Big Kid Drops (Week 26)

Brett Davis-Imagn Images

Instead of examining the top adds of the week, I decided to look into the drops here at the end. I hoped to see some teams trying going for it and made some major drops to move up in the standings. After looking over the moves, not much happened.

I’ll go ahead and look at a few of the interesting drops and the league standings for the drop (number of leagues dropped in parentheses).

• Kenley Jansen (1): This manager was in 14th place in Saves and needed four to get to 13th and 21 ahead of the 15th place team.

I’m surprised there weren’t more teams dropping closers. The next two “best” dropped closers were Calvin Faucher and Blake Treinen.

• Jorge Soler (1): The team was in last place in home runs and could move up in batting average. Solid move

• Nick Lodolo (1): With the drop of Lodolo, he added Bryan Abreu. The team is in first place by 20 points, but needs 5 Wins to move up or 2 Wins for the three people 8 Wins behind him. With Saves, he is four behind the person ahead of him, and one person is within one spot of catching him.

• Jasson Domínguez (2), Nick Castellanos (2), Cedric Mullins (2), Paul Goldschmidt (2), Hyeseong Kim 김혜성 (3), Miguel Andujar (3), and Spencer Steer (3): These managers are finally cutting players who are not getting regular at-bats. I parted ways with Mullins and Goldschmidt over a month ago.

These too-late drops have got me thinking about creating an automated process to highlight my players who aren’t reaching certain minimum playing time requirements.

• Trea Turner (3): Three teams decided they needed the roster space after they heard the latest news on Turner from Rotowire:

Turner is not with the team in Los Angeles on Monday for the start of their road trip, and the Phillies hope the star shortstop will return to action before the regular-season finale on Sept. 28 against Minnesota. Philadelphia won’t travel back home until the Sept. 23 contest versus the Marlins, so Turner, who’s nursing a Grade 1 right hamstring strain, appears unlikely to make his way back into the lineup for at least another week.

Sounds like the managers who kept him may get a partial week from Turner … maybe.

• Hayden Birdsong: Someone came out of a coma and checked their team’s roster.

Thoughts

Again, I was hoping for more drastic moves to highlight. Maybe there is too much talk on making major moves.

1. I’m weeks behind the major moves. These managers needed to make a move, and a week or two wouldn’t make a difference. Going back a few weeks, I found some moves from teams focusing on individual categories. For example, one manager led the stolen base category by 22 Steals and dropped Chandler Simpson. I might need to do a similar piece to this one closer to the first of September next year.

2. Dead teams. Even though these managers paid $2500 or more to be in these leagues, some may know it’s over and focus on their competitive teams or football.

3. Out of FAAB. After starting with $1000 FAAB, these managers should have some spending control and have a few dollars left to make moves. I know some don’t. Out of that $1000, I leave myself with $10 per week, or $260 total to win the week. Managers would still have $740 left over for adding pop-up players.

I’ve won leagues by streaming my leagues over the last few weeks. I’m close to doing it again this year. Just a little restraint during the season can lead to huge dividends later.

4. Sunk costs. Seeing those Goldschmidt drops is a perfect example of someone who managers probably relied on but couldn’t move on.