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Thanks to my front-running Toronto Walrus coming abruptly back to the pack the last couple of weeks, there are now eight teams within 10 games of first place in the BBFL Alomar division. Actually, my Delgado-less, Wagner-less club wasn't so bad this week; Scott's Austin Senators were simply better. The 8-2 final could have been worse — it was 11-1 for a while — so I'm grateful for "halving" two categories.

AGF, after trailing the SABR Magicians most of the week, pulled out a 6-6 tie on Sunday and is now looming large in my rear-view mirror, a mere two games back. The Eastern Shore Birds are third, only 4.5 games off the lead, after defeating the Thunderbirds 7-5. With a 12-0 whitewash of the melting-down Springfield Isotopes, the Moscow Rats made by far the biggest move of the week, from ninth to fourth. Red Mosquitos beat hannibal's cannibals 7-2 and are now tied for fifth with Mebion Glyndwr, who won a 7-5 decision over gashouse gorillas. Six more teams are within just four games of the final spot in the championship playoff bracket.



Here are the Alomar standings through 9 of 22 weeks:
  #  Team                      W-L-T      Pct    GB 
1 Toronto Walrus 65-36-7 .634 --
2 AGF 64-39-5 .616 2
3 Eastern Shore Birds 63-43-2 .593 4.5
4 Moscow Rats 61-43-4 .583 5.5
5 Red Mosquitos 57-45-6 .556 8.5
6 Mebion Glyndwr 58-46-4 .556 8.5
7 Baird Brain 57-47-4 .546 9.5
8 Chatsworth Halos 57-48-3 .542 10
9 hannibal's cannibals 52-46-10 .528 11.5
10 Billie's Bashers 55-50-3 .523 12
11 SABR Magicians 54-49-5 .523 12
12 Horse Field Hammers 54-50-4 .519 12.5
13 gashouse gorillas 49-54-5 .477 17
14 Austin Senators 46-52-10 .472 17.5
15 K-Town Mashers 44-56-8 .444 20.5
16 Springfield Isotopes 45-59-4 .435 21.5
17 Reykjavik Fish Candy 45-60-3 .431 22
18 Thunderbirds 42-62-4 .407 24.5
19 Garces_not_on_roids 39-67-2 .370 28.5
20 Jick's Rays 25-80-3 .245 42
There's another "race" this year — the one to avoid relegation — and it's not looking good for Jick's Rays, who were thumped 9-2 by the Horse Field Hammers and will need a torrid second half to dig themselves out of the cellar. 19th-place Garces_not_on_roids has been doing much better in the Roto stats than in Head-to-Head, so improvement there won't come as a surprise. On paper, before the season, the Thunderbirds' great pitching scared me, but Santana has been disappointing, Halladay missed a couple of turns, and now one of Justin's offensive stars (Chavez) is on the DL. Very tough luck. Our commissioner's team is still spinning its wheels in 17th after a 7-5 loss to Billie's Bashers.

I'm really not disappointed in the outcome of our matchup; these things happen. Albert Pujols' monster week was no surprise, but when David Eckstein's OBP is .750 and he slugs 1.000 against you, that spells trouble in the hitting rate stats. Greg Maddux tossed two games like his younger self, and my pitching, while not terrible, simply couldn't keep up. All I can do is tip my cap to the Senators; I'm not ready to blow up my team just yet. As with the Jays, the Walrus goes as Delgado goes, and if Carlos comes back healthy, we'll be fine. Also reminiscent of my favourite AL team, if we can endure this period of bad luck (coincidental slumps, injuries and hot opponents) there will be better days ahead. Maybe we can get back in gear this week, but Gwyn gets two starts from the new and improved Ben Sheets and has that Guerrero kid in his lineup, so I'll be pretty happy with a split.
BBFL Week 9: Pennant Race | 24 comments | Create New Account
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Craig B - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:05 AM EDT (#58276) #
A terrific showdown in Barfield saw some very hot competition between my surging Anarchist Archivists and a tough Ben's Men squad. The Double-A's pulled it out 6-5-1, winning the average and OBP categories (and surrendering WHIP) on a wild Sunday.

The Archivists have pulled into a tie for 10th; this week's matchup with third-place Good Sports should give us a good indication whether we're contenders or pretenders.

BONDS - Sheff! Sheff! Sheff! After a slow start to the year, Gary Sheffield is showing the form that made him the Archivists' #1 pick. He his .563/.667/1.250 fot the week, with five runs and 7 RBI. Sheff edges catcher Paul LoDuca, who matched those run and RBI totals but "only" hit .333/.391/.810.

NEIFI - A 2-for-24 week from Todd Walker led to ugly figures of .083/.120/.250, his lone run and RBI coming on a homer against Houston. Honorable mention to Edgar Martinez.

PEDRO - His K/W was nothing to write home about, but a solid 1.32 ERA and 1.17 WHIP over two starts earned Jason Jennings the Pedro in a close contest over Nate Robertson, who also had two starts. Jennings had a great 8 4 1 1 1 4 start against San Diego on Monday, then had a series of struggles on Saturday, walking seven in 5.2 innings against the Giants but only allowing one earned run.

LIMA - Just barely hanging onto his job as I cursed his name on Sunday, Steve Reed managed to singlehandedly blow the ERA category for me after it was seemingly in the books, with a disgraceful performance in the eighth inning against the Giants yesterday. Already losing 9-2, Reed gave up a hit, a walk, hit two batters and got himself ejected, following which Brian Fuentes allowed all the inherited runners to score and saddled Reed with four earned runs. I lost the ERA category 4.02 to 4.06. Grrrrr...
_Moffatt - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:12 AM EDT (#58278) #
My Mosquitos stack up well against the Commish's Fish Candy. Where I'm weak, he is too. Where I'm strong, he's not. Yippee. That said, we're playing H2H. Youneverknow.

We'll see. I would have won all 6 hitting categories and IP if we played against each other last week.

That being said, my team has royally stunk this year. Injuries, Hinske, and Derek *!@(ing Jeter are killing my team right now.
_Moffatt - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:25 AM EDT (#58281) #
You send it to the Commish. E-mail me at economics.guide@about.com.

There's quite a few of you who haven't gotten around to paying.. I'll get my four legged bill collector after you soon. :)
_Gwyn - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:27 AM EDT (#58282) #
I'm looking forward to the battle with the Walrus this week. I'm just relieved to have them scheduled now they've cooled off slightly from their early season form.
I thought I might sneak another point or two from the Gorillas last week but their pitching was just too strong in the end. A bad Sunday by Looper and Millwood cost me a shot at ERX and WHIP.
Bonds - Luis Gonzalez went .577/.633/.846
Neifi - Randa took the award for a change giving Jimmy Rollins a week off. Joe's line of .111/.167/.111 would make Neifi proud
Pedro - Free Agent pickup Doug Davis posted another shutout 6 innings. He does'nt help the K/BB numbers but he has been excellent since I claimed him.
Lima - Aaron Harang put up a 7.20 ERA and landed himself on the DL
Pistol - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:39 AM EDT (#58284) #
Barfield:

Ghost Man on Third, Slippery Pete, and Canadian wannabe all cranked out 10 wins this week.


Rank Team W-L-T WPct GB
1 Ghost Man On Third 73-32-3 .690 -
2 Slippery Pete 67-38-3 .634 6
3 Good Sports 66-38-4 .630 6.5
4 Pistol Nine 64-39-5 .616 8
5 Edmonton Decepticons 59-43-6 .574 12.5
6 team junior felix 59-43-6 .574 12.5
7 Canadian wannabe 57-50-1 .532 17
8 Middleclass Elitists 50-52-6 .491 21.5
9 TMG Eh's 46-49-13 .486 22
10 Anarchist Archivists 48-54-6 .472 23.5
11 HOMER JAYS Simpsons 47-53-8 .472 23.5
12 Freddy Beach Fracas 49-55-4 .472 23.5
13 The Sweaty Guys 47-57-4 .454 25.5
14 MonkeymenCubed 46-56-6 .454 25.5
15 W-A-M-C-O 47-60-1 .440 27
16 Schroedingers Bat 43-59-6 .426 28.5
17 Capers 43-62-3 .412 30
18 Ben's Men 42-63-3 .403 31
19 Vancouver Cyphers 41-64-3 .394 32
20 1-Tool Wonders 37-64-7 .375 34


The Pistol Nine had a solid week with a 8-4 victory over the Elitists.

MVP this week: 15th round draft pick Ken Griffey Jr .333/.481/1.048; 8-8-0.
_Shrike - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:45 AM EDT (#58285) #
The Cyphers started the long climb towards respectability with an 8-4 victory over the injury-riddled Freddy Beach Fracas, and it could easily have been an even more lopsided.

Tim Hudson certainly demonstrated why I traded for him with a shutout of the undermanned Jays this past week.
Lucas - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 11:52 AM EDT (#58286) #
ALOMAR DIVISION Roto Standings

TEAM	               R	RBI	SB	AVG	OBP	SLG	IP	W	SV	 ERA 	 WHIP 	 K/BB 	 TOTAL 
Toronto Walrus...... 18 12 18 18 19 9 17 17 13 17 13 19 190
Horse Field Hammers. 12 9 19 14 18 15 12 19 7 18 18 11 172
Mebion Glyndwr...... 14 16 11 7 8 13 15 6 16 11 8 18 143
Moscow Rats......... 6 4 12 15 15 6 10 11 3 20 20 20 142
Baird Brain......... 10 1 12 17 20 19 3 7 17 6 16 13 141

Billie's Bashers.... 19 18 15 12 12 17 2 2 19 4 6 15 141
Garces_not_on_roids. 7 19 1 20 17 18 1 1 1 19 19 14 137
Chatsworth Halos.... 16 17 7 19 14 14 18 13 10 1 1 6 136
Eastern Shore Birds. 20 20 6 16 16 20 14 5 11 3 2 1 134
gashouse gorillas... 11 10 14 8 10 12 9 3 5 16 17 17 132

Red Mosquitos....... 8 8 20 5 5 4 20 11 14 13 14 10 132
SABR Magicians...... 15 14 17 13 13 10 7 20 4 8 4 5 130
hannibal's cannibals 17 15 2 6 9 7 13 13 14 15 12 2 125
AGF............... 5 3 9 10 6 1 16 17 18 9 15 12 121
Austin Senators..... 13 13 7 9 3 10 4 8 12 10 7 9 105

Springfield Isotopes 1 2 2 11 11 16 11 10 7 12 9 3 95
Reykjavik Fish Candy 9 7 16 3 2 2 8 3 20 7 11 4 92
Thunderbirds........ 4 5 10 1 7 5 19 15 5 5 5 8 89
K-Town Mashers...... 1 6 2 4 4 8 6 8 9 14 10 16 88
Jick's Rays......... 3 11 5 2 1 3 5 15 2 2 3 7 59


ALOMAR DIVISION Strength of Opposition

TEAM	               R	RBI	SB	AVG	OBP	SLG	IP	W	SV	 ERA 	 WHIP 	 K/BB 	 TOTAL 
Jick's Rays......... 19 20 15 20 19 16 20 15 5 19 17 18 203
Springfield Isotopes 18 11 12 15 13 6 12 7 19 18 20 19 170
Horse Field Hammers. 13 16 15 19 18 17 8 11 7 15 14 11 164
Garces_not_on_roids. 2 13 20 13 20 19 3 17 14 9 16 14 160
SABR Magicians...... 16 13 17 9 15 8 19 13 14 16 12 6 158

gashouse gorillas... 10 18 3 11 9 20 18 10 16 17 10 8 150
Thunderbirds........ 9 19 8 17 11 13 9 20 1 12 11 13 143
Austin Senators..... 15 9 18 7 12 9 17 17 2 13 8 10 137
Billie's Bashers.... 17 17 10 14 16 17 16 7 2 4 4 4 128
hannibal's cannibals 20 12 14 4 5 10 13 2 19 3 3 20 125

K-Town Mashers...... 8 8 19 18 17 12 5 1 17 7 7 3 122
Toronto Walrus...... 4 7 1 12 8 11 7 17 9 20 19 7 122
Reykjavik Fish Candy 11 10 13 16 10 7 10 13 10 2 2 2 106
Mebion Glyndwr...... 14 3 4 5 7 4 11 15 12 6 6 16 103
Red Mosquitos....... 7 5 5 8 13 15 14 7 10 5 5 5 99

Baird Brain......... 6 4 11 3 3 3 6 4 12 11 15 15 93
Chatsworth Halos.... 5 6 9 6 4 14 4 5 17 8 13 1 92
Moscow Rats......... 12 15 5 10 6 5 15 5 6 1 1 9 90
AGF............... 3 1 7 1 2 1 2 11 7 10 18 12 75
Eastern Shore Birds. 1 2 2 2 1 2 1 3 2 14 9 17 56
_snellville jone - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 12:12 PM EDT (#58287) #
Another rate category lost by fractions of a point, this time slugging by .002% to Mebion Glyndwr. I've had to endure superhuman efforts the past two weeks by Mackowiak and now Vlad, who have combined for 24 RBIs against me. No mas!
Things don't look much better this week as I match up against the SABR Magicians with their red-hot triumvirate of Sheffield, Casey, and Beltran.

Bonds: One bright spot for the week was the play of Scott Hairston. He pounded out 10 hits this week, scoring 7 runs, and slugging .733 as my replacement for Matt Kata.
Neifi: Cliff Floyd's 0-5 on Sunday cost me one, if not two categories. .154/.185/.308 for the week.
Pedro: Good performances all around, especially Hudson's unfortunate shutout, but Oswalt had two quality starts and posted 10 Ks to zero BBs.
Lima: My bullpen's been reliable for me all year, but K-Rod and Reitsma combined to give up 6 ER in 5 1/3 IP.
Lucas - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 12:17 PM EDT (#58288) #
BARFIELD DIVISION Roto Standings

	               R	RBI	SB	AVG	OBP	SLG	IP	W	SV	 ERA 	 WHIP 	 K/BB 	 TOTAL 
Ghost Man On Third.. 16 16 19 13 8 14 18 18 15 16 20 20 193
Good Sports......... 17 2 18 20 20 12 12 18 18 19 19 15 190
team junior felix... 13 10 13 19 16 15 19 13 17 14 15 12 176
Slippery Pete....... 6 4 16 15 10 11 20 15 16 15 17 16 161
Pistol Nine......... 14 17 14 14 17 17 1 9 8 8 14 14 147

Freddy Beach Fracas. 4 3 4 16 19 18 3 1 20 18 18 17 141
HOMER JAYS Simpsons. 19 20 2 17 14 19 14 20 6 4 2 2 139
Canadian wannabe.... 18 18 15 5 5 7 8 15 3 20 13 10 137
TMG Eh's............ 11 10 10 7 9 10 7 7 9 13 16 19 128
Anarchist Archivists 20 19 1 18 18 9 15 13 1 2 7 3 126

MonkeymenCubed...... 1 9 4 11 15 16 17 10 10 10 8 5 116
W-A-M-C-O........... 2 5 2 12 12 3 9 10 19 17 10 13 114
Middleclass Elitists 12 12 8 4 6 20 10 7 3 7 11 8 108
Edmonton Decepticons 7 8 12 6 7 8 13 15 13 6 5 6 106
Vancouver Cyphers... 9 7 20 9 11 6 6 5 11 3 9 7 103

Schroedingers Bat... 14 13 6 2 2 5 2 4 7 9 12 18 94
The Sweaty Guys..... 2 14 9 10 13 4 5 3 12 12 6 4 94
1-Tool Wonders...... 7 6 10 3 1 1 16 12 5 11 4 11 87
Ben's Men........... 10 15 6 8 4 13 4 6 2 5 1 1 75
Capers.............. 5 1 17 1 3 2 11 2 14 1 3 9 69


BARFIELD DIVISION Strength of Opposition

TEAM	               R	RBI	SB	AVG	OBP	SLG	IP	W	SV	 ERA 	 WHIP 	 K/BB 	 TOTAL 
Canadian wannabe.... 14 19 3 17 20 19 13 3 14 11 16 18 167
Vancouver Cyphers... 3 8 20 19 17 4 14 16 18 14 11 12 156
Good Sports......... 2 3 15 18 19 17 5 1 20 16 20 17 153
Capers.............. 5 8 5 12 9 9 16 12 17 20 19 13 145
HOMER JAYS Simpsons. 6 11 13 11 15 12 20 13 13 17 12 1 144

The Sweaty Guys..... 20 15 18 9 4 7 17 5 15 9 13 11 143
MonkeymenCubed...... 18 14 15 1 5 3 18 13 4 13 18 20 142
W-A-M-C-O........... 17 16 11 20 14 20 7 18 7 1 3 8 142
1-Tool Wonders...... 19 20 14 8 6 14 6 10 2 10 10 15 134
Freddy Beach Fracas. 13 5 9 13 8 15 9 20 4 15 15 5 131

Middleclass Elitists 15 18 7 16 16 16 2 3 7 8 5 14 127
team junior felix... 10 11 12 15 18 18 12 6 7 6 2 2 119
Ghost Man On Third.. 16 7 8 7 12 5 8 16 1 4 9 19 112
Edmonton Decepticons 8 17 1 2 1 11 3 18 19 19 4 3 106
Ben's Men........... 3 13 6 14 10 8 10 6 16 3 7 7 103

Slippery Pete....... 1 1 4 6 13 2 19 13 7 12 14 9 101
Anarchist Archivists 11 6 15 10 10 10 15 9 4 2 1 4 97
Pistol Nine......... 8 10 2 4 2 6 11 2 7 18 17 10 97
Schroedingers Bat... 12 2 18 3 3 1 4 8 7 7 8 16 89
TMG Eh's............ 7 4 10 5 7 13 1 10 2 5 6 6 76
_Cristian - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 12:29 PM EDT (#58289) #
Billy Friggin Koch

The Edmonton Decepticons turned in a 5-4 loss to last place 1-Tool Wonders to fall 12.5 games back of the lead. The Decepticons now go into their toughest portion of the schedule with 3 weeks against top BBFL competition. How did my final week against 'lesser' teams go to hell? Here's what happened in 5 categories I should have had:

Saves: Billy Koch blows two and the Decepticons fail to take the category
Wins: Of course one of Billy's blown saves cost Mark Buerhle a victory and the Decepticons the category.
RBI: Which two players conveniently pick up RBIs during Billy's Sunday Night Meltdown? 1-Tool Wonder superstars Randy Winn and Jolbert Cabrera. RBI category is lost.
AVG and SLG: Two close categories lost as Billy can't retire anyone, especially 1-Tool Wonder Mariners, Randy Winn and Jolbert Cabrera.

Bonds: Beltran had a decent week but I can't give the award to him when his 0-4 Sunday helped me lose the OBP category. I'll give it to Carlos Guillen who is turning out to be my best player.

Neifi: Going into Sunday Night baseball, AVG, OBP, and Slugging were up for grabs. Juan Uribe's 0-5 juxtaposed with Randy Winn hitting everything in sight for my opponent tilted the scales to my opponent. As Uribe had a horrible Monday-Saturday he's an easy pick for the award.

Pedro: Isringhausen picked up 3 saves and threw in a 0 era. It's nice to have a dependable closer.

Lima: Do you even need to ask? The goat horns this week go to Goatboy himself.
Lucas - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 12:51 PM EDT (#58290) #
I've created some regression models to study the effects of roto performance and strength of opposition on the H2H standings. (Nerdiest sentence ever, by the way.) Once I'm done I might get a full article out of it, but fow now...

Regression of Head-toHead standings with roto standings and strength of opposition:

2003 Alomar Division (aka the Premiereship):
Correlation Coefficient: 0.857
Proportion of H2H standings dependent on team's roto performance: 64%
Proportion of H2H standings dependent on opposition's performance: 36%

2004 Alomar Division:
Correlation Coefficient: .744
Proportion of H2H standings dependent on team's roto performance: 41%
Proportion of H2H standings dependent on opposition's performance: 59%

2004 Barfield Division:
Correlation Coefficient: .751
Proportion of H2H standings dependent on team's roto performance: 85%
Proportion of H2H standings dependent on opposition's performance: 15%

If you're wondering why the Alomar H2H standings don't make sense, it's because they don't. I would expect things to even out over 22 weeks, but for now a team's standing is influenced more by strength of opposition than its own performance.
_Shrike - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 01:07 PM EDT (#58291) #
It's somewhat disheartening, or oddly reassuring, depending on my mood, to note that my extremely tough strength of opposition (2nd to Canadian wannabe) and rash of injuries have put the Cyphers in 19th (a full five spots lower than their roto performance). If my roster continues to perform at this current rate, I should climb in the Barfield standings fairly quickly as my injured players help pull the Cyphers' sleigh.
_King Rat - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 01:47 PM EDT (#58292) #
Well, after a disappointing loss to the Rays, it's nice to win big. It's less nice to realize that my entirely unexpected success this year is mostly due to the weak performance of the opposition, but I'll take what I can get. On to the week 9 awards!

MVH: Brian Roberts, after sucking for two weeks, put up a .292/.400/.458 line, scoring eight times, driving in five and stealing two bases.

LVH: Bobby Hill drove in one, while hitting a paltry .214/.313/.286.

MVP: Rodrigo Lopez was great, winning two games over eleven and a thrid innings pitched, with an ERA of 3.09, a WHIP of 1.46 and a K/BB ratio of 3.00.

LVP: Kip Wells has had better weeks, going only five innings with an ERA of 5.40, a WHIP of 1.80 and a less than stellar 0.20 K/BB ratio.

This week, the eighteenth place Thunderbirds. Given the licking the cellar dwelling Rays gave us, we're certainly not taking this one lightly. Beware the Rats.
_Niles - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 02:20 PM EDT (#58293) #
With Peavy and Wood both on the DL, I'll gladly take a split. If anybody's interested in a versitile middle-infielder with modest but consistent offensive stats let me know. (Pookey Reese, Chris Gomez)
I'd also listen to offers on Bobby Crosby.
_Rob Andrew - Monday, June 07 2004 @ 03:36 PM EDT (#58294) #
A furious Sunday pitching comeback by the TMG Ehs brought the Good Sports down from a 10-2 advantage to win 7-4, losing ground on the leading Ghost Man on Third.

I'm not very optimistic about the upcoming matchup with the impressively healthy Anarchist Archivists. In contrast, the Good Sports now have three guys on the DL and two guys in the minors - which may be poor roster management more than anything else. If we can get out of this week with a 7-5 or 6-6 result, I won't be at all disappointed.

Bonds: When I picked Nick Johnson in the BBFL draft, it was greeted widely with derision. "He's already injured." My response was that I expected to be happy with 100 games of him in Montreal/Puerto Rico. Now that he's already missed two months, and 100 games is the ceiling for him, those naysayers have probably been proved right. That said, his first week of 500/577/865 was almost worth the wait.
Leaders: Belliard 2, Johnson 1, Payton 1, Clayton 1, Sanchez 1, Bellhorn 1, Ford 1, Podsednik 1

Neifi: Brian Daubach, who is now gone.
Leaders: Scutaro 2, Hawpe 2, Daubach 1, Piazza 1, Clayton 1, Segui 1, Everyone Who Played on Sunday 1

Pedro: This is a really tough call. Nobody really stands out, but there was a lot of great performances. I'm tempted to go with Jason Schmidt again for his 9-1 K/BB ratio, but instead I'm going to reward Jason Frasor for another spotless week.
Leaders: Schmidt 4, Clemens 2.5, Frasor 1, The Bullpen Collectively 1, Wilson 0.5

Lima: Nobody was terrible, but Nate Field didn't really contribute anything.
Leaders: Ligtenberg 3, Field 1, Urbina 1, Correia 1, Osborne 1, Schmidt 1, Clemens 1
_Justin B. - Wednesday, June 09 2004 @ 11:18 AM EDT (#58296) #
Just when I thought things couldn't get worse for my injury-riddled 18th place Thunderbirds, they manage to go 2/48 last night in what has to be the most futile day in BBFL history (made even worse by the fact I decided to sit LaRue and he goes 2/4 with a homer).
Mike Green - Sunday, June 13 2004 @ 10:00 AM EDT (#58298) #
Spicol, I thought the saying was "you can never have too much pitching". :)
BBFL Week 9: Pennant Race | 24 comments | Create New Account
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