Day 255: At Least There Were No No-Nos [Beer League Roundup Week 8]

What’s up, Beer Leaguers? It’s me, the interim commish, the Coze, the only one of you that has to work before 3 on Memorial Day, so let’s cut to the chase. We survived an entire week without having a no-hitter! Give your offense a round of applause! If only this could happen a few more times, we could go back to something resembling normalcy. Despite the pitcher ineptitude, the league average in ERA actually dropped from the week before, no matter how hard I tried to inflate it. So what happened last week? How was there two upsets? And how in the hell is Joe back in first place? Let’s talk about it.

Cheese Whiz made a platter out of US2 Onion Melter, 10-3

I would call this matchup the “Philly Cheesesteak Bowl”, but honestly, that sounds disgusting. Even if it was a bread bowl. So I guess I’ll have to call it “Random Matchup Between Two Teams Whose Names Combine To Make A Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich”, or RMBTTWNCTMAPCS. And just like a Philly Cheesesteak, the RMBTTWNCTMAPCS had really soggy bread as a result of all the steak grease. That results in a huge mess that gets all over your fingers and then you have to do the walk of shame to get a fork. Stolen bases are just like runny steak grease. Your sandwich would be inedible without it, but if you let it run wild, it gets in the way of the other good stuff. Amanda led the league with 10 stolen bags, which convinced both teams that small ball was the way to play. In effect, their week was very lackluster in terms of dingers, ribeyes and OPS. How can the RMBTTWNCTMAPCS be lacking in ribeyes?!? That’s got me thinking that their collective cheesesteak is made out of Tofurkey. And while Tofurkey Philly Cheesesteaks are good every now and then, they get old real, real quick. Both figuratively and physically.

Team 2 Be Named L8er sk8ed up and down the BQE Gongshow, 8-6

In sports fandom, we all know how terrible a slump feels. Your entire team’s injured, your ace shits the bed constantly to the point that he has to sleep on an air mattress and no matter how hard they try, eeking out a win just seems utterly hopeless. After having a particularly bad week myself, I was elated to see that Rachel finally got out of her own slump. Her team scrapped together a win somehow and I’m here to soak in the good vibes. Joc Pederson and Joey Gallo busted their way out of the basement, reminding the world that they’re two of the most dangerous lefties in the game. She got stellar performances out of Max Scherzer and the entire Mets rotation, garnering a disgusting 0.89 WHIP. Hell, even Marcel Ozuna got an RBI for her before busting up his hand, choking his wife in front of cops and going to jail for presumably 3 years. How nice of him to contribute! That’s not to say that PK didn’t try his hardest, which he did. At the end of the week, it was a wild roller coaster of a matchup that left both participants feeling somewhat okay about themselves. In fantasy baseball, that’s the best case scenario!

House of Brews served Dollar Dogs, 7-6

Paul’s offense is so good, it’s offensive. And most of them seemingly had a week. Tatis knocked in 10 ribeyes, all of them probably in the 9th inning or later. Jose Abreu is looking to defend his AL MVP title. Adolis Garcia is looking like a Rookie of the Year shoo-in, which makes me sad that I once had him and dropped him after 3 days. And when your offense is as good as his, all you have to do is win one measly pitching stat and the week is yours. He’s got the formula down to a tee. Which means just tough luck for Kaitlyn, whose pitching staff was un-fucking-stoppable. 5 of her boys combined to throw 34 scoreless innings. You should probably pick up your jaw before bugs fly in. She led the league in both innings pitched and WHIP. Let that shit sink in. How is that even possible? What kind of witchcraft could it be? It’s called having the best pitching staff in the league and catching them on a week where they were all on-point at the same time. But that’s much too long. We’ll just call it awesome. That’s much more succinct.

GusPolinski’s Hotdog Crown Chi had a day on against the Connecticut Rainbows, 9-4

This was a milquetoast win for Boscoe. He beat up on the punching bag for a little bit, got tired, had a fruit punch Gatorade and went back to punching, fueled by fruit punch. Cool story, bruh. Even though he won decisively, he still garnered the league’s worst stats in Runs and Stolen Bases. Meanwhile, Dave’s Autodraft Squad had 7 stats in the league’s cellar. It was a slop-fest all around. Anyways, here’s Werewolves Of London:

GERALD’S® FRAUDS scammed Tommy Lasoda, 10-3

I straight up was not having a good time. I always envisioned the rivalry between Joe and I to be much akin to the Dodgers and Giants. The elements are in place for a tangible rivalry, but in recent years, it hasn’t fully panned out. While Joe has been floundering and rebuilding, I’ve been a perennial bridesmaid and once a bride. But now the tables have turned. Suddenly, Joe and the Giants are making something out of nothing. And I don’t find it coincidental that his team name is the Frauds while all year, people have been accusing the Giants of being frauds. But that would all be laid to rest this week, as I faced Joe at the same time that the Dodgers had a weekend series against the Giants. And the results were…completely fucking parallel. Much like the Dodgers, my achilles heel was my unusually atrocious pitching. Only two of my 6 streams had a solid outing. Blake Snell needs to be shot into the sun. My ERA was 6.82, the worst of the season by a mile. The second worst ERA of the year was Kelsey in week 4 and I still have an entire point on her. It almost seems like I tried to be the absolute worst. And no matter how hard my offense tried, I couldn’t catch up. Just like the Dodgers. I take full blame in allowing Joe to be in 1st place again. If you’ll excuse me, I need to go cry in a corner.

RBI’d 4 Her Pleasure out-dueled Batting Cages, 7-6

And that brings us to the upset of the week. Bryan let his newfound success get to his head and he immediately humpty-dumptied out of first place. And it happened in pretty strange fashion. Every week, Joe makes me a spreadsheet compiling all of the stats in the league. When I saw that Kelsey has a 0.17 batting average and a 1.6 ERA, I thought that maybe Joe had woke and boke again. But the stats are correct. Kelsey had a 0.170 batting average while still tying in Runs and trailing by 1 or 2 in HR, RBIs and SB. This was almost a blowout with a 0.170 batting average. On the other end, a 1.60 ERA seems impossible. While she pitched 24 less innings than Kaitlyn, her ERA was 0.47 lower. Only two of her pitchers had an ERA above 1.50. Meanwhile, none of Bryan’s pitchers threw below 1.50. In short, Bryan dropped out of first place in ridiculous fashion and there was literally nothing he could do about it. And now Kelsey can take her newfound upset energy into this week when she plays…me. God damnit.

Jeff Passan’s Blue Check Mark goes to Matt, for cashing in on James Kaprielian as he had his coming out party. He spun 7 scoreless innings and showed a lot of promise for the future. Unlike Bruce Hooper, who has no future.

The Drive Into Deep Right Field By Castellanos Award goes to me, for doing absolutely everything wrong in the pitching department. I kind of want to go back further and see if 6.82 is the worst ERA in league history.

I’m gonna go bang my head against the wall and get ready for work. Be sure to set your lineups, because games have already started. So I guess you can’t set your lineups. Damn you, Memorial Day!!!

– TeeCoZee