Kean Doherty of Sportsbreak published an article on October 11, which thanks to the miracle of the Internet I discovered today, on the 20 most disappointing players in 2017. Well, 18 most disappointing players — two managers made the list.
At ten teams we should have 1/3 of MLB’s disappointments. How did we do?
Well, once again, we overperformed.
# 20: Jonathan Lucroy, Canberra Kangaroos, for bad fielding and hitting. Maybe Lucroy prevented the ‘Roos from waylaying the Wolverines, which would be understandably disappointing. Or at least, he may have kept them from making it to .500.
# 15: Nicholas Castellanos, Pittsburgh Alleghenys, for bad fielding. Yes, it’s too bad the Alleghenys had to suffer.
#14: Tim Anderson, Canberra Kangaroos: bad hitting and fielding. So Lucroy had help.
#12: Kyle Schwarber, Old Detroit Wolverines: bad fielding. What? He was fielding badly, too? Sigh.
#11: Billy Hamilton, Canberra Kangaroos: Bad batting. Wow. I had no idea things were so disappointing in Canberra. Those Aussies always seem so upbeat.
#6: Dansby Swanson, Pittsburgh Alleghenys: Rookie. That’s what it says in the article: the Alleghenys were disappointed because Swanson was a rookie. Didn’t they know he was still a rookie? He’s going to be one for several more years. I guess they’d better get used to disappointment, if that’s going to discourage them. Oh, wait, the article explains this a little more. The disappointment was because Swanson was the worst rookie who qualified for the batting title. Oh. Well, That’s different. Again, the Alleghenys have every bit of the sympathy we can muster.
#5: Johnny Cueto, Haviland Hill City Dragons: Starting Pitcher. What was wrong with Cueto? He was mostly mediocre and expensive. But that could be said of a LOT of pitchers who didn’t make the list. But here’s the quote that makes everything clear: “Cueto, along with Matt Moore and Jeff Samardzija, formed likely the worst starting pitcher core in the bigs.”
Let’s see: Cueto went 8 – 8 with a 4.52 ERA over 147.1 innings. Samardzija went 9 -15 with a 4.42 ERA over 207.7 innings. That’s not inspiring, but there are worse pitchers in MLB. So, what about Moore? 6 -15, 5.52 ERA, 174.3 innings.
Oh, so THAT’s what happened. But Moore doesn’t make the list, obviously because no one had any reason to be particularly disappointed in him. Apparently everyone already knew that’s what he would do.
This entry is totally unfair to Mr. Cueto. He had a poor year, for him, but the real disappointment wasn’t him, or even Moore. It was in whoever was the lame person who bid Moore up to 5 years and $9,250,000. Unless, of course, no one espected any better of him, either.
#3: Tyler Glasnow, Haviland Hill City Dragons: Rookie Pitcher. Another team disappointed to discover their pitcher is still a rookie? Well, in this case, there are other factors, too: 2 -6, 7.69 ERA, 1.9 HR/9 innings, a WHIP over 2, 6.4 walks per 9 innings… all that is pretty stinky.
Glasnow and Cueto dragged the Dragons all the way down into the dregs of the EFL You know, third place. How do they even get up in the morning?
By the way, numbers 1 and 2 on the list were managers (Bruce Bochy and John Gibbons, respectively). You will be comforted to know that, no matter how badly you were disappointed in your manager in 2017, at least two other teams were even more disappointed in theirs.
Johnny Cueto WAS a Dragon – in 2015 for two short months. After being DFAed by the Dragons, he was picked up by the Rosebuds and so in 2016 he disappointed the Rosebuds, not the Dragons.
Glasnow, on the other hand, was a total disaster for the Dragons.