Takes a long inhale…Ah, is that baseball I’m smelling? It is, isn’t it? It is, it is! Honestly, I think it’s starting to smell like baseball. Sadly, MLB has a long list of regulations they’re going to institute in order to play games this year. Will it still be baseball even without the spitting and tobacco and clubhouse showering and towel-ass-slaps and celebrations involving hugging and touching and extended wet willies where players giggle then slap away their teammates’ hand and–Wait, did MLB ban baseball-related activities or reenacting the pool scenes from Y Tu Mama Tambien? So hard to say! “Hey, Skip, I was wondering if I could snap my towel on my teammate’s butt.” “Not this year, kid.” “Hmm…Can I watch the Oscar-winning film Moonlight?” “I will have to check the rules and regulations on that one.” Any hoo! Baseball sounds like it’s getting close, as I’ve been saying for the last six weeks. I’m not in the business of predictions but the world can only shut down completely for so long before the powers that be start exerting their, uh, power that, uh, be. Last year in 121 games and 376 ABs across two levels (Triple-A and MLB), Kevin Cron hit 44 homers. *smiles wide* Don’t mind if I do! On our Prospectonator, Cron is projected for 33 homers. Yelled like Fat Bastard, “Get in my lineup!” He has legitimately no chance of playing without the universal DH, but that seems a foregone conclusion now, so giddy + up = giddy up. It’s simple math, tee bee aitch. So, what can we expect from Kevin Cron for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?
If you don’t sing Alec Bohm to Spoon’s You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb, you are a better person than me. If you sing Alec Bohm’s name to The Gap Band’s You Dropped A Bomb On Me, you are a much worse person than me. If you sing Alec Bohm to B.O.B. (Bombs over Baghdad), then we’re roughly the same person. Okay, now that we got those comparisons out of the way, let’s talk turkey. Much like the turkey that Phillies fans will throw at Alec Bohm if he fails to live up to his prospect hype. I’m not going to recount here the 1200 words that Prospector Hobbs wrote about Alec Bohm in this Blind Resume Challenge. It’s worth reading, if for no other reason than to see how well Hobbs wrote while wearing a blindfold. By the by, what kind of luck are we having that we add another prospect writer, because demand was at its peak in early 2020, and now we’re living through a pandemic and demand is at its nadir? If not for any luck, we’d have no luck. Wait, I said that wrong. A second prospect writer adds some perspective, and I think that helps, especially here, since I don’t think Prospect Itch and Prospector Hobbs necessarily love Bohm equally. If I may infer from digital words posted on Razzball, Hobbs seems to like Bohm better than Itch. Perhaps the major drawback for Itch and why he ranked him fairly low on his top 75 prospects for 2020 fantasy baseball was Bohm’s lack of glove, and, with no DH in the National League, it hinders him. Did someone say NL DH? Well, now we are talking! (Also, JKJ went over some thoughts about Alec Bohm in his Universal DH: NL East edition. Am I the last one in the world to talk about him? I dropped a Bohm on me, baby…) So, what can we expect from Alec Bohm for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?Allow me to demonstrate my feelings on Aristides Aquino over the last 12 months:
“Meh, he’s got some swing and miss tendencies, but I guess you can pick him up if your league is deep enough.”
“Wow, Tuffy Rhodes ain’t got nothing on this guy.”
“Yes, absolutely pick him up!”
“Oh em gee, Aristides Aquino is the greatest GOAT of all-time. I will now call him The GGOATOAT!”
“I want The GGOATOAT to have my babies.”
“Will I have baby GOATs with The GGOATOAT or Baby GGOATOATs?”
“Hmm…The GGOATOAT is starting to swing and miss a lot again. That could be a little bit of a concern.”
The preceding was the tides of my thoughts in only two months of his playing time. Then, this offseason:
“The GGOATOAT is going to be way overpriced, but I still do like him.”
“Wow, he’s not overpriced at all, I wonder if he’s worth a sleeper post?”
“Wait a second, he still has a starting job, right? I mean, this Shogo Akiyama signing won’t kill that, right? Right?! Answer me, Internal Monologue!”
“They signed The Greek God of Hard Contact?” Extremely worried, “Um, can Nick Castellanos play shortstop?”
“Sorry, Cinderfellas and five Cinderellas, I’m dropping Aristides Aquino way down in my rankings since he will never play in that crowded outfield.”
“DID SOMEONE SAY UNIVERSAL DH?!” So, what can we expect from Aristides Aquino for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?So, I didn’t expect much from this Patreon podcast, but, honestly, waking up Lenny Dykstra mid-nap to hear him say Ron Darling sucks d**k, well…I have to be honest here, this podcast is in the pantheon of nonsense. So, we get Lenny Dykstra on the show, for, I don’t know, maybe 15 minutes. He’s in the middle of napping-slash-having sex and he’s also very, very angry with Ron Darling, but, other than that, it was a totally normal conversation where I say 1993 Phillies players names and Lenny says whether or not they did drugs with him. Ya know, standard stuff.
Please, blog, may I have some more?Did one of you em-effers say something bad about Austin Riley and/or good about Johan Camargo? Because if you did, you’re gonna have to answer to Bazooka and Cannon, which is what I call my biceps, as I point to them in a mirror, while wearing a burlap sack filled with limes, because if anything can kill Corona, it’s limes. I’m a genius! You know how hard players are gonna push back on a universal DH? Imagine a feather pushing against Paul Donald Wight II aka Big Show. Unless I’m misunderstanding what a Universal DH is. “A Universal DH sounds amazing! I always loved The Mummy franchise! Can Brendan Fraser be the DH for the Marlins?” That’s me misunderstanding a Universal DH. Why I say there will be no pushback on a Universal DH is because it means one more hitter getting stats, which is good for contracts. It’s an unmitigated win for players. With a universal (still playing with capping it every time or only sometimes; feels like it should be capped, because it’s such a big thing) DH (talk about a parenthetical interrupting the flow of a sentence, huh?), Austin Riley has to be at least near the top of the list of guys getting extra at-bats. Praise be, it’s gonna rain sexy time in Hot Atlanta! Or will it…Let’s take this sucker to ‘graph numero dos…So, what can we expect from Austin Riley in 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?This baseball season is going to be a bunch of fast rappers who somehow con people into thinking they’re impressive because they rap in double-time. Who will be an Overnight Celebrity? Could Anthony Santander be Twista? Spit some bars, Santander! *Santander scream-raps a bunch of gibberish, but because it’s fast it doesn’t sound awful* Yo, Anthony Santander in 162 games your bars were weak, but in a three-month season with 598 syllables in 55 seconds…Well, you kinda nasty, and nasty is good. After my Starlin Castro fantasy yesterday, can you see a theme? Wearing sweatpants every day isn’t a theme, that’s a lifestyle. Okay, there’s not one theme exactly, but Starlin Castro and Anthony Santander do share one similarity — they both are currently penciled in as a three-hole hitter. Something I’ve said before but not sure it’s got through your seven layers of brain crust to the inner core: If you only draft three-hole hitters, you can only go so wrong. They will get the most runs and RBIs on average, and, well, batting average will likely be okay, because there’s a reason they’re batting third. That reason? They’re likely not automatic outs. So, what can we expect from Anthony Santander for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?Manager Dave Martinez indicated Wednesday that Starlin Castro is the most likely candidate to open the season as the Nationals’ No. 3 hitter, Jesse Dougherty of The Washington Post reported on March 11th, 2020, which was approximately two and half years ago. You remember March of 2020, it lasted 365 days and was followed by a year of April and we’re now about halfway through a year of May, and I believe May is a leap year. So, roughly 800 days ago, Starlin Castro was penciled in as the Nats’ three-hole hitter, and that alone was reason to give him a closer look. David Wright in 2013 was the last three-hole hitter that wasn’t worth owning for counting stats (that I remember, and my memory is all over the map; I’ll remember thinking in the 6th grade The Peanut Butter Solution was someone with peanut butter in their underwear, so I tried to do a “Peanut Butter solution” rather than go to the bathroom, but I can’t remember what I had for lunch yesterday). For whatever reason, David Wright’s three-hole year in 2013 has stuck with me and he should’ve stuck it in his two-hole with a Peanut Butter Solution it was such crap. Wright’s 2013 runs and RBIs respectively were 63 and 58 (was in only 112 games, but still). Another crazy stat from that egregious lineup was Eric Young Jr. had 68 runs with a .254 average and 43 steals (so moving into scoring position and still no runs) and that was in 508 ABs! HA! What in the actual eff. Some of those leadoff at-bats came for the Rockies in Coors too, because he was traded to the Mets after 57 games. How is that line by Eric Young Jr. even possible? Mathematically, that Eric Young Jr. is the craziest line in the history of baseball, please prove me wrong, so I can stop thinking about it. Seriously, how does one steal 43 bags and only score 68 times! He also had 7 triples and two homers! Okay, moving on. So, what can we expect from Starlin Castro in 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?I wanna flap my gums about Monte Harrison all day, e’eryday. To me, he screams a guy who is much better for fantasy than he is in real life. I love those guys. Not coincidentally, I hate guys who are great in real life but terrible in fantasy. That’s nearly every catcher, which doesn’t help them. I’ve hated Buster Posey for nearly a decade thanks to the love he garners in real life. It’s so hard for me to not be contrarian that I almost immediately begin to dislike a guy when others start liking them. On the X-axis is my love and on the Y-axis is everyone’s love, and you can see when they overlap for just about everyone. Last year, around April, Gerrit Cole crossed streams. The top hitters run pretty much parallel along the Y-axis with my love and everyone else’s. Okay, legit way off course here, and veering back to Monte Harrison. These dart throws won’t exactly line up to their projections in my 2020 fantasy baseball rankings. Some of them aren’t even in my rankings; Monte is. He’s in the top 100 outfielders for 2020 fantasy baseball (barely), and he’s number 60 on Prospect Itch’s top 200 prospects for 2020 fantasy baseball. With these darts, I’m aiming for the ceiling. (Good for fantasy baseball, not great for actual darts.) If you want this in more plain English, I like these guys more than my rankings might show as last round sleepers in any league. Also, if we hear soon that baseball is returning for only 82 games vs. 100 games (as it is in my projections and rankings), I will make the necessary adjustments. My ear is to the ground, and baseball sounds like it’s getting close. What’s that, the ground has The Rona? How do I clean my ear now?! So, about Monte Harrison for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?
Patreon Podcast: Lenny Dykstra Part 1 of (Possibly) 100
May 11, 2020 | All Podcasts | 136 Commentsby: Grey
So, I reached out to Lenny Dykstra about being on our podcast along with many other people, such as:
Let baseball return with the craziest shizz they got! Robot umps? Check! 7-inning games? Why not? Divisions changed? Sure! No shifts! No foul balls! Everything is in play! Pitchers have to throw with their wrong hand! Hitters have to stand on one foot! Mascots get stockpile of vaccines and choose who gets one! I don’t care! Just let baseball return! With all that said, universal DH is being thrown about like that somehow fixes baseball post-Covid-19. Has anyone on this green earth that Al Gore is eating his way through asked why? This is one that keeps coming back after every discussion about restarting baseball like they’ve already unplugged it and blew in the cartridge. Could someone, preferably a journalist, ask WHY? Why does a DH make things better for restarting? I’m guessing no one asks why because they know there’s no reason and it would just make Manfred uncomfortable. Shame more journalists don’t ask questions to make people uncomfortable. Not to go down that rabbit hole too far, but too many sports journalists (and maybe other types) are so concerned with access they refuse to ask tough questions, then they go on Twitter and make fun of the subject. Twitter is bad for a lot of reasons, but this is the reason number one for me. You see reporters say point blank about how stupid something is, but did they pose the stupidness to the actual subject? No, never. Prolly why I couldn’t make it as a journalist. If Manfred said to me about universal DH, I’d ask, why, and minds would be blown. Any hoo! Assuming there is a universal DH, our writer, JKJ, is going over a series of hitters who would benefit from it. I don’t want to go over what JKJ has said already, but Tyler O’Neill…O’Well, he’s too juicy to ignore. So, what can we expect from Tyler O’Neill in 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?Here’s the Jays’ rotation:
Hyu-Jin Ryu
Chase Anderson
Tanner Roark
Matt Shoemaker
Trent Thornton
Here’s the Padres’ rotation:
Chris Paddack
Garrett Richards
Zach Davies
Joey Lucchesi
Dinelson Lamet
This is why, when asked recently, if I prefer Nate Pearson to MacKenzie Gore, why I said I like both equally. I love MacKenzie Gore and have drafted him, but who has the easier path to innings? Put aside those teams’ respective aces. Say what you want about Zach Davies, Garrett Richards, Joey Lucchesi of the Rigatoni Crime Family, Dinelson Lamet, and I’ve said plenty, but Trent Thornton, Shoemaker, Roark, Chase Anderson are a goofy mess. Shoemaker injured himself reading about how he is injury-prone. Even in regards to their two respective aces, Ryu is less likely to stay healthy for even a shortened season. Pearson’s sliding into that rotation in the landmark case of sooner vs. later. Any hoo! I just wanted to put it out there that I think both will see innings, and this isn’t about which one I like better, while I make it about which I like better for 2020, but MacKenzie Gore is going to need an injury to get in the rotation or, and this ‘or’ is the size of Kanye’s ego, starters piggybacking this year, in what will be a weird year. Minor leaguers will be a part of the major league team, whether they want to or not (of course they want to). With no conceivable minor league season, Gore should be with the Padres in some form. So, what can we expect from MacKenzie Gore for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?Kyle Lewis is in my top 100 outfielders for 2020 fantasy baseball, but, as mentioned the other day, these Dart Throws are me being a little more footloose and fancy-free like Kevin Bacon on Casual Fridays with projections and possible upside. By the way, can you imagine explaining to an alien right now what Casual Fridays are? “It’s when you don’t have to dress up for work on Friday.” Alien speaks in an alien language while you wait for the Alien Language Translator to give you back what it’s saying. Finally, the Alien Language Translator says, “You’ve been wearing sweatpants for the last five weeks. What’s more casual? Your stained gotchies?” Yo, that Alien has a smart mouth, which is located on its feet, because it’s an alien. Any hoo! In my top 100 outfielders, I threw Kyle Lewis a bone by including him. To get him in the lineup, Dee Gordon has to be benched; Mitch Haniger’s Mr. Peanut has to be crushed; Austin Nola has to do whatever it is Austin Nola does, but on the bench; Jake Fraley has to do a bit better than Austin Nola, but not good enough to start and Dylan Moore…Well, who? Your 2020 Mariners are tight eh-eff team of recycled garbage that was never recycled. But, when the league starts up again, and, if the M’s are playing in Arizona — better! — then Kyle Lewis could be the starting right fielder. So, what can we expect from Kyle Lewis for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Please, blog, may I have some more?