AZ Snakepit Fantasy Baseball Week #3: Beef goes deep

For those of you who selected Welington Castillo in fantasy this season, your patience was awarded. He absolutely smashed the ball this week, scoring 6 runs with 5 home runs and 9 rbi while adding a stolen base for good measure. Other key contributors to fantasy teams were Ryan Braun (7R, 2HR, 8RBI) and Drew Smyly (15IP, 2W, 17K, 0.60ERA).

Lots of close games and one blowout to speak of puts SKJ_Muu into first place, 3 weeks into the season.

Alabama Slammers 1 vs. SKJ_Muu 9

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
A	28	10	32	2	.228	2	2	61	4.34	1.52	1
S	33	13	37	4	.257	4	3	51	3.16	1.11	9

Despite the blowout series victory, Slammers made it a close one, losing by a couple stat points in each category. Muu swept the batting categories behind Welington Castillo's breakout week. On the pitching side, a balanced effort from Muu led him to taking 4 categories. 7 pitchers had 5 or more K's with Justin Verlander leading the charge (10K, 2.57 ERA, 0.86 WHIP). Clayton Kershaw (10K, 1.13 ERA, 1.38 WHIP) tried his best for Alabama but was unable to make his mark.

AZ SnakePit 7 vs. Mizzoula Osprey 3

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
A	33	15	46	2	.284	4	0	53	3.36	1.12	7
M	35	6	20	6	.255	2	2	46	4.50	1.37	3

SnakePit powered his way to victory, with Kris Bryant (6R, 2HR, 10RBI) and Salvador Perez (3R, 3HR, 8RBI) doing most of the work in the 3-category batting win. Mizzoula used a balanced attack, with 6 players grabbing a SB and every player except for one grabbing a run. Pitching was more of the same, with Snakepit punting saves to grab the other 4 categories. Two KC pitchers led the way with Yordano Ventura (2W, 9K, 2.25ERA) and Chris Young (1W, 10K, 3.00ERA) supporting the cast. Wade Davis picked up 2 saves to take the category.

Skinny Jean Segura 7 vs. Disco Quest 3

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
S	41	10	35	8	.296	3	6	81	4.56	1.40	7
D	34	8	22	3	.251	5	5	36	2.98	0.94	3

A batting category sweep with Ian Desmond (7R, 2HR, 5RBI, 3SB, .421BA) contributing in every category. Curtis Granderson (7R, 3HR, 7RBI) was solid in the losing effort for Disco. The pitching side was close fought but in the end quality bested quantity. Stephen Strasburg (1W, 10K, 0.00ERA) and Sean Tolleson (3SV) led the way in the 3 category victory.

CGS 6 vs. Angry Saguaro 4

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
C	32	10	39	5	.257	5	5	54	3.40	1.36	6
A	37	9	36	1	.338	2	3	50	2.56	1.10	4

Another close one, but CGS took 3 batting categories behind Bryce Harper (5R, 3HR, 8RBI) and Miguel Sano (4R, 3HR, 5RBI). Adrian Gonzalez (2R, 2HR, 7RBI) and Josh Donaldson (7R, 2HR, 6RBI) came close but in the end fell short. Pitching again was close but Jose Fernandez (1W, 14K, 3.75ERA) led the way for CGS. Steve Cishek recorded 3 saves in the losing effort.

Greinke to Victory 3 vs. Waffles 5

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
G	30	5	32	7	.287	3	0	53	5.06	1.48	3
W	35	11	29	7	.281	3	1	51	4.96	1.33	5

Despite a huge week from Anthony Rizzo (6R, 5HR, 10RBI) Waffles and GtV split the batting title. Ryan Braun (7R, 2HR, 8RBI) led things for Greinke. Pitching was a close fight, with John Lackey (1W, 16K) doing his best to give Greinke the win but Waffles ultimately came out on top thanks to Corey Kluber (1W, 10K, 1.13ERA).

The Life of Carlos 5 vs. The Baseball Furies 4

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
	25	7	23	6	.233	4	6	64	2.45	0.94	5
	32	6	32	4	.305	4	7	53	4.65	1.25	4

A hotly contested one here between Carlos and Furies with Carlos just squeaking out the victory. Lucas Duda (4R, 3HR, 7RBI) ldid his best but Manny Machado (5R, 2HR, 6RBI) and Co. took 3 batting categories. Backed by the pitching MVP Drew Smyly (1W, 17K, 0.60), Carlos took 3 of the pitching categories while tying for W. Rosenthal, Allen and Papelbon combined 7SV and 10K across 9 appearances.

Socrates Burritos 4 vs. MyWeiterGetzLongoria 4

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHI	FN
	30	12	38	5	.270	6	2	60	3.17	1.32	4
	33	10	38	5	.272	4	5	32	4.18	1.25	4

A close matchup with all but 6 total batters hitting home runs combined. Maikel Franco (3R, 3HR, 8RBI) and Paul Goldschmidt (6R, 2HR, 6RBI) led their respective teams in splitting 2 of the batting categories. Longoria wasn't as lucky in the pitcing category as Burritos used Robbie Ray (1W, 13K) and Noah Syndergaard (1W, 8K, 1.29ERA) to get 3 category wins.

Here are your standings after 3 weeks of fantasy play.

Rank	Team	W-L-T	Pct	GB	Last Week	Waiver	Moves
1	SKJ_Muu	17-12-1	.583	-	9-1-0	2	8
2	MyWieterGetzLongoria	16-12-2	.567	0.5	4-4-2	10	3
3	Socrates Burritos	16-12-2	.567	0.5	4-4-2	12	10
4	Disco Quest	16-12-2	.567	0.5	3-7-0	13	5
5	Skinny Jean Segura	16-13-1	.550	1	7-3-0	11	3
6	CGS	16-13-1	.550	1	6-4-0	8	7
7	Greinke to Victory	12-11-7	.517	2	3-5-2	3	3
8	Waffles	13-14-3	.483	3	5-3-2	5	3
9	The Life of Carlos	13-15-2	.467	3.5	5-4-1	4	6
10	The Baseball Furies	13-15-2	.467	3.5	4-5-1	14	6
11	AZ SnakePit	13-17-0	.433	4.5	7-3-0	1	5
12	Alabama Slammers	11-15-4	.433	4.5	1-9-0	9	5
13	Angry Saguaro	12-17-1	.417	5	4-6-0	7	5
14	Mizzoula Osprey	11-17-2	.400	5.5	3-7-0	6	10

Our matchup of the week pits MyWeiterGetzLongoria (2nd) and SKJ_Muu (1st) in a battle for the early season lead. How is your team doing? Are you climbing your way to the top or are you pulling the escape cord on your fantasy season?