The MBL

It looks like Bud has been doing a fantastic job updating the blog. I guess he's been too busy overseeing the new construction on his house. I thought he'd turned over blog-boy duties to Stiffy, this things so out of date.

Ok, this time around, we're looking for a minimum of 250 points from an offensive player (that's a hitter, Mario) and 175 points from a pitcher. Here goes:

Hitters
Lance Berkman - formerly the property of the Rhody Coyotes for whom he racked up 329 points (plus whatever he gets me tonight before he hopefully leaves his game with a season-ending injury). He has slowed it down a bit over the past month or so, but he's still putting up some incredible numbers.

Chase Utley - Mario has no idea who this guy is or what position he plays, but he's keeping Coerced in the top half (or so) of this league with his 304 MVP-caliber points.

Ian Kinsler - speaking of being completely unaware, this guy has come out of nowhere for the team playing without a leader (The Stiffs). His 303 points has kept the captainless Stiffs ahead of the likes of dbarnetth, Ducky Boys, LT's Namedroppers, and until recently the general infantryman known as VA Express.

Josh Hamilton - the owner I expected the most from in terms of message board/blog participation has really let me down, but he's still the owner of this unbelievable reclamation project. Just as Josh has risen from the ashes, maybe DJ will emerge and become a part of this league. Should I tell him that dbarnetth is really Sina? Would that help?

Carlos Lee - the Bitches top scorer so far has racked up 283 points.

Nate McLouth - Another player excelling without leadership on Stiffy's team, McLouth has put up 270 points so far, giving Stiffy 2 of the top 6 players in our league. If only Stiffy were paying attention, imagine how happy he'd be :)

Ryan Braun - one of my favorite young players moved from 3B to the OF and still continues to rack up the points. He is HighHeat's top scorer and one of only two for this over-achieving first-place-in-spite-of-their-ownership team.

Grady Sizemore - he has scored 265 points already for GHoff which almost matches his batting average.

Hanley Ramirez - Hanley is happy to be enroute to the Rhody Coyotes as we speak. He's underachieved for the most part this season, but he's still the 9th top player and has been absolutely en fuego for the past month +. Once he joins the Coyotes and finds himself in the same lineup as Pujols, Pedroia, Longoria, and others, he should perform even better. So far he's racked up 262 points. I'll go out on a limb and put him in the top 5 overall by the next update (in August).

Jose Reyes - Death's spoiled little 4th-grader is putting up impressive numbers so far with a total of 261 points. Will he become more of a headcase and fall out of the top 10? Will he grow up a bit and become all that we expect of him? I'll be anxious to see.

Chipper Jones - the man who almost hit .400 (and then faded quickly) finds himself looking up at the top 10, but still the owner of enough points (259) to keep him in the discussion. Abs needs to swing by Turner Field with a rib basket or something to get him back on track.

Adrian Gonzalez - Softened Stools only player on the list has 252 points, enough for 12th overall.

Brandon Phillips - One of three guys traded for Bartolo Colon several years ago (along with Grady Sizemore and Cliff Lee), he's doing quite nicely for 86's Pikers by earning a solid 251 points so far.

Dustin Pedroia - The second-highest scoring Coyote so far has been unstoppable at the plate this month. I'd love to see him move up even further, but how can he keep up this torrid pace? If I told you a month ago that he'd be outscoring Pujols and Quentin, would you have believed me?

Pitchers
I'm too tired to type comments right now. Maybe I'll try to come up with something witty (or at least wordy) for these guys tomorrow. In the meantime, here's the list:
Roy Halladay - GHoff - 226 points
Tim Lincecum - Death's team - 215
Cole Hamels - VA Express - 207
Edinson Volquez - Southie Shuffle - 206
CC Sabathia - Milwaukee Brewe...errr, Chesapeak Monarchs - 203
Cliff Lee - HighHeat - 200
Ben Sheets - VA Express - 195
Ervin Santana - VA Express - 192 (how have he, Sheets, and Hamels not been traded away for DeRosa, Michael Barrett, and Julio Lugo yet by Jamie?
Johan Santana - Abs - 191
Brandon Webb - BigMikes Boyz - 188
Danny Haren - LT - 187
James Shields - Southie Shuffle - 179
Chad Billingsley - BigMike - 176
Javier Vazquez - Bobnoxious (yay, Dad!) - 175

The only teams not to be represented here are dbarnetth and Ducky Boys. Not surprisingly, they are two of the bottom three teams in the league. More surprisingly, neither of them is in last. The last place team has a player (Haren) on the list. I guess the rest of his team just sucks enough to drag Haren down.

Last time I posted the top players in our league, the threshold was 100 points on offense and 75 points for pitchers. I'm now looking at the guys who have reached/exceeded the 175 point mark on offense and 115 points for pitchers.

1. Lance Berkman (Rhody Coyotes) - maintains the number one spot
2. Josh Hamilton (Chesapeake Monarchs) - jumps from 8th to 2nd
3. Chase Utley (Coerced) - drops one spot to 3rd overall
4. Nate McLouth (The Stiffs) - drops one to 4th overall, still holding his own
5. Albert Pujols (Rhody Coyotes) - jumps from 12th to 5th after being traded for Holliday
6. Chipper Jones (Abs Blasters) - drops 4th to 6th as reality is starting to set in
7. Ryan Braun (HighHeat) - wasn't even on the list last time and now in the top 10
8. Adrian Gonzalez (Softened Stools) - another guy not listed last time finds his way to number 8
9. Carlos Quentin (Rhody Coyotes) - Jumps from 18th to 9th. 3rd Coyote to make the top 10, yet I'm still in 4th place.
10. Dan Uggla (HighHeat) - Not in the top 18 last time, now at number 10 - one of many reasons HighHeat has risen so rapidly in the standings
11. Derrek Lee (HighHeat) - Fell from 6th to 11th, but still one of 3 players on HighHeat to make the list
12. Xavier Nady (Coerced) - Slight drop from 9th to 12th - helping to keep Mario in the game
13. Carlos Lee (GHoff's Bitches) - up from 17th, but more importantly the ONLY member of GHoff's team to make the top 15 offensively - yet he's still in 1st
14. Ian Kinsler (The Stiffs) - Cracks the top echelon at number 14 giving the unmanaged Stiffs two of the top fifteen players in the league, offensively.
15. Manny Ramirez (Chesapeake Monarchs) - I said last time it was a matter of time before he found himself on this list. That time has come. Without Papi in the lineup, however, it will be interesting to see how many hittable pitches he sees.
    

Guys highlighted in blue above are new members of the list.

Guys who fell off the radar (aka Guys You Should've Sold High On): Rafael Furcal (The Stiffs), Conor Jackson (GHoff's Bitches), Miguel Tejada (Softened Stools), Kevin Youkilis (VA Express, for now), Hanley Ramirez (Geese), Pat Burrell (Bobnoxious), Casey Kotchman (dbarnetth), Ryan Church (86's Pikers).

Now for the pichers:

1. Edinson Volquez (Southie Shuffle) - like Berkman, he holds onto his number one status in pitching.
2. Roy Halladay (GHoff's Bitches) - jumps from 7th to 2nd. Considering his lack of offensive firepower, pitching must be what's keeping GHoff at the top of the standings.
3. Brandon Webb (BigMikes Boyz) - Huge jump from 14th to 3rd.
4. Cole Hamels (VA Express) - Jamie's next likely traded player didn't make the top 17 last time, but finds himself in the top 5 now at 4th.
5. Tim Lincecum (Death's Team) - A huge jump from 6th to 5th : )
6. Ervin Santana (BigMikes Boyz) - Drops from 4th to 6th, but luckily for BigMike he's still pretty high on the list. With no offensive players above, BigMike needs Webb and Santana to keep performing or risk falling below 13th overall.
7. Cliff Lee (HighHeat) - drops big from 2nd to 7th
8. Johan Santana (Abs Blasters) - everyone's favorite griller adds a pitcher to Chipper Jones giving him 2 players on these lists. Unlike Chipper, Johan is moving up, however, from 11th to 8th.
9. Javier Vazquez (Bobnoxious) - Jumps up from 16th to 9th while being managed by yours truly. At least I did something right for the old man.
10. Carlos Zambrano (GHoff's Bitches) - Falls from 5th to 10th, but still gives the Bitches 2 pitchers in the top 10. Sadly, he'll be out of usable innings by July 1st and will have to beg us to take Halladay and Zambrano off our hands for Adam Everett : )
11. Ben Sheets (VA Express) - Two pitchers have come out of nowhere to find themselves on the list this time around. Sadly for them, they're both owned by Jamie and likely to be traded for Heathcliff Slocum sooner rather than later.
12. Shaun Marcum (GHoff's Bitches) - Drops from 9th to 12th, but still keeps GHoff at the number one spot (for now) with all the pitching depth. Damn that "maximum IP" rule.
13. Ryan Dempster (Death's Team) - Rising from the ashes like a Phoenix, Dempster finds his way to the list for the first time.
14. Aaron Harang (HighHeat) - One of many players traded from VA Express, Harang drops from 10th to 14th but he's still raking in the points for HighHeat.
15. C.C. Sabathia (Chesapeake Monarchs) - If only DJ followed this league, he'd know that he's got 2 of the top 15 offensive players and the 15th best pitcher in the league (hell, some owners haven't seen their names on this list yet - at all).
16. Josh Beckett (Bobnoxious) - Yeah, what a crap job I did managing his team. It seems to me that a couple of these guys didn't start living up to their potential until I started managing them. Sort of like how JD Drew only starts to perform when I call him out on SoSH. He's still a sally girl (hey, if it works it helps the Sox, if not it proves I'm right - win-win for me).
17. Todd Wellemeyer (Southie Shuffle) - Another newbie to the list, Wellemeyer is the number two man in Southie's rotation, behind Edinson Volquez. These two guys are why Southie is in the top 5 of the league and many of you aren't.
18. Felix Hernandez (BigMikes Boyz) - Felix drops from 12th to 18th but stays on the leader board (although there were only 17 pitchers who made the cut last time).
19. Chad Billingsly (BigMikes Boyz) - New to the list this time out. BigMike is in 13th place, where would he be if not for the uber-rotation of Webb, E Santana, King Felix, and Billingsly?
20. James Shields (Southie Shuffle) - Yet another newbie, adds to the strong rotation of Volquez and Wellemeyer - helping to complete a trifecta of players casual fans have never heard of but are raking in points for Southie.
21. Adam Wainwright (Coerced) - Huge drop for Mario's top pitcher - going from from 13th to 21st. Then again, with 18 teams, having anyone in the top 21 isn't really that bad, right? Oh, who the hell am I kidding, I'm just practicing in case McCain taps me to be the new press secretary in his administration. The truth is, it sucks for Mario. Then again, Wainwright isn't on the Celtics and isn't as "cute" as Emmitt Smith, so Mario likely doesn't even know he exists.
22. Tim Hudson (GHoff's Bitches) - Another new name to the leader board. Seriously, GHoff, it's starting to get sickening how much pitching you have. You do realize you're well over 50% of the way to the 1300 IP mark at only about 25% of the way through the season, don't you?
23. Dan Haren (LTNamedroppers) - The best part about this player making the leader board is that LT finally has someone on the list - he didn't make the cut at all offensively or pitching last time out and only barely made it this time. He was the only owner not to have a player represented on the original list, so I'm sure he'll treasure his 23rd place ribbon. Way to go, Kate's dad!

Guys who fell off the radar (aka Guys You Should've Sold High On): Jake Peavy (dbarnetth) - seriously, this has got to hurt. Glad you wouldn't trade him to me. Zach Grienke (Bobnoxious), Chien-Ming Wang (Southie Shuffle), Vicente Padilla (Softened Stools)

As you can see, there are plenty of newbies on the list this time out. Plenty of time for anyone, even ducky, to find themselves in the hunt at the end of the season. Once GHoff reaches the 1300 IP plateau (likely on Tuesday), he'll start to enter a freefall.

Yaz4Ever (Mike) and his lovely bride.

A church sign near Camden Yards.

HighHeat likes him some crab.

Stiffy, Stiffysboss, and Jneen

No, this picture wasn't taken from the "Hot Chicks with douchebags" website (a real website), this is our very own Jamie (VA Express) and his better half.

Abs, wish you were there brother. That would've been the icing on the cake. Still a great time and it was nice to have roughly 1/3 of the league on hand.