Ramblers Playing Aces

The Ramblers from Las Vegas returned to the top spot in the league with 422 points on the week. Billy Hamilton was the star as he churned and burned for a league and season high of 63 points. Manny Machado, Aaron Judge, and Giancarlo Stanton were blasting big multiples of three by scoring 39, 36, and 33 respectively.

Cab’s Coolers put up the most points this week with 428. The Coolers from Mendocino jumped from 9th to 6th place thanks to Billy Hamilton’s big week.

Even without Hamilton, Yu Mad Bro? from Santa Rosa posted a solid 419, moving up eight spots into a tie for 7th place. Left Coast Nation (Mendocino) jumped 10 spots up to 20th overall with 420 points, thanks in large part to Chris Sale’s 51 points.

Week 5 Stars
C – Sandy Leon 26
1B – Cody Bellinger 44
2B – Javier Baez 42
3B – Manny Machado 39
SS – Jean Segura 37
OF – Billy Hamilton 63
OF – Aaron Hicks 42
OF – Aaron Altherr 40
DH – Yonder Alonso 43
SP – Chris Sale 51
SP – Johnny Cueto 37
SP – Scott Feldman 36
SP – Rick Porcello 35
SP – Jon Lester 35
SP – Clayton Kershaw 35
SP – Dylan Bundy 35
RP – Ken Giles 29

There were three transactions this week – check the transactions page to view them.

On Sunday, I sent out an email trying to get your thoughts and opinions in preparation for a survey that I’ll post in a few weeks. Thanks for taking a few moments to respond!

One of our new players noticed that players were earning an extra point for Intentional Base on Balls. My formula in the spreadsheet counted them twice – once in the BB category and again as an IBB. I have recalculated all of the scoring back to week one and all should be correct. The Scoring Changes page just got a whole lot bigger! Most team’s totals were only changed by a few points. Thank you Alex!

Have a great week . . . Go Mariners!

Week 4: Roy Hobbs Moves Up

If you had Washington National hitters this week, you probably had a decent week. Four of the top five hitters were Nats, but nobody has Anthony Rendon!

Roy Hobbs, from Bend, OR, moved into first place after scoring a league high 453 during the week. Hobbs made the jump from 4th place behind balanced scoring . . .  Ivan Nova, Hyun-Jin Ryu, and Masahiro Tanaka all scored over 30 points on the hill. Aaron Judge and Chris Owings paced the Hobbs’ hitters by each scoring over 40 points.

The Ramblers jumped from 5th to 2nd place with the second highest team total on the week, 19 points behind. Last week’s top-team, Bellzzano, dropped to 3rd, only 25 points off the lead.

Here are the averages by position each week for the first four weeks of the season. These only include players that earned teams points – one at each position, except three outfielders and 5 starting pitchers.

Catcher			Firstbase			Secondbase
Week	Avg		Week	Avg		Week	Avg
1	20		1	21		1	20
2	17		2	20		2	24
3	18		3	24		3	23
4	16		4	23		4	22
Thirdbase			Shortstop			Outfield
Week	Avg		Week	Avg		Week	Avg
1	23		1	26		1	23
2	22		2	19		2	27
3	24		3	17		3	31
4	25		4	28		4	28
DH			Starters			Relief
Week	Avg		Week	Avg		Week	Avg
1	22		1	23		1	25
2	21		2	26		2	18
3	24		3	27		3	23
4	24		4	25		4	21
Team
Week	Avg
1	343
2	357
3	378
4	370

Week 4 All-stars

C – Matt Wieters 34
1B – Ryan Zimmerman 55
2B – Daniel Murphy 46
3B – Anthony Rendon 43
SS – Trea Turner 55
OF – Aaron Judge 44
OF – Scott Schebler 40
OF – Bryce Harper 40
DH – Hernan Perez 43
SP – Dallas Keuchel 54
SP – Bud Norris 40
SP – Zack Greinke 40
SP – Patrick Corbin 38
SP – Ivan Nova 37
RP – Kenley Jansen 44

A few trades were made. Another stat correction for last week changed a few team totals by a point.

Week 3: Bellzano and Martians Roll

Fungoed Martian shot into outer-space in week 3 with an impressive 468 point total. Fungoed Martian was led by a couple of Cardinals on the mound, Lance Lynn and Seung-Hwan Oh. Austin Hedges, Ryan Zimmerman and Joey Votto all put up big numbers at the plate. With the big week, the Battleground, WA, based Martian jumped from 11th to 2nd place in the standing, just 5 points off the lead.

Moving from 7th to 1st place this week is team Bellzano, hailing from Santa Rosa, CA. Bellzano put up 459 points on the week and were paced by some of the same names as Fungoed Martian – Lynn, Oh, and Hedges. Mookie Betts looks like he is starting to heat up by pacing the Bellzano’s hitters.

The Passion Warriors, last week’s leader, dropped to 3rd place, 40 points off the lead.

Four transactions this week – check out the Transactions page for details.

Week 3 All-Star Line-up
C – Austin Hedges 34
1B – Freddie Freeman 47
2B – Robinson Cano 35
3B – Travis Shaw 36
SS – Taylor Motter 32
OF – Bryce Harper 50
OF – Mookie Betts 39
OF – Nelson Cruz 39
DH – Anthony Rizzo 43
SP – Max Scherzer 50
SP – Lance Lynn 46
SP – Corey Kluber 39
SP – Ivan Nova 39
SP – Bronson Arroyo 39
RP – Seung Hwan Oh 45

Week 2: Warriors and Ramblers Scramble to the Top

The Passion Warriors and The Ramblers start Week 3 in a tie for the top spot by scoring 403 and 407 points respectively in Week 2.

The Warriors have two of the top three hitters in the very young season with Mitch Haniger and Bryce Harper. On the mound, James Paxton and Clayton Kershaw are in the top five overall. The Ramblers also have Paxton delivering on the mound to go with high scoring hitter Francisco Lindor, plus a whole lot of balance.

The top scoring team of Week 2 was Flop House Gas, which tallied an impressive 447 points. Flop House Gas jumped from 36th to 12th place during the week.

Week 1 leader Albion Rollers dropped to fifth while Hot Sake hangs on near the top, only two points off the lead.

No transactions this week.

Week 2 All-Star Line-up
C – Travis d’Arnaud 34
1B – Eric Thames 43
2B – Jose Altuve 37
3B – Eugenio Suarez 40
SS – Asdrubal Cabrera 31
OF – Marcell Ozuna 43
OF – Yoenis Cespedes 43
OF – Bryce Harper 38
DH – Ender Inciarte 36, Jose Ramirez 36
SP – James Paxton 54
SP – Michael Pineda 50
SP – Chris Sale 45
SP – Tyler Chatwood 43
SP – Matt Boyd 42
RP – Francisco Rodriguez 35

Week One, Done

The Albion Rollers rolled in as one of the last teams to enter, but start the season in first place. The Rollers rode the arms of Kendall Graveman, Johnny Cueto, and Madison Bumgarner. Albion hot bats for the first week included Brandon Belt, Yasiel Puig, and Khris Davis.

The Rollers open the season with a 22-point lead over second place Hot Sake, a newcomer to the Lazyman League. Hot Sake saw five players total 30 or more points – George Springer, Mitch Haniger, Danny Duffy, Chris Owings, and Jean Segura.

Honors for the first trade of the year go to the Waiver Wire Tappers, who picked up Buster Posey.

New pages have been added the past few days. Check out the links to Leaders and Transactions.

First Week All-Star Line-up
C – JT Realmuto 35 points
1B – Brandon Belt 40
2B – Yangervis Solarte 31
3B – Miguel Sano 37
SS – Francisco Lindor 33
OF – George Springer 37
OF – Yasiel Puid 36
OF – Mitch Haniger 35, Nomar Mazara 35
DH – Paul Goldschmidt 40
SP – Jake Arrieta 48
SP – Kendall Graveman 44
SP – Ervin Santana 41
SP – Noah Syndergaard 40
SP – Johnny Cueto 40
RP – Greg Holland 38

Opening Day!

I can’t express how thankful I am to deal with such great people, most of whom I have never met. Your kind words and patience has been much appreciated, sincerely.

Here is how we stand currently:

• We have 39 teams submitted for 2017. A tick off from last year, but impressive considering the change in league commissioner. We have 4 new teams this year.
• Emails with rosters to be confirmed have been sent out to all owners. We are still waiting to hear back from six two. Once confirmed, I will post the rosters on the website. No mistakes so far! Phew. I will probably need until tomorrow to build and publish all of the team pages, but the work is under way.
• Drop Bruce a note and tell him thank you for all the help he has given this rookie Lazyman commissioner today, and throughout the last couple of months.
• Thank you to all of you who have paid via pay pal or check in the mail. If I haven’t sent you confirmation for payment, I will at some point this week.  If you haven’t paid, please do so when you can. One thing I dread is sending out reminders.
• I am not sure if 147 exclusive players is a lot, but it seems like a lot to me. I will post the list of exclusive players soon. These are players that were selected by only one team and cannot be acquired by other teams during the season. Equally impressive is that 148 players found a home on only two or three rosters. Seems like the salaries were about right to provide diversity in rosters.
• Well, some rosters have similarity. Over half of the teams selected Blake Treinen, which I expected after he was named the Nationals closer a few days ago, and Gregory Bird, who most of you really want to be the next Natural and the rest of us hope takes a back seat to last year’s HR leader in Chris Carter.

I will let you know via email when the rosters are posted.

Peace,
Damon

One Week!

DEADLINE to submit your teams: Next Saturday, April 1, midnight. First pitch of Sunday’s game at the latest.

TEAM SUBMISSION can be done one of the following ways:

1) email it to lazymanbaseball2@gmail.com (text, spreadsheet, image, all is good)

OR

2) click on the link to the contact page on this website and enter or paste your team there.

INCLUDE WITH YOUR TEAM
Your team name
Your name
Your hometown
Your email address if new or different
If new, who invited you into the game
Your roster – double check your math. $52 million max. 42 players max

NEWBIES
Make sure you read the league rules, linked in the menu. Send me questions if you have them.

BE PATIENT
I will send you an email verification/confirmation as soon as possible after you send me your team. Please double check the roster I send back to you.

PAYMENT OPTIONS
Sent in the email containing this same information. I would love to have everyone paid-up by mid-April. We are all friends or friends of friends. Thank you.

Less than two weeks!

I am starting to feel some excited anticipation . . . for the upcoming baseball season. How about you?

ADVICE FOR BUILDING YOUR TEAM
Some words of advice that were shared with all of us from a wise sage that I will pass along here as you consider the team you are constructing:

1. You only get three trades all season. It would be a bummer if you had to spend one of those trades on a catcher or relief pitcher. Get depth at those positions.
2. Starting pitchers, and many of them, may be a key to building the next Lazyman champion. Earning five wins in a week can keep your team in contention. Think about selecting as many as 10 starters or more when building your team. They don’t all have to be Sandy Koufax, but quality starts add points.
3. Injuries and slumps happen. Do you have some reserves at each position to tide you over or will you need to spend a trade just to prevent zero points at a position?
4. Check your math – 52 million dollars is all you get. 42 players is all you can have. No banking money. No increasing roster size.
5. Make sure you get a decent back up hitter at some position. The top scorer at each spot on the field scores each week, and so does the next best batter from any position. This player will function as your DH.

OK, there was probably more wise advice that was sent my way in previous years, but I have forgotten that advice, probably because I didn’t follow it . . . as evident in finishing in the middle of the pack every year. Bruce may want to chime in here. Good luck.

TIME SENSITIVE REMINDERS
Your team is due no later than Saturday, April 1, at the stroke of midnight. Give or take a bit . . . OK, at least by first pitch on opening day of Sunday, April 2. I will do my best to send confirmation and ask for verification of your team as they arrive. Be patient with me. This is my first rodeo in this role.

When submitting your roster, please make sure you include your name, team name, hometown, and, if you are a newcomer, who invited you into the game.

Payment is due with team submission, or as soon as possible. I will send out a separate email with payment options.

The teams, stats, and standings posted on the website from last year will go away Sunday, March 26. I need some time to scrub and prep things for this year. If you want to look things over, do it soon.

Newbies, ask questions sooner rather than later, either from me or the person who invited you into this most intriguing, thought-provokingly strategic, potentially exciting, and laziest fantasy baseball game of all time.

JUST IN CASE YOU MISSED THEM

PDFs

Lazyman Player List 2017 – Salaries

Lazyman Player List 2017 – Alpha

lazyman-baseball-rules-2017

Excel Team Maker

Lazyman Team Maker – 2017

Player Lists

FIXES (as of Tuesday 3/14): On-line Salary by Position now will accurately add total salaries (3/14). On-line player list now has Starting Pitchers and Relief Pitchers included (3/12). On-line Team Makers are now less cumbersome to navigate, especially on a phone (3/11). Jung Ho Kang is now Kang, Jung Ho on on-line player lists (3/11). Old Excel spreadsheet of player lists is available in .xls by request (3/11). Inaccurate initial Alpha Player List for player salaries has been corrected, emailed, and posted here (3/11).

EDIT (3/11): The Player Lists have their own page found in the menu. The Excel Lazyman Team Maker is ready, use the link at the bottom of this post, or click on the Team Maker page from the menu.

Greetings to all!

About 3 weeks until the first official game of 2017!

I hope everybody is doing well. I have heard from many of you, and it sounds like we will have a very high percentage of returning owners. Welcome to prospective new team owners. We should see some nice growth with new owners.

Only two rule changes.

• The points for saves will drop from 8 to 6.
• There will no longer be a loss of 5 points for a loss by a pitcher.

You will find links for the PDF’s for this year’s rules, player list by salary, and an alpha player list at the end of this post. I will be posting web pages with the same info shortly.

I am constructing the Excel Team Maker and will have it out soon. There will also be an on-line version of the Team Maker.

Please report any errors ASAP. This is my first time through the salary process . . . and boy, do I have an even greater respect for Bruce and the amount of work he put in over the years. In a nutshell, I downloaded player projections from eight different services, wrote a formula that would predict the number of points players would score using the Lazyman system, wrote more formulas that would spit out a salary the was roughly the same as previous years, and then . . . I poured over transactions, rankings, injuries, sleeper lists, depth charts, etc., to tweak the salaries as needed. I really hope I did OK.

Questions, comments, suggestions, complaints . . . send them my way.

Spread the word.

Thanks, Damon

PDFs

Lazyman Player List 2017 – Salaries

Lazyman Player List 2017 – Alpha

lazyman-baseball-rules-2017

Excel Team Maker

Lazyman Team Maker – 2017

 

 

 

 

Welcome to Lazyman Baseball West

Same League – We Just Migrated

Lazyman headquarters has migrated from the bustling metropolis of New York to the Wild West of Everett, Washington (about 20 miles north of Seattle).

Greetings, I am Damon. Welcome aboard. I have been a participant of Lazymans Baseball for a few years and couldn’t stand the idea of seeing the league fold. I enjoy it too much and I am nearing the empty-nest stage of life, so I have a little free time.

Let’s keep the good times rolling. In the menu on the left (or the drop-down menu if you are on a phone), you will find the Rules for 2017, and the standings and team stats from last year. Be patient with me as I get things up and running. Before I continue any further . . .

All Hail Bruce

There are times when we are called to join together to celebrate and to acknowledge the great deeds of those that have come before us. Those that have brought joy, entertainment, and meaning to our lazy and fantasy-filled lives. This is that time that we pause to honor the great and illustrious contributions to the world as we know it. Please join me.

Applause. Hip-hip-hooray. More Applause . . . Thanks Bruce!

Bruce is helping immensely in the transition and is pretty much holding my hand through the process.

Changes . . .

A few changes you need to aware of right from the start:

1. New website = https://lazymanbaseballwest.wordpress.com
2. New contact email = lazymanbaseball2@gmail.com
3. Yep, the “s” has been dropped from the league name due to clerical/grammar errors.
4. No other changes. No other changes? Just be careful when sending an email, the former and new email are similar . . . look for the ‘2’ at the end.
5. Oh, Bruce and team had a few other changes ready to put into place before the transition, so we will implement them as designed. Read on . . .

What’s Is New

Here are the changes that Bruce and team were already ready to go with and will be put into place this season:

1. The salaries of the top players will be lowered slightly in comparison to last year.
2. The points for saves will drop from 8 to 6.
3. There will no longer be a loss of 5 points for a loss by a pitcher.

Please check out the Lazyman Baseball Rules for more details, especially if you are a newcomer to the league.

Here is a PDF for the 2017 rules if you would like to download it: lazyman-baseball-rules-2017