The Sterling Pirates announce the trade of Nats' past and future closer Drew Storen to Occoquan Osprey for the shell of a washed up Joe Nathan + OCC#9 pick.
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Monday, June 2, 2014
Newsletter - June 2, 2014
NVABL
Newsletter
June 2014
The Commissioner Speaks
His eminence verbally issued a recommendation to me today,
that is noteworthy in maintaining the composure and Zen-like peace we enjoy in
the NVABL. He said that in the absence
of a volunteer after a series is finished, it should fall to the winner of the
series to write it up, and if the series was a tie it should fall to the home
team. It was my misunderstanding all
these years that I thought the home team was supposed to write it up. Now I’ll be able to enter the bliss of rarely
doing write-ups unless some kind of miracle happens and I turn this season
around.
The Standings
W
|
L
|
%
|
GB
|
|
30
|
18
|
.625
|
--
|
|
15
|
9
|
.625
|
3
|
|
14
|
10
|
.583
|
4
|
|
19
|
17
|
.528
|
5
|
|
9
|
11
|
.450
|
7
|
|
12
|
16
|
.429
|
8
|
W
|
L
|
%
|
GB
|
|
27
|
9
|
.750
|
--
|
|
5
|
3
|
.625
|
8
|
|
19
|
29
|
.396
|
14
|
|
19
|
29
|
.396
|
14
|
|
5
|
11
|
.313
|
12
|
|
10
|
22
|
.313
|
15
|
Results
May 2014
OCC 0 at ROS 4
|
ARL 1 at OCC 3
|
WAS 2 at SEA 2
|
SPR 3 at SEA 1
|
STO 3 at ARL 1
|
WAS 2 at ARL 2
|
ARL 1 at ROS 3
|
CPC 3 at STP 1
|
OCC 0 at STP 4
|
OCC 3 at OAK 1
|
OCC 1 at STO 3
|
WAS 1 at CPC 3
|
CPC 1 at ROS 3
|
Who’s Hot and Who’s Not
The records for the teams during May are:
Roswell 10-2, (30-18) It was
another great month for Bob, powering into first place in the tough Coastal
Division, and on pace for a 55 win season.
If Bob could somehow hold on and win the division, it could be a huge
difference maker for Roswell, Oakton, and Springfield in the playoffs.
Stonehenge 6-2, (27-9) The
Stonehenge battering ram rolls on with 3-1 results in every series. The .750 winning percentage is a pace that
would set a record 66 wins this season. The
Druids still have not faced Oakton, thought they have swept Roswell. That’s part of why the division race is so
critical in the Coastal. Stonehenge all
but has the Piedmont division championship sewn up with a 14 game lead over the
nearest playoff eligible foes. You do
not want to face the Druids in the semi-finals if you can help it.
Springfield 3-1, (15-8)
Being as busy as Chris is, it was nice to get a series in and take it 3-1. Chris will be playing much more in June and
he has started scheduling the games.
Sterling 5-3, (12-16) The
Pirates are still fighting and have brought new hopes for a playoff spot. It might come down to July trades with this
team, to see which way they are going to go.
If they trade for a little help this year it could make them a playoff
team. If they trade for next year they
are looking very tough next year.
Columbia Pike 7-5, (19-17) The
Cubs played 3 series in May and had a winning record, which maintained their
position to be 7th seed in the playoffs. The continual string of favorable results we
see from this team reinforces the message that Steve is a very good manager.
Washington 5-7, (19-29) Bad
luck continues for this Senator franchise it is not that Bart is a bad
manager. This team on paper should be
over .500 and are now 10 games under .500.
Perhaps June will be the month they snap out of their funk.
Seacoast 3-5,(10-22) The
Wayfarers split with Washington and lost to Springfield 3-1. They are hoping for the Hamner trophy, and
are still on pace for it. The gap is
closing though, as Occoquan has dumped 2 of their best cards, while Seacoast
stood pat.
Occoquan 7-13, (19-29) This
team has fallen out of contention for the 8th playoff spot. The record is the same as Washington’s it is
true, but the roster does not support any hope they will be close to Washington
in the end.
Arlington 5-11, (5-11) It
was good to see Arlington finally playing this month. Arlington matching Seacoast’s losing
percentage for 16 games makes it a 3 team race for the Hamner trophy. A new manager in the league might be blessed
with the number 1 pick in next year’s draft.
Oakton 1-3, (14-10) It was a
tough month for the Aviators, not playing much, losing to the lowly Ospreys in
their first meeting of the season, and falling 4 games behind division leader
Roswell.
Delphi 0-0, (9-11) George
did not play in May. It’s going to be up
to June to see if they remain in playoff contention prior to a possible sell
off in July.
Vermont 0-0 , (5-3) Did not
play. They are still looking for an
owner.
Transactions
OCC sends Antre Ethier to SPR for Michael Bourn
OCC sends Prince Fielder to ROS for ROS #3.
Trader Roberto is still doing the most trading in this
league. In both trades Occoquan sends a
player whose card is better this year than it is likely to be next year. Both Ethier and Fielder should have good
cards a couple of more times in their careers, but I am cutting bait and
looking towards next year.
Michael Bourn’s OPS is slightly better next year at this
point than Ethier’s, but the weakness is in picking up a player who relies on
his legs and who is now getting old. As
Larry said, I didn’t get a young enough guy to be worth making that trade. Bourn will help me live out the 2014 year
however, making it less painful in the runs scored against department by
finally having an OF-3 I can start every day.
You’ve got to like those -1/-1 splits Prince Fielder
brings to Roswell’s roster. Roswell has
been a team that historically has struggled with some of the main power guys
not being able to hit lefties. It’s nice
to have the consistency of a player who you never need to worry about subbing
out when a new pitcher is brought into the game. His card is not bad, with 14 safe numbers,
but it would be nice to have a 4th power number on 22 rather than a
7. We see this often now in the
post-steroid ERA.
2015 Kilg Korner
Hitting
|
Pitching
|
Overall
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Team OPS Rank Top Player
OAK 0.812 1 Tulowitzki
SEA 0.806 2 Stanton
ARL 0.766 3 N.
Cruz
STE 0.757 4 V.
Martinez
STO 0.750 5 Encarnacion
CPK 0.748 6.5 Puig
DEL 0.748 6.5 Bautista
VER 0.736 8 Donaldson
WAS 0.714 9 Gonzalez
SPR 0.713 10 Blackmon
OCC 0.710 11 Rios
ROS 0.707 12 Utley
|
Team ERA Rank Top
Player
ROS 3.20 1 Cueto
VER 3.21 2 Teheran
SPR 3.25 3 Peralta
WAS 3.30 4 Gray
STE 3.37 5 Sale
OAK 3.39 6 Hernandez
STO 3.46 7 Wainwright
DEL 3.76 8 Darvish
CPK 3.79 9 Hudson
ARL 3.93 10 Samardzija
OCC 3.97 11 Leake
SEA 4.40 12 Qualls
|
|
OAK – Hitting 1st and Pitching 6th, the
Aviators are returning to their usual position as the best franchise in the
league. If Larry were to sell them it
would be for $2 billion easily.
STE – The Pirates rode consistency in both hitting and
pitching to become the 2nd best team. This is a team to watch and watch out for.
VER – Vermont pitching is starting to blossom for 2015. This team is 3rd overall with 2nd
in pitching and 8th in hitting.
STO – It was great month for the Druid bats, jumping from 10th
to 5th led by Edwin Encarnacion who earned his first “One” on next
year’s card with 19 home runs. In
pitching it was not so great, falling from 4th to 7th. But John Lester is starting to look like a
dominant Ace in real life. His
consistency over the last 5 years for Boston is bringing back memories of Roy
Halladay in the glory years of his career.
Look for the APBA game company to start rewarding him with grades above
15, while Adam Wainwright is also on pace to also have a killer grade.
ROS – The Greys had a huge jump to become the best pitching
team, led by Cueto, Greinke, and Wacha.
Three very strange names if there ever were any. Hitting still brings up the basement, but
overall this is not a bad team.
SPR and WAS – Tied with Roswell overall, with weak hitting
and strong pitching. Sonny Gray of
Oakland is the one teams in our league may regret passing on the most. He lasted until late into the 3rd
round when wily Bartolo snapped him up.
ARL – also tied with Roswell, but with strong hitting and
weak pitching. Nelson Cruz, lambasted so
badly by everyone when he was traded to Arlington, now is leading the MLB with
20 home runs and is the plum of the franchise.
Carlos Gomez has become the type of outfielder owners drool over if you
can ignore his poor sportsmanship and arrogance on the field. Of the two franchises a new manager could
choose from, you get #2 pitching with Vermont vs. #3 hitting with Arlington. Imagine how sweet it would be if you could
choose your 36 players from either team.
SEA – Seacoasts pitching didn’t just fall from 9th
to 12th, it fell off the charts with an ERA of 4.40. The next to bottom 4 teams have ERAs of 3.76
to 3.97, and then there is Seacoast, far, far behind. But the hitting came through in a big way,
with Stanton jumping into the best player slot on this team loaded with hitting
talent. The Wayfarers are the #2 team in
the league in offensive production. What
we said about the last 5 teams in pitching, we can say about the first 2 teams
in hitting. Oakton and Seacoast are off
the charts being the only 2 teams with OPS above .800, and the rest of the
league far, far behind.
DEL and CPK – The Oracles and Cubs are tied near the middle
of the pack in hitting, with a slight edge to Delphi in overall pitching,
although Steve is the manager who has the bragging rights to Tim Hudson. Neither manager currently has confidence that
they can compete this year. Neither team
is biting on trades when players are dangled in front of them. Both of these teams are looking to enter the
draft with all picks intact, and may be in major sell mode in July.
OCC – The Ospreys closed the gap a bit with strong pitching
from Porcello combined with a great month by Alex Rios, but still are ranked
last. We hope for a good crop of young
players next year who can propel this team into contention. Occoquan owns 14 draft choices in the first 4
rounds and a record 19 picks overall.
The question for the Ospreys dismal team will not be which 12 players to
cut, but which 17 players on the current roster are worthy of being kept. If the draft were held today, I only see 9
players I could keep, so we would have to go 8 rounds deep into the
supplemental draft before I could stop drafting, which would give me 27 new
players out of 36.
So what are some of the players that might be first round
picks next year?
Pitching has Masahiro Tanaka coming on strong with a 1.83
ERA for the Yankees, while Mark Buehrle is at 2.10 for Toronto, and Scott Kazmir
has resurrected his career with a 2.36 ERA for Oakland.
On the hitting side we have Seth Smith, who was disrespected
out of the NVABL but now sports a .967 OPS.
Michael Morse who was never disrespected, but had some tough years with
the injury bug, is back and looking strong with a .925 OPS. Jose Abreu is a rookie slugger from Cuba with
15 home runs already for the White Sox.
It might not be a first round pick, but if you like speed it
might be time to bring 26 year old Dee Gordon back into the league and leave
him on your roster to stay. He has 34
stolen bases and only 3 caught stealing for Los Angeles. He’s on pace to steal 95 and be caught only 8
times, Which has the potential for a rare A steal grade with a number well over
30 in an everyday player.
Lastly, who can resist drafting a 20 year old rookie named
Rougned Odor? He’ll be available.
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