Victory!
Posted by Evan Brunell on October 29, 2011
I participate in what is best termed a “reality fantasy” baseball league. It is not run on a website — rather it is run offline with spreadsheets for team rosters and an engine that simulates games. It is the closest approximate to being a general manager I have found, even moreso than video games. You compete with other actual players who GM their own teams and must build and compete with a team much like you would in real life with trades (which can take weeks to consummate), free agency, the draft, waivers, finances, the whole nine yards. It isn’t an easy league, which is filled with many qualified people, a large part of which have a (significant) role in some capacity in baseball.
I took my team over in June of 2009 and while there was plenty of promise in it, I overtook a pretty significant overhaul of the team to put it in better shape for the future, both financially and in talent. We stumbled to a poor finish the rest of the way in 2009, and 2010 was a battle to stay above .500 but we made major moves for the future. It arrived a year early in 2011 — we were expecting one more year before a serious push — but once we saw how well the team was, we had to throw our support behind it. That led to trading for Zack Greinke at the trade deadline, dealing away Brett Jackson and Zack Wheeler for the honor. We made several other deals as well, one which traded away Mariano Rivera, others to fortify bench depth, and so on.
Somehow, we won 98 games and held the best record in the league for a long time before slipping in September when it seemed as if every single player on our team was injured. But we were able to weather the loss and advance through the postseason. Despite not being able to pitch Greinke in October due to his poor postseason in real life, we advanced to the World Series on the strength of Clayton Kershaw, Johnny Cueto and Gio Gonzalez in the rotation. We lost Gonzalez for the World Series, but somehow improbably won the World Series in Game 7 thanks to Kershaw, Cueto and a major boost from Felipe Paulino, who made two clutch starts in the World Series after not participating in any earlier round. Carlos Quentin was the hero in Game 7 with two homers. We have some work to do to repeat next season, but with Brett Lawrie, Brandon Belt and Mike Minor all expected to ascend to key roles, we are in good shape.
Here’s the roster of the World Champion Defenestrations of Prague:
League: Jackie Robinson
Division: Willie Mays
Team: Defenestrations of Prague
League Type: National
Owner: Brunell/Rathman
non-DH Starting Lineup
CF Bourn,Michael
1B Helton,Todd
RF Ethier,Andre
LF Quentin,Carlos
3B Jones,Chipper
CA Hundley,Nick
2B Hill,Aaron
SS Escobar,Alcides
(DH in AL parks: Giambi,Jason)
Substitutes
1 Giambi,Jason
2 Saltalamacchia,Jarrod
3 Weeks,Jemile
4 Jones,Andruw
5 Izturis,Maicer
6 Maier,Mitch
Starting Pitchers
1 Kershaw,Clayton
2 Cueto,Johnny
3 Gonzalez, Gio
4 Greinke,Zack
5 Stauffer,Tim
Relief Pitchers
1 Venters,Johnny
2 Janssen,Casey
3 Collins,Tim
3 Parnell,Bobby
4 Sherrill,George
5 Wade,Cory
6/spot starter Paulino,Felipe
Unassigned Players (bold — received major-league playing time)
1 Abad,Fernando
2 Arias,Alberto
3 Barmes,Clint
4 Barnes,Scott
5 Belt,Brandon
6 Blackburn,Nick
7 Buckel,Cody
8 Burke,Kyler
9 Castro,Simon
10 Ceciliani,Darrell
11 Chacin,Jhoulys
12 Cooper,David
13 Davidson,Matthew
14 Davis,Kentrail
15 Flaherty,Ryan
16 Fryer,Eric
17 Gearrin,Cory
18 Gindl,Caleb
20 Greene,Tyler
21 Gutierrez,Juan
22 Hamilton,Billy
23 Hawkins,Christopher
24 Hawksworth,Blake
25 Lawrie,Brett
26 Lindsey,Taylor
27 Mather,Joe
28 Matz,Steven
29 Mcgehee,Casey
30 Minor,Mike
31 Morris,Akeel
32 Navarro,Raul
33 Nick,David
34 Nieuwenhuis,Kirk
35 Olmos,Edgar
36 Outman,Josh
37 Palma,Alexy
38 Parra,Manny
39 Pena,Wily Mo M
40 Petersen,Bryan
41 Pie,Felix
42 Pounders,Brooks
43 Raga,Argenis
44 Russell,Adam
45 Sanabia,Alejandro
46 Santana,Domingo
47 Smith,Blake
48 Snyder,Chris
49 Spilborghs,Ryan
50 Stewart,Zachary
51 Stoffel,Jason
52 Swanner,William
53 Teaford,Everett
54 Torreyes,Ronald
55 Uribe,Juan
