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Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The ones that don’t draft pitching early. The Muslim Mrs. Garretts. The Yu’s that we saw in the 2nd half. The ones that see things differently and not simply the ones who are holding drinking glasses up to their face to make googly eyes. They’re not fond of the rules like: Don’t wear sweatpants every day. And they have no respect for the status quo, because they’ve checked out every time someone defined “status quo” for them. They held onto Yu Darvish (6 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners, 14 Ks, ERA at 3.97) all 1st half and were rewarded nicely. Unless he’s just on a team that started checking out fantasy football in June. Back in July, Coolwhip wrote, “I’m not prepared just yet to say he’s back back, but it’s looking like he’s finding his way back. I’ll call him a tentative buy for now, while advising to keep an eye on his walks and I’ll be watching his velocity and arm slot. In fact, I just picked him up where I could to see what happens.” Hashtag nailed it. Prior to that, Darvish had a 5.01 ERA. Since then, 2.44 ERA in 66 1/3 IP. The fix, as we all know by now, he’s stopped walking everyone. His season-long peripherals 11.2 K/9, 3 BB/9, 4.39 FIP are sweet, but his 2nd half peripherals are legendary, and some of the best in baseball — 12.6 K/9, 0.8 BB/9, 3.20 FIP. For 2020, the thought of getting anywhere close to Darvish’s 2nd half has me, not only interested in him, but thinking he could be a steal as a number two fantasy starter. Yu might think I’m crazy, but the crazy ones change the world, or at least do well sometimes in their leagues. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Brad Hand – Left the club to get an MRI. It came back clean, which is all the proof the old Greek mother needs that Windex wards off disease. Not, clean like that, Athena. Francona said Hand will be day-to-day and might need to be built back up to the closer role, so the 9th inning is wide open, and I mean that literally. The Indians have a gorgeous bullpen behind Hand, but a bit too gorgeous because they can go a bunch of different ways. I grabbed Nick Wittgren, but there’s also Adam Cimber, Oliver Perez, Tyler Clippard and Nick Goody.
Matthew Boyd – 5 IP, 2 ER, 7 baserunners, 3 Ks, ERA at 4.54. All of those home runs allowed for “Soup Can” Boyd and he can’t ever be seriously considered an every-time-out starter for 12-team leagues or shallower.
Luis Severino – Set to make his season debut on Tuesday. Just what you expected when you drafted him in March and his timetable was “a full recovery by May.” I’ll repeat this again in March of next year, but don’t draft an injured pitcher. It pays off about once every twenty cortisone shots.
Luke Voit – 4-for-8, 4 runs, 3 RBIs and his 20th homer. That gives the Yankees six players with 20 homers, and one player with one homer.
Aaron Judge – 2-for-6, 5 runs, 2 RBIs and his 22nd homer, hitting .274. Not to dog out “Soup Can” Boyd, but chicken or egg: juiced balls or just crappy pitchers who give up homers? Both? Yeah, prolly.
Edwin Encarnacion – Hit his 34th homer, but left with an oblique strain. Welp, that’s not good, and I could see this ending his regular season. For decades, that imaginary parrot on his shoulder relied on him. Now, he’s gonna need to rely on that parrot.
J.A. Happ – 4 2/3 IP, 2 ER, ERA at 5.07. Against the Tigers?! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA–Breathe, Grey, Jesus Fortuna Christ, breathe! The Yankees had to win this game so bad they couldn’t let Happ finish the effin’ 5th inning for the win?! Are you seriously serious?
Domingo German – 4 IP, 0 ER, 2 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 4.09. Yes, I’m thinking I should’ve just went with the as-of-now middle reliever, German, instead of Just Awful Happ.
Gary Sanchez – Exited with groin tightness. He has so many problems with his groin I’m about to start calling him Hurty Sanchez.
Marcell Ozuna – 1-for-3, 2 runs and his 27th homer. OZUNA is life of party. OZUNA make terrible cosplayer of Bernie in Weekend at Bernie’s.
Kolten Wong – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and a slam (11) and double legs (21, 22), hitting .283. After the previous two pitchers’ duels at Coors, the Cardinals were singing their Redemption Song, mon. They hit five homers — Harrison Bader (1-for-4, 2 runs) hit his 8th; Dexter Fowler (2-for-3) hit his 17th and Rangel Ravelo (1-for-4) hit his 2nd. Now, that they’re out of Coors, they can all be dropped. Well, don’t drop Wong, and stop listening to that Detachable Penis song.
Nolan Arenado – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 39th homer. Can’t believe I won this eBay auction! I am now the proud owner of a one-of-a-kind potato chip that looks like Sir Anthony Hopkins. I’m just going to leave it right by this open window–NOOO!!! Torenado!
Ryan Braun – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 19th homer, hitting .279. Braun or Rhys Hoskins? Obviously, Hoskins, right? I mean, obviously, right? Not even close, right? Say not even close! Say it! Sorry, I rope-a-doped ya. On the Player Rater, they’re about the same.
Gio Gonzalez – 4 IP, 2 ER, ERA at 4.01. His next is against the Padres, and the Streamonator likes it, but it’s worth noting this short start of his was a byproduct of a team being in the pennant race. Sometimes guys get pulled super fast because the team has to win the game. A solution to that is, of course, just pitching better.
Caleb Smith – 5 2/3 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 4.13. What are the Marlins gaining by pushing him? A chance to only loss 102 games instead of a 103? Shut him down already!
Shohei Ohtani – Done for the season with surgery on his patella. Terrible break for him or my general practitioner who I believe is named Patella. The recovery time is 12 weeks, so I don’t know, but this doesn’t sound good for an offseason pitching schedule.
Nick Senzel – Diagnosed with a torn labrum. Senzel in audio form: The sound of a flat tire.
Eugenio Suarez – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 45th homer, hitting .269. Everyone spent five months talking about how Bellinger, Yelich or Trout were going to win Home Run Titles and Eugenio and Soler are sneaking in the back door.
Omar Narvaez – 2-for-5, 2 RBIs and his 20th homer, hitting .276. I could be remembering this wrong, but I get more questions about dropping Narvaez than I think any other catcher. He’s got 20 homers. What do you want from him? Seriously, your catcher slot is not where you win and lose fantasy championships. It’s having Shane Bieber instead of Kenley Jansen.
Kyle Lewis – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 3rd homer and 3rd homer in three games. Okay, no idea where this is coming from but grab him!
Lucas Giolito – 6 IP, 5 ER, 6 baserunners, 12 Ks, ERA at 3.41. Attorney Phangrafs D. Atabase walks into frame, carrying a wooden pointer stick, “Have you or anyone you’ve known been a victim of a FIPlash? Symptoms include getting a lot of strikeouts, not walking anyone and give up a ton of runs. If this sounds like something that’s happened to you or someone you know, you might be entitled to compensation.”
Jorge Soler – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 44th homer. Annie’s “Sun’ll Come Out Tomorrow” song translated to Spanish is, “Soler will hit the beisbol out mañana.”
Hunter Dozier – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 26th homer, hitting .291, hitting near-.450 in the last week, but prior to yesterday was mostly 4020’s. Now that he’s going Long Dong with Dozier’s Squier Stroke, I’m more interested.
Ronald Acuna Jr. – 1-for-5, 2 runs a slam (39) and double legs (35, 36). Tildaddy says it’s safe to go in the ocean! By the way, I literally have dreams about guys wanting to get to 40/40. That is the fantasy baseball dream. 2nd is what? Someone wanting to get 75 steals? I’m not sure there is a 2nd.
Ozzie Albies – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 22nd homer. According to Pro-Sports Contract dot com, Albies made $1499 between homers.
Jean Segura – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and a slam (12) and legs (9), hitting .284. Since I have owned Segura all year (I say with a long sigh), I can say without a doubt this was his best game all season.
Cesar Hernandez – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 11th homer, and his 3rd homer this week. Looks like Cesar’s dressing up that hot schmotato.
Adam Haseley – 1-for-2, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 5th homer, and 2nd homer in the last four games. Even in a small sample — that’s what she said! — he’s doing exactly what interested me when he was called up. If you were to prorate his stats — Mr. Prorater, “Don’t do it, the people can’t handle it.” — I’ll take my chances; he’s a 15/15 guy across 150 games. Hope he gets some serious runway to play next year.
Kyle Gibson – 4 2/3 IP, 5 ER, ERA at 4.73, as he returned from colitis. Damn, looks like he’s still got the runs.
Juan Soto – 2-for-5, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 34th homer. Great, super, adjective, Sexy Dr. Pepper, you are my boo, but — and this is a J. Lo-sized but — Acuña has more homers than him and stealing close to 40 bags. I’m sorry, they’re both sexy eh eff, but are they even remotely close in value?
Anthony Rendon – 2-for-3, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and his 33rd homer, hitting .335. With Yelich out on bended knee, Rendon sees an opening to win NL MVP and he’s surging! Now he just needs to steal 40 bags to look anywhere near as good as Acuña or slug another twenty homers to look as good as Bellinger.
Adam Eaton – 2-for-5, 2 runs and his 14th homer, hitting .285. That’s his 2nd homer this week, and, in a hot week, he used to hit two doubles per week, so that’s four total bases vs. eight so the ball is twice as juicey. The math’s right, nerd!
Nick Solak – 2-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 4th homer, and 7th homer this week. They say Big Nick Energy makes outs, but I don’t believe them. They are a bunch of phonies! And, of course, Solak will be in this afternoon’s Buy column, the only question is will he be the lede? Whoa, leading lede question!
Rougned Odor – 1-for-4 and his 26th homer, and 4th homer in five games, More incredibly, he only has four Ks. That’s usually a good game for him!
Matt Olson – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 32nd homer. Conspiracy Theory Alert! He had his hamate bone removed and an aluminum bat inserted. Ooh, good idea! What would happen if a guy had an aluminum bat implanted on his shoulder? You can’t tell someone they can’t use their arm, right? This is a million dollar idea!
Homer Bailey – 5 1/3 IP, 1 ER, 6 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 4.76. Speaking of elective surgery, Streamonator‘s got an aluminum bat inserted in his pants for Bailey’s next start.
Jose Altuve – 2-for-4 and a slam (27) and legs (6), hitting .304. His speed dried up quicker than you can say, “To clean your car, we’re gonna have to put the phone books from your seat in your trunk.”
Todd Frazier – 1-for-2, 2 runs and his 21st homer, and 3rd homer in two games and the mayor of Toms River needs to change the city’s name Todds River or GTFO! Frazier won’t be in this afternoon’s Buy column, but is obviously a hot schmotato right now.
Juan Lagares – 2-for-4, 6 RBIs and his 4th and 5th homer, hitting .215. If you’re wondering why Lagares is doing well in the last few weeks, it’s because I dropped him from a deep NL-Only league a few weeks ago. Just follow behind me and pick up what I drop — I’m freakin’ Dopey-locks!
Robinson Cano – 1-for-3 and his 13th homer, hitting .263. Of course, he’s going to be in this afternoon’s Buy column as he’s been for the last three weeks. Cano’s figured out a great way to not run hard is to homer, and it’s paying dividends for all of us.
Marcus Stroman – 6 1/3 IP, 1 ER, 8 baserunners (4 BBs), 6 Ks, ERA at 3.35. Stroman my pain with his pitches…Background extras sing, “One time, one time…” Living my life without his turds…
Michael Conforto – 2-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 30th homer, hitting .260. The quietest 30-homer hitter in baseball or nah? Could see a case for Carlos Correa because he was so quiet, he didn’t actually hit 30 homers.
Alex Young – 2 2/3 IP, 1 ER, ERA at 3.38, but he had five unearned runs for the massive ticker shock. Whew, I nearly stroked out after streaming Young. Streamonator is very mildly interested in his next start, and I’m desperate, so whee!
Rich Hill – 2/3 IP, 1 ER, ERA at 2.68, as he was activated from the IL. I did a perfunctory search of news sites to see if Hill’s already injured again, didn’t see it and called it a day, but if you told me he was, I’d believe you.
Pedro Severino – 1-for-1, 2 RBIs and his 13th homer, and his 2nd homer in two games. You in March, “Grey, you’re handsome and I know you say not to draft catchers, but I’m in a H2H league, and I wanna make sure I have someone rock solid like Gary Sanchez.” You now, “Drop Sanchez for Severino?”
Joe Musgrove – 5 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 4.52. Streamonator loved this start because: Pirates pitching to contact + Giants not being able to hit anything even if they make contact = Putting a book in a Vitamix. Hmm, math’s a little off there, was supposed to equal “machine learning.”
Felipe Vazquez – 1 IP, 0 ER, ERA at 1.65 and his 28th save. I seem to be the only one interested in this storyline, but it is bugging me out that Vazquez lopped off Crick’s index finger like he’s Lorena Bobbitt and the Pirates are like, “En bee dee, go get ’em, champ!” I could see if they’re in a pennant chase, but when you let pitchers chop each other’s fingers off, where does it end? “Starting today is Joe Musgrove…He’s the straw poking out of the mound because Vazquez buried him alive.”
