Vigilante Sports

My fantasy team is a wreck. The combination of injuries, ill-advised roster moves, and general idiocy I have dropped 6 games in a row. SIX IN A ROW. Is this a joke? Did I gloat too much at the beginning when I was in first place for 15 of the first 16 weeks? I think it’s probably all of the above.

First off I traded Dontrelle Willis and Matt Holliday for Andruw Jones. I knew it was a risky trade but I figured that Andruw Jones was a. a Brave and they always win and b. he’s a fantasy stud, why would he stop now? Well, turns out being a Brave doesn’t always lead to the post season (or dominant fantasy stats for that matter). While Dontrelle Willis has had more success than I expected, he hasn’t gotten run support so he hasn’t won a ton of games. Here comes the big problem… Matt Holliday is snuggled right under Adam Dunn and Bobby Abreu on the points list for outfielders. Andruw Jones is ahead of him, but not by much. And Holliday has more points than notable names such as Ichiro, and Magglio Ordonez.

But it didn’t end there, I traded Jim Thome and Julio Lugo for Tom Glavine and Miguel Tejada. It was a late season trade, so I had gotten a ton out of Thome, and was scared that he was gonna get hurt. He hasn’t yet, but I wouldn’t be suprised. And the prospect of having Tejada and Michael Young on the same team was too sweet to pass up. But of course, now Glavine is probably done for the season and my late push for the playoffs isn’t looking so hot.

Along the way I’ve also let go of Alex Rios, which turned out to be a big mistake. He would have rounded out my outfield so nicely. As it stands it’s not too bad with Jones, Jason Bay, and I picked up Rocco Baldelli (which has turned out very nicely).

I don’t think the problem with my team is the hitting, although they have hit a cool streak. The pitching has been horrendous. Mark Buerhle has let me down time and time again. He has been a mainstay for the BALCO Hitmen over the years and has produced solid numbers every year. This year it seems like he just can’t get it together. There have been other hot and cold pitchers on the staff including Barry Zito, Chris Capuano, Chris Young, and Kenny Rogers. There has been a revolving door at the relief pitcher position all year (including Chad Cordero, JJ Putz, Bob Wickman and even Kerry Wood). None of them have been consistently effective so I’ve pretty much tried to go with the hot hand.

I think that the 2006 season is pretty much over for me. What can I learn from it? I’m not too sure yet. I don’t know that I would have made too many changes. I would probably have spent more time and energy making sure I had the pitching horses down the stretch. Or maybe trying to get another strong bat? Who knows. What do you think? What should/could I have done differently to remain competitive?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 22nd, 2006 at 8:45 am and is filed under Vigilante Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.