2015 Astrology Awards Recap
View the 2015 FABL Lineups Here!
As we reach the half-decade point of my retrospective look back through the history of the Fantasy Astrology Baseball League, the graph is starting to show us some meaningful data points. Such as… well, see for yourself :
As I mentioned earlier, 2015 is the only year between 2013 and 2018 where Aries was not the overall points leader among FABL teams, as they were eclipsed by Libra. Both signs would enter a fairly steady decline heading into the end of the decade, which mirrors a decline in the top end of fantasy points leaguewide. Of all the signs, Virgo probably remains the most consistent throughout this time period, with Capricorn having the largest fluctuations. Cancer, Pisces, and especially Sagittarius all steadily trended up over the last five years, with the latter showing the most improvement. And it was generally just not a good stretch for Aquarius, Taurus, and Gemini.
For the 2015 FABL AWARD WINNERS, I’m starting with the pitchers again, since they made up the top five fantasy point scorers. And the top two overall, who were separated by less than 100 points, both play for the Pisces Fish in the Negative Polarity. Jake Arrieta (3,273 points / 99.2 points-per-game) has the edge, corresponding his win of the real life National League Cy Young Award for the Cubs. But Clayton Kershaw (3,193 / 96.8) earns most honorablest of mentions, and even leaving aside the possibility of a co-CYA situation, he gives PIC the top lefty-righty punch in the league. The Libra Scales also provide the Positive Polarity with a 3,000-point scoring CYA winner in Kershaw’s real life teammate on the Dodgers, Zack Greinke (3,115 / 97.3).
The race for PP MVP was even closer than NP CYA, with the top two scoring batters in the game separated by just 12 points. Bryce Harper (2,707 / 17.7), the real life National League MVP, has the slightest of advantages over his real life American League counterpart Josh Donaldson (2,695 / 17.1). But I’d have to pick one, since both of them play for Positive Polarity teams (Libra and Sagittarius, respectively), and since Libra finished higher in the standings, it justifies me sticking with the point leader. I will always prioritize fantasy points over a player’s sign’s performance when looking at awards, but it’s a fun coincidence that Negative Polarity MVP Paul Goldschmidt (2,683 / 16.9) played for the league-leading Virgo Maidens. I actually don’t know if I like Maidens as a nickname anymore. Not only is it very gender specific, but it also has ties to the concept of virginity, which is not exactly sex-positive. I’ll start workshopping some other alternatives.
2015 was a banner year for NP rookies. Leading the way is Kris Bryant (2,032 / 13.5), who would win the real life National League Rookie of the Year, followed immediately by an MVP award, as he led the Cubs to the World Series Championship. Bryant’s Capricorn teammate Matt Duffy (1,705 / 11.4) put up another strong year at third base for the Giants, and a pair of Virgos also made a splash: hard throwing Mets righty Noah Syndergaard (1,588 / 66.2) and Astros shortstop of the future Carlos Correa (1,473 / 14.9). In the Positive Polarity, you have to go all the way down to Rangers Rule 5 pick Delino DeShields Jr. (1,349 / 11.1), who didn’t even make the Leo starting lineup. But I’d be more inclined to give the PP RoY award to Giants starting pitcher Chris Heston (1,338 / 43.2), who missed making the Gemini rotation by about 100 points, but who did throw a no-hitter in 2015.
This was my most ambitious baseball card attempt, featuring a logo swap on Clayton’s cap.
Last time, I toyed with changing the name of the award for relievers to Closer of the Year (or CoY), but I didn’t like having the abbreviation come alphabetically before CYA. So I’ve decided to stick with the same abbreviation as Rolaids Reliever, but change it to Reliable Reliever. The Positive Polarity winner of the recently-rebranded award is Mark Melancon (2,381 / 30.5), the 16th highest scoring player overall. Melancon did his best to try and keep the Aries Rams on top, but was overcome by Libra’s charge, which included a bullpen led by Jeurys Familia (2,198 / 28.9) – 26th overall. Next, we have a pair of Geminians: Trevor Rosenthal (2,124 / 31.2) – 33rd – and Andrew Miller (1,960 / 32.7) – 54th – before we get to a negative reliever in Capricorn Zack Britton (1,942 / 30.3) – 55th – who still went by Zach at the time. Baltimore’s sinker-wielding closer would go on to defend his title in 2016, but since we’re going reverse-chronologically, I don’t yet know how long this streak ended up being.
In honor of hitting five years of full seasons in this project, my next post will be a half-decade retrospective of the Fantasy Astrology Baseball League!