The worst home run hitter of the day

Hello summer! For those that don’t know (how could you) I am a middle school counselor and soccer coach by day. My fake sports obsession only percolates at night. Anyway, school let out midday yesterday for me so I had my closest coworkers over for a “taco bar” and some general hilarity for lunch. I also took my daughters to the pool yesterday afternoon. I’ve already been to Lowe’s once this morning, and I’m about to go back this afternoon. Oh, and this morning my daughters and I caught a $1 Alvin and the Chipmunks movie. They are currently at the pool with Mom while I get ready for another Lowe’s trip.

In short, summer is in full swing. BUT I STILL HAVE ALL THIS TIME ON MY HANDS. So, inspired by a tweet from EmpireMaker2 comes the first edition of “The Worst Home Run.”

The rules are simple: pick the worst player you think is going to hit a home run tonight, and post it in the comments section. There is nothing to win since I do this “touting” for free, but if your terrible pick actually goes yard I’ll make sure I give you some shouts on Twitter to my elite following of 642 people.

The Worst Home Run: Chase Headley ($3,000) vs. Ricky Nolasco

My pick is Chase Headley, he of the .242 batting average and measly four home runs this season.

The reasoning is simple: Ricky Nolasco is bad! That, and his numbers are getting worse by the month. Here are some reasons Chase Headley is going yard tonight...

Nolasco is bad all around, allowing a .357 wOBA to LHH (Headley) and a .385 wOBA to RHH.

Nolasco is bad at home (.368 wOBA) and on the road (.374 wOBA). Tonight he is on the road in Yankee Stadium with that short right field porch.

In March and April Nolasco allowed a .268 BAA, .302 OBP, and .332 wOBA.

In May those numbers increased to .277 BAA, .353 OBP, .389 wOBA.

In June he’s given up a .325 BAA, .358 OBP, .395 wOBA. You get the idea. Nolasco is heating up...in a bad way.

While most DFSers will (rightfully) roster the dangerous RHH in Aaron Judge/Starlin Castro/Gary Sanchez, you can attempt to be sneaky with this really, really, really terrible pick of Chase Headley. I mean, in a large tournament you have to be different to win, right? I wouldn’t know personally, but that’s a logical assumption. It’s pretty sweet to be different in such a cushy spot against a bad pitcher.

Lastly, left-handed hitters hit more line drives and more fly balls off of Nolasco than right-handed hitters. The big difference with Nolasco is a normal-ish HR/FB rate of 14.5% to lefty bats, compared to an insane HR/FB rate of 27.7% to righty bats. Against the powerful Evil Empire, today may NOT be the day that that rate begins to normalize...but it could be. If so, I’m going to take the guy with the L/R split in his favor that isn’t named Didi Gregorius. Didi does not qualify for this competition. Didi is not bad. Didi is GOOD.

In summation: I’ll take a stab at the worst home run of the night coming from Chase Headley. All the marbles are on the proverbial table. Tell me who ya got in the comments, ladies and gents. Here’s a poll with some bad ones to get you started: