Mastersball

Each week, your friends at Mastersball will post the results of the weekly LABR FAAB run, featuring the winning bid as well a the runner-up bids. There are three LABR leagues, a 12-team AL only, 13-team NL only and 15-team Mixed League. You can see the complete standings for each league by clicking on the appropriate heading, located just under each player photo.

Included with each league report will be commentary from a Mastersball staff member participating in that league. We invite you to ask questions and post comments at the bottom of the report.

All contingency bids for awarded players are included. Sometimes, this bid is tied to a player that the owner received, so at times the bid amount is larger than the winning bid. We are including it to provide as much information and context as possible with each report.

AMERICAN LEAGUE

PLAYERS AWARDED

UNAWARDED CONTINGENCY BIDS

Perry Van Hook's Commentary

This was an odd FAAB puzzle to figure out for my team – while I lost a few points this week, I am still in 4^th place and it looks like my battle is to try and stay there. In the hitting categories I could gain in BA, but not sure I can make any gains in HR and RBI where I am next to last. Second or third in R and SB. On the pitching side, now tied for first in W, middle of the pack in Saves and okay in ERA and WHIP. The one category where I can pick up a few points is strikeouts so I will stay with seven SP and two RP. But can I or should I go all in for one of Ryan Dempster, Daniel Straily, or Mike Olt? With half the teams in the league well behind my $23 but several with lots more it is an interesting problem and I decided I would try for Straily and Olt beating all those at $10 or less with $11 bids, but still maintain some bidding dollars for the next two months unless I got both. Going all in on either/both would only beat one more team who has $20, and I do have some pitchers (pleaaaase Mariners) who might help in September.

So what happened? Well as usual I was partially right and partially wrong. Dempster went for $41 to Larry Schechter (Sandlot Shrink) as expected, and Straily also went for more than I had - $25 to Dave Adler (BHQ), but I could have had Olt if I beat the winning $16 from Jason Collette (BP etc.). But would he have given me enough at bats for help in average? At least I have a commanding position in FAAB dollars and there are two more months to play.

NATIONAL LEAGUE

PLAYERS AWARDED

UNAWARDED CONTINGENCY BIDS

Lawr Michaels' Commentary

Well, Snider proved to indeed be the high priced ticket, as the Sandlot Shrink's Bob Radomski sank $58 bucks into the new Buc, replacing Tony Gwynn, Jr. Suzuki went for $30 to Derek Carty of Baseball Prospectus, replacing Martin Maldonado, and Vitters for $18 to Ray Flowers and XM/Sirius (filling in for Clint Barmes).

Good buys all, though it was tough to say good-bye to any of them as my team is indeed starving for offense (the best I could come up with was $1 for Dioner Navarro).

Mr. Flowers also copped the tastiest pitcher of the week in Patrick Corbin for $18, filling Dale Thayer's now departed spot.

The other pickup of note was Jonathan Broxton, who actually only went for $3 to ESPN's Eric Karabell who is hoping for a save opportunity or two from the hard thrower, now a Red (Eric reserved Jair Jurrjens in the process).

So, if the questions are what impact does the trade deadline really play, and is it worth holding some mid-season bucks specifically to fortify a team for the stretch, the answers would have to be yes. For save Corbin, all the players involved in the big bucks of the week were indeed inter-league spoils of MLB trade deadline moves.

MIXED LEAGUE

PLAYERS AWARDED

UNAWARDED CONTINGENCY BIDS

Todd Zola's Commentary

I feel like Rudolph, beung left out of all the reindeer games. I spend the bulk of my FAAB trying, OK, failing to stay competitive during my early season rash of injuries. I'm left with a mediocre lineup but with no one weak enough to be replaced by the lower priced players and not ample FAAB to take a shot at the high risk, high reward guys.

I do find in interesting that a guy that was on no one's radar foiur months ago, Daniel Straily, garnered more attention than a couple of available starting pitchers with a track record of some success -- but that's the nature of the high reward aspect of the bidding. For some, Blake Beavan isn't going to get it done, so why not roll the dice on the unknown? Truth be told, this has become a larger element of today's game, one which I do not favor, but that's a story for another time.

Similarly, Josh Vitters, Mike Olt and Brett Jackson are now on a roster while established MLB vets sit on waivers - betting on the come is the name of the game at this point of the season. That said, Jackson's 34% strikeout rate scares the heck out of me -- the risk outweighs the reward.