[brid autoplay=”true” video=”437842″ player=”10951″ title=”Fantasy Baseball 2019 Mailbag Week 16″]
Yesterday, Alex Verdugo went 1-for-4 and his 12th homer. Were there guys who had better games yesterday? It’s not a rhetorical question. I want a typewritten response, notarized at my doorstep by 5 o’clock today. Reminds me of a joke. Father interrogating a suitor, “So, my daughter says you’re Irish. That’s important to us.” A little panicked, not really Irish, but lying through teeth, the young man says, “Yes, that’s right.” The father quickly snaps, “What’s your last name?” “Uh… O…clock.” Any hoo! Check out Little Daddy Smooth, Alex Verdugo’s last 30 days stats from the 30-day Player Rater:
That’s good for approximately top 25 overall for the last month. He’s owned in almost 100% of RCL leagues, as you see photo op, but he’s owned in less than 50% of ESPN leagues, which is why he’ll be in this afternoon’s Buy column, but, if he’s out there in your league, no one said you can’t grab him now. *listens for a moment* Okay, nope, no one said it. Was double checking. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Matt Beaty – 3-for-4, 3 runs and his 4th homer, hitting .307. “I don’t want to be disturbed when I check into hotels, so I use the name Batt Meaty,” which is what Beaty says to confused faces.
Enrique Hernandez – 4-for-4, 4 RBIs and his 15th and 16th homer, hitting .235. Be so awesome for me if Kiké did love me and got hot, because I own him in a deep league, but do I think he’s much more than a guy who had a good game against a pitcher who is struggling? Meh, not really.
Ross Stripling – 5 IP, 2 ER, 5 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.64 vs. Aaron Nola – 5 IP, 4 ER, ERA at 3.77. Classic example of owning a name vs. owning a pitcher who is actually pitching relatively the same and getting them hump stats. ‘Hump stats’ as in mound stats and not hump stats like when your dog trainer says to take copious notes about your labradoodle’s behavior, which are ‘mount stats.’
Adam Haseley – 1-for-3, 2 runs, and his 1st homer. Since Bruce went down, Haseley’s played nearly every day. Here’s what I said previously on him, “Phils’ 2017 1st round pick, but the Prospectonator doesn’t love Haseley, giving him 15/7 with little average over the course of a season (by the way, if you click on Haseley’s name, his projections are there for free — like every player). I will say this for Haseley, he looks ready to contribute in the landmark case of sooner vs. later since he played college ball. In NL-Only leagues, I’m interested.” And that’s me quoting me!
Ryan Borucki – Blue Jays manager, Charlie “You Killed My Father Prepare To Die” Montoyo, said that Borucki will make his next start in the majors. Borucki is most famous for being the best name ever to play The Name Game. “Borucki-fucki-me-my-mah-mucki-fee-fie-no-nookie…Borucki!” Borucki is around a 6.5 K/9, 4.50 xFIP guy, so, ya know, an ace.
Nathan Eovaldi – Worked a scoreless inning in rehab and is now being activated this Saturday. The Red Sox said, “Hey, can you come join our team to work the ninth since each game is do or die?” This is the stupidest thing the Red Sox are doing. Eovaldi as the closer? What’s he, a 6.5 K/9 guy who says he hates working relief? This might be the dumbest narrative of the season that everyone is accepting at face value.
Chris Sale – 6 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners, 12 Ks, ERA at 4.05. This year Chris Sale is less a 1st half vs. 2nd half of the season pitcher and more a 1st half vs. 2nd half of the week pitcher. Monday through Thursday afternoon? Great! Thursday night until Sunday night? Avoid!
Mookie Betts – 2-for-3, 2 runs and his 14th homer, hitting .284. Mookie Best! (Most years. This year it’s more like Mookie Supremely Gifted But Lacking Some Of The Best.)
Rafael Devers – 1-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 19th homer, hitting .325. Can’t fight the Devers!
Harold Ramirez – 1-for-4 and his 4th homer. Ya know how you know you’re old? You see H. Ramirez in the Marlins’ box score and you’re like, “Hanley stopped dealing drugs and started hitting again!”
Caleb Smith – 5 IP, 2 ER, 7 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 3.47. Caleb Smith should take Trevor Bauer’s offseason course, “Some Bad Tweets And Some Good Pitching: How I Learned To Pitch Past The 5th.” Actually, nearly every pitcher should take the course, except Josh Hader.
Fernando Tatis Jr. – 1-for-4 and his 15th homer. Too bad he fell into a slump that he couldn’t get out of. He was having such a great season. Damn, his average is all the way down to .325. Real shame.
Dinelson Lamet – 4 IP, 1 ER, ERA at 5.14. Speaking of needing Trevor Bauer’s Social Media and Pitch Count Management course.
Harold Castro – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 2nd homer, hitting .317. True Story Alert! Before this game, I wrote Harold Castro in the Buy column co,ming later today, because he’s been hot, then deleted it because I was like, “Who the eff is picking up Harold Castro?” Then this game happened and I added him back in. Black Moon says you got the props if you pick him up.
Niko Goodrum – 3-for-4 and a slam (8) and legs (11). It is such a joy to own Goodrum. Not Niko, I mean this Bacardi I brought back from Jamaica in 2006.
Matthew Boyd – 6 IP, 5 ER, ERA at 4.13. What do I always say? He’s Matt when he pitches well and Matthew when he doesn’t because it rhymes with snafu. In all seriousness, Boyd’s got himself a home run allowed problem. I know, everyone does, but Boyd really does. He’s bottom third of league for homers/fly ball, bottom 15 for HR/9 and I couldn’t find it (lazy) but he seems to give up too many two-strike homers. Check this out: He has a 6.08 ERA since June 1st, but 72 Ks and 9 BBs in 47 IP. That’s insane. Know why his ERA is so bad? He’s given up 14 homers.
Jose Ramirez – 1-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 9th homer. Don’t look now but Jose Ramirez is hitting .350 in July. What are you doing, the Bird Box challenge? I didn’t mean literally don’t look!
Trevor Bauer – 6 2/3 IP, 3 ER, 7 baserunners, 10 Ks, ERA at 3.67. He threw only 120 pitches. Geez, that’s usually his pregame warmups. What a wuss.
Tommy Edman – 1-fgor-5, 4 RBIs and his 4th homer. My dog’s name is Ted, and in the box score the Cards’ leadoff hitter’s name is written as T. Edman. Ted man! Who doesn’t love this guy? Raise your hand so I can ignore you and it will sting. Okay, so the Cards offense sucks and Edman’s leading off, any correlation? He has a 2.7% walk rate and 10/10/.250 potential. Ted man woof!
Paul DeJong – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 14th homer, hitting .251. Colonel Mustard in the lavatory with a urinal cake!
Dakota Hudson – 5 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners, 3 Ks, ERA at 3.57. Crazy all these years later the Ghost of Dave Duncan still lives on with the Cards. Dakota and Ponce de Leon both are, how do you say, not good, and their ERAs are 3.57 and 2.86 respectively. Streamonator hates Hudson’s next start, but, without Ks, it’s never gonna really embrace him.
Austin Meadows – 2-for-9, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and a slam (15) and legs (9), hitting .289. Who told you Meadows was a Buy two weeks ago? Can you say Fantasy Master Lothario and not abbreviate that shizz? If you can’t say it, you might need a speech therapist. I had one when I was a child. If you’ve ever heard the podcast, you know how well it helped!
Yandy Diaz – 2-for-8 and his 14th homer. If you were to stick a needle in Yandy’s muscles, he’d deflate like a Macy’s parade balloon. Yo, Yandy, you a muscle-bound man or you a Garfield float? Answer me true. You want to hit home runs or you want lasagna? Tell me this please.
Gio Urshela – 3-for-7, 3 RBIs and his 9th homer, hitting .305. The Yankees should have a commercial where little kids repeatedly say, “Yankee Gio,” so it sounds like “Thank you, Gio” and Miguel Andujar, dressed as the Easter Bunny, is standing nearby, crying. That’s the kinda of dark shizz I want to see!
Domingo German – 6 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.38. I officially fell to 2nd place in Yahoo Friends & Family league where I was in first all year. You might remember that league as the one where I stupidly dropped Domingo German and held German Marquez. Worse German mixup since the Munich Symphony Hall thought they booked Yo-Yo Ma but accidentally booked Wilmer Valderrama performing Yo Mama jokes.
Aaron Hicks – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 9th homer. It’s too bad he doesn’t play every day because nine homers in 46 games, while batting third for the Yankees would be a huge value uptick.
Luke Voit – 2-for-7, 2 RBIs and his 18th homer. Member when I used to pit Voit against Alonso and it was kinda close? Now it’s like Alonso’s cousin is pitching to him and Voit has Matt Chapman’s dad. If I may channel Aaron Boone, Voit is no f**king savage in the box lately.
Jurickson Profar – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 14th homer, and 3rd homer in two games and fifth homer in four games. He won’t be in this afternoon’s Buy column, because hasn’t he hurt us enough? But he is a hot schmotato.
Mitch Garver – 1-for-4 and his 16th homer, hitting .297. Blind squirrel in March, “Guys, I can’t stay until the end of the draft, can you just give the last catcher left?” Moments after the Blind Squirrel has left, “Let’s give him Mitch Garver!”
C.J. Cron – 1-for-4 and his 18th homer. Been a bit disappointing this year. He’s getting near-everyday at-bats and he has an 18 AB/HR, which is around 53rd in the league. About that of Trey Mancini, Ramon Laureano and J.D. Martinez (woof).
Alex Bregman – 2-for-2, 3 runs and his 25th homer. Also, in this game, George Springer (2-for-5) hit his 22nd homer. Incredibly, Elias Sports Bureau said this was the first time Grey noticed them homering in the same game.
Madison Bumgarner – 9 IP, 1 ER, 6 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.65 vs. Noah Syndergaard – 7 IP, 1 ER, 7 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 4.36. This game was played in San Francisco and the announced crowd was 26,898, and 26,897 were scouts from other teams for the trading deadline and one entrepreneurial guy was selling chewing tobacco. Smart guy!
Pete Alonso – 1-for-7 and his 32nd homer. Albombso!
Merrill Kelly – 7 IP, 1 ER, 3 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.77 vs. Zach Davies – 7 IP, 1 ER, 8 baserunners, 0 Ks, ERA at 2.79. Whatever kind of tonic MLB was pumping into the stadiums in the late games last night, they should put it in all the parks, because there was hardly any offense late. “I bought Slimer goo from the Wawa and I’m putting it in the humidors.” “Is that legal?” “Are you a Ghostbuster? You have to say if you are, it’s the law.”
Ryan Braun – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 14th homer, hitting .272. That was his 2nd homer in the last three games. Sir, this is RB’s.
Ender Inciarte – 0-for-4 as he was activated from the IL. The Braves were so happy to see Inciarte return they bought him a copy of Wally Pipp’s autobiography, “I Sat On The Bench For 2,130 Games But No One Gave Me Any Awards.” I kid, because he actually played and Austin Riley was benched. Um, uh-oh. Member when I said to sell Riley when he was hitting .375 and you were like, “Grey, you’re handsome and I love your gait, but I’m not selling Riley, you dope.”
Nick Markakis – 2-for-4 and his 9th homer. Sparkakis!
Brad Keller – 6 1/3 IP, 2 ER, 11 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 4.18. Took me a bit long to realize this (I’m dumb), but Royals are solid Streamonator calls more times than not at home. Of course, Keller’s next start isn’t good from what I’m seeing. Sorry, poor choice of words.
Bubba Starling – 2-for-3, 2 runs and his 1st steal. Bubbalicious! Rotowan just gave you a Bubba Starling fantasy regarding his steals. The Bubb rubb is he might not get on base to steal. Woo-woo!
Yoan Moncada – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 17th homer, hitting .303. Yoan can bone! BTW, this is currently going on with Donkey Teeth and I’m required by Donkey law to tell you about it. If you’re nice to Donkey Teeth in the comments, maybe he’ll put you in a league with one of the ‘perts — you know you always wanted to take on Brad Evans, now is your chance!
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— DonkeyTeeth (@DonkeyTeeth87) July 18, 2019
