The Talk of the Town

After reading a half-dozen stories about Alexander Guerrero — a process I could repeat a dozen times, I bet —  I got to wondering if any other EFL players were getting so much attention.

I will report on my study of the topic after the standings.  If I miss the buzz-center of your franchise, feel free to let me know all about it in the comments.

 

Haviland:  “L”, 9 – 6.  .423, .528, .577; 11.7 ip, 5 er.  Ah, the glories of the EFL!  Where else can a team compile an 1.105 OPS, a 3.86 ERA, and a 9 – 6 score — and LOSE — and come from 0.4 games down to take over first place against a team that won!  Crazy fun, unless you’re a Wolverine.  Now, as to who they’re talking about in Haviland:  you’d think it would be Chris Archer in Tampa Bay — and he did get 9 links from Baseball Reference for last night’s 7 shutout innings that lowered his era to 0.84 over 32.1 innings.  He’s now made four consecutive starts without allowing an earned run. But how could a pitcher hailed as the “most unheralded arm in MLB” be the talk of any town, especially if he’s on a team that plays in Tampa Bay’s crypt?

Old Detroit: “W”, 2 – 6. .289, .360, .467;  13.7 ip, 7 er.     Apparently Los Angeles is in the throes of Guerreromania (with 10 links from Baseball Reference just yesterday), as Alexander Guerrero went 2 for 3 with another homer to improve his batting line to .500, .500, 1.273.  That’s an OPS of 1.773.  He’s all over the LA Dodger blogs, who are pressuring Don Mattingly to give Guerrero more playing time — at 3b, in LF, somewhere.   Mattingly has been resisting the pressure, preferring known quantities like Juan Uribe at 3b and Carl Crawford in LF.  I can’t criticize Mattingly — I am only getting 21% of Guerrero’s probable career month.   Mattingly is doing better:  the 24 plate appearances Guerrero has for the Dodgers represent about 33% of a full-time role.

Portland: W, 5 – 1.  .375, .394, .406; 8 ip. 3 er.   Mookie Betts, Mookie Betts, Mookie Betts.  All you ever heard about anywhere in North America earlier this month was Mookie Stinking Betts.  He snags a homer, hits one, steals two bases at once and suddenly he’s the next Willie Mays. Except now he’s batting .203, .291, .319. In Sunday’s 18-7 loss to the Orioles, Mookie went 0 for 5. (Manny Machado, hitting for the Orioles who had 18 runs and 20 hits, went 0 for 4, the only Oriole position player not to get at least one hit.)  Even with his bad day on the team’s bad day, Mookie still got 7 Baseball Reference links Sunday.  Of course, Yordano Ventura got 20 links on Friday, so maybe he’s the Rosebud Talk of the Town.

Cottage: L, 3- 6. .192, .344, .308;  17 ip, 9 er.    Yasiel Puig going to the DL  with a sore leg got some attention in LA, but he’s currently living in the shadow of Alexander Guerrero.  What about Sonny Gray in Oakland? He’s got a shiny 1.91 ERA, he’s essentially the ace of the staff, he’s young with a high ceiling.  But he pitches for the MLB team most underappreciated by its local fans, except maybe the Tampa Bay Rays.   Gray only got 3 Baseball Reference hits the last time he pitched — a gem against the Angels.  Hmmmm.. who else?  Well, now that Addison Russell has been called up, maybe you could call Arismendy Alcantara the talk of Des Moines.  (Except Des Moines, in my experience there going back 38 years, is like a combined Oakland and Tampa Bay for the way it ignores its team. In the two years I lived there no one I knew ever attended an Iowa Oaks game. )  Alcantara did get nine Baseball Reference references on the day Russell got called up. Still, I don’t know: his OPS in AAA is .478.

Peshastin: W, 6 – 4.  .257, .289, .543; 0.7 ip, 0 er. Devon Travis is batting .383, .439 .733 as a second baseman, even after going 0 for 4 Sunday. So far he’s on pace to be the best second baseman in history. He’s getting 5, 6, 7 links a day at Baseball Reference.  But he’s 100% inactive in Peshastin.  I suppose this shouldn’t disqualify him: Kris Bryant was the talk of Chicago before he debuted there.  So I suppose Travis could be the talk of Peshastin while eager Pear fans await his call-up.  But consider this — if the Pears don’t activate Travis this year, they’ll own him through 2020.  If they DO activate him this year, they’ll only own him through 2019.  So can the Pears stick to their plan to control Travis’ service time by never activating him this year? Can they stand up to all the pressure from the media, and from their own desire to compete?

Flint Hill: W, 7 – 3. .333, .333, .548; 4.7 ip, 2 er.   Let’s see.  Xander Bogaerts (former phenom) and Dustin Pedroia (future Hall of Famer) both got buried in the Bettsalanche. Joc Pederson (.912 OPS)  is lost in Guerreromanialand. Collin McHugh (1.86 ERA) is running for sidekick to Dallas Keuchel.  I can’t pick anyone out of the crowd of good Tornados.

Pittsburgh: W 1, L 2; 13- 18.  .256, .356, .385; 12.7 ip, 9 er.  Mike Trout. They can’t stop talking about him. They even made a huge deal about how he hit a home run off Anthony Bass Sunday — one fish homering off another.   Big deal.  It was the second time he’d done that, according to Baseball Reference’s Play Index.  In the old league I had the last Angel fish — Tim Salmon. He was a great player, even hitting the 8th-inning home run off Don Powers’ team that won game 7 of the World Series for my only championship in that league. No one made a big fuss when Salmon hit any of his 4 homers off Chuck Finley, or 3 homers off Paul Byrd, or when he doubled off Doug Creek or singled against Jim Poole.

Kaline: “L”, 5 – 3.  .324, .395, .405;  3 ip, 0 er. Marcus Stroman is the big story of 2015 for the Drive, his injury coming while our Rookie Draft was still going. But he’s dropped off the map for now as far as Baseball Reference goes. Same for Christian Vazquez, although he never got as much buzz as Stroman.  Craig Kimbrel’s gotten some buzz for his trade on the first day of the season to the Padres — he was mentioned 9 times on Wednesday, for example, and gets four or five mentions practically every day.

Canberra: L, 2 – 7. .171, .209, .317;  1.3 ip, 3 er.  Taijuan Walker is the subject of angst in Seattle, but the M’s have so many sources of angst that he doesn’t stand out. Anyway, we want someone with a more positive spin.  How about Shane Greene? His ERA is still 3.00 even after his last troubled start, which earned him 11 Baseball Reference links. (Meanwhile, Daniel Hudson’s triple chulk  — 1 ip, 3 er — combined with woeful Kangaroo hitting, has dumped the ‘Roos into the cellar.)