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No half-baked metaphors this time, just right to the action. Except, a refresher first.
Scoring
Every player is worth 90 total points with each category being worth 15 points. The top 5 closest predictions are awarded points, 1st - 5 points, 2nd - 4 points, 3rd - 3 points, 4th - 2 points, 5th - 1 point. Ties share points. For instance if two entries are tied for first, they each get 4.5 point, splitting up the total points from 1st and 2nd place. This, to a small degree, makes a tougher prediction more valuable. Say predicting Michael Brantley's SLG more difficult than Ryan Raburn's SBs.
All stats are through the midway point, 81 games.
Leaderboard
This time around we have 28 people on the leaderboard, again with a very clear leader. Garnering 72.77 points, or an incredible 19.4% of the vote, keenej is in the lead! Let's take a look at how we got there.
Player Breakdown
Justin Masterson
The top 3 performers are: tgriffith1992 - 17.25, keenej - 12.5 and ethorn - 11.5.
To say that Justin has been a disappointment would obviously be an understatement. LGT as a whole roundly overestimated what he would do in his walk year. We weren't too far off on the K rate. That's something, right?
Danny Salazar
The top 3 performers are: AmbienTribe - 10, tgriffith1992 - 9.5, playdoh - 9.5.
Nobody saw this coming. Even the most pessimistic among us thought it would be an above-average year for Danny. There is much to say besides "we were wrong." We still undershot his K/9 by nearly a strikeout per inning.
Corey Kluber
The top 3 performers are: Alex Trebek - 14, Chad Young - 10.67, ethorn - 10.
Kluber in on pace to match our predicted win total and was just ahead in WHIP, while besting both K and BB/9. The even cooler thing? Both ERA and WHIP has dropped since these numbers went live. I, for one, embrace our new robot overlord. Alex Trebek's optimism has paid off and it doesn't look like it will relent any time soon.
Zach McAllister
The top 3 performers are: keenej - 24, kgall3 - 12, emdk3 - 7.83.
And this, sadly, is where keenej made their money. The only category that keenej didn't win was K/9, where Zach actually flourished. Zach might have a chance to come back and drastically improve on these numbers, but he's going to have to make a huge turnaround to unseat the leader here.
John Axford
The top 3 performers are: bschwartz - 10, AmbienTribe - 8.5, rolub - 8.
This, my friends, is what a disaster of a BB/9 looks like. Ax surprisingly bested us in K/9 and has an ERA not much above what we thought he might. Everything else is horrific. And I really wanted him to work. How much so? I predicted this: 67 - 47 - 2.12 - 1.23 - 11.5 - 2.7. Oh mama, was I ever wrong. If you need me, I'll be over here licking my wounds.
Conclusions
Besides Kluber, nobody on this list came out looking good. If we had predicted Tomlin or Bauer, things might have evened out a bit. Unfortunately, we didn't and things in this segment look bleaker than bleak. But Corey Kluber is good enough to be an ace on nearly any staff, so let's drink to him! #VoteKluber! Oh, and enjoy the lead, keenej!