Jimmy Rollins hit his second homer of the year, which isn’t exactly a 25-30HR pace from the Phillies shortstop. Rollins has been hitting .342 on the strength of a .355 BABIP but at least the walks have shot up to 19% on the season. All of Rollins’ contact and discipline numbers are the same except for the continued freefall of Zone%. Rollins is currently seeing just over 43% of balls inside of the zone; a far cry from his career average of 53%. So long as Rollins continues to bat in the bottom half of the order, 100 R and 80 RBI aren’t imaginable. Rollins owners need to hope for Ibanez to put it together pronto.
Derrek Lee broke his 0-for-May homerless drought with a dinger last night. Wrigley’s starting to heat up and Lee’s been starting to hit quite a few doubles, so good things may be in store. With Derrek Lee’s line-drive, fly-ball, ground-out ratios intact and a career BABIP of .321, it’s safe to assume that his average will rise as his .258 BABIP regresses.
Jose Contreras picked up the save.
Clayton Kershaw got the win but he’s still using too many pitches (107) to get through 7 innings. Kershaw’s a strike-out pitcher (7K last night) but using that many pitches to get through 7IP of 7H, 1BB baseball is pushing your luck.
Every starting position player for the Dodgers managed at least a single.
Will Venable stole yet another base — that’s 12 SB on the year. Why a man with a 36% strike-out rate and an 11% BB-Rate is leading off is beyond me. Venable’s meager .250 BA is propped up by a BABIP about 30pts higher than it should be.
Tim Lincecum got as lit-up as Tim Lincecum gets last night: 5IP, 5R, 5BB and 6K.
Chad Qualls managed to strike-out a single batter to get the one-out save. If only they were all that easy, eh?
Erick Aybar isn’t exactly tearing up the basepaths but he attempted to steal a couple bases last night and ended up 1-for-2. On the season, Aybar’s 6-for-11. Aybar’s not a bad deal at this point: He’s leading off, attempting to steal, and he should hit .275 for the rest of the year. The increased K-Rate and decreased LD% might be something to keep an eye out for, though.
Jake Peavy exploded, giving up six runs, and probably deserves his own article at some point.
Houston’s success and 7-run Wednesday was definitely too good to be true as the Rockies blanked them on Thursday. They were facing Ubaldo Jiminez and his 0.93 WHIP and 0.99 ERA, though. Jiminez only managed to strike out four Astros — Blasphemy!
Roy Oswalt put together another quality start and looks revitalized with almost a K-per-IP (8.85). Oswalt’s ERA in the low-twos probably isn’t here to stay but it looks like he has at least one more low-to-mid three left in him.
Manny Corpas came in to protect a 4-0 lead in the ninth. Against the Astros, I guess that’s more like a 6-0 lead.
It looks like Troy Tulowitzki is starting to find the Sweet Spot after going 2-for-4 with a dinger and 3 ribeyes.
Brian Matusz gave up 2HR and 7ER in 2.1 Innings worth of work. Ouch. I still like the kid to finish out the year as one of the premiere first-year pitchers.
The Rangers and Orioles managed 35 hits between them.
Jon Lester is making everyone forget about his slow start after pitching a complete game, 1 ER, 9K gem. If the windows is still open to grab this guy, I’d try.
After complaining, Mike Lowell went 0-for-4. Congrats and enjoy your gigantic paycheck.
Andy Petitte had his first bad start of the year, giving up 6 ER in 5IP, against the Rays. Petitte’s left-on-base percentage is still sitting around 80% and his BABIP is about 30pts too low. Realistically, you should probably expect Petitte to do just what he’s always done: a low-4.00 ERA and about average strike-outs (ZiPS Update: 130K)
As I mentioned a couple days ago, Ben Zobrist is really starting to heat up. Zobrist finally hit a DINGER! Zobrist now has 9 hits in the last week.
With a couple homers, Carlos Pena showed the world that he’s aight. The .215 BABIP is bad even for Carlos Pena. From the looks of it, Pena’s BABIP should regress to the .250 range — same as last year. However, this means a .270 BABIP for the rest of the season. Pena is hitting quite a few more grounders than year’s past which isn’t a good sign for a power hitter — Keep an eye on him and this disturbing trend.
John Maine faced a single batter and left with shoulder issues — It seems to be a precautionary issue.
Jose Reyes had two hits, a run and a RBI. When it comes to break-out candidates, Jose Reyes is the center-of-the-universe. Everything points to a return to greatness, even if he doesn’t get close to his career-high of 19HR. If the owners in your league remember Reyes’ hey-days, he’s probably overvalued, though.
Carlos Villanueva recorded his first save of the year! Other than that, not much of note in the 4-3, Brewers over Pirates victory.
Kevin Gregg blew the save last night against the Mariners. Poor Ricky Romero, who only allowed one run and is starting to look like Ace-Material in Toronto. I’m not fucking with you, Jose Bautista hit another HR.
Dave Cameron details the Braves re-donk-u-lous COMEBACK.
It was a Sizemore and Cabrera-less Tribe, but Luke Hochevar pitched a complete game, 3 run, 7K ball-game. Even if the Kauffman Stadium pFX adds a couple miles per hour onto Hochevar’s fastball, he’s still hucking it.
