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“Only thing better than three homers in a game is three World Championships in three years for three different teams.” — Joc Pederson probably. Joc Pederson is 80-grade fun. Maybe it’s the goofy paunchy body, maybe it’s the frosted hair that seems done by himself on a whim. I don’t know; he’s just so much fun. Yesterday, him and his fantasy owners had a whole lotta fun — 4-for-6, 8 RBIs and his 8th, 9th and 10th homers and his first career three-homer game. I know it’s inaccurate, but it feels like Joc Pederson hits 30 homers every year, and they’re all hit in the matter of 10 games. Think the only thing you need to know about Joc Pederson is this picture:
Joc Pederson has ice in his veins and NFTs in his crypto wallet. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Tommy La Stella – 2-for-5, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 2nd homer. Have no idea why La Stella was immediately thrust into the leadoff role, but there he is. Maybe the La is for Lineup Agitator.
Chris Bassitt – 4 1/3 IP, 8 ER, ERA at 3.91. Bassitt is such a dog! You ever have such bad pitching that you don’t even want to look at the current league standings? That was my day. Lots of hitting, but I think it was all against my pitchers. I was reading Bassitt, Dylan Cease and Tyler Mahle’s lines by oven light.
Mookie Betts – 3-for-4, 4 RBIs, and his 11th and 12th homer. Seriously, why, like every baseball player before him, couldn’t Mookie Betts just say, “Ya know what? I’m in the best shape of my life!” That’s all I’m asking! Why did he say his hips were still bothering him? Just say you’re in the best shape of your life like every other player! No one knows the difference! Who says their hips are hurting when they’re about to go on to have a great season? Hips don’t lie! Shakira said so! It’s not, “Hips don’t brag and say they’re in great shape, but modestly they say they’re not.” That’s not a thing!
Chris Taylor – 2-for-5, 2 RBIs and his 4th homer. Been quiet so far, but Dave Roberts is gonna whisper some magic words into Chris Taylor’s ear, “Start playing better or I’m gonna tell you again how I won the entire country a free taco from Taco Bell.”
Trea Turner – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 3rd homer. Treat Urner with the zoomies around the bases.
Josiah Gray – 3 IP, 7 ER, ERA at 5.44. Ya know when he’s gonna be great? *looking at Tarik Skubal* Think 2024.
Nelson Cruz – 3-for-4, 1 run, 2 RBIs and his 1st steal, hitting .220. Who let him get a 89-foot lead off first?
Jonathan India – Bell said India is still 10 days to two weeks away from returning from a day-to-day injury he got a month ago. Vasco da Gama found India quicker than his fantasy owners.
Tyler Mahle – 4 IP, 8 ER, ERA at 6.32. Can we send him to go find India? Not Jonathan, I mean the country. He should absolutely be better, but I’ve reached the point where someone else can pick him up and let him try to be better on their team.
Tyler Naquin – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 5th homer, hitting .270, and hitting leadoff, and 2nd homer in the last week. Prolly won’t continue to hit leadoff when India returns. So, I don’t know, July?
Frank Schwindel – 3-for-5, 3 runs, 3 RBIs and his 5th and 6th homer, and four homers in four games. Picked him up in one league, simply because Wisdom was already rostered by someone else. Clearly, a hot Schwinmotato.
Marcus Stroman – 5 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 4.71. Streamonator is a little bit positive on Stroman’s next start, and that’s my feelings on him, as well.
Hunter Renfroe – Hit the IL with a strained hamstring just as he was heating up. Can’t spell Renfroe without Ef. Absolutely brutal luck for me, and I guess him.
Tyrone Taylor – 1-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 4th homer, 3rd homer in four games, and, if you take nothing else from this post, you should pick up Tyrone Taylor. He’s hot, and Renfroe’s out for who knows how long.
Blake Snell – 5 1/3 IP, 3 ER, 5 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 6.00. Appropriate that Snell and Roansy are back-to-back here, because they’re super similar. Snell, unfortch, has, like, seven years on him, and still can barely pitch into the sixth.
Roansy Contreras – 5 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 2.13, as he was called up. Just gave you my Roansy Contreras fantasy. It had its feet on the ground, while reaching for the stars on Hollywood Blvd.
Daniel Vogelbach – Hit the IL with a strained hamstring. Word is he tried to douse it with BBQ sauce, but thankfully he couldn’t reach his hamstring to his mouth, but he did strain it in the process.
Cal Mitchell – 1-for-4, 1 RBI as he hit eighth, after being called up by the Pirates. I almost spelled his name Calm Itchell, and now I want that to be his name. Calm looks like Alek Thomas, but on the Pirates. At 23, he has solid power/speed and great contact. Had five homers, six steals and .306 in 34 games in Triple-A. Prospectonator (projections for every rookie) actually likes him. Even in deep mixed leagues, I’m simply monocle’ing. In NL-Only leagues, keep Calm Itchell and carry on.
Kris Bryant – Sounds headed back to the IL, after spending a month there. “Bad back?” “No, I’m Bud Black, why do you keep saying that?” “No, skip, my back.” “Skip Back? Who do you think I am?”
Kevin Kiermaier – 2-for-4 and his 6th homer, hitting leadoff. Usually don’t hot schmotato up a guy on an inside-the-parker, because that feels flukey vs. hitting well, but Kiermaier has three homers this week, and he will be in this Friday’s Buy (barring an injury), that will be up on Patreon later this morning.
Shane McClanahan – 6 IP, 0 ER, 6 baserunners, 9 Ks, ERA at 2.06 vs. Pablo Lopez – 7 IP, 4 ER, 9 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 2.04. Pretty sure you could only draft Marlins, Rays and Brewers starters, no matter who they are, and win your league’s pitching.
Kyle Lewis – 2-for-4 as he was activated from the IL. Kevin from ESPN’s “Get Him In Your Lineup” Department said, “You ever get to the middle of a CVS receipt and are like, damn, I read this one already?”
Julio Rodriguez – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 5th homer, and 2nd homer in as many games. He’s on pace for 20/40/.270. His rookie year!
George Kirby – 5 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners (zero walks), 9 Ks, ERA at 4.50. Meh, you want better results, and I can understand wanting to move on, but he has 20 Ks and two walks total in 20 IP, i.e, don’t Kirb your enthusiasm yet.
Zac Gallen – 5 1/3 IP, 6 ER, ERA at 2.22. Regression Fairies love BTS and hate your fantasy team.
Pavin Smith – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 6th homer, and 3rd homer in four games, and, yesterday, I said, “Hot schmotato,” and today I’m saying, “Same.”
Daulton Varsho – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 8th homer, hitting .268. On the Player Rater, he’s around top 30 overall. Rudy nailed that one in the preseason; me less so, though I did draft him in a couple of leagues.
David Peralta – 1-for-4 and his 8th homer, and third this week. Ever since I said the Diamondbacks had one hitter, and eight nine-hole hitters, everyone on their team has been hitting.
MJ Melendez – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 3rd homer. Even when Sal P. returns, MJ’s gonna playing in the powdered blue like Dean Smith’s coaching them.
Matt Olson – 1-for-4 and his 5th homer, hitting .244. Oh my God, I don’t know what to do with my hands. Do I…clap? I just have to uncross my fingers. Oh, man, arthritis.
Kyle Gibson – 5 IP, 2 ER, 8 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 3.94. He pitches well, even though you don’t think he pitches well. He’s inconceivable! Streamonator hates him; I hate him; he does well! He’s Mr. Gibsonceivable!
Bryce Harper – 3-for-5, 4 RBIs and his 10th homer, hitting .302. Doubt Harper and it comes back at you tenfold. Hope he stays healthy. I have no vested interest, but needing five days off every other week, and having a torn UCL, well, does not sound great.
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. – 2-for-4 and his 8th homer. Cake Batter and Allahson back in one day! It’s like going to Mecca with Duncan Hines.
Danny Jansen – 2-for-5, 4 RBIs and his 4th and 5th homer. Big night for catchers yesterday. No shizz, I got like five catcher homers across my leagues. There were a lot of homers, in general. I think the seams are tight again.
Kevin Gausman – 6 IP, 0 ER, 6 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 2.25. If I only drafted Gausman in every league (and only Gausman).
Taylor Ward – MRI showed an imprint of a Camping World sign, where he banged into a wall, but no shoulder damage, so that’s good. Shoulders are tricky, and I’m not doing the white man’s overbite with some dance moves just yet.
Jared Walsh – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 9th homer. Gotta love how he’s a three-hole hitter one day, and a platoon guy the next.
Noah Syndergaard – 8 IP, 1 ER, 4 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.08. Syndergaard’s return from Tommy John is going so much better than his turn on Vikings. He was on that show. I’m not lying. Ever wonder what Syndergaard would be like as a Medieval Times waiter? Now you can find out!
Dane Dunning – 6 1/3 IP, 5 ER, ERA at 4.32. Dunning, the gerund meaning “being done.”
Mitch Garver – 2-for-4 and his 5th homer, and 2nd homer in as many games. That’s two balls he’s hit solidly, that he’s glad he hit.
Jonah Heim – 2-for-4 and his 5th homer. Cool, sure, whatever. What I really want to draw your attention to here is the Rangers spent $500 million and are playing two catchers.
Jose Ramirez – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 11th homer, and 2nd homer in as many games, hitting .293. Crazy how Jo-Ram became the most reliable bat in the league. Because I’m not two years old, I’m old enough to remember when he was a threat to hit .240.
Sonny Gray – 7 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 10 Ks, ERA at 2.60. Not even exaggerating when I say this one start will have me thinking about him fondly for 18 more months.
Aroldis Chapman – Hit the IL, and Clay Holmes is percentage points from being the top reliever on the Player Rater, not Josh Hader, who’s third, but you guys do what you do.
Gleyber Torres – 2-for-5, 3 runs and his 6th and 7th homer, hitting .241. It’s not exactly dispelling a myth by having a big game off the Orioles.
Anthony Rizzo -1-for-3 and his 11th homer. HR to the Rizzo!
Jordan Montgomery – 6 IP, 2 ER, 4 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.30 vs. Bruce Zimmermann – 6 1/3 IP, 4 ER, 6 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.78. Since I have JoMo going in a lot of places (thanks, Michael King!), I watched this game, and JoMo looked fine, but Zimmermann actually looked better vs. a much harder opponent. Still looking at Streamonator for Zimmermann, and his next start is just as terrible, but, well, I’m monocle’ing.
Austin Hays – 1-for-5 and his 4th homer, hitting .284. He was getting hot a few weeks ago, then had a deep hand laceration that sidelined him. Hopefully, he’s back on track now and the only hand laceration he gets now is a lace glove like early-career Madonna.
Rougned Odor – 1-for-4, 4 RBIs and his 3rd homer, and 2nd homer this week. Not bad for this 2017 sleeper!
Enrique Hernandez – 2-for-6, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 2nd homer. Don’t let the very bad leadoff man in Boston get hot, because then they might actually be good from leadoff thru nine.
Christian Vazquez – 3-for-5, 4 RBIs and his 2nd homer, hitting near .400 in the last week and I’m baiting you for catcher questions.
Trevor Story – 2-for-6, 2 runs, 4 RBIs and his 8th homer, and 19th homer this week. Story not hitting a home run until May 11th, then hitting 167 of them in ten days seems impressive.
Rafael Devers – 2-for-5, 2 runs and his 10th homer. Call him Devs because he’s just like that giant statue in the forest in that Hulu show! Kidding, that’s as confusing as that show was.
Jose Abreu – 2-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 5th homer, hitting .225. Later in the game, he was replaced by Reese McGuire. Shame because Abreu was heard chanting, “The lewds will not replace us.”
Dylan Cease – 3 IP, 7 ER, ERA at 4.24. Man, the White Sox entire being seems just off. Like there’s some funky curse on them. Maybe their manager being a Gavin Sheets to the wind isn’t helping. I don’t know. The White Sox need to Windex their aura.
Watching the Dylan Cease start pic.twitter.com/Ar43uB0ocN
— Razzball (@Razzball) May 25, 2022
Luis Robert – Hit the Covid IL with symptoms. Welp, he’s gonna miss at least a week. *digs hole in dirt the size of my body*
Eloy Jimenez – On track to begin a rehab assignment next week. I am laughing through tears he’s going to come back before India. Eloy needed to be carted off the field and had surgery; India played two days after his injury!
Lance Lynn – Could also be a week away from a rehab, which would put him on target for around June 6th. Will be nice to have a sweet Lynn infusion. Like a lavender scented oil, but the scent of sweaty beard.