Last week I did the unthinkable. I left my Blurbstomp title with a placeholder “Aug 31” and did not replace it. Instead, this numerically significant Blurbstomp was left led with a limpid label, a preposterously pickled nom de plume. I had a list of three possibilities, but I will burn them (I deleted the note).
“Aug 31” was my 69th post on Razzball, at least according to a dashboard feature I had ignored until this week. That total seems a tad high, but who am I to argue with two numbers made for each other, at least according to an author whose mind is that of a baby toadstool?
Speaking of people with baby toadstool brains, do not check out Wander Franco’s player Discuss page on the Yahoo app. It’s amazing how quickly this weird feature is becoming a 4chan knockoff. Yahoo continues to work as hard as Elon Musk to destroy the good features of the flawed but fine entity under their stewardship while adding things that make hate speech by anonymous accounts flow into the internet like Parmesan cheese on microwaved Chef Boyardee.
Happy 70th Blurbstomp, enjoyers of arbitrary milestones! Thank you for not filling up my comments with vile crap, and on with my own vile crap, er, the blurbstomping!
A Blurbstomp Reminder
We will analyze player blurbs from a given evening, knowing that 1-2 writers are usually responsible for all the player write-ups posted within an hour of the game results. We will look at:
Flowery Diction – how sites juice up descriptions of player performance
Q and Q – when a site contradicts a player valuation on back-to-back blurbs
Stephen A. Smith IMG_4346.jpeg Award – Given to the player blurb that promises the most and delivers the least.
Bob Nightengale Memorial Plaque – instances of updates that don’t update anything
The hope is that by season’s end, we’ll all feel more confident about our player evaluations when it comes to the waiver wire. We will read blurbs and not be swayed by excessive superlatives, faulty injury reporting, and micro-hype. I will know that I have done my job when Grey posts, and there isn’t a single question about catchers that he did not address in his post. Onward to Roto Wokeness!
Stephen A. Smith IMG_4346.jpeg Award
Rockies designated INF Coco Montes for assignment.
Montes struggled in his limited action with the Rockies this season — hitting just .184/.244/.316 with one homer and three RBI in 38 at-bats. There’s a decent chance that he’ll pass through waivers unclaimed and continue to function as extra infield depth for the Rockies at the Triple-A level.
Source: Rotoworld.com
Somewhere in the mountains of Colorado, you trek through the snow and notice four paw prints. It’s a wolf’s tracks, fresh in the powder. You follow, one foot after the next, as if pulled by an invisible wire, a waking dream that could tip into nightmare at any moment. The night sky billows above you, as the tracks tighten up. The wolf is slowing.
As you reach the summit, the tracks merge. They are the tracks of a man. Your pulse quickens, your shallow breathing pauses as the altitude fights a battle against your common sense. You push forward.
The summit reached, you see him. Bud Black. He stands resolutely, a lumpen totem pole stoic in the face of the savage solitude of his surroundings.
“You’re here to kill me?” he says in a knowing voice without turning. You say nothing.
“You don’t have to you, you know,” he says, and turns to face you.
Tears stream down his face. Blotches of blood mar his time-battered Rockies hoodie and uniform. Bud Black turns back around to face the sky.
“I made a deal when I came to this city. It was a good deal. My soul in exchange for an endless supply of mediocre middle infielders and utility players. I…”
He hitches over and coughs up blood, lowering himself to the ground.
“Do you have any regrets, Mr. Black?” you ask, drifting over to his crumpled body.
“None!” Bud Black whispers fiercely. Blood drips from his nose.
“You would do the same? Sacrifice the youthful joy of baseball in this city. Block prospects? All for what?” you ask, staring down at the glowing nest of lights that is Denver by midnight.
Bud Black laughs. He laughs and laughs. Peals of mirth, gurgling and sputtering from a broken heart.
“I don’t know why. It just feels right. Ian Desmond. Jose Iglesias. Heck, I’ve gotten Alan Trejo almost 200 at bats this season. I didn’t know I would break apart every time they were DFA’ed. You didn’t tell me that.” Bud Black looks up at you and a smile emerges as the accusing words escape it.
You survey the damage done to him. “It was Coco Montes. How does it feel that a man named Coco will be the one to send you to eternal damnation?”
Bud Black takes a beat and looks at the late summer sky.
“Heck, I’d do it again. We might be able to resign DJ Lemahieu this winter. Could you imagine the prospects he could block? We could trade for Mauricio Dubon and send Nolan Jones back to Triple-A!”
His voice falters as the tears begin anew.
“There’s never enough time. There’s, well, I just need more! Three more!”
You smile, and your forked tongue escapes for a moment.
“Three more it is. Your suffering is delicious, Bud. You will like it in Hell. You are kin already.” You put your arm around Bud’s shoulder, your claws puncturing the flesh easily.
Bud smiles at Denver. “You mean their suffering, best fiend. Their suffering is all that matters.”
You nod as you slowly sink into the earth. Bud is transforming into a wolf again. Your last image before returning to the Land of Fire is of a wolf wearing a Colorado Rockies baseball cap, howling gleefully into the cold unearthly night.
Q and Q
Gunnar Henderson went 2-for-5 with a three-run homer on Monday, lifting the Orioles to a 6-3 victory over the Angels.
Henderson’s seventh-inning blast into the right-field seats off Angels reliever Gerardo Reyes ostensibly put the contest away, providing the Orioles’ bullpen with enough insurance runs to coast the rest of the way after a solid outing from rookie starter Grayson Rodriguez. It was the 22-year-old rookie sluggers 23rd round-tripper of the season and first time he’s gone deep since August 25. Fantasy managers were likely anticipating more production in the stolen base department, but Henderson is still putting together an encouraging rookie campaign with a few weeks left to improve his overall numbers.
Source: Rotoworld
Was anyone expecting more than 13 stolen bases? Where are these fantasy managers drafting Gunnar Henderson for 20+ stolen bases? You can’t just prorate a sample size at the major league level and call it a day. Why drum up disappointment for an outcome that most people didn’t expect in the first place? Sure, ESPN had him at 17 stolen bases, but we’ll never know where they are pulling their numbers from. Sure, the numbers are covered in a brown sticky tar, but we’ll never know where they are pulling their numbers from.
Flowery Diction
Kerry Carpenter went 1-for-3 with an RBI in a loss to the Yankees on Wednesday.
It wasn’t an electric performance by Carpenter, but there wasn’t much going on for Detroit tonight. Carpenter is now hitting .292/.355/.526 on the season with 20 home runs and 57 RBI in 96 games. He looks set to be a key contributor for the Tigers next year and a solid fantasy draft target.
Source: Rotoworld
I enjoy optimism, but if Kerry Carpenter earns his ADP next year, I’ll eat two giant steaks prepared medium well. Did I forget to mention that red meat does not agree with my bowels? Yes, it will be delicious. No, it’s not a little stomach discomfort. It’s all day. And two steaks? Boy howdy. Pepto can’t do anything against my internal pink slime.
What I’m saying is I think he’ll be a popular sleeper, meaning you’ll see his face all over Twitter and your favorite sites and his sleeper status will be obliterated by itchy trigger fingers on draft day. I wonder if the league will scout his swing all winter and find new ways to pitch to him that will result in a dip in production at the start of the season. What if he adjusts back after a month or two and he’s on waivers? And he produces like a number 4 outfielder the rest of the way?
Hey, it’s me, putting the “fantasy” back in “fantasy sports!”d
Flowery Diction
Francisco Lindor went 2-for-4 with an RBI and a stolen base in a loss to the Nationals on Wednesday.
Lindor got the game started with an RBI single in the first inning for his 83rd RBI on the season. The shortstop would later swipe his 26th base. All told, it’s been a solid season for Lindor, with a .251/.332/.466 triple slash to go along with 26 home runs, 92 runs scored, 83 RBIs, and 26 steals. He came into the game 2nd amongst all shortstops in WAR, so he should be above reproach regardless of how this season turned out for the Mets.
Source: Rotoworld
This is baseball, and we live in a world with the internet. No one is above (beyond) reproach. People were hating on Ohtani’s 2022 season because he played for a losing team. People were hating on Acuna for going 30/60 because of the rule changes aiding runners this season. There is no above (beyond) reproach.
People were hating on the Beatles Revolver a few weeks ago on Twitter. They even said “Tomorrow Never Knows” isn’t the best track on the album. This, a song record in 1966 with a bombastically looped drum set, a song recorded in 1966 containing spliced and mutated samples as harmonic underpinning, a song recorded in 1966 with vocals fed through a rotating leslie cabinet that feeds back into the microphone as the song returns from the instrumental break, sounding like a tornado siren cut short.
Nothing is above (beyond) reproach. There are people who probably hate the moon and can tell you exactly why in a logic that is their truth alone.
Reproach comes for us all.
Besides Bud Black, of course.
