Interesting proposal, Douche... Let me give it some thought (as I know it'll make PL squirm in wonderment for a few hours )

Nah, it's mostly skill for everyone - whether they have some or not. :p A player you choose that does well or poorly isn't luck, IMO.

What I would consider luck (in the salary cap game) is when your SP is replaced and he does either extremely well or extremely poorly. Or if you get rained out and half your offense doesn't play. Or any other factor out of your control.

In this game I think there's less luck and more skill involved. But there is still a matter of luck in this game - say, you wanted to start Ben Sheets today for some reason, but since he just came off the DL you can't. If he ROCKS / gets ROCKED today, then it's bad/good luck.

In any event, it seems good and bad luck follow certain people (I'm one of the latter :rolleyes: ), but skills presumably increase over time in those who take this seriously.

That's why you're supposed to check the weather. :p

back-to-back -17 days for Linebrink

PS: I don't know if what I lack is 'skill' or 'luck', I just wanted to be able to know when Brian McCann is going to play and when he's not.

What's that information worth to you? :p

Hey Douche - I may have a counter-offer for you, but I need to run out now probably for the evening. I'll sleep on it, and let you know tomorrow (if the offer is still available to me). K?

That's cool, JG.

I dunno....it seems to me that I'm getting worse.

Yes, having JL aboard for season 3, and TM's performance the first half this year - both in Salary Cap - have made the competition tougher, but I seem to be doing worse myself, independent of those two factors.

As far as Yahoo goes, I attribute my performance - which, as you will see when the final tally is in is not gonna be as bad as you think it is - to mostly bad luck with injuries:

I basically lost my 6th and 7th round draft picks for the whole season due to injuries and got just about nothing from either.

I don't think anyone else was hurt as much by injuries as I was.

JG lost Lee and Sheffield for part/most of the season, but it's much easier to replace offensive players than it is to replace SPs.

DB lost Sheets for most of the season, but that's one guy.

I lost the guys I was counting on as my #2 and #3 starters.

Give me the 17 FPPG or close to that that Harden was averaging before his injury and that's another 200 points for me.

Then give me 11 or 12 FPPG for Patterson instead of Haren's 9, and it's another 50 or so.

If my 5 man rotation had been Santana, Halladay, Capuano, Harden, and what I could've honestly expected from Patterson for most of the season, I think I would have had a higher FPPG average for my 1-5 starters than anyone else.

And yeah, I guess complaining about injuries qualifies as a whine.

Of course there hasn't been too much whining about injuries this year because no one was really affected by them that much except for me, and I generally don't whine.

I couldn't even finish all that -- where's the Whine Alert???

You think losing D Lee and Sheff and Kent is NOTHING? If I had those guys -- at the rate they should've been playing -- then I'd be so far ahead it wouldn't even be fun any more.

Not only that, I traded Carp away for A-Rod who decided to slump just then, and has for the most part since then.

*You could act like a man! What's the matter with you! SLAP* I did what I had to do to get by with all those losses - and apparently I made some right pick-ups that I've hovered between 1st/2nd Place for quite a while now. All the while listening to someone in 5th claim he's gonna pass me -- and after weeks hasn't made up any significant ground.

And now he's whining????

What's this world coming to? :p

Tuesday (official)

You poor guy.

You really don't understand the concept of "replacement value".

And after all this time I thought you were just breaking my balls, you weren’t.

You really don’t get it.

Let’s take the first part of that statement I quoted above….

“At the rate they should have been playing”

Hey, that’s the whole game, man: Figuring out the rates at which they will play.

I deliberately avoided picking Sheff and Kent, because I figured they were a year older and due for a drop off. And I certainly didn’t think Lee was gonna duplicate last year.

You wanna talk about “At the rate they should have been playing” and guys who were disappointments, I have those too.

We all have them.

Disappointments, and surprises who did better than we expected.

I could say if Chavez and Burrell and Tejada had played up to expectations, I’d have another 200 points or so, and with my extra 25 starts I’d project to being in the lead.

But I wanted to talk about replacement value, and how you don’t really understand it.

This season, Lee has averaged 3.00 FPPG, Sheffield 3.47, and Kent 3.26, while missing about 170 games between the three of them.

Do you mean to tell me that they guys you used as replacements didn’t average 3.21 FPPG in those 170 games?

Why, I’d bet that their replacements did better!!

I can tell you for sure that I lost a lot more points in replacing Harden and Patterson than you did in replacing your three guys, and those two injuries were considerably more damaging to my chances than your injuries were to yours.

But let’s say you’re right….

Let’s say that over those 170 games their replacements averaged half a PPG less than Sheff, Lee, and Kent.

Or let's say that the three of them were about to start producing half a point a game more.

So you’d have another 85 points in total?

That puts you “so far ahead it wouldn't even be fun any more.”?

Please. Get serious.

As far as you saying that I haven’t made up any points on you in weeks.

Well, let’s see…..

While your deceptive lead in raw points has increased from about 400 to about 450, I believe that I’ve gained an additional 8 or 9 pitching starts in hand against you in that time.

Since I value each start at about 13 FPPG, I figure that in fact I [i[have[/i] gained on you, since if you add the 100 points those starts are worth to my total, my deficit is only about 350.

(N.B.: I didn’t check those figures; I’m going from memory here, so I could be wrong)

But that’s OK, because all this business about games in hand and projections is yet another concept which you don’t fully understand.

You and numbers……sometimes I wonder….

Like when you told me that allowing only 6 runs a game gives your team a good chance win.

Or what you just told me: That the high score in the salary cap game is over 100 practically every day.

So keep your head buried in the sand and keep thinking you have a 500 point lead, and all will be well.

I’m gonna tell you, though:

This race between you, JL, TM, DB, and myself is a lot closer than you think it is.

Fnally, my whine in my last post was about injuries.

You didn’t realize that?

Whinemeister w/ 2 decent SPs today????

What does that mean?

All those question marks?

Did I do well? Did I do poorly?

Do you think I did well or poorly?

I'll tell you what though....

You better hope I don't average 19 FPPG in my extra 25 starts or the rest of the way, 'cuz if I do, you're toast.

Yeah....I know you don't expect me too; I don't either.

But you better hope that I don't.

Now - ugh - 2;30 in the morning and I have to go out and buy cigarettes.

How retarded am I? :rolleyes:

Fuck this crap -- erase all previous bets and raise the stakes: $100 says I beat you in this game. It'll be worth it to see you actually PROVE yourself rather than reading you yap about it all the time. :p Okay?

And this has no bearing with my (already maybe) trade w/ Douche tomorrow.

I said decent, didn't I?? It means I didn't expect you to 1) run with 2 SPs in one day, since apparently you'd rather hold on to them until October or November; and, 2) they did okay. Better than mine.

What's the confusion? :p

And as I was reminded, the MOST to do with "luck" in this game is injuries.

I've had my share, trust me -- and you claim to as well. But, I made the best of it (so far - knock on Wood), while you're still mired in mediocrity. :p

(Shit, I almost forgot -- when I bet I lose... fuck! Ahh, well, at least it'll be interesting to see you make up all those points! Which for (seemingly) months you've been claiming you will... it just hasn't happened quite yet, inching toward August....)

No, it's just that it's much harder to replace SPs than it is to replace position players.

As far as our bet goes, I'm content to leave it as it is.

I think that you and I are very close, and it could go either way - certainly not worth betting on.

Besides, I'd feel very badly and guilty if I won. Honestly. I don't like winning money from friends.

That's why I limit my poker playing to Atlantic City and very rarely play in my friend's "home game", and since i know that you're not a smart gambler, really.....

Cuz if you were, you wouldn't want to increase a bet which is so close that it will probably be decided by luck.

You don't wanna hear any more yapping, that's fine. I'll shut up, ignore your yapping about your 500 point lead and my poor playing which starts it all, and save my yapping for the end, when I either finish ahead of you or so close behind you that it will make all your talk about your big lead seem even sillier than it does now.

You wanna make a bet, make one with me when we start off at something exactly even.

Meanwhile, you keep that head buried for me, and believe in your big lead, OK? :p

I said decent, didn't I?? It means I didn't expect you to 1) run with 2 SPs in one day, since apparently you'd rather hold on to them until October or November; and, 2) they did okay. Better than mine.

What's the confusion? :p [/b][/quote]The confusion is all the question marks.

Without them, it makes sense -- with them, I'm not so sure

And can't you ever be serious.

You know you're not serious when you say you didn't expect me to use both Santana and Halladay tonight.

And yeah, as you say "They did OK."

That's why I don't understand the question marks.

Oh....and when did I become the "Whinemesiter"?

That's you. PLEASE don't make me go back to count whines and prove that point.

It seems that I'm always keeping track of something to prove how silly one of your silly statements were.

Allowing 6 runs gives your team a good chance to win.....the high score in salary cap is over 100 practically every day.....

Lemme guess on your trade with DB....

Howard for Santana or Penny.

That deal is a natural - helps you both.

I don't think I said SIX runs per game -- if I did, then shoot me.

And YES, you WILL find that MOST days someone scores 100+ pts...

In any event, I really thought you'd take me up on that bet, being a betting man and all. If I had more money, I'd make it $1000, but that's beyond my current budget, even for easy bets like this.

My deal w/ DB isn't final yet, I'm thinking of a counter-offer to his. But I know it'd probably piss you off. Actually, maybe I should check your roster first...!

P.S. If you still want BullSchmidt, make an offer... only a few days left!

You wanna bet on that ?

I'm a betting man, but I prefer to bet when I'm sure I have the edge and in things that involve less luck.

As I've said - if you missed it - we are very very close despite the fact that you think you have a 400 point lead, and I don't particularly like winning money from my friends.

In any case, I'm not confident enough to bet more on this, and if you were a smart bettor who truly understood some of the things we've talked about, you wouldn't be either.

The only deal that would piss me off is a one-sided stupid one.

Or a deal in which one of you trades away a guy I would've wanted and would've been willing to offer more for.

If you're offering, say, Penny for Howard, I can't be pissed off because as much as I'd like Howard, I can't offer DB anyone bettr than Penny, and as much as I'd lik Penny, I can't offer you anyone better than Howard.

But, as I've said numerous times in the past, if there's a guy you're thinking of trading it's silly not to see if someone is willing to make you a better offer.

I mean, unless you're 100% certain that no one will, or unless the guy you're getting is the only guy you could possibly want in the whole world, or unless you're sure that you're totally fleecing the other guy, you have absolutly nothing to lose by doing that, do you?

And yeah....you said 6 runs a game

I made you enough offers for him already.

I keep making 'em, and you keep turning them down.

That's silly.

Why don't you just tell me who I have that you want for him?

Well, you backed down from "practically every day" to "most" days.

I guess we're getting somewhere.

Pretty soon it'll be about "half the time", which is about what I think it is.

That's true... for OBVIOUS reasons... I'll see where I'm at after the possible DB trade -- altho, after losing all my pitching, I'm not sure I'd want to lose even more...

'night!

Obvious reasons? :rolleyes:

I wish I saved all the trade offers I made to you so we could see which ones were so horribly one-sided.

And I guess one of my reasons must apply to your trade with DB with respect to why you don't want to see if I can make a bettr offer - Either

a) you're 100% certain that I won't, or
b) the guy you're getting is the only guy you could possibly want in the whole world, or
c) you're sure that you're totally fleecing the other guy

"B" and "C" are doubtful, so it must be "A". And that 100% condition makes even "A" tough to believe.

Would someone please explain to me the reluctance to make public trade offers in an attempt to get a better offer for the player you are trading, unless one of the above reasons apply?

I'll be damned if I can figure it out.

Plaw, I'd give you a shot at it, but you don't have any 1B's that I want... But in any event, let's see who you'd offer me for Zambrano & Penny... or if you still want Schmidt...

C'mon, Plaw, I don't have all day. :p

[WhineAlert!]
I'm really happy that I swapped J Rivera (10) for J Jones (0) at the last minute. :rolleyes:
[/WhineAlert!]

Sorry...I was out.

Zambrano and Penny? Gimme a minute or two.

Don't want 'em both, and I'm no longer interested in Schmidt, really.

So we're back with me offering you the same guys for Zambrano, the starting point of the deal from my end being Tejada or Dunn.

I wouldn't include either of them in a deal for Penny, though, unless I got a lot more than Penny in return; like maybe Nathan also, or something like that.

Interesting...

Okay, let me put it on the table. Here's DB's original offer:

RF Abreu
1B Howard
SP Beckett

for:

LF Holliday
SP Zambrano
SP Penny

And this is my counter offer, which he hasn't seen yet and could reject:

1B Howard
SP Beckett
RP Zumaya

for:

SP Zambrano
SP Penny
RP Timlin


I figured I'd want to upgrade my RP a bit for losing a starter. Whether DB will accept or not, I don't know.

I wouldn't mind Tejada or even Dunn since I should get a reliable 1B, whether him or Howard.

Hmmm...

Hmm, it figures Zambrano (yesterday) and Penny (right now) are putting in really shitty games! Who wants these guys now??