Recapping the Wacky Leagues: The Guillotine Leagues

I was eliminated week 1 of the Guillotine Leagues and honestly, I’m glad. I don’t know how I would have balanced running a team with writing recaps about what ended up being one of the most high-pressure, competitive, and cutthroat fantasy experiences I’ve ever seen. 

 

The Finals

 

Now let’s get into the winners, shall we? In League 1, Alex Drennan got to keep his head, winning the final week by a mere 36 points. He employed a very novel strategy in the final week, dropping his entire offense on Tuesday and filling his entire bench with pitchers, denying Rich Holman any chance at streaming his way to victory. It’s definitely a risky play as a bad outing from a starter can put you in a real hole for points, but aside from Sunday, where a pair of guys threw worse than -10 days, Alex’s staff gave him around 100 points every day when he was able to fill out the whole rotation, headlined by a 33.50 point day from Trevor Bauer on Wednesday. The floor may have been low, but the ceiling was sky-high. As you can tell from the final score, Rich Holman’s team didn’t roll over in this final week, with his offense firing on all cylinders, but he simply couldn’t overcome the pitching barrage he faced. Playing for your life leads to some interesting strategies.

Over in League 2, Darrin Ambrose was able to take the crown (and his head to place it on.) It was a much more standard week between him and Donny Moskovits, but that didn’t stop Darrin’s pitchers from putting up a 100 point day of their own on the final Saturday, headlined by 35 points from Brandon Woodruff. While League 1 came down to a pretty close finish, Darrin ended up on top in league 2 buy 105 points, as Donny’s vaunted pitching staff stumbled a bit in the final week while Darrin’s offense stayed hot, including a 61 point Wednesday buoyed by Salvador Perez and Bryce Harper. 

By default, both Alex and Darrin now get unfettered access to every single player available in the league, fulfilling their prophesized Super Teams, and ascending to the Plane Of Perfect Baseball that we all someday hope to attain.

 

Parting Thoughts

 

It’s worth pointing out that originally the league split here was supposed to be first/second half, but the truncated season but the kibosh on it. This means that League 1 finished their draft on April 4th, so week one must have seen at least a few managers really sweating some of their choices by the time the season began. League 2 had the advantage of information, and the last picks were made on August 22nd. But the beauty of this format means that if you’re aggressive with FAAB, you can plug some draft holes quickly as long as you survive the first week. And FAAB strategy is big here. Do you spend big early on guys who almost by definition aren’t living up to their promise? Or do you try to improve around the edges and let your draft skills ride? Myles went on the record on Discord saying he thinks the most impactful time to get loose with the bankroll is around the midpoint of the season and I find myself agreeing. But even then you have to decide if you want to spend everything to get your guys, or keep a reserve so you can hopefully dictate the market in the last weeks like we saw Alex and Donny do?

FAAB always ups the level of complication and gamesmanship in fantasy, and combined with the sheer number of moving parts in a daily fantasy baseball league plus the absolute plethora of “waiver wire” picks to make every week means the Guillotine format requires some real management chops. It might be called a Wacky League, but surviving a whole season is no joke. I’m fully in for next year, and if you’ve enjoyed the recaps I can’t recommend it enough. Get your PL+ account if you haven’t already so you can join us.

Thanks to everybody who helped make this a fantastic experience to cover, and a special shout out to our commish Myles Nelson for organizing everything and handling all of the week-to-week logistics!

Featured Image by Justin Paradis (@FreshMeatComm on Twitter)