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Go forward to more recent blurbs.

7/31 - The MLB trade deadline is upon us, which always makes for some anxious moments if your fantasy players might be moving to new situations. And it sounds like an announcement on the Biogenesis scandal is also imminent (although not necessarily today), which has even bigger implications for the players involved – and their likely backups. Stay tuned.

The Reno-Tahoe Open tees off tomorrow morning. The field is rather weak by normal PGA Tour standards, since the top golfers are playing at the WGC-Bridgestone event in Akron. For GuruGolf, I’ve always opted for tournaments with a 2nd round cut if one is available. If you’ve got some trades banked, this is when they’ll come in handy, as there won’t be much overlap between the Reno-Tahoe field and next week’s major (PGA Championship). And frankly, the few golfers who will play in both events are probably not going to be the ones you’ll prefer to have next week.

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7/29 - Hunter Mahan surged to a -13 through two rounds, delighting the one-third of GuruGolf managers who had him in their foursomes. And then nature called, and Hunter answered. So it’s not surprising that the two teams who tied atop the GuruGolf best ball leaderboard this week were Mahan-free. On the worst ball side, Cooper’s Hawk blazed ahead of the pack with a +49, 3 strokes ahead of the runner up, and 7 strokes better than anyone else.

I made one update to the GuruGolf Standings report over the weekend. If you hover over the trades available (far right hand column) for a team, you can see how many trades that team has sold during the season. Remember that a maximum of 10 trades can be sold during the season at a price of $50 per trade. And at the end of the season, the prize for the top franchise value will be determined on the assumption that any available unsold trades are first cashed in. (The winning team must also finish above the median in the full season best ball standings.)

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7/26 - Football notice: We are still looking for more managers to fill slots in the RIFC AA league. For more information, please see the RIFC 2013: Qualifying Leagues thread, and sign up if you are interested – or at least ask questions. Leagues are competitive, include individual defensive players, and use a “slow” online draft that will take place over the last week or so of August.

Back to baseball. I wonder what the over/under line is on the number of Yankees games that ARod will appear in this season? Lots of moving parts on that issue.

I've had a number of requests over the past year or so to produce both the Pitcher vs Batter report and the Weather Dashboard at DailyBaseballData.com with all games listed in order of start time. I know it seems like a simple thing to adjust, but given the way those reports are cobbled together, it wasn't so trivial. But I finally bit the bullet and figured it out.

So as of this morning, both of those reports should now be in chronological order. One caveat- occasionally, you'll still get the BvP report in the old order (A.L. park games sorted ahead of N.L park games). Then that happens, you be prompted to refresh the page to get the consolidated sort.

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7/25 - Matt Garza must be happy that he won’t have to pitch in Wrigley Field again this season. In spite of having a sub-3.00 ERA for the entire season, he sported a 4.73 ERA at Wrigley, where opponents were hitting .282 against him. Admittedly, those stats are only for 4 starts, and his Wrigley stats were quite good over the previous two seasons. But if you throw out the Wrigley games this year, he’s got an ERA of 1.91 and a BAA of .196. Good time to sell high? That’s what the Cubs thought, I guess.

The RBC Canadian Open teed off this morning, and Hunter Mahan is the popular favorite among GuruGolf managers, on roughly one-third of active foursomes.

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7/22 - I was on a long-weekend vacation in Maine, so I heard Phil Mickelson’s British Open win on ESPN Radio. Trust me, golf was not made for radio. But Phil was evidently made for golf.

Congrats to the British Open prize winners in Gurugolf:
Duffers #1 (best ball, -37, with consistent team rounds of -10, -9, -9, -9)
Putt for Dough (worst ball, +66, with consistent team rounds of +18, +14, +16, +18)

We also had a rare “Perfect High”, which is a worst ball round with every hole showing a bogey or worse: Close Talker (round #1 – 15 bogeys, one double, two triples). It’s been several years since we had one of those.

The next GuruGolf contest is the “Dog Days Contest”, encompassing the tournaments from the RBC Canadian Open through the Wyndham Championship (four weeks).

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7/17 - The RotoGuru Invitational Football Challenge leagues (aka RIFC) have begun forming. All managers who participated last year should have received an email (at the address they registered at myfantasyleague.com). In addition, if we are going to fill two AAA leagues and a AA league, we’ll need to find some new blood. If you are interested in a competitive fantasy football opportunity, please check out the introductory thread. And bring a friend.

The British Open tees off in the wee hours (approx 1:30am ET). Be sure to get your GuruGolf foursomes set before you hit the hay tonight. As one of the major tournaments, there are separate prizes (best ball and worst ball) for this tournament, and there is also a contest for just the four majors combined.

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7/15 - Baseball holds its annual Hall of Fame enshrinement ceremony in July each year. So why shouldn’t I?

Thus, I am honored to announce the newest qualifiers for the RotoGuru Hall of Fame – Class of 2012-13:

• Mike Melton, 2012 RotoGuru Invitational Baseball Challenge champion
• Bill Miller, 2012 GuruGolf champion
• John Holt, 2012 RotoGuru Invitational Football Challenge champion
• Rob Thayer, 2012-13 RotoGuru Football Pickoff champion
• Jason Hall, 2013 RotoGuru Market Madness champion
• Ryan Bowling, 2013 RotoGuru Market Madness (excluding basket units) champion
• Florian Kirstein, 2013 RotoGuru Invitational Hoops Challenge champion

7/12 - I recall that when I was a teenager, MLB All Star games were a very big deal. Of course, back then I got most of my in-depth baseball news from my weekly copy of The Sporting News, and national baseball TV coverage was relegated to the Saturday afternoon “Game of the Week”, so the All Star game provided a rare opportunity to see many players who I seldom got to see in action. So yes, it was a very big deal.

Nowadays, not so much. Presumably, a lot of that is due to the gross expansion of coverage. But maybe some of it is part of my rite of passage into curmudgeondom. Whatever. [grunt]

As usual, I’m going to use the break to begin working on organizing the RotoGuru Invitational Football Challenge (RIFC) leagues for the upcoming season. I plan to contact all of last year’s managers by email, after which I’ll open it up on the RotoGuru Forum. I really haven’t started yet, so give me a week or so before pestering me if you haven’t heard anything. If you are interested in serving as a commissioner for one of the leagues, however, feel free to email me now. I’m not sure where I stand yet, but I do know that some of last year’s commissioners will be moving to a different level, so I may have a need.

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7/11 - Francisco Liriano. Who knew?

Back in 2006, it looked like Johan Santana and Liriano could perhaps be baseball’s most dominating 1-2 pitching punch for years to come. But after sustaining a late season injury in 2006, Liriano missed all of 2007 due to Tommy John surgery. Over the next five seasons (2008-2012), he never looked like he would regain form, with a 5-year ERA of 4.75, and three of those years over 5.00 – including the last two. In the five RIBC leagues, he was only drafted once –obviously as a flier. But as we approach the All-Star break, he’s 9-3 with a 2.00 ERA, a 1.19 WHIP, and more than a strikeout per inning. Not only has he been a key component of Pittsburgh’s surprising success, but he’s been the type of F/A pickup that can drive a fantasy team to a title as well. Kudos if you’ve got him!

In GuruGolf, Steve Stricker is the popular favorite this week, on roughly 25% of active foursomes. He’s at -5 through 12 holes, so that’s looking like a productive choice so far.

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7/10 - I think that it would be good for baseball for Yasiel Puig to be on the All Star team. I voted for him. You can certainly cite any variety of stats to support the selection. And you can also fall back on his short tenure as the primary case for resistance. But when he was called up, the Dodgers were 23-32. Today, they are 44-45. He’s probably been the most talked-about player in the last month. There aren’t many players who would actually impact the game’s viewership – but I suspect he would. I’m guessing that if he doesn’t win the fan vote, he’ll find his way onto the team through some other channel, if the opportunity presents itself.

The John Deere Classic tees off tomorrow morning. This is the last event in the 4-week Open Faced Sandwich contest, which is still up for grabs in both the best and worst ball formats. And even though the next tournament is across the ocean, there are about 20 golfers in this week’s tournament who will take the Deere-sponsored charter to Muirfield, so there are plenty of trade-conserving options if you look for them, including all of the top three favorites to win this week.

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7/9 - Over the past few days, I’ve added some extra links to the RotoGuru baseball player pages, and also to the Pitcher vs Batter report at DailyBaseballData.com. In particular, links to player pages at Razzball have been added.

Razzball player pages are designed to help fantasy baseball fanatics make quick, informed daily decisions. They go beyond just a snapshot of what the player has done to date - they provides projections on what the player is going to do over the next 7 games as well as for rest of season. This next 7 day uses Steamer projections as a base and then applies factors such as opposing pitcher/hitters and park. These next 7 day stats can either be viewed on each player's page or together via the Stream-o-nator and Hitter-tron pages.

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7/8 - Kudos to Blue Lagoon, who posted the top best ball score (47) in GuruGolf this weekend. Worst ball honors were shared by two teams (+42). Interestingly, no team had the tournament winner, Jonas Blixt. That’s not unprecedented, but it is unusual.

It’s rather amazing that the tournament was able to finish on Sunday, as the last group didn’t tee off until 5:10pm, finishing around 9pm. Obviously, they were motivated to get it in, as the local sunset was at 8:45pm.

By winning, Blixt reportedly played his way into the British Open, moving up to around 50th in the Official World Golf Rankings, which should put him atop the list of alternates. He’s also listed in the field for this week’s John Deere Classic – so I suspect his absence from GuruGolf play is about to end.

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7/3 - Homer Bailey tossed his second career no-hitter, and moves to the top of the “Worst Career ERA for Pitchers with Multiple No-Hitters”, edging out Hideo Nomo, 4.36 to 4.24. Nomo’s value is obviously locked in, so Bailey has a chance to “undertake” him over the next decade. Perhaps the greatest threat to top that list is Philip Humber, with his career ERA of 5.34. Of course, he still needs to notch another no-no. But on any given day…

Then again, Humber is currently mired in AAA, and with his current season’s major league ERA (at Houston) of 9.34, he may have run out of given days.

Speaking of no-hitters, Alex Rodriguez showed that he hasn’t missed a beat since the World Series, grounding into a double play and taking a called third strike before exiting his game at Class A Charleston. Incredibly, ESPN carried both plate appearances live. That’ll get old pretty quickly.

Perhaps the only thing more tiring than the A-Rod saga is the renewal of the Dwight Howard “who loves me?” tour. He says he’ll announce his decision on Friday. But precedent suggests that there is no reason to expect that will actually happen.

The Greenbrier Classic tees off early tomorrow morning. Get your GuruGolf foursomes in place. A lot of rosters have a good deal of necessary turnover since last week’s event.

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7/2 - The entire east coast is already pretty damp, but it’s going to get soggier today, as heavy rains are forecast from Florida to New England. The weather dashboard currently suggests that games scheduled in Boston, New York (Mets), Washington, Pittsburgh, & Atlanta are all “on the bubble”, and while it’s certainly possible that they’ll all get played, the uncertainty will at least make line-up setting problematic. These are the conditions that even confound detailed weather forecasting, as I’ve recently looked out the window to see it raining when the current hourly forecast shows a 0% chance of precipitation. So, my best advice is to be wary.

Weather permitting, Alex Rodriguez begins a rehab assignment in Charleston, S.C. (Class A) today – the next development in the continuing soap opera. If nothing else, it should be good for the local economy in Charleston, as the team will undoubtedly attract more fans and especially more reporters.

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7/1 - So I lied. Sue me.

I closed out my June 13 blurb saying that I’d be back from vacation and blurbing again on June 24. That was half right, as I was back at RotoGuru World Headquarters on the 24th. But, as often happens when you are away from the daily routines for an extended period, I had plenty of catch-up work to do and just never got over the hump to start blurbing. But today starts a new month, so I’ll force myself.

Since my last blurb, a lot has happened, including:

• The Heat overtook the Spurs in 7 games, thanks to a last second miracle shot from Ray Allen
• The NBA draft was held, with the most notable result that in the process, the Celtics blowed themselves up.
• Meanwhile, the Patriots endured their own “blow up”, with Aaron Hernandez now looking like a top prospect for the “Mean Machine”. With Gronkowski also likely to miss the start of the season, New England’s high-powered 2-headed monster at tight end may turn out to be Tim Tebow!
• The U.S. Open was expected to cough up low scores at a rain-softened Merion Course, but instead failed to produce a single red number when the tournament was completed.
• Yasiel Puig finished his first month in the majors with 44 hits in 101 AB, producing a slash line of .436/.467/.713, including 4 steals and 7 HRs.
• Yankees GM Brian Cashman publicly told ARod to shut his yap (OK, perhaps he said it a bit more colorfully)
• The Pittsburgh Pirates sport the best record in the major leagues as of the end of June, at 51-30

2013: June . . . May . . . April . . . March . . . February . . . January