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:
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. Click the heading above to check out the ‘Perts League home page and follow along.
J-FOH’s been on my case two weeks running for writing my rundown “too early”. We take the snapshot Monday morning for the week’s Master Standings and all the stat goodness that goes into the RCL Update. If your team makes a big jump Monday night, well, that’s too bad, you’ll have to hold on until the following Monday if you want your glory. Well, low and behold, J-FOH finally held on for a Monday morning! J-FOH was the biggest points gainer and made the biggest leap in the ‘Perts League standings this week. His squad added eight points and jumped up three spots to land in 3rd place. Prospector Ralph wasn’t about to give up his spot to Jack and added seven points of his own to bump himself into 2nd, six points ahead of J-FOH and seven points behind league leader, Team McLeod. Big Magoo took the biggest tumble this week, losing three points and falling into 4th place. Grey and Rudy each lost 2.5 points this week and now sit in 8th and 7th respectively.
TOP 10
For those too lazy to check the MASTER STANDINGS, I present to you, the current top 10
| RK | TEAM | LEAGUE | RCL PTS | LG PTS | LG INDEX | MASTER PTS |
| 1 | Cram It | DFSers Anonymous | 106.5 | 105.5 | 103 | 102.3 |
| 2 | Fatuous Jeffreys | Cougs R Us | 105 | 102 | 104 | 101.9 |
| 3 | Team Lion | South Side Titans | 104.4 | 103 | 101 | 103.9 |
| 4 | You had to make it weird | Nico Sux Dico | 104.1 | 106 | 100 | 102.6 |
| 5 | Backdoor Sliders 1 | FCL | 103.4 | 101 | 104 | 100.2 |
| 6 | T 1000 | RCL 1000 | 103 | 100 | 101 | 104.9 |
| 7 | Team Bromelia | Cougs R Us | 102.4 | 95.5 | 104 | 103.4 |
| 8 | Team Frost | Cougs R Us | 102.1 | 98 | 104 | 100.3 |
| 9 | Poe Dameron | The Force Awakens | 102 | 102 | 101 | 100 |
| 10 | Chicken Shack | American Dream | 100.8 | 101 | 100 | 100.3 |
As mentioned above, Cram It remains atop the heap for another week. Fatuous Jeffreys takes over the lead in Cougs R Us and therefore leads the trio of members who all remain in the top 10. Team Lion, who just so happens to be the team that benefitted from the Betts/Desmond for Harper/Sale/Chapman trade last week jumps up from 11th last week to 3rd overall this week. You had to make it weird moves from 6th to 4th this week, nice work weird. Backdoor Sliders 1 has been in and out of the top 10 this year and jumps back in this week. T1000 remains for another week as does Poe Dameron. Finally, it was Chicken Shack that made a big jump this week from 22nd last week to a debut in the top 10 at 10th overall.
TRADES
All the trades that have gone down in the past week. Public ridicule is not only allowed, but encouraged.
| DATE | LEAGUE | TRADE |
| 6/26/16 | FOHs Fantasy Funride | Rusty Trumbo traded John Lackey to Vin and FOH Show for Sam Dyson |
| 6/26/16 | Great Knocks | Diamond Dragons traded Matt Harvey and Robbie Grossman to Team Montesanto for Roberto Osuna and Ryan Madson |
| 6/26/16 | Trout Mask Replica | Pimpin’ Flyouts traded Rougned Odor to Principal Blackman for Steven Matz |
| 6/27/16 | Effectively Hide my Thunder | CarCar GoGo traded Matt Wieters to Man or Stroman? for Chris Archer |
| 6/27/16 | Hey Ladies! Get Funky | I Was Saying Booher traded Evan Gattis to Vin and Jack Hate for Josh Harrison |
| 6/29/16 | Cougs R Us | A bunch of f—ing nerds traded Addison Reed, Brian Dozier and Kyle Hendricks to Team Sheridan for Arodys Vizcaino, Ben Zobrist and Brad Boxberger* |
| 6/29/16 | Mortals Vs. Beddict | Muskogee Wharf Rats traded Jeanmar Gomez, Jon Lester, Mark Trumbo and Neil Walker to R to The Izzo for Jean Segura and Starling Marte (R to The Izzo dropped Brandon Moss and Tyler Thornburg) |
| 6/29/16 | Razzball `Perty `Perts | Ralph Lifshitz traded Todd Frazier to Team Albright for Jose Abreu |
| 6/29/16 | South Side Titans | Enter Xandman traded Adam Jones to Sippin’ on Gin Andrus for Jacob deGrom |
| 6/30/16 | All Hail Beddict Tha God | Grey’s Balls traded John Lackey to Team Levy for David Robertson |
| 6/30/16 | Be About Yo’ Paper | Deuce Caboose traded Masahiro Tanaka to Team Cheesesteaks for Chris Archer and Will Harris (Deuce Caboose dropped Carlos Estevez) |
| 6/30/16 | ECFBL | The Hippos traded Marcell Ozuna and Trevor Rosenthal to ThrowTheHeat Meat for David Robertson (ThrowTheHeat Meat dropped Eugenio Suarez) |
| 7/1/16 | Cougs R Us | Mr Robot traded Jeremy Jeffress to Rookie Monsters for Carlos Gomez |
| 7/2/16 | JB’s RCL | Case of the Goldschmidts traded Jeremy Jeffress and Jonathan Villar to J B for Corey Seager (J B dropped Jimmy Nelson) |
| 7/2/16 | Razzball `Perty `Perts | Negative and I’m A Meat Popsicle traded David Price to Team Albright for Chris Archer and Steve Cishek |
| 7/2/16 | Riverboat Fantasy | HappyLooking VikingDude traded Jose Fernandez to Ill Will Phil Hill for Adrian Gonzalez, Christian Yelich and Miguel Sano (HappyLooking VikingDude dropped Ender Inciarte and Jonathan Broxton) |
| 7/3/16 | Be About Yo’ Paper | Coffee is for Closers traded Ian Desmond, Khris Davis and Santiago Casilla to Midnight Ramblers for Miguel Cabrera (Midnight Ramblers dropped Brandon Phillips and Prince Fielder) |
| 7/3/16 | Riverboat Fantasy | Ill Will Phil Hill traded Brandon Crawford and Lorenzo Cain* to Mutant Atomic Supermen for Michael Pineda (Mutant Atomic Supermen dropped David Hernandez) |
In what can only be described as “Closerpocalypse hysteria” it seems like every trade this week involved a closer, myself included. John Lackey was traded twice for a closer this week, once for Sam Dyson and once for David Robertson. Count me in the David Robertson camp there, that’s an impressive get. I, myself, panicked upon Trevor Rosenthal’s demotion and swapped him and Marcell Ozuna for David Robertson. Maybe an overpay, but saves have eluded me in ECFBL and I stand to gain a bit of ground in that category, I can’t be waiting around for Rosenthal to get his shizz together and/or another closer to magically fall from the waiver wire sky…darn you Brandon Maurer! Anyone else panic over losing Rosenthal and/or Fernando Rodney this week? Did you capitalize on gaining Oh or Maurer and make a move of your own? Do tell.
Besides closers, Ill Will Phil Hill must have really, really wanted Michael Pineda as he traded recently DL’d Lorenzo Cain and Brandon Crawford for him. Pineda was on waivers in almost all of my leagues just 2 weeks ago. Lorenzo Cain…well, he wasn’t.
WEEKLY LEADERS
The best of the best from the week that was.
R – 79 – Ford Pinto’s (Muscle Car Fanatics)
HR –25 – Calmer Than You Are (Dropped Third Strike) & Ford Pinto’s (Muscle Car Fanatics)
RBIs – 80 – Rusty Trumbo (FOHs Fantasy Funride)
AVG – .366 – Apollo Burning Stars (Prospecter Ralph’s Cavern)
SB – 16 – Dizzy Dreams (American Dream)
W – 10 – Team doormatts (Take on the JayWrong #4)
K – 106 – Calgary Cannons (Razzballero1)
SV – 13 – AK FortySevens (Night of the Living Zombinos)
ERA (Min. 40 IP) – 1.56 – Summah’ Dawgs (Original Recipe 2016) (in 52 IP)
WHIP (Min. 40 IP) – 0.89 – Hall of Shamers (Center Field) (in 40.2 IP)
New weekly marks were set this week in Runs and RBIs. Both records were previously held by Kid A back in week 9. That week Kid A had 74 Runs and 73 RBIs. Both marks fell by a hefty margin this week though. Dizzy Dreams has had an impressive couple of weeks with what must be slams and legs and all over the place. Last week they co-led all RCL teams with 22 homers, this week, they lead all teams in stolen bases with 16. Nice work Dizzy!
TEAM OF THE WEEK
Our weekly shout out to the team that killed it the previous week.
Team: Kid A
League: FCL
Stats: H/AB: 118/357, AVG: .331, R: 63, HR: 19, RBI: 75, SB: 9
IP: 58.2, ERA: 3.07, WHIP: 1.24, K: 65, W: 2, SV: 10
Summary: While Kid A’s Original Recipe team fell off the weekly leaderboard, his FCL team had the last laugh this week. Kid is adept at finding every last AB for his RCL teams, a must to compete in this format. Therefore, when his teams put it all together for a week, it’s a very good week. You can see by the numbers and the 357 ABs what I mean. His FCL team this week actually beat his Original Recipe team’s record of 73 RBIs, it just wasn’t quite enough to hold the record. Still, it’s not a week to scoff at and it moved him up to 47th overall in the Master Standings. Still, he’s looking up at Backdoor Sliders and he’ll need a few more strong weeks to make a dent in that league lead. Get on it Kid!
