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 Razzball Commenter Leagues in the week that was, week 4:
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.
Since we last left our heroes Big Magoo has kept his stranglehold on first place while everyone else tries their best to run him down. Just for good measure, Magoo tacked on an extra 2.5 points this week while Team McLeod remained idle with 84 points. Good for Tim McLeod for hanging in there so far. It’s cool to see an outsider, who is maybe not as fluent in the format as the Razzball crew, doing well here. Tim has only used 8 moves on the year too. Meanwhile Grey has made 92. I’m not sure Tim can keep up the 2nd place standing when making so few moves, but it will be fun to see how long it lasts.
The biggest point gain this week in the ‘Perts league came from Mr. Grey Albright himself. Albright clawed his way out of the despicable position of dead last and now sits happily in 6th place following an 18.5 point gain. Call it trade karma? Well, Prospector Ralph was the week’s second biggest point gainer with 14 points of his own. Is it possible their trade was *GASP* a win-win!? By the by, in case you somehow missed the fracas, I’m referring to the trade Grey and Ralph made last week, it will appear below in the “TRADES” section. Ralph now occupies 4th place, up from 9th last week. Nice work Grey and Ralph! On the negative side, we have J-FOH who flip-flopped spots with Ralph after losing 13.5 points this week. Ouch.
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 | Simply Fred | ECFBL | 108.8 | 105.5 | 104 | 106.2 |
| 2 | Team Bender | Emasculating Throat Lozenges | 104.9 | 109.5 | 99 | 102.8 |
| 3 | Breaking Balls | DeadPool | 103.2 | 105 | 99 | 102.5 |
| 4 | Team Sullivan | Rosterbators Anonymous | 102.9 | 104.5 | 99 | 103.7 |
| 5 | Guy Montag | Be About Yo` Paper | 102.5 | 102 | 101 | 101.2 |
| 6 | Ra’zbahl Al Ghul | ECFBL | 101.1 | 99 | 104 | 97.7 |
| 7 | Straight Outta Omaha | All Summer Long | 100.8 | 98.5 | 102 | 100.9 |
| 8 | A Man Named Brady | Dropped Third Strike | 100.2 | 98 | 102 | 99.8 |
| 9 | Yapping Chihuahuas | Effectively Hide my Thunder | 99.8 | 101 | 99 | 99.4 |
| 10 | The Education of Dr Z | Take on the JayWrong 3 | 99.7 | 101.5 | 100 | 97.6 |
I think I just heard Simply Fred yawn from his perch atop the overall standings. It’s yet another week on the top of the heap for Fred who now enjoys a 3+ point lead over Team Bender who moved from 4th to 2nd this week. Breaking Balls, last week’s runner up slips to third this week while Straight Outta Omaha falls from 3rd to 7th. Team Sullivan picked up one spot this week as does Ra’zbahl Al Ghul. the Yapping Chihuahuas lost one spot and The Education of Dr. Z holds steady at 10th overall. That means Barry Fette and Eaton p*ssy or Eaton dong fall out of the top 10 and are replaced by Guy Montag (who debuts in the top 10 at #5 overall, up from #12 last week) and A Man Named Brady, who I can only hope is actually Tom Brady.
TRADES
All the trades that have gone down in the past week. Public ridicule is not only allowed, but encouraged.
| DATE | LEAGUE | TRADE |
| 4/25/2016 | DFSers Anonymous | Samuel Colt Debate Team traded Randal Grichuk to Wacha Wacha for David Peralta |
| 4/25/2016 | Razzball `Perty `Perts | Ralph Lifshitz traded Eric Hosmer and Wade Davis to Team Albright for Nomar Mazara and Todd Frazier |
| 4/26/2016 | Cougs R Us | Team Sheridan traded Brad Ziegler, Michael Conforto and Stephen Piscotty to The Grand Dudapest Hotel for Kolten Wong, Steven Souza Jr. and Trevor Rosenthal |
| 4/27/2016 | DFSers Anonymous | Butterfly Pimp traded Daniel Murphy, Giancarlo Stanton and Jake Odorizzi to Go Team Ventura! for Brian Dozier, Clayton Kershaw and Vince Velasquez |
| 4/27/2016 | Muscle Car Fanatics | Silver Streakers traded Kevin Pillar to Up North2 for Francisco Rodriguez |
| 4/28/2016 | ECFBL | El Macho Borracho traded Edwin Encarnacion and Francisco Rodriguez to Team AL KOHLIC for Brett Gardner, Dallas Keuchel and Kris Bryant (El Macho Borracho dropped Zack Cozart) |
| 4/28/2016 | High Heat | Butte Invaders traded Chris Davis, Dallas Keuchel and Kyle Seager to Kiermaier 5wars for Josh Donaldson and Lucas Giolito (Kiermaier 5wars dropped Joey Gallo) |
| 4/28/2016 | Razzball `Perty `Perts | Negative and I’m A Meat Popsicle traded Carlos Gonzalez to Yahoo DDD for Denard Span and Jake McGee |
| 4/29/2016 | DFSers Anonymous | Chicago Mark traded A.J. Pollock*, Manny Machado and Pedro Alvarez to Matt Truss223 for Brandon Belt, Glen Perkins* and Starlin Castro (Matt Truss223 dropped Mark Lowe) |
| 4/29/2016 | Take on the Jaywrong 5 | Just Here For The Beer traded Anthony Rendon and Jean Segura to Slippin Jimmy for Corey Seager (Slippin Jimmy dropped Brock Holt) |
| 4/30/2016 | ECFBL | Nine Pound Hammer traded Anthony Rendon and Marcell Ozuna to The Hippos for Christian Yelich and Joe Panik |
The top RCLs were getting busy in the trade market this week. Apparently the 4th week of the season is the week to let it fly. We had two trades in ECFBL (LCI: 104), three in DFSers Anonymous (LCI: 103), one in Cougs R Us (LCI:103) and two in the ‘Perts League (LCI:102). Dallas Keuchel, Francisco Rodriguez and Anthony Rendon each were moved twice this week and have both underperformed so far. I like the buy-low by Kiermaier 5wars though, turning Josh Donaldson into Chris Davis, Kyle Seager and Dallas Keuchel. If you’re going to trade your stud, you should at least do so by getting back some quality depth. I think getting Giancarlo for Kershaw in an RCL is a real coup, nice work Go Team Ventura. I think Triple-D just raked JB over the coals for a mediocre closer and a “meh” Denard Span. McGee is only so-so as closers go and while I understand closers go at a premium in RCLs, this seems excessive. Denard is just so yawnstipating, I can’t get excited about him. CarGo, of course is always a threat to miss time, but I’m willing to take on that risk in this format just for his upside in Coors while he’s on the field. There’s a reason CarGo was a consensus 5th rounder and Jake McGee and Denard Span we drafted after pick #150. Not much has changed for me in 4 weeks time with these players. Nice work DDD and for shame JB, for shame. Yours truly was involved in two deals this week as well. I love trading, so expect to see my teams in this report often. I was especially giddy to receive Manny Machado this week, and if he somehow finagles SS eligibility amidst the JJ Hardy injury, I’ll be completely ecstatic. My other trade with frequent commenter, MauledByPandas, was more of a “Hey, I’ve got this ball of rolled up, hardened rubber cement, I’ll trade you for that knotted up yo-yo” type of deal.
WEEKLY LEADERS
The best of the best from the week that was.
R – 62 – The Schmohawks (Original Recipe 2016)
HR –23 – The Schmohawks (Original Recipe 2016)
RBIs – 64 – The Schmohawks (Original Recipe 2016)
AVG – .353 – Jameson and Corned Beef (Mighty Minions)
SB – 15 – All Autopick All The Time (Grey haired sack o balls)
W – 11 – Jake from state farm (Myers Superfoods)
K – 109 – A**y’s Fish Fry (The Heat Is On)
SV – 13 – Reverse Cowgill (Enemies of Beddict)
ERA (Min. 40 IP) – 1.15 – Dusty BagTagger (Rosterbators Anonymous) (in 54.2 IP)
WHIP (Min. 40 IP) – 0.84 – Up North (Mortals Vs. Beddict) (in 45.1 IP)
Welcome to the Schmohawk show! That’s an impressive week leading 3 of the 5 offensive categories in all the RCL land. Nice to see Jake from State Farm is alive and well, but he still sounds hideous. This is Up North’s 2nd appearance on this list as the weekly RCL WHIP leader. That will happen when you have Kershaw, deGrom and Rodon on your pitching staff. Up north might have to jump into the stream pretty soon though. Only having 16 GS is a little under-pace.
TEAM OF THE WEEK
Our weekly shout out to the team that killed it the previous week.
Team: The Warlord
League: High Heat
Stats: H/AB: 96/331, AVG: .290, R: 57, HR: 19, RBI: 63, SB: 5
IP: 78.1, ERA: 2.18, WHIP: 1.06, K: 71, W: 5, SV: 4
Summary: You might think with all the category-leading The Schmohawks did that they would have been this week’s TOW. However, The Warlord kept pace nicely on the offensive side and had an even more impressive pitching performance. The Warlord was carried this week by their first and second round picks, Nolan Arenado and Miguel Cabrera while also getting help from Zombino…with Vetard Strength?…Robinson Cano. Jordan Zimmerman, Julio Teheran and Rick Porcello helped offset Zack Greinke’s awfulness and helped The Warlord to a great week. It could have been a depressing week with the loss of Carlos Carrasco, but now, The Warlords can sit back and wait for Carlos to return while riding the wave of plentiful fantasy stats.
