4.5 Cities this weekend

Let’s see if I do better than last week where JCC finished second instead of the predicted 5^th and the Lakes came in last.  That result shows the difference between having a deep squad (like Royal Oaks who only had 11 available but still had quality lineups) and having limited depth -  Lakes were without 2 key players (Whittaker & Oberg) and as a result were not able to realize the potential that their full lineup threatened.
 
One of the surprise teams of the season was the Village.  Unfortunately I don’t see their Cinderella story continuing and are unlikely to win a match.  However, could they really be better than JCC?

Lifetime will be without their big Swedish stud (Mudsam) who was bumped to 5.0 for the fall.  Eddie and Featherstone have been great all season but against the quality of Royal Oaks, they might struggle.  Yes they already beat Royal Oaks once, but expect revenge as Royal Oaks bring the house!

I see Lifetime finishing 4th behind Oak Creek who have a lot of experience but may struggle in the heat against deep, quality lineups. Coach Rasor and Andy Alarid will need to be playing well for Lifetime to challenge Oak Creek or Somabut.

Oak Creek have a good roster on paper but will struggle to field back-to-back strong lineups in the heat.  John Wright, Ryan Snell, Brad Clark, Rudy Peters, Brad Tidwell & Kole Fink will all have to play a lot, and well, for this team to be competitive 

Second place, and a likely wildcard to Sectionals, will probably go to the High Point/Somabut team.  They have 5 strong lines and will give the other 4 teams fits.  Alfredo & Marcus are very difficult to play against and Tony & Ryan are also a handful.  Their third line is slightly weaker and their singles is solid.  Sam can easily play all 4 matches but Van may need to be subbed in for one of them.

On balance Royal Oaks are just that little bit better and will likely win that match 3-2.  You have to believe they will have more guys available than they did this past weekend.  If Wooley, Waldrep, Moore, Molina, Bell, Lawrence & Vogl are playing this team is very tough to beat…..

Here are my match-by-match picks:

1v4 Lifetime vs Somabut : Somabut 3-2

2v3 Village vs Oak Creek : Oak Creek 3-2

 

2v5 Village vs Royal Oaks : Royal Oaks 4-1

3v4 Somabut vs Oak Creek : Somabut 3-2

 

3v1 Lifetime vs Oak Creek : Oak Creek 3-2

5v4 Royal Oaks vs Somabut : Royal Oaks 3-2

2v4 Village vs Somabut : Somabut 4-1

1v5 Royal Oaks vs Lifetime : Royal Oaks 4-1

5v3 Royal Oaks vs Oak Creek : Royal Oaks 4-1

1v2 Lifetime vs Village : Lifetime 3-2

 
Final Standings:

1.      Royal Oaks 4&0

2.      Somabut 3&1

3.      Oak Creek 2&2

4.      Lifetime 1&3

5.      Village 0&4

Have fun guys! Play hard and call them fair