[brid video=”214854″ player=”10951″ title=”Mailbag1″]
Didi, Didi, can’t you see, sometimes your home runs hypnotize me? Or how about, Gre-Gre-Gregorius? Gre-Gre-Gregorius… Gregorius sung by Duran Duran or Biggie work for me. Fun fact! Duran Duran is the past tense of Da Doo Run Run Da Doo Run Run. Bit a of a trivia whiz, though I did need to Google to see if it was spelled whiz or wiz. Did you know Truvia was discovered by someone sniffing artificial sweetener off a Trivial Pursuit card? Any hoo! Didi Gregorius went goofy time, there’s always money in the banana stand, crying at the end of The Last American Virgin but with tears of joy, with himself yesterday — 4-for-4, 3 runs, 8 RBIs and two homers (1, 2). His first homer went 346 feet, which is almost three and half Cespedes. I was way off Didi in the preseason, but that was almost (exactly) five games ago, let’s forget about that! Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Trayce Thompson – Yankees claimed him from waivers. Trayce was left for dead by the Dodgers, who were calling him, Chalk Outline.
Giancarlo Stanton – 0-for-5 with 5 Ks as the Yanks scored 11 — what a ticker tease! Oh, who am I kidding *fans self with Chinese hand fan* He teases me every which way! He still looks sexy, even wearing that platinum sombrero.
Jordan Montgomery – 5 IP, 1 ER, 6 baserunners (4 BBs), 4 Ks. Somehow, he was able to keep Matt Duffy, Jesus Sucre, Daniel Robertson, Rob Refsnyder, Adeiny Hechavarria and the corpse of Carlos Gomez off balance. Okay, I kid. I do like him — no Jo-Mo! — but this was not the toughest matchup.
Chris Archer – 5 IP, 4 ER, 9 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 6.55. Rough going to start for Archer, but don’t worry he goes to Fenway next. *insert blinking white guy meme*
Matthew Boyd – 6 IP, 1 ER, 4 baserunners, 1 K. Yesterday, Stream-o-Nator predicted a line of 6 IP, 2 ER, 7 baserunners. Damn, way off!
Jakob Junis – 7 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners, 6 Ks. His middle name should be Bokaj. How awesome would that be? You don’t need to answer a loud, I can’t hear you anyway. But Jakob Bokaj would be bonkers awesome. Also, bonkers awesome yesterday was Jakob Bokaj, however, it was vs. the Tigers. I watched yesterday’s game, which doubled its audience. My takeaway is the Royals and Tigers are going to lose a lot of games this year. Not a ‘hot take,’ per se, Thomas Keller, but worth noting. I did stream Junis yesterday, and I’m not dropping him yet.
Bryce Harper – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 4th homer. *in a low whisper* Have a historic season, please, please, please.
A.J. Cole – 3 2/3 IP, 10 ER. Wow, A.J. Cole doesn’t burn clean. I hope Trea didn’t get black lung and jeopardize his 60 SB season. The Braves were good, and they got Cole. Figure that out, Santa!
Freddie Freeman – 2-for-3, 3runs, 4 RBIs and his 2nd homer. …and this ball you cannot cage. That’s Freeman.
Preston Tucker – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 1st homer, and now Tucker and Lane Adams, the Acuna-to-be platoon has two homers. The Braves best not get any ideas.
Dexter Fowler – 2-for-5 and his 1st homer. I hope Fowler gets hurt. Sorry, y’all, I’m ruthless aka without ruth. Harrison Bader was called up and I need him to play.
Tommy Pham – 3-for-5, 2 runs and a slam (1) and legs (2). Damn, is he seeing 20/20 again?
Jack Flaherty – 5 IP, 1 ER, 7 baserunners, 9 Ks. I love, love, lurve me some Flaherty, but Wainwright is due back this week. I’d wait to see what the Cards do, but it doesn’t bode well for Flaherty.
Marcell Ozuna – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and a homer. OZUNA hit first home run with Cards. OZUNA happy with new team. OZUNA favorite childhood game was 52-pickup.
Ryan Braun – 2-for-5 and his 2nd homer. In related news, Domingo Santana shopped online for his cousin, Miercoles, wedding shower. It’s today.
Nelson Cruz – Hit the DL with a sprained ankle. Mariners’ depth will come in handy now as Daniel Vogelbach and the 84-year-old Ichiro will see more regular at-bats. Too bad Ichiro didn’t let his nails grow since he was a rookie. For no reason other than it would be pretty rad.
Dee Gordon – 3-for-5, 1 run and two steals (1, 2). Those were the first two steals of the season in the majors. Okay, no, but it feels like that sometimes.
Ty Blach – 4 1/3 IP, 6 ER, ERA at 5.79. After the game, Blach said, “My nether juices only flow when facing the best pitcher in baseball. I need competition, dammit!”
Joe Panik – 2-for-4 and his 3rd homer. It’s a Launch Angle Revolution! It’s better than Dance Dance Revolution with less awkward overbites! Listen, or read as the case may be, I don’t think Panik is suddenly a 35-homer guy, but I just picked him up in case he is. I wonder if now there will be a Widespread Panik pickup.
Evan Longoria – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. Aw, shucks, it was three games in and you wanted reason to drop him. This homer doesn’t help, huh?
Josh Donaldson – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 2nd homer. I liked him better when his arm was an extra in The Walking Dead.
Aledmys Diaz – 3-for-3, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 2nd homer in as many games. Was a hot schmotato, but he left with back spasms. Hopefully he didn’t catch Mat Gamelitis, the disease that debilitates a player just as they look to be breaking out.
Tim Anderson – 3-for-4, 3 runs and a slam (3) and double legs (2, 3). If he breaks out as I predicted this preseason, I will be accepting your freshly shorn roses at my feet. (No comment about Gausman!)
Avisail Garcia – 3-for-5 and his 1st homer. Watch the White Sox not even be that bad of a team this year. Seriously.
Carlos Correa – 2-for-2, 3 runs, 3 RBIs and his 2nd homer. Apparently, his toe is better. Aw, what a big boy!
Josh Reddick – 2-for-4, 6 RBIs and his 1st and 2nd homer. One homer was a grand salami with its brand name: Reddick.
Justin Verlander – 5 2/3 IP, 3 ER, 7 baserunners, 9 Ks, ERA at 2.31. If you drafted only Astros starters, you’d be doing better in your fantasy league than you currently are. And by ‘you’ I mean me.
Jonathan Schoop – 3-for-5, 3 runs and his 1st homer. On the reals, the O’s look listless. And, unlike the Red Sox, who are also scuffling, I don’t see where the O’s come out of it. *intern whispers in my ear* Oh, that’s right, Michael Saunders! *intern whispers again* What do you mean that was sarcastic? Saunders was great in 2007 in the minor leagues.
Christian Villanueva – 3-for-3, 4 runs, 5 RBIs and his 1st, 2nd and 3rd homer. Villanueva translates to Newtown, and, coincidentally, Alex Jones denies these three homers happened. Obviously, he won’t do this every night, but he has seven homers in 14 career games, and 20 homers last year in Triple-A. His homers last night seemed pretty legit too. It’s hard for me to go full Monty on a Padres hitter this quickly, but I’m definitely cyclops’ing him with a monocle.
Wil Myers – Dealing with triceps soreness. Far from the bust of Heyward, but, man, the both of them from original perception of them when they were called up to now.
Tyson Ross – 6 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners, 2 Ks. One of the last surviving Hodgepadres. A breed of player that’s on the endangered species list with the flat-billed pitchypus.
Jake Lamb – Hit the DL with a shoulder sprain. Shame about that Lamb shoulder. Hopefully they can salvage the marrow, that’s the best part. Deven Marrero started at 3rd for the Diamondbacks yesterday. He’s the answer to the trivia question, “Which MLB player’s family doesn’t even know their relative plays major league baseball?” Maybe the D’Bags shouldn’t have been so harsh to Yasmany Tomas.
David Peralta – 2-for-5 and his 1st homer. He’s not especially remarkable. He’s decent, not bad at all, but, for whatever reason, he’s one of my favorite players. Always underrated, and gives you that Ender Inciarte-type ya-ya.
Zack Godley – 7 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 3 Ks. Godley outside the humidor, “Guys, look, it’s Cher!” When everyone turns, he turns up the knob to eleven.
Jose Urena – 7 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 4.91. Much better in his 2nd start against another top five offense. Who made the Marlins’ schedule? Are they just trying to suck the life out of them? Well, they’ve been sucked already, and not in the good way. Urena, frankly — R-E-S-P-E-C-T! — isn’t worth much outside of NL-Only leagues, but there he kinda interests me.
Andrew Benintendi – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 1 RBI and his 1st steal. The Alex Cora Experiment to make the entire Red Sox team into a slap-hitting, stolen base machine is nearly complete.
Ben Lively – 5 2/3 IP, 2 ER, 7 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.18. Lively is doing okay so far. Looks like he’s had a lot of work done since he first appearance in the show.
Anthony Swarzak – Hit the DL. His last name sounds too much like swastika, so good riddance!
Matt Harvey – 5 IP, 0 ER, 2 baserunners, 5 Ks. He was even getting some close calls behind the plate, after sleeping with the ump’s wife.
Jose Ramirez – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. Are you happy now, Jo-Ram owners? I mean, the panicking after four games is crazy town, population: you. *looks at waiver replacements for Lindor*
Garret Richards – 5 2/3 IP, 2 ER, 5 baserunners (4 BBs), 9 Ks. Early on, Garrett Richards was pitching like Michael Richards does standup, but he settled down and got that Seinfeld reunion (totally lost myself in that metaphor!).
Luis Valbuena – 1-for-2, 3 runs and his 1st homer. He has never hit one homer without following it the next day with another homer. I know, logic says that means he’s going to hit 158 homers this year, but that’s not how my logic works.
Mike Trout – 1-for-4 and his 2nd homer. No joke, I feel like it was just a few games ago he was 0-for-6 (and it was), and you blink and this guy has multiple homers and a decent average.
Matt Shoemaker – Hit the DL with a forearm strain. Parker Bridwell was called up to replaced him. Parker Bridwell sounds like a polygamous Mormon. “Yo, you know Jebediah? He brides well.” Bridwell had a 5+ K/9 last year, so no thank you, sister-wife.
Shohei Ohtani – 3-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 1st homer. Madison Bumgarner bought him a Yamaha bike. Welcome to Pitchslap Club.
Cameron Rupp – Signed with the Rangers. Blondie’s fantasy team, “Rupp-ture,” is looking better!
Cole Hamels – 5 IP, 1 ER, 7 baserunners, 11 Ks, ERA at 3.38. Um, I mean, WUT. Listen, or listicle if Buzzfeed is reading, I hate Hamels with a passion, but if he found his stuff that he lost last year, I’m fine going back in on him.
Joey Gallo – 1-for-4 and his 2nd homer. Every notice how some players change their name to something completely different, but no one ever gets more mature, like Joey to Joseph. “Hey, don’t forget my hard contact!” Okay, Nicholas Castellanos.
Rougned Odor – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs. Maybe it just feels this way, but I think this is Odor’s first multi-hit game in two years.
Chad Pinder – 2-for-4 and his 1st homer. Chad Pinder is the PG-13 version of Doug Fister.
