WEEK 11 RECAP: 1/4 MILE AT A TIME
"I live my life a quarter-mile at a time. Nothing else matters. Not the mortgage, not the store, not my team, and all their bullshit. For those ten seconds or less, I’m free." - Dominic Toretto.
We are over the halfway mark, and Ian has let the upstart rookie manager define the week so he can do dumb things like improve his livelihood instead of writing 1000 words about fantasy baseball for free. What a chump. I am writing this for two reasons: 1. I want to prove to you all how appreciative you should be of Ian’s writing compared to all my typos. 2. I wanted to, and this is still America until you all nanny legislate fun out of this league.
After some deliberation and a lack of exciting finishes (congrats to Mark for beating Mike raw and Ian for keeping Vinson at bay like the fences in Jurassic Park), I decided to make this a mid-season awards show! For this article, I will break this down into the following six awards:
The Han Lue Award for Best Retconn of a Player Career.
The Dominic Toretto Award for Family
The Posthumous Paul Walker Award
The SpaceCar for Dumbest Decision to Success
The Tej Parker Chop Shop to Hacker Award.
The Most Valuable Manager
Some ground rules: For player and team awards, there will be two runners-up and the eventual winner. For a player to win a positive award, the manager/player in question has to be on the current manager’s team unless it's via trade. These awards are entirely decided by a team of crack-shot experts in sabermetrics and other clever things, and so here we go!
the han lue award for best retcon:
"You know, who you choose to be around you lets you know who you are." - Han Lue.
This first award goes to the player and manager who realized that this nothing player was so valuable that somehow they went from obscurity to a central cog in their championship dreams. Like Han Lue, so valuable other things are moved around, and plot holes are created in the wake of this genius. This is similar to how Dan’s cannibalizing his team for parts is a central step to a championship in all of ours. Our nominees are:
Jurickson Profar - Jurkison Store God This Name Sucks to Type
Shota Imanaga - Elly Enchanted
Jared Jones - Bucks in Six
And our winner….. Shota Imanaga and Elly Enchanted. Wait. Why give it to the guy who just traded this player?
When you look at his basic metrics being near the top of his class, you also look at the relative IP eating he has been doing. In a league where IP matters and thus, in a backhanded way, quality starts to do, too, it makes a world of difference. Heller might be able to capitalize on sustained success, but Richard turned a bonus late-round draft pick into shoring up assets for a playoff run. That and his overall output convinced this committee to give the award to the Asian Persuasion. Congrats. Your prize will be in the mail when a millennial becomes US President.
the dominic toretto award for family
"Everyone'outtag for the thrill, but what's real is family." - Dom
The Dominic Toretto Award for Family goes to the manager that best exemplifies the Fast and Furious ethos: It’s all about family. No matter how complex or challenging life is, you always have your family. They are the one thing you can count on even when they hurt you. This award goes to the manager who doesn’t treat their players like dots on a screen or throw them away as chips to be bought and sold, but rather, treats them with love and loyalty. Like how a family should operate.
Our nominees are:
Joey - Harper’s Ferry
Mark - Running outta of Patience for this stupid name
Brooke - Shirley’s Sox
Our winner is…. Shirley’s Sox! While all three fit what it means for family, only Brooke exemplifies the Dom ethos to a T. You don’t get rid of family, no matter how much they hurt you. No matter how much you should REALLY read messages to improve your team. As the prophet Ye once said:
But while y'all washin', watch him He gon' make it to a Benz out of that Datsun
He got that ambition, baby, look at his eyes
This week, he moppin' floors, next week, it's the fries
So stick by his side
I know there's dudes ballin', and yeah, that's nice
And they gon' keep callin' and tryin', but you stay right, girl.
So, congratulations to Shirley’s Sox and especially Shohei. You will receive your award when Kanye stops being anti-Semitic.
the posthumous paul walker award
"I Like The Tuna Here." - Brian O’Conner
This award is for the player who lived his life too fast and furious—not going to make nearly the number of jokes I wanted. This is to the player who had high hopes, but injuries and other things are just keeping them down.
Our Nominees Are:
Spencer Torkelson - I Like Ian on Topper
Jordan Walker - Cashman’s Cashouts
Xander Bogaerts - La La La, this is obviously Mark’s Team
And the winner goes to… Cashman’s Cashouts and Jordan Walker. I feel a little self-deprecating giving a bad award to myself, but woof. A 7th-round pick, while not impressive in this league, within a month, he’s sent back down to the minors in a struggling offense and still hasn’t come up. I am sure some of you have better offers and shout them out, but I couldn’t find one THAT much worse come draft season. Unless I wanted one of Dan’s trades, but that wasn’t the player’s fault. The award is being sent to the Mexican baseball league Jordan Walker will attend in 5 years.
The SpaceCar for Dumbest Decision to Success
"We Are Not Normal." - Tej Parker
This award will probably be renamed the Dan Award if another writer gets the idea to do this next year, but for now, it’s an award for the dumbest idea that somehow works out in the manager’s favor. It could be a draft strategy, a player pick-up, or a trade that, FOR THIS YEAR, has worked in the manager’s favor.
Our Nominees are:
Teoscar Hernandez for Paul Skenes Trade - Red Soto Cups
Trash Heap's early FA acquisition of Jared Jones - Bux in Six
Corbin Burns for Jackson Chourio Trade - Mendoza Liners
And our winner is…. Corbin Burns for Jackson Chourio by Mendoza Liners! When I looked at dumb decisions that helped out a team, Mike’s trade is the head and shoulders winner in this category. I like Jackson Chourio as much as the next guy, but what was offered was a gross overpay. Instead of sulking and keeping him or taking pennies on the dollar, Mike was offered a sweetheart deal by the only person more willing to overpay than Mike. Which helped turn his season around with Freddie Freeman and Bo Bichette. I also thought of including the Freeman trade to Vinson here, but Mike can’t always be the center of attention. Look at Chourio’s stats before the trade to get a sense of why Mike was screwed:
.176 BA and .557 OPS aren’t winning batting titles. So congrats to Mike for both fucking himself over and fucking over Dan. Your award will be received when Corbin Carroll hits 30 HRs.
The Tej Parker Chop Shop to Hacker Award
"Plan B? We Need A Plan C, D, E. We Need More Alphabet!" - Tej Parker
This award goes to the manager who went from a bit part in a bad John Singleton movie to being the technical expert and seeing The Matrix. This is for that manager who Ian lambasted in his Prediction Opus but has come around to really doing the work and being an integral part of the league, one way or the other. This person also understands that living your life a quarter mile at a time means a little bit of fear in what you do, which is a normal part of life.
Our nominees are:
Pickle the Beast - Andrew
I like Ian on Topper - Dan
This Name is a Jurkison I’ll Give you 5 Dollars to Change your Name Mark - Mark
And the winner is…. Pickle the Beast. Unlike the MVM award coming up, this award is about engaging in the process and being a positive contributor to the league as a whole. Andrew Heller, in my limited time in this league, has been a very friendly and upbeat competitor while also fielding a team that will make you want to shit your pants every week, not knowing if he’s going to hit 20HRs on a Sunday. He’s been engaged in trades and the waiver wire, and he isn’t overly reactionary. He’s willing to make deals that work for him, but never at the push or request of others. He knows what he wants and isn’t afraid to get it. Congrats to Andrew on the award. It will be received when the Nationals win the World Series next.
the most valuable manager award
“Ask any racer— any real racer. It doesn't matter if you win by an inch or a mile. Winning is winning.” - Dom
And our final mid-season award goes to the manager who has had the best season so far. This award is not just for the mid-season's best record but for the manager who has engaged in the process and comes out ahead. Maybe they were a team with shitty keepers or a terrible draft and have come out the other side better than many expected. This is for a manager taking lemons and making lemonade; this is for the manager who understands the Dom ethos: “Winning is winning.” It doesn’t matter how you get there, but it matters how you finish. These three nominees exemplify that ethos by competing at a high level and working angles at all times to win season to season and week to week.
Our nominees are:
Bucks in Six - Vinson
Mark, this is a cry for help - Mark
Oneil & O’Neill Attys at Law - Ian
And our winner is….. Bucks in Six - Vinson Mulvey! It was a surprising choice by the committee but an appropriate one nonetheless. When you look at Vinson’s team starting the year, you see that he was terrible. It's just Godawful making this writer question if you all knew what you were doing if this guy won. However, after some bad starts, he made moves. Acquiring Freddie Freeman for Corbin Carrol's corpse has been very helpful. Still, he has found pockets of FAs throughout the year that have become massive contributors to this organization, which is a process for the work. He is now playing around in the giant middle for 3rd and 4th place right now but has a steady pitching staff and warming up hitters to make a late-season push to be scary for any of the teams potentially facing him in the 1st round of the playoffs. That is the Dom ethos.
And with that, I hope you all hated this article and hope I never write it again. I will again because, at this point, who else will besides Ian and Richard?
