Keys To Dominance
Oct 14 2006
Amazingly enough, after being out of the country and with limited internet access, watching the team fall to 10th in the rankings, and seeing enough cold streaks to rival the great April of ’05 and it’s .204 team batting average for the month…..I WIN! The Oakland B’s are the Champions of The Minors Fantasy Baseball League.
That’s right, we soared back. Climbing 10 spots in order to take over #1 and win by a commanding 21.5 point margin. How did we do it you ask? Well, with brains, an almost psychotic commitment to the stats and the situations, and not pressing my players. The team knew that Ryan Howard was the real deal so they should just be trying to compliment him and the shortstop machine of Miguel Tejada (how can you not take him every year, no-brainer). Adding Frank Thomas back to the team after a 10 day trial-run was also much needed for the clubhouse to offset the young inexperience of the team. Frank responded to the second opportunity to hit out of his shorts for the final 3 months of the season. Aramis Ramirez came on in the clutch too, breaking out of a 3 month slump in order to pull his average up from around the Mendoza line, to almost .300 and get the RBI and HR numbers to right on the mark with his career. The hitters were just needing to warm themselves up. That much talent wasn’t going to stay dormant forever, but it was the pitching that really stood out on this year’s team.
Deciding early on in the season, after being ladened with marginal mid to late career starters such as Jake Westbrook, and Jared Washburn, the decision was made to drop the dead weight and make a commitment to youth. We also decided that the Zach Duke experiment wasn’t going to pay off. So the influx of young, unproven talent came in with the likes of Justin Verlander, Jarred Weaver, Scott Olsen, and John Maine. Other decent performances from spot starters Jeff Francis, and Esteban Loiaza provided a good compliment to the cornerstones of Scott Kasmir (until injury shut him down) and Jeremy Bonderman down the stretch.
Relief was also a department that bounced out to an early season jump, thanks to hot starts from Derrick Turnbow, Huston Street, and Jason Isringhausen. Of course with the injuries or in Turnbow’s case, implosion, the team turned to the acquisitions of Clay Meredith, Seth McClung, and Salomon Torres, not losing the league lead in stats until the final 10 days of the season. Wire to almost wire for that one.
All in all it was a complete team effort, and a great job by the front office. Here’s to back-to-back and belly-to-belly in 2007!!!!
As for the other league…well, it was a head-to-head league, not my preferred set-up but I adjusted. I didn’t feel the need for much roster adjusment because with a couple of pickups such as Thomas, Weaver, and Olsen on that team too, I thought we had the best out there.
I played come from behind on that league all year. Overcoming 26 games back in the standings at the All Star Break to take the #1 spot in the playoffs by just 1 game. The playoffs would prove to be more of the same. Eeking a round in the semis to face the team who I came back to overtake in the regular season. That was a flip-flop series back and forth for two weeks. Until on the final day of the season, I moved ahead in hits, 1B’s, and HR’s en route to a 15-12 victory.
Two leagues, two titles, 1 thing in common: both are managed by me. Arguably the biggest brain in fantasy baseball today.
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