Going into last Friday’s draft, I needed two things: a middle infielder or third baseman to replace Jose Iglesias, and a pitcher. The guy I wanted most was Jose Pirela: a slugging outfielder who also plays second base, a veteran one could get for two years at $1,000,000 each. One could get him because no one had ever mentioned him, so of course, no one but me knew about him.
Except that darn Rosebud! He put up Pirela in the first round and bid him all the way up to $1,750,000 for two years. I couldn’t afford that.
Oh, well, not a big problem. There were some decent options among the debutant infielders, especially Paul DeJong.
But then our greenhorn owner of the DC Balk pulled one of the slyest tricks in drafting: manipulating a fellow owner into drafting a player no one wanted. He bid the minimum on Johan Camargo, a modestly talented infielder. I was next. Camargo was only a backup option for me. I didn’t think that much of his offense, he is a crummy shortstop. His best position is third base, but I still have Manny Machado — albeit in season-long slump. Whatever, I thought, others will be bidding. So I bid him up, confident others would continue to bid. They all passed, including D.C. I was suddenly the unwitting owner of Camargo.
Later, after I had picked up my third-choice pitcher (Andrew Moore), Paul DeJong was still there! So I put him up. Only one person bid against me — that pest Rosebud, may he stumble into a convention of aphids. But lo! he was bewildered by the presence of a different DeJong in the draft, and only made me pay $750,000!
So here are the July stats as of this morning for the characters in this drama:
Pirela: 29 AB, .276, .276, .517 — a very respectable .793 OPS.
Camargo: 23 AB, .348, .375, .522 — an OPS of .897.
DeJong: 23 AB: .435, .500, .913 — an OPS of 1.413.
I know, I know, small sample size, etc. etc. So let’s see how they did today:
Pirela: 1 for 5.
Camargo: 3 for 3 with a double, a homer and a walk: 3.583 OPS.
DeJong: 1 for 4 with a homer. That’s only a 1.750 OPS, but he still improved on his July line.
I do not pretend I saw any of this coming. And I admit I’m gloating. Gloating about the unforeseen success of an accidental acquisition is AWFULLY lame. But the last we looked, the W’s were a 9th place team. We haven’t had much to gloat about, so our standards are pretty low. We’re likely to gloat if our bread falls peanut butter side up and yours doesn’t. If you want to be free of gloating, stick to the regular league updates. I never gloat there.