I Want Grandy

(Music Pun #9. The Bow Wow Wow Version.)

Well, how about that. Curtis Granderson's having a fantastic season. The only downside of that is the fact that he's doing so in a Blue Jays uniform.

And look, the Blue Jays hatred has gone down a bit for me this year...mainly because they're only having an 'okay' year. A lot of their best guys are injured, a ton of trusted starters are batting under the Mendoza line, and most of their star pitchers are giving up a lot of runs. While they're definitely better off than they were last year, the Jays are only barely over .500, and in a division where the main conflict concerns two mega-teams are ones that are not the Toronto Blue Jays.

Luckily, regardless of the general meh-ness of the team, they still have Curtis Granderson, who, at 37, is having one of his best seasons in years, and playing the outfield pretty well while focusing more on average than on home runs. Also, Kevin Pillar is doing the team-carrying that we all thought Josh Donaldson would still be doing at this point, and Yangervis Solarte is back to his old tricks. Hell, even the bullpen has been wholly fantastic this year, with a lot of former bit-players from mega-teams, like John Axford, Seung-Hwan Oh and Tyler Clippard,  coming together to create some great late-inning ball.

This is a flawed team, and I don't know how much they're going to accomplish...but, on the plus side, they still have Curtis Granderson, and that'll be enough for me when I head to Rogers Centre in a month.

Coming Tomorrow- Well, over the last two seasons he's calmed down quite a bit...and, concurrently, so has his once-1st-place team.

Corbin Caught Stealing

(Music Pun Streak #8- Yes, a MAJOR STRETCH for the Jane's Addiction reference)

The Arizona Diamondbacks have the best record in the NL, and is among the best teams in baseball. And Patrick Corbin is their best pitcher right now. So...do the math.

This isn't...EXACTLY out-of-nowhere. Corbin's 2013 season, where he broke into a rotation headed up by Ian Kennedy, Brandon McCarthy and Wade Miley and absolutely stole the show, garnering an All Star nod in the process. But after missing the 2014 season due to injuries and coming up with diminishing returns his last few seasons, we were all worried that there'd never be another truly great season from Corbin, especially as ace-duties were essentially handed off to Zack Greinke and Robbie Ray before the former had bad starts and the latter got injured.

With Corbin at the helm of the rotation, and with Matt Koch delivering some really nice stuff filling in for Taijuan Walker, the team is soaring, especially since David Peralta and AJ Pollock are both having incredible seasons, and Paul Goldschmidt's consistency is slowly returning. Unfortunately, the rest of the lineup is pretty-hit miss, but with the strength of the rotation, and with the momentum of the team, it doesn't worry me a great deal.

The Rockies, the closest competitors, are 3.5 games behind, and the Giants aren't far behind them, so this may end up being the race. I do think the Diamondbacks have the talent to stay afloat.

Coming Tonight: One of my favorite players...wearing a concerning uniform.

Everybody's Got a Hungry Bart

(Music Pun Streak #7. I'm proud of this one.)

It's 2018, the Texas Rangers are in last place...and the best player on the team is a 44-year-old Bartolo Colon. What a world we live in.

I wanna throw in this statistic before I go, because this is actually pretty incredible. In 2002, Bartolo Colon was traded to the Montreal Expos, in exchange for Grady Sizemore, Cliff Lee, Brandon Phillips and Lee Stevens. And a few years ago, we were all going 'aaaaahhh, that trade was a steal for the Indians, two of those guys had careers with Cleveland, and Colon went nowhere with Montreal, haaahahaaa'

...Bartolo Colon is the only member of that trade that is still in the major leagues. THINK ABOUT THAT.

Bartolo Colon's numbers haven't been the most consistent across his career, but the most you can say about him is that he outlasted. He's the Jamie Moyer of this era, and you can argue that he had an even better career than Moyer did, and later.

Right now, the bulk of the Rangers' offense is injured, and they're struggling with the little power they can muster. The pitching is a mixed bag, with a lot of inflated ERAs (and Matt Moore, who simply cannot pitch anymore). And yet...there's Bartolo Colon, throwing strikes, winning games, and having an excellent season a month before his 45th birthday, on a team where nobody can really be bothered to do well at all.

I sincerely hope this keeps up. I hope Colon has another amazing season, and gets another ASG nod. I want that so much because it's Bartolo Colon, and he deserves it. This might be his last year (I also said this like 3 years ago), so I sincerely hope he decides to end things on a high note. And if not...I hope he pitches until 60.

Coming Tomorrow- Who would have thought HE'D become the best pitcher in Phoenix?

May Be Hader Someday Later

(Music Pun #6. Yes, Weird Al Lyrics count too. I don't care.)

Meanwhile, in the NL Central, there's a fierce battle going on between the Brewers, Cardinals, Pirates and Cubs. Still. Right now the Cardinals are in first, and the Brewers are creeping up on them. I don't know how they're doing it, because Eric Thames is injured and they're rallying around a reshuffled core that includes Lorenzo Cain, but something is working.

The pitching is at least improving- Chase Anderson, Junior Guerra and the revitalization of Wade Miley are holding up a generally okay rotation, and Josh Hader is throwing SMOKE in the ninth. Like, to the caliber that nobody else is really hitting (other than Jordan Hicks). The guy could be a major closer/reliever for years, and hopefully he'll keep his velocity and consistency up.

The lineup is hit-miss, but thanks to Lorenzo Cain and Travis Shaw, it's improving. Bench players like Jesus Aguilar are getting more time in the field, which is nice, as there's a bit of roster depth here.  The rest of this lineup needs to begin to heat up though, as Yelich, Domingo Santana, Orlando Arcia and Hernan Perez all have a ways to go.

It's gonna be cool to see how they fare against the Cardinals, who are doing great right now, but I don't expect it to be a quiet fight.

Coming Tonight: The Rangers' Lord and Savior. I am so excited for this reveal.

No Twin Cities to Love

(Music Pun #5. Oooooh, I went indie...)

The Twins...had a rough go of it back there.

There was a good period from April 20th until May 1st where they couldn't be bothered any big games. And they lost major series', minor series', pretty much everything. The roster was hurting too, as Sano & Buxton were hurt, Dozier was slumping, and Jose Berrios was beginning to look human. Something needed to be fixed.

Now, they've won some games since, and they're back to third in the AL Central, but...are they a good team anymore? Well, it's a tricky question to answer. They still have some fine elements, like Eduardo Escobar doing an incredible job at shortstop, Joe Mauer playing like his old self, and Kyle Gibson having a great comeback year, but...there's a lot that's not working. A lot of veterans that aren't coming together. A lot of hired players from this year that aren't adding up to anything.

And this is a year where the AL Central is shockingly simple, and the Indians are running away with things from the start...yes, even if the Yankees are knocking them back a few pegs this week. So the Twins need to seriously figure out if they want to compete, or if they want to keep losing. Because it's becoming evident that they could do either, and one could be trickier than the other.

Coming Tomorrow- What is it with the NL Central and relievers? First Jordan Hicks throws smoke in St. Louis, and now this guy from Milwaukee's throwing fire in the ninth.

Trouble Will Find Me (by the Nationals)

(Music Pun #4. Bit of a stretch, but it still works)

The Nationals are exactly .500. They had a really poor end-of-April stretch, they lost Adam Eaton to injuries (AGAIN), and it's only been the last week or so of surprisingly hard-fought games that have brought them back to the bubble. Yes, they are still in fourth place, and 3 games out of first, but the drive that these Nationals teams usually have is slowly returning.

It's thanks in part to the stellar work from the rotation. Max Scherzer is having YET ANOTHER fantastic season, with a low era, six wins, and 65 strikeouts. And it's frigging May. The guy is just showing off at this point, especially considering that Clayton Kershaw just landed on the DL after 3 poor starts. We've known that Scherzer is one of the best pitchers in the NL for a while now, and this season is not only cementing that fact, but the fact that Scherzer might seriously be a Hall of Famer. The guy's had two 20-win seasons in a career based in an era of baseball straying away from 20-win seasons, he's gotten top-5 Cy Young votes every year since 2013, and he's only 33. The guy's a legend in the making, and we're just watching the highlight reel at this point.

The rest of the rotation is also fantastic- Stephen Strasburg, Tanner Roark, Gio Gonzalez and the newly-resuscitated Jeremy Hellickson are all doing pretty well, and would be highlights on a rotation that didn't have Scherzer on it.

The lineup's only alright at the moment, with only Bryce Harper's home runs and some great Trea Turner stuff standing out. But this is still a promising team that could be up there with the big guns in this division very, very soon. The Braves might need to watch out.

Coming Tonight: I got this guy's autograph last year at Spring Training, and now he's having a great all-around season for a team that's trying to come back.

Would You Like to Buy an O?

(Music Pun #3. ....YES, SESAME STREET COUNTS NOW. I DON'T CARE IF IT'S LOWBROW, I'M USING IT.)

Now, for so many AL East teams to do great this year, somebody had to take the short end of the stick...but oh, gosh, why did it have to be the Orioles?

They're still a fun team! Manny Machado, Adam Jones and Dylan Bundy are still great! The rookies have promise. But...so much on this team is so blueprint-esque that everyone else is taking advantage of it, and making them look truly bad. And yes, it's not helping that a lot of the power core that made last year so fun is either injured or slumping.

The solution is probably gonna be to pawn some people away by August, and while people are already shouting about Machado and where he could go, there's also not a great deal of other people that are worth looking at. Dylan Bundy's having another great season, but is he eligible for trades? Same question goes to somebody like Trey Mancini. Is it possible for this team to be dissected, or is it just going to have to be the contract-applicable pieces that are working.

Still, you never know- they could go on a tear this month. But not a ton is working, and not a ton is fun to watch, so we may have to run with this for a bit.

Coming Tonight: One of the best pitchers in baseball.