The prairie wind stirs up the sweet bouquet of spring. On the horizon, we see Mason Saunders, a rodeo extraordinaire, who looks remarkably similar to Madison Bumgarner. Mason stands on top of a wild steer throwing knives into a target right above the Astros’ mascot’s head, Orbit. Charlie Blackmon, dressed like the star of the blaxploitation film Chazz Noir Does Your Mom, approaches Saunders. “I’m Chazz Noir and my tricked-out Cadillac lowrider ran out of gas at the entrance of your ranch. Was wondering if you had any extra gas.” Saunders throws one last curve with his knife, and it sticks into Orbit’s arm and the mascot goes down like a sack of potatoes. Finally, Saunders replies, “Around here, boy, there’s no handouts. You need to work for gas. In the silo on the left of my ranch, we make Horsey Sauce that we sell to Arby’s, and, in the right silo of the ranch, is ranch dressing.” Oh, sorry! I didn’t hear you come in. I was just working on my NL West-ern novel. Any hoo! Here’s what I said in the top 20 outfielders about Chazz Noir, “As with most 33-year-olds, Noir’s speed has completely vaporized. Last year, he had two steals in — and this made me laugh — seven attempts. Bud Black, man (no relation), had to keep sending him? That franchise is such a mess. Coors is so good too! It’s like a hot fudge sundae made by a five-year-old and it’s all fudge and whipped cream and there’s no actual ice cream. Chazz Noir’s sprint speed was 308th in the league. He was as fast as Jay Bruce. With his flat feet, Blackmon’s BABIP is going to come down (for those not convinced about Sprint Speed, his HP to 1B was not great either), even in Coors, which is a notoriously high BABIP park, then his average will fall and his goofy power will fall back to earth and–This is like musical chairs. You keep sitting in Blackmon’s fantasy value, year after year, but at some point the music is going to stop and you’re gonna be left standing with a 24-homer, .270 hitter. Or worse: Daniel Murphy.” And that’s me quoting me! Then, I had a hot flash like my much older wife, Cougs, and I thought I screwed the pooch like my dog, Ted, out on the prowl. A full-on panic attack, guys and five girl readers, because I searched Chazz Noir’s Sprint Speed and HP to 1B again to double-check my work, and he wasn’t nearly that bad. His Sprint Speed was decent-enough, around that of Jonathan Villar, and his HP to 1B was actually okay around that of Chase Utley–Wait a second! That doesn’t sound right; Utley was retired. Then I looked at what I was searching, and it turned out Chazz Noir’s speed was good. Dot dot dot. In 2018! I was searching the wrong year. What a nerd, I am, said like Yoda. I wanna roll with the gangstas, but so far they all think I’m too…White and nerdy! Think I’m just too white and nerdy (repeat 3x). When going back to 2019, Blackmon was once again slow. Now, this isn’t necessarily new information in the standard way one thinks about new information. It’s more like not new news (stutterer!), but it points out my big problem with Darker Noir, he slowed massively last year. He went from 4.27 HP to 1B/27.6 ft/sec to 4.35/26.7. As the the guys who spit chew, chew spit and wear stopwatches around their necks say, he lost a step. Only player ever to get faster as they got older, according to Sprint Speed, was Manny Machado. Though, Machado’s HP to 1B seems to more likely stand for him ordering an intern, “Hammock Please to 1B.” Also, Machado got faster from 2018 to 2019 because he was only ‘slow’ due to effort. Anyway, what can we expect from Charlie Blackmon in 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him overrated?
The 2nd paragraph in these schmohawk posts are colloquially known as the “Wait! There’s more!” paragraphs. Charlie Blackmon’s average exit velocity was 88.5, good for 207th (sorting by 100 batted ball events), and sitting next to Buster Posey and Austin Slater. Um, yay? His xBA was .294, which is actually very strong, but I just don’t fully buy it. Blackmon’s O-Swing%, Z-Swing% and F-Strike% went up. Mean’s while, his Contact% went down, i.e., he swung more and made less contact, i.e., he needs to guess more as he gets older because he’s losing just a little bit of his hand-to-eye coordination or swing speed. His walks were also down while his BABIP buoyed the Titanic that Blackmon is currently captaining. His Launch Angle isn’t bad, and his fly ball rate (37.8%) was 54th in the league. He gets enough lift, assuming the ball is flying out for him. You’d have to think in Coors that wouldn’t be a problem. Well, Cincy is pretty good for homers, and Joey Votto had a near-identical fly ball rate and no one would say he’s a home run threat anymore. The 1st half and 2nd half splits show a guy who looks like the grind of the long season is starting to drag on him. His HR/FB% tanked in the 2nd half with a nearly identical fly ball rate. It also saw his batting average go from .330 to .294. Men of a Certain Age is a good show for men of his certain age who see their stats start to trail off with his age. Would be shocked if Noir puts up a repeat of last year (32/2/.314), but would not be surprised if he looks closer to his 2014 year when he hit 19 homers and .288, but without the 28 steals he chucked in back then. Back when? No, Blackmon, and he’s a strong avoid.
