Well I'll be damned, the past few weeks have been great for chokesters (Spain & The NL), so maybe that signals new beginnings? Oh who am I kidding, the second half of the season is going to be a series of disappointing events culminating in failure. Andrew and I have descended into standings purgatory and will no doubt will be trapped in 2nd and 3rd for the rest of the season. There may be some hope, notice I said purgatory and not limbo, all the Dante fans out there know what I mean.
The injury bug, well its more like a venomous snake or a rabid dog, has finally bitten Andrew. I know he isn't surprised, and neither am I, but Jake Peavy has finally made his way to the DL with a detached muscle in his right (throwing arm) shoulder. I don't think I have to tell you his season is over. Good thing the White Sox have him signed through 2012, I hear good things about pitchers in their 30's recovering from shoulder surgery. It isn't all bad news though, Andrew managed to jettison Brad Lidge for Jon Rauch in a waiver move, and he added Huston Street for Peavy. With four closers he should make up some serious ground in the saves category.
We had such high hopes...
I'm teetering in 2nd place, but I could have made a move to ruin my season. I failed to do much research when I placed Shin-SooChoo on the DL, and now I'm stuck with a guy who doesn't even start. I only requested Josh Willingham (Nats OF) and Seth Smith (Rockies OF) thinking I would land Willingham, but someone else had a DL move and requested him as well. Smith is hitting .287 with 12HR, but with Choo being out for a long time I may be stuck with this guy for longer than I'd like. I also boned the move because I have 6 OF (we have 5 OF and a UTIL slot), and I took a weak OF when I could have taken any position. I can't believe I'm saying this, but in hindsight I'd almost rather have JD Drew. Even Carlos Quentin and his impressive .244 average would be better than a part time player. The best thing to happen to me, or maybe a not-so-horrible thing, was the trade of Cliff Lee to the Texas Rangers. Upside; Texas has an offense and he should win more games, Downside; Lee goes from a super-defensive team in a pitchers park to an all-offense team in a hitters park.
My favorite Korean, you will be sorely missed.
Current Status Bert - Don't run away from this, Dude! Goddamnit, this affects all of us! Andrew - I'm shomer shabbas!
Well the 2010 World Cup is over and we have a first time winner, sadly it was not the Dutch. Spain hoisted the cup for the few fans that were able to get tickets (You may have noticed how few vuvuzelas could be heard), and the angry people watching on TV. You can't hear it, but I'm grinding my teeth right now.
FIFA has already awarded Diego Forlan the Golden Ball (Best Player) and Thomas Müller the Golden Ball (Top Scorer) and Best Young Player awards. Despite the handing out of "official" awards, we at the Sports Optimator feel that more are required. With no real rational behind them, we present our picks.
The Sports Optimator 2010 World Cup Awards
Team Of The Tournament : Spain (Teeth grinding...). Didn't look like a superpower, but managed to grind down their opponents and win games when it mattered.
Player Of The Tournament : Wesley Sneijder. This was tough, it was down to Sneijder, David Villa, and MesutÖzil. David Villa didn't snag the Golden Ball in the final and didn't really seem all that dominant. Özil looked like he was going to own the tournament, impressive considering that he didn't score much, but he looked spent against Argentina and turned into Mesut The Friendly Ghost against Spain. Sneijder gets the nod based on his overall play, not just goals and assists, and I think he meant more to the Netherlands than Müller did to Germany.
All that for nothing...
Goal Of the Tournament : Giovanni Van Bronckhorst. Absolutely the most amazing goal of the tournament, Uruguay and the rest of the world never saw it coming. This barely beats out Carlos Tevez's blast.
Coach Of the Tournament : Joachim Löw. This could have been Bert van Marwijk, but Germany wasn't getting much hype before the tournament. Löw coached the tournament's juggernaut right up to the Spain loss, its safe to say nobody saw the Germans scoring the most goals and putting up three 4 goal games.
Biggest Disappointment (Team) : France. Do I really need to explain this?
Biggest Disappointment (Player) : Fernando Torres. This could have been Lionel Messi if we had gone with Expectations vs. Performance as the decider. Messi played very well but failed to score, and Torres just... failed. He clinched the award by pulling up lame in the final and rolling around on the ground, Liverpool is kicking themselves for not selling him before the World Cup.
Worst Coach : Raymond Domenech. See Biggest Disappointment (Team).
Still doesn't understand what went wrong.
Worst Pass : Ricardo Osario. This clunker of a back pass could have doubled as the best assist of the tournament, I know Gonzalo Higuian and Argentina liked it.
Most Insufferable Arrogance : DidierDrogba. How dare you flag him offsides.
Most Enjoyable Schadenfreude : France.
Lack Of Class : Ivory Coast. The Ivory Coast ended their tournament in a 3-1 loss to Brazil, but that isn't why they get to take home this award. Once they were down, and well beaten, they resorted to childish thuggery. The worst incident was followed by theatrics and Kaka getting a second yellow. The whole scene was bad enough to knock off Italy's performance against New Zealand as #1.
Well, the All Star break is finally upon us. With half the season behind us we have a decent picture of how things are going to go down the stretch. The 1st place team is still comfortably in first with 66.5 points, 5 ahead of me and 9 ahead of Andrew. Things look bleak for the rest of the league with 4th place at 52.5 points, we have a smaller league than usual (9 teams) so we changed the rules so the top three get prize money. Being “safely” in the money isn’t comforting to Andrew who isn’t happy with anything but the title, typical German.
The past 10 games have been cruel to Andrew, but he retains some optimism that the Baseball Gods will work their magic on the 1st place team. He may be right, but it’s going to be hard to knock him off his pitching perch. The current leader has been riding high on the league’s best staff by far (35.5 points), which has been held aloft by super-buy Ubaldo Jimenez (14-1, 1.83ERA), super-rookie Jaime Garcia (7-4, 2.27ERA), and first half monsters Josh Johnson (8-3, 1.83ERA) and Matt Garza (9-5, 4.05ERA). Aside from Javier Vasquez’s start and Garza’s recent ERA explosion his staff has been solid all season, I’m not 100% clear where Andrew sees room for a fall so I’m not all that hopeful. He is going to have to deal with an injury to V-Mart, but he has the studly Cano-Longoria combo to fall back on.
Andrew’s hitters have started to cool off, and his pitching staff is not what it was to start the season. Jake Peavy has had some good starts, but he also has had a meltdown here and there. Aside from Adam Wainwright, who I covet, Andrew’s arms have been all over the place. Francisco Liriano is starting to plummet back to earth, and Dan Haren could be moving into his dangerous post-break slump. If history has anything to say, Haren’s second half numbers could be brutal considering his start. Who knows, Andrew has enormous upside in his staff and has traded his way into a three closer (Lidge-Gregg-Bailey) rotation which will help him gain ground in the saves department.
Haren watches one of his 19 homers given up, well on his way to a career worst.
My team is now on the verge of a complete implosion. I can already see my team bursting into flames as my best performer, Shin-Soo Choo, is joining Tulo on the DL for 6-8 weeks. I still have the best offense in the league, but only by 2.5 points. Losing Tulo and Choo Choo ends my dream of hammering the hell out of the ball, but a lot of my best hitters have been ice cold (Holliday-Upton-Markakis) and I’ve had to sit and watch my totals drop. My catchers (Barajas-Y.Molina) have been horrible lately, but the two headed monster of Youk-Zimmerman has been keeping me afloat. I’ve done everything I can with my pitching staff, but it’s not working out all that well just yet. Mat Latos has been awesome, Greinke gave me 2 wins in a row after the poor guy went 2-8 through 15 starts, but Pelfrey, Sanchez, and Hughes have all been getting shelled lately. At least they go 5+, strike out 5 or so, and don’t walk everyone (I’m looking at you Rich Harden) so it could be worse.
Padres and Royals and Mets, Oh shit.
Current Status
Bert – So he says, “My son can't hold a job, my daughter's married to a fuckin' loser, and I got a rash on my ass so bad I can't hardly siddown. But you know me. I can't complain.”
Andrew - I'm sorry, I wasn't listening.
Mid-Season Thoughts
Yeah, but what I meant was…
Vernon Wells. Wow, were we way off on him. Even if he does nothing for the rest of the season he was well worth the $1. Maybe once his steroid cycle ends, err, I mean his good luck, he may even out. He is well on pace for a career year and has already made our predictions look horrible.
Chipper Jones. So that slump last year wasn’t a fluke, huh, well at least I didn’t buy him. Chipper’s decline has been so sudden and drastic, its tough to see a solid player like him completely melt down.
Calmer Than You
$1 Closers. I am SO happy that I spent $1 on Billy Wagner and Frank Francisco. I had to dump Francisco for Neftali Feliz (who leads the AL with 21 saves) so it wasn’t perfect, but had I thrown down cash for a Broxton or Papelbon I am 100% sure I would not be where I am.
Matt Cain. Andrew and I sat in stunned disbelief when he went for $10. I think Andrew still has nightmares about this because he had TWO chances to get him for that price after the original winner didn’t have the salary space. Ubaldo Jimenez went for the same price (I backed off after spending all my money on Lester and Lee), but we had no idea he would be the best pitcher in baseball. Cain has a deceptive 6-7 record, but his 76K, 2.93ERA, and 1.14WHIP make him a major steal at $10. I’m not sure when Andrew will get over this, maybe never.
We had such high hopes...
My favorite Korean, you will be sorely missed.
