Manny Ramirez was involved in a trade. The drug trade! Many people move to Florida to retire. Manny just decided to do them in a slightly different order. Manny said of the sudden retirement, “I’m at ease. I’m now an officially retired baseball player. I’ll be going away on a trip to Spain with my old man.” First, he tests positive for estrogen, now he’s going to Spain with what sounds like a sugar daddy. Manny’s a kept man! The Rays suddenly have room for Desmond Jennings… Or Matt Joyce… Or Sam Fuld. We grabbed Desmond Jennings in one league where we had room for a flyer. Here’s some of what Grey said about Jennings in the preseason, “DJ is currently on the ones and twos for top ranked MLB prospects. He’s never had an OBP lower than .360 at any stop in the minor leagues, so I don’t think the bottom is going to fall out on that in 2011. If he’s getting on base, he’ll be stealing bases and scoring runs, whether he’s slotted leadoff or ninth. Is he much more than SAGNOF? Yes and no. He can be more than SAGNOF for 2011, but, worst comes to worst (or wurst comes to wurst, if you’re German), he’s going to steal bases. There’s the possibility of him getting 5-8 homers and he has the power for 12. If he reaches the top end of his ceiling, you’re looking at Carl Crawford. More likely, you’re going to open up this Crackerjack and get half a Carl Crawford. Say a Carlford. You ain’t got the Craw yet, kid!” And that’s us quoting Grey! In the short term, if the Rays go with Joyce, he has decent pop, but his average will be po’. Or poor if you’re a completist. Or poo, if you’re a middlist. Sam Fuld, who sounds like a cartoon character, can steal 25 bases this year with little power. Sounds okay, until you break that down to one steal a week and little else. Anyway, here’s what else we saw this weekend in fantasy baseball:
Jered Weaver – 7 2/3 IP with 1 ER, 8 base runners, and 15 Ks. That’s a Weaver family record! Even more impressive is that he did this with Bobby Wilson as the catcher – if Jeff Mathis was the catcher, it would’ve been a no-hitter with 25 Ks.
Josh Beckett – 8 shutout innings with 3 base runners and 10Ks….against the Yankees. Take that Weaver! It seems like Beckett owns the Yankees but they crushed him last year to the tune of a 10.04 ERA in 26 IP. So does this mean 2011 Beckett is back to the dominant SP that you would want to actually own on your team? Not I. Or is it not me? Or not we?
Matt Thornton – After Thornton blew his second save, Ozzie tweeted, “Thornton is throws gas like me after a plate of frijoles.” On Saturday, Chris Sale grabbed the save. Here’s the thing, and there’s always a thing, Ozzie has no loyalty to Thornton, but Thornton also is better than he’s shown so far. Don’t think Thornton gets every save and he may get even less than that if he keeps blowing saves, but right now I’d want him then Sale.
Ryan Franklin – Blew his third save on Saturday. Motte hasn’t been good. Mitchell Boggs hasn’t been bad but his best attribute is that he’s got the best law firm-sounding name this side of BenJarvus Green-Ellis. La Russa will probably stick with Franklin for a few more blow ups, but I’d own Motte and Boggs, in that order.
Jaime Garcia – 6 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 9 Ks. Another gem on Saturday in spite of everyone saying a regression was coming this year. Baseball-Reference’s Database had to talk Fangraphs Database down from the roof of a twelve story building. “It’s not just your FIP. It’s everyone’s.”
Carlos Beltran – Hit 2 homers on Saturday. One for each knee he has problems with.
Chris Narveson – 7 IP, 0 ER, 7 baserunners, 9 Ks. Now has 13 straight scoreless innings. Someone go grab Orel Hershiser off the beach in Jamaica! Not because Narveson is going to break his scoreless inning streak, but Orel’s really pale, you don’t want him to burn. Grab Narveson in every single league you have room, you never know where a crazy breakout is going to come from.
Justin Masterson – 6 1/3 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 9 Ks and now has only given up 2 earned in two starts. Could I have been a year early when I told you to grab Masterson last year? It’s possible. Sometimes when I pop out of my DeLorean, I have no idea what year it is. It’s worth a flyer to see if Masterson can continue his early success, but I have less faith in him, the Indians and AL pitcher flyers, in general.
Russell Martin – Hit two four-baggers on Saturday. Speaking of a four-bagger, for those who read my e-book, my friend from college, Dirty, was visiting me this week. So we’re headed to this bar on Friday and he starts telling me about this girl he hooked up with on Tuesday night. He’s like, “I was hooking up with her and then she starts making out with this girl… Then me… Then this girl….It was so hot!” Now, my one experience with the bar he was at was seeing a friend’s band perform and there were a lot of lesbians there, so his story sounded plausible. So I tell him to invite his bisexual girl to the bar we’re going to. He does, but she has no car or cash. He’s like, “I’ll pay the forty dollar cab ride for you!” He’s giddy with excitement. I’m giddy just to meet her. He’s built this girl up to the point where I’m expecting Vanessa Hudgens taking pictures of herself. She texts him from the cab outside, “Come pay for the taxi, I’m here.” So he walks out while I stay inside the bar. Fifteen minutes later, he walks in with his tail between his legs and a girl that can be best described as Rosie O’Donnell from the days of Exit to Eden. She was wearing a denim jacket, a silver chain hanging from her jeans’ pocket and had a shaved faux hawk. She wasn’t bi-curious, she was a lesbian. Yeah, he still went home with her.
J.J. Hardy – Sidelined for six weeks with an oblique injury. I see your appendix and intercostal and raise you an oblique!
Zach Britton – 7 2/3 IP, 0 ER, 7 baserunners, 2 Ks. Another solid start on Saturday. Because he induces groundballs, his downside isn’t as bad as some other rookie pitchers. He also doesn’t K a lot of people. I’d prefer my SP flyer from the NL, but you do what you do, I do what I do and we’ll meet somewhere in the middle like Monie and Malcolm.
Hanley Ramirez – With a deep contusion on his leg, he’s out until Tuesday. A deep contusion for Hanley is also known as a charley horse.
Ryan Zimmerman – Abdominal strain has knocked him out for a few days. Zimm loves himself some day-to-day injuries, huh?
Brett Cecil – 5 IP, 5 ER on Saturday. Hey, you took the flyer, gave him a chance, he touched your naughty bits and left you high and dry. I’d start to look elsewhere.
Bud Norris – See 1/8th of an inch above…i.e., grab Narveson.
Andres Torres – Strained Achilles – consider him out until Friday. Now if he has a doctor that stutters, no one will know when he says, “Heal heel! Heal heel!” The big problem with Torres coming into this year and his career is he had a hard time staying healthy. Achilles injuries can linger, says the guy without the medical degree.
Ryan Doumit – Hurdle said he won’t play Doumit in right field or at first when Snyder returns. I did enjoy Clint Hurdle’s quote about it, “It wouldn’t be fair to Ryan.” He’s making it sound like he’s doing Doumit a favor by benching him. This is like when you do the ol’ “It’s not you, it’s me” breakup.
Dan Haren – Got the relief win on Saturday. In the dugout, the Sciosciapath was seen reading Dusty Baker’s book on managing pitchers, “They Weren’t a High Pressure One Hundred and Eighty Pitches.”
Jose Tabata – Knock Knock. Who’s there? Tabata. Tabata who? Tabata the Rockies are leaving town because Jose hit 2 HRs and stole 3 SBs in 4 games against them. It’s been only 10 games but Tabata is showing signs of improvement vs. his rookie year. He’s walking more than twice as much as last year, flashing more power (only had 4 HR in 400+ AB last year), and is stealing more (5 for 6 vs last year’s 19 for 26). While it’s highly doubful he’ll keep up this Bondsian/Eric Davisian pace (32 HR / 80 SBs), a 15/40 season isn’t out of the question.
Rajai Davis – For the love of Rajai! Davis re-irritated his right ankle on Sunday. Don’t they have band aids in Toronto? Damn socialized medicine. He will likely miss a couple games, just in time for Corey Patterson to appear off the DL, look great for a week or two, and then morph back into Corey Patterson. This has the potential for the best SAGNOF fight with only CarGo Lite and Nyjer standing in its way. And if Podsednik ever gets his act together, he can team up with Mike McCoy and the Jays can have a SAGNOF tag team event.
Stephen Drew – 4-for-4 with 3 RBI. Looks like he’s holding Bloomquist in contempt.
Matt Kemp – That was 5 SBs for Kemp in the 3 game series at San Diego. Maybe he just visualizes Chris ‘Tall’ Young on the mound.
Fernando Rodney – Just when you think that Scioscia has no respect for Rodney as a closer, he gives him another chance. Even crazier, he throws a 1-2-3 inning. Maybe it’s because Walden pitched on Saturday but Rodney had pitched on Friday and Saturday. Go figure. I still think Walden will get more saves this year but you’ve got to hold onto Rodney for now. Sorry in advance.
Yovani Gallardo – 4 ER and 11 base runners in 5 IP. And only 2 Ks – which makes it 8 Ks in three starts (20 IP). That’s Buehrlesque. That’s not good at all for someone who’s averaged over a K an inning for his career. Maybe he’s saving them up to impress Zack.
Metco – The Mets and Nationals hitters somehow made the quartet of Capuano (8 Ks), Gorzelanny (8 Ks), Marquis (9 Ks), and Chris ‘Tall’ Young (7 IP, 1 ER, 5 Ks) look like great pitchers. If there’s anything to learn from this, it’s not to pick these guys up. It’s to stream starters who face these two teams.
Jonny Gomes – Slam and legs!
Brandon Belt – Another 0-fer. That’s 3 for 24 since the big HR in his 2nd game. We had a guy in one of our leagues spend his whole $100 waiver budget on Belt. Ouch. Obviously, Belt is better than this but it’s always a crapshoot with rookie hitters. If you can bench him until he snaps out of this funk or gets demoted, do it.
Eric Bedard – That’s two bad starts in a row for Bedard. The odds are low that he’ll pitch so poorly the rest of the year. But that’s because there’s a 90% chance he gets injured and can’t pitch at all.
