Yesterday, Shawn Tolleson went zero innings and gave up five earned for the blown save. Why is there blood dripping down the back of my leg? OH GOD, TOLLESON, WHAT HAVE YAO REEKED?! Yao is totally a medieval word for you, by the way. Yao Ming was medieval for “You mean?” Rather popular question in the olden days. Any hoo! Jesus, Tolleson, I wish I owned Jesus Tolleson, the Dominican League 2nd baseman from the Punta Cana Putas, instead of you. That was egregious, my man. At least buy me dinner before touching up my nethers with an iron maiden. Someone tase me so I forget about it. I immediately grabbed Sam Dyson and Keone Kela, wherever I could. It’s not completely clear who would be next, but Dyson has been used as the 8th inning setup man recently, so he’d be my first choice. If Tolleson looks wonky in one more game, he might no longer be the closer. Or as Elvis Costello would say, “Tolleson, I know the M’s are killing you, but my aim for SAGNOF is true.” Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Prince Fielder – 1-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 1st homer. The ironically named DH homered off Wade and the ball went a Miley.
Nori Aoki – Sat out with a sore shin. Shinning!
Robinson Cano – 2-for-4, 5 RBIs and two more homers (3, 4). Barry Bonds just got a hitting coach job with the Marlins to fix everything wrong with OZUNA and now him and his family have to travel around the country and watch Cano in case he breaks his single season record. I mean, he is on pace for 220 homers. What, premature extrapolation?
Leonys Martin – 3-for-5, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. Would’ve been a nice batty call. Right, Hitter-Tron? Hitter-Tron what are you doing to that chocolate fountain that has no chocolate in it? Ew.
Andrew Heaney – To the DL with a left flexor muscle strain. Heaney, meeny, miney, doh!
DJ LeMahieu – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 2nd home run as he hit leadoff. Don’t think that he continues to hit leadoff once Blackmon returns. #Blackmonmatters
Trevor Story – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 4th homer. The Trevorending Story! Ahh-aa-ahh! Ahh-aa-ahh! Ahh-aa-ahhhhhh! The Trevorending Story is filled with homers and luckdragons and why is this movie so depressing? It’s supposed to be for kids.
Jake McGee – 1 IP, 1 ER and the save. He was touched up by Ahmed — where’s Trump to get rid of the Muslimy sounding people? — but otherwise McGee looked relatively fine.
Nick Ahmed – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 1st home run. Has two hits in three straight games. Hot schmotato alert!
Patrick Corbin – 7 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners, 6 Ks and allowed three homers. Um, yay? Okay, I’d be lying if I said this start filled me with lots of confidence, but it’s one start, it’s April, yadda3. We need to let the boys breathe.
Jean Segura – 2-for-5 and his 1st steal. Why don’t I have him anywhere? Oh, I know, because he screwed me for the last two years.
Marco Gonzales – For his elbow injury, he will visit Dr. Neal ElAttrache of the Nike Air Huaraches. Man, they were cool sneakers that look hideous in retrospect.
Jeremy Hazelbaker – 1-for-3 and his 1st career home run. Didn’t I see an HBO movie about this guy? The Jeremy Hazelbaker Story? Is that him? I thought he was the “Jazz Cleopatra.” I’m so confused. Can we just play Grichuk again?
Mike Leake – 4 1/3 IP, 4 ER. Between Leake, Wei-Yin, Corbin and Smyly, I’d rather not have anymore ‘safe starters’ going on my team. I need more ‘risky starters’ like Nicasio, Aaron Sanchez and Finnegan.
Juan Nicasio – 6 IP, 1 ER, 2 baserunners, 7 Ks as he made good on his Spring Training promise. It wasn’t just that he pitched well in the preseason, but he was also leaving Coors and being coached by Ray Searage. The narrative just made sense. We should have a glossary term for a guy like this. Please suggest in the comments.
Jarrod Dyson – Royals beat writer said Dyson looked “pretty healthy” during workouts yesterday. Is he pretty? Or is he healthy? Make up your mind!
Denard Span – Out yesterday with the flu. Did Bumgarner get him sick? How does a Bum pass germs? Sneeze or fart? Did he walk past Denard singing, “My bum is on your lips! My bum is on your lips?” I got questions, y’all!
Matt Duffy – 1-for-4 and his 2nd homer. Damn, I wish I had some of that Duff stuff.
Jeff Samardzija – 5 1/3 IP, 3 ER, 11 baserunners, 6 Ks. Ah, it had been too long since I was tied to the WHIPping post. Apparently over the offseason, I forget that the fantasy baseball equivalent to the cartoon expletive of shouting #$@&%*! is Samardzija!
Taylor Jungmann – 5 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 1 K. The guy that brought the K placards to the game had a ton of free time.
Chris Carter – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 1st home run. I took some crap from some ‘perts for drafting Chris Carter for $15 on my Tout Wars team. I think if people understood that Tout is OBP and what Carter can do in an NL-Only league, they’d find it hilarious that anyone is second guessing my Carter pick. Let’s see, 30+ HRs and an OBP that was equal to Pujols’s last year? Yeah, I’m okay with it.
Jose Fernandez – 5 2/3 IP, 5 ER, 6 baserunners, 13 Ks. He drops in a backdoor curve on righties that is not only unhittable, and it is, it makes the viewer at home say, “Damn.” By the way, Fernandez pitched to one too many batters yesterday because Don Mattingly is a non-mustachioed buffoon. That’s why there’s five earned.
Jarrod Saltalamacchia – 2-for-5, 4 RBIs and his 1st home run. Salty’s return to Miami was magicchia.
Victor Martinez – 1-for-1, 2 RBIs and his 2nd homer in as many games as a pinch hitter. “Stop stealing my identity!” That’s Rusty Staub.
Michael Pineda – 5 IP, 6 ER with the conshellation prize. How is it possible that I have all kinds of pitchers giving up runs but none of my teams are putting up offense? I will now jump out of my one-story-up window.
Carlos Correa – 4-for-5 and his 2nd and 3rd homers. At no point all preseason did I have an opportunity to draft Correa. For that, I slowly reel up my middle finger.
George Springer – 1-for-4, 4 RBIs as he hit a two-out grand slam, his 1st homer. That’s great, fantastic, adjective, except it was against Pineda, who I own. Barkeep, another Mekong please. Yes, of course, you can keep the change. I came all the way from starting Wei-Yin yesterday. Now my banged up staff is pouring runs, and I’m going blind again.
Collin McHugh – 1/3 IP, 5 ER. The last time I saw a feast in NYC like that on Houston was at Katz’s deli.
Brett Gardner – Yankees scored 16 runs and Gardner went 0-for-2 with 2 runs. Ticker Tease!
Starlin Castro – 4-for-5, 5 RBIs and his 1st homer. If he went 0-for-25 five games a week and did what he did yesterday one day a week, you’d be happy. See, I know you.
Mark Teixeira – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 4 RBIs and his 1st homer. Anyone ever think at some point Teixeira’s going to pull off his face and reveal Rafael Palmeiro? No? Hmm, maybe it’s just me.
Carlos Carrasco – 5 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners, 5 Ks. Last year, he had problems giving up runs in the first inning. Yesterday, he gave up runs in the 2nd inning. I’m drafting Carrasco first overall in eight years.
Carlos Santana – 2-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 1st homer. Oye como yay!
Clay Buchholz – 4 IP, 5 ER. Clay told reporters that he was frustrated he wasted 4 of his 100 healthy innings in 2016 on such a weak start.
David Ortiz – 1-for-5 and his 2nd homer. I’m not joking when I say I think Ortiz could hit 30 homers at the age of 50. Yes, technically, he’s prolly 50 years old now, but I mean 50 years old according to his birth certificate.
Brock Holt – 2-for-3, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. In related news, Rusney talked to Sandoval about Obama’s recent trip to Cuba and what it could mean for baseball.
Hanley Ramirez – 2-for-4 and the slam (1) and legs (1). Hanley’s yet another guy I’m not surprised to see starting hot. Give him to June and he’ll be complaining of a hammy and reaching for a throw in the first base line when Prince Fielder runs him over.
Aaron Nola – 7 IP, 1 ER, 4 baserunners, 8 Ks. Don’t let his high crime rate last name fool you, Nola’s safe with his excellent command.
Dalier Hinojosa – 1/3 IP, 2 ER and the blown save. I call this song, “Anything You Can Do I Can Do Worse,” being performed by Dalier Hinojosa and David Hernandez (1 IP, 0 ER in the 8th). I’m guessing the Phils go back to Hernandez, or maybe one of the other five relievers they supposedly have.
Maikel Franco – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. This is funny (not funny). Franco saw seven total pitches all game; Nola saw eight in only two at-bats. Bleh, working the count is for the Marlins and their new batting coach!
Brandon Finnegan – 6 IP, 2 ER, 4 baserunners, 9 Ks. Stream-o-Nator liked this start by Finnegan, but is far from impressed with his next matchup.
Eugenio Suarez – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 1st home run. Suarez could be a decent MI this year, but I bet every time you pick him up, you will want to switch him for someone else.
Andrew Cashner – 4 IP, 5 ER and he was pitchslapped by Kenta Maeda (6 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 4 Ks). Thank you, Maeda. I own Cashner in one league and he’s so frustrating I was actually happy he was pitchslapped. Teach him a lesson! Damn, I sound like Jose Reyes.
Yasiel Puig – 3-for-4 and his 1st homer. Signs that it’s early, Puig’s homer ties Kenta Maeda for team lead in homers.
Chris Davis – 2-for-4 and his 1st home run in the Orioles 2nd game. Whew, was starting to worry about him!
Trevor Plouffe – 1-for-4 and his 1st homer. Plouffe goes the dynamite!
Sonny Gray – 7 IP, 1 ER, 7 baserunners (4 BBs), 5 Ks vs. Carlos Rodon 7 IP, 2 ER, 8 baserunners, 6 Ks. This matchup was billed as the glass is half empty vs. the glass is half full. Last night, the glass is half empty won which proved its glass is half full, and the glass is half full is actually half empty.
Adonis Garcia – 3-for-4, after hitting a home run in the 1st game. I don’t buy Adonis all that much even with his adorableness, but, if nothing else, he’s a hot schmotato.
Ben Revere – Hit the DL with a tweaked rib cage. “I wish I was twerking in a baby back rib cage.” That’s nice Billy Butler, but not now. With Revere out for at least a few weeks, I’d grab Michael Taylor (0-for-4) for some upside and the chance he could Wally Pipp Revere.
Stephen Strasburg – 6 IP, 1 ER, 9 baserunners, 4 Ks vs. the Braves. Well, I wanted more, but after last year with Stressbird, we’ll take the baby steps, Bob.
Steven Souza – 4-for-4, 4 RBIs and his 2nd and 3rd homers. He’s owned in too many leagues to be a hot schmotato, but he’s definitely a guy I like, and wish I owned. So, for now, Souza’s virtues have been *pinkie to mouth* trumpeted!
Matt Moore – 5 IP, 3 ER, 7 baserunners, 6 Ks. He hopes to get back to his Spring Training form in his next start, and not look like his previous 400+ major league innings.
Josh Donaldson – 1-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 2nd home run. He came out of the game early with a calf strain, but John Gibbons said it’s not considered serious, adding, “Only if he were a cow vagina, then a calf strain is bad. Speaking of cow vaginas, how about that new slide rule?”
