Another excellent Memorial Day weekend, probably the best weekend of the year. I caught the biggest crappie, biggest northern, and biggest bass out of everybody at the cabin, and while this would usually be the point where I'd brag about how awesome I am - and I am - but pretty much everybody killed it, or at least as much as we could when it wasn't too windy. We collectively caught a ton of crappies that all ranked among the biggest we ever caught at the cabin, and in one stretch of about 45 minutes out on the boat we caught 15 northerns. It was totally awesome. You're so jealous. Anyway I'm really tired so you can expect a definite half-assed effort here.
WHO WAS AWESOME
1. Nick Blackburn. Generally he's pretty overrated, but I get it - good lookin' guy, killer side burns, little bit of a "I don't care what anybody think about me" beard, unflappable on the mound, and just a cool, calm guy who can absolutely shut down a team once in a while, so I get it. If you actually look at stats and whatnot, however, he's generally been pretty bad over his career, even finishing in the top 4 in hits allowed twice in his career. I have to give it up to him, however, because he has somehow become the team's only reliable pitcher - the only one you know will keep you in the game this year.
In his six games pitched in the month of May his worst outing would have been today - 6ip, 7 hits, 5 runs. Using Game Score (I won't bore you but it's explained mid-page right here) that comes out as a 40. Looking at every other Twins starter they've only equaled or beaten that score 19 times between five guys, and only 16 times prior to this weekend before the hapless Angels gave everybody a boost. Blackie's average for the month was 59, a score only reached by a non-Blackburn twin 7 times. All of which is a nerdy way of saying that an average Nick Blackburn outing is probably better than the best any other Twin can pitch right now, which is actually of really succinctly summing out just how crappy this season is going.
2. Mike Miller. This already feels like a million years ago but technically it happened last week, but did you see Miller against the Bulls in those final two games? After playing sparingly in the first two playoff rounds and even in the first 3 games versus Chicago he suddenly burst back onto the scene and played 26 and 24 minutes in games 4 and 5, averaging 10 pts and 8 rebs in the two games and, no joke, was probably the biggest reason the Heat won game 4 and swung the series. No kidding if you watched it he registered the majority of his stats in the fourth and absolutely was the difference in that game. There's a decent change he'll matter again against Dallas, but let me tell you watching him in that fourth quarter was jarring and a reminder of how good he used to be. At Florida, I mean, when he played a complete game, not the jump-shooting nancy boy he became in the NBA.
3. Bartolo Colon. I will admit that I thought Colon was a big-fat tub of goo who was basically washed up and done and when the Yankees signed him I was like "good, suck it Yankees you queers!" but well fuck me I guess. Colon shut out the A's today on just four hits while striking out six, and now has just a 3.26 ERA on the year. And I don't care because the Yankees are still stupid and still suck and Bartolo is still fat and has a stupid name. He's probably going to give up eleventeen runs his next time out, assuming he's not throwing at the Twins.
4. Carl Crawford. Well it's about time, Mr. Crawford. After signing that huge contract with the Red Sox he's been one of the biggest disappointments of the year and was sort of the symbol for Red Sox suckage to start the season, but he's starting to turn it around. Well, he's had a few good games, I should say, including a 4-4 with 2 doubles and a homer on Wednesday and 4-5 with two triples the next day. Then I went out of town and now I just looked up his next few games and they were 0-4, 0-3, and 0-4. So who knows. He's still just hitting .232/.267/.362 now for the year, which sounds bad but would be the fifth highest OPS on the Twins. Wow. Fifth highest on the worst team in the league. I guess he's still really bad. But at least he had a good week. Has any twin had even a single 4-hit game this year? Looking it up, yes. Span had 4 hits April 13th and Cuddyer had four the day before. So the Twins have gone nearly two months without a 4-hit game from a single player, and one the season have as many as Carl Crawford, the guy synonymous with disappointing player this year, had in one week. This season is so much fun.
5. Michael Morse. I seriously have no idea who this guy is, but I do a lot of wagering on individual players and the Nationals have been a gold mine to bet against players not getting an rbi or not scoring a run in a game. So every time I see Washington has scored a run I have to look up immediately how they scored to see if I lost a bet and need to punish myself. So that's how I know that Morse hit a home run on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Monday and in that stretch he's knocked in 11 of his team's total 27 runs. So I picked up in Fantasy. Stay tuned to find out if I'm a genius, like I was with Charlie Morton.
WHO SUCKED
1. Derrick Rose. No lie, it was kind of tough to watch Rose those last couple of games against Miami. The good news is he clearly wanted the ball, was the leader, and was aggressive. The bad news was he couldn't have scored with your mom after a glass of white zin. He's still one of the best in the NBA and he'll be fine and all, but yuck. More here if you need it.
2. Kevin Durant. Much the same as Rose, Durant certainly didn't do himself any favors in the final few games against the Mavericks. In game 3 he was 0-8 from three, in game 4 he turned it over 9 times including a killer down the stretch where he just straight lost control of the ball, and overall he shot just 23% from three for the series. I love the guy and he's obviously one of a handful of people you'd consider as your #1 choice if you were starting a franchise, but I almost wonder if he needs a littler more killer in his blood. I'm interested to see if any kind of possible feud develops between him and Westbrook. You can only have one alpha on a team, and it's obvious to everyone that Durant should be that alpha - obvious to everyone except Durant and Westbrook. Pay attention. You'll see.
3. Washington Nationals. It's hard to believe a team could be as bad as the Twins - because that's actually impossible so the joke's on you - but Washington is bad, bad, bad. They're 1-8 in their last 9 and have given up five or more runs in six of those games while scoring three or less runs in five (we've already talked about that offense above). That's a bad combination. Also a bad combination? Their rotation. Jason Marquis and Livan Hernandez in the same rotation? Possibly the two worst pitchers of the last five years? Seriously that's like the pitching equivalent of a middle infield combination of Alexi Casilla and Matt Tolbert, as if anybody would be dumb enough to roll with those two.
4. Joakim Soria. Did I, or did I not, tell you about this? I did, because I'm a genius and so much smarter than you. Soria's week - 2/3 inning, 3 runs allowed, blown save - 1 good ip in a meaningless 12-7 game - 2/3 ip, 2 runs allowed, blown save - 1 ip, 3 runs allowed, blown save. He now has an ERA of almost 7 and is seven for twelve in save opps after having now blown 4 of his last 5. Done. And I told you so.
5. Car Racing. I normally wouldn't bother to include car racing in the sucks column since it always sucks - I mean, come on man, it's just cars driving in a circle and whoever has the fastest car wins, you know it, I know it, and racing fans know it no matter what they try to say - but tonight was a special case. I only know this because it was all over the radio when I was driving back from the cabin, but now we have special proof of how stupid it all is. There were two big races this weekend, one in each league (called, I believe, NASCAR and NASCAR2), and in one some dude was winning until the very last turn on the last lap where, for some unknown reason, he drove straight in a wall despite having a big lead and ended up finishing second, and the other where some dude was winning almost until the end when he ran out of gas. He ran out of gas. He ran out of gas in car racing. That would be like a baseball player going out into the field without his glove (I would guess Casilla almost does this twice a week) or a basketball player not wearing shoes. So dumb. But honestly if you like racing you probably don't own a computer so you can't read this and your Memorial Day BBQ likely consisted of squirrel or possum or whatever you ran over in your truck recently (you know, your truck with a door that's a different color than the rest of the truck and has a sticker of calvin pissing on a logo on the back window, along with an "Ass, Cash, or Grass bumper sticker.) In conclusion, racing is stupid and so is your face.
Since I mentioned Memorial Day BBQ you're probably wondering what we had. So I will tell you. We simply had Kobe beef burgers on the grill (lightly seasoned with salt and pepper - you don't want to mess with these too much - and topped with provolone), corn on the cob (garlic and herb butter), and really excellent cauliflower gratin that Mrs. W made. It was excellent, and I highly recommend going for the Kobe burgers once in a while. They're about twice the price of regular burger patties and about 3 times more than lump burger you form yourself, but holy crap they were worth it. Also, before any smartass posts a comment here, I will come clean and admit I screwed up cooking turkey burgers and brats on the grill this weekend, but in my defense I haven't cooked on a charcoal grill since we got our sweet gas one about 6 years ago. Plus everything was fine once my dad figured out the bottom grate was closed. So shut up.
Showing posts with label Joakim Soria. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joakim Soria. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Has the Mexicutioner been Mexicuted?
You may remember this award winning post from last year where I pointed out Zack Greinke wasn't nearly the same pitcher as the previous Cy Young winning year and how I showed by digging deeper into the numbers than just wins, ERA, and WHIP that he was clearly off. Some people called me an idiot, but you may recall he finished out the year with significantly worse numbers than the year prior, as I predicted. Now I must turn my attention to another pitcher who has caught my worrying eye, coincidentally another Royal, in Joakim Soria.
Soria has been a fullly dominant closer for the past three years, never posting an ERA over 2.12 or a WHIP above 1.13 while saving an average of 38 games and striking out more than a batter per inning. He started out the season pitching in 4 of their first 5 games, going 4 total innings and allowing just two hits and no runs while picking up a win and a save. All sounds great. But the number that really stood out to me was he had just one strikeout. For a pitcher who averaged over at least one per inning in his career this looking like a minor red flag - maybe simple variance could account for it - but it was something I meant to look into. Then came yesterday, when Soria entered the game with the Royals up 6-3 on the White Sox and after getting two ground outs allowed four hits and four runs to blow the save. Worrisome from a guy like him. I don't know where to find this info but I'm willing to bet he's rarely if ever blown a 3-run save.
Looking at ERA and WHIP would be meaningless here since our sample size of just five innings is so small and he has that monster of a blow-up on his resume, so like Greinke last year, let's look a little deeper.
Checking out his profile page at Fangraphs one thing immediately stands out: velocity. Soria's fastball has always been at 91-92mph throughout his career, this year it's at 89.6mph, over 2mph slower than last year and as we've seen with Nick Blackburn if your fastball is under 90 you can't miss or that thing is getting pounded, and it's even worse when that fastball is your best pitch as in Soria's case.
Due, at least in part, to that change in velocity he's also getting hitters to chase balls out of the zone far less and missing fewer bats. Last year batters swung at 30.3% of his pitches that were outside the zone, this year that number is far lower at just 21.7%. That 30.3% number ranked him in the top third of relievers last year, while that 21.7% number would put him dead last if it held up the entire year.
Obviously it's easier for batters to hit the ball hard if it's in the strike zone, so if you can't get them to chase you need them to miss - something Soria isn't doing this year either. Overall contact rate on balls swung at is up, from 75.8% in his career to 84.2% this year, while the % of strikes he throws that are swinging strikes is way down (from 11.0% to 2.6%).
Finally, let's look at his approach. Perhaps due to that drop in velocity he's relying far less on his fastball. In his career he's thrown the heater 72.6% of the time, but this year he's thrown it just 55%, increasingly relying on his slider and his changeup, throwing both at more than double his career frequency. Unfortunately for his career if you rank the effectiveness of his pitches it goes fastball, curveball (although it was bad last season), slider, change-up.
Basically Soria has lost velocity on his best pitch and is throwing his lesser pitches more often, causing batters to chase less and make more and better contact on the balls they do swing at which are more consistently in the zone. Ouch. And although regression to the mean works both ways and suggests he's going to get better, the changes detailed above coupled with a completely reasonable .316 BABIP make me think that this may not be a regression to the mean case - we may be at the mean already.
I hope not. I like the guy, he's fun to watch, and he's on our fantasy team. But I'm worried.
Soria has been a fullly dominant closer for the past three years, never posting an ERA over 2.12 or a WHIP above 1.13 while saving an average of 38 games and striking out more than a batter per inning. He started out the season pitching in 4 of their first 5 games, going 4 total innings and allowing just two hits and no runs while picking up a win and a save. All sounds great. But the number that really stood out to me was he had just one strikeout. For a pitcher who averaged over at least one per inning in his career this looking like a minor red flag - maybe simple variance could account for it - but it was something I meant to look into. Then came yesterday, when Soria entered the game with the Royals up 6-3 on the White Sox and after getting two ground outs allowed four hits and four runs to blow the save. Worrisome from a guy like him. I don't know where to find this info but I'm willing to bet he's rarely if ever blown a 3-run save.
Looking at ERA and WHIP would be meaningless here since our sample size of just five innings is so small and he has that monster of a blow-up on his resume, so like Greinke last year, let's look a little deeper.
Checking out his profile page at Fangraphs one thing immediately stands out: velocity. Soria's fastball has always been at 91-92mph throughout his career, this year it's at 89.6mph, over 2mph slower than last year and as we've seen with Nick Blackburn if your fastball is under 90 you can't miss or that thing is getting pounded, and it's even worse when that fastball is your best pitch as in Soria's case.
Due, at least in part, to that change in velocity he's also getting hitters to chase balls out of the zone far less and missing fewer bats. Last year batters swung at 30.3% of his pitches that were outside the zone, this year that number is far lower at just 21.7%. That 30.3% number ranked him in the top third of relievers last year, while that 21.7% number would put him dead last if it held up the entire year.
Obviously it's easier for batters to hit the ball hard if it's in the strike zone, so if you can't get them to chase you need them to miss - something Soria isn't doing this year either. Overall contact rate on balls swung at is up, from 75.8% in his career to 84.2% this year, while the % of strikes he throws that are swinging strikes is way down (from 11.0% to 2.6%).
Finally, let's look at his approach. Perhaps due to that drop in velocity he's relying far less on his fastball. In his career he's thrown the heater 72.6% of the time, but this year he's thrown it just 55%, increasingly relying on his slider and his changeup, throwing both at more than double his career frequency. Unfortunately for his career if you rank the effectiveness of his pitches it goes fastball, curveball (although it was bad last season), slider, change-up.
Basically Soria has lost velocity on his best pitch and is throwing his lesser pitches more often, causing batters to chase less and make more and better contact on the balls they do swing at which are more consistently in the zone. Ouch. And although regression to the mean works both ways and suggests he's going to get better, the changes detailed above coupled with a completely reasonable .316 BABIP make me think that this may not be a regression to the mean case - we may be at the mean already.
I hope not. I like the guy, he's fun to watch, and he's on our fantasy team. But I'm worried.
Monday, April 4, 2011
Week in Review - 04.04.2011
The Final Four and opening weekend of baseball at the same time? It's almost too much goodness. If only there was some way to move the Masters up, although I suppose that would be overload a bit. I was a bit bummed by the Final Fours games, only because even though they were close games and entertaining they were kind of boring each time. Game 1 had both underdog cinderellas while game two had both evil superpower cheaters (although Kentucky/Calipari is far worse, obviously). No real good narrative to be written for either game. It's kind of like if Duke played the Yankees, other than rooting for a disaster, natural or otherwise, who would you root for? At least tonight's championship sets up pretty nicely, although I won't be pissed no matter who wins which kind of takes some of the fun out of it. My picks will be given below. I'm hot, baby. 2-0 on game bets and 7-3-1 on player props in the semis. Take notes, kiddos.
WHO WAS AWESOME
1. Clay Kershaw. Oooh baby. It begins. I've been waiting on Kershaw since I saw him pitch his first ever game a few years ago and maybe this is the year. He's been very good the last two seasons, registering ERAs under three with more than a strikeout per inning both in both years, but still hasn't had that breakthrough, I'm a #1 ace Cy Young candidate and everyone can just get out of the way because I'm unhittable type of season yet. He got off to a good start, assuming that's his goal, on opening day by pitching the Dodgers to a 2-1 win over the Tim Lincecum and the World Champion Giants, going 7 shut-out innings with 9 strikeouts and allowing just 4 hits and a walk. He's always been tough to hit and if he can keep his walks down like that he's going to finally win that Cy Young I've been predicting for three years.
2. Kemba Walker. Outside of Shelvin Mack's little solo mini-run of points in the VCU/Butler game no single player really jumped out at me for his performance, but this seems like a nice place to honor the incredible run Walker has been on, particularly since he put up 18 points, grabbed 6 rebounds, and dished 7 assists in UCONN's win over Kentucky and it seemed like an off game for him - that's saying a lot. He just does whatever they need and can will them to victory. If they need him to score, he scores (33 vs. Cincy and 36 vs. San Diego State), but if they need him to play the role of distributor he does that too (12 assists against Bucknell, 7 in each of the last two games). He's also averaging over 5 rebounds per game, has gone 38-42 from the free throw line, and is averaging less than 3 turnovers per game which is pretty amazing when you think about how often he has the ball in his hands. It's truly been a remarkable year for him this entire season, and it wouldn't remotely be offensive to me if he takes down the championship, even if Calhoun is a sleazeball.
3. Baltimore Orioles. Perhaps Baltimore's young pitching is going to pay dividends faster than expected (or perhaps the Rays offense is in serious trouble without Evan Longoria who is out for three weeks after getting sore having sex with so many chicks because he's a machine), but they shut down the Rays this weekend and got the O's off to a 3-0 start for the first time since I'm going to assume the 1970s. First Jeremy Guthrie (who's actually old) pitched 8 scoreless innings in the opener. Then Chris Tillman pitched six hitless innings in game two, and then in the third game of the series Zach Britton made his major league debut and gave up just one run through six, helping complete the O's sweep of Tampa. I don't know if this is more indicative of the strength of Baltimore or the weakness of Tampa, but for now at least I choose to believe maybe Baltimore is back, if only a little bit. The world just seems a little brighter when there's a good team playing in Camden Yards.
4. Nelson Cruz. For a long time I dismissed Nelson Cruz as being any good, mainly because his name is Nelson. Also because he's a Ranger and the Rangers are super lame-o. I think, however, it's time to rethink that stance because he's apparently decided that his new thing is going to be destroying baseballs, which he did three times in three games over the weekend as the Rangers obliterated Red Sox pitching (more on that later) with Cruz and Kinsler becoming the first pair of teammates to ever each homer in the season's first three games. Hard to believe Hrbek and Brunansky never pulled that off, but whatever. It seems like Texas might actually be a good team, which goes against everything I believe in. Like church.
5. Joakim Soria. MEXICUTIONER!!!! Want to know how good this guy is and how dependent on him the KC bullpen is? The Royals have played three games this year and he's pitched in all three of them. He's picked up a win, a save, and given up zero runs. It is a bit curious that he doesn't have a strikeout yet this year in three innings despite having a career average of more than 1 K per inning, but I assume he's either realized strikeouts are fascists and doesn't want to promote an oppressive political ideology or he's bored of dominating for such a crappy team and has just been screwing around out there and may or may not being throwing every third pitch left-handed. In any case this guy is straight dominant, and the fact that he doesn't want to be called the Mexicutioner makes it all the more better to call him that.
WHO SUCKED
1. Minnesota Twins. The 1-2 start doesn't particularly bother me because it was on the road against a pretty good Blue Jay team, and even the dismal offense and subpar pitching performances aren't what's currently grinding my gears. It's the god damn stupid plays, the kind of stuff "Twins Baseball" doesn't consist of if you ask any retarded national journalist or announcer. Where to begin? The obvious Nishioki errors or the inability to get runs home when they're in scoring position with two outs? The lack of hustle by Span in center field which allowed a runner to tag from first to second on a medium deep fly ball and later turned a double into a triple when he loafed after a gapper? Valencia getting thrown out at home by five feet on a play where he had zero reason to even attempt to score? How about the way too many walks to bottom of the order opponents?
And want to move it into the dugout? What the hell was the deal with pinch-running for both Morneau and Kubel in the 8th in Sunday's game? Taking two of your best hitters out of a 1-run game for a speed upgrade and basically guaranteeing yourself a loss if we hit extras? Even worse than that though was letting Drew Butera hit in a 1-run game with runners on 2nd and 3rd and two outs in the 8th when you have Joe Mauer sitting on your bench. Absolutely pathetic. You're telling me that your best player and a guy you pay $23 million a year to can't get off his ass for one at-bat and two innings of playing catcher? Just completely gutless and pathetic, and I don't know if I'm more mad at Mauer or Gardenhire, but every game counts you assholes. Some of these decisions are the kind you'd make if you were actively trying to lose the game. Manager of the year, folks. Manager of the year.
I do not like the way this season is going already. I know it's early, and if I was ranting about the hitting or pitching or a specific players early struggles I'd be an overreacting moron, and I'm sure they're out there. But what I'm saying is there is something off about this team and they are playing stupid and Gardy's managing is worse than usual. I'm afraid we're destined for a third place finish. At least they won't get swept by the Yankees in the playoffs this year.
2. Boston Red Sox. Yikes. I'm not a Boston fan at all, and although I have Lester, Buchholz, and Papelbon in fantasy I also have a wager on them under 95.5 wins so I'm kind of conflicted about their fortunes. Who isn't conflicted is any Texas Ranger hitter, because they battered the shit out of anybody Boston trotted out to the mound. Jon Lester: 5 ips, 5 runs, 3 homers allowed. "Closer of the future" Daniel Bard: allowed 4 runs and got two outs. Jon Lackey: allowed 9 runs and 10 hits in less than 4 innings. Clay Buchholz: gave up four dongs in six innings, and even when they brought in Papelbon to stop the bleeding he gave up a run and was lucky to escape with just that solitary mark against him. This, my friends, was a thorough, thorough ass-whipping, and if I didn't own those three dickfors I'd have thoroughly enjoyed it.
3. Fausto Carmona. When you're a moribund franchise going through a moribund period in your moribund existence and you really only have one or two bright spots, even if the bright side of one of those bright spots is that you might be trading him soon, it really sucks when he gets lit for 11 hits and 10 runs in just three innings. Eleven hits. Ten runs. Three innings. And this is from one of only three players you'd even consider league average (maybe four if you count set up guys - Rafael Perez). You want to know what this baseball season is going to be like in Cleveland? It's gonna be cold, it's gonna be grey, and it's going to last you for the rest of your life. And the Twins will probably go .500 against them.
4. DeAndre Liggins. Ok, so he's a pretty insignificant player overall but he's also a starter on a Final Four team and, if you follow me on Twitter, you know he made me some money this weekend so I'm sticking him here. When they were announcing players in the starting lineup before the game they showed his face and let's just say "deer in headlights" doesn't quite cover it, it was more like had been caught having sex with a tree - a male tree. So I checked the line on him and he was OVER/UNDER 13.5 points+rebounds so I slapped down some money on the under, and bingo - four points (on 1-7 shooting) and 0 rebounds later I had a little extra to blow on booze. So thank you Deadre Liggins, and thank you sportsbook for still accepting prop bets that close to tip off. I'll be paying attention to the announcements tonight, that's for sure.
5. John Axford. This guy may be awesome at having a mustache, but he sucks at pitching (in case you have no idea who this is, he's the closer for Milwaukee with the sweet stache pictured below). Axelford pitched twice this week against the Reds and, possibly because he wanted to fit in with the rest of the Brewers' staff, he got lit up. His first time out was opening day and he entered with the Crew winning 6-3. A couple hits, a sac fly, and a 3-run bomb later and Milwaukee (and Axelrod) was 0-1. Then he got another turn on the hill on Sunday, this time in a game the Brewers were already losing 12-3, and gave up a couple of hits before being lifted for Kameron freaking Loe, some dork who doesn't spell either his first or last name correctly so that can't be good. This is a pretty big deal for Milwaukee since with their lineup and starting pitching their looking to make a run at a division title. If Axnard is just a slimmer, better mustachioed version of Bobby Jenks they're basically screwed.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I meant to have some info/report on the McDonald's game, but I didn't have a chance to watch it yet. Still have it on Tivo though, so I'll probably have some notes or something later this week or maybe for next week's Week in Review. Or not. I don't know. I'm tired.
For tonight's big game I'm on Butler +3.5 and the over 128.5, both for 3 units. I don't know who wins this game, but I think it's going to be close so I'm grabbing the points. I also think Brade Stevens is probably the best coach in college basketball so I'm sure he'll figure out how to take Kemba out of the game and make the other guys beat him and I don't think they can. I'm going with the over because 129 is really not that many points and these are two teams that can play pretty efficiently. This just doesn't seem like a game where both teams are going to be in the low-60s.
Unfortunately it doesn't appear player props are up yet, which sucks and is also kind of weird. I will be sure to post what I'm going to play once it pops up, just because I want to make sure you make money. I am so giving sometimes it actually hurts. Now I know what Jesus felt like.
WHO WAS AWESOME
1. Clay Kershaw. Oooh baby. It begins. I've been waiting on Kershaw since I saw him pitch his first ever game a few years ago and maybe this is the year. He's been very good the last two seasons, registering ERAs under three with more than a strikeout per inning both in both years, but still hasn't had that breakthrough, I'm a #1 ace Cy Young candidate and everyone can just get out of the way because I'm unhittable type of season yet. He got off to a good start, assuming that's his goal, on opening day by pitching the Dodgers to a 2-1 win over the Tim Lincecum and the World Champion Giants, going 7 shut-out innings with 9 strikeouts and allowing just 4 hits and a walk. He's always been tough to hit and if he can keep his walks down like that he's going to finally win that Cy Young I've been predicting for three years.
2. Kemba Walker. Outside of Shelvin Mack's little solo mini-run of points in the VCU/Butler game no single player really jumped out at me for his performance, but this seems like a nice place to honor the incredible run Walker has been on, particularly since he put up 18 points, grabbed 6 rebounds, and dished 7 assists in UCONN's win over Kentucky and it seemed like an off game for him - that's saying a lot. He just does whatever they need and can will them to victory. If they need him to score, he scores (33 vs. Cincy and 36 vs. San Diego State), but if they need him to play the role of distributor he does that too (12 assists against Bucknell, 7 in each of the last two games). He's also averaging over 5 rebounds per game, has gone 38-42 from the free throw line, and is averaging less than 3 turnovers per game which is pretty amazing when you think about how often he has the ball in his hands. It's truly been a remarkable year for him this entire season, and it wouldn't remotely be offensive to me if he takes down the championship, even if Calhoun is a sleazeball.
3. Baltimore Orioles. Perhaps Baltimore's young pitching is going to pay dividends faster than expected (or perhaps the Rays offense is in serious trouble without Evan Longoria who is out for three weeks after getting sore having sex with so many chicks because he's a machine), but they shut down the Rays this weekend and got the O's off to a 3-0 start for the first time since I'm going to assume the 1970s. First Jeremy Guthrie (who's actually old) pitched 8 scoreless innings in the opener. Then Chris Tillman pitched six hitless innings in game two, and then in the third game of the series Zach Britton made his major league debut and gave up just one run through six, helping complete the O's sweep of Tampa. I don't know if this is more indicative of the strength of Baltimore or the weakness of Tampa, but for now at least I choose to believe maybe Baltimore is back, if only a little bit. The world just seems a little brighter when there's a good team playing in Camden Yards.
4. Nelson Cruz. For a long time I dismissed Nelson Cruz as being any good, mainly because his name is Nelson. Also because he's a Ranger and the Rangers are super lame-o. I think, however, it's time to rethink that stance because he's apparently decided that his new thing is going to be destroying baseballs, which he did three times in three games over the weekend as the Rangers obliterated Red Sox pitching (more on that later) with Cruz and Kinsler becoming the first pair of teammates to ever each homer in the season's first three games. Hard to believe Hrbek and Brunansky never pulled that off, but whatever. It seems like Texas might actually be a good team, which goes against everything I believe in. Like church.
5. Joakim Soria. MEXICUTIONER!!!! Want to know how good this guy is and how dependent on him the KC bullpen is? The Royals have played three games this year and he's pitched in all three of them. He's picked up a win, a save, and given up zero runs. It is a bit curious that he doesn't have a strikeout yet this year in three innings despite having a career average of more than 1 K per inning, but I assume he's either realized strikeouts are fascists and doesn't want to promote an oppressive political ideology or he's bored of dominating for such a crappy team and has just been screwing around out there and may or may not being throwing every third pitch left-handed. In any case this guy is straight dominant, and the fact that he doesn't want to be called the Mexicutioner makes it all the more better to call him that.
WHO SUCKED
1. Minnesota Twins. The 1-2 start doesn't particularly bother me because it was on the road against a pretty good Blue Jay team, and even the dismal offense and subpar pitching performances aren't what's currently grinding my gears. It's the god damn stupid plays, the kind of stuff "Twins Baseball" doesn't consist of if you ask any retarded national journalist or announcer. Where to begin? The obvious Nishioki errors or the inability to get runs home when they're in scoring position with two outs? The lack of hustle by Span in center field which allowed a runner to tag from first to second on a medium deep fly ball and later turned a double into a triple when he loafed after a gapper? Valencia getting thrown out at home by five feet on a play where he had zero reason to even attempt to score? How about the way too many walks to bottom of the order opponents?
And want to move it into the dugout? What the hell was the deal with pinch-running for both Morneau and Kubel in the 8th in Sunday's game? Taking two of your best hitters out of a 1-run game for a speed upgrade and basically guaranteeing yourself a loss if we hit extras? Even worse than that though was letting Drew Butera hit in a 1-run game with runners on 2nd and 3rd and two outs in the 8th when you have Joe Mauer sitting on your bench. Absolutely pathetic. You're telling me that your best player and a guy you pay $23 million a year to can't get off his ass for one at-bat and two innings of playing catcher? Just completely gutless and pathetic, and I don't know if I'm more mad at Mauer or Gardenhire, but every game counts you assholes. Some of these decisions are the kind you'd make if you were actively trying to lose the game. Manager of the year, folks. Manager of the year.
I do not like the way this season is going already. I know it's early, and if I was ranting about the hitting or pitching or a specific players early struggles I'd be an overreacting moron, and I'm sure they're out there. But what I'm saying is there is something off about this team and they are playing stupid and Gardy's managing is worse than usual. I'm afraid we're destined for a third place finish. At least they won't get swept by the Yankees in the playoffs this year.
2. Boston Red Sox. Yikes. I'm not a Boston fan at all, and although I have Lester, Buchholz, and Papelbon in fantasy I also have a wager on them under 95.5 wins so I'm kind of conflicted about their fortunes. Who isn't conflicted is any Texas Ranger hitter, because they battered the shit out of anybody Boston trotted out to the mound. Jon Lester: 5 ips, 5 runs, 3 homers allowed. "Closer of the future" Daniel Bard: allowed 4 runs and got two outs. Jon Lackey: allowed 9 runs and 10 hits in less than 4 innings. Clay Buchholz: gave up four dongs in six innings, and even when they brought in Papelbon to stop the bleeding he gave up a run and was lucky to escape with just that solitary mark against him. This, my friends, was a thorough, thorough ass-whipping, and if I didn't own those three dickfors I'd have thoroughly enjoyed it.
3. Fausto Carmona. When you're a moribund franchise going through a moribund period in your moribund existence and you really only have one or two bright spots, even if the bright side of one of those bright spots is that you might be trading him soon, it really sucks when he gets lit for 11 hits and 10 runs in just three innings. Eleven hits. Ten runs. Three innings. And this is from one of only three players you'd even consider league average (maybe four if you count set up guys - Rafael Perez). You want to know what this baseball season is going to be like in Cleveland? It's gonna be cold, it's gonna be grey, and it's going to last you for the rest of your life. And the Twins will probably go .500 against them.
4. DeAndre Liggins. Ok, so he's a pretty insignificant player overall but he's also a starter on a Final Four team and, if you follow me on Twitter, you know he made me some money this weekend so I'm sticking him here. When they were announcing players in the starting lineup before the game they showed his face and let's just say "deer in headlights" doesn't quite cover it, it was more like had been caught having sex with a tree - a male tree. So I checked the line on him and he was OVER/UNDER 13.5 points+rebounds so I slapped down some money on the under, and bingo - four points (on 1-7 shooting) and 0 rebounds later I had a little extra to blow on booze. So thank you Deadre Liggins, and thank you sportsbook for still accepting prop bets that close to tip off. I'll be paying attention to the announcements tonight, that's for sure.
5. John Axford. This guy may be awesome at having a mustache, but he sucks at pitching (in case you have no idea who this is, he's the closer for Milwaukee with the sweet stache pictured below). Axelford pitched twice this week against the Reds and, possibly because he wanted to fit in with the rest of the Brewers' staff, he got lit up. His first time out was opening day and he entered with the Crew winning 6-3. A couple hits, a sac fly, and a 3-run bomb later and Milwaukee (and Axelrod) was 0-1. Then he got another turn on the hill on Sunday, this time in a game the Brewers were already losing 12-3, and gave up a couple of hits before being lifted for Kameron freaking Loe, some dork who doesn't spell either his first or last name correctly so that can't be good. This is a pretty big deal for Milwaukee since with their lineup and starting pitching their looking to make a run at a division title. If Axnard is just a slimmer, better mustachioed version of Bobby Jenks they're basically screwed.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I meant to have some info/report on the McDonald's game, but I didn't have a chance to watch it yet. Still have it on Tivo though, so I'll probably have some notes or something later this week or maybe for next week's Week in Review. Or not. I don't know. I'm tired.
For tonight's big game I'm on Butler +3.5 and the over 128.5, both for 3 units. I don't know who wins this game, but I think it's going to be close so I'm grabbing the points. I also think Brade Stevens is probably the best coach in college basketball so I'm sure he'll figure out how to take Kemba out of the game and make the other guys beat him and I don't think they can. I'm going with the over because 129 is really not that many points and these are two teams that can play pretty efficiently. This just doesn't seem like a game where both teams are going to be in the low-60s.
Unfortunately it doesn't appear player props are up yet, which sucks and is also kind of weird. I will be sure to post what I'm going to play once it pops up, just because I want to make sure you make money. I am so giving sometimes it actually hurts. Now I know what Jesus felt like.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
