Mastersball.com’s experts take on the four Tout Wars roto leagues with commentary and charts. I wish Brian Walton had pointed out that Kreutzer’s all-in bid would have been $28, just half of his winning $56 bid.
Mike Gianella goes all Fonzie over at Baseball Prospectus, covering the week’s transactions. Eh!
After six weeks of play, Mike Podhorzer is in first place in Tout Wars AL. He’s there, just two and a half points ahead of Rob Leibowitz, by virtue of an almost perfect offense, which has 58.5 of a potential 60 points.
Not only are Mike’s big bets on offense, like Prince Fielder, Hanley Ramirez and Jose Bautista, producing, but he’s getting outsized production from $1 endgame buys Devon Travis and Jose Iglesias.
The pitching staff, built around closers Koji Uehara and Sean Doolittle, with Scott Kazmir, Colby Lewis and CC Sabathia, has been good enough so far.
Mike’s team will be tested in coming weeks, having recently lost Alex Avila and Ike Davis to injury. Leibowitz and Jeff Erickson, who is also close, will be laying in wait for any stumble.
A snafu tangled the results of Tout Daily last night, when nine non touts were invited to play by mistake. Three of them finished in the Top 10, making a shambles of the official winnings screen. Here are the official results, with point totals and weekly winnings.
10.(t) Andrea LaMont 38.5 $12
Brian Walton 38.5 $12
8. Andy Behrens 38.75 $18
7. Scott Swanay 39.66 $18
6. Patrick Mayo 40.25 $24
5. Steve Moyer 40.91 $30
4. Gene McCaffrey 44.75 $36
3. Stephania Bell 49.16 $42
2. Seth Trachtman 51.5 $48
1. Chris Liss 54.91 $60
Chris LissLiss started with the expensive and popular Clayton Kershaw, who had an off outing but still produced 17.66 points, supplementing with the Belt Brothers, Brandon and Adrian (Belt)re. Good production from the Giants’ stack, including Buster Posey and Joe Panik, was the difference maker, especially since Adrian Beltre was owned by more than 50 percent of FanDuel teams. More than a third also rostered Posey.
Seth Trachtman, second place finisher, started with Madison Bumgarner, who didn’t strike out many Reds but shut them down while his teammates ran up their big score. Trachtman also rostered Posey, but his team was otherwise powered by less-owned players, like Bryce Harper (14%), JJ Hardy (2%), Justin Turner (2%) and David DeJesus (2%). It seems there are any number of ways to compile a competitive team.
The Winning Team (click to view larger) After two weeks of Phase 2, the overall Leaderboard shows Lawr Michaels in the lead, with Stephania Bell in second and Liss in third.
The top three finishers in each of the five phases will win a ticket to the Tout Daily By Fanduel final on August 28th, when fifteen entries will compete for $2,000 in prizes.
The Phase 1 winners were Scott Pianowski, Adam Ronis and Jeff Erickson.
Ray Guilfoyle has had the lead most of this season, though Derek Carty has edged him from time to time. The middle pack is a comfortable ways behind at this point.
Ray built a team without speed, opting for solid bats like Adrian Gonzalez and Nolan Arenado on the corners, Starlin Castro at SS, and Jay Bruce, Corey Dickerson, and Marcel Ozuna in the OF. He went cheap at Catcher, but is getting hefty production too from Danny Espinosa at 2B.
Ray’s pitching staff features two semi-aces, Jordan Zimmerman and Lance Lynn, and one bought closer, in Jonathan Papelbon. He’s also getting closer production out of Jason Grilli, so far, who cost him nothing, and ace production out of Mike Leake and Bartolo Colon, each for a few bucks.
Most impressive, Ray’s DL includes Kenley Jansen, so more saves are likely coming, and three certifiable top prospects, in Corey Seager, Julio Urias and Hector Olivera.
Derek Carty is competitive, despite Travis D’Arnaud’s and Brandon McCarthy’s injuries and Javier Baez’ demotion, which represents $10 wasted so far. He has plenty of steals, in Billy Hamilton, but has dumped Saves, at least so far.
