RCL Update: The Week That Was, Week 26, 2026

It was the week to realize, “Oh crap, I am sitting at 1250 IP and need to get to 1400!  Let’s stream”.  Everyone was streaming like crazy this week, to mixed results.  It felt like every pitcher I touched turned to flaming garbage while Brayan Bello was tossing gems out of nowhere.  Totally makes sense.  We blew away the strikeout weekly record this week, and with teams dropping 100+ IP weeks, the standings got all kinds of shook up.  If you haven’t been paying attention, now is the time to toss out all the innings you can handle.  Just beware, a Jacob Lopez is lurking on the waiver wire to ruin those ratios.  This will be a pretty quick wrap up with no RazzSlam, no trades, and no standings update.  Don’t worry, I’ll make up for it next week with my final RCL update, which is typically quite an epic.

‘PERTY ‘PERTS

Each week we’ll peek in at our resident ‘perts to see who is laying claim to best “expert” RCLer in the land.  We’ll take notes, check the standings and generally stalk them.  The heading is also hyperlink, so feel free to follow along as we go.

I need to stop declaring teams “out of it”.  Two weeks ago I declared MarmosDad out of the running, only to have him storm back to third place.  Then I corrected myself and said Grey was the cutoff for “out of it”, only to have him toss 100 IP this week, gain 100 strikeouts and a league best 4.5 points to move him to sixth place, just 11 points out of first place!  The race in Perts is crazy this year.  It’s a game of hot potato, and we’re all just hoping when the music stops, we’re the ones sitting in first.  This week, it’s me, thanks to Mike losing three points and me gaining two.  That could all swing in the final week, it’s going to be fun!

WEEKLY LEADERS

The best of the best from the week that was.

R – 65 – Mikelecuyer (RCL 14)

HR –20 – Starfish & Coffee (RCL 19) & Taylors Team (RCL 24)

RBIs – 62 – Tximista (RCL 14)

SB – 20 – bellow (RCL 31)

AVG – .316 – Andy_p (RCL 25)

K – 188 – Vin Sixteen (RCL 16)

W – 10 – TripleBs (COUGS R US), Des Morts-Vivants (ECFBL), & Vin Sixteen (RCL 16)

SV –  9 – cjsullivan3 (RCL 9)

ERA (Min. 40 IP) – 1.20 – Kreplech (RCL 31 ) (in 45 IP)

WHIP (Min. 40 IP) – 0.85 – Mudville Nine (RCL 1) (in 42.1 IP)

As I mentioned, Vin completely crushed the weekly strikeouts record, hitting 188.  If you’re curious, the best ever week was in 2018 when Writer-Wan had 219 strikeouts in a similar attempt to catch-up on innings.  Writer-Wan also set the best ever weekly wins total that week with 17.  Vin led in innings by a long shot, but his pitchers let him down in the win column, clearly.  Bellow tied the weekly high for stolen bases this year with 20.

Some more stats from the week from VinWins:

28 teams had an ERA under 2 and 28 teams were over 6.

5 teams hit under .200 and 18 teams were over .300.

Vin also dug into some of the category races:

It’s looking like There’s a drive into deep left field ( RCL #29 ) will lead in strikeouts with the highest total since 2021 (1754 Team Truss Takeover – RCL 2021 #29) thanks to another big week – 101 K/86.67 IP.

The The (RCL 22) had 4 wins to surpass last year’s total, but now would need 10 this week to break the record of 122. Hey you, Hey! Neo Suarez!!! (RCL #34) has also reached last year’s total of 110.

Vin passed last year’s SB total, and still has the top two teams, but is only three ahead of the 3rd best team.  Vin’s quest for the most steals could come down to the final days!

TEAM OF THE WEEK

Our weekly shout out to the team that killed it the previous week.

Team: TripleBs

League: COUGS R US

Stats:   AVG: .296, R: 47, HR: 13, RBI: 44, SB: 5

IP: 96, ERA: 2.44, WHIP: 1.083, K: 112, W: 10, SV: 4

Summary: For those not familiar, COUGS R US has become the RCL Champions League.  Every season, we take the top 12 teams from the overall standings the previous season and invite them to a league for the best of the best.  If someone passes, or has multiple teams in the top 12, we keep moving down the list.  If you’re around that spot, keep a lookout for an email from me in the weeks after the season ends.  TripleBs’ big week now has him sitting atop this prestigious league.  Tarik Skubal struck out 12 in 12 innings and earned two wins to lead a stellar pitching staff (look at those ratios in all those innings!). Griffin Jax also K’d 12 in 10 scoreless innings and won one of his two starts. Quinn Mathews (1 ER/8 K), Dean Kremer (0 ER/8 K), David Peterson (1 ER/7 K), Joey Cantillo (0 ER/5 K), and Matthew Boyd all earned victories. Emmet Sheehan and Jared Jones each struck out nine. Juan Morillo won two in relief while Grant Taylor had two saves. Brandon Lowe, acquired in a May trade, and Cole Carrigg, a June free agent, paced the offense. Lowe hit .348 with four home runs and eight runs batted in, while Carrigg was even better: .387/3 HR/9 RBI/2 SB. Randy Arozarena had a long ball and a steal, along with seven runs scored. Four players picked up during a week of churning also contributed. Leo Bernal, Alejandro Kirk, Jakob Marsee, and Xander Bogaerts combined to hit 17 for 45 (.378) with eight runs, a homer, and six ribbies.  The big week earned Triple Bs nine points and, as mentioned, moved them from second to first.  Impressive timing!

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