Stephen Strasburg only went 5 1/3 innings yesterday, striking out 8 but uncharacteristically walking 5 batters. I watched a pretty good portion of the start, and the walks seemed to build on each other, as he walked back to back batters in 2 different innings. Overall, he was solid beyond those walks, and earned his 2nd win in as many starts. For those keeping track at home, Strasburg looks like he'll be starting next against the White Sox on either Friday or Saturday.
Someone forgot to tell Miguel Cabrera it's not supposed to be this easy to hit homeruns apparently. He hit his 19th of the season yesterday off of Octavio Dotel. He now has 56 runs batted in to go with his .330 batting average. Could Miguel Cabrera be a top-5 player going into 2011?
Clearly, people concerned about the production of Albert Pujols may have been a bit too soon. He went 2 for 4 yesterday with a run and 3 runs batted in. For the season, he's now hitting .300 with 14 homeruns and 47 runs batted in. While the issue of him not providing better production than any other player in the game remains, he is still providing at or near 1st round production. If someone is looking to sell because they think he's not going to be better than he has been, scoop him up and don't look back.
Chris Young homered twice yesterday, bringing his total to 12 for the season. He's pretty clearly rebounding quite nicely, as he is also hitting .277 on the season. I didn't have a whole lot of faith in him at the beginning of the season, but he really seems to have figured it out again. He also has 10 stolen bases as well, and is a threat to go 25-20 this year with that solid average. Perhaps Justin Upton light?
Alex Rodriguez missed his 3rd straight game yesterday with a sore hip. It concerns me that he isn't able to DH at this time, and I'm wondering if he could potentially see a trip to the DL in his future.
Zack Greinke threw a complete game and struck out 12 in the victory. It's good to see him pitching effectively, but clearly the results are still not nearly what his owners were expecting. I think what we saw yesterday could very well be what we should expect out of him the rest of the season. I'm just not sure that he's going to finish up as an elite starter.
David Wright hit 2 homeruns and drove in 4 as the Mets routed the Orioles. He's now hitting a solid .286, and already has 12 homeruns and 11 stolen bases. I'm thinking that a lot of owners were able to get a very good value out of Wright, who fell in drafts this season after the lackluster performance last year. I think he's going to end up being the 2nd most valuable fantasy 3B behind Evan Longoria.
Troy Glaus is back with a vengeance! 2 more homeruns yesterday brought his season total to 13, and the 4 hits overall raised his average to .290. I think he is going to end up as a top-10 third baseman, although I'm not sure how much of that is related to the fact that 3B is pretty shallow this season.
A player I targeted in a lot of drafts this year was Carlos Gonzalez, but I didn't really get him in too many leagues. Wish I had. He hit his 10th homerun of the season yesterday, and raised his average to .302. I think a 20-20 season is not too much to project for him this year, and I think he'll finish the year as a top-20 outfielder.
Mark Reynolds continues to struggle, as he went 1-5 yesterday with 4 strikeouts. I ended up with him in one league, and was extremely happy about it at the time. The hope had been that he would be some version of what he had done last year. The version I had hoped for was not the one that got the strikeouts and not the speed. He does have 15 homeruns, but the .223 batting average and only 3 steals to this point are not exactly what I'd hoped for.
Rather surprisingly, James Loney stole his 9th base. He's not going to provide a lot of power, but if you have a big power guy in an unusual position (like catcher or 2B), Loney could be a great match for your overall lineup balance. He's hitting .286 with 5 homers on the season.
Seth did a pretty good write up about the starters from the Cubs-White Sox game last night, and you can find it further down the front page.