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Monday, July 7, 2008

MLB Headlines Week 14

The All Star voting is over. Of course I didn't vote at all, but that's just me. When all is said and done the Twins ended up with 3 players on the All Star game. Joe Mauer was voted in by fans and Morneau and Nathan were either picked by the manager or players.
Youkilis was voted in over Morneau for the starting position which I kind of disagree with, but when you break down their numbers it's really not a travesty, especially since Morneau will still be in the All Star Game.
All in all, as far as the Twins are concerned, this is just how it should be. If you asked me right now who on the Twins team should be on the All Star team I would say Mauer, Morneau, and Nathan. That's all. And that's how it ended up. It's good to see the process work.

www.mlb.com Headline of the Week:
A-Rod ties the Mick, Gardner plants a victory

Hmmm...indeed.

Dr. Bitz:
July 6th, 2008 – Cubs 7 Cardinals 1
Marshall handcuffs the Cardinals

July 6th, 2008 - Padress 2 Diamondsbacks 3
The Big Unit stiffens up and sticks it to the Padres

July 6th, 2008 - Indians 3 Twins 4
Twins brush aside Cleveland in sweep

Teebore
July 4th, 2008 - Indians 3 Twins 12
Byrd in the hand is worth twelve in the Twins' bush

July 6th, 2008 - Royals 2 Rays 9
Royal pain as Rays sting KC

July 6th, 2008 - Blue Jays 1 Angels 7
Garland wreaths Angels with a complete game victory

Teebore eeked out the victory last week. This week I'm going to crush, I know it! Voting to your left.

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12:02 PM: After the Pujols trade and with my less-is-more pitching philosophy I really thought my team turned a corner. I figured my line up was good enough to take 3 to 4 hitting categories and my mostly relievers pitching staff was good enough to take 2 to 3 pitching categories. Then Monday happened. My relievers combined for like 8 runs on 2 innings or something like that. I got one save from a pitcher who pitched 1/3 of an inning and that was about the only positive that night. It killed my ERA and WHIP and made me resort to streaming pitchers. This is how it looks now:
R HR RBI SB AVG W SV K ERA WHIP
Me: 30 6 30 7 .278 4 5 58 5.03 1.27
Him: 36 5 21 9 .318 6 5 63 2.91 1.22


It's amazing how your opponent can dictate how well you feel your team is doing. Because when I look at my hitting stats by themselves, they're not bad. Home Runs and Average is a bit low, but not terrible. Yet, compared to my opponent, I feel like I'm doing terribly. As far as pitching is concerned, I have one starter going today and he has none, but, without any reliever shenanigans, Wins is his category. I could take Saves, Strikeouts, and, amazingly enough, WHIP with a good performance from Wandy Rondriguez and my relievers. Here's to hoping.
If I have a really good day and he has a really crappy day I could take all of the hitting categories. Then again, technically, I could say that any week. Realistically, Runs and Average is his and RBI is mine. 3 stolen bases isn't out of the question, but it seems unlikely. Of course, I'd need him to not get any steals today for that to matter. So Steals is probably his category. Home Runs is the only category in serious doubt. Let's hope my team can hold on to that category. This could shape up to be a really exciting Sunday or a fretfully dull one. Let's check it out!

12:12 PM: Miguel Tejada's out of the lineup and I've got nobody to replace him. Not that he's been lighting the world on fire anyway.

12:37 PM: First Batter of the day, Brandon Phillips. Happens a lot...

12:38 PM: And he flied out. I'm still waiting for my first batter home run. Maybe next week.

12:42 PM Ian Kinsler, of course, singles. He's....annoying.

12:52 PM: Crawford lined out. I'm 0 for 2 and Crawford's looking like he may be 'Garbage' today.

1:00 PM: And now Jimmy Rollins singled and stole a base. Looks like he's winning steals.

1:17 PM: Carlos Quentin reaches base on an error. Always lame.

1:18 PM: Of course a Jermain Dye home run with Quentin on base would be very nice.

1:19 PM: Wandy Rodriguez's game is in rain delay. If I want a good chance to make up some pitching categories, I need him to pitch.

1:20 PM: Dye singles to left. Which is OK. Still not a home run.

1:21 PM: Brandon Phillips singles to left. You'd think I had a bunch of Twins on my team.

1:22 PM: Matt Capps injured his shoulder and is thus on my DL. Now I have to keep reminding myself that I don't care about Pittsburgh getting into save situations anymore.

1:25 PM: Carl Crawford singles. My team IS the Twins!

1:26 PM: Both Phillips, Crawford, and Quentin scored. I've cut the Run deficit to 3!

1:30 PM: And now Kinsler has singled and come around to score...annoying.

1:48 PM: Crawford...singles again. Perhaps the 'Garbage' talk was a bit premature.

1:50 PM: Crawfod scores cutting my run deficit to, once again, 3.

1:53 PM: Brandon Phillips doubles to left. You can take more than one base on a hit? Who knew?
1:59 PM: My White Sox biffed things by striking out and flying out. It's ultra lame because the White Sox are still leading. If my guys aren't going to do anything, they might as well lose, right?

2:35 PM: Back from shower. Down by 4 runs again. Got a steal and an RBI. And Wandy's pitching. That is all.

2:58 PM: In 1 and 2/3 innings Way-Rod already has 4 strike-outs. I'm down by 1.

3:05 PM: Twins, down by one, bases loaded, it's getting exciting now that I see Oakland's cut the White Sox lead to one.

3:10 PM: Gomes came into the game to replace Carl 'Gold' Crawford. Hopefully it's because the Rays were dominating and they just wanted to rest Crawford instead of Crawford being injured or something.

3:13 PM: Stupid Pujols...hehehehe...flying out with two men on base.

3:30 PM: Way-Rod certainly isn't setting the world on fire with his performance. 3 earned runs already and we're not through the second inning. But he's getting plenty of strike outs, the category is now tied.

3:32 PM: My team started off well, but now they're all getting out. Dye grounded out and Connor Jackson popped out, most recently.

3:39 PM: You know, I questioned the Twins resigning Nathan, mostly because I didn't think they'd win a lot of game thus rendering Nathan useless. But the Twins are winning a lot, and Nathan is automatic. It must be nice playing '8-Inning games'.

3:41 PM: Way-Rod with another Strike Out. I've taken the lead. Now I just have to hope his relievers don't get into the game.

6:23 PM: Just got back from dinner. Surprised some games are still going on. Looks like I'm going to win Strike Outs and tie Saves. Not really happy about that. Mark Reynolds hit a home run. Extremely unhappy about that. I'm down to hoping Tejada can hit one, since he's in the game now, or hoping Alex *Expletive Deleted* Rodriguez can hit one in the night game. I also have to hope Youkilis does not hit one in the night game.

7:45 PM: I'll be honest. I needed a home run by A-Rod tonight, but I really didn't expect to get it. Yet, for his first at bat of the game, he jacks a solo shot. I'm happy about that.

8:03 PM: Alex *Expletive Deleted* Rodriguez grounded out to third. That's alright, as long Youkilis doesn't hit a moon shot tonight.

12:38 AM: Nothing else exciting happened in the night game. This is how it all shakes out:

R HR RBI SB AVG W SV K ERA WHIP
Me: 36 7 32 9 .289 4 5 73 4.91 1.30
Him: 42 6 23 13 .321 6 5 63 2.91 1.22


I mean really, losing 6-3 annoys me so I'm disappointed in my team. Yet I look at my stats and they're not terrible. 9 Steals is a lot for me...yet not enough compared to his 13 steals. Although my relievers disappointed me as far as ERA and WHIP goes. Of course, if I played against my opponent's stats last week I would've won 8-1. So in some ways fantasy baseball is more about timing over anything else. That's annoying.

Nemesis of The Week:
After checking over his players' stats this award has to go to Ian Kinsler. 8 Runs, 1 Home Run, 3 RBI, 3 Stolen Bases, and a .458 batting average. I was annoyed. Especially since I had Ian Kinsler last year. He was great the first month, then stunk, then got injured. So this year I wasn't touching him with a ten-foot pole. Now he's awesome again. I think he hates me.

Savior of The Week:
I'm beginning to sound like a broken record, but Alex *Expletive Deleted* Rodriguez has got to be my savior again. 8 Runs, 3 Home Runs (Including the category winning HR in the night game, that's like a walk-off as far as I'm concerned.), 7 RBI, 3 Stolen Bases, .333 Batting average. I'll take that every week.

The Moral of this week's story is that you can call him Kneel Before Zod, Kneel Before Church, Green Lantern Corps, whatever you like, it doesn't matter. He always beats me. Combining this year and last year, I've won a total of 7 categories against this guy...he's won 30 against me. Pretty lame. I think I'm going to look back at this week and find that this was the week that 1st place became unreachable. Stupid fantasy baseball...

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