The Check Swing: Week 18

This man, who scored 26 points on Fresh Fish's bench Saturday, won't pitch in the FBLG playoffs. Deja vu, eh Nationals?

It's the end of the FBLG regular season, and our first-round playoff matchups are set. As expected, the Fresh Fish will miss the fun. The Bryce is Right and Soler Eclipse finished in a tie for 8th in the standings, and Soler nabbed the final playoff spot by finishing 59 points ahead of Bryce. Here are the matchups for the first round, which lasts 2 weeks. For the 1/8 and 2/7 matchups, the lower seed must win both weeks to advance. For the 3/6 and 4/5 matchups, the team with the higher 2-week total advances.

1 Already Zaun - 8 Soler Eclipse

2 Retire 21 - 7 Rookies

3 PYB - 6 Misfits

4 Chateau Marmol - 5 Arbitration Losers

1. Already Zaun (15-3, 3,306 points, last week 1): A 270-point week? Save it for the playoffs, boys. Everyone except Carlos Martinez was in double figures, with Jake Arrieta leading the way with 41 points and Matt Carpenter adding 30. Kyle Schwarber has solved AZ's catching woes. 

2. Retire 21 (12-6, 3,161 points, last week 2): Ray's pitching folded in Week 18, and it led to another loss. The staff posted only 25 points, and Aaron Harang and Santiago Casilla were each at minus-1. On the other hand, Cesar Hernandez looks like a nice addition to the roster. 

3. Pitch You Blockhead (11-7, 3,061 points, last week 3): The Blockheads still look poised to make some noise in the playoffs, but Kolten Wong (7), Nolan Arenado (10) and Jonathan Lucroy (10) will have to perform better than they did in Week 18. 

4. Arbitration Losers (10-8, 3,022 points, last week 4): Tim's team lost by 117 points this week, so it's foolish to try to pick out one problem when the opponent goes berserk like that. But Wily Peralta should be able to do better than minus-1 in a pair of starts.  

5. Chateau Marmol (10-7-1, 2,955 points, last week 5): The only negative for Matt in a 192-point week was Matt Cain's 0 across a pair of outings. Odubel Herrera scored a 24 in his first week in FBLG. Welcome to the league, kid! 

6. Soler Eclipse (6-12, 2,889 points, last week 6): Adam's team took down the second-place Retire 21 and nailed down the final playoff spot. Hey, remember when Derek Norris was one of the top players in FBLG? Looks like he caught the Padre Flu. 

7. Rookies (7-10-1, 2,871 points, last week 7): The inconsistent Rookies lost a close one to Bryce and now face the tough pitching staff of R21. Which Jay Bruce and D.J. LeMahieu will show up for Henry's team in the playoffs? 

8. Misfits (8-10, 2,845 points, last week 9): Yoenis Cespedes posted 23 points in his first week as a National Leaguer, and Taylor Jungmann has pitched like an ace for Reid's team. Should Scott's PYB squad be on upset alert? 

9. The Bryce is Right (6-12, 2,830 points, last week 8): Bill's team got the win it needed to sneak into the playoffs but wasn't able to score enough points to pass Soler Eclipse. Todd Frazier's second-half cold streak is a big reason why. 

10. Fresh Fish (4-14, 2,613 points, last week 10): Freddie Freeman got hurt, the starting pitching was a disaster, Drew Storen imploded as a setup man and Stephen Strasburg scored about a thousand points on Rick's bench. Anything else?