One-Third Poll

Last week I updated you on the status of my keeper league team roughly one third through the season. Today we'll go through my other team aka the team that lost 19 points last week and went from 2nd to 7th place. I swear I'm not bitter. As an aside, there is not a more helpless feeling as you stare at your computer and just watch the points continue to slip away. I think I even cried at one point.

Aside number two - it wasn't the best week for my keeper team either, I went from being in first by a decent amount to 2nd and trailing by as many as 10 points at one point. But thanks to a six homer, 20 rbi night last night and a little slippage from the 1st place squad, I narrowed the lead back down to three. I have about a 10 point lead on the next cluster of the 3-4-5 teams, which is nice. Very optimistic here - but the crazy point swings goes to show you that it is still relatively early, there is a ton of baseball left, and anything can happen.

Now onto the bad news. First off: more injuries. Not only more injuries, but they are to my same two guys! Nelson Cruz went back on the disabled list with another hamstring injury (different leg) while Brett Anderson went back on with the same strained forearm. If I had just taken out fantasy insurance on these guys....

Anyway - Aramis Ramirez is a shell of his former self while he still bats under .200 and he is about to hit the DL also. Good times! With all that said I am still sitting at 95.5 points in 6th place. 1st place is still chillin' up there with 126.5 points (although he has been as high as 134, so hopefully he is on the downturn the whole league is hoping for) and 2nd place has 107. So I am still very much in the running for the money, if not championship because as I said above, there is still a whole lotta baseball to be played.

The good news about my team is twofold, I still love my roster as a whole and think it is just one hot streak away from taking off. I think for the most part my team has not played that well and is fortunate enough to be in the position it is currently in. Then, as you will see below, in about half of the categories I am in these clusters where all it will take is a good night or two to break away from the pack and gain bundles of points at a time. I just need to hang in and stay focused and pray that this hot streak comes sooner than later. Here is the category breakdown:

Well, first off, I should say that I have 68.5 offensive points - second most in the league - but only 27 pitching points - 4th worst in the league - so right away you can tell where I need to improve.

Batting Avg - 6th place/9 points. Respectable, but still room to grow. As a team we're hitting .275 while the leader of the pack is .279. That is certainly attainable so I believe I can easily gain anywhere from one to five points with some good hitting.

Homers - Tied for 5th/9.5 points. There is a crazy cluster here. First place has 88, i have 83, and the 8th place team has 80. Power is down across the league this year so this category can stay tight all season. With Nelson Cruz coming back next week and Aramis Ramirez rumored to be dusting off his corps after the all-star break, I expect a little power streak to come and could easily see myself getting to the top here, gaining up to another 4.5 points. Boom.

Runs - First/14 points. 30 run lead on the next guy. Comfortable for now but you never know. But if my offense only gets better, as I expect, then an increase in runs should coincide and ideally I never have to worry here.

RBI - 6th place/8 points. Hurting. This is one spot where 5 weeks of Nelson Cruz on the DL has really hurt me. Oh and 10 weeks of A-Ram sucking (have I mentioned that yet?). Even worse, I am nowhere near 5th place, currently 17 rbi's behind him and only 2 ahead of 7th place. So this is one category where I just need to shut my eyes and let nature take its course and hope that over the next few months I will steadily improve here. Again, the return of Ol' Nelly will only help as he is an rbi machine.

Steals - First/14 points. 6 steal lead on 2nd place. As I had hoped. You know I just like to draft guys who all chip in 20+ steals and the sum of the parts is usually pretty impressive. The only bad part is that it may come down to me needing to trade speed for power at some point and since all of my guys chip in, meaning I don't have a Juan Pierre-type speed ace, it may be more difficult to pull off a deal. We'll cross that bridge later though.

Total Bases + Walks - First/14 points. 24 base lead over 2nd place, which is nothing and could change in a day. This is one category that is near impossible to analyze. Happy I'm here but no guarantee I stay.

Now onto the gross part: pitching.

ERA: 8th place/7 points with a 3.8 mark. Eh. The deeper we get into the season the harder it is to improve ratios. Here's hoping.

Strikeouts: 8th place/7 points. Currently in a crazy cluster where I can gain or lose 6 points any given night depending on my pitchers' performance as well as my opponents'. Last week Cole Hamels and Bret Anderson combined for 2 2/3 innings pitched due to rain and injury. That screwed me out of at least ten much needed strikeouts. Bummer. Again, just need a little hot streak here and I can gain big time.

Saves: 8th place/7 points. 24 saves, middle of the pack. Who knows, these things come in bunches and I feel like I haven't had one in forever, so maybe I have a nice saves run on deck.

Wins: Tied for last/2 points. Yuk. Can't chase wins, just have to pray. On the bright side I'm 7 wins out of 2nd place, so hoping there's a run to made here too.

WHIP: 12th place/3 points. Climbed out of the cellar here with some decent outings lately. Can realistically gain one point here in the near term and then there are three teams in the next tier I have my sights on. Very optimistic, but if I have a chance at this I am going to need my pitching to get hot.

We will see. More to come.

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