As we near the halfway point of the season and enter the Dog Days of Summer, the season is really beginning to shape up. Who are the teams that will contend, who are the jokers, and what players are disappointing or surprising? As any baseball fan knows it’s a long season and what is supposed to happen on paper doesn’t necessarily mean that’s actually how it will pan out. As self-proclaimed baseball dorks, this type of thing fascinates us so we hope it fascinates you as well (and if it doesn’t, don’t be a jerk, read it anyway).
The Cleveland Indians
The surge of the Tribe this season might be the biggest surprise so far this season. They are currently in 2nd place in the AL central, one game behind the Tigers. Considering they finished with 93 losses last season with only the Royals finishing with a worse record, and no big free agent pickups this past offseason you have to give Cleveland some love.
Personally I find their record to be baffling. On paper this isn’t a very good team and outside a handful of players like Shin Soo-Choo, Grady Sizemore, and Fausto Carmona, the roster resembles the movie Major League.
Another baffling fact is Soo-Choo is having a career-worst year only batting .244 with 5 home runs and 27 RBI’s, yet his .244 average is ranked fourth on the team. The saving grace has been shortstop Abdrubal Cabrera, who leads the team in all offensive categories, and defensively has a nightly web gem on Baseball Tonight.
Josh Tomlin and Justin Masterson have led the young pitching staff. They have cooled in recent days but Carlos Carrasco (the centerpiece of the Cliff Lee trade), has begun to get hot.
Ubaldo Jimenez
Last season Jimenez had a career season when he finished third in wins (19), third in strikeouts (214), second in shutouts (2), eighth in ERA (2.88), and first in winning percentage (.704). He also finished third in Cy Young voting (behind Roy Halladay and Adam Wainwright), and made his first all-star team.
This year Jimenez has been an abomination on the mound. In 13 starts Jimenez is 2-7 with a bloated 4.68 ERA. His K/9 is down over one per game his BB/9 is up per game and his WHIP is almost .500 from last season. He is currently one of the big reasons the Rockies are struggling to stay above .500.
Curtis Granderson
Granderson has always had five tool talent and has had some impressive seasons. His best season came in 2007 where he earned his only All-Star birth and batted .302 with 23 home runs, 74 RBI’s, and a league-leading 23 triples. After that Granderson’s stats slipped and was shipped off to the Yankees before the 2010 series. His first season was less that the Yankees hoped for, where while he did hit 24 home runs, he batted a meager .247.
With less than half the season passed, Granderson is on pace to shatter the career season he had in 2007. Currently he leads the American League in runs (62), triples (6), and home runs (21). His .280 batting average ranks him fourth on the Yankees, and his 53 RBI’s are second only to Mark Teixeira (who has 54). Granderson is a shoe in for his second All-Star selection and should he keep it up, Comeback Player of the Year.
Lance Berkman
Berkman, a five-time All-Star was one of the most feared hitters in the National League. During his hay day he averaged 33 home runs and 110 RBI’s per season. Things started to slip for Berkman in 2009. He battled some injuries that caused his power numbers to dip and his average dropped over 30 points. In 2010 Berkman had a real slow start and never recovered. He was traded mid-season to the Yankees, and what was a perennial All-Star, was now a bench player, backing up first base, outfield and designated hitter.
Berkman wasn’t offered a contract in the offseason by the Yankees, and there weren’t many takers. That is until the Cardinals took a flyer on the 35-year-old free agent.
It was money well spent. Berkman is looking like the player of old. Berkman is currently batting .303, with 17 home runs (he had only 14 all last season), with 51 RBI’s. Also, given the fact Albert Pujols will be on the shelf until August, they now have an adequate fill-in until Pujols returns.
Hanley Ramirez
Sure, he’s had some injuries this season but Ramirez’s season to date has been an abortion (thank god he’s not on my fantasy team). The career .306 hitter is currently hovering around The Mendoza Line. His speed numbers are down (13 stolen bases), and he leads the league in times caught stealing (6). His current play is a shell from what he was two years ago when he led the league in hitting (.342).
Hopefully the recent benching by “Grandpa” Jack McKeon, will wake Ramirez up and he can turn it around.
The New York Mets
This might be a stretch here, but I’m completely surprised that the Mets have recently been flirting with .500. In my pre-season predications I had them in last place with over 100 losses, and unless they have a collapse of epic proportion, that’s not going to happen.
What’s really surprising here is the Mets are doing this without Johan Santana who’s been out for the entire season and only 39 games by David Wright. Outside of Jose Reyes, who is an early front-runner for MVP, and Carlos Beltran the Mets have been winning games with cast-offs and no-names. Guys like Chris Capuano, Dillon Gee, Justin Turner, and Ronnie Paulino have Mets ownership thinking they are going to be buyers down the stretch.
Adam Dunn
Talk about a bust on the South Side of Chicago. White Sox fans knew what they were getting into with Dunn’s strikeouts considering he averages a 185 whiffs in a season, but they were hoping for the other guarantees upper 30’s to 40’s in the home run department and at least 100 RBI’s. Barring a miraculous hot streak, that’s not happening this season. Through 64 games Dunn seven home runs and 29 RBI’s. He also leads the league in strikeouts with 91 and although he’s never been much of a hitter for average he’s always at least hit his weight. His current .195 is completely unacceptable. He keeps these shit stats up he’s going to get a Venezuelan ass-kicking from manager Ozzie Guillen.
In hindsight, I’m glad he snubbed the Orioles to join Paul Konerko in Chicago.
The Pittsburgh Pirates
Another possible reach, but based on their record this late in the season, it deems some attention. No disrespect to any Pirates fan (as someone who roots for teams like the Orioles and Oilers, I feel your pain), but they have been a complete joke (along with the Royals and afore mentioned Orioles), for the last 15 years.
Things are looking up for the Bucs. The top picks they’ve consistently drafted over the years are finally maturing and the Pirates are actually a game over .500 and find themselves in third place in the NL Central, only three games behind the first place Brewers.
Young studs like Neil Walker, Andrew McCutchen, Jose Tabata, and Garrett Jones are leading an offense that uses speed and timely hitting to score runs. The pitching staff I still find to be a concern. Any Pirates fan who thinks the Bucs are going to make a playoff push needs to quit smoking PCP. Should they finish with a record around .500 you have to have optimism for the future.
Jake Arrieta
When most people discuss the Orioles, they discuss the young pitching that has come up through the farm system. Names like Zach Britton, Chris Tillman, and Brian Matusz are supposed to be the future of the Birds rotation. Britton has had a solid rookie campaign, but Matusz can’t stay healthy and Tillman has been a mess and is back in the minors. The one name always overlooked is Jake Arrieta.
Arrieta was very inconsistent in his rookie campaign, sporting a 6-6 record in 18 starts. In 16 starts this season, Arrieta leads the American League (at the time of this writing); with nine wins on the last place Orioles. His 71 strikeouts also lead the birds (he’s ranked 25th in the AL). Another interesting stat regarding his wins, they account for 26% of the Orioles wins this season. While it’s not like Steve Carlton’s 1972 season when he accounted for 50% of the Phillies wins, but nevertheless, it’s impressive.
The San Francisco GiantsI know what you’re thinking “how can the defending World Series champs be a surprise?” Well let me tell you. Being based in the San Fran Bay Area as I am I hear a lot about the Gigantes and the A’s (whom I will bitch about next) and watching the defending champs this season thus far has been a surprise. The Giants today on 6/28 stand in first place in their division with a 2.5 game lead on the D-Backs. Now granted it’s somewhat of a weak division, but they are still 12 games over .500 with the third best record in baseball. The first reason why this team is surprising is because they have no middle of the line-up at all. Currently they have Aubrey Huff with 8 homers and 41 RBI, Pat Burrell with 7 homers and 20 RBI and Nate Schierholtz with 4 homers and 23 RBI holding down the middle of the lineup. Their three best hitters Pablo Sandoval, Buster Posey and Freddy Sanchez have either been battling injuries all year, or will be out for the rest of the season (Sanchez and Posey are done for the year) and they don’t have one player, not one with more than 8 homers. I know the Giants were built on pitching and they won the World Series on the backs of those studs, Cain, Sanchez, Lincecum and that bullpen, but they also had a lineup that produced something. Although they just laid 19 runs on the Cubs in a doubleheader sweep yesterday, they haven’t been scoring runs at all. As a matter of fact they had won 5 games in a row last week while scoring a total of 15 runs. I hope that pitching holds up, they will be a great story if they make it back to the Fall Classic with this lineup.
Oakland A’s
So like I said earlier, being based in the Bay Area of San Fran like I am I bought into this Oakland A’s sob story and hype. How can there be a sob story and hype you ask? The Oakland A’s might be the lowest drawing team in the majors right now. I know the Marlins are tough to compete with in this category but the A’s are giving them a run for their money. In a stadium that holds roughly 35K, the A’s are pulling maybe 12K per game. I’ve heard that number as low as 6 or 7K at points this season. So the question becomes with a team that has such a rich history and great baseball tradition why are they drawing such a low amount of fans? The stadium is almost always the answer. True it is a dump and it is in a bad part of town but it’s always been a dump and it hasn’t levitated magically to a shit part of town all of sudden so why now? Maybe the area has gotten worse over the years, and with ticket prices rising and the A’s not making the playoffs for 9 seasons I’m sure all play a part. But for some reason the empty seats seem emptier this season. So there’s the sob story that the A’s lose because their fans don’t support them and the fans don’t support them because the stadium sucks and the stadium sucks because the A’s lose and the fans don’t come out. It’s a vicious cycle I know but here’s where I get pissed; I picked this team to win the AL this year. They are built like the Giants with tremendous pitching and timely hitting. Well the pitching was great early but the timely hitting needs to be more than once a month and after a 9 game losing streak, my dreams of a Brewer-A’s World Series is over. I don’t know if that’s a surprise to you, but it is to me.
The New York Mess
Ok, I will admit it, the Mets are way better than I expected them to be. I picked them to lose 100 games just like Jay did. But what I will say is I’m not buying it. Being a Mets/Jets/Rangers fan for my whole life I’ve learned to spot the fraudulent contender early and this Mets team reeks of it. They pulled to one game over .500 last night by annihilating the Tigers 14-3 (they hit their first Gland Salami since 2009) and stand 5 games back in the Wild Card chase and 9.5 games back in the NL East; so a playoff berth is unlikely. But what this record does is puts management in a position to not better themselves by unloading a Beltran or a Frankie Rodriguez. I’m not buying this success, I’ve seen it before. This team will still finish 10 games below .500. It may not be the 100 loss season I predicted but it may actually be worse in the long run.
Great Pitchers having crap seasons
In what is the “year of the pitcher” there are a few guys not having such great years. Not just scrub guys either, former cy-young winners and perennial all-stars struggling to get it done. Here’s the list:
*Ubaldo Jimenez – (2010) 19-8, 2.88 ERA (2011) 3-7, 4.50 ERA
*Chris Carpenter – (2010) 16-9, 3.22 ERA (2011) 2-7, 4.26 ERA
*Roy Oswalt – (2010) 13-13, 2.76 ERA (2011) 4-6, 3.76 ERA
What are your major league surprises? Drop me a line at shatmeself@yahoo,com and we’ll discuss them. Also, if you haven’t yet, follow The Sports Riot! on Twitter. You’ll hear about breaking sports news and the daily escapades of me and my esteemed colleague Chris.
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