If I Were to Do Power Rankings for Week 8…
“Hey, guess what? Nobody cares who would win in a crazy fantasy fistfight between Anne Frank and Lizzie Borden.”
-The Monarch, The Venture Bros (2003-2018)
Week 8 saw the preview of a potential postseason of this league. Four of the current top five teams faced off against each other with Dan vs. Mark and James vs. Vinson. The results of these matchups was a fairly close match between James and Vinson as they struggle to deal with slumping hitters who had once been hot, and then a decisive victory of Dan over Mark. This of course has no real implications for what the end of the season will look like, but it is going to be interesting to see how these teams figure out the holes in their teams without them getting out of control.
A lot of changes in the standings occurred last week as several teams began to see the fruition of their trades begin to take effect. For those that missed it in the chat, a rule proposal was suggested for the offseason that could help curb the trend of massive selling that we’ve seen in recent years. The details of the rule hasn’t been ironed out yet, but the gist would be that any team finishing over a certain win percentage (around .480) but did not make the playoffs would be able to reverse inflate one player by 2 rounds. This would be after the original inflation had already occurred and would not stop the inflation from continuing its escalation each year. However, this would suddenly make first round players viable keeper candidates for those that keep fighting to win. This would also limit the offseason first round pick trades that people like myself are prone to make. Whether this proposal gets approved or not will be determined later, but it’s still something interesting to think about.
For now though, let’s take a look at how everyone has done this week.
Week 8 StandingsMarkJamesMikeDanVinsonAndrewJonPatIanJoeyRichardBrooke
Current StandingsMike (+2)Dan (+3)James (-1)Mark (-3)VinsonAndrewPat (+1)Jon (+-1)Joey (+1)Richard (+1)Ian (-2)Brooke
Week 8 Power Rankings
1. Mike
Mike is still my number one team to beat in this league. Last week saw him take it easy as he annihilated Ian, propelling him to first in the standings again with a nice 4.5 lead. I say take it easy because his opponent sold most of his players already, but Mike absolutely crushed everyone in this league last week as his team scored in the top three of almost every category. A lot of that has to do with the fact that almost every single one of his players hit a home run last week. Cruz, Devers, and surprisingly Lowe all hit 3 each. Brandon Lowe might be the most surprising as he was left for dead on the free agency not that long ago having barely hit his body weight in average with just as little of home runs. But now he seems to have found new life on Mike’s team as he is belting .400 with a 1.504 OPS. It’s the kind of turn around that can make you forget the corpse of Marcus Semien is still lying in that corner. Don’t look at it. It might try to pull you down too. On the pitching side, Mike continues to dominate despite Hunter Brown having his first hiccup. Not really worried about that though, he’s young, he’ll have these speed bumps. I think the only real “weakness” (if you can even call it that), is the relief pitchers for Mike sometimes yield too few SOLDS at the cost of ratios. That’s a really small nitpick and one that isn’t consistent week to week. But I am trying to find something to poke at Mike’s team. It just seems unstoppable right now.
2. Dan
Welcome to the second spot, Dan! Have I put him this high before? Yes? No? Well he’s here now after beating the snot out of Mark. That’s quite impressive, especially since he out streamed him for IP and almost Ks too. In a lot of ways, this match was actually really close. Had certain stats flipped, I’d be talking about Mark here instead. But I don’t want to take away Dan’s triumph here, he faced one of the top five and not only won, but won 9-3. I think the biggest story here is Acuna being back and surprising everyone with his display of power. Analysts are already trying to draw a bullseye around this new arrow now as I don’t think anyone actually predicted this apart from pure hopium. Sometimes drugs work and Dan can tell you right now that this is the best high he’s ever had. He’d also say you’re all bums. He has a thing about bums. Dan’s pitching had an interesting week as apart from Zac Gallen and Chris Bassitt, it actually did incredibly well. A lot of that was off the backs of Luzardo, Mize, and Ray. Ray’s two step of Kansas City and Washington being particularly cherry. I don’t see this staff being this good every single week, but I think this staff can luck into some good starts that with a bit of streaming luck, could be all Dan needs to win.
3. Vinson
After a long tirade of proving to Pat that he hasn’t been lucky, Vinson goes out and proves it by having a pedestrian week. Thankfully, it was enough to beat an equally pedestrian James. Vinson shouldn’t get too excited about breaking back into the top 3. If I had the choice, I would actually take his team, James’s, Dan’s, and Mark’s and wrap them all up together and call it 4th place. Only reason I didn’t say that up in Dan’s rank is I wanted to let him have a minute in the sun. That minute is over now. It’s cold, dark reality time. All of these teams are showing flaws that are opening up more and more as the season trudges on. Those hot offensive guys before are all cold now and being stuck with them is showing up in the scores. The sheer drop off of Mike’s stats to the next four teams is telling as Polanco, Vientos, Harris, and Campbell have all either have cooled off or still have yet to find their gear in the season. Fortunately for Vinson, Suzuki went absolutely ape this week and made up for any deficiencies.
On the pitching side, Vinson took quite a blow with the news of King going on the IL. He managed to hang on in some of the categories, but got screwed over by some bad luck streams and a few reliever blow ups (How you liking those Ryan Walker apples???). Vinson’s team is vulnerable at the moment in a lot of different places (power and ERA particularly). I don’t imagine this will last, but I do think this is the chance Pat and Heller need to make a move upward.
4. James
Hello, 4C. James took a tough loss against a team he needed to beat, especially with Dan making a huge push up the rankings. The offense really let James down here as several bats like Riley, Soto, Aranda, and Garcia were nowhere to be found. Adames in particular has been putrid in what is starting to look like a bad season. Despite this, James’s offensive stats this week were actually close to Vinson’s. That isn’t praise, that’s just the illustration of how bleh this week was for offense from anyone not named Mike. And these are the top four teams, just wait until the teams farther down fare in this spot. It’s ugly. This month sucks. How close is June again?
On the pitching side it’s more hopeful. The strong core of Wheeler, Valdez, Skenes, and even Greene now (despite a bumpy start) make it so much easier for James to absorb some bad streams from Allen, Lee, Evans, and Kolek. It’s remarkable how many streamers went badly for James and yet how good his pitching ratios still look in spite of that. I can’t find any real flaws in this part of his team and if there comes a time where James needs to fix a part of his offense, this might provide some opportunity to trade from excess.
5. Mark
Well 4D didn’t fall any further this week. So take that win. I don’t think Mark’s offense was that bad per se, but Dan’s was infinitely better. Guys like Smith, Bichette, Naylor, and Abreu were like millstones around Mark’s neck as they all hit a collective .159. Fortunately, Ramirez and Schwarber continue to get it done with a surprise burst from Taylor Ward. Mark’s pitching was done in by a bunch of relievers imploding paired with some poor streamers and Tony Gonsolin. This week was rough, but I do find this pitching staff similar to mine: it’s slowly coming together as Mark takes it piece by piece with guys like Liberatore, Smith, and now Weathers.
6. Andrew
Two straight weeks at the number 6 spot in the standings. I keep wondering when Andrew will overtake fifth place. Unfortunately, his offensive impetus stalled this week as he barely was able to hold off my team. A poorly timed benching and then trade of Nick Kurtz had this matchup much more even than it probably deserved. A lot of the bats that led Heller last week were nowhere to be seen this week as Jung (really Texas) couldn’t put up the same numbers. Nolan Arenado seems to have really fallen from his hot start now. On the plus side, this was a decent week from Bryan Reynolds who hit above .200 finally. The guy who really bailed Heller out though was O’Hoppe who hit a whopping 4 home runs.
Pitching wise, Heller would have been absolutely fine if Tyler Anderson, JP Sears, and Griffin Canning didn’t completely screw him over. Yeah there were some relief pitcher blowups, but these starters were the reason Heller lost pitching this week. Fortunately one of them was just a streamer. Unfortunately the other two are still here. He should be relatively fine though as Peralta and deGrom are still a potent combo and there are teams in the top 5 that don’t have quite as steady of a core as Heller has. With some lucky pick ups, Andrew could turn this into a pretty capable staff.
7. Richard
The power still isn’t showing up and I blame Santander. There’s other players too like Soderstrom not hitting more than one home run since the Athletics exiled him into the outfield. Or Castellanos not having a tragedy or apology to hit another home run. Burger, Elly, and Suarez are the highlights this week as they all are hitting up to their potential. But this lineup is frustrating. I’m not sure what more I can do as I wait for Trout to come back off the IL and for Santander to stop being so lame.
I think this might have been my best pitching week so far. Everything clicked and now I was the one with the buzzsaw as Heller ran into 4 of my two step pitchers. That easily carried the team to the end despite the blowup from Hoglund. The injured players on the bench are starting to become a problem though. GrayRod has had no notification about his injury and at this point, it’s not looking like he’s going to be of any impact in this season. A back injury plus a triceps injury and he’s not even on a throwing plan yet? That’s a drop because even if he does come back it’ll probably be in August and at that point, what pitcher is even showing up? If the Orioles are out of contention by that point, they might just shut him down permanently to not risk it. Ugh, I’m going to have to drop Darvish too. This week sucks. This month sucks. How hot does it have to be for the Athletics to hit dingers without trying?
8. Patrick
Beating up the capsized remains of Jon earned you a significant climb upward in the standings. Those standings are still very far away from Vinson, but this was a good chunk of games won. I just don’t get it. This team should be menacing everyone and yet it just isn’t. The pitching I get why it’s bad. But this hitting? A team with Carroll, Judge, Henderson and Bregman should be devouring the league. Unfortunately there’s a lot of players in between those four that aren’t carrying their weight. Schneeman, Benson, Story, Yastremski, and the two catchers really gutted the performances from Judge and Henderson. Corbin Carroll had a rare bleh week that didn’t help this team’s struggles. Oh and Bregman is out for two months now. Bad luck just keeps gnawing at this team like a bed bug.
I know I just besmirched Pat’s pitching because it’s such an ugly beast, but he had a very good week with it regardless. I suppose this is what happens when Max Meyere and checks notes Walker Buehler? don’t suck. Is Mason Miller cooked? He’s been so bad this season. I know he’s still striking people out technically, but that’s a lot of damage without much else to show for it. I guess the best I can say is he’s only pitching a few innings at a time, but man this is just concerning.
9. Joey
Quite a jump for Joey in my power rankings, but that’s because this is going to get ugly quickly. Joey’s power still seems to be MIA, but at least he beat the worst team in the league. A worst team that is looking better these days, so good job Joey. JJ Bleday getting optioned probably is a good thing for Joey as he no longer has to keep rostering this batting average sink. Brent Rooker is just 3 games away from getting OF eligibility back and it must be excruciating waiting for it. I think Joey’s team could use a shake up, but I’m not sure what it will look like just yet as Joey is fairly reluctant to part with guys he believes in. That said, there’s still the Witt card he could play as both Witt and Harper will be inflated to the 1st round next year. I wonder what package Joey could get back with Witt who even in the 1st round would be a fabulous keeper.
Pitching was fine this week. I’m starting to think most teams had a good pitching this week judging by how many hitters sucked. Webb had an unusually bad outing, but Yamamoto continued his Cy Young season and erased that. I don’t believe in Boyd or Hicks, but as long as they’re not killing you, then sure why not. Side note: Did everyone’s relief pitchers blow this week? I’ve yet to find a staff that didn’t have one or more stepping on landmines.
10. Jon
We’re finally seeing the effects of the sell. Jon’s gradual fall in the standings is a direct result of a team full of injured players as well as his selling of Machado last week. He still has some guys who are trying to keep the water pumps running despite being almost underwater already. Josh Lowe, Ezequiel Tovar, Wilson Contreras, and Nico Hoerner put up a good show despite the putrid lineup around them. Kjerstad, Langford, and McLain are all guys we expect big things from, but just seem unlikely to do them this year. Jon’s pitching fell short this week and I’m curious why he didn’t try streaming anything besides Kikuchi as he could have easily caught up to Pat in IP and possibly even Ks. I get this team is in a tight spot because of the amount of injured guys in bench spots, but that’s one pitching spot that could have at least a couple starters or two cycled in. I realize I’m nitpicking why someone could have possibly left a port window open on the Titanic, but it is something that could help slow the sinking a bit.
11. Brooke
Ohtani can only do so much, or in this case, he can only get 4 hits for the week in what saw I guess a league wide offense depression. On the plus side, we finally saw some life from William Contreras this week as hit .304 with a homer and a steal. He’s still batting with a broken middle finger though so this was probably just a fluke. I cannot for the life of me figure out why Rafaela is here. He’s been so bad this year. Donovan and Pena have continued to surprise me and probably everyone by still being productive. This is a lineup of guys who all get cold at different points and their “hot” is never high enough to warrant holding onto them.
After Brooke fixed her team last week, her pitching is looking really good. Lopez, Singer, Crochet, and Castillo have been an incredible group of starters that’ll make every week just a little bit harder for teams thinking they won’t have to stream. And look at those two beautiful saves from Hader there. Ahh that feels good. All is right in the world.
12. Ian
Ian took my claim that his team looked better after his trades as a personal challenge. After yet more trades this week, his team finally just collapsed under the weight of all that crap. And what an incredible collapse it was. How incredible? How does not having any acquisitions left to fill your roster because you traded too many pieces away the week before and had to use them all just to fill in those, treat you? This still isn’t all bad and I actually chuckled typing that. There are some interesting players here that are surprisingly carrying some weight: Dansby Swanson might be a fantasy zombie this week as he’s showing life with respectable .280 avg and home run. Rhys Hoskins and Austin Hays have both picked it up to at least give us the illusion that Ian’s team is still fighting.
Pitching wise, I know Ian is frustrated with Sandy. I think we all are. There’s not much anyone can do about it though as he’s still getting his control back. The biggest offenders are his Slider with a 77 Location+ and a Cutter with an 87 Location+. Those wouldn’t be so bad except Sandy is throwing his cutter 11% more than he has ever used it before. Velocity is always the first thing to return with TJ and control is always the last. So, it’s a big old wait and see game here. I am surprised to see Ian gamble with Taijuan Walker as he should just know better. Were it not for him, Strider, and oh look the relievers all blowing up, then Ian would probably have had a decent pitching week. This team is now sad, and it got more sad after Ian traded Luzardo for Zebby Matthews.
Performances of the week:
Hitter:
Seiya Suzuki: 12/25, 9 Runs, 3 HR, 10 RBI, .480 AVG, 1.552 OPS
Pitcher:
Tarik Skubal: 14.2 IP, 21Ks, 1.84 ERA, 0.545 WHIP, 21.00 K/BB
Clutch performances of the Week:
Hitter:
Logan O’Hoppe: 10/27, 6 Runs, 4 HR, 7 RBI, .370 AVG, 1.245 OPS
Pitcher:
Will Warren: 9.2IP, 17Ks, 1.86 ERA, 1.034 WHIP, 5.67 K/BB
Fantasy Zombies:
Ronald Acuna Jr: 4/12, 2 Runs, 2 HR, 3 RBI, .333 AVG, 1.301 OPS
Dansby Swanson: 7/25, 4 Runs, 1 HR, 3 RBI, .280 AVG, .733 OPS
This was a term from the old 06010 podcast that described a player that was thought to be dead but suddenly became relevant again. While Acuna doesn’t quite fit that definition as no one really saw him as irrelevant this year despite his injury, I did want to include him anyway because we all were expecting his power to be dead and yet here it is. Swanson has always been an overvalued piece of mediocre hipster filth so seeing him have a week like this is both surprising and a welcome sight.
