Fantasy Baseball Final: The Coca Cola Kids Break League Records!

The fantasy Baseball season has come to a close, and while the Coca-Cola Kids broke many league records, they did not have the best season ever.  The Kids lost their final week of the season 8-12, to take 8th place in the league playoffs out of 10 teams.  The shining star of the last week was Brian Reynolds of the Pittsburg Pirates batting .500 (11/22) with two doubles and three home runs.  He scored 6 runs and batted in six runners.  Shohei Ohtani batted .370 (10/27) with 2 doubles, 8 runs scored, and 4 RBI.  The pitching did not come through for the Kids in the final week.  

While the season ended about as successful as a flat tire, the Coca-Cola Kids did end up with some dubious records set for the league.  The Kids now hold the following records for the league: 

Most Pitching Losses for the season: 68

Most Hits allowed in a season: 890

Most Walks in a week:  34 

Most Walks in a season: tied 311

It is pretty apparent that the draft strategy last March was to grab as many everyday impact players.  While that may not have exactly panned out, the Kids did hold their own offensively throughout the season.  Not having an ace and a top-notch closer really showed in the standings.  

The management of the Coca-Cola Kids has a lot to ponder this offseason.  Maybe a little more draft research and strategy will make for a more competitive team next year. 

Funny Things We Hear

Thanks to my good friend Colby Mead for the topic of this week's post.  On a recent episode of Colby's podcast, The ColbyCast (episode 52 to be exact), Colby and his son Caleb discuss their favorite movies, but it is the discussion before the movie talk that caught my ear.  The father and son duo were discussing Caleb's Labor day weekend coaching hockey, and Colby mentioned a humorous conversation he heard at a hockey tournament one time.  Coming out of an ice rink, he heard one boy say to another in
passing, "Did you hear Carson fractured something?"  Colby mentions while he hopes Carson is fine (whoever Carson is) that the comment was "on point" to something you might hear at an ice rink. And in my shoes, seems like a humorously "on point" comment, and I agree, I hope Carson is fully healed now and helping his team to many victories.  

That story made me think about some "on point" comments that I hear on a fairly regular basis that are just humorous when either taken out of context or when they are, as Colby mentioned, on point. 

I will never forget, early in my daughters' gymnastic careers, them talking to friends in the back seat while I was driving them home talking about how big so-and-so's rip was.  I remember thinking, rip?  Like a rip in their leotards????  Or did they mean to say, "Did you see the rip in a certain mat, or I didn't know what!?  I discovered that a "rip" is a nasty open blister that appears on the hands of gymnasts from doing the bar event.  They often will callous, but when the callous is stretched or "ripped" it becomes quite painful and nasty to look at for a gymnast dad.  So if you hear a gymnast discussing a "rip," it has nothing to do with an outfit, bad gas, or damaged gym equipment, it is totally worthy of your sympathy
and admiration that they just keep swinging with those hands pain or no pain.  

If you hang out in my crowd of people, you may hear one of us threatening that "you just might die the next time we get together."  Out of context, someone may want to file a police report, but then you might realize that one of us is the Dungeon Master of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign and the other person's character has probably made some bad decisions.  Not to worry, someone may die, but it is "just" someone's D&D character.  

In the library, I heard some kids whispering the other day that someone wanted to get a book, and the other kid mentioned that you just go up to the counter to "rent" the book from me.  While I would be happy to rent books as a fundraiser for the library, I informed the students that they can check them out rent-free.  

I realize that sometimes life just flies by, and we miss a lot of things that are on the periphery of our awareness.  Stop to listen from time to time and like my friend, Colby, you just might catch something that is so "on point" or just a bit out of context, that it will make you smile or even laugh a little bit.  

Running

I've never been much of a fan of running.  I realize this is a rich comment coming from someone who had a time in his life when he ran several triathlons, marathons, and half-marathons.  I am here to say it was less about the running and more about being able to say, "Done it."  I wasn't winning anything; I was just competing against my personal best time.  

But now I get to look at running from a new lens, and that lens is that of a father.  My youngest daughter signed up for cross country at her school this fall.  It is the first time she, or anyone in our family, has ever attempted this sport.  My older daughter did track last year, but I'm here to tell you, cross country is a different animal.  

Unfortunately for my daughter, she got her dad's ability, and cross country is more about finishing and trying to reach small wins.  Like her dad in his races, she isn't chasing a leader.  But, what is amazing to me, is this child doesn't really seem to care.  She is just loving being a part of these crazy kids who want to run 2 miles as fast as they can.  She loves the friends she is making, and quite frankly, she loves her pack.  And, I love that!  

As young parents, we have dreams of the great things our children will do.  We imagine Olympic medals or top CEO jobs, but it is amazing to watch all of the leading kids race by, and 5 or 6 minutes later comes my daughter, and that brings tears of joy to me.  I am so proud of her in her school uniform just working her ass off.  It is amazing.  I hope all dads get to experience this sometime in their daughters or son's lives.  It may not be in cross country or even athletics.  But to watch my daughter putting it all out there is just amazing.  

To find positivity in the galaxy, we don't have to look very far.  It kind of scares me as a dad that I will miss these moments.  Both of my kids and if you have children too, we know they do amazing things all the time.  Stop and watch.  I am so thankful for my daughter and thankful that she decided to give cross country a try.  Even though it is impossible to see it all,  I try to catch all the cool things my kids do, but I am glad my daughter caught my special attention when she started running.  

2022 Coca Cola Kids Fantasy Baseball update: It isn't pretty

Let's just say, there is no joy in Cola-ville this season for the Coca-Cola Kids baseball club could never
get it together.  The playoffs have begun and, well, the Kids didn't make it.  They will head to the consolation bracket, so maybe they can finish at the top of that.  They finished the regular season in last place in their division and 8th out of 10 in the league. 

Individually, several players have had nice seasons, but no one seems to have been willing to carry the team. Here is the current roster of the Coca Cola Kids: 

C:  Sean Murphy, Oakland A's

1B:  Nathaniel Lowe, Texas Rangers

2B:  Christopher Morel, Chicago Cubs

3B: Ezequiel Duran, Texas Rangers

SS: Eugenio Suarez, Seattle Mariners

OF1: Aledmys Diaz, Houston Astros

OF2: Brian Reynolds, Pittsburg Pirates

OF3: Cedric Mullins, Baltimore Orioles

Utlility:  Shohei Ohtani, Los Angels Angels

SP:  Lucas Giolito, Chicago White Sox 

SP: Yu Darvish, San Diego Padres

SP: Triston McKenzie, Cleveland Guardians

SP: Marcus Stroman, Chicago Cubs

RP: Gregory Soto, Detroit Tigers

RP: Erik Swanson, Seattle Mariners

P:  Jason Adam, Tampa Bay Rays 

P:  Jordan Montgomery, St. Louis Cardinals

Bench: Jonathan India, Cincinnati Reds, 2B; Chris Taylor, Los Angeles Dodgers, 2B, 3B, SS, OF; Wilmer Flores, San Francisco Giants, 1B, 2B, 3B; Riley Green, Detroit Tigers, OF; Miles Mikolas, St. Louis Cardinals, SP. 

In some cases, the Kids have been attempting to pick up youth for next year in the case of Morel, Duran, and McKenzie.  In other cases, the Kids have picked up some veterans hoping for a resurgence in numbers like Suarez, Soto, and Darvish.   Nonetheless, it has been a rough year for the Kids.  We will report back in at the end of the playoffs with a final report.