AL: Mike Podhorzer
Mixed Draft Alt Categories: Zach Steinhorn
MIxed Auction: Alex Chamberlain | Dave Adler
Mixed Draft: Mike Gianella
Category: History
Goodbye Good Friend, Lawr Michaels
Lawr Michaels was a member of the board of Tout Wars since, like, there was a board. He has been a tireless advocate of the fantasy baseball community for a really long time. How long? He started by writing for John Benson.
He passed away today after a recent bout with illness. He died way too young.
In 2009 he won Tout Wars AL (because, if I recall correctly, his team hit an improbable eight homers on the last day), which gave him first nomination. He did something novel with it.
The Tout Wars Leaderboard is Updated!
Each year we charge each Tout Wars team an imaginary $100 for playing, and award the top finishers in each league imaginary winnings. You can see the complete results by clicking here.
The top finishers for the last five years can be seen here.
The all time leaders list is a little bit different.
Congratulations to all the leaders. Well played!
Tout Warrior Steve Moyer Has Died
Steve Moyer never won a Tout Wars title, but he was there at the leagues’ founding in 1998, and his contributions were an important part of Tout’s history. In 2001 we held the AL and NL auctions in his baseball memorabilia-filled basement in the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania. Why? Because he thought we should, and he was right.
We have set up a GoFundMe to benefit Steve’s two daughters. Please feel free to contribute if you’re so moved, or to share it if you cannot. Thanks.
You can read memorials by Lawr Michaels and Peter Kreutzer at rockremnants.com, and by Ron Shandler and Steve Gardner and no doubt others on Facebook. The official obituary is here.
Let’s Give 10 Year Leaders Some Props
Tout Wars keeps a leaderboard. We imagine that each team pays $100 to be in the league, and that prize money is split up at the end of the season to teams who finish in the Top Third.
The other day we posted about the Five Year Leaderboard. Good for the What Have You Done for Me Lately Crowd, but who are the 10 Year All Stars?
Six of these 10 don’t have 10 years in. Attrition is a factor. Which give special props to Tristan Cockcroft and Larry Schechter.
You can play with the leaderboard at this Google Sheet.
The Tout Wars Leaderboard is Updated!
Fred Zinkie has won the most (imaginary) money the last five years, finishing in the money for the seventh straight year! (This post originally said Zinkie finished out of the money in 2017, but that was in error.)
But Fred’s remarkable dominance is being challenged by Rudy Gamble, who has finished second, second and first in his first three seasons in Tout, and Jeff Zimmerman, who has finished first twice in his two years. They both have a long way to go however, and Zinkie keeps on ticking.
You can see and peruse all of the results, and Tout Wars history, on the newly updated Tout Wars Leaderboard.
The Tout Wars Leaderboard Has Been Updated!
Though Tout Wars leagues are not money leagues, one way to measure a tout’s success is to pay the winners as if there were money involved.
Each year we charge each entry an imaginary $100, then divide the purse to the top 33 percent of the winners, with first place earning 50 percent and each place behind that half as much. In 15 team leagues the payouts are $674, $287, $93, -$3, -$51. In 12 team leagues the payouts are $540, $220, $60, $-20.
With his rookie win in Tout H2H, Jeff Zimmerman has the highest average win per season, slightly ahead of Adam Ronis, who has two firsts and fourth in his three season.
Ronis is tied with Fred Zinkie, on average. Zinkie has three firsts, two seconds and a fourth in his six seasons. Zinkie’s winning total is second overall, a little behind Tout Wars’ six time champion Larry Schechter.
Head over to the chart to see how the Touts are doing.
Tout Wars Head To Head, Origins!
By Rotoman.
Going into this year, for most of Tout Wars’ 18-year history, I played in Tout Wars NL. This was my NL home league, and while each year a face or two might change, there was great continuity and camaraderie. So it felt odd, this past Sunday, to be sitting outside the Fishbowl at SiriusXM in NYC, watching reigning champ Mike Gianella and three-time champ Tristan Cockcroft and tw0-time champ Scott Wilderman and one-time champs Brian Walton and Steve Gardner and half-champ Lenny Melnick (with Irwin Zwilling), setting NL-only benchmark roto prices while putting their teams together. How did this happen?
It happened because this year I chose to play in the brand new Tout Wars Head To Head League. There were a few reasons for this. Let me count the ways (in no particular order).
Continue reading “Tout Wars Head To Head, Origins!”