Forebodings and Perturbations

Some things I’ve noticed about September as I set up everyone’s BP rosters:

EVERYTHING’S COMING UP ROSES

• This game is so easy.  THE prize of the pennant race rentals, Corey Kluber, is an Allegheny.  Any resentments from their parting years ago have apparently been worked out: Kluber’s debut as a retread Allegheny went 8 innings with only 1 earned run. Led by Domingo Santana’s 2.292 OPS, five Alleghenys are OPSing over 1.000 for the months so far. The Team September ERA is a microscopic 2.16; it’s OPS is .962.
• Byron Buxton is breaking out. After years of frustraion, Buxton was OPSing less than .600 on July 1.  In July he went .387, .467, .516 — but that was only 35 ABs. A fluke. Except he went .324, .354, .619 in 105 August ABs.  The OBP was way off, but the SLG was way up — both months OPSed .913.  So far in September he’s 5 for 7 with three triples. That’s an OPS of 2.063.  The Tornados worked hard to trade for Manny Machado, and Sonny Gray, huge boosts to their pennant race. But the best player they’ve added is probably the New Byron Buxton.
• The Dragons mystified me when they draft Daniel Descalso. Descalso has accumulated a total of 1.0 rWAR in his 8 seasons of play.  He had accumulated 1.1 rWAR by the end of his second season — since then he’s been almost precisely a replacement player by Baseball Reference’s calculations.  I never scout him anymore. But, it turns out, he had a great run in the last two weeks, with an OPS over .900.  And on September 1, he hit a pinch hit home run.  So here’s what I think the Dragonmaster is up to: He’ll activate Descalso 100%.  Then he’ll bench Descalso right away, so he captures Descalso’s homer without having to live with Descalso’s return to Earth. Clever use of the new rules1!  The old Dragonmaster’s still got it!
• Mike Trout is healthy and doing wonderful things: 6 for 12 with  doubles, 4 walks, 2 stolen bases, and no strikeouts, double plays, caught stealings or anything bad.  Bryce Harper hasn’t done anything bad (or good, either) so far this month.  Ian Happ, Jorge Polanco, and Starling Marte are all filling in nicely as Harper replacements, OPSing over 1.000. So maybe the Head Cheese can still say “Excellent. Everything is going as planned.”
• Newly-acquired Kevin Gausman pitched 6 shutout innings.  The Commissioner’s Office does not advise teams about how to manage their teams, or else it might suggest benching Gusman for the rest of the season. Why risk injury?  Let that draft pick fall into richer veins of talent. True, you’ve traded that pick away, but it will still be good for the EFL in general… to get more talent onto EFL rosters you could trade for.
• The Wizard truly is a Wizard. On August 22, he traded Cespedes for Wil Myers. On August 25, Cespedes pulled a hamstring to end his 2017 season. So far in September, Myers is batting 5 for 10 with a double, a triple, and a walk. That’s a 1.345 OPS.  Cespedes’ September OPS: 0.000.  Also, Drive pitchers so far have 20.7 innings pitched, with only 4 earned runs, for a 1.74 ERA.
• Rhys Hoskins celebrated becoming a Pear Saturday morning by going  3 for 3 with a double and a homer Saturday afternoon. His September batting line at that point: .500, .625, 1.167.
• Madison Bumgarner homered Sunday, his third of the season, to lead the Wolverines this month with an OPS of 2.500. (All the other W hitters went 6 for 37 Sunday with a double and 3 walks. That’s a daily OPS of .433.)  (And yes, this is the good news for OD so far this month.
• Ozzie Albies is off to a good start: 4 for 11 with 3 walks. But Tim Anderson is off to an even better one for the month: 4 for 12 with two doubles and a homer, for a 1.083 September OPS.
• Welington Castillo is leading the Balk offense with a 1.400 September OPS fueled by two homers.

IT’S GOING TO BE A LONG MONTH

• The only possible bad news is how much the Tornadoes loaded up at the final trade deadline. Yet, really, down inside, we all know:  it won’t be enough. We’ve seen this movie 6 times already.  The Alleghenys always win.
• Trevor Cahill, Brad Hand, Kate Middleton and Ryan Sherriff have combined so far for 5.7 ip and 13 earned runs. Cahill and Middleton triple chulked. I don’t know — this probably doesn’t even deserve to be seen as bad news.  The Tornados have 42.7 other innings already, in which only 12 earned runs scored.  So they can bury the four chulkers, and leave themselves with a September ERA so far no worse than 2.70.
• Descalso went 1 for 4 on Saturday, and 0 for 1 Sunday, so his OPS is all the way down to 1.167 for the month and still falling. Allocations aren’t due until this evening, so the soonest Descalso can be demoted to East Haviland is tomorrow. There may not be much left to be preserved by then.  See also Darvish, Yu.
• Chris Archer’s Saturday start didn’t go all that well. He threw 8 pitches, served up back to back homers to the only two batters he faced, and left the game with right forearm tightness. He insisted Sunday he felt fine, but we all know better.  Or at least, we will know better later today when the results of a medical examination are in Not that the Commissioner is rooting for improvement in the Cheese’ draft position (Old Detroit has the Cheese’ first round pick), but I can hear him muttering “Excellent. Everything is going as planned.”
• Chris Sale stumbled in his September start, surrendering  3 earned runs — all solo homers — in 4.3 innings.  The Commissioner’s Office does not advise teams about how to manage their teams, or else it might suggest benching Sale for the rest of the season. Why risk injury?  Let that draft pick fall into richer veins of talent. True, you’ve traded that pick away, but it will still be good for the EFL in general… to get more talent onto EFL rosters you could trade for.
• It is hard to find any bad news for the Drive this month. Maybe Ben Gamel going 0 for 9 so far?
• Rhys Hoskins got hit by a pitch on his hand in the seventh inning Saturday. Shades of Tony Saunders? Could his fourth plate appearance for the Pears have been his last? X-rays indicate the hand wasn’t broken… we’ll just have to wait and see.
• One headline summed up Bumgarner’s Sunday thusly: “Cardinals Out-homer Bumgarner.”  Wolverine pitchers have so far pitched 26.7 innings. And have allowed 26 earned runs for a spiffy 8.77 raw ERA. Clayton Richard is the staff “ace” s0 far (6 ip. 3 er), followed by Alex Wood (6 ip, 4 er) and Bumgarner (6 ip, 5 er).
• Tim Beckham may be cooling off. He has 2 singles for 16   AB so far in September.
• Sam Dyson is back to his early-season struggles, the ones that got him booted off the Rangers. He has nearly quadruple chulked so far in September: 1.7 ip, 5 er.