Alex Gordon and Jeff Francoeur were shut down for the year because the peasant Royals want to give Lorenzo Cain and Jarrod Dyson a full three days to show their worth. Gordon’s line this year was 101/23/87/.303/17. Terrific! Wonderful! Tonderific! But if you peak under the hood, things aren’t as they seem. His BABIP is .358, easily a career high in the majors. His walk rate and line drive rate dropped from last year, and his ground ball rate nudged up. His homers and speed look about right, but if luck goes against him those two categories could get affected. He’s probably much closer to a .280 hitter with 17-20 homers and 12-15 steals. With just a tad bad luck, he becomes a fifteen homer guy with 10 steals and a .265 average. That’s far from spectacular. That’s spectaculess. I just made that up; you like it? You use it. As for Frenchy, his line was 77/20/87/.285/22. Oh, well, that looks pretty normal– Wait a second, 22 steals?! Where the eff in the effhole did those come from? His previous high was 8. He always failed to take pitches like he needed some ADHD medicine, but now he’s running the bases like it too. “Sorry, first base coach, whatever your name is, can’t stay at 1st, gotta run, peace!” That’s Frenchy, and he can’t even stop for a period at the end of sentences; he only has time for commas. He’s always been a notorious bad ball hitter. This year Frenchy swung at 41% of balls outside the strike zone, which is actually high for him, and his percentage of balls swung at inside the strike zone was actually down. Only thing that changed this year, he made more contact with pitches outside of the strike zone. If that stops along with his whacked out of his mind stealing, he may use 2012 to revert to his old ways, so it’ll be hard to give Frenchy my arrondissement. Anyway, here’s what else I saw this weekend in fantasy baseball:
Psyche! Before we get into the roundup, I just wanted to announce a very good friend of mine is putting on a one man show in Los Angeles. If you go see the play, you may just run into yours truly and my significant other — my mustache. If you can’t make it to Los Angeles or if you’re in Los Angeles but afraid to leave your house, you can buy his book. Anyway II, the roundup:
Hunter Pence – 3-for-5 with his 21st homer. Hey, that homer can drink legally! After Pence sat out for three games with a sore knee, it was good to see him return, unless you had him on your bench like I did. Sonavabench!
Jacoby Ellsbury – Hit his 29th, 30th and 31st home runs yesterday. For the Sox’s sake, it’s too bad he can’t pitch.
Francisco Liriano – 1/3 IP, 5 ER in middle relief. How’d he go from one of the best arms in the game to mop up duty? When Dr. James Andrews tells people 9 out of 10 pitchers agree with the good doctor, I think I know which one doesn’t agree. “I feel like Bruno Mars’s forehead, big and empty!” That’s Liriano talking through a translator.
Wilson Ramos – 1-for-4 with his 2nd homer in his last three starts. I specify his last three starts, because the Nats have been sitting him every other game. It’s really important to get at-bats for Pudge, whose nickname wasn’t always ironic, and Jesus Flores? Rhetorical!
Stephen Strasburg – Nats announced he would have an innings limit next year. The GM said that innings limit has been semi-calculated. The equation he used was pretty straightforward: A Reinjured Strasburg = No Job.
Wade Davis – 8 IP, 2 ER, 5 baserunners, 6 Ks. Nice end to what’s been a pretty terrible season. His K-rate was atrocious and it wasn’t like he was getting unlucky with his 4.45 ERA. Usually the third year a starter is in the majors is when their breakthrough comes, which next year will be for Davis, but I don’t have high hopes here.
Jason Bay – Didn’t play Sunday and was pulled from Saturday’s game because of illness. Illness sounds like it should be managing the Mets.
Nolan Reimold – 2-for-4 with his fourth homer in the last ten games; also he’s hitting .300 over the last week. He’s either hitting really well recently, or it’s an illusion to get people to draft him again next year.
Robert Andino – 1-for-2 with a steal. After 136 games, he has 13 steals with 4 coming in the last week. I don’t get that. Did he just suddenly realize he’s fast? Was he auditing a summer class from the University of Phoenix on base stealing and he just passed? If you have speed, then run.
Brian Matusz – 5 IP, 6 ER. On the year, he gave up 59 earned runs in… Guess how many innings. Wait for it… Here it comes… Wait, where did I put it?… How did it end up in my glove compartment? Anyway, in 49 2/3 innings. That gives him the worst single-season ERA in MLB history (10.69). On the bright side, for the record he beat Halladay’s 10.64 ERA of 2000. Then again, Halladay was throwing with his left hand that season.
Grady Sizemore – Shut down for the year. Backdate that to the moment his flash went off in front of a mirror. Use any definition of the word flash you’d like.
Asdrubal Cabrera – Left Saturday’s game with an elbow contusion and didn’t play Sunday. On a side note, I think Asdrubal should follow Ichiro’s lead and have just Asdrubal on his jersey. Imagine parents taking their kids to a game and covering their eyes when they see Asdrubal.
Shelley Duncan – 2-for-3 with his 7th homer in September. I feel sorry for all those that had to high-five him during his torrid month. He’s always so intense. Here’s him at a post-game press conference.
Felix Hernandez – 3 1/3 IP, 5 ER, 13 baserunners, 2 Ks and was pulled from the game after being hit by a comebacker. Over the winter, I want a 500 word essay from him about what he did this summer that made me no longer love him.
Miguel Cabrera – Hit a homer in his third straight game, then left due to lightheadedness. After the game, he said he prefers Amstel Light-headedness.
Matt Holliday – 2-for-7 over the weekend as he returned. La Russa, wearing a jacket made from veggie burgers, said as long as Holliday’s healthy, he’s going to be out there. Now it’s a judgment call whether you should play him. I wouldn’t necessarily go back to him if I had options that were hitting.
Jose Bautista – After crashing into a wall, he stayed in the game for five innings only to then leave with a knee injury. I think he should be fine. My mom was right, I could’ve been a doctor. “But, mom, there’s a whole lot more zeroes in blogging. Though that’s not zeroes as in money.”
Brett Cecil – 3 1/3 IP, 4 ER and ends the year with a 4.73 ERA and 1.33 WHIP. Somehow, I’ll find a way to make him seem attractive yet again next year; you just wait and see!
Carlos Gonzalez – As reported here first on Friday after inferring shizz from other sources, CarGo is done for the year. As I said in the preseason, “He’s a bumps-and-bruises, miss-a-few-days-here-and-there type guy. Those day-to-day things can turn into more.” And that’s me quoting me!
Kevin Kouzmanoff – 3-for-6, 5 RBIs and 2 homers. Don’t mess with The ‘Noff.
Josh Willingham – 1-for-4 with his 28th homer. I’d put $5 on The Other White Meat getting to 30 homers, if I were a betting man. Okay, if I were a betting man on things I actually know and not just random rolls of a die.
Torii Hunter – 1-for-3 with a steal yesterday, and a homer on Friday and Saturday. Not the same homer, that would be weird.
Vernon Wells – Slam & legs yesterday and 4 homers in the last 8 games. You looking at his 25 homers and 9 steals on the year, “Hey, Vernon Wells had a good year? Who knew?” You looking at his average, “He hit .220? Crimey a river, Justin Timberlake.”
Adrian Beltre – 3-for-4 with his 30th homer and 101st RBI while hitting .293. I don’t get it, is he gonna try to renegotiate his contract?
Ian Kinsler – 3-for-4, 3 runs and a homer and two steals. Totally just padding his stats to get to 30/30 and I love it. This is why all players should have to own themselves in an H2H league with 50% of their contract in their fantasy league pot. I wonder if the union will go for it.
Emilio Bonifacio – 2-for-4 with his 2nd homer in as many games, and he’s 7 for his last 13. Can you tell I don’t want the season to end? This is like the longest roundup ever. Bonifacio is hot, moving on…
Ricky Nolasco – 2 IP, 6 ER. Ends the season with a 4.67 ERA. Somehow, he’ll be hyped again next year by everyone but me. “Hey, ESPN analcyst here, and I want you to look at Nolasco’s strikeout to walk ratio. He’s awesome!”
Clayton Kershaw – 7 1/3 IP, 2 ER, 5 baserunners, 6 Ks and his 21st win to go along with his 2.28 ERA, 0.98 WHIP and 248 Ks. Even with an injured knee, that had Ethier dancing.
Justin Upton – Left the game after being hit in the head by a Lincecum fastball. Tests are showing no signs of a concussion. Too bad. I was hoping he’d return as Jason Bourne and bring down Justin Morneau for trying to kill my fantasy teams.
