Archie's Blog

[rburgh]

Gumshoes - well, our grand plan of saving up for a diamond level card hit the skids when we saw Ron Hansen sitting there with a BIN price of 2500. Since Mark Belanger was flirting with the Mendoza line with an ISO around .040, we ponied up the points. Ron didn't disappoint, hitting .316/.413/.632 for the month (we don't expect him to keep that up). We were 15-12 for the month, and are sitting at 68-65, in 7th place in our conference, with basically no hope of the playoffs. Our metrics continute to be solid at 558-500-.716, 12th, 1st, and 1st. Belanger is being trained at all 3 infield positions, since the 66 OVR Honus is at 93-83-104 now with the glove. We had a disappointing earnings day, though, grabbing only 600 points, with a couple of CG shutouts the main events. It's a good indicator of how meh this team is when I tell you that the league pitching leaderboards are only lightly sprinkled with Gumshoes, and one of the appearances is Bruce Berenyi's 87 walks (although his stat line is a quite respectable 10-7, 3.17). We will definitely be looking for an ace with our next acquisition.


Partisans - 14-12 for the month and 81-52 overall. 553-458-.722 (again, 12th-1st-1st). We earned 2915 points for the month, more than half of that from the left arm of Eddie Plank, who faced only 27 batters in his no-hitter (1 walk, erased on a CS) on 95 pitches. We used the points to buy Sano and Donaldson, advancing our Twins mission and replacing Tenney and Urshela in the lineup These guys are not ideal for our ballpark, but we will see how they do. As you might expect, the league pitching leaderboards are littered with Partisans. Kison (2.67), Dierker (2.82), Gausman (3.03) and Plank (3.07) are all on the ERA board, although no one is catching Mike Mussina's 1.95. Closer Mike Crudale is t-6th in saves with 34 and sports a 2.72 ERA. And Plank leads in CG (6) and ShO (5). Plank (0.98), Kison (1.02), and Dierker (1.03) are 2-3-4 in WHIP, again trailing Mussina by quite a bit.

Edit - we have made the difficult decision to leave Donaldson and Sano on the bench against RHP, moving Shed Long to 3B against RHP, activating Adam Frazier to play 2B against RHP, and purchasing Daniel Murphy to play 1B against RHP. Hanser Alberto will play 2B against LHP until we run across a better option down the road. When I remember, Sano will play 1B, Long 2B, and Donaldson 3B in power parks. This will likely be our playoff alignment, I don't want playing PT to become a full time job.


Freelancers - 16-12 for the month, and 73-60 overall, we have moved into a tie for 2nd in the division and 6th in the conference, 3 1/2 and 1 game out in the playoff races. Our metrics are 792-699-.644 (2nd, 11th, and 15th), some late evening thought suggested that our poor DER may be influenced somewhat by our generous park factors. Bur our ZR of -26.1 puts that conclusion into question. We earned 2270 PP' s on the month, with the biggest event an 11 H, 11 run inning in a 12-11 win. It came early in the game, and staked us to a 12-0 lead. We have just nosed over the 4000 PP mark in our balance, and will be perusing the AH sporadically during the day for a splash purchase. And our 3-4 hitters continue to dazzle, Derrek Lee in the 3 hole is at .318/.389/.596-33-99, on the conference leaderboards in HR and RBI and leading the league in Slg. Hazle is at .331-.388-.561-27-134, 6th in BA and Slg and leading the league in RBI by a dozen. And Lee (103), Hazle (100), and #2 hitter Buddy Myer (99) are all on the runs scored leaderboard.


Urchins - An 11-16 month saw us drift down to 3rd in the division at 70-63, still clinging to the 2nd wild card slot by a game over our division rival NorCal Crash. One division in our conference features the Toronto Baccalas, standing at 107-27 with a 49 1/2 game lead in the division. We earned only 540 PP's on the day, taking forever to earn the 300 or so we needed to complete the Brewers mission and add Mike Caldwell to the rotation. He bumped Brandon Woodruff to the setup role, and Woodruff immediately demonstrated why he was taken out of the rotation, with a 9.95 ERA in 12.2 innings and an 0-1 mark. We may have to find a less demanding role for him. On the bright side, LF and leadoff man George Burns is sitting on 26 HR and 41 SB - could a 30/30 season be in the offing? I will be watching with some interest.


Pirates - 14-14 on the month, 78-57 overall, our treading water cost us a game and a half in our division race, we now lead by only 3 games. We have the 2nd best record in the conference, and a 10 game lead over the 2nd wild card team, so playoffs seem assured. Our metrics are 734-668-.672, 1st, 11th, and 11th. But our ZR is a solid +21.7, 2nd, so our idea that generous park factors are bad for DER may have some merit. We earned 1635 PP's on the day, with the major contribution a cycle from SS Frank Crosetti, who currently sits at .241-26-74 on the year. We made an acquisition, purchasing Joe Blanton for 2250 PP's and installing him in the #1 slot in our previously all silver rotation. He went 4-1 with the loss inflating his ERA from 3.72 to 5.12. And our PP balance makes it look like another acquisition may be available soon, particularly with the anticipated playoffs bonus. And Max Muncy continues to rake, currently leading the conference with 42 HR and the team with 98 RBI.


Bees - 12-16, our 2nd consecutive losing month, dropped us to 63-69, although we are not threatened with relegation. Our metrics are 737-643-.655 (2nd/6th/15th). That Pythagoras fellow owes us big time, we are 4th in the conference in both run margin and Pythag record (74-58). But, as Lemandria would attest, this is a very tough division and league. We earned 990 PP's on a day (we had been averaging almost 2400) where a good earnings game or two would have allowed us to complete the Live Dodger mission and install the Duke in CF. We are still 800 points or so away, depending on the vagaries of the AH. Our biggest earnings event was a 5 hit game from backup C Roger Bresnahan. The league batting leaderboards are littered with appearances from Ozuna, Derrek Lee, Shamsky, and Winfield, but none are likely to top any particular category. Oddly, Bob Tewksbury has a shot at leading the league in CG (he has 5, the leader has 6) and fewest walks (he leads, as you might expect in a league with no Madduxes), although Mathewson is nipping at his heels.


All in all a somewhat disappointing day. It looks like we will have only 2 playoff teams, although none is in any serious danger of relegation. But I have to console myself that early progress up the level ladder is not always a good thing - accumulating talent is easier at lower levels.


I also have to say that my collection teams are, in genera, doing much better than my AH focused teams. But I think that's beacase the mission teams are forcing me to focus on sporadic big advancements rather than frequent small ones. My purchase of Hansen to replace Belanger for the Gumshoes is a case in point. It was a clear short term improvement, but it set me back a couple of days in my quest to buy what I really need, a standout #1 starter. I may not be able to buy that guy until late next week now.



In the early going, it seems to me that you must improve the parts of your team that fit your ballpark the best until they are clearly the best in your league. Case in point - the Gumshoes and the Partisans are in the same ballpark, at the same level. The Gumshoes, with a rotation of Berenyi, Drabek, Chuck Stobbs, and Charlie Liebrandt, have earned 1710 PP's individually this season. All have ERA's under 3.25. But the Partisan's front four (Plank, Kison, Gausman, and Dierker) have earned 7160, and Plank has individually earned 2900 thanks to his no-hitter.

[rburgh]

Someone posted an Alex Wood for me and I bought it shortly before 1PM. Duke has been installed as the leadoff man and CF, we will eventually grab Harrison Bader as a defensive sub but for now we are keeping Darryl Hamilton around as his caddy.

[rburgh]

The Bees and Gumshoes are eliminated. Well, technically the Gumshoes are still alive, but they're 6 games back in the loss column for the 2nd wild card slot with 17 to go.


The Urchins are now clear leaders in the wild card chase (but only 1 1/2 games ahead of third in the race) and only 3 games out in the division. Our division will probably send 3 teams to the playoffs, although there is a team in another division is only 4 back of us. We have gone 8-4 so far on the day, and have more home games remaining that either the division leader or our closest pursuer. But the current division leader has the easiest remaining schedule among the 4 tams from our division, and we have the hardest. And the team from the other division has the easiest overall schedule by a lot, and has 10 of 16 at home. The software estimates our playoff chances at 80%, I am not so optimistic.


The Freelancers have gone 8-5 and now trail the division lead by only a game. But we now have a 4 game road series against a team that is 52-94 and has an all bronze and iron rotation. And our division leader is on the road against the 3rd place team in the division, which is only 1/2 game behind us. Exciting stuff. Our schedule after that is brutal, the software gives us only a 66.7% chance of a playoff spot. I am more optimistic than that, Flood has taken the CF job with fire in his eye; he has earned 1.9 WAR in 61 games.


And the Pirates and Partisans are basically in.



The Pirates have 9 of 15 at home, against teams with a composite .479 record, a 5 game lead for the division title and a 9 game lead over the division leader with the worst record. The best record in the division, though, is 9 games ahead of us, so we will most likely be the 2-seed in our conference.


The Partisans are in a similar situation, but their lead for the 2nd seed in the division is only 1 game, and they are only 4 games behind for the best record. And they have 9 of 16 at home, against a cream puff schedule with a composite .454 winning percentage. The other 2 division leaders both have 10 of 16 on the road, and the top seed has teh toughest schedule of the 3.

[rburgh]

Bees



The Bees were my only team to finish under .500. Lemandria's Lincoln Park Pirates were also in this league, and he told me that I was in a tough division. He was right. We finished fourth in our division with a 78-84 mark despite a positive run differential of 109. But we were solid earners, earning 11,170 PP's during the season. That's a key part of the process of building a strong team.



Notable acquisitions during the season included Duke Snider, who has moved this offense to a whole different level since we brought him on board. We also added David Price and Corey Seager as a part of the collection required to get the Duke. Seager is being trained at 2B, he is up to a 45 at the position, which is fine for a 2B with a 135 OPS+. And David Price has been serviceable at 8-5, 4.02.



Gumshoes


This team was an earnings dud, earning only 6825 PP's during the season despite an 86-76 record and +92 run differential. I have spent 1500 of them on Vic Davalillo, planning to build a Bronze tournament team to try to supplement that number. So I expect this team to remain at the Stone level for several weeks, as the playing roster will remain rather stagnant.


Notable acquisitions for the real team were few; SS Ron Hansen, CF Byron Buxton, and 3B Rafael Devers. Hansen didn't upgrade my defense (he replaced Mark Belanger) but he brought actual offense to the SS position. And Buxton, who replaced Harrison Bader, did much the same. Devers was installed in the cleanup spot in front of former 3B Vlad Jr. So we have a quietly decent offense in front of a quietly decent pitching staff. But PP's are earned with splash plays, and we don't get many of those.


Freelancers


We were eliminated in game 161, although we had been hanging by a thread for some time. Part of this was because I decided to train Corey Seager as a 3B during the stretch run. But I thought it was best for he long term, Seager just doesn't have enough glove to play in the middle infield in a high average, low power park with a worm-killer staff. And he has a pretty good bat for a 3B that will play for several more levels.


We finished 90-72, with a +121 run differential, and earned 10,585 PP's. But our DER sucked, primarily because we were playing legacy player George Hendrick in CF and brought in Seager as a SS. So in early September, we took about 6000 PP's into the AH and emerged with a couple of shiny new toys, Cyrt Flood with his 90 contact and 80 glove in CF, and Brandon Crawford with his 102 glove at SS. Earlier in the season, we had brought in Mel Harder as a 5th starter and Jeff McNeil as a temporary RF and long-term utility guy. Hendrick is already trained up to a 60 in RF and may have a few more ticks left. Seager has just started training; I expect him to take at least 30-40 more games to become competent.


Urchins


We made a frantic push in the late part of the month, and won our division at 89-73 about right for a +122 run differential. Had the last day played out differently we could have finished 3rd since there was a tie for 2nd at 88-74. We also collected a couple of individual honors, as Ralph Garr won the batting title with a .332 mark, lashing 247 hits including 50 doubles, which tied for the league lead. And George Burns stole 47 bags, and hit his 30th HR in game 160 so he was awarded 400 PP's for the 30/30 season. Coupled with the playoff award, this team earned 12,990 PP's on the year.


Notable acquisitions were SP Mike Caldwell and C Jason Kendall, from mission awards, and Keone Kela, Brandon Woodruff, and Zo Cain as parts of the collections for the missions. And we're well along on our next collection, with a nice PP balance to further the push.


Pirates


We finished at 95-57 with a +99 run differential, and earned 16,595 PP's. A great season! This team was atypical for a bombs away offense, though, since it outperformed its Pythag by 5 games. Max Muncy, who earned 60 PP's last season, earned 6575 this season. His accomplishments included 5000 PP's for a 7 game HR streak, two BOTM awards, a POTW award, and the league HR title.


Notable acquisitions on the year were Michael Conforto, now platooning in RF, Eddie Mathews, Marcell Ozuna, Joe Blanton, Randy Jones, and Mike Caldwell. So our team heading into the playoffs is:

Kolten Wong, 2B
Manuel Margot, CF
Art Shamsky, DH
Eddie Mathews, 3B
Marcell Ozuna, LF
Max Muncy, 1B
Billy Conigliaro / Michael Conforto, RF
Francisco Cervelli / Jason Castro, C
Frankie Crosetti, SS


Caldwell, Blanton, Jones, and Dean Chance, SP
Kirby Yates, CL


We may not win, but we'll scare hell out of whoever beats us.


Partisans

We finished 99-63 with a 715-583 run advantage. Our Pythag was 96-66, so we beat it by 3 games. My experience with baseball sims is that pitching and defense teams outperform Pythag, and bomber offenses don't. My Pirates above violated this hypotheses, but my Bees certainly upheld it. We earned 17,710 PP's on the season. And we led the league in runs allowed by a hair, 3rd was 601. Those two teams also both finished in the top 3 in runs scored, so our playoff prognosis isn't great. But we do get to put the cleats on and go compete.


Notable acquisitions on the year were headlined by spring training signee Eddie Plank, who finished 16-9, 2.99 and earned 3000 PP's on the nose. Later in the season, we acquired Bret Saberhagen and Jason Kendall via missions, and Daniel Murphy and Tim Anderson as building blocks for a couple of the missions we are currently setting out on. We now own an even 200 cards, 78 of which are locked and on our books forever.

[rburgh]

Test

[rburgh]

The Partisans went out 3-1 in the Division round. The Urchins went down 4-2 in the Conference finals. And the Pirates face a whale team that went 138-24 in the regular season in the Finals. We hope to give them a battle, but they basically have all the players you can get from completing the Live missions. So I've got to be a 20-1 underdog, at least.


But the Pirates will come out of this with a nice chunk of PP's; we will make a major acquisition before our Bronze season begins. Most likely, we will add to the pen, but C and 2B are also possibilities, as Kolten Wong and Jason Castro have become marginalized by the new level.

Edit - we did lose the final, but we won 2 games and only lost by more than 2 once. We lost 6-4 and 3-2 on the road to open the seriex, then came home for a 3-1 win, 6-0 loss, and 2-0 win before dropping the finale 7-5. So I went into the AH and bought Steve Reed for 2500 and Rex "The Wonder Dog" Hudler for 1851. Hudler becomes a platoon 2B and backup CF for us, as well as emergency duty at 3B and LF.

Other purchases were Anthony Rizzo for the Urchins, replacing the 77 OVR Wally Joyner, and Jose Abreu to move the White Sox collection closer to completion for the Partisans. The Freelancers, Gumshoes, and Bees have declined to expend any powder right now.

And with the off-season awards voting, the final PP totals for the year were:

Gumshoes - 7,175
Partisans - 19,900
Freelancers - 11,735
Urchins - 14,720
Pirates - 19,465
Bees - 11, 420

[rburgh]

I have 3 teams assigned to Bronze 209 - this severely limits my chances for awards; I'm not a happy camper.

Season outlooks

Gumshoes - The two best records in our conference are 218 and 198 wins, and in the other conference there is a 244 win team. I don't know how well this will work out, but it's surely going to be better than my division and league assignment last week. The preseason prediction for this team is 92 wins and a wild card.

Pirates - They are in a relatively soft division, and should have a good shot at the division title, but there are two very strong teams in the league and both are in my conference. The Seattle Steel Hawks are 293-31 in their two previous seasons, and the Detroit Tigers 257-67. There are a lot of poor teams in the league, so at least we should earn a lot of PP's. I'm not going to spend any of them, though, there's no point in it and I may be in position to drop 15k+ on a player after the season is over. Their preseason prediction is 83 wins and a wild card.

Partisans - We're in a winnable division, but the Hong Kong Tigers are in our conference with a roster featuring most of the live mission awardee cards. So we're not winning a ring here either. At least we will be able to pile up points, there are numerous teams in the conference that look pretty mediocre. Their preseason prediction is 96 wins and a division crown.

Urchins, Bees, and Freelancers - the Urchins are alone in the AC, and the best teams in that conference have win totals in the upper 190's. Although we are a pedestrian 159-165, I think we have a shot at competing for a finals berth since this team made great strides last year and has a good shot at completing another mission this season for a late talent infusion. The Bees appear to be in a winnable division, too, with no team that has more that their 174 wins to its credit. The Freelancers, with 181 wins, have a 202 win team in their division that is mostly made up of Live diamonds, so they may have a shot at that division, but it will be a very competitive one since all 5 teams have at least 180 wins so far. And the third division in their conference sports a 201 win team, so this appears to be a league without a true whale team. I'm just irked that the playoff success and awards success for these teams is going to be limited. The position strength by team report is pretty kind to the Bees, and pretty hard on the other two teams. That's probably right, but the Urchins and Freelancers get significant value out of their DH slot (Garr and Hazle, respectively) and they have ranked Hazle poorly in RF, ignoring George Hendrick. The Freelances also get dinged for a weak 3B position, ignoring the fact that Seager is training there and would be a pretty good 3B if his position rating gets to 60.

[rburgh]

We bought our first diamond card, Jose Ramirez. Corey Seager moves back to SS, Brandon Crawford becomes a rather expensive defensive sub. Jose will lead off, and hopefully earn us many PP's for 20/20 and 30/30 seasons.

In other Corey Seager news, he has brought his defensive rating at 2B up over 50 for the Bees, and is settling in to the position nicely.

[rburgh]

Gumshoes - We entered our first 4 tournaments yesterday with no success. That's not a surprise, we still have some players we need to replace. And the big team went 13-14 in Iron 165, 4th in our division, winning only 490 PP's. Our metrics are 118-105, .713, ranking 8th, 3rd and 2md respectively. Vlad Jr. is at .324-6-20 and Berenyi is 2-1, 1.96.


Partisans - We are 17-10 in Iron 152, first in our division, and earned 650 PP's. Bruce Kison threw a Maddux to earn most of them. Our metrics are 127-101-.690, 7th, 2nd, and 3rd. We have been going with a 4-man rotation, but Gausman is not handling that well so we have moved Dierker back into the #5 spot in the hopes of giving Gausman a little rest.


Pirates - We are 11-16 in Iron 182, 3rd in our division. We have earned 200 PP's. Our metrics are 117-145-.670, 9th, 13th, and 9th. It's hard to believe this is the same team that took a Whale team to 6 games in the LCS last season. And we added Steve Reed to the bullpen and Rex Hudler to the bench. Minor upgrades, bah! I've got to stop doing this.



Freelancers - We are 12-15 in B209, 4th in our division. We've earned 670 PP's and spent 4500 to add Jose Ramirez to the roster, ending the Seager at 3B experiment. Our metrics are 132-154-.662, T 5th, 15th, and 15th. It looks like time for Brandon Crawford at SS and live with the sub-Mendoza stick. Seager was hitting only .202.


Urchins - We are 13-13 in B209, 3rd in our division. We've earned 930 PP's. Our metrics are 131-150-.691, 6th, 15th, and 9th. George Burns is on a pace for 30 HR and 20 steals. New acquisition Anthony Rizzo is hitting .309-0-12, not what we expected. Adam Eaton is the star of the team in the early going, at .356-2-15, and Harrison Bader is at .326-1-18.


Bees - The Bees are 18-9 and first in their division in B209, and also have the best overall record in the league. Our metrics are 173-136-.680, 1st/13th/12th. We've earned 2775 PP's, with a triple dinger from Derrek Lee, a cycle from Duke, and a 9 hit inning. We've also hit 44 HR, 1st in the conference; Snider has 7, Lee, Shamsky, and Winfield have 6 each, and Story has 5. And our .282 team BA is 2nd only to the Urchins' .290.


Not a good start to the 3rd season. Overall, we are 84-77, but the earnings are poor except for the Bees, whose 2775 PP's earned almost matches the 2940 earned by the other 5 teams.

Also note that my 3 mission teams have earned 4355 PP's, the AH teams with incremental updates have earned 1360. Incremental updates are clearly wrong. I will have to let those 3 teams suffer while accumulating enough PP's to cquire some splash players. In the meantime, I am going to sell off some of the superfluous guys to speed the process.

[rburgh]

Happy Days are here again! The skies are blue and clear again!


Partisans - 21-6 on the day, and earned 2180 PP's. We spent almost all of it on missions, and are nearing completion of a couple of the better team collections. Our metrics are 276-191-.691, 5th, 2nd, and 3rd. Bruce Kison threw a Maddux, and Jesse Winker and Josh Donaldson each had triple dinger games to account for much of the earnings.


Urchins - 8-18 on the day, for a 21-31 mark and last in the division. We did earn 1650 PP's, mostly for batting achievements. Our metrics are 269-289-.678, 6th, 14th, and 10th. We should complete a mission tomorrow that will provide some needed help.


Bees - 11-16 on the month, but still leading the division at 29-25. Our metrics are 317-290-.677; 1st, 14th, and 12th. We completed the Rockies mission late this evening, and Tulo will replace Story (who was quicksold for two players and 2800 leftover PP's that have been sunk into the D'Backs mission). Much better to have two dead silvers on the roster than a dead diamond. And we earned 1945 PP's on the day. If we do that tomorrow, we may well have a tall lefty on the bump.


Gumshoes - 13-14 for the 2nd day in a row, we stand at 26-28 and 3rd in the division. There's a baby whale in the division (3 perfects and 5 or 6 diamonds), so we expected little more. But we earned 1475 points and threw some of them at bronzes for a tournament team. We are getting better, but still haven't cashed. We have the PP's to grab a couple of high-end bronzes tomorrow morning.


Freelancers - 22-6 on the day, as the bats came alive. We are 34-21, a game out of first in the division. Our metrics are 289-233-.677, 4th, 6th, and 13th. Compare that to 5th, 15th, and 15th in April. Brandon Crawford has grabbed the SS position by the neck. We earned 2190 PP's on the month, and have acquired Dan Quisenberry to shore up our weakest group. Early this morning, we also purchased Adam Kolarek to replace James Pazos as the LOOGY in our pen.


Pirates - 18-9 on the day, and now first in the division at 29-25. Our metrics are 264-236-.681, 5th, 5th, and 4th. How's that for consistency. And we earned 4555 PP's on the day; more than 2/3 of that came via a 12 hit, 10 run inning. We acquired Jason Kendall this morning for the BIN of 5399. We had been hoping something better would come along, but saw no need to wait any longer to pull the trigger on a replacement for Francisco Cervelli. He will also relegate Jason Castro to every 5th day duty against RHP.


We nearly tripled our daily PP earnings from yesterday's 5700; we earned almost 14,000 today among the 6 teams, and our poorest earning team still snagged 1475; that would have been a comfortable 2nd on Monday. It appears to me that their sim takes weather into account. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

[rburgh]

Just checked in on my teams, and the Pirates just lost 11-0. That ran their opponent's record to 61-2. Wow.


Also my Gumshoes collected their first pack from a tournament. We have 72 OVR Bake McBride in the AH; he was the best card received in the pack. But the 2nd best received was Live Craig Stammen, who has been added to our tournament team's pen.

[rburgh]

We acquired Randy Johnson from the D-Backs mission, and that completed the NL West campaign and awarded us Mel Ott. I have installed Ott as the everyday LF (currently training) and leadoff hitter, and he has led off 3 games with dingers in his first week on the job.


On a related training note, Corey Seager seems to have settled in as a 61 at 2B. That seems to be a pretty good spot for him, to my way of thinking.

[rburgh]

Partisans - 20-7 on the day, to bring their record to 53-22. But with completion of the White Sox mission in the crosshairs, the team earned only 735 PP's on the day. Metrics are 394-269-.708, 5th, 2nd, and 1st in the conference. We may not complete the mission today, either, as the prices for the remaining group of players we need skyrocketed on the day. But it matters not, we have the 2nd best record in the entire league, but we are 12 games behind the whale in our conference.


Bees - a dismal 10-16 on the day, falling to 39-41 and 3 games out in the division. We were 3-8 prior to completion of the D-Backs' mission and the NL West campaign, and 7-8 afterwards. That just goes to show how good a season Marcell Ozuna was having. Mel Ott has trained up to only a 17 in LF, so that's part of the problem. (Corey Seager, who I thought might have been fully trained at 2B when his rating reached 61, is now up to 63.) Metrics are 464-438-.671, 2nd, last, and last in the conference. And we earned a very welcome 2465 PP's on the day, fueled by a 4 HR inning that earned a chunk of 1000.


Urchins - 16-11 on the day, to reach 37-42 at the end of the month. Metrics are 420-413-.684; T-2nd, T-13th, and 10th in the conference. We completed the Cardinals mission late in the day, and Wainwright bumped old-time Cardinal Jesse Barnes out of the rotation. But Adam was 1-1, 3.09 in his first two starts. George Burns projects to 29 HR and 34 SB's on the year, we are rooting hard for a slight power surge. And we collected 1460 PP's on the day, headlined by a Maddux thrown by Mike Caldwell.


Gumshoes - 17-11 on the day, to move up to 43-39. We are 2nd in the division but 16 games out, and currently stand 2nd in the WC race. Metrics are 334-317-.719, 11th, 2nd, and 2nd in the conference. We earned a regular pack from a tournament, with the main acquisition Bake McBride. We failed to sell him in the AH yesterday, and are now planning to train him in RF, replacing Nori Aoki who has a .238-3-18 line on the year. Aoki goes to the bench, as we are happy with Brian Goodwin as a 4th OF. The team earned a paltry 1040 PP's on the day; we hope to see this mark continue to inch upward, but we expect it to be slow going.


Freelancers - 16-12 on the day, 50-33 overall, and now have a 2 game lead in the division; yesterday's leader is now 4 games out in 3rd. Metrics are 424-340-.691, 4th, 3rd, and 8th in the conference. We earned 1530 PP-s on the day and have the best record in the conference. It looks like 3 teams from our division will make the playoffs. Yeterday's bullpen acquisitions of Quis and Kolarek had first month ERA's of 2.70 and 1.80 respectively, and Quis logged 7 saves, a win, and 2 losses in 10 appearances.


Pirates - 16-10 on the month and 2nd in the division, a game out. Metrics are 425-357-.674, 3rd, 5th, and 10th. Yesterday morning's acquisition Jason Kendall did not disappoint, hitting .370-1-12 and picking up 80 PP's individually out of our day's haul of 910. We start the month with 3 at one of the whales in the league; this one is 63-17 with a +301 run differential. But hey, we won one of 3 against the big whale in the conference, that team is currently 77-3 with a +460 differential. We have 4 more games against that whale at the end of the month. Needless to say, our playoff outlook is bleak and we may lose our grip on the 2nd wild card. But we continue to save up for another splash acquisition; we'll probably be able to afford one after the end of season awards points are distributed.

[rburgh]

Partisans - 15-14 on the month, and 68-36 overall. 499-374-.707, 6th, 2nd, and 1st. We spent much of the month on the road, away from the cavernous spaces of Partisans Park. And we earned an even 1000 PP's on the month. Plank, Kison, and Daniels earned ASG berths. We are now 19 1/2 games behind the best record in the conference, and have been working a 2nd mission while waiting for the White Sox prices to come back to earth.


Urchins - 15-10 on the month, to even our record at 52-52. 535-507-.689, 5th, 11th, and 10th. George Burns (now projected for 30 HR and 39 SB), Anthony Rizzo, and Jason Kendall were All-Stars, contributing to our 1440 PP's on the month. Wainwright is 5-2, 2.39 in his first 8 starts.


Bees - 13-11 on the month and also 52-52 on the season. 591-536-.680, 1st, 11th, and 11th. Snider led the All-Star voting, and Carson Kelly, Kenley Jansen, and Joe Jimenez also were voted in. They helped fuel a 1480 point month, and we completed the relatively easy Angels mission. 82 OVR Wally Joyner has a hell of a card for that rating, at 79-75-81-53. Unfortunately for him, we have Derrek Lee and Shamsky at 1B and DH respectively, so he's riding the pine.


Gumshoes - 12-13 on the day, checking in at 55-52 on the year. Metrics are 453-409-.719, 10th, 2nd, and 2nd. Berenyi and Kimbrel made the ASG, and we earned 425 PP's on the month. We did, however, acquire Leron Lee to replace Aoki in RF. Lee is at .348-1-3 in his first 6 games, and has a ton of gap power for our spacious park.


Freelancers - 18-7 on the day, 68-40 overall and 1st overall in the conference and 2nd overall in a league without a whale. Metrics are 537-432-.691, 4th, 1st, and 7th in the conference as Hendrick has now trained up to a 74 in RF. Buddy Myer and Derek Lee were our only All-Stars, but a 12 game winning streak earned us a chunk of 1500 PP's, leading to 2620 on the month. We are mulling a splash acquisition, but the guys we really want are 400-500 points out of our current reach. Late edit - perusing the AH, I found Tony Oliva with a BIN price of 2500. So he is now platooning in RF with Hendrick (who is now up to a 76 glove in RF), and bringing his lethal 84-83-95-26 bat against RHP.


Pirates - A dismal 7-17 on the month, thanks to a tough schedule, and 52-52 on the season. We are on a 6 game losing streak, the last 4 by a composite score of 8-46 at the hands of the 101-5 Seattle Steel Hawks. Metrics are 513-491-.671, 3rd, 6th, and 10th. Eddie Mathews and Steve Reed made the ASG, and we earned 750 PP's on the month despite our dismal record. We have our eye on a CF upgrade, but a little patience may allow us a bigger fish so we will wait until the season closes before making a move.

[rburgh]

Bees completed the Mariners mission, Buhner is for sale in the AH.


Freelancers bought Tony Oliva at the start of the day. Not satisfied with Oliva and Hendrick as a RF platoon, we bought Elmer Flick just after 7 EDT. Oliva and Flick are now being trained as a LF platoon. Incumbent LF Carl Crawford is being retained for the moment as a defensive replacement. Carl is more than a little POed with me, since he has earned 1645 PP's this season. He had a 3 homer game (400), added a double to the 3 homer game for an XBH machine award (200), had 5 hits in another game (150), stole home (500), a couple of 3 SB games at 50 each, a couple of walk-off HR's at 70 each, and scored runs in 10 straight games (125). There were other minor accomplishments, too. On the season, he is hitting 289/331/420 with 10 HR and 25 SB in 117 games.

[rburgh]

Gumshoes - we went 9-18 on the month thanks to 13 games against whale teams. At 64-70 we are still above the promotion line, but 6 more games against whales may keep us at the Iron level another year. Our metrics are 544-537-.715, 10th, 3rd, and 3rd. We bought SE Wally Joyner for 1351 PP's (what a bargain) and installed him in the 3 spot, moving Durham to leadoff and relegating Votto to backup duty. We earned 1010 PP's on the month, mainly due to a Maddux from Drabek. Doug also had a Corner Painter and an In Control, for 580 PP's individually.


Freelancers - 15-12 on the month, now 83-52 overall and a 13 game lead for the best record in the conference but 2nd overall in the league, 12 games behind. Our metrics are 675-546-.693, 4th, 2nd, and 6th as our DER has been slowly creeping upward with Flood in CF and Brandon Crawford taking over from Seager at SS. We earned a tidy 2400 PP's on the month, with the lion's share coming from the bat and wheels of Carl Crawford (see the previous entry on this blog). Oliva is now a 12 in LF (I expect him to get to the upper 50's) and Hendrick is a 7 (he may get into the 70's eventually but with limited PT it will take a while).


Pirates - 18-11 in a busy month leaves us at 70-63, 3rd in the division and also in the WC race. Our metrics are 682-621-.674, 4th, 6th, and 10th. Our ZR is +20.9, 3rd, so our park may be an issue with our DER. We purchased Galarraga for 2800 PP's overnight, and will install him at 1B, replacing Muncy and balancing off the L-R of our lineup a bit. As of this morning, our starting lineup has 102 HR from LHB and 38 from RHB. We will keep Muncy around for a while, though, and may eventually platoon him with the Big Cat. We earned 1800 PP's for the month, with a BOTM for Mathews and a 21-1 thumping of one of the two weak teams in our division that additionally generated 360 other awards.


Partisans - 18-11 on the month, 86-47 overall, 1st in the division by 22 games and 2nd in the conference, trailing by 27 games. You know the playoff and promotion prognoses. Metrics are 628-485-.703, 5th, 2nd, and 1st. We earned 1120 PP's on the month and are on the cusp of completing the White Sox mission and adding SE Ted Lyons to the rotation. BIN prices for Eloy are ridiculous and I have a budget and will stick to it until I get him.

Morning edit - someone posted Eloy with a BIN within my price range. I tried to steal him for a lower bid, but lost that auction so I pulled the trigger and now my rotation is Lyons, Plank, Kison, Saberhagen, and Gausman, with former #5 the Live Mitch Keller, bumped to locked card purgatory for the duration of PT21. His final stats - 13 GS, 80.1 IP, 5-4, 2.80 (ERA+ 147), with 62 H, 6 HRA 28 BB, and 76 K's. As a Pirate fan since about 1955, I can only hope that he does that well in real life.


Urchins - 15-13 on the month, 67-65 overall, T-2nd in the WC and 3rd in the division, 26 1/2 out of 1st and 13 1/2 out of 2nd. We have 10 games remaining against the top 2 teams in the division, so we will probably fail to make the playoffs but get promoted to Silver, where the beatings will continue. Metrics are 666-627-.602, 4th, 11th, and 9th in the conference. George Burns is currently on a 28 HR, 41 SB pace, we are rooting for a power surge. We earned 1115 PP's on the month, and sunk most of it into missions as usual.


Bees - 17-12 on the month, and 69-64 on the season. We are tied for 1st in the division and also for 3rd in the WC, a game out. Since there are six teams within 3 games of the 2nd wildcard, winning the division seems like a good plan. Another 17-12 month would be good, more wins would be better. Our remaining SOS is .503 and we have 16 home, 13 away. But I don't know if that's good or bad; I wish they would put the playoff race page up for Saturday morning. We earned 2560 PP's on the month, topping the 11,000 mark for the season. Major contributors to that were Mel Ott, with a 6 game HR streak for 1000 and Bob Tewksbury for a Maddux.

[rburgh]

We had been inching up on both of these missions simultaneously, and starting the day we were 3 card short of completing both. Early in the afternoon, we landed our 26th Red, and acquired Bucky Walters. We moved him into the rotation, and sold off one of our poorer historical starters, Sid Hudson. He sold for 2500 in literally a few minutes. So we were able to use the 2250 PP's along with our balance of 600 or so to buy Kyle Hendricks and Craig Kimbrel. The Kimbrel acquisition earned us Billy Willams; completing the last of the NL Central missions earned us Ralph Kiner, and also a gold pack. And the gold pack gave us Steve Garvey, an excellent first baseman. He is currently platooning with Anthony Rizzo, since I have not had time to consider whether to just use Garvey full time. But in the space of a little over an hour, our purchase of Nick Castellanos for something under 500 PP's led to a chain of events that landed us Bucky Walters, Ralph Kiner, Billy Williams, Steve Garvey, and Craig Kimbrel, at the further cost of having to sell off the starter who was bumped from the rotation by Walters.


The Urchins aren't going to make the playoffs, but their outlook for next year is a whole lot better than it was at noon today. The combined L7 for the 5 guys I acquired is about 29,500 PP's. And we have sold off Ralph Garr, who had been our DH, and George Burns, who had been the star of the team until this row of dominoes fell, which netted us another 4500 PP's to use to kick-start our next mission.


With a few games to go, the Partisans have over 100 wins and a division title, the Freelancers have 94 wins and the top seed in the NC of B209, and the Bees have 88 wins and the second seed in the NC of B209. The Pirates are a game out of the second wild card slot, with 3 games left on the road against the team we are chasing. I guess I will stay up to watch those results come in. The Gumshoes (77-82) and the Urchins (79-79) are eliminated from the playoffs, but both are in the top 16, which means that they are showing as being promoted.


The outlook for the Gumshoes in Bronze next year is bleak, but the Pirates and Partisans will also be in Bronze leagues and they should do OK. And the Freelacers, Bees, and Urchins will apparently all be in Silver leagues - it will surely depend on how many whales are in their new leagues before forming an opinion on how well they will do. But my guess is that the Bees are the best team right now, with an outfield of Ott, Snider, and Winfield, Derrek Lee at 1B, and Shamsky at DH. The infield is Machado, Tulo, and Seager (now a 71 at 2B). And the catcher is Carson Kelly. Whatever mission we choose next will have a SP as the reward, as our rotation is the Big Unit and a pile of junk.

[rburgh]

The Pirates pulled out the 2nd wild card berth, doing it the hard way. They won 2 of 3 on the road, against the team they were tied with. And they lost game 1 when closer Steve Reed blew his first save since early May. But they won game 2 behind a dominant performance by Don Larsen, and game 3 on a 3-run homer by Eddie Mathews in the top of the 10th. Their final record was 88-74, with an 18-11 final month. Metrics are 829-727-.678, 4th, 5th, and 10th. They earned 1700 PP's on the month and another 1000 for the playoffs.



Meanwhile, the Urchins, who I had given up for dead when the game reported their playoff chances at 0.0% with a dozen games left, won 8 of their last 12 games to finish the season at 82-80, in a 3 way tie for the 2nd wild card spot. I like their chances, with all the top talent they acquired to fuel this hot streak. They have flattened their first play-in opponent with 10 runs in the first, finally winning by a 12-3 score. Our final metrics were 805-745-.692, 3rd, 11th, and 10th. And they earned 3140 PP's on the month, with the final play-in game yet to be completed. They lost that play-in game by a 6-5 score, so no playoffs for the year. But great hopes for next year.



The Bees had a huge last month, going 23-6 by simply mashing baseballs. Over those 29 games, they outscored their opponents 228-116. Final numbers on the season 971-773-.683, 1st, 11th, and 10th in the conference. They also had a huge month in another way, earning 7795 PP's on the month, thanks in large part to the 4600 PP's accumulated in a 24-0 whomping of one of the two weak teams in the division. And another 1000 are on the way for the playoffs.



The Partisans went 16-13 on the month, finishing on a flat note with a 4 game losing streak but a 102-60 record. Their metrics were 773-617-.703, 5th, 2nd, and 1st. They earned 2620 PP's on the month, mainly thanks to an immaculate inning by Eddie Plank and the playoff appearance.


The Gumshoes turned it around a bit, going 16-12 for a final record of 80-82. They won 805 PP's on the month, finishing with a dismal total of 5240. Their metrics, though, were good at 666-635-.716, 10th, 3rd, and 2nd.


The Freelancers had a 12-15 month, mainly due to some LF training in progress for Tony Oliva and George Hendrick. Hendrick is up to a 20 now, and Oliva a 44. Hopefully, this won't come back to bite us in the playoffs, but I seriously think we will be underdogs to the Bees should we meet. Our metrics were 794-685-.687; 4th, 3rd, and 7th. And they earned only 940 PP's on the month, they will get another 1000 once the Urchins resolve their playoff situation.


Final thoughts for the night - two stirring stretch runs in the final days and another month long hot streak, to go along with two teams that dominated their divisions basically from wire to wire. I am pleased at the progress being made by all but the Gumshoes. But I have had lots of good advice from Lemandria and Big Red, and have done well with collection missions. The Bees, in particular, have completed two of the 6 division campaigns. They will be jumping into the NL Central now that the Urchins have completed those missions. And the Urchins will be jumping into the NL East, which will be another slow slog I think.

[rburgh]

We won 4 games to 2 vs. a team whose lineup was:


Ichiro RF
Cano 2B
Bagwell 1B
Snider CF
Kiner DH
Yaz LF
Berra C
Mathews/Longoria 3B
Tulo SS


And his rotation was Maddux, Randy Johnson, Carlton, Lyons, and Wainwright.


My lineup was
Jose Ramirez 3B
Curt Flood CF
Elmer Flick LF
Derrek Lee 1B (Series MVP)
Tony Oliva LF
Bob Hazle DH
Buddy Myer 2B
Buster Posey C
Brandon Crawford SS


And my rotation was Cliff Melton, Mike Caldwell, 89 OVR Gerritt Cole, and Mel Harder. 5th Starter Saberhagen never took the bump because of the off days.


His two wins were both 1 run nailbiters, and I won a pair of those also, as well as 8-4 in game 4 and 6-4 in game 6.


Woo Hoo! All this without investing a dime in points purchases. Off to the silver level! And I don't even think this will be the best of my 3 teams at that level.

[rburgh]

Gumshoes - I decided to blow this team up (well, I used a very small firecracker). Out is LF Leron Lee, in is LF Ralph Garr. Ralph's contact rating will be appreciated. Out is Dan Driessen, why was he still around anyway? Out is Bruce Berenyi, in is Rick Rhoden. Bake McBride has trained up to a 60 in RF and will be there for a while; when his time as a regular is ended he will probably hang on for a while as an OF backup since he is a 57 in his natural position of CF. Garr's hit tool and Rhoden's command should generate more PP's than Lee's gap power and Berenyi's strikeouts. We will see how our foray into the Bronze level goes, but will not be too disappointed if we are back in Iron next season.


Freelancers - we spent our championship booty on SE Adam Wainwright, who is immediately our #1 starter. That seemed to be the best use of the available PP's.


Pirates - Conforto was banished to the bench in favor of Roaring 20's CF Benny Kauff, who is being given the everyday LF job and teh leadoff position. Max Muncy is also gone; the acquisition of Kauff made a platoon partner for Galarraga less desirable. Also gone is Dean Chance, replaced by groundballer Jose Lima.


Partisans - In addition to the Twins mission we completed to have Joe Nathan as our closer for the playoffs and beyond, we completed the Tigers mission with our playoff earnings. But with Sano on the roster, Cecil seemed expendable, so we quicksold him. And we used those funds to bring the Indians mission (And AL Central campaign) to within about 1800 additional PP's. Once we complete that, our rotation will be Bertie Boy, Lyons, Plank, and Kison, with spot starts from Kevin Gausman. We have also decided to part ways with SE Bret Saberhagen and DH Kal Daniels. We have given the DH job to Eloy Jimenez temporarily, while we search for a more park-suitable DH. And Saberhagen goes in anticipation of the arrival of Blyleven.


Side note - During Blyleven's time in Pittsburgh, he irritated practically everybody - he just didn't like the city; he preferred brighter lights I suppose. So one of the popular talk show hosts started calling him Bertie Boy in a sneering sort of tone. It spread like wildfire.


So I quicksold Saberhagen and Daniels, completed the team and division missions, and opened my gold pack to find a perfectly acceptable replacement for Daniels - Shin Soo Choo 2013. And of course Rosen will be on my roster, too, as my everyday 1B.


Urchins - Buoyed by the riches we acquired in September from the collection missions, we have mainly been buying up Live Dodgers. But that's one of the more expensive team missions. We are in no particular hurry, though, as Harrison Bader is a more than acceptable placeholder.


Bees - A shout-out to Bronze 209 MVP Duke Snider. I believe I omitted this from the season wrapup this morning. Like the Urchins, we have little to do right now except wait for the PP's needed to complete the Astros mission, which will compete our AL West mission, too. But the Astros, like the Dodgers, are very expensive.So it is going slowly.