The prospects are coming, the prospects are coming!  What fun the end of week 16 brought.  I, for one, was so excited that I happened to catch the news on Twitter of Manuel Margot being pulled in the 4th inning of his game that I totally whiffed on the David Dahl news.  Turns out Manny Margot just had a bum foot…awesome.  Now these Hippos are almost entirely Dahl-less in the RCLs.  That makes me sad.  As of this writing Dahl is owned in 75% of leagues and if he stays with the club through this week and makes it back to Coors still on the roster, I could see that number growing pretty quickly.  Alex Bregman also got the call, but he was already stashed in most leagues.  In fact, he’s only available in three leagues as of now.  Those three leagues are clearly asleep at the wheel.  Trea Turner is doing his thing and all his owners are happy to see he’s not getting Dusty’d…yet.  With Nomar Mazara, Wilson Contreras, Tim Anderson and Max Kepler also out there making an impact, it’s been quite the season for the rookies so far.  Let’s see who out there is putting these rooks to good use and what else transpired in the week that was, Week 16:

Despite it only being a three day work week for us fantasy baseballers, there’s no rest for the weary here at RCL HQ.  We’re still here, crunching the numbers and cranking out standings for you all.  Many of you took advantage of the time with no games to do some self-reflecting.  Looking inward you identified your team’s weaknesses and set about addressing them.  Like any good rehabilitation process, you’ve come to terms with your team’s issues and now it’s time to fix them.  After only eight trades last week there were eighteen this week.  Looks like you all are gearing up for that second half run.  Let’s take a look at those trades and what else happened in RCLs in the shortened week that was, week 15.

Have you seen your family today?  They’ve missed you.  Spend the next couple days convincing them you’re in good health and that it’s fantasy baseball that has kept you away all this time, not a crazy, religious cult that demanded you move into a hut in the woods and live off wild mushrooms.  We’re at the unofficial halfway point and it’s time to take a breather, reflect, regroup and get back to the grind on Friday.  Maybe you can visit the Fantasy Golf section of the site and dabble in some PGA DFS for The Open.  Say “hi” to Joe, he gets lonely over there from time to time.  Speaking of lonely, it’s lonely at the top and that’s where Cram It remains for another week.  This guy is a machine.  He has now dispatched of fellow frequent commenter, MauledByPandas, who had been his closest league competition and is now fending off one of our five female readers, frequent commenter, MuneForNothing.  By “fending off” I mean, keeping a healthy twelve point cushion as he steamrolls us.  At this point, we’re all just his little helpers, keeping that LCI high so Crammy can stay at the top of the Master Standings…I feel so used.  Kick back with that knitting project you left collecting dust in March and let’s check out the other RCL goings on in the week that was, Week 14.

Here we are, it’s the halfway point of the season, lucky week 13.  There are 26 weeks in this fantasy season, so while the All Star Break marks the unofficial halfway point, this week is the true halfway mark.  The halfway point this year looks a lot like the end of the season last year with familiar friend Cram It leading the RCL Master Standings, albeit, in a different league.  A virtual tip of the cap goes out to Cram It, it’s no easy feat topping all these nut jobs and here he is doing it twice.  At the official halfway point we also had our first team eclipse the 180 Games Started mark.  With 182 Games Started, Calgary Cannons, take a bow.  The Cannons can now go about stacking relief pitchers in search of saves (53), ratio help (4.11 ERA, 1.31 WHIP), and improving that K/9 (7.9).  Their 89 wins might move up to around 100 or so, but with teams like the Yapping Chihuahuas out there with 62 wins and 86 GS left, it’s not very likely to hold up.  As everyone is slowly recovering from their Independence Day long weekends, let’s take a look at what else happened in the week that was, week 13:

Congratulations go out this week to the league members of Cougs R Us.  We’re all Cougs R Us kids after all.  I wouldn’t have guessed that it would be possible for three league members to all be inside the top 10 overall in the Master Standings, but by golly, they’ve done it!  Team Frost leads the way with a 101.5.  Next up is Team Bromelia, who despite being behind Fatuous Jeffreys in the league standings with 95.5 points (compared to Jeffreys 97), is ahead of them by 0.3 RCL points in the Master Standings.  These strong scores along with a great LCI of 104 have placed these three Cougs kids into the top 10 overall.  Impressive stuff.

Five leagues currently hold the top LCI of 104.  They are, in no particular order, Cougs R Us, ECFBL, FCL, Night of the Living Zombinos and the ‘Perty Perts league.  I’m impressed with the ‘Perts league index.  Typically the ‘Perts league has been a total pushover, full of mostly dead teams with only a few teams fighting it out ‘til the end.  It’s early yet and there’s a long season of Tehol’s stats yet to be compiled (or not compiled rather) but it will be fun to see if the ‘Perts can hold on.  FCL and ECFBL are no strangers to the top LCI leaderboard.  These leagues finished 1-2 last year with FCL (112) dethroning a long run of ECFBL (110) holding the title of “Most Competitive RCL”.  Keep fighting the good fight everyone, keep those LCIs high.  Let’s see what else what down in the RCLs in the week that was, week 12:

Eleven weeks are in the books and the Master Standings have had a major shake-up.  Poe Dameron, fresh off of destroying the Starkiller, has zapped Cram It’s star and taken over first place overall.  Poe has been in or right around the top 10 overall for the past 3 weeks, but made a big push this week.  Poe gained 3.5 points in the league, The Force Awakens and the league as a whole increased its LCI from 100 to 101.  Cram didn’t rest on his laurels while in the #1 overall spot this week either, Poe really earned the top spot.  Cram also gained 3.5 points this week in the high LCI league, DFSers Anonymous.  However, the overall numbers for Poe were enough to push them over Cram.  Both teams are sitting at 80 Games Started, which makes comparisons easy.  Despite having about 50 less IP than Cram, Poe has almost the same number of strikeouts.  The K/9 is strong with this one.  If Poe can pick up the middle reliever streaming a bit, those strikeout numbers could really soar.  Saves and ERA are very close between the two top teams.  Poe has the edge in Wins while Cram has the advantage in WHIP.  Only 0.2 RCL Points separate these two and we’ll keep an eye on them come next week.  Here’s what else went down in the RCLs in the week that was, week 11: