Sanchez Acing His Orel Exam

Cristopher Sanchez had a May. Oh, did he have a May. Yesterday, he went 7 IP, 0 ER, 6 hits, zero walks, 9 Ks, ERA at 1.47. That brings his May totals to 39 IP, 25 hits allowed, three walks, 45 Ks, 0.72 WHIP and a 0.000000000000000000 ERA. Scoreless. Cristopher Sanchez now has five consecutive starts of at least seven shutout innings. His scoreless streak goes to 44 2/3 IP, a new Phillies franchise record. Longest scoreless inning streaks by LHP since 1900: Carl Hubbell – 45 1/3 IP, 1933; Doc White – 45 IP, 1904, then Sanchez. For all-time scoreless streak, well, as your wife said before you were married and never since, next up, Orel! I kid, you know Orel–wait a second. I mean, I love Orel–Sorry, I’m sorry, I think Orel is great–Do you remember Orel? I mean, I have to stop talking about Orel. Shame Cristopher Sanchez won’t make the All-Star team. Good run, though. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Trea Turner – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and  slam (7) and legs (11), 2nd homer in as many games. Kinda irrelevant for fantasy, but they called that Treat Urner home run 382 feet, and they are 100% guessing once the ball hits something. That was the most 400-plus-foot homer I’ve ever seen.

Walker Buehler – 5 1/3 IP, 2 ER, 3 hits, zero walks, 2 Ks, ERA at 4.88. Has anyone done a deep dive into how The Burpler got broken? Only thing I can think is he wears his pants as tight as Robbie Ray and he’s broken too, so that’s why. Okay, moving on!

Trevor Megill – 1 IP, 0 ER, ERA at 4.74, and his 6th save, which is notable because the day before Abner Uribe slap-chopped his nuts in the direction of the Cards’ dugout with a SUCK IT after a called-strike strikeout, which is nuts (other definition) for a lot of reasons, but mostly because it was in the middle of an ABS challenge, when that pitch might’ve been overturned. It wasn’t but it was an incredibly borderline strike. Also, they were up by six runs and it was the 8th! After *that* game, Pat Murphy said he didn’t like Uribe doing that (not a fan of D-Generation X, I guess), and then we see Megill getting the save the next game. I’d infer Megill should be rostered.

Dustin May – 7 IP, 1 ER, 2 hits, zero walks, 9 Ks, ERA at 4.57. Dustin May loses no-hitter in the 8th inning; I delete 12,000-word screed about how unpredictable pitching is and how you shouldn’t draft it early. Dustin May isn’t as bad as he’s been in past years, but not as good as he was in past past years either. Likely wouldn’t even Streamonator him, until I saw more of this vs. that.

Nolan Schanuel – Hit the IL with a strained calf. Don’t worry, the Angels called up Nick Madrigal. Last time he was in the majors in 2024, he had a HardHit% of 16.9. Call him, Dead Ball.

Jose Soriano – 5 IP, 3 ER, 11 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 2.65. ‘Member when he was the best pitcher in baseball? I do, vaguely.

Casey Mize – Left the game with a trainer with groin tightness. Uh, Mize had the groin tightness, not the trainer. I don’t think. Any hoo! I love Drew Anderson (3 IP, 0 ER, ERA at 3.44). Likely more than I should, but guess who’s in the rotation if Mize is out? Bingo-slash-bango.

Kenley Jansen – Left with a groin injury. It’s a nutbagpocalypse! I’d look at Kyle Finnegan for saves. Will Vest is good financial advice, but not sure for SAGNOF.

Spencer Torkelson – 3-for-4 and his 8th homer, hitting .210. As a 1st baseman? Is it worth it? Let me Tork it? I put down my thoughts, flip it and reverse it. ?ti kroT em teL ?ti htrow ti sI ?namesab ts1 a sA.

Ian Happ – 2-for-6, 5 RBIs and his 11th homer, hitting .215. He was oh-for-like-I-can’t-remember-his-last-hit, so it’s nice to see him get into one.

Bubba Chandler – 5 IP, 4 ER, 10 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 4.85 vs. Jameson Taillon – 5 IP, 4 ER, 7 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 5.37. Those two lines are colloquially known as, “Who gives a fudge only he didn’t say fudge.”

Brandon Lowe – 1-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 14th homer, hitting .269. Lowe on his way to a top five 2nd baseman year would be something I did not expect.

Konnor Griffin – 1-for-4 and his 4th homer, hitting .261. Pirates have a funny dance with Konnor and Horwitz. They move one down the lineup, then he homers, so they move him up and the other down, then the guy who went up does nothing, and guy who went down homers, so they reverse the two and the other guy going down homers, then they reverse them again. It’s the Dance of the LL Donkey. If you know who LL Donkey is, you’ve been reading for a while. Treat yourself to a cookie.

Bryce Elder – 3 1/3 IP, 5 ER, ERA at 2.50. The only kryptonite to the Shroud of Touki is the Regression Fairies.

Connelly Early – 7 IP, 0 ER, 7 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 2.95. Tolle > Early, but Early > Late. Early’s not pitching *bad* necessarily — asterisks for emphasis not because I think they’re pretty — he is pitching like your basic backend starter in a 12-teamer.

Jarren Duran – 4-for-5, 2 runs and his 8th homer, hitting .213. Raised his average from .173 this month, and is on pace for a 25/30 season, which is solid if it comes with a .240+ average.

Jonah Tong – 3 2/3 IP, 0 ER, 7 baserunners (4 BBs), 1 K, ERA at 0.00. Ain’t trying to be a hater for hatin’ sake, but that is not a good line and he should be in the minors figuring out his command. He changed his arm angle this year, so maybe he should change it back? I don’t know, something’s broke.

Juan Soto – 2-for-3 and his 12th homer, 3rd homer in three games, nine homers this month, and near the top of the 30-day Player Rater, and protecting him in the order is Mark “I Can’t Hit A Barn” Vientos. Kinda fun to see the 30-day Player Rater, because the first month is like, “Oh, yeah, DeLauter and Ildemaro — they’re breaking out, baby!” Now it’s like, “Hey, ya know those guys from April? Were they actually good?”

Andrew Abbott – 6 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 3.88. That 3.88 ERA is giving the wrong idea. He allowed four runs this month for a 1.29 ERA.

Yordan Alvarez – 3-for-4, and his 19th and 20th homer. For years, I evangelized my love (sounds like nerdy Madonna lyrics) for Captain Woo Cubano by saying he is the most “Guy who could hit 50 homers every year” who hasn’t done it yet. Yet is keyword there.

Mike Burrows – 7 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 5.40. That’s nice, do it one more time in a row and I’ll pay attention.

Andrew McCutchen – DFA’d by the Rangers. Too little McCutchen, too much McClutchin’ his knee.

Joc Pederson – 3-for-4, 3 runs and his 5th and 6th homer, 2nd and 3rd homer in two games. Fine, hot schmotato, but I can tell you right now if you ask me if you should drop for Joc, I will say no 99.9% of the time. Everyone but Nick Madrigal.

Jacob deGrom – 6 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.77. He allowed the Yordong on a slider, and in April (31 1/3 IP) 4 HRs allowed; in May, (28 1/3 IP), 9 HRs.

Shohei Ohtani – 6 IP, 1 ER, 0 hits, 4 BBs, 7 Ks, ERA at 0.82, 1-for-4 and his 9th homer. Ohtani vs. the Rockies is totally a fair fight. It’s like the Globetrotters vs. the Generals, if the Generals were all in body casts. The hilarious thing is Ohtani seemed gassed, on fumes, not nearly 100% on his game, and he no-hit the Rockies for six innings.

Teoscar Hernandez – Looks headed to the IL with a hamstring strain. He did you a favor, so you can stop benching him for better hitters and you can just IL him.

Andy Pages – 2-for-4 and his 13th homer, hitting .303, as he hit 2nd, which incredibly he never does, when it makes total sense for him to hit there–Oh, that’s why he doesn’t. It makes sense. Forget it.

Freddie Freeman – 2-for-4 and his 7th homer, hitting .271. If a guy’s career can be between sunrise and sunset, Freeman’s around 6 PM and Daylight Savings is next week.

Munetaka Murakami – 2-for-4, 3 runs and a slam (20) and legs (1). You’re gonna be shocked to learn this but he homered off a four-seamer. I know, shocking!

Chase Meidroth – 2-for-5, 4 RBIs and his 5th homer, hitting .273. White Sox scored 15 runs, so everyone was hitting, if you catch Meidroth.

David Sandlin – 6 IP, 1 ER, 1 hit, zero walks, 4 Ks, as he was called up. I don’t know for a fact, but it looks like that might be the first game where he allowed zero walks at any level ever. He had a 6.1 BB/9 in the minors this year. That’s hard to do, and even harder for a 25 year-old. Feels like a roofie’ing waiting to happen, speaking of which…

Connor Prielipp – 4 1/3 IP, 6 ER, ERA at 5.13. I’m gonna leave this Coke Zero on the counter of this al-Qaeda-run bar while I go to the bathroom…[five hours later]…Hey, how long was I asleep and why is that guy putting my kidney on Etsy–AHHH!!! Roofie!

Byron Buxton – 1-for-3 and his 17th homer. What I said for Soto about the 30-Day Player Rater? Buxton’s up there too.

Gerrit Cole – 6 2/3 IP, 0 ER, 4 hits, zero walks, 10 Ks, ERA at 0.0000000000. I’m still learning, and I’ll admit I have to get better about drafting aces coming back from injury. If the price is fine — and Cole’s was — we should’ve all been in. I mean, I told everyone to draft him in my rankings, but I didn’t, and I should’ve. He’s gonna be a top 10 starter drafted next year and not affordable again.

Julio Rodriguez – 1-for-5, 3 RBIs and his 10th homer, hitting .258. Last year JRod didn’t hit his 10th homer until May 27!

Logan Gilbert – 6 IP, 0 ER, 7 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.69. I won’t be happy with my ace pitcher until he has an ERA under 3, but I will subtly tip my beret that I bought from the Travolta collection that he’s righted the ship.

Trevor McDonald – 6 1/3 IP, 2 ER, 8 baserunners, 6 Ks, ERA at 4.34. They can’t possibly move him to the pen or back to the minors when Webb returns, right? It has to be Houser to the pen, right? Dot dot dot. Right?

Michael Soroka – 6 IP, 2 ER, 4 hits, zero walks, 3 Ks, ERA at 3.25. My least favorite part of Soroka is I always forget if it’s Mike or Michael. Everything else? I am a swooning emoji.

Gavin Williams – 7 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 3.07. There’s a case to be made that Gavin is givin’ top ten starter numbers. I won’t make the case, but can’t imagine him lower than the top 20. (Out of curiosity, I just looked at Marmos’s latest top 100 starters and he has him at 21. The noive!)

Gunnar Henderson – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 12th and 13th home, hitting .222. Only hits this year are homers, so [hands together, head bowed] please get to 70 hits.

Blaze Alexander – 3-for-4, 6 RBIs and his 1st homer. After the game, he received word Cody Bellinger wanted to congratulate him on his big game, and, when he called Cody back, Cody tried to smoke him through the phone.

Trey Gibson – 5 2/3 IP, 1 ER, 10 baserunners, 1 K, ERA at 3.65. His BB/9 is 5.1 and his K/9 is 3.7 and my interest in him is 0.0.

Steven Matz – 3 IP, 6 ER, ERA at 4.67. Not Long Island’s own Steven Matz! I wouldn’t even Streamonator him.

Eury Perez – 4 IP, 0 ER, 3 hits, zero walks, 9 Ks, ERA at 4.60. Eury drilled Okamoto, and stared at the Jays’ dugout. No one really seemed to understand why, then he struck out the next guy, and laughed maniacally. Following that bizarre set of circumstances, he went into the dugout and hurt himself stretching. There’s a delicate tightrope MLB players must walk between playing out of their mind and being a head case.

Otto Lopez – 4-for-4, 1 RBI and 2 steals (9, 10). I know none of us care about league leaders anymore now that none of us read a hardcopy newspaper like the always-beautiful, colorful USA Today Sports section, but Lopez is leading the NL in batting average with .342, and it’s not particularly close. I could give you 50 guesses who’s number two and three and you’d never guess them. By the by, wanna see if someone is over the age of 40? Ask them if they remember reading league leaders in the USA Today. If they are of age, there’s a special glint in their eye.

Charles McAdoo – Being called up. Just in time for the NBA finals! What’s McAdoo, a center? Small forward? An infielder? Basketball teams don’t have infielders! McAdoo slashed .250/.356/.436 with eight home runs and 27 RBIs at Triple-A, and I think Lenyn might’ve got got by the Socialists. McAdoo went 16/34/.247 last year in Double-A, and I think he’s just an option to face lefties.

Kazuma Okamoto – 1-for-2 and his 11th homer, hitting .218. One of the more bizarre lines so far, and it is odd that someone who has never been in the league before would elicit in me that feeling, but all signs pointed to Okamoto being a lesser power, better average guy.

Kevin Gausman – 5 IP, 1 ER, 8 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.13. Just had a thought, we think this is the end point in the deterioration of starters’ ability to go deep into game, but what if it’s the beginning? In ten years, no one will go 70 pitches deep. A three-inning start will be a Quality Start and Openers will only be able to warmup before they’re pulled.