Nolan Arenado Is An Old Canadian With A Speedo

Groupthink is a powerful drug in fantasy baseball.  Pre season draft lists are often very similar.  Literally everyone I saw had Nolan Arenado ranked 6.  Alex Bregman was ranked 7.  In first base, everyone had Pete Alonso in the late second.  Jose Abreu went 6 pretty much everywhere.

The group can be wrong.

And I succumbed to some groupthink.

Assuming my predictions aren’t so bad that I get fired, I’ll work to make some more spicy predictions next year.  In my defense, I was just trying to fit in with the cool kids who spend thousands of dollars in real money to play in the NFBC main event, the TGFBI, and all sorts of other cool leagues you can follow on the interweb.

I guess I have no further point.  I should have been brave and faded Bregman and Abreu.  Better times are coming.

For now, we just highlight some good and bad players.

Rising:

Christian Walker:  He could be proving me wrong.

I still think it’s a good process to fade a 32-year-old coming off a career year, but can’t ignore what he’s done now for a month.  The average won’t hold, there’s too much swing and miss, and that could spike that K rate.  On the other hand, you got him for a late pick and he’s working out.  Good for you, and maybe a miss for me.

Walker to me is a little bit like Paddleball.  You go back and forth, and sometimes you get a long streak of successful back-and-forth play.  But other times, it just doesn’t work and the ball just falls down harmlessly, or accidentally hits your daughter in the jaw.  Walker is working right now.  Just keep in mind last year’s 50 game stretch where he hit below .200, had below a .300 OBP and less than 10 HR.  It’s how he rolls.

Vinnie Pasquantino:  This guy on the other hand has completely convinced me.  I love first baseballers with this kind of plate approach.  He’s what I thought Eric Hosmer would be in like 2013.  I went to the beach Sunday (I know, I skipped church, leave me alone) and saw people boogie boarding.  You can do that on like any beach day.  This made me think of Vinny P, who I faded HARD this preseason.  He, much like boogie boarding, can be plugged into any team and help out.  Just check out what he’s done:

Falling:

Continuing with the beach theme, Nolan Arenado has been like watching people try to put up beach umbrellas in 20 mph winds.  It’s a complete struggle, and you wish they would just abandon the effort.  The upside isn’t worth the effort taken to put the thing up, and you can just see the umbrella flying away and becoming a dangerous sword like projectile.

Yes, that is a hideous Statcast profile.  This is as bad as those Canadians at the beach who rock the true Speedo, banana hammock style.  I mean, my wife and daughter won’t even let me buy a Speedo brand suit, even if it’s appropriate, respectable length just because they think I’ll make too many jokes about speedos.

Nolan Arenado is the Speedo of corner infielders.  He had his day, but much like those way too revealing of the thigh and buttocks pieces of fabric, his time has passed.  I’d trade him if I could get something for him.

Some notes on people, both good and bad, both happy and sad.

Gunnar Henderson is at .176 BA for the season, and even worse when you see this trend:

I can see arguments on both sides.  The Orioles are a really good team, and they’re winning with him performing like this, but at some point, he could go get a cup of coffee in the minors to get on track.  But Gunnar is like a day at the beach where it’s 99 degrees and super windy.  Is it really worth running it back out there?  For you, for this year, move on.  For the Orioles, they keep winning so they’ll keep playing him to develop the talent.

I still like Brett Baty to be the main guy in NY at some point, but who knows with this team.  I compare him to wearing a rash guard.  Why not?  Who really likes sunscreen?  Baty, much like a rash guard, is the intelligent choice.

You probably drafted Jean Segura and forgot to check on him.  He’s been absolutely awful.  I’ll just let the numbers be my expert analysis.

Someone in the Razzball writer’s chat, and I forgot to remember who it was, said Ryan Mountcastle doesn’t do anything for weeks then does everything in like one game.  It’s not exactly true.  His spurts last for weeks, not days.  My take for Mounty is that he’s much better in a roto league than a weekly H2H one.  Those down weeks are killers.

Harold Ramirez is a guy I’ve needed to dive into for a few weeks.  I am a procrastinator, and I’m just now getting to an apology for it.

That’s a darn good month.  Power, contact, plate approach (ooooh, don’t look at his last 7 day K rate though) and he looks valuable.  He’s started every game but 2 in the past 30 days also, so playing time isn’t a risk.  There’s nothing in his profile that screams luck like a seagull screaming at another seagull who is eating a Cheetoh.  I guess the data is leading me to buy into all of this.  So the data led me to pick him up in the Razzball Writer’s League.

That’s all for now.  Usually, I post ranks, but you don’t get new ones until June.    I’ll be more accurate doing them this way.  I’ve got one commentator who LOOOOOOOOVES Max Muncy.  He’s a perfect example of why I am changing to monthly ranks.  Dude was RAKING for a while, but now his AVG is down to .210 again.  He reacted too much to a small sample.

I will do better than that for you guys.

Thanks again, and any questions please hit me in the comments or on Tweeter at @theEducator23.