Hello managers,
It’s been a hot minute but I finally found the time to
throw together a fresh post. Sorry for the lack of update following World Cup 2
but life has (unfortunately) got in the way of fantasy speed skating once
again.
Today is just going to be a quick update of the teams
of free agents that we’re following this season. Spoiler: you’re probably going
to feel a lot worse about your team after reading this one. When I get a moment
later this week or next week, I’m hoping to post an update to the
Crappy Tire
Power Rankings.
I’ll also make sure to update the usually trackers well
before we get to the next World Cup, and will likely put together a winter trials
update once all the major countries have held their respective events. But I’m
getting ahead of myself—for now, let’s just stick to this free agent stuff.
Is Your Team Better Than a Bunch of Free
Agents?
How many real teams are all these teams of free agents
beating? Here’s the breakdown of World Cup 2.
Dad’s Lads
We all thought 148 points was pretty fucking good last
week, but a 180-point haul at World Cup 2 was absolutely elite. If this team was
actually ranked in the standings, that would have been the 8
th
best
result for WC2. And now this rag-tag group of forgottens is somehow beating 26
teams. That’s well over half the league! Dad's Lads now sit out of the
money by a measly 15 points (or 4 spots in the rankings). If this team is
proving one thing, it’s that no one should ever say “my pool was so hard, all
the good skaters were taken!” again. It’s pretty clear to me that a lot of
value was left on the board on Draft Day.
The Leftovers
With a 16-point improvement over World Cup 1, the Leftovers
turn things up a wee bit and manage to crack the 100-points per weekend barrier.
To be completely honest, this really isn’t that good, but it’s somehow still
enough to finish ahead of four teams at the end of the Fall World Cups.
Things are about to get spicy for this jolly band of
free agents though. Scheperkamp, Wennemars, In ‘t Hof, and Dul are all going to
have to battle it out at Dutch Trials again and the odds that they all
re-qualify for all their distances ain’t exactly stellar. Now that he’s skated
two World Cups (his new annual average), Gao could disappear at any point for
the remainder of the season. Na-Hyun Lee is headed to B Group in both the 500m
and 1000m. McGregor and Wenger are both Swiss. In case you aren’t following,
none of this is good news. The only bright spot on this team is Kaja
Ziomek-Nogal who totally does not have a history of getting pregnant mid-season
and running away back to Poland…. surely that would never happen!
Jordan Stolz
Stolz is still better than the bottom 7 teams,
including Stepdad’s team (shocker). In fact, Stepdad’s team is so much worse
than Stolz that Stepdad could have an additional Mei Han, or Zhongyan Ning, or
Davide Ghiotto on his team for both WC1 and WC2 and he would
still
be
losing to Jordan Stolz. Now, Dad shouldn’t be too hard on Stepdad because he’s
now also been caught making a mistake. Dad had Stepdad ranked third-last in the
preseason edition of the
Crappy Tire Power Rankings,
but Stepdad is
currently second-last. Dad isn’t usually wrong, but when he is it’s probably
because someone’s team was even worse than he every could have ever imagined.
I also don’t want to gloss over how impressive back-to-back
120-point weekends is in this league. To get 120 points (on ice that isn’t likely
to produce a world record) you have to skate four or five races really, really,
really well. The number of athletes that skate at least 4 distances a weekend
is pretty limited, but if we only count those that do this in A Group (aka, the
ones actually competing for points in 4+ races) then the pool is tiny.
Kimi Goetz
was
a 4-race skater for the past
year, but has lost that status heading into World Cup 3. Ivanie Blondin has
also been a 4-race skater most of the past few years, but scratched the 1000m
at WC and thus only raced 3. Jutta Leerdam gave the whole 4-race weekend thing
a try two seasons ago but that was a short-lived experiment. Brittany Bowe, who
is older than your mother, actually still skates 4 races a weekend in A Group,
but she is clearly one of the few remaining of a dying breed of skater. These four
elite skaters combined are averaging just 8 more points per World Cup than
Jordan Stolz.
Vanessa Herzog, Gretta Myers, Mia Manganello, Nadezhda
Morozova, Damian Zurek, Ryota Kojima, and a handful of other skaters compete in
4+ races in a mix of A Group and B Group, though none of these skaters are
nearly as competitive (at least in their current state (RIP Herzog)). And these
skaters are no slouches. This just goes to show how hard it is to be competitive
in that many distances or races a weekend. And Stolz isn’t just competitive — he’s
absolutely dominant.
Tim Prins, Zhongyan Ning, and maybe even Jenning de Boo
could all skate 4 races a weekend in A Group, but—rumour has it—they’re all so
sick of losing to Stolz so many times a weekend already that none of them could
stomach the extra losses. It really is that tough out there on the men’s side
right now.
So, how many copies of other top skaters would you actually
need to match a single Stolz? Two Mommy Mihos? They don’t even come close. Three
Ivanie Blondins? Nope, not good enough. Four Zhongyan Nings? Negative. Five Min-Sun
Kims? Nope! Six Laurent Dubreuils? Try again fucker! Eight Wataru Morishiges won’t
even get you there. Surely certified 1
st
round pick Chris Huizinga
could match that Stolz guy… Nee, even 12 of him wouldn’t cut it. Exactly 80
Hallgeir Engebratens would indeed be enough. Though, unfortunately, that’s 72 more
than you would be allowed to field for a weekend on your active roster.
Now, I’ll admit, this exercise is already starting to
get tiresome. But it just keeps blowing my mind how fucking good this Jordan Stolz
kid really is. There have been 5 track records so far this year. 4 of them belong
to Stolz. He’s racing more than most skaters and somehow still averaging 30
points per race in a fantasy league that gives 25 points for a win. This is the
stuff of legend and we’re getting to witness it live. What a time to be alive.
Finally, dear reader, I guess I owe you an apology. I’ll
admit I’ve been a bit too quiet lately, but the holiday break is just around
the corner. Plus, the Chess World Championship just ended. This means I have
about 6 more hours of my day back, and more free time means more Dad’s Columns.
Just remember, the only guarantee in this column is a complete disregard for
quality. And I guess a couple of Power Rankings updates. Plus a new edition of
the Free Agent Tracker. I promise those are all coming… bigger and better
things are always in the works too.
See you next time, Shitters.
Dad