What Should I fix?

[mfsleeze]

Here's why I have empathy, I have had Schmidt on 3 teams this year and he's won 25, 22 and 21 games.

Post the FA hitters for your league and maybe we can pick someone.


And by the way I'm in the league with you where you have the Miller team. I'm the Scarlet Begonias Jr. I didn't appreciate you sweeping me the other day. But since I have two Wrigleys in my division and I built my team to compete with them I can accept it. Good luck in the Division/Wild Card race. I'm just trying to hold close until we get back to divisional play, when I hope to make a big move.

[cummings2]

AHA! I knew mfsleeze was a familiar name...that's right, the Begonias...ufff that's a nasty good team you have there something like 500 runs a bit after the mid point in the season and if memory serves me well you have done pretty good within your division. I'm happy not to get swept when I play against you.

Thanks very much for the help guys I have made a couple of moves, figured I had to act fast because there are only 48 games left in the season and this division is particularily tough (all other teams are over 500, the second place leads the wild card by four games but would be leading any of the other two divisons...hmmm doesn't it always seem we all end up in the toughest divison?

Anyway, this is what I have figured out while looking at numbers a bit more closely:

Strangely enough my record at home is almost 500, on the road I am having a hard time, there is one Shea and one Turner in the league but all other stadiums are neutral or favor RHB. It is true that I face a limited number of lefties in my division and that they are reversed which should limit the damage in my heavy LH lineup BUT in another division I have faced almost 50% lefties and THAT has been nasty on me. And the other division also has a healthy number of lefties in their rotation and pens that have also been nasty on me....at least the one good thing is that in a few series we'll go into divisional play.

In looking more closely at the way the offense has perfomed I noticed two main problems: the OBP you guys pointed out right away and then when I have men on base I have noone to drive them in. On the defensive side maybe it's just been bad luck but Adam Everett's errors (11) accounted for over 85% of my unearned runs... so much for having him for defensive purposes. Then when Amezega subs due to Everett's broken toe nails or hyperextended eyelashes, the team performs quite well defensively.

So with that info in mind I looked for trades but...no dice, not much help there. So I turned to FAs and...very little help there too. Either players were even more injury prone or good SLG low OBP, with far too many #s, which would kill them in Petco...I tried to upgrade 1B and LF as we talked about but I would've really been making changes just for the sake of it because the numbers and cards were fairly close and the defense would've been downgraded...so I opted for upgrading on CF and C.

Here's what we did: Said Bye Bye to Mientkiewicz, let go of BJ Ryan, didn't want to but we needed the salary and he was being a bit wasted in the pen with very little work. Let go of Everett and will play Amezega full time SS, if I am going to have an automatic out for the sake of it's defense I'd rather spend .50M on it as opposed to 2.57 AND from what the numbers showed it might actually not be a steep downgrade in defense. Then let go of Finley, love his defense and pop but he was just hurting the team, in his place I picked up Johnny Damon to top the lineup and help my OBP and speed. I know he has a funky arm and I am downgrading the most important defensive position in the OF but there was really no other choice that was better. Then I decided to take a chance with Mauer, his INJ concerns me with few games left and the posibility of picking up a player that spends most of his time injured but he was the hitter I liked the most for driving the top of my lineup in. So far this changes leave me with the same good Starting Rotation, failry good defense, it upgrades OBP, SLG, AVG, speed and gives a bit more consistency to the lineup. I am trying to upgrade 1B and get a hold of a good OBP good extra bases hitter I think I'll have to let go of a SP for this but I'll only do this through trade, can't really loose more cap.

This is how I have it penciled vs RHP

Lineup vs. RHP

1. Damon, Johnny (L) CF
2. Dejesus, David (L) LF
3. Chavez, Eric (L) 3B
4. Mauer, Joe (L) C
5. Nixon, Trot (L) RF
6. Morneau, Justin (L) DH
7. Erstad, Darin (L) 1B
8. Amezaga, Alfredo (S) SS
9. Reese, Pokey (R) 2B

In OBP/SLG/AVG terms it would go like this (expected #s in parenthesis)
OBP / SLG / AVG
1 Damon (.381) / (.453) / (.308)
2 Dejesus .380 / .450 / .300
3 Chavez .370 / .412 / .215
4 Mauer (.340) / (.490) / (.295)
5 Nixon .389 / .459 / .306
6 Morneau .322 / .482 / .255
7 Erstad .321 / .349 / .265
8 Amezega .222 / .204 / .143
9 Reese .248 / .316 / .203

It's tempting to flip flop Chavez and Nixon because of Nixon higher AVG, OBP and SLG but I figure that chavez's main contribution right now is getting on base and with Mauer, Nixon and Morneau behind him his walks might become productive.

Another question is who to lead off and who to bat second. I like Damon leading off because of his higher number of doubles and Dejesus is a pretty good bunter so the combo has a chance of setting up a sac fly (I am trying to scratch runs out of anywhere by now), another option is to drop Dejesus to 9th, setting up the turn of the order and move Nixon to 2nd and perhaps moving erstad to 5th where his clutch might come into play and help get his numbers up or play Morneau 5th and use his extra bases hopefully with men on.

I am trying to keep Chavez and Mauer on the 3 and 4 slots to help reduce the chances that their neg. clutch will come into play

Well...few changes...way too many words...what'cha think guys?

[cummings2]

Some improvement with my Awattos...swept last night (only the fourth time I've swept this season) but still long way to go to get out of the cellar and little time left in the season.

At least the Horde is in good position I think you are 3 back of first but how are you doing in the wild card?

So what do you think of the moves charlie? You think there's some hope for my Awattos?

[cummings2]

BTW I forgot to mention that the other players in my division are Worrierking, abnerdoubleday and Ineluki...I know that at this point divisional play is my only hope of climbing out of last place but against these guys it looks like it is my highway to 100 losses!

Well we can all learn from a good whooopin'

[CHARLESBELL]

Hey, been out of town the last couple days. Will try to get a look at your changes, but congrats on teh sweep!

[CHARLESBELL]

Ouch, Schmidt takes another tough loss for you last night. Damon is a good pickup to improve OBP vs RHP and should be leadoff as you have him. I love Mauer and use him often, although I tend to use him mostly in hitters parks. Not sure I would have let Everett go - amezaga is still fine defensively but everett at least offered a RH bat.

You are still very vulnerable to reverse RHP and LHP as neither damon or mauer helps that, but it's an improvement and, depending on what the other teams send against you, should get you a few more baserunners. Both have hit well for you so far.

I would still have liked to see you pick up a better closer for ryan - shields is ok but you need more innings out of him than just as closer. I haven't used brower, but a c0 doesn't stretch very far. I still think that if you can swing a low cost c4+ closer and another bat (right handed, good OBP) then I think you would be in better shape, even at the cost of one of those SPs.

The horde swept the first place team last night, got back to .500 at 75-75 and is one game behind. This team bounces back and forth, so its just as likely they'll lose all three tonight, but if the team happens to be on the upswing at the end of the season I just might steal this thing.

[cummings2]

8) 8) 8) :!:

Thanks for the input on my Awattos, agree with your comments 100%...wierd design of a team...weird results, just another learning experience.

BUT the Horde is doin' it...we keep track of it charlie and we like what we see 8)

[CHARLESBELL]

I got that one game lead by winning two from my opponent in our final series, then blew it last night by losing 2 heartbreakers by identical 8-7 scores while my opponent swept his series. Now one game back with 3 left to play. In head to head we are tied 12-12. It's possible the division title could go to a coin toss.

[CHARLESBELL]

Well, on the positive side the team finsihed at .500 on the season, something I didn't think was possible earlier. But after sweeping the first place team to overtake them, horde went 2-4 against the 3rd and 4th place teams and finished one game short. Thanks again for your advice, it did wonders for this team!

[cummings2]

Well, Charlie the Horde made a pretty good run, it was fun following its climb.

Update on my Awattos: since the changes I've gone 15-12 but I lost Eric Chavez and Mags Ordonez for 15 games...If I had held on to them I'd be rifding them for 15 games only to play them for 8-10 games at the end of the season...I felt it best to make the moves and replace them, especially since game 141 was played last night: Replaced Eric Chavez with Randa/Alfonso and Maggs with Jolbert Cabrera. Vs. Lefties Dejesus will play RF and Cabrera LF, not the most ideal OF but he does give me some flexibility in case my inj prone team has more injuries.

Congrats on the great run Charlie!