Are you feeling a little like Jose Bautista as the page turns to week 6 of the fantasy baseball season?  Perhaps you aren’t sure where you are, how you got there and/or where you’re going.  Dazed, confused, you look around for someone to hold you up.  Oh good, there’s Adrian Beltre, he’ll keep me from falling down.  Pretend to hold me back while I shake this off, would ya.  With any luck you’re more on the Rougned Odor side of things and you’re landing a mean right hook on the rest of your league.  Most of us are probably Sam Dyson though.  We’re lurking in the background, just waiting to spear tackle Russell Martin.  Underrated and underpublicized, we’ll be there in the end when it matters with a big play, hopefully ending on top.  Grey is surely feeling a bit like Joey Bats this week after taking a mean punch in the grill from Rudy.  He’s icing his ‘stache as we speak.  Rudy is picking his ‘fro and giving JB the business.  Punches were thrown all over the Razzball Commenter Leagues this week.  Jump on down with me and see who else landed haymakers in the week that was, week 6.

Welcome to the recap of week five.  Week five already, that doesn’t seem possible.  Five, as in the number of feet tall Jose Altuve is.  The numbers this little man is putting up don’t seem possible either.  After the 5th week of the season Altuve has 30 Runs (tied for first), 9 HRs (tied for 9th), 19 RBIs (still pretty amazing for a leadoff hitter), 13 stolen bases (most in the league), and a .325 batting average.  In week 5 alone his drafters got 2 HRs and 4 SBs.  I mentioned how Bryce Harper was a roto wet dream a few weeks back, but Altuve is making his 10 HRs/5 SBs look like pocket change.  The best part for his drafters is they didn’t need a top 3 pick to nab him.  Altuve had an RCL ADP of 10.79.  He was taken as high as 4th overall by the *ahem* “Goat F*ckers” of Albright’s ECougarHarmony.com (great league name, questionable team name) and fell to as low as 18 where “cardinals # !” nabbed him in Razzballero2.  Grabbing Altuve around pick 11 likely meant you could pair him with a power hitter such as Miggy, Abreu, Bautista, Chris Davis, or is you were lucky, Kris Bryant.  That sure seems like a pretty nice start right about now.  It got me to thinking, I wonder what impact drafting Altuve has had on the standings position.  So, employing the help of the ever helpful VinWins we set about figuring out the average standings position of those teams that drafted Jose Altuve.  The result?  Glad you asked!  Those teams that drafted Jose Altuve are currently on average in 5.88th place, we’ll call it 6th.  They are also averaging about 68.5 standings points.  Not too shabby, you certainly could be doing worse.  By comparison, Mike Trout drafters are averaging 6.34th place and 65.84 points.  As luck would have it our brand spanking new #1 team in all the RCL land was a drafter of Jose Altuve themselves, at #13 overall.  They paired him with…Clayton Kershaw of course!  Want to find out more about our new #1 team?  Then come on down and check out the rest of the week that was, week 5.

What a week week 4 was, especially for those RCLers who drafted Dee Gordon.  Gordon had an ADP of 21.35 for our RCLs and never made it past the middle of the third round in any RCL draft.  What a rude thing to awaken to Saturday morning.  Sleeping off that Friday night fun, Gordon owners woke around noon on Saturday to see their (possibly) lone source of stolen bases will be out for half a season.  So what is an RCLer to do?  With the inability to DL him, you’re either forced to drop him, or let him burn a very valuable roster spot for 3 months.  I highly doubt anyone would trade anything of value for him at this point.  When he does come back will he be rusty?  Will he be PED free and back to hitting just above the Mendoza line?  How many bases can he steal in the final 60 games and will that be worth the wasted roster spot?  The way I turn and burn my roster, I say absolutely not.  Give me Rajai Davis on days he plays and the streaming middle infield of Alcides Escobar, Danny Santana and Jonathan Villar to make up the difference and let someone else be hogtied with Dee for half the year.  It’s a darn shame that a batting title is now tainted over this, but there’s really hardly any downside for Dee here.  He got paid, a guaranteed contract, and that’s worth whatever shade is thrown his way now.  Sure, he loses about 5 million of that contract to the suspension, but that’s hardly a deterrent when there’s another 45 million that’s all but in the bank.  It’s too bad and it’s also too bad that not a peep of this was known about before now.  Dee allegedly tested positive during spring training.  If any hint of that had leaked, at least fantasy drafters would have something to go on and possibly avoid him.  Instead, they’re left high and dry.  This is a pretty big suspension for league dynamics everywhere and I wouldn’t be surprised if the likes of Billy Hamilton and Jarod Dyson are traded for a premium over the next couple weeks.  Here’s what else happened in the RCLs this in the week that was, week 4:

What an opening week.  It’s so great to have baseball back and to be back to the RCL grind.  Are you slugging your way to the top of your league via Trevor Story?  Maybe you’ve Edinson Volquez’d yourself to the front of the pack instead.  Either way, I hope your roto points floweth over.  Kyle Schwarber owners, (I had 1 share just for SsNGs) I send my condolences.  Mike Trout and Zack Greinke owners, the support group meeting is tonight at 7 in the basement of the town library.  I’ll bring the Cracker Jack, you bring the Big League Chew and we’ll have a prayer octagon.  

Already the RCL battle has been waged on the waiver wire as the race to grab the top up and coming prospects is in full sprint.  In just the first week we’ve seen Max Kepler, Mallex Smith and the top prize, Nomar Mazara all called up to the show.  Kepler is yet to crack the lineup, but 4 teams have decided to make the stash.  52 teams are hoping Mallex Smith can give them some sweet, sweet SAGNOF.  So far, there’s just been a hit, a run and a caught stealing that ended in a nasty forehead gash, but the speed is real.  Then there’s Mazara, who made his presence felt ASAP with a dinger (1 more than Mike Trout!) in his first game.  As of Monday morning he was scooped up in 84 of 85 leagues.  The 85th league is 12 Matthew Berrys running Razzball recon, so they hardly count.  This year’s rookie class has a lot to live up to after last year’s rookie nookie, but they’re getting and early jump.  Speaking of jumps, let’s take a look at which RCL teams are getting early jumps on their league standings: