Day 16: The Golden Glory

It's time for another Fantasy Olympiad to wrap up. Despite the pandemic, it's been fun once again to see the amazing performances of the athletes and teams! 

After a very competitive games, I'm glad to reveal the FINAL STANDINGS:

Gold Medal - Congratulations to the Wasabi Warriors for a decisive victory, separating from the field on the final night of swimming and not looking back once she reached the top.

Silver Medal - Kara-oke was scoreless for days when the games began, but her focus on drafting elite teams paid off in the end with an ascension to the silver medal on the final day of the Olympics. 6 of the 7 teams drafted by Kara-oke medaled, with 4 of them Gold.  

Bronze Medal - Ra-men+women had an overall balanced performance which led to the finish in 3rd place.  In the final week, the strategic selection of two wrestling teams (Japan and Iran) netted 39 points and enough to jump up the standings.

There's endless amounts of analysis you can get from the points spreadsheet but I thought a couple items were interesting to note:

1. Here's a spread of points earned by our teams from Individual point categories and Team point categories (my teams were pathetic):

2. Here's the comparison of the final point totals to the projected points from the draft so you can languish over "what could have been." The League of Pokemon win the award for the team that didn't live up to expectations the most. Also, 37 of TokYoMama's 58 unrealized points were from Simone Biles, which hurts extra when you finish in fourth place.

Congratulations again to everyone on a well fought games and thank you to everyone for participating! I really do appreciate you all and hope you have had fun!

Onto Beijing 2022 in just a few months for the Winter Games! 

Day 15: DRAMA

HERE WE GO - it's the final full day of competition with just a few medals still pending for tomorrow.  Of course there has to be plenty of DRAMA or it isn't the Olympics.  

In Rhythmic gymnastics, two of our fantasy competitors drafted a pair of twin Russian sisters widely anticipated to win gold and silver - Dina (Wasabi Warriors) and Arina (Kara-Oke) Averina of the ROC. However, as the ribbons flew through the air and the judges tallied their scores, there wasn't a Russian on the top of the podium. Averina was off the podium and looked fairly stoic, but Dina was noticeably distraught as the tears flowed creating a river of muddy mascara as the Israel contingent celebrated the unexpected Gold - even more unexpected because the medalist DROPPED the ribbon in the routine. Immediately the ROC coaches filed for an inquiry, the judges re-reviewed and decided to not make any modifications to the scores.  

From an article on the event:

"Russian Rhythmic Gymnastics Federation president Irina Viner described the result as 'egregiously unjust' on state media. “Dina didn’t lose, she won. But unfortunately the judging was egregiously unjust,” she told the Kremlin-supported RT channel. “It was simply a disgrace to rhythmic gymnastics." “Enough, they got tired of Russia. And the judges decided to support this Israeli woman.”

Outside of our games, but more drama in the modern pentathlon, as a German competitor, Annika Schleu, was leading the event by a wide margin heading into the horse jumping portion of the competition, but the horses are randomly assigned to the riders.  This horse, named Saint Boy, was anything but saintly.  The competitors get 20 min to try and bond with their horse and prepare but it was not going well.  Schleu's coach became so frustrated that she punched the horse.  As a result, the coach was banned from the Oympics.   Schleu attempted to ride and jump but ol' Saint Boy said nope - more tears flowed and Schleu did not medal:

Thankfully, we did not draft modern pentathletes, but here's the scoreboard update for all we did select:

The picture of Saint Boy above could also represent either SamuRyan or Fire Dragons as they have each frozen in place and been jumped over - falling off the medal stand with a challenging road ahead.  In one of the big comeback stories of the games, Ra-men+women, Kara-oke, and TokYoMama have had stellar team performances lead the way to an incredible day of jumping up to possible podium position.

Wasabi Warriors may have a strangehold on the gold, but it's going to come down to the last few events overnight to see who will come away with the remaining podium places.  I am sad that my team could not find their kick in the final turn of the race, but still thankful to have had a strong performance at the Games.

Too much to recap at the moment but we'll see how it all shakes out with the final events finishing in the next few hours!

Day 14: The Race Is On!

Here we go - the event and team finals are coming down to the end and we're looking at a very tight scoreboard as the Fantasy Olympiad heads into the final weekend:

Wasabi Warriors hang onto the top spot for another day with a strong performance - Jack Carlin of GB took a cycling Silver, Sifan Hassan got passed in the last lap of the 1500m to get Bronze, but still a double medalist, Sweden women's football fell in the Gold medal match, but still get the team bonus with 10 points for a silver, and grabbed a bronze from Turkey men's wrestling.  It may be tough to pass Wasabi on the stand, as she still has the Steel Curtain to come - the ROC Artistic (Synchronized) Swimming team and the Rhythmic Gymnastic favorites.  We'll see if the pageantry parlay pays off.

SamuRyan clings to the silver position by one point - thanks to the Jamaican 4x100m women's relay gold with Shelly-Ann Frayser-Price.

Ra-men+women were emphasizing the + today with a huge day to jump into podium position.  Harrie Lavreysen led the way with his second gold medal in Cycling. Ma Long also grabbed his second Gold in Table Tennis in the men's team final. Then in wrestling, their Iran men's team slammed their way to another bronze.

The Fire Dragons kept pace with a gold from Joshua Cheptegi in the 10000m race.

League of Pokemon needed some points to stay in contention and had a decent day - Xu Xin also earns a gold from the men's table tennis team, and a Bronze from the legend in her 5th Olympics - Allyson Felix.

Kara-Oke keeps steadily closing in on the field with another solid day - Elaine Thompson-Herah secures her 3rd Gold medal in the 4x100m relay as she continues to carry the Jamaican team. Fan Zhendong is the 3rd table tennis player on the Chinese men's team to get the 10 points for gold today. Of course, the big ROCK for Kara-oke has been the ROC men's wrestling team who earned their SIXTH medal today - another Gold.

TokYoMama had an amazing day earning 41 points to leap up the leaderboard. Gabby Thomas earned a silver in the 4x100 relay, Tomokazu Harimoto won bronze in the Team Table Tennis final, the dynamic duo of Ross and Klineman won the beach volleyball gold for USA, and USA men's wrestling got a double slam with a Gold and a Bronze on the day.

Hibachi Ninjas unfortunately only managed another gold from the Japanese women's wrestling team and fell to the bottom of the standings.

No matter where you stand - don't get comfortable and don't give up - there are LOTS of points still on the board to be earned.  Who will stand on top? Let the Gold Rush begin!

Day 13: Scoreboard Update

Busy day with school starting for the kiddos today, so I'm a bit out of time for analysis, but here's a scoreboard update after another day of competition!  Medals were awarded in Diving, Table Tennis, Shotput, Race Walking, Cycling, Wrestling, and the first Football medal - a disappointing bronze for the US Women.  Wasabi Warriors hang on for another day but the gap has closed!

Day 12: Wrasslin' on Wheels

Not a significant amount of medals for our teams today other than Cycling and Wrestling. However, there are a number of awesome events to watch!  A 13 year old Britsh skateboarder won bronze.  If you didn't catch it, you should watch sport climbing - it's seriously amazing. They are climbing up a wall in 7 seconds - it's like spiderman.

Here's the scoreboard update:

SamuRyan secured a gold from Filippo Ganna of Italy in the Cycling Team Sprint event.

Hibachi Ninjas rolled to silver in the same event with Denmark and Lasse Norman Hansen. They also slammed the mat with a gold from Japan women wrestling.

Ra-men+women got an Iran men's gold in weightlifting.

League of Pokemon landed double silver from Kung-fu Kenny Bednarek in the 200m and Hungary men's wrestling.

TokYoMama got a lift from the Georgian men's weightlifting with a Gold.

Day 11: Singing a New Song

The big mover today was singing and dancing up the standings - and it's been a long time coming. Kara-oke gained 35 points today leaping into 6th place and within range of medal contention - Three golds - Elaine Thompson-Herah in the 200m, Uzbekistan in Weightlifting, and ROC in Wrestling, and a silver for Wang Zongyuan in Diving, 

Fire Dragons also scored a diving gold from Xie Siyi and a wrestling gold from the US women, along with a Cycling bronze from Chloe Dygert, US to retake second place.

SamuRyan flew high with Armand Duplantis securing the expected gold in the pole vault, and a gold in gymnastics from Zou Jingyuan to try and stay on pace with the flame lizards.

Ra-men+women sped to a cycling gold from Harrie Lavreysen, a bronze from Nagorny in gymnastics, and a pair of wrestling bronze medals for Iran and Japan to jump ahead of Pokemon.

League of Pokemon celebrated Hungarian wrestling gold, as well as a bronze in diving from Jack Laugher. 

Wasabi Warriors spun a silver from Jack Carlin of GB in cycling.

And finally TokYoMama received a bronze from Gabby Thomas of the US in the 200m final, and of course a bronze from Simone Biles - while she couldn't do her best on balance beam, it's amazing as a competitor to be able to make adjustments and find a way to still be on the podium.  A great bit of redemption for what most assuredly will always be one of the great Olympic disappointments - for Simone...and for us as viewers not getting to see the amazing talent that was possible from her.

For a bit of analysis as some sports have wrapped up, I thought I'd take a look at the top performers for our teams so far - these sports have wrapped (with the exception of Rhythmic Gymnastics but only Wasabi Warriors and Kara-oke are in play there): Archery, Badminton, Fencing, Swimming, Surfing, Rugby Sevens, Rowing, Artistic Gymnastics, and Tennis.  

In this chart (sorry for low res), I have it sorted by the top performers - those that earned the most points.  On the far right you can see their "net impact," which is really just their comparison of actual points received to the projected points we had assigned to them on draft night.  Basically dark blue was a great pick, and dark red was bad news.

We'll see how the picks turn out when all is said and done!

And some further analysis, here's a cross reference of net impact from picks by team and sport - Gymnastics really hurt us all, but none more than TokYoMama - if Biles delivered to expectations TokYoMama would have the best overall impact score right now.

Day 10: Made by Real Cubans

Cycling and Wrestling kicked off today and a modest amount of medals collected overall, but still some movement on the scoreboard:

SamuRyan was able to smoke the competition and roll to the second spot behind a couple of Cuban wrestlers grabbing gold in their respective weight classes. Kramer approves.

SamuRyan also grabbed a weightlifting bronze from USA.

Kara-oke has now tied TokYoMama and is officially back in the mix. She grabbed the first medal in Cycling with Emma Hinze of Germany in the team sprint.

Wasabi Warriors put some additional distance on the field with a gold from Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands in the 5000m.  Hassan is a favorite to medal in the 1500m and 10000m which is quite a program of events and may prove to be the strongest pick in this group. Wasabi also grabbed a weightlifting silver from Ecuador.

Ra-men+women also got a Distance gold in the steeplechase from El Bakkali of Morocco.

The Legendary League of Pokemon kept their training program going strong with double gold medals from the Chinese women's weightlifting team.

Wrestling also saw medals for:

• Fire Dragons - USA women - Silver
• Ra-men+women - Japan men - Silver
• Kara-oke - ROC men - Double Bronze
• Wasabi Warriors - Turkey men - Bronze

Day 9: A Spicy Surprise

This standings update is extra hot and spicy tonight, as Wasabi Warriors burn their way to the top of the standings with an incredible day:

We talked about the Fire Dragons' thirst for gold, but Wasabi Warriors layered on the flavor of SIX gold medals today to grab the lead.  This type of jump may not be possible for the rest of the games so enjoy this ride to flavortown!

Without a doubt, the main reason was Wasabi's dynamic duo of Caeleb Dressel and Emma Mckeon who each grabbed double gold in their respective 50m free and 100m relay races.  40 points from two huge performers with 12 medals between them.  Wasabi Warriors is making all the other teams green with envy on these two draft picks.

Wasabi also enjoyed a Diving gold from Shi Tingmao and a Weightlifting gold from the Ecuador women's team.

The Fire Dragons aren't that far behind and also grabbed a gold from Cate Campbell on the swimming relay team.  However, they left some points on the board with Suni Lee faltering on the uneven bars and squeaked out a bronze, and Trayvon Bromell went from one of the favorites for the 100m gold to unfortunately not even making the final with a couple of lackluster runs in the heats.  Their beach volleyball team (Claes and Sponcil, USA) also faltered in the quarterfinals after having a 1 set lead to a team from Canada, a place famous for its beaches.

SamuRyan also had a big jump today with Ryan Murphy splashing a relay gold, Chen Yufei smashing the shuttlecock to Badminton gold, and the US Women's Weightlifting team raising a silver medal.

Ra-men+women made a splash with Kaylee McKeown (Gold) and Duncan Scott (Silver) in swimming and Wang Han (Silver) in diving. Also, Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic won the women doubles gold medal in Tennis. Ra-men+women have been noodling for a big points day such as this one.

Hibachi Ninjas were the only other team not foiled from points on the day as they speared a bronze from Alexander Massialas of the US who got 3rd in the Team Foil Fencing competition.

It's going to be a sweaty few days as competitions are heating up in Tokyo and anything can happen!