RCL Update: The Week That Was, Week 1

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:

TOP 10

Typically, this will be a quick view of the top of the Master Standings.  Since it takes a couple weeks to get those up and running, this week we’ll just that a look at the top 10 highest scoring RCL teams based on roto points.  Here’s how it shakes out week 1:

The Yapping Chihuahuas are currently running away with the #1 spot as far as roto points are concerned.  We’ll talk more about them later.  One of my favorite parts about going through all the league and team data is looking at all the league and team names.  Razzamatazzberry League is one of my favorites.  Bottoms Up is currently leading that league by a wide margin.  Tied for 7th we have Admiral Troy from my RCL, DFSers Anonymous and Razzball’s favorite villain commenter, (who is actually a super nice guy) Ra’zbahl Al Ghul.  Ghul is also currently #1 in the competitive ECFBL RCL and that squad is 18th overall.  Congratulate Ghul next time you see him in the comments.  A little further down Prospect Ralph makes an appearance as does RCL regular My Mustache Has A Mustache.

‘PERTY ‘PERTS

Each week we’ll peek in at our resident ‘perts & other industry names to see who is laying claim to best “expert” RCLer in the land.  We’ll take notes, check the standings and generally stalk them.

I mentioned a couple weeks back that once I had it I would link you all to the ‘Perts league.  Well, there you have it.  I’d recommend snooping on that crew regularly.  No offense to the rest of the members, but keep close tabs on Grey, Rudy, Big Magoo and J-FOH.  Those are your masters of the format, look and learn.

Speaking of masters, I wanted to shout out to J-FOH for the killer draft he laid down in this league.  If you want a clinic in how to draft an RCL team, then look no further than right here:

How Anthony Rizzo lasted until pick #11 in an expert league is completely beyond me, but there it is.  Considering I was drafting Rizzo at #4 overall in some leagues, I’m obviously jealous.  To boot, he comes back and nabs one of the eilte 3B in Bryant.  Now we’re cooking.  Rudy, Grey et al are all super high on Justin Upton this season (me too) and then on the way back J-FOH nabs my comeback player of the year choice, Carlos Gomez.  That’s 4 rounds in and we’ve got a slew of power and SB potential.  Time for an ace?  How about Grey, Rudy, Sky and my pick for AL Cy Young, Carlos Carrasco?  Maikel Franco was sneaking up drafts like crazy around this time and anything past pick #60 was pretty solid, grabbing another great corner option at #62 is such a good move.  I’m not going to go pick by pick, but J-FOH absolutely killed this draft.  There’s plenty more power (Khris/Duda), speed (Yelich/Burns) and a slew of fantastic relievers (Britton w/O’Day handcuff/Rondon/Ziegler/Colome).  This season, this is honestly the type of draft I was shooting for.  I was typically targeting Mookie in the 2nd over Bryant, but I’m no quibbler.  I probably wouldn’t have drafted Duda for my UTIL spot at that point either, but that’s really picking nits and trying to keep J-FOH’s ego under control.  If someone asked me what an ideal RCL draft should look like, this is where I would point them.  I’d be nervous if I was ‘Perty Pert, J-FOH’s on a mission.

TRADES

All the trades that have gone down in the past week.  Public ridicule is not only allowed, but encouraged.  You can also find all the RCL trades in our RCL forum, graciously updated by RCL friend, VinWins.

WEEKLY LEADERS

The best of the best from the week that was.

R – 68 – Get You Some Nuky (South Side Titans)

HR –24 – Injury Prone Patients (Diickin Around)

RBIs – 70 – Vin Reich (Riverboat Fantasy) (Nice work Vin!)

AVG – .336 – Team Carner (Baba Booey)

SB – 11 – Team Sullivan (Summer of 69), Memphis Chicks (The Viz vs. The Commenters)

W – 10 – Yapping Chihuahuas (Effectively Hide my Thunder)

K – 137 – Hoboken Squat Cobblers (Brave Frontier)

SV –  12 – Rudy is Booty (Baba Booey) (Who also already has 181 moves on the year)

ERA (Min. 40 IP) – 1.16 – Matz A Ballz (Grey haired sack o balls) (in 46.2 IP)

WHIP (Min. 40 IP) – 0.78 – Up North (Mortals Vs. Beddict) (in 44.2 IP)

TEAM OF THE WEEK

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

Team: Yapping Chihuahuas

League: Effectively Hide my Thunder

Stats:   H/AB: 87/290, AVG: .300, R: 52, HR: 15, RBI: 55, SB: 7

             IP: 70.2, ERA: 2.29, WHIP: 0.92, K: 58, W: 10, SV: 5

Summary:  The Team of the Week something I always enjoyed from back in the Vin days of RCL updates and something I absolutely wanted to bring back.  I love shouting you guys and 6 gals out and giving props where they are deserved.  There’s no set numbers I’m looking for here, just a team that has displayed dominance on both the hitting and pitching side of the equation.  This week is pretty easy, we can look at the top scoring RCL team and clearly see their numbers are superb.  This was a league created by one of our 6 female readers and I dig the league name.  The Yapping Chihuahuas, no doubt a Sparky Anklebiter fan club member, had the 12th pick in the draft and was able to land roto stud, Carlos Correa.  That was followed up by fellow HOU middle infielder, Jose Altuve.  Power and speed, check and check.  The next two picks for the Yappers were Chris Sale and Jake Arrieta, setting themselves up nicely there and explaining the insane ratios thus far.  What’s especially scary about this team is it’s only going to get better.  Brantley, Gattis and Kang are all currently on the DL for the Chihuahuas.  What a way to ride out those DL stints by being the #1 RCL team week 1.  Congrats to the Chihuahuas, hopefully they can keep it up.