Mostly MLB Notes: Talking Troy Tulowitzki, the Dodgers and a look around the league
Troy Tulowitzki has always either been highly productive or hurt, so naturally, he’s been healthy this season and not hitting (although he's been dealing with a yet another leg injury of late, to be fair). But Tulow owns a 29:2 K:BB ratio, which is terrible for any hitter and is downright reprehensible for someone who plays half his games in Coors Field. Among fantasy shortstops who've played at least 25 games this season, he ranks No. 26 on a per-game basis. There's no where for his value to go but up, but Tulowitzki has been a major disappointment so far for different reasons than usual. His current 1.7 BB% is a career low, while his 24.2 K% and 11.5 SwStr% marks are career highs (the latter by a wide margin, with his career mark being 6.7%), and his defense has also graded as worse than ever. Let's hope he's just dealing with an injury that he'll soon recover from, because these signs are pretty discouraging for the soon to be 31-year-old who may very well be traded away from Coors Field in the near future.
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The Dodgers have a team wRC+ of 127, which is historically good (and put into perspective here). They also massively upgraded their defense compared to last year’s team, which both scares me badly as a Giants fan and frustrates me as a Clayton Kershaw owner in multiple leagues considering he somehow has just two wins despite these facts (not to mention a bullpen that has a top-five ERA in MLB that’s just now getting back Kenley Jansen, and that offense is doing so well with Yasiel Puig missing 26 games already). Jimmy Rollins is hitting .200/.278./.356 while underperforming in a big way, and this team has the deepest bench in baseball. Moreover, Mike Bolsinger and Carlos Frias own a combined 2.00 ERA with a 30:10 K:BB ratio over 36.0 innings, and yet they are frequently priced among the bottom starting pitchers on FanDuel, if you’re into DFS. Anything can happen in baseball in the postseason, but the Dodgers sure look like the favorites to win it all, even with Hyun-Jin Ryu unlikely to contribute this year.
This final appearance by Norm Macdonald on “The Late Show” is a must watch.
This seems like as good a time as any to bring up Macdonald’s famous “moth joke.”
Joe Mauer sports a .344 OBP and has hit third in the lineup all year yet is on pace to score just 56 runs. It would help if he hit himself in every once in a while, as he has zero homers on the year. After smacking 28 home runs over 523 at-bats in 2009, Mauer has totaled 37 over 2,396 ABs since, and this was with him moving off the taxing catcher position the last couple of years. And while Target Field suppresses power for left-handed batters, it’s helped LHH batting average and has increased run scoring overall by six percent over the past three seasons, which ranks top-five in the American League, so it’s hard to come up with excuses for Mauer’s lack of production. His current BB% (8.9) is a career low while his K% (17.8) is his second worst mark ever, with last year’s the only higher. Mauer is barely approaching 50% ownership in Yahoo leagues, so I understand this isn’t especially revelatory, but it really is crazy just how irrelevant he’s become at age 32 for one of the best prospects of his generation, with injuries seemingly not to blame.
Headlines of the Week: Man Pleads Guilty After ‘Killing His Stepfather With An Atomic Wedgie Because He Called His Mother Worthless’...Gynecologist Leaves Cell Phone In Patient’s Abdomen...Chinese Theme Park Sets Up ‘Death Simulator’ Where Volunteers Can Experience Being Cremated...Man Sneezes Out Part Of Toy Dart After 44 Years...Cocaine-Eating Butterflies Proposed To Replace Herbicides in Columbia...Election Candidate Who Got No Votes Demands Recount Because He Picked Himself...School Officials Threaten To Cancel Prom If Students Hold NFL-Style Draft To Select Dates...Kim Jong-un Executed Defense Chief For Falling Asleep In Meeting.
Quick Hits: Miguel Cabrera has hit nine homers with 26 RBI and a 1.427 OPS during day games compared to one home run, three RBI and a .575 OPS at night. This of course means nothing moving forward, but it is rather crazy...It’s a good thing the Indians’ top-four starting pitchers have a collective 10.8 K/9 rate, since their defense is so bad, having allowed a .340 BABIP that’s 10 points higher than the next worst in baseball...I own Starling Marte in my home league, so I’m pulling for him, but he has eight homers over 135 ABs after setting a career high of 13 last year over 495 at-bats despite a 2.43 GB/FB ratio. In other words, he’s hitting more bombs than ever despite hitting as many groundballs versus fly balls as around 15 other hitters in baseball. Put differently, his .429/.455/1.048 line against southpaws is probably unsustainable...Here’s Giancarlo Stanton hitting a ball out of Dodgers Stadium...James Shields leads the NL with a 13.8 SwStr% yet has allowed five homers over 18.1 innings at PETCO Park.
Police Blotter: Man Found Guilty Of Pulling Out Lovers’ Teeth During Sex...Man Driving Lawn Mower Had A .445 Blood Alcohol Content...Macaroni Salad Trail Leads Police To Suspected Burglars...Stabbing Suspect Spits His Own Poop At Arresting Officers...Robber Caught After Leaving Phone At Crime Scene Then Ringing Cops To Get It Back...Getting Drunk and Chasing Bears Is ‘Strongly Not Advised,’ Police Warn...Man Accused Of Strangling His Second Wife And Throwing Her Off Cruise Ship Tried To Hire Inmates To Kill His Third.
Quick Hits Part Deux: Julio Teheran somehow has a .339 BABIP and a 22.0 HR/FB% (remember home runs don’t count against BABIP) despite producing the 10th-most soft-contact (23.5%) among all starters. That really makes no sense, and if you combine that with his 10.4 SwStr%, Teheran sure looks like one of the best buy-low targets out there...I always preach patience, but in a couple of mixed leagues in which I went boring veteran hitters late thanks to my typical SP heavy strategy early, I cut bait on Marlon Byrd and Torii Hunter a couple of weeks ago. Shame on me, as Byrd has raised his OPS from .453 to .750 over his last 14 games, when he’s hit six homers and taken 12 walks. Meanwhile, Hunter entered May with a .559 OPS and has gone .367-15-5-14 over 15 games since. At least I stayed patient and held onto Carlos Beltran!...Here’s an odd walk-off hit to end a 10-10 game in the 12th inning...Danny Salazar’s 30.1 K-BB% not only leads MLB it’s well ahead of the next best, which is Max Scherzer’s 25.9% mark...Todd Frazier is on pace to finish with a .250 batting average yet with 111 runs scored, 51 homers, 98 RBI and 26 stolen bases.
Songs of the Week: TV on the Radio: “DLZ”, “Wolf Like Me” and “Will Do.”
Longread of the Week: How Billy Walters Became Sports’ Most Successful And Controversial Bettor.
Quick Hits Part Tres: Joc Pederson and Steven Souza entered the year as similarly ranked prospects (at least for this year alone, as Pederson obviously had higher long-term upside given their age differences), and both are doing some serious work when it comes to the “three true outcomes.” They have combined for 294 plate appearances and homered/walked/struck out in a ridiculous 55.1 percent of them...Here’s an announcer going berzerk after a batter who was hit by a pitch throws the ball back to the pitcher...Who knows how it will turn out, but Maikel Franco is worth owning right now regardless....Drew Stubbs will be worth an add if/when Corey Dickerson is placed on the DL...The Rangers look like the latest team to make a change at closer...Eric Hosmer may finally be living up to expectations, as the former top prospect has an OPS (.959) that’s more than 150 points higher than his previous high of .801. Hosmer’s hitting more line drives than ever, and while his 23.3% HR/FB ratio is going to regress, I’m buying into the 25-year-old with such a high pedigree. Enjoy Hosmer’s forthcoming career-year if you own him.
