It feels like only yesterday J.D. Martinez injured himself, and it was yesterday if you were roofied. In his place, Steven Moya is filling in admirably. Yesterday, he went Yardo Montalban as he Tattooed the ball two times. Da plane, da plane…is flying right next to Moya’s homers! My dear guests! I am Mr. Albright, your host. Welcome… to Fantasy Baseball! Smiles, everyone, smiles! No, seriously, smile, you paid a lot of money for those caps. Moya now has three homers in his last three games, and if baseball is a game of inches, Moya’s got a lot of ’em. 79 inches to be exact. Not saying he’s John Holmes, he’s six-seven and looks like an easy 35-homer hitter. I watched him hit a ball the other way and he was like, “Yeah, okay, I guess I’ll hit this one out.” He looks like the kind of guy that could twelve homers in a month. If you’re power-starved, or just bored and wanna pick up a new player, I’d grab Moya. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Wade LeBlanc – Signed by the M’s and will start on Friday in place of Taijuan. If the M’s would’ve also signed a monkey to play third, LeBlanc’s signing would’ve been hilarious.
Tom Wilhelmsen – Signed with the M’s. Well, they had all of these old Wilhelmsen jerseys just lying around, so why not?
Hisashi Iwakuma – 4 2/3 IP, 5 ER, ERA at 4.45. Serious question, when the Dodgers backed out of the Iwakuma deal this winter due to a physical, why did the Mariners decide to sign him anyway? That’s like when someone says, “This tastes awful, wanna try it?” Naturally, you refuse. The Mariners, however, did not refuse. Why didn’t they refuse?
Willson Contreras – 1-for-1, 2 RBIs and his 2nd homer. Oh, just his 2nd homer in his first nine at-bats. If Bill Gates had pockets stuffed with prospects instead of hundies, he would be the Cubs. The Cubs collect prospects like Warren Buffett collects kids who play ping pong. Miguel Montero went down yesterday with a leg issue, which is supposedly day-to-day, and Contreras replaced him. That’s like replacing your Mitsubishi Montero with a Tesla, then hoping the Mitsubishi is fine.
Michael Wacha – 6 2/3 IP, 2 ER, 5 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 4.41. That’s his third start in a row where he hasn’t looked like a total plonker, lowering his ERA from 5.16 to its current state. His control is still up on the year, but he has been better recently. I wouldn’t say I’m now suddenly excited by him — or rather, I Wachan’t say. But, if you own him already, you should be encouraged.
Aledmys Diaz – 3-for-4, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 9th homer, hitting .310. The Aledmys magic seemed to vanish recently, and not like the good type of vanish in regards to magic like David Copperfield making the Statue of Liberty disappear, but the bad type of vanishing magic like David Copperfield’s recent career.
Derek Holland – Hit the DL with shoulder inflammation. Holland’s just happy he still has his two lips.
Matt Bush – 1 IP, 0 ER, ERA at 1.02 with his 9th Hold. Damn, he’s doing a lot better than I thought he would considering the path he took to the majors. I believe he was in prison this time last year. Ed Norton needs to star in his life story, American History K.
Colby Lewis – Will miss at least two months with a strained lat muscle. Rangers starters are dropping left and right. They better hope Martin can carry on without Lewis.
Shin-Soo Choo – 1-for-3, 2 runs and his 2nd homer. Between Bush, Lewis, Choo and Josh Hamilton, the Rangers are always looking for the next reclamation project. They should be managed by The Property Brothers.
Eugenio Suarez – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 14th homer, hitting .229. He heard you wanted to drop him. Keep talking.
Travis Shaw – Left with a shin contusion that was a carryover injury from Tuesday. Consider him day-to-day. Or dayo-to-dayo, if you’re Jamaican.
Eduardo Rodriguez – 6 IP, 3 ER, 6 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 6.41. Do it three more times in a row, and we can reevaluate. He’s lucky I’m even giving him that option. Tough love!
Hanley Ramirez – 1-for-5 and his 6th homer, hitting .263. It feels so long ago he was a top fantasy guy. *looks up his stats* Holy crap, it was a long time ago. Damn, I’m getting old–excuse me, more distinguished.
Melky Cabrera – 4-for-5, 2 runs, 4 RBIs and his 7th homer, hitting .291. Get him off the Melk-carton, he found his stroke.
Todd Frazier – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 21st homer. Did Adam Dunn leave behind his donkey suit? Because it’s starting to feel like all Frazier does is homer.
Devon Travis – 0-for-4 as he bats leadoff. It only took Bautista coming down with the worst turf toe since Tree Man, but at least it happened. Now, hopefully, he can stay there and hit.
Russell Martin – 1-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 6th homer, hitting .218. He’s hitting near .280 in the month with two homers in the last nine games. Considering he was hitting .150 in April, it’s nothing to sneeze at, assuming you’re not allergic to catcher stats.
Troy Tulowitzki – 1-for-3 and his 10th homer, hitting .215. Career average in Coors is .321. Career average in Rogers Centre is .215.
Edwin Encarnacion – 1-for-2, 2 runs and his 19th homer, hitting .255. Is it me or is Edwin and Bautista like Andre the Giant and Giant Machine? They never seem to be in the same lineup at the same time.
Chris Archer – 6 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 4.70. I keep hoping it gets better, and it keeps being the exact same. I believe that’s the defintion of madness. At least I can now say I’m crazy for Archer.
Trevor Bauer – 9 IP, 1 ER, 4 baserunners, 10 Ks, ERA at 3.20. That is the best game I can remember from Bauer, by far, and I use all of his game logs as toilet paper, so I’d remember. I mean, what else am I doing in the john? Answering comments? Well, maybe. Just keep that in mind when you’re asking me who I’d drop. Bauer’s got his walks way down, and he still averages 93 on his fastball with solid Ks. In other words, he’s worth grabbing in all leagues.
Jose Ramirez – 2-for-4, 1 RBI and his 8th steal, and he homered on Tuesday, hitting .296, and he was a favorite of mine last year, before we fell on hard times. That’s we: me, him and Danny Santana.
Jason Kipnis – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 9th homer. Cleveland finally got to witness, and they got a Kipnis.
Cameron Rupp – 1-for-4 and his 6th homer, and 2nd homer in as many games. Sure glad the catcher on my team yesterday was DNP, and doesn’t stand for Derek Norris playing.
Fernando Abad – 1 1/3 IP, 0 ER and his first save. “Not Ian” Kintzler had gone over an inning the day before, so he was likely unavailable. That’s what I want to believe at least because the last time I picked up Abad, it was Anotgood.
Joe Ross – 6 1/3 IP, 2 ER, 8 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.11. Why do I hear club music while I type this? JB! You’re making Greg’s ears bleed.
Wilson Ramos – 1-for-4 and his 12th homer, hitting .330. Not a misprint. Wilson Ramos is hitting .330. What-WHAT?!
Julio Urias – 5 IP, 2 ER, 7 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 4.33. I hear Urias will get at least one more start. Not sure where I heard it. Might’ve been from the 17 Dodger updates over the last 17 days.
Corey Seager – 3-for-4 and his 16th homer, hitting .289. Gonna go out on a 150-year-old oak limb and say the shortstop position is no longer shallow like last year.
Rich Hill – Has been cleared for rehab starts in High-A Stockton, California, the sister city to Malone, Karl.
Daniel Mengden – 6 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners, 9 Ks, ERA at 3.00. What’s more, he has a 10.5 K/9, 3.00 BB/9 and a 3.52 xFIP. Of course, it’s a pretty small sample size — that’s what she said sarcastically — but he did have a decent K-rate, walk rate and ERA in Triple-A this year, so I could see start opening up the pick up of Mengden to deeper mixed leagues. In 12-team and shallower, I’d still use the Stream-o-Nator for him.
Scooter Gennett – 3-for-5, 2 RBIs and his 7th homer. I was thisclose to picking up Gennett. If I could only get the ‘this’ closer to ‘close.’ Maybe it’s time for a new font. I almost picked him up because he’s been hot recently, and now has two homers in the past three games.
Kirk Nieuwenhuis – 1-for-4 and his 3rd homer. If you heard this week’s podcast, you heard me put Nieuwenhuis into my lineup when Fowler was DL’d. Grey Albright: Turning Pathetic Into Prophetic!
Junior Guerra – 7 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 3.67. I would’ve been better off randomly drafting Junior Guerra in the 5th round in March instead of Chris Archer. Bartender, I’ll take a rickety ledge with a strong gust of wind.
Jeremy Jeffress – Was unavailable yesterday due to pink eye. He blamed Will Smith for gettin’ farty wit’ his pillow.
Albert Pujols – Out again with his tweaked ankle/hamstring. Pujols is hoping it’s only another day sitting on his Pujol.
Jose Altuve – 1-for-2 and his 12th homer, hitting .343. He’s cooled off a lot since April, right? Um, yeah, about that. He has a .390 average in June, after a .345 average in May, and he’s three home runs short of his career high. Apologies for use of the word short.
Lance McCullers – 5 2/3 IP, 1 ER, 9 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.91 vs. Matt Shoemaker – 7 1/3 IP, 3 ER, 10 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 4.43. Their ERAs don’t show it, but I have much love both of these pitchers. Now, please let my love turn into something wonderful!
Mark Trumbo – 3-for-4, 2 runs and his 21st homer. Oh, you again.
Jonathan Schoop – 2-for-3, 1 run, 1 RBI, hitting .285, and, with Machado serving time in Manfred’s office, Schoop was batting third. In my Schoop sleeper post back in January, I said Schoop would be, “the 2nd Oriole prospect in as many years to break out.” And that’s me quoting me!
Jon Gray – 4 IP, 4 ER, ERA at 4.80. I see the name Gray, and I think, “You handsome, charming devil. You’re like Lorenzo Lamas without the misogyny,” but then I see it’s Jon Gray and I’m like, “String together some Quality Starts, you schmohawk.” You know what’s fun (not fun) about owning Jon Gray, his good matchups are in Coors and his bad ones are on the road. You know, Coors, it’s like piss for pitchers.
Nick Hundley – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 4th homer. Nick Hundley, welcome back to Team FML (they make me abbreviate it)!
Starlin Castro – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 10th homer, hitting .257. Castro really catsup’ed to that ball. Okay, taking a nap. *claps hands* I’m back!
Chase Headley – 1-for-3, 4 RBIs and his 4th homer. If you opened your window at exactly 1:42 EST yesterday, you could’ve heard JayWrong’s ecstasy from Headley’s home run. At least I hope that’s what it was.
CC Sabathia – 4 1/3 IP, 5 ER. The Regression Fairies aced a boy band Sporcle, they signed a petition that says every transatlantic flight should have transgender stewards and they will destroy your ratios.
Jeff Samardzija – 3 IP, 6 ER, ERA at 3.59 vs. Francisco Liriano – 5 IP, 4 ER, ERA at 5.17. This matchup was billed as The Ulcer vs. The Premature Balding. No matter what happened, stress was going to win.
Gregory Polanco – 3-for-5, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 10th homer. In my top 100 overall in the preseason, I said this, “Two quick things: Yes, I’m aware that Polanco is ranked insanely high in my rankings vs. other people’s rankings. And, yes, I’m going to own Polanco on every team. Confession Alert! I had Polanco in the top 20 overall prior to seeing where others ranked him and moved him down a round. I could’ve moved him down six rounds and still had him higher than everyone. Polanco feels like an Arenado situation from last year. By that I mean, I will say something to another fantasy baseball ‘pert like, “Do you like Polanco?” They’ll reply, “Yeah, I love him.” I’ll follow up with, “Then why do you have him ranked 110 overall?” They’ll answer, “I don’t know.” Then my head will explode.” And that’s me quoting me!
Alex Gordon – Will return this weekend. I’ve stashed him on my DL slot because I had Raisel there, who is now activated, and I didn’t feel like combing the DL-eligible guys for very long. I’ll likely drop Gordon almost the moment he comes back, but it makes me feel better that I’m using my DL slot for someone. The preceding is also verbatim what I said to my fantasy shrink.
Danny Duffy – 4 2/3 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners (4 BBs), 8 Ks, ERA at 3.38. The tastes great, less filling Duffy chant: His Ks are soooooo good…He can’t get out of the fifth inning. His Ks are sooooo good…He can’t get out of the fifth inning. As with any advertisement, it’s all true. *said in a very fast voice* Believing all advertising is true can lead to sudden stroke, menstruation in men and death. Please see your physician before thinking all advertisements are true. Duffy does struggle to avoid going K-put in the fifth, but I’m holding him because A) I’m a Ks whore and there is no B or C.
Cheslor Cuthbert – 1-for-4 and his 5th homer, hitting .269. Ron Darling told us Mets game listeners that Cuthbert is from the Mosquito Coast, the place not the movie. Specifically, Cuthbert hails from the Corn Islands. Sounds tough to digest.
Bartolo Colon – Says his thumb is fine and aiming to make his next start. For what it’s worth, he also aims using his thumb for other things. Right now, he has his thumb up in front of a buffet.
Asdrubal Cabrera – 2-for-3, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 8th homer, and 2nd homer in as many games. Hot schmotato alert! Speaking of schmotatoes, I was listening to the Giants game recently and I found out Bochy is a fan of schmotatoes. Jon Miller said if a Giants player hits a home run, Bochy will always play him the next day. Assuming Miller meant a Giants hitter, otherwise Bumgarner would be pitching every day.
Noah Syndergaard – 6 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 2.08. Random factoid that sounds like it means something but doesn’t: Syndergaard’s 2.08 ERA isn’t even top 5 for the NL. Not bad, considering he left yesterday’s game because his elbow was barking like DMX. The MRI showed no damage to his elbow, but he could still miss a start.
Steven Matz – Reported no discomfort in his elbow after throwing his bullpen session. Unless his next game is held in a bullpen in the recent past, I’d still be concerned.
Yoenis Cespedes – Could miss a few games with a mild wrist sprain. Worth watching for developments since Cespedes has 100 legs, but only two wrists.
John Gant – 5 2/3 IP, 3 ER, 7 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 4.45. Has everyone seen his windup? Looks like he’s in slow motion, then the VCR jams, someone comes along and taps the side of the box and it starts again. Braves’ minor league pitching coaches are asleep at the wheel. This isn’t art, pitching correctly isn’t subjective!
Justin Bour – 2-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 12th homer. I feel like Bour’s my poor man’s C.J. Cron, though he hits more like a rich man’s Cron. I will call him, Rich Man/Bour Man.
Adam Conley – 8 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 4 Ks. Sonavalackofballs! I knew I should’ve streamed him. Then again, what if my streaming of him would’ve been the Indonesian butterfly that caused him to have a terrible game? The Stream-o-Nator even liked this game, but hates his next, you have been advised. Aw, Nick Capozzi.
Giancarlo Stanton – Sat out yesterday again. Is he now in a platoon with Ichiro? I get that he’s struggling, but how does he stop struggling if you bench him every other day? StupiDon Mattingly teaching someone to riding a horse, “If you fall off, get back on in about a week. If you fall off hard, you might not want to get back on at all.” Did Mattingly learn the “fall off a horse, you have to get back on” cliche from Christopher Reeve?
