Your BPP 2024 final standings -- and winners!

The points distribution last night -- Judge's bat waking up, too late (or at the same time the defense went back to sleep) -- caused an 11th-hour shake-up in the standings. I always enjoy that kind of thing in years (...most of them) when I'm mathematically out of it by October 20th. But it's kind of a shame that, after dominating the money for weeks, neither Bauer slate could hang on for a payday -- and that Johnson's glorious comeback was halted a mere 2 points from the podium.

A big night at the plate for Judge and Freeman's return to something resembling earth made it exciting at the end. Your final BPP standings, with all slates noted:

115 MArbour 2
111 JArbour and Winklepleck
104 Shotwell 1

Congratulations to all! That's a $196 win for returning champ MArbour; JArbour Winklepleck LLC divide $56; and Shotwell gets to buy some Dodger-fan champers with $28. (Payouts will go out later today.)

102 Johnson
100 Quinn

95 Bauer Snooze

86 Bauer OMG

78 Wonsetler 1
73 Stempel
72 Cameron 2

The rest of us, and some awards, after the jump.

68 SDB Safe
66 SDB Sorry
65 Dunn and Fell
61 Tormey and Shotwell 2

58 Cameron 1 and Drake
54 Bingham
53 Reid 1

45 Reid 2

38 Fell 2

34 Brady

33 MArbour 1 and Bingham 1

28 Crase

19 Wonsetler 2

All the winning slates had Betts, Teoscar, and Shohei, but the difference-maker this year was Soto. He's not our MVP, however -- technically, that's Giancarlo Stanton. Only picked by Stempel, and it wasn't quite enough, but he consistently dropped 4s almost every night for a total of 39.

Also critical to success: Betts and Mark Vientos (35) and Soto, as noted (31) -- and Freeman, a mid-frequency pick who felt like he had many more TB than 27, and was also a key component of winning slates. And hat-tips to Lindor and Tatis, each of whom departed earlier but still notched more TB than Judge and kept their pickers in the conversation for quite some time.

Looking at the MLB expanded postseason stats, our Shane Victorino Flyin' Hawaiian' Most Valuable Unpick Award must go to Tommy Edman, with as many TB as Soto. Polar Bear and Kiké Hernandez also stood out, although they might merit a separate award for players who have seen heavy action in past BPPs but were skipped this year -- and made us regret it.

And now to the LVP. Oddly, at both ends of the equation, the VP is a guy only one BPPer picked, Stanton on the good side, L.A. catcher Will Smith on the bad with a mere 18. And at both ends of the equation, it was more important to have -- or to bemoan -- the second-best or -worst pick. If you had Betts, you had a shot. If you had Judge, you...had a shot if you had Betts also. 

As for Judge, well, he's going to get roasted and it's not going to be fair; he is streaky all year, and sometimes dudes just go cold in October. Daniel Murphy dragged the Mets to the Classic on his back in 2015 and, once there, went tundra -- but we were also beat by a better team that did more things right. The 2024 Yankees got by with it until the end, but the "who me, hustle? the bats will save us" mindset that worked better than it should have in the summer won't get the job done in October.

...Not against Freddie goddamn Freeman. Good for him; good for all the newborns about to get named after him.

All right, it's a full day over here and I've got money to send, so have a look at the arithmetic and let me know ASAP if you see something hinky. Failing that, I'll put payouts together this afternoon. Happy Halloween and I'll see you later today!