TGIF Dirty Turbaners! After a long hard week of donating money to DraftKings, working too much, and listening to non-stop LeBron talk, I’m cooked. Can I take a minute for some real talk that’s unrelated to baseball? I can? Thanks! Seriously LeBron can you make a decision already? Is there any other sport where the best player is such an insecure attention whore? Mr. James you’ve led me to the conclusion that the NBA sucks. It sucks for a million reasons too, primarily though it’s two things. #1 the significant number of divas. People talk about soccer players being Sally’s these guys are 1000 times worse. #2 the lack of parity due to “Super Teams”. It’s the real reason true basketball fans love San Antonio, it’s because they did it right. Building chemistry and camaraderie though years of team work and focus on the task at hand. Okay that’s enough, END RANT.
Before we move on can I just apologize for serving y’all a s**t sandwich on Wednesday by lobbying hard for Roenis Elias? Sorry, he sucked. He may have been worse than Julio Teheran was on Tuesday but it was close. Between those two pitchers and my beloved Selecao (that’s Brazil’s soccer team in case you didn’t know) it’s been a rough sports week in the Lifshitz Casa. They say champions are made from failure, fire is the test of gold, if at first you don’t succeed and all that. So like the Phoenix from the ashes I rise! I’m very dramatic about fantasy sports. No?
All prices based on DraftKings
SP 1 – Jeff Samardzija, $8,200: After a sparkling debut in A’s green Shark travels to Seattle today to take on the 2nd worst home offense in the majors. The Mariners numbers at Safeco are miserable, check it out .289 wOBA, 81 wRC+, and a 23% k%. The only two teams in their zip code are the Phillies and the quad A Padres. Seriously the Mets are 4th worst and their wRC+ is 13 points higher. This leads me to my final point, why is Samardzija so cheap? What does DraftKings know? Do they have some guy in their basement in Boston using advanced algorithms to figure out he’s going to get bombed? Let’s break this down, Samardzija is a top 10-15 pitcher this season, he faces a soft hitting lineup, in a pitchers park, with a better team behind him. What’s not to like? I ‘m going to trust my gut and start em’.
SP 2 – Jordan Zimmermann, $10,500: To piggy back on my focus in the Samardzija write up, the Phillies are part of the unholy trinity of bad home hitting teams. The big difference between the Phillies and the other two home haters is the Phil’s actually play in a hitter’s park. This would lead me to deduct that the Phillies may actually have the worst lineup of the bunch. Well maybe they are equally bad to the Padres, it’s tough to be worse than the Padres. Oh yeah Jordan Zimmermann! He gets the Phillies today in Illadelphia, and I like him to be the top scoring pitcher on the day. Book It!
C – Christian Vazquez, $2,000: Prospect Punt Play! You know I love three things Boobs, Baseball, and Prospect Punt Plays. Especially at Catcher. If Vazquez isn’t in the lineup go for Caleb Joseph. Vazquez does have some solid minor league stats putting up a .721 OPS in Pawtucket this season and a .771 in Portland last year. In 2011 he had a slash line of .283/18/84 at A Greenville, so there’s some offensive ability in there.
1B – Justin Morneau, $4,800: I know the new wisdom states that the first game in any series in Colorado is an offensive dud, but Kris Johnson is starting for the Twins today. He’s a 29 year old rookie with 2 previous major league starts. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say this is a solid Stack Attack play. I’d try and get as many Rockies bats into my lineup as possible. Johnson is a lefty and Morneau isn’t a lefty masher but he’s not too shabby either. He sports a .337 wOBA at home against southpaws with 3 dongs. I like that matchup.
2B – Ramon Santiago, $2,200: Ahhh yes the injured star punt play. The Reds are dropping like flies lately huh? I’m not all that crazy about Santiago, but I like that he helps me get Tulo, Puig, and Stanton in my lineup. So I like him just fine.
3B – Zelous Wheeler, $2.000: “I get Zelous because he costs 2,000 bones, I get Zelous cause I want Tulo at home.” Any uChromeo fans out there? Yes? No? Well check them out great songwriting, fun music, and if you love the 80’s you’ll love them. As for Zelous, he hit a homer last night and he’s cheap, that’s why.
SS – Troy Tulowitzki, $5,600: The best shortstop in the world has a .475 average at home against lefties, a .621 wOBA, and a 297wRC+. Those are better than video game numbers. Those are just stooped doo-doo dumb, like Mac Dre coming out the romper room.
OF 1 – Yasiel Puig, $5,500: Puig faces righty Jesse Hahn tonight at home in LA. Puig has a .422 wOBA, a 178 wRC+, a .404 OBP, and a .567 slugging at home against righties. Those are good numbers right? What you don’t like math?
OF 2 – Giancarlo Stanton, $5.500: Giancarlo has been slumping thus far in July, hitting a lowly .171 with 0 homers. Do you think this is a blip? Have you seen this guy hit a baseball? Yeah, it’s a blip. He faces Zack Wheeler tonight, who can be solid, but can also be volatile. It’s been a few weeks since bad Zack showed up, as he’s only given up 2 ER’s in his last 12 2/3rds over the last couple of turns. I expect a line more like his June 25th home start against the A’s where he gave up 6 ER’s in 2 innings of work. Let’s also not forget Wheeler got our trust the start prior to that stinker by pitching a complete game shutout against the very Marlins who visit Citi tonight. I think Stanton will be the catalyst as he busts his slump like Mark Grace in a room full of BBW’s
OF 3 – Kendrys Morales, $3,700: Morales is on a nice run the last three games as he’s averaged over 9 points per game. He gets to hit in Coors tonight. Here’s some quick math Hot Hitter + Coors Equals = Johnny Football speaking with his hands. He’s my favorite buy under $4K tonight. I’m going to make a BOLD PREDICTION!!! Kendrys is my dong of the night.
As always make sure to check the lineups, give a look at the weather and I toast your team with slightly chilled Manischewitz.
Contributing Writer: Ralph Lifshitz
@Ralphlifshitzbb
#DirtyTurban
the DIRTY TURBAN 