GOT XIII FINALS
The Grand Open Tournament Finals is entering Week 9 of the regular season, with three dominant teams having all but locked up their respective division leads. Bob Jecmen’s Parallel Universe (90-51) is 20 games in front in the East; Jay Knight’s Santa Clara Swamis (88-53) has a 17-game lead in the Central; and Tom Gilbert’s Finals Frontier (82-59) is 13 games up in the West.
Jecmen last reached the finals in GOT X (his fourth final 12 appearance), but was knocked out of the playoffs in the LCS that year and is still looking for his first GOT title. Knight previously reached the finals in GOT XI, but fell short of the playoffs. Gilbert is in the GOT finals for the first time.
Just one game back in the closely contested race for the Wild Card spot is Craig Natale’s Wake County GOT XIII Finals (70-71), which should give the division leaders cause for concern: Natale has three past GOT playoffs appearances (II, X and XII) and took out the championship all three times.
NEW LEAGUE FORMATS
Many “roto” fantasy league groups of friends have joined the Diamond Mind community in recent weeks. This has prompted the Imagine Sports team to introduce several new league formats to our existing 12 and 24-team options. You can now form two, four, six and eight team leagues.
In two team “leagues” there is no World Series, but if the league ends in a tie, there is a one-game winner-take-all playoff. Four and six-team leagues comprise a single division, with a best-of-seven World Series between the first and second place teams. Eight-team leagues are comprised of two four-team divisions, with the winner of each division squaring off in a best-of-seven World Series.
The ”turbo” league option also is up and running now. With six three-game series simulated at regular intervals each day, turbo leagues power through the regular season and playoffs in just two weeks, for a cost of just $4.99 a team.
A DOMINANT MIGGY SEASON
In 2012, Miguel Cabrera became the first player to achieve a batting Triple Crown since Carl Yastrzemski in the 1967. In 2013 he nearly repeated the feat, finishing first in batting average, but second in HR and RBI (although his 1.078 OPS led the league and was higher than the .999 he posted in his Triple Crown season).
Carl Yastrzemski MLB Career Highlights
The 2013 Cabrera got his back-to-back Triple Crown playing for Ray Sedlock’s Milo the Wonder Dog team in the Big Dawgs 2009-2013 progression league. In fact, not only did Miggy lead the league in batting average, home runs and runs batted in, he led in runs scored, on base percentage, slugging percentage, OPS, runs created, hits, game-winning RBI, and had the league’s longest consecutive games hitting streak (29).
NOTEWORTHY PERFORMANCES
Jimmie Foxx and Whitey Ford recently had games to remember.
Ford spun a perfect game for Dan Snider’s Hayward Zombies team in the Tony Bartirome League.
And Foxx hit two grand slams in a single inning for Brian Ehrlich’s 1930-1938 team in the One Season Per Week League.
TELL US ABOUT YOUR HIGHLIGHTS
We want to share your success in our newsletter! Tell us something amazing that happened with your teams or leagues or an interesting/unusual strategy you’ve used!
THE TIPPING POINT
Each month we’ll offer a few tips in this space that may come in handy for the beginner as well as the experienced team owner.
In leagues that allow loans and pay daily interest on cash balances, daily interest is paid at noon PT, and a day ceases to count in calculating interest payable on a loan after 3 p.m. PT. So, before you spend your money, wait until noon PT to collect your interest for that day, and before you take out a loan, wait until 3 p.m. PT so you’re not paying interest on the loan for that day.
If it’s the preseason and you’re thinking of taking out a loan to sign a free agent, unless you’re really concerned about someone else signing the player you want, wait until after 3 p.m. PT the Sunday before the season starts to minimize the number of days on which interest on your loan will be payable.
If you’ve just gotten your weekly income payment and are planning to splash out on a free agent upgrade, wait until after noon PT the next day to collect your daily interest before you spend that wad of cash to sign your player. And if you’re adding a starting pitcher mid-week as a free agent, try to time your signing to collect an extra day’s interest on the money you’ll be spending without the pitcher losing a start.
There’s lots of helpful material on the Diamond Mind site Reference page. A good place to start would be with Frequently Asked Questions.
How do you play it. Is there a board game or a computer disk