Rockem Sockem

Rockem is a magical place…Mike Ryniec coined a phrase this season which contained our second three-peat, ”Where the unimaginable is not only attainable, it's REPEATABLE!”

Somehow, with all of us spending waaaaay to much time and mental energy on this league, Birdie continues to dominate things. John Ferrari just won his third championship in a row and fourth overall, leaving him just one behind BK as the all-time champ of Rockem; truly an amazing feat and one done with very little competition. While the first half saw a few different people lead the league for brief periods, once July hit John settled into the top spot and never looked back, no one else came close in the second half to touching him. Congrats John on the much deserved three-peat and fourth championship.

After Ferrari though there was a pretty fantastic battle to join the new/old champ at the free eats table for our upcoming 2018 dinner. While not on The Ghost of John Olerud or Charlie Blackmon’s Caught Stealing level of chaos it was still tense as fuck. There were many points to be had going into the final stretch run as places 2 through 5 were pinballing all around from at bat to at bat. It came down to the final day of the regular season (games 163 don’t count) for a bloody Sunday massacre to take place.

When the dust settled your humble Commish had jumped into the 2^nd spot and Gallagher flew back from Ireland to grab third place as both will be eating for free while Jay Moon and BK (who rose from the depths to put the fear of G-d into the top 4) will just be missing out finishing 4^th and 5^th respectively. None in that scrum lost points on the last day, with razor thin margins in lots of categories making for a positive end (more positive for some then others) and no dreaded 4 way tie for third went down, which would have crippled the rest of the leagues wallets.

There was a big break after the top 5 but places 6-8 were tight as well. McNally managed to end the season on an upbeat note edging out Jeff and Fatone who wound up tied for 7^th place with 78 points a peach. The ninth and tenth spots were also tightly contested as Eben eeked out Ryniec to finish at the top of the bottom third while Bull and Vig remained down in the cellar for pretty much the full season; there is always next year boys.

Another Three-peat, another final day full of intense drama, Rockem 17 ”Where the unimaginable is not only attainable, it's REPEATABLE!”

Continuing a tradition that is Meh atbest…unlikethispicturewhichisBooshatworst.

MVRSFP - The Most Valuable Rockem Sockem Fantasy Player goes to….

Mookie Betts- We all passed on him in the draft, he fell to the second round and he made us all pay. Best player in Rockem, rated # 1, on the winning team, won’t be doubted again next year. Amazingly this is hte second time Betts has claimed this award and the second time Birdie has ridden him to a championship, 2016 was the first. Hopefully he doesn't draft him in 2020.

Honorable Mention: JD Martinez for BK,, Trout for Vig and Yelich for Moon.

Rockem Sockem CK - Goes to the best fantasy pitcher this year, just like the CY in real baseball but we renamed it CK in 2016 for Kershaw because he keeps winning it:

Jacob deGrom- While he wasn’t the top rated pitcher in the final standings (that would be Max Scherzer) he was only 4 slots behind him (finished 10^th overall while Max was 6^th ). However unlike real baseball, deGrom pitched his team to the table, getting free eats for Tom. If he had a few Wins to go along with everything else he probably would have been the top player in the game.

Honorable mention: Max, clearly. Verlander, Kluber and Snell.

The Zeddemore Poles Coach of the Year Award: Goes to the best Rockem Manager (named for Winston's Historic 11 point last day jump in 2008):

John Ferrari- To go along with Betts winning the MVRSFP, this winner was clear cut as well. Birdie dominated all season long and now John joins the ranks of all time champs with…well BK. Well done John. (I wrote the same sentence last year, just switched out Kluber for Betts this year)

Honorable mention to BK who was awful to start yet rose like a phoenix to challenge the top of the league and your Commish who made the most moves in the league (100) and somehow worked those to a second place finish.

The Eric Hinske Memorial: (he's dead right?!) goes to the Biggest Bust Drafted that Year named for the Commish drafting Hinske in the 4th round of 2003:

Gary Sanchez- This one is a head scratcher. Sanchez was so good in 2017 and seemed to have the world in front of him but something is clearly off. While there were some injuries he dealt with, no one could have for seen a ranking which ended up 754 overall with a .186 Avg and .697 OPS from the Sanchez-ize…Maybe that name is just prone to butt fumbling away seasons, Mike would certainly like that second round pick back, woof.

Honorable mention goes to Chris Archer who fucking sucked it up proper, the lame Gregor Polanco and Billy Hamilton whose SB’s only got him to 435^th overall.

The Edwin Encarnacion Elation: goes to the biggest positive surprise of the year who was drafted late (after 10th Round for EE's amazing jump a few years back)

Blake Snell- Birdie found magic with Snell this year, who made a massive jump and could very well win the Cy Young in real baseball. Drafted in the 18^th round he finished 17^th overall, pretty amazing. Along with Cole and Severino, all of Birdie’s starters over produced their draft positions but it was Snell who was the biggest surprise and wins this award.

Honorable Mention goes to Eugenio Suarez who proved much better than a 15^th rounder for McNally, Mitch Haniger for Tom who finished 35^th overall after being drafted in the 20^th round. Mike Clevinger for Winston pitched to the 66^th overall ranking after being drafted in the 22^nd round and Josh Hader drafted in the 21^st for Moon was great out of the pen and a racist.

The Nomar Broken Everything Award (Player's injuries who sink a team, named for Nomar sinking multiple teams early in Rockem History):

Tie: Kris Byrant and Carlos Correa- As always there are LOTS of possibilities for this one. Yu Darvish was a disaster when he played and hurt for the majority of the time, almost winning this award this year on his own. Byron Buxton & Wil Myers both also sucked when healthy, The Miguel’s (Sano and Cabrera) did nothing, Donaldson instantly got old and Sanchez was already mentioned, but none were first round picks.

Both Byrant and Correa put up shockingly similar numbers (Byrant finished 205, Correa 290) in almost the same amount of at bats and both were drafted at the end of the first round and both killed their teams offensive stats. Also almost as painful is that they were in and out of the lineup, not droppable; right up until the end, making it doubly frustrating as it was impossible to cut respective loses. Who would have thought both Mike Moustakas and Chris Taylor would have been a hundred rankings higher then both respectively at their positions…ah baseball.

The Cliff Lee Award : (FA Pickup that changes the league, named for Bull snatching Lee in Rockem 7)

Jesus Aguilar – Usually there are a few candidates each year for this award (and last year it was easy) but perhaps I am blanking on someone but it looks like we drafted really well this year and only a few unexpected names had great seasons. Jesus was pretty holy in Milwaukee and for BK having a breakout year, finishing 33^rd overall and giving him a much needed power boost.

Other pickups considered here were Andujar by Moon who wound up 43^rd, Miles Mikolas for Tom who finished 45^th overall, Patrick Corbin for the Commish who finished 47^th and Max Muncy for Vig who finished 50^th, but couldn’t get him out of the wood paneled Rockem Sockem basement.

Another season in the books…Until next year amigos!