Alright my beautiful babies, FINAL FOUR here. I am sure this is where the win loss records fall apart but I don’t care, if baseball can’t be bothered to have the Toronto Blue Jays play in Toronto (or seemingly ANYWHERE) I can’t be bothered to line that shit up. Onward….

We have many logos okay…

#4 Island Beach Bears

2019 RECORD:  8-9-1

PROJECTED 2020 RECORD:  6-4-1, 4th place (1-1 Playoffs). I mean not to toot my own horn here but I think I deserve some credit for all the GREAT PLAYERS that I have briefly owned, but no longer own. Alotta greats have passed through these doors. And what we are left with now is a team that I think is just top to bottom real solid. Solid but unspectacular, but steady enough to slot right in the middle of the ole playoff pack if we were still having playoffs with some level of dignity. Alas we are not having those. And alas I can’t be steered to victory by my co-owner but I’m sure he can advise me on enough moves to maybe win a playoff matchup for a fucking change? That’d be nice. I’m a simple man of simple pleasures.

SHORT SQUAD SYNOPSIS:  So now the FEELING I get when I glance at this roster is just…WOW. Such potential. Such potential that will be fully actualized. Ketel Marte and Austin Meadows are two young studs that were added last season and they’ll be real good OBVIOUSLY (the latter will need to return from this FUCKING virus first), Max Muncy is forreal and that dastardly Dave Roberts will have to really work overtime to keep benching him against lefties for no reason whatsoever, Marcus Semien was excellent last season and shall obviously be excellent again in his contract year, and BEST OF ALL Cavan Biggio is about to become a bonafide star. Ya got all that and ya got some other stuff and maybe Gary Sanchez will stay healthy and maybe ❤Edwin<3 has one more great year in him. And by “one” I mean three. So that’s the bats.

The pitching I’m even PROUDER of, because Blake Snell is definitely healthy and definitely not bouncing balls in the dirt in his final “spring” tuneup. He pairs nicely with Mike Clevinger as two aces on the staff, which is a personal best for my pitching staffs. Behind them we feel like we’ve got a buncha guys that are top 50 arms or so, like maybe seven guys in the top 60 or something. The whole staff, just good solid arms (and Dinelson Lamet and Joe Musgrove can both make a leap and so obviously they both will). So Michael Kopech can take his ball and go home and see if I fucking care. Also I know I haven’t really talked about the bullpen for anyone else but I will for my team and my team only:  We are happy to have Kenley Jansen back as our longest tenured arm and we also feel like Nick Anderson is really good and has only the “Rays Ways” standing in his…..way. Please note I probably felt the same way about Jose Alvarado last season…..turned out to be a misfire. HEY IN THIS SPORT YOU FAIL 7 OUTTA 10 TIMES AND YOU ARE A HALL OF FAMER AMIRITE?!

SHORT SEASON STUD BAT:  SS Cavan Biggio  –  I had to ship Jose Altuve outta town just to CLEAR ROOM for this guy, that’s how much we believe in Cavan. Helluva walk percentage last year, made verrrry little “soft contact,” 14 for 14 in SBs. LOOK AROUND and there’s a buncha 20/20 talk surrounding this guy, with a few concerns about his “swings less than Votto” approach but there’s a deep dive on this very website that shows he picked up the ole swinging pace towards the end last year. Just read that or something IDFK:  https://www.fantraxhq.com/breaking-down-biggio-a-deep-dive-into-cavan-biggio/ 

SHORT SEASON DUD BAT:  SS Carter Kieboom  –  The dud part is a bit hard to pull off when discussing one’s own team CUZ I MEAN if I think a guy is gonna be a true “dud” I should just not be rostering that guy, but in Carter’s case there’s a few caveats. Firstly he’s a prospect I’ve had like twice now, and he still has a whole buncha minors eligible ABs to try and figure this thing out. So we need to ride out that eligibility OBVIOUSLY (even with the tweaks to that system, always tweakin ya tweakers). Secondly team ownership thinks he’s eventually gonna be a real solid bat, team ownership just isn’t sure if that’s going to come to full fruition in a shortened season where he will be most focused on not booting grounders over at third. Lest he lose time to fucking Asdrubal Cabrera. So Carter may have some growing pains in the year twenty twenty Anno Domini.

SHORT SEASON STUD ARM:  SP Dinelson Lamet  –  UNFORTUNATELY (using another chunk from a previous preview, this is just efficient writing) Dinelson has been a sleeper darling all offseason so that’s a curse in and of itself BUT…..we think they get it right on this one, for a change. Lamet was being treated with kid gloves last season as he returned from TJ but this year he’s supposedly in line to be allowed to throw “without restrictions.” He also supposedly throws two sliders (both nasty) and had about 13 Ks per 9 last year across 70ish innings. If we decided he qualified he would have had a top 20ish for starters swinging strike percentage (14%). PS Blake Snell was tops amongst starters at 17.7, Gerrit Cole was the next closest at 16.8 JUSSAYIN.  

SHORT SEASON DUD ARM:  SP Jake Odorizzi  –  As stated above we really find our collection of starters to be just CONSISTENTLY ABOVE AVERAGE but if I had to pick one guy I expect to let me down, without the influence of Dave Roberts (seriously I fucking hate that guy), it would be Jake Odorizzi. Because it certainly SEEMS like the Twins may have come to the decision he is best when pulled after the 5th no questions asked. He was very good last year, he was also only allowed to go 6 or more 10 times in 30 starts. PERHAPS QS is a dying stat anyhow and he just blends into the pack but also PERHAPS, that gets so annoying we have to tell him to hit the bricks. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

#3 East Coast WhateverTheFuck (Lions?? Are they gonna be lion-themed?)

2019 RECORD:  10-8

PROJECTED 2020 RECORD:  7-4, 3rd place (3-0 Playoffs, BCS CHAMP).  That’s right that crown is NO ACCIDENT, friends. I believe, cuz I have to believe, that 3 titles in a row is just far too statistically unlikely to happen twice in this league. I also believe, as I have for several years now, that the core of this team is good enough to win a championship SHOULD THEIR OWNER PAY ENOUGH ATTENTION. Shorter season plays to the shorter attention span, ergo I predict they finally live up to the potential in the year TWENTY TWENTY. The asterisk title may be more curse than gift but all of the titles are pretty much meaningless, as is life, so don’t worry about it my brother. 

SHORT SQUAD SYNOPSIS: I feel like I’m always gassin this roster up in these things and I don’t feel like it’s a fraternal thing but I would understand if someone made that accusation but let’s do it againnnn I guess. I mean thank god we took Ketel from this roster or else LOOK OUT AMIRITE?! Nah but their bats are okay, and they got Rhys Hoskins as a return in that deal anyhow and he’s pretty damn solid in this league. Other bats that are solid to above solid include yanno pretty much the ENTIRE lineup. You could make an argument there’s some work to be done with a last OF spot or last two OF spots or something but everywhere else is pretty damn good to great, particularly that Christian Yelich guy and that Gleyber Torres guy  and that great for a long time now Anthony Rendon CHARACTER. The bats are really solid throughout folks. OH YEA also Francisco Lindor and Javy Baez. See what I’m saying here?

The INTRIGUE here may be that for years this team was pitching staff heavy and didn’t quite have the same firepower on the other side of the ball, and now the other side of the ball may be a smidge better. That doesn’t mean the pitching staff isn’t very good, though. Stephen Strasburg, Jose Berrios, James Paxton, Carlos Carrasco, Clayton Kershaw all potentially GREAT when right (which I acknowledge can be said about all sorts of injury prone pitchers out there). Now this staff probably has the most risk baked into it in alllll the Backyard but again, the thinking here is the short season might benefit them most of all for that reason. Perhaps there’s no TIME for these guys to get hurt. Also David Price probably did them a favor by opting out. Also I assume this team, like the rest of your teams, has some relievers and maybe those guys are good I dunno. Short synopsis has no time for (most) bullpens.

SHORT SEASON STUD BAT:  SS Amed Rosario –  NOT that this team needs any help in the middle infield, in fact they probably need less, but I actually well and truly feel something might actually go the Mets way in the form of a real GROWTH SZN outta Amed Rosario. The kid already made for a sneaky Backyard asset even as he struggled to get his OBP up to snuff, chipping in 15 triples over the past two seasons (4th best in MLB). But what intriiiigues me is the tale of two halves for 2019. A not ideal .299 OBP in the first half was replaced by a .351 OBP in the second half, and the slugging percentage ticked up ’bout 40 percentage points. Not sure he’ll ever be confused for a power hitter but a sustained .350ish OBP would give him plenty of opportunities on the basepaths, perhaps plenty of opportunities to score runs should the rest of the Mets DO THEIR FUCKING JOBS. Amed could certainly stand to try and work a few more walks into his game but there’s folks that think he can get the average up over .300. I read it somewhere. On the world wide web. So HERE…..Ryan does not own David Dahl are you happy? Does not own David Dahl yet? 

SHORT SEASON DUD BAT:  2B/3B Ryan McMahon – Ryan McMahon hits the ball pretty damned hard and his name is similar to Ryan’s name and he popped 24 HRs last year so what is the problem here why isn’t he in the stud section amirite?! UAREWRONG, cuz he also hit the ball on the ground 50% of the time which means he needed a TWENTY SEVEN PERCENT HR/FB rate to get to those 24 Dongs. Sure there’s guys that had higher rates last year (that wacky fucking new baseball of theirs) but uhhh that’s pretty high man. Not too many true talent 27% hitters out there. He also struck out nearly 30% of the time which is pretty damn high itself. There’s a floor to be found here, Coors be damned . And also just like get the fuck out of Garrett Hampson‘s way mannnnn.

SHORT SEASON STUD ARM:  SP Jordan Montgomery – Perhaps this is Casual Yankees Fan Bias or Regional Bias but I’ve been far too in tune with Jordan Montgomery’s tuneups this year and the guy has looked GOOD. I watched the start on Sunday and he mowed those bitch-ass Mets down. Breaking balls looked filthy, he’s claimed it’s the best he has felt in “a while” and I just think he can be one of the two or three best pitchers in the Yankees rotation this season. PERHAPS meaning that James Paxton isn’t but that would be cuz of injury or something, I like the Big Maple no BM (hehe) slander here….

SHORT SEASON DUD ARM:  SP Anthony Desclafani  –  They have a really good pitching staff so Desclafani is obviously their worst starter. Can’t I just stop here? I mean I probably could but I’ll go on. Sureeee he’s got pretty solid strikeout numbers but I just feel like this guy feels like he’s perpetually 25 and NO…..he’s 30. And he gives up a lot o Dongs and probably got lucky on both the BABIP and the strand rate last year. I just don’t think he’s particularly good, Sonny Gray made it work in the GAB but many other pitchers do not make it work there, more streamer than rostered fella IMHO. I DON’T KNOW WHAT ELSE TO SAY I ALREADY FEEL LIKE I SAID MORE THAN I NEEDED TO. 

I think this one may have had my most caps lock and we allllll know what that means. It means I’m getting bored of this shit already. THANKFULLY we have the final two tomorrow, which you can obviously guess (BUT NOT THE PLAYOFF PREDICTIONS MAYBE), so I’ll try and spice it up by including multiple personal attacks on both owners. I’ll also perhaps commit to some level of weekly reviews IN WRITING there to keep me honest, but when I say weekly I mean it will be like every 3 or 4 weeks or something boo hoo deal with it or write em yourself. I will see all of you, my many readers (Brian), tomorrow for the BIG FINALE and MULTIPLE REAL GAMES and POSSIBLY MIKE AND I EACH HAVING TO TAKE A BUNCHA AQUAVIT SHOTS.

now look at this:

jk nothing to look at eat a dick.