuffle in and out of the rotation until they find the best combination.  I would heavily bet the over on the Cougars saves projection, which was also impacted by the sheer quantity of relief pitchers on the current roster.  They should be able to roll out four closers most of the season, so a finish near the top in saves seems likely.  The offensive projections are a little more worrisome for the Cougars.  Charlie Blackmon and Kris Bryant are elite players, but they are going to need a couple other guys to reach All-Star caliber levels this season.  Some candidates for that include first round pick Tommy Pham and last year’s first overall pick, shortstop Trevor Story.  Story bouncing back from a disappointing DTBL rookie campaign might be the key to the Cougars season.  Somebody has to come in last in these prognostications.  It would be pretty surprising if the Cougars fell all the way to the bottom of the league in 2018 though.

Charlie’s Thunder Choppers

Category – Projected Rank (2017 Rank)

  • Batting Average – 9th (9th)
  • Home Runs – 10th (10th)
  • Runs Batted In – 10th (9th)
  • Runs Scored – 10th (9th)
  • Stolen Bases – 1st (7th)
  • Earned Run Average – 8th (4th)
  • WHIP Ratio – 4th (3rd)
  • Wins – 4th (6th)
  • Saves - 2nd (2nd)
  • Strike Outs – 4th (1st)
  • Total Batting Points – 10th (10th)
  • Total Pitching Points – 4th (3rd)
  • Total Points – 7th-T (7th)

Summary:

After four straight seasons in the top half of the standings, the Choppers took a step backwards in 2017 and fell to seventh place.  Their strong pitching staff couldn’t overcome an offense that finished dead last in batting points.  According to these projections, they could be in for a repeat of that again this season.  The Choppers attempted to improve their offense by drafting Whit Merrifield and Delino DeShields Jr and trading for Andrew McCutchen.  Clearly, this will be a speedier team in ’18.  With regular playing time, DeShields could contend for the league lead in stolen bases.  But questions remain on where the power will come from.  Anthony Rizzo and Byron Buxton appear to be the best offensive players on the squad.  After those two though, the player with the next highest projected batting PAR is actually 10th round pick Randal Grichuk.  The pitching numbers are much more promising.  I’m not sure they will be able to lead the league in strikeouts again this year, but Chris Sale, Danny Duffy and Jon Lester form an impressive trio of left-handed starters.  Joining them this year will be Trevor Bauer, who had a sneaky impressive strikeout total a year ago.  The bullpen remains one of the best in the league, led by Craig Kimbrel and Ken Giles.  It would be surprising if the Choppers don’t have one of the better pitching staffs in the league this year.  But in order for them to return to the top half of the standings, they will need to be a better hitting team.

Dom’s Demigods

Category – Projected Rank (2017 Rank)

  • Batting Average – 2nd (2nd)
  • Home Runs – 7th (4th)
  • Runs Batted In – 5th (2nd)
  • Runs Scored – 7th (8th)
  • Stolen Bases – 9th (6th)
  • Earned Run Average – 4th (5th)
  • WHIP Ratio – 5th (5th)
  • Wins – 6th (1st-T)
  • Saves – 7th (9th)
  • Strike Outs – 10th (8th)
  • Total Batting Points – 7th (3rd-T)
  • Total Pitching Points – 7th (6th)
  • Total Points – 7th-T (4th)

Summary:

Much like the Cougars, the Demigods are projected to take a tumble in the standings after finishing in fourth place a year ago.  Also like the Cougars, a possible explanation for the fall could be tied to their current roster construction.  In the Demigods case, four of the five extra players are hitters.  They continue to have a very deep roster of solid hitters.  Jose Altuve and J.D. Martinez were two of the best players in the league last year and should be again this season.  Add in Francisco Lindor and Freddie Freeman and you have the makings of a team that doesn’t look like the seventh best offense in the league, but that is what the projections are saying.  Perhaps some of their veterans could be declining a bit, like Buster Posey and Evan Longoria.  And it remains to be seen if Ryan Zimmerman can build on his ’17 resurgence.  Overall though, this looks like a good hitting team.  Outside of Cy Young winner Corey Kluber, the pitching staff was a little disappointing last year though.  Aaron Nola and newcomer Alex Wood could blossom into stars this season.  The Demigods will be looking for bounce-back seasons from Johnny Cueto and Cole Hamels.  The bullpen is likely to be a weakness.  While they could have as many as three closers, not one of them is in a particularly safe situation.  Fernando Rodney did manage to save 39 games a year ago though.  While the Demigods are projected to finish seventh in the league in both batting and pitching points, I believe their offense is much stronger than the pitching staff right now.  Will Kluber be able to carry them into contention again this year?

Kat’s Komodos

Category – Projected Rank (2017 Rank – Gators)

  • Batting Average – 7th (6th)
  • Home Runs - 3rd (5th)
  • Runs Batted In – 7th (10th)
  • Runs Scored - 2nd (3rd)
  • Stolen Bases - 2nd (1st)
  • Earned Run Average – 10th (8th)
  • WHIP Ratio – 10th (8th)
  • Wins - 3rd (5th)
  • Saves – 9th (10th)
  • Strike Outs – 9th (9th)
  • Total Batting Points – 2nd (6th)
  • Total Pitching Points – 10th (10th)
  • Total Points – 7th-T (10th)

Summary:

The Komodos inaugural DTBL seasons should be pretty interesting.  They inherited a Gators roster that finished in last place a year ago, but had a relatively decent offense.  Early signs are that the Komodos could be more than just decent with the bats.  The pitching staff, however, is still a work in progress.  Adding Cody Bellinger to an already potent lineup has helped make the Komodos the second best offensive team in the entire league, according to these projections.  Jose Ramirez looks to build on his breakout ’17 campaign.  Other young players who could be poised to do big things in ’18 include Starling Marte, Joey Gallo and Corey Seager.  Also, don’t forget about Wil Myers, Yoenis Cespedes, Eddie Rosario and Nelson Cruz.  The Komodos received some bad news today with catcher Salvador Perez suffering an off-field knee injury that will shelve him until mid-May or so.  But otherwise, things are looking up for the Komodos hitters.  The pitching staff will have trouble escaping the cellar, however.  Jose Quintana is definitely the ace of the staff.  Rich Hill and Gio Gonzalez are solid veterans.  As is Ervin Santana, but he will likely miss the first month with a hand injury.  One young pitcher to keep an eye on is Dylan Bundy.  The bullpen has some interesting guys, most notably recent acquisition Aroldis Chapman, but may struggle to rack up saves.  Greg Holland remains an unsigned free agent.  Getting him onto a roster as a closer would certainly help.  It will be fun to see if the Komodos can make some noise in their first season.

Posted in Choppers, Cougars, Demigods, Komodos | No Comments »

Komodos Nab Bellinger

Monday, March 19th, 2018

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The 2018 DTBL Draft kicked off Thursday, March 8.  The first pick belonged to the league’s newest member, Kat’s Komodos.  Inheriting a Gators roster that was well stocked with hitters but very much lacking in pitching, the biggest question going into the draft was if they would select a player based on need or take the best player available.  The Komodos did the latter, picking the consensus top player in the draft pool, Dodgers first baseman Cody Bellinger.  As usual, the first round as a whole skewed young with nine DTBL rookies selected, four of whom didn’t make their MLB debuts until after the All-Star break last season.  The first round was light on pitching this year as eight of the top ten were hitters.

In retrospect, the decision to take Bellinger with the first pick was probably pretty easy for the Komodos.  The reigning National League Rookie of the Year will give them a huge power boost and may even position them as one of the deepest offensive teams in the league.  Bellinger made his presence known right from the start.  He was a NL All-Star as a rookie.  He hit 39 home runs with 97 RBI and 87 runs despite not making his debut until late April.  His .267 average was quite respectable for a slugging rookie and he even stole 10 bases.  Bellinger should be a star for the Komodos for a long time to come.

In many ways, the Kings faced a similar predicament to the Komodos with the second pick and made the same decision, taking the player they believed to be the best available despite it not being a position of great need.  With that pick, the Kings selected first baseman turned outfielder Rhys Hoskins.  The Phillies young slugger came up through the minors as a modestly rated prospect who did nothing but mash at every level of the minors.  That continued in the majors, despite also having to learn a new position at the big league level.  Hoskins slugged 18 homers in just 50 major league games, pumping out a ridiculous 1.014 OPS.  With the Phillies signing Carlos Santana this winter, it appears they will continue to deploy Hoskins to the outfield.  Even if that goes poorly, Hoskins’ bat will force its way into the lineup on a daily basis.

With the third pick, the Jackalope were able to do both of the things mentioned above:  pick the best player available and fill a glaring hole in the roster.  They selected Yankees starting pitcher Luis Severino.  Severino is technically a DTBL rookie, having never appeared on an active roster before.  But this is the second time he has been drafted.  The Naturals picked him in the 5th round in 2016, but he started the season in the minors and was released in May.  After that disappointing ’16 campaign, he was removed from the league last year, causing us to miss out on his breakout season.  In 2017, he became one of the most dominant pitchers in the league, posting a 2.98 ERA, 1.04 WHIP with 14 wins and 230 strikeouts.  The Jackalope pitching staff really struggled a year ago, making Severino a perfect fit.  They are also quite heavy on Yankees now, employing Severino, Giancarlo Stanton, Gary Sanchez, Didi Gregorius, Sonny Gray and Dellin Betances.  Not a bad group.

The top three of the draft seemed pretty clear cut.  Predicting who would go fourth and beyond was a bit more challenging.  The Choppers had the fourth pick and used it on second baseman Whit Merrifield who went from relative obscurity to fantasy monster during the course of the 2017 season.  The Royals infielder hit .288 with 19 home runs, 34 stolen bases, 80 runs and 78 RBI.  He was a plus contributor to all five categories, but especially stolen bases.  The Choppers had the worst offense in the league last year (in terms of batting points), so adding a do-it-all infielder makes plenty of sense.  It remains to be seen if the power was real, but in today’s home run climate, it seems quite possible it was.

Last year, the Moonshiners somewhat regretted passing on a young Red Sox up-and-comer in the first round in Andrew Benintendi.  They ensured that the same mistake wouldn’t be made again this year, grabbing third baseman Rafael Devers with the fifth pick.  Devers was just 20 years old when he made his MLB debut last summer.  But he earned his promotion by demolishing every level of the minors on his way up.  And the hitting continued when he reached the big leagues.  He hit .284 with 10 homers in 58 major league games.  Considering his age, the sky is the limit with this guy.  Early signs are that he is going to be a great hitter with above average power.  That should make him a fixture at hot corner for the Moonshiners for a very long time.

While hitters took most of the spotlight of the first round, there were a couple very intriguing pitchers selected as well.  The second of those was Twins starter Jose Berrios, picked sixth by the Darkhorses.  Berrios earned elite prospect status on his ascension up the minor league ladder, but a rocky MLB debut season in 2016 dampened expectations a bit.  But in 2017, he regained his status as an exciting young hurler.  He posted a solid 3.89 ERA and 1.229 WHIP with 14 wins and 139 strikeouts in 145 innings, helping lead the Twins to a surprising Wild Card berth.  He should immediately boost a Darkhorses pitching staff that finished last in ERA, WHIP and wins last season.

The Demigods selected the lone non-DTBL rookie of the first round with pick number seven.  Outfielder Ender Inciarte continues to be one of the more underrated all-around players in baseball.  With a weak Braves team around him last year, he managed to hit .304 with 11 homers, 93 runs scored and 22 stolen bases.  What a difference a year can make to a player’s stock.  The Darkhorses drafted Inciarte for the second time last year, in the 12th round.  Now he’s a first rounder.  For the record, the Darkhorses also drafted him in the fourth round in 2016.  With the investment of a first round pick, I have a feeling he will stick around for a while this time with the Demigods.

Following that selection of a DTBL “veteran”, the Cougars picked an outfielder who will be a rookie in this league, but is actually almost three years older than Inciarte.  Now 30 years old, Tommy Pham broke out big time for the Cardinals in ’17.  He hit .306 with 23 home runs and 25 stolen bases, becoming a legitimate five category force, seemingly out of nowhere.  This has become a consistent trend in the Cardinals organization:  late blooming non-prospects becoming excellent major league contributors.  There are plenty of reasons to believe Pham’s breakout is sustainable, most notably that he has been able to harness his degenerative vision problems.

For the second straight year, the Naturals used their first round pick on one of the top prospects in baseball who probably will spend a bulk of the upcoming season in the minors.  With the ninth pick, they selected young Nationals outfielder Victor Robles.  Considered the possible heir apparent to Bryce Harper in the Nats outfield, should Harper decide to take his talents elsewhere next winter, Robles has elite hitting, fielding and running skills.  Though not a big time slugger to this point of his career, scouts believe that will come as well.  MLB.com has him ranked as the #6 prospect in baseball and #1 among those who have already made their MLB debuts.  Robles is just 20 years old, so this is a long-term play for the Naturals.

Finally, the defending champion Mavericks closed out the first round by selecting another young hitter who splashed onto the scene late in the 2017 season, Braves second baseman Ozzie Albies.  Albies hit .286 with six home runs and eight stolen bases in 57 big league games, basically replicating the numbers he posted in AAA as a 20 year old.  So for those of you scoring at home, that’s three first round picks on guys who will enter the ’18 season at age 21 or younger (Albies, Devers, Robles).  The Mavericks don’t really have any holes, but Albies will slot in nicely at 2B.

The first round didn’t feature any trades this year, but there have been three separate deals since the first round ended, involving six different teams.  First, the Mavericks continued a revamp of their bullpen, dealing Aroldis Chapman to the Komodos for their second round pick (11th overall).  That pick was used on a very interesting pitcher, Alex Reyes.  Reyes should return from Tommy John surgery in May.  While his exact role remains a mystery, there are a few intriguing possibilities including closer or spot starter.  The fact that he will be designated as a reliever for this season could make him extremely valuable once he is healthy.  Meanwhile, Chapman gives the Komodos a reliable anchor in their bullpen which had no such commodities on the returning roster.

The next trade saw the Choppers flip their second round pick (14th overall) to the Naturals for outfielder Andrew McCutchen.  Once one of the best players in the league, McCutchen quietly put up pretty strong numbers across the board last year and will now be applying his craft in San Francisco.  As mentioned above, the Choppers needed a boost to their offense, so McCutchen should help to that end.  The Naturals used the acquired pick on the top closer in this draft, Pirates lefty Felipe Rivero, a former teammate of McCutchen’s.  Rivero had a dominant debut as a closer in ’17, saving 21 games with a 1.67 ERA and 0.889 WHIP.

The third deal was a swap of power hitters, in an attempt to clear position log jams on both ends.  The Kings dealt their longtime slugging outfielder Jay Bruce to the Cougars for first baseman Justin Bour.  On the Kings side, this was mostly a move to clear an overcrowded outfield, but also to get younger.  Trading away Bruce allowed them to select rookie outfielder Willie Calhoun with their subsequent pick, in the fifth round.  Of course, hours after they drafted Calhoun, he got sent to the minors.  But this was a future value play anyway.  Meanwhile, the Cougars didn’t have much use for Bour after drafting Justin Smoak and Bruce fills a need for a power hitting outfielder.

With four rounds remaining in the draft, we should easily finish up with time to spare before Opening Day.  Thanks to everyone for keeping things moving.  I hope to start my season preview articles this upcoming weekend.  Until then, keep up the good work!

 

 

Posted in Choppers, Cougars, Darkhorses, Demigods, Draft, Jackalope, Kings, Komodos, Mavericks, Moonshiners, Naturals | No Comments »

Cy Young Goes to a Klubot

Monday, November 20th, 2017

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The 2017 season got off to a rough start for Demigods ace Corey Kluber. He managed to win three of his first six starts, but was far from his usual dominant self, posting a 5.06 ERA before hitting the disabled list for nearly a month. Apparently the time off served him well, because he was the best pitcher in baseball for the final four months of the season. Those four months of dominance were enough to make Kluber’s full season numbers as impressive as any other pitcher in baseball. Corey Kluber is the 2017 DTBL Cy Young award winner.

Kluber is the definition of a workhorse.  Despite missing a month of the season, he still managed to record 203.2 innings, exceeded by only two other DTBL pitchers.  He has thrown over 200 innings in all four of his seasons with the Demigods.  But it wasn’t just about quantity of innings for Kluber.  The quality was unsurpassed as well.  He easily led the league in ERA (2.25) and WHIP (0.87) and tied for the most wins (18) as well.  His 265 strikeouts ranked third in the league.  In terms of PAR, he was also the best pitcher in the league with a mark of 13.2.  He did all of this while pitching in the hitter friendly American League.  He is the first American League pitcher to win the DTBL Cy Young award since David Price in 2012.

The Demigods drafted Kluber in the 10th round of the 2014 draft.  Needless to say, that pick has worked out quite well for them.  Kluber won the DTBL Rookie of the Year award in 2014 and has been a Cy Young contender pretty much every season since.  He has struck out over 225 hitters in each season and has never posted an ERA above 3.50 or a WHIP above 1.09.  This season was probably his best to date, but there hasn’t been a bad one yet.  He already sits in the top five in Demigods franchise history in all relevant categories.  Amazingly enough, this season marked his first DTBL All-Star appearance.  I would say that is a sign of how dominant Kluber tends to be in the second half of seasons, because his full season numbers have been All-Star worthy in all four years of his DTBL career.  The Demigods pitching staff was a bit of a disappointment as a whole, keeping them from being a serious championship contender.  But that obviously wasn’t Kluber’s fault.  He easily led his team in ERA, WHIP, wins, strikeouts and PAR.

Plenty of pitchers had great 2017 seasons, but Kluber won this award pretty easily.  He received eight of the ten first place votes, and was ranked second on the other two ballots for a total of 94 points.  Chris Sale looked like the favorite to win this award at the All-Star break, but he continued his career trend of fading down the stretch, creating quite a contrast to Kluber.  Nonetheless, the Choppers lefty still led the league in strikeouts with 308, the highest single season total since Randy Johnson’s 334 in the 2002 season, 15 years ago.  Sale received one first place vote and eight seconds for a 69 point total.  There was a very close race for third place.  Last year’s Cy Young winner, Kings ace Max Scherzer edged out Mavericks star Clayton Kershaw.  Scherzer received a majority of the third place votes (7) and accumulated 44 points.  This was just enough to beat Kerhaw’s 40 points that included a first place vote.  Finishing near the top of the Cy Young vote is nothing new for this duo.  Scherzer has now finished in the top four in four of the past five seasons.  Amazingly, this is Kershaw’s seventh straight year in this elite company.  He won the award in 2013 and 2014.  There was a huge gap after these four, but Mavericks closer Kenley Jansen took the fifth spot thanks to four fifth place votes.

Click here to view the full voting results.

Two down, one to go.  The Most Valuable Player award, which figures to be the most hotly contested of the three races, will be announced on Wednesday.

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September Storylines

Saturday, September 9th, 2017

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In some circles, it is believed that I have magical powers that allow me to alter the state of the championship race by declaring certain teams dead, thereby causing those teams to actually find their way back into the race. There has been little proof of this, however, as what was described as a two team race a month ago has now become more of a solo act. The Mavericks now hold a double digit lead with just three and a half weeks to go. Is it over? Are the Mavericks a lock to win their first championship in 11 years? Eh, not exactly.

While the Mavericks have held a double digit lead for a couple weeks now, they are not completely bulletproof. On the batting side, they hold precarious leads over chasing teams in pretty much all five categories. And they are currently nursing several injuries to hitters. Without any free agent signings remaining, they don’t have a lot of options to replace injured players either, not that the free agent pool has anybody worth signing at this point anyway. As for pitching, they are sitting pretty and it seems highly unlikely they could lose more than a point or two in pitching categories, especially with Clayton Kershaw healthy again. Perhaps someday I will come up with a way of calculating championship odds, but for now, I’m going to take a blind guess instead. I’d give the Mavericks close to a 90% chance of winning the title, with the other 10% split between the Naturals and Demigods. I suppose a few other teams could enter the picture with a couple ridiculously hot weeks. But it is pretty much the Mavericks title to lose.  There, I said it.

So the championship race may not be particularly exciting right now, but there are some other very interesting storylines to follow down the stretch. First is the impressive power display by Jackalope outfielder Giancarlo Stanton (spoiler alert: he will be mentioned again below). Stanton currently sits at 53 home runs and has a great chance to be the first person to reach 60 since 2001. In fact, if you exclude the seasons during the peak of the steroid era (1998-2001), Stanton could surpass the next highest single season home run total (Ryan Howard, 58, 2006). While the actual single season home run record (73) is probably not realistic, Stanton does have a great shot at a different kind of home run record: margin of victory for the home run crown. In 1995, Albert Belle hit 10 more homers than any other player. Nobody else has repeated that feat since. Currently, Stanton leads Moonshiners’ Khris Davis by 14 home runs. At his recent pace, hard to imagine Stanton not expanding upon that lead.

The MVP and Cy Young races are both way too close to call right now. In fact, there are so many hitters in play for MVP that I’m not even going to mention all of them here. On the pitching side, Chris Sale and Max Scherzer have been the presumptive Cy Young leaders most of the summer, but Corey Kluber has been coming on strong and a now-healthy Kershaw can’t be ignored either. Will Sale reach 300 strikeouts? If he gets to 302, it will be the highest single season mark since 2002.

Now a belated look back at the award winners for August 2017:

Batters of the Week:

Week 18 (7/31 – 8/6) – Willson Contreras, Demigods
Week 19 (8/7 – 8/13) – Giancarlo Stanton, Jackalope
Week 20 (8/14 – 8/20) – Rougned Odor, Naturals
Week 21 (8/21 – 8/27) – Byron Buxton, Choppers
Week 22 (8/28 – 9/3) – Jose Ramirez, Gators

Pitchers of the Week:

Week 18 (7/31 – 8/6) – Cole Hamels, Demigods
Week 19 (8/7 – 8/13) – Corey Kluber, Demigods
Week 20 (8/14 – 8/20) – Gio Gonzalez, Gators
Week 21 (8/21 – 8/27) – Masahiro Tanaka, Choppers
Week 22 (8/28 – 9/3) – Jeff Samardzija, Moonshiners

August was a good month for veteran pitchers.  Four of the five Pitchers of the Week are at least 31 years old, with Tanaka being the young guy (28).  It was also a good month for a few under-the-radar stars like Jose Ramirez and Gio Gonzalez.  The Moonshiners July trade for Jeff Smardzija has been paying dividends as well.  But let’s face it, August was all about one guy, who obviously won the Batter of the Month award:

Batter of the Month:

Giancarlo Stanton, Jackalope
.349 AVG, 18 HR, 37 RBI, 28 R, 1 SB, 4.81 PAR

Pitcher of the Month:

Corey Kluber, Demigods
1.96 ERA, 0.630 WHIP, 5 W, 0 SV, 54 K, 4.35 PAR

As amazing as Jose Altuve’s July was, Giancarlo Stanton kicked it up another notch in August.  He had the best month of this season by a player, by far, according to PAR.  His 4.81 August PAR is a full 1.3 points higher than any other Player of the Month has earned this season.  He slugged an insane 18 home runs in August, which is the second highest single month total in league history, trailing only Sammy Sosa’s 20 homers in June of 1998.  As outlined above, this has a chance to be a truly historic season for Stanton.  He is firmly in the mix for MVP now as well.  You want to know who has had the second best month this season?  The Mavericks’ Manny Machado, who put up 3.9 PAR in August, but somehow didn’t come close to winning this monthly honor.

Not to be overlooked, Corey Kluber also posted the highest monthly PAR we’ve seen from a pitcher this season, coming in at 4.35.  He was nearly unhittable in the month, leading qualified pitchers in ERA, WHIP, wins (tied) and strikeouts.  He has also inserted himself into the Cy Young conversation, which didn’t seem possible a month ago.  Nobody came close to snatching this honor from Kluber, but recently traded Justin Verlander was the runner-up.

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Still a Two Team Race

Sunday, August 6th, 2017

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It’s been a two team race for the DTBL Championship for several months now.  Despite the fact that the Mavericks and Naturals have been dealing with injuries to several of their most important players and neither team has truly put it all together yet, no other team besides these two has come close to sniffing first place in recent months.  At the end of July, the Mavericks and Naturals were tied for first place, but the Mavericks have moved into a 1 1/2 point lead at the time of writing.  It is still very much possible for other teams to get back into the race since the gap between the top two and the rest of the pack is just over ten points.  But we just haven’t seen any other team make a run yet.

Two teams looking to make such a run struck a deal a couple weeks ago.  The Moonshiners and Kings completed a trade that was intended to solve roster problems created by injuries.  But as it has turned out so far, this trade has only created further problems as both teams seemingly received damaged goods.  The Moonshiners traded shortstop Zack Cozart and pitcher Jon Gray to the Kings in exchange for outfielder Avisail Garcia and pitcher Jeff Samardzija.  At the time, the Kings were in desparate need of a shortstop to replace the injured Carlos Correa while the Moonshiners were looking for an outfielder to fill in for Gregory Polanco and Keon Broxton.  Of course, within a week of the trade, both Cozart and Garcia hit the disabled list.  This marks the second trade between these teams that appears to have been a bit of a bust for both sides.  The March swap of Polanco for Kyle Seager hasn’t been terribly productive for either team.

This seems like a good time to remind you that the DTBL trade deadline is coming up on August 15.  That is a Tuesday, meaning any trades must be confirmed by both sides before midnight on the 15th even though they will not be processed until the following Monday.  Now, onto the award winners for July 2017.

Batters of the Week:

Week 14 (7/3 – 7/9) – Jose Altuve, Demigods
Week 15 (7/14 – 7/16) – Anthony Rendon, Jackalope
Week 16 (7/17 – 7/23) – Nolan Arenado, Naturals
Week 17 (7/24 – 7/30) – J.D. Martinez, Demigods

Pitchers of the Week:

Week 14 (7/3 – 7/9) – Clayton Kershaw, Mavericks
Week 15 (7/14 – 7/16) – Jose Quintana, Gators
Week 16 (7/17 – 7/23) – Jon Lester, Choppers
Week 17 (7/24 – 7/30) – James Paxton, Naturals

The way these weekly honors usually work is that my weekly transaction processing program will create a database record for the players with the highest batting and pitching PAR for the week at the time of processing.  But because of the All-Star break, I wasn’t able the capture who had the highest PAR for Week 14 (7/3 through 7/9).  So instead, I used the FanGraphs’ splits leaderboard to eyeball the stats for that week and decided Altuve and Kershaw were the likely PAR leaders for the week.  It could be wrong though, particularly in the case of Altuve who had stiff competition from his Astros teammate George Springer.  There wasn’t particularly stiff competition for the monthly awards though.  Here are the winners.

Batter of the Month:

Jose Altuve, Demigods
.485 AVG, 4 HR, 21 RBI, 22 R, 8 SB, 3.38 PAR

Pitcher of the Month:

James Paxton, Naturals
1.37 ERA, 0.788 WHIP, 6 W, 0 SV, 46 K, 4.08 PAR

Jose Altuve nearly hit .500 in July!  He went 48 for 99, which penciled out to a .485 average for the month.  It is the highest monthly batting average since recently inducted Hall-of-Famer Ivan Rodriguez hit .500 in June of 2004 and the fourth highest total in league history:  https://www.baseball-reference.com/tiny/i0mzo.  It wasn’t just the average though.  He also hit four homers, scored and drove in over 20 runs and stole eight bases.  Altuve’s hot month has inserted the Demigods second baseman right into the thick of the MVP conversation.  He won this award easily.  Following him were a bunch of closely packed players, with Bryce Harper leading the way.

On the pitching side, another pretty rare feat was achieved by the Naturals’ James Paxton.  He won six games in the month, becoming the first DTBL player to do that in a single month this season.  Along with all those wins came a very impressive 1.37 ERA and 0.788 WHIP.  The Canadian left-hander has become the de facto ace for the Naturals in their championship hunt, replacing the injured Noah Syndergaard.  It was a comfortable win for Paxton, but the Choppers’ Chris Sale was the runner-up.

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Turner Breaks Wrist, Wins Award

Tuesday, July 4th, 2017


For the second consecutive month, one of the league’s top title contending teams is facing an uncertain future due to the loss of arguably their most irreplaceable player.  So far, the Mavericks have weathered the storm without Mike Trout quite nicely.  They have held onto first place for virtually the entire season and have built a relatively comfortable margin over all but one of their competitors.  The one team that is giving them everything they can handle is the Naturals.  As of this writing, the two teams are tied in first.  But while the Mavericks have Trout on the verge of returning, the Naturals will now be without young star outfielder (now shortstop) Trea Turner.  Turner broke his right wrist when getting hit by a pitch by the Cubs’ Pedro Strop last Thursday afternoon.  He figures to miss close to two months of action. Less than ideal for a Naturals team that is competing for a championship while already missing their best pitcher, Noah Syndergaard.  More on Turner in a bit.

At the halfway mark of the season, it has become pretty clear that we are headed to a record breaking year for home runs and probably the best league-wide offensive numbers in 15 years.  The record for most home runs hit in the DTBL in a single season is 3,231 back in 2000.  Through Sunday, basically the exact mid-point of the season, 1,625 home runs had been hit.  Runs and RBIs are way up as well.  Even stolen bases are on pace to surpass the totals from the past few years.  Only batting average has stagnated.  Meanwhile, it has been a rough go for pitchers.  The league’s 3.90 ERA is up more than 3/10 of a run from last season and is higher than any full season mark since 2006.  Strikeouts remain the lone strong spot for pitchers compared to recent seasons.

Despite the incredible power surge, it is guys with speed who have been among the biggest contributors to their teams this season.  Last month, Billy Hamilton won the Player of the Month award despite hitting just one home run.  This month’s honor goes to a guy who only hit a pair of homers in June.  Meanwhile, the Pitcher of the Month was earned by a hurler who has bounced back from a slow start in a big way.  Here are the award winners for June 2017.

Batters of the Week:

Week 9 (5/29 – 6/4) – George Springer, Darkhorses
Week 10 (6/5 – 6/11) – Gary Sanchez, Jackalope
Week 11 (6/12 – 6/18) – Jose Ramirez, Gators
Week 12 (6/19 – 6/25) – Corey Seager, Gators
Week 13 (6/26 – 7/2) – Mookie Betts, Kings

Pitchers of the Week:

Week 9 (5/29 – 6/4) – Tanner Roark, Jackalope
Week 10 (6/5 – 6/11) – Robbie Ray, Moonshiners
Week 11 (6/12 – 6/18) – Jacob deGrom, Darkhorses
Week 12 (6/19 – 6/25) – Corey Kluber, Demigods
Week 13 (6/26 – 7/2) – Max Scherzer, Kings

The weekly hitter honors went to five guys who were just named to the MLB All-Star teams.  How many of them will make the DTBL All-Star squads as well?  Find out later today!  Interesting that Tanner Roark won a weekly award because he has really struggled recently, outside of that one week in late May, early June.  His Nationals teammate Max Scherzer has basically been a candidate for the weekly award every week this season.  Another one of the weekly winners edged him out for the monthly honor though.

Batter of the Month:

Trea Turner, Naturals
.316 AVG, 2 HR, 9 RBI, 23 R, 22 SB, 3.51 PAR

Pitcher of the Month:

Corey Kluber, Demigods
1.26 ERA, 0.674 WHIP, 4 W, 0 SV, 64 K, 4.33 PAR

Trea Turner’s incredible June ended poorly with the broken wrist, but prior to that, he was terrorizing pitchers and catchers throughout the league.  Famously, in one of his last games before the injury, he stole four bases off the Jake Arrieta/Miguel Montero duo, causing the latter to throw the former under the bus prior to being designated for assignment.  Turner stole 22 bases in June, the highest single month total since Jose Reyes stole 23 in August of 2007.  There have only been three 22+ stolen base months in DTBL history:  http://www.baseball-reference.com/tiny/cPbAS (Roger Cedeno wasn’t on a DTBL roster in ’99).  Prior to the injury, Turner had been on pace to challenge the league’s full season stolen base record as well.  But that has gone by the wayside with him expected to miss up to two months of action.  This was Turner’s honor pretty easily, but Mavericks young phenom Aaron Judge was the runner-up.

It has been an interesting season for Corey Kluber.  After getting off to a rough start, he hit the disabled list in early May with an ERA north of 5.00.  But since returning, he has been dominant, to the point where the Demigods ace is now a strong All-Star candidate.  In June, hes sported an impressive 1.26 ERA and led the league with 64 strikeouts.  Despite very strong months from a couple other pitchers, Kluber won this award pretty handily.  His closest competition was a pair of pitchers you may have heard of: Clayton Kershaw and Max Scherzer.

Stay tuned for the announcement of the 2017 DTBL All-Stars later today!

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2017 Season Preview: Part II

Saturday, April 1st, 2017


Part two of the 2017 DTBL season preview will examine three teams who are projected to finish near the middle of the standings.  This would be a major change from last year for all three squads.  Two of them would view this as a positive move in the right direction while the other would consider this to be a major disappointment after nearly winning the championship a year ago.  I should mention that the projected league standings shows very little separation among these three teams in particular, but really the entire projected top seven finishers.  You can even throw in the Moonshiners and have eight teams who are prognosticated to be within 20 points of first place.  So it wouldn’t take a whole lot of weird stuff to happen for any of these teams to win the league.  Here are the teams projected to finish in fifth through seventh place.

Dom’s Demigods

Category – Projected Rank (2016 Rank)

  • Batting Average – 3rd (1st)
  • Home Runs – 5th (1st-T)
  • Runs Batted In – 3rd (1st)
  • Runs Scored – 4th (4th)
  • Stolen Bases – 10th (8th)
  • Earned Run Average – 4th (2nd)
  • WHIP Ratio – 4th (4th)
  • Wins – 7th (2nd)
  • Saves – 9th (10th)
  • Strike Outs – 9th (1st)
  • Total Batting Points – 5th (2nd)
  • Total Pitching Points – 7th (4th)
  • Total Points – 7th (2nd)

Summary:

In the Darkhorses preview, I said that I thought their projected fall from 5th to 9th was the biggest surprise we’d see.  Well, here we have the Demigods falling even one spot further.  But this one is less surprising, in my opinion.  You simply can’t replace one of the best pitchers in the game, which is the obstacle the Demigods must overcome after the passing of Jose Fernandez.  The weakened pitching prognostication makes sense.  Attempting to replace Fernandez will be Aaron Nola and Matt Shoemaker.  Nice pitchers, but not the same.  Corey Kluber and Johnny Cueto will remain the true aces of the staff.  This is still an above average rotation.  However, it doesn’t appear to be elite.  The bullpen remains one of the league’s worst with a pair of closers who don’t have great job security (Tony Watson and Jeanmar Gomez).  What is more troubling about these projections is the offensive drop-off.  But the Demigods remain a balanced hitting team with solid players in every slot.  Jose Altuve, Freddie Freeman and Francisco Lindor are the stars.  A key newcomer to keep an eye on is Greg Bird.  If he continues his hot spring training into the regular season, there is no reason to think the Demigods couldn’t be near the top of the league in the power categories again this year.  I’m sure the Demigods have much higher expectations for this season than this.  There are plenty of reasons to believe they can make a run at that elusive first championship again this year.

Kelly’s Cougars

Category – Projected Rank (2016 Rank)

  • Batting Average – 6th (8th)
  • Home Runs – 6th (10th)
  • Runs Batted In – 7th (8th)
  • Runs Scored – 7th (5th)
  • Stolen Bases – 7th (9th)
  • Earned Run Average – 3rd (10th)
  • WHIP Ratio – 3rd (9th)
  • Wins – 6th (7th)
  • Saves – 7th (7th)
  • Strike Outs – 4th (5th)
  • Total Batting Points – 7th (9th)
  • Total Pitching Points – 3rd (8th-T)
  • Total Points – 6th (10th)

Summary:

Here we have the most positively surprising projection.  The numbers show potential for major improvement from the Cougars, who finished in last place in 2016.  The improvement is especially impressive on the pitching side.  Madison Bumgarner leads the way, of course, but a major bounce-back season from Chris Archer seems probable.  Three interesting newcomers join the rotation too:  the ageless Rich Hill, who has been one of the best pitchers in baseball when healthy the past couple years, Jameson Taillon and Jerad Eickhoff.  This rotation has a little bit of everything.  The bullpen is respectable as well, with Cody Allen, Alex Colome and David Robertson.  In order to see significant improvement from the Cougars this year, the bats will need to take a huge step forward.  First overall draft pick Trevor Story should help in that regard.  He and Kris Bryant form quite a duo on the left side of the Cougars infield.  Underrated Charlie Blackmon leads the outfield.  I think it is safe to project the Cougars to soar past their league worst home run total from last season.  While it has been painful for the Cougars finishing near the bottom of the standings the past three years, it has allowed them to restock the lineup with high draft picks (Bryant, Story and Jose Abreu). Perhaps this is the year those assets start paying off.

Jay’s Jackalope

Category – Projected Rank (2016 Rank)

  • Batting Average – 5th (9th)
  • Home Runs – 1st (9th)
  • Runs Batted In – 1st (6th)
  • Runs Scored – 2nd (9th)
  • Stolen Bases – 9th (5th)
  • Earned Run Average – 7th (7th)
  • WHIP Ratio – 8th (8th)
  • Wins – 3rd (9th)
  • Saves – 6th (4th)
  • Strike Outs – 10th (10th)
  • Total Batting Points – 2nd (8th)
  • Total Pitching Points – 8th (8th-T)
  • Total Points – 5th (9th)

Summary:

Here we have another projection that shows a massive improvement over last season.  But unlike the Cougars, this one isn’t particularly surprising.  Last season was essentially a write-off for the Jackalope.  The core of the team that won the championship two seasons ago remains, particularly on the batting side where they are still one of the best hitting teams in the league, despite what happened a year ago.  Paul Goldschmidt and Josh Donaldson are still two of the best players in the game.  Goldschmidt had the quietest 20/30 season I think I’ve ever seen.  32 steals out of a first baseman is insane.  New to the lineup is Gary Sanchez, who should give the Jackalope a huge edge over most teams at the catching position.  Perhaps the most important player for this team this year will be Giancarlo Stanton.  If he has a healthy, productive season, the Jackalope will almost certainly be one of the best hitting teams in the league.  The pitching staff does not appear to be top notch, however.  Jake Arrieta returned to being somewhat human a year ago, but still an elite pitcher.  Gerrit Cole figures to be healthier and more productive in ’17.  Tanner Roark and A.J. Happ give the Jackalope two of the more underrated pitchers in the game.  The bullpen features just two closers, but they are among the best in the league:  Wade Davis and Mark Melancon.  An improvement over last season seems like a forgone conclusion for the Jackalope.  But will they be a championship contender?  The talent is there.

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