abuck1220

well, a long season is nearly over, and the two teams with the most regular season points face off for the title. the big factor this week will be what teams are in contention. some vets on non-contending teams may lose time to youngsters (thankfully not with the cubs, whew!). some guys are just playing out a meaningless schedule, while other guys are on teams fighting for their playoff lives. GHS has cano, matsui, street, wakefield and wagner playing for the postseason, while nsbb has abreu, berkman and burnett in the postseason hunt. one thing that may hurt nsbb is the cardinals' early clinch...who knows how much action pujols, izzy and carpenter will see down the stretch as they play out the rest of their schedule. both teams made some roster moves for the championship...dusty baker...er...tim sits liriano and cain in favor of more seasoned vets. but he may give the nod to the youngster gomes over damon and guillen. ghs doesn't buy into the 'go with what got you here' adage as he unceremoniously dumps gonzalez and benches overbay in favor of delucci and cano. place your bets now...should be a good battle!

i'd maybe give him a .270/.335/.400, but, yeah, i think a lot of people are expecting a little much out of him.

that would be correct. the hand sanitizers go into the championship fresh off a statement game....should be near 350 points! i have some tough decisions too...i released a slumping/platooning gonzalez for delucci. i don't like having three rangers in my lineup, but i also don't like gonzalez playing four times a week. also, i'm going with a red hot cano (47 points this week) over the more consistent overbay, who may start sitting in favor of fielder as the season winds down. i hope my ragtag pitching rotation can hang in there for one more week...boy, would i love to have three starts from sheets over the next two weeks.

i think some here have overestimated his ability based on his quick start, but it looks like he'd be more productive than dubois/hollandsworth. and if you get giles/dunn/somebody awesome for rf, that would be a drastic improvement over burnitz. if the cubs upgrade rf and lf, keep nomar healthy, bat walker in the correct spot in the order, and get something out of patterson, i feel like the offense has made some decent improvement. i'd be really surprised if murton hit .280 next year, but as long as he doesn't completely lose his plate discipline (i'm looking at you, jason dubois), i can live w/ him in lf. especially since i don't see any way that the cubs will land two, let alone three, very good-great outfielders in the off season. i think that at least one of corey and murton have to start...possibly both.

Fortunately, that doesn't happen very often. and fortunately, for you, he's pitching against the cubs. Bloody Cubs. Just when I need them to roll over and play dead, they come alive against the best pitcher in the NL this year. i hear you...for a while there, the cubs were only playing well when it hurt my team (ie dempster's five save week).

neifi just about three run jacked the db-nsbb game into a very interesting matchup! :shock:

here comes a squeeze.

Fortunately, that doesn't happen very often. and fortunately, for you, he's pitching against the cubs.

matsui and giles, please. thank you.

DB was oh so close to three QS yesterday. if he had gotten just an extra out or two here or given up one less run there, he'd be nursing a small lead going into the final day. DB needs a disaster start from carpenter today.

i'm glad the cubs are willing to skip a pitcher's start so maddux can increase the chances of him extending a meaningless record that he already owns from 0% to 5%, but they refuse to skip a pitcher's start so that they can further evaluate their young arms. i know i'll never forget where i was when mcgriff got that 30th homer!

i got it...it just wasn't funny. like most of his jokes.

well, between that and the fact that he robs an average of two homers a year, i'd say he's well worth the $10 mil...i'm in!

Maybe the third time will be the charm. good point. for instance, rusch's fifth time was the charm. of course by the time rusch had gone 0-4, the cubs' playoff hopes were pretty much over. but, boy, has he turned it on since!

Maybe the third time will be the charm. ?

shocking that hill wasn't razor-sharp after two weeks plus of sitting on his can.

well, i feel much better now that colon and prior have had non-quality starts tonight...and my offense scored some points as well. big night for nsbb as he opens up a pretty substantial lead...

so what you've seen w/ your eyes over his 25 major league innings is more valuable than all the numbers he amassed in the minors? sorry, but i don't trust your eyes that much. i don't have his minor league splits, but i saw him make a handful of AAA starts, and i can tell you that righties didn't mash him in any of those games.

duh because Palmerio did the juice without being on the Yankees. Giambi came about as clean about being on the juice as his lawyer would allow. The guy didn't stand up in front of Congress and lie about it. He's been pretty forthcoming. But, I'd never give him a "come back player" award for putting up decent numbers without the juice. Raffy deserves harsher treatment because he lied big time and obtained hall of fame numbers on the juice. the only reason he came clean was because his testimony was leaked. and probably the only reason he didn't lie when he testified was because he knew he was busted.

i'm having a rich hill overdose.

overbay and lee have made up the points he got from floyd and castilla. i'm a little worried about prior and colon tonight, however.

You can take it down to 2200 and I'll be thrilled. :D why the change?

If I come back, it will be some sort of miracle.. :) i don't like using the term 'comeback' in fantasy sports...because it implies that the team 'blowing it' had some hand in choking the lead away...and that's not really the case. it's not like i could run out the clock to hold my lead. let's just say if you 'win', it will be some sort of miracle. tonight should be a good indication as to whether that's possible...you probably need two very good starts from prior and colon.

boston's done all right with some pretty shaky defense up the middle. And Atlanta has done well being solid there. they're also 3rd in the NL in runs and 6th in the NL in era. are you saying their defense at c, 2b, ss and cf is a bigger reason for their success than their hitting and pitching? seattle has the fewest errors in mlb...they must be winning their division by 25 games. Again with extremes. It's a balance that needs to be addressed and if you tell me that if you have two exact teams only one has worse defensive players up the middle that that team would be better? Also, errors are objective...score keepers are not reliable in what I would look at. Also, If you have pitchers giving up missles it doesn't matter who have out there. Balance is needed..good balance and solid up the middle Defense is always a good place to start. Look at the dominate 70 Red teams...yeah they could hit but they were also awesome up the middle. of course you'd rather have the team that's solid defensively up the middle. but no team is good-great at everything...and, for me, in a fantasy draft of team skills, good d up the middle would be pretty low on my draft board. if you can show me a replacement for barrett that is a perfect balance of offense and defense, maybe i'd want him. but i don't know who that is.

everybody needs to QUIT saying that my game is over...it's not over! tootie's offense is on fire, and he has three aces left to throw. grand slam for floyd... 8-[