Giving Back Thursday

So...last Thursday I made a big deal about how I was going to try to make the Thursday posts about you guys for the next however many weeks by sending out the 7 questions to someone randomly...then Memorial Day happened and took my memory with it apparently.  So, yeah, I forgot to send out questions to someone on Tuesday and I realized it some time during the incredible Hawks-Kings game last night and now I dont have any answers to post.  I thought about doing what Bill Simmons does on occasion, the self-mailbag, but that seemed kinda lame and, besides, who wants to talk more about myself and answer questions that no one has even thought to ask.    Seriously, this is how it would have went:
1) What books are you currently reading?
- I always end up reading like 4 or 5 books at a time.  Mostly, thats because I like to read in different places and I leave books in each one and I always have problems finishing books when I am not really into them.  When I am into them, I'll read them all the way through and kinda ignore all the other ones I am reading.  So maybe reading isnt the right term, maybe "started and may or may not finish" is the right term.  Anyways, currently I am at some point in the middle of the following books: Rob Neyer's Big Book of Baseball Legends (this is my bathroom reading, I have read through it at least 14 times and it never gets old.  Highly recommended for anyone who likes the stories and legends that make baseball what it is.  I will even let you borrow my copy - I promise there is no poop, pee or other bodily fluids on it :) ), Moneyball (another re-read), a book for work on Lean, Dante's La Comeda Divina (I have been reading this for like 3 years), a Sandy Koufax biography that Kyler got me and...I think thats it.  Most recently I finished a biography on Stachel Page (phenomenal in that it not only discusses the life of a one of a kind man but also that it places that man within the context of the larger society in which he lives and looks at how both that society shapes him and how he helps to reshape that society) and How Evan Broke His Head by Garth Stein (this was good but not as good as his other novel, The Art of Racing in the Rain.)

See?  Who thought that was fun other than me?  If I wanted to post random musings on any subject whatsoever, I would start another blog and call it "Chronicles of a Grad School Dropout" and not tell anyone that it existed.  Wait, I already did that like 7 years ago when I was actually contemplating dropping out of Grad School because I had grown tired of so many college related things but then got bored with blogging so I stopped?  (You can try to find it, I think that the internet ate it because I cant locate it and I have no idea what email address I would have used.  Knowing me, I would have used my winona.edu address to open a blog about dropping out as some sort of ironic twist.)  I think I'll stick to baseball, some other sports once in a while and the occasional terrible joke.

Luckily for me, we are pretty much at the end of May, so another look at the leader boards can fill our collective voids. The lists on the left are the to date season leaders, the ones on the right are the leaders for the last 30 days:

Player	Team	R	$		Player	Team	R	$
Troy Tulowitzki	Dustys Nustys	45	$52		Jose Reyes	MBHB	24	$29
Josh Donaldson	Les Moles	43	$22		Josh Donaldson	Les Moles	24	$22
Brian Dozier	MBHB	43	$8 (5/20)		Hunter Pence	MTMAS	24	$23
Paul Goldschmidt	MBHB	40	$60
Hunter Pence	MTMTAS	40	$23

 If you would have told me that you would give me $10 million dollars if I could name the 5 league leaders in runs scored (and that I could, in fact, buy the Cleveland Cavaliers if I wanted to) there is no way I would have come up with Hunter Pence.  Maybe it is because he languishes on the left coast and I am well asleep by the time his games hit the 4th inning. More likely it is because the rest of his game is lacking enough (18 RBI on the season in 54 games...and he is hitting mostly second for the best team in MLB right now) that the thing he is most known for right now is offering a signed bobblehead to the thief that stole his custom scooter.  Jose Reyes is back and looking healthy and fast and hitting in front of Jose Bautista and the scorching Edwin Encarnacion (we will see him again in a bit).  That is a recipe for mucho runs scoredo...which means that Reyes will likely reinjure himself walking out to his position before the Blue Jays game this evening.

Player	Team	RBI	$		Player	Team	RBI	$
TMGS	UCCMA	49	$34		Edwin Encarnacion	Bobs ATers	32	$27
Nelson Cruz	Zattack	48	$8		Miguel Cabrera	Dustys Nustys	29	$76
Miguel Cabrera	Dustys Nustys	44	$76		Yasiel Puig	BySs	25	$36
Edwin Encarnacion	Bobs ATers	44	$27		George Springer	MBHB	25	$10
Brandon Moss	Bobs ATers	42	$2 (5/20)

After only 12 RBI in April, Edwin Encarnacion has been super nova hot in the last 10 games, with 14 hits, 8 HR and 14 RBI.  Maybe they are pitch stealing in the YYZ again.  We'll get to Puig shortly, but the biggest surprise here, to me, is George Springer.  The rookie super prospect was dubbed a dud by many fantasy writers (the entire Yahoo! crew was prompting users in non dynasty leagues to dump him saying, he likely wont be useful until 2015) after only 2 weeks in the bigs.  Then the calendar flipped and Springer turned into Mini-Giancarlo  (316/407/653 in the last 30 days) and inspired a clever and respectable hastag (#SpringerDinger).  He will likely go through some peaks and valleys as the league adjusts and he adjusts back, but clearly the talent is legit and George Springer will be a Hitless Bastard for life at $10.

Player	Team	SB	$		Player	Team	SB	$
Dee Gordon	Bobs ATers	30	$3 (4/22)		Dee Gordon	Bobs ATers	17	$3 (4/22)
Billy Hamilton	Bobs ATers	18	$30		Jose Reyes	MBHB	11	$29
EY Jr	Les Moles	17	$5 (4/29)		Alcides Escobar		10
Jose Altuve	Zattack	17	$20
Rajai Davis	Huckleberries	16	$2 (5/6)

 Dee Gordon...his batting average, on base percentage and slugging percentage are all way down for the month of May, but he just keeps right on running...on damn near every chance he gets...and Kyler will keep kicking himself every week for not going up to a whooping $4 for his services. Billy Hamilton will need to start running MORE if he wants to catch Dee.  Surprisingly, Hamilton has taken a monumental leap forward in his on base skills, registering a .325 OBP in the last 30 days (bringing his season line to .287...yowzah) but only stealing as many bases as he did through the end of April. 

Player	Team	AVG (150+ ab)	$		Player	Team	AVG (65+ ab)	$
Troy Tulowitzki	Dustys Nustys	0.369	$52		Yasiel Puig	BySs	0.410	$36
Yasiel Puig	BySs	0.344	$36		Connor Gillaspie		0.400
Victor Martinez	Huckleberries	0.341	$6 (5/27)		Victor Martinez	Huckleberries	0.380	$6 (5/27)
Chase Utley	Les Moles	0.335	$7
Alex Rios	Bobs AT ers	0.329	$36

As you will see over the next 3 categories, this is Yasiel Puig's world, and we're all just allowed to live in it because he has decided that he only wants to murder baseballs, not people like Alfredo Simon.  Remember how I was badly hiding my boner when I was talking about how amazing Troy Tulowitzki was doing through the end of April?  Puig is doing even better...like basically Puig is playing like the Cubano reincarnate of Rogers Hornsby, aka the greatest right handed hitter ever.  Only in Hornsby's best season (I'd choose 1925, but you could argue for a bunch of them), the best pitchers in the league were Eppa Rixey, Dolph Luque, Bill Sherdel and Dazzy Vance (Vance was legitimately spectacular), there were no stud relievers and baseball was going through an offensive explosion much like the late 1990s in baseball.  That Puig is doing it in the offensively depressed 2014 season while facing specialists who are throwing at most an inning or so at a time from the 7th inning on is downright amazing.  What has to scare the other 31 General Managers is that he is 24 years old and only in his second year in the league; there is still room for him to be better.

Player	Team	OBP (150+ ab)	$		Player	Team	OBP (65+ ab)	$
Troy Tulowitzki	Dustys Nustys	0.471	$52		Yasiel Puig	BySs	0.512	$36
Yasiel Puig	BySs	0.442	$36		TMGS	UCCMA	0.475	$34
Andrew McCutchen	Les Moles	0.435	$78		Troy Tulowitzki	Dustys Nustys	0.467	$52
Jose Bautista	Dustys Nustys	0.434	$29
Shin-Soo Choo	Zattack	0.418	$32

Dont let the preceeding paragraph fool you.  Troy Tulowitzki might not be the hottest hitter in the league right now, but he is still leading the league in average, OBP and slugging (spoliers!) for the season...and he is amongst the best defensive shortstops in the game (though Andrealton Simmons is #1-2030, that guy is frickin phenomenal with the glove.  He will have a MLB job even if he hits .180 for 2 seasons on end -- remember he plays for the Braves.  Looking at you BUpton and DUggla.)  Puig is coming on strong, but Tulo is still the MVP for both fantasy and real life purposes through the end of May.  The biggest surprise is Stanton.  For all the mashing he does, he hasnt every really been on to wait out at bats.  If this is a skill he is able to harness, they might as well station a Coast Guard rescue boat off the coast of Miami, because it wont be safe in the ocean (I told you there were bad jokes).

Player	Team	SLG (150+ ab)	$		Player	Team	SLG (65+ ab)	$
Troy Tulowitzki	Dustys Nustys	0.702	$52		Yasiel Puig	BySs	0.750	$36
Nelson Cruz	Zattack	0.663	$8		Edwin Encarnacion	Bobs ATers	0.746	$27
Yasiel Puig	BySs	0.623	$36		Nelson Cruz	Zattack	0.733	$8
TMGS	UCCMA	0.621	$34
Justin Upton	BySs	0.602	$34

All Smiles for Cruz

So...this is the point where I finally talk about the $8 that Zach spent on Nelson Cruz.  During the draft it almost seemed like it was one of those nominations that is made to get other people to spend some of their money, and Zach was trying to bid him up to get someone else to pay a little more than they wanted to, but then no one did and Zach got stuck with him.  That might not be accurate, but if it is, it would be understandable.  Cruz was a baseball pariah without a team and with no one knowing how he would perform out of Texas and off the performance enhancers.  Well...look at the salaries of every other player on this leader board.  In terms of bang for the buck, Cruz has been the most important player in the Tater Tot league.  Some of Zach's other buys havent worked out as well as he had hoped (none of us have been completely happy), but Cruz was a huge steal.

Player	Team	W	$		Player	Team	W	$
Mark Buehrle	UCCMA	9	$5 (5/27)		Jered Weaver	Huckleberries	5	$4 (5/6)
Adam Wainwright	Bobs AT ers	8	$42		Mark Buehrle	UCCMA	5	$5 (5/27)
Zach Greinke	Les Moles	8	$38		Travis Wood		4
Rick Porcello		7			JA Happ		4
					Chris Young		4

 

Wins are fickle.  But they are still a scoring category and as such, it is strange to see one of the league leaders sitting unowned.  On the 30 day board, there are eleventy pitchers tied with 4 wins, so I highlighted the unowned ones just so that I could mention the 6'10" Chris Young.  Young was a stud in the San Diego (it means a Whale's Vagina) rotation back in 2006 and 2007 then kind of petered off after a couple of injuries.  Now he is back, with Seattle, as a pitch to contact specialist.  He's not fooling anyone (3.8 k/9, 3.6 bb/9) and teams have hit 9 homers off him in 57 innings.  With those numbers, we wont see him on the leader board ever again, but its a great story to get in while we can.

 



Player	Team	K	$		Player	Team	K	$
Johnny Cueto	MWP	85	$10		Corey Kluber	MTMTAS	53	$1 (4/1)
David Price	Les Moles	84	$36		Jon Lester	Les Moles	40	$8
Jon Lester	Les Moles	83	$8		Clayton Kershaw	Zattach	39	$70
Corey Kluber	MTMTAS	83	$1 (4/1)		Cole Hamels	MBHB	39	$6 (4/22)
Felix Hernandez	MBHB	83	$44

 When Tyler picked up Corey Kluber back at the beginning of April for $1, I wrote "Kluber is a pitcher who doesnt strikeout a ton of batters, but he doesnt walk many either. For his career, he strikes out nearly 4 batters for every 1 that he walks. That ratio keeps his WHIP low even though he gives up more than a hit an inning. For $1, why not?"  Well at least the "For $1, why not?" part was right.  I am not sure what I was looking at, as Kluber struck out an acceptable number of hitters in 2013.  His walk rate is still low, and he is still giving up just over a hit an inning, but his K numbers have risen to elite levels (obviously).  His current K rate would have placed him behind only Yu Darvish last season (ahead of Max Scherzer who finished with 240 Ks and won that silly Cy Young thing).

Player	Team	ERA (65 ip)	$		Player	Team	ERA (30 ip)	$
Adam Wainwright	Bobs AT ers	1.67	$42		Phil Hughes	Dustys Nustys	1.62	$9
Jeff Samardzija	Zattach	1.68	$12		Tim Hudson	Zattach	1.63	$1 (4/15)
Julio Teheran	MTMTAS	1.77	$15		Ryan Vogelsong		1.64
Johnny Cueto	MWP	1.83	$10
Tim Hudson	Zattach	1.92	$1 (4/15)

Kyler texts me every time Samardizja pitches and asks me if he is going to get any run support that day.  And every time I reply with something like "Unlikely."  The big Musketeer has the second lowest ERA in all of baseball (amongst qualifiers) and has 1 win to show for it.  That 1 win was in what was argueably his worst outing of the season; he allowed 4 runs (3 earned) for only the second time this year (the other time only 2 of the runs were earned).  The Cubs have found new and interesting ways to snatch No Decisions from the jaws of victory for Samardijza like the May 21st game where the Cubs took a 2-0 lead into the 9th inning in one of his starts only to have closer Hector Rondon blow the save on a bloop to center and a botched double play by Darwin Barney that allowed the tying run to score from second on a ball that never left the infield.  Honorable mention for Phil Hughes who is currently on a run of 30K:0BB and hasnt walked a batter since April 20th.

Player	Team	WHIP (65 ip)	$		Player	Team	WHIP (30 ip)	$
Johnny Cueto	MWP	0.75	$10		Johnny Cueto	MWP	0.74	$10
Adam Wainwright	Bobs AT ers	0.85	$42		Dallas Keuchel	Les Moles	0.74	$1
Tim Hudson	Zattach	0.88	$1 (4/15)		Hisashi Iwakuma	Bobs AT ers	0.82	$27
Julio Teheran	MTMTAS	0.94	$15
Scott Kazmir	MTMTAS	0.96	$2 (4/22)

I think that we can all agree that the Johnny Cueto "Hideo Nomo"delivery experiment has worked out ok.  How Cueto has not been all over every ESPN platform continues to confuse me.  He is clearly the best pitcher in the majors right now, and really only Adam Wainwright comes close.  That is the same Adam Wainwright who has given up 10 runs in 12 innings over 2 games to the anemic Cub offense (Wainwright has given up only 5 runs total in his other 69 innings pitched, so theres that).  Also making an appearance on the monthly leader board is our good friend Houston pitcher Dallas Keuchel.  The battle for best bargain so far has to be the Tim Hudson/Dallas Keuchel battle royale that I just made up and envisioned in my head (Keuchel wins the fight...Hudson is like 62 years old and would likely break a hip almost immediately in any kind of scuffle)

Player	Team	QS	$		Player	Team	QS	$
Johnny Cueto	MWP	10	$10		Mark Buehrle	UCCMA	6	$5 (5/27)
Julio Teheran	MTMTAS	10	$15		Jose Quintana		5
Felix Hernandez	MBHB	10	$44		Mike Leake		5
Sonny Gray	BySs	10	$2
Masahiro Tanaka	MWP	10	$19

Lots of familiar names on this board.  One that hasnt shown up in any other top 5 is Kamakaze Tanaka, but that shouldnt lessen what he has done in his first turn through the American League. Tanaka has started 10 games, all of them quality starts.  He is averaging 7 innings a contest, with 8 strike outs, 1 walk and 5 hit allowed.  His only loss of the season was to the same Cub team who flumoxed Wainwright.  Maybe the Cubbies need to face Cy Young contenders every game in order to get their competitive juices flowing.  They currently havent scored a run in 20 innings, but they can take down Wainwright and Tanaka.

Player	Team	SV/H	$		Player	Team	SV/H	$
Francisco Rodriguez	MWP	17	$2 (4/15)		Brad Ziegler		10
Mark Melancon	Huckleberries	17	$1		Mark Melancon	Huckleberries	10	$1
Kenley Jansen	MWP	16	$28		Sergio Romo	MTMTAS	10	$12
Sergio Romo	MTMTAS	16	$12
Brett Cecil	Les Moles	16	$1 (4/29)

Grantland already did a great piece on Brad Ziegler, so I wont rehash the details here.  KRod's magical ride has slowed so that he is no longer Dennis Eckersley circa 1989, but he is still picking up saves whenever the Brewers hand him a chance (4 times this month? Ouch!)  One look at the leader board compared to the one on May 1 shows how volitale the saves and holds market can be.  Only KRod (13) and Jansen (12) remain in the top 5 and Melancon and Romo rode huge May months to the leader board.