The Very Unlikely Yordano Ventura to the Yankees Rumor

Depending on what news site you get your information from and depending on what jersey you wear when you go out to your favorite ballpark to watch your favorite team the Kansas City Royals may or may not have made young right-hander Yordano Ventura available. Ventura has been troubled to say the least in his young major league career and he has caught attention for many on-the-field instances including the 99 MPH fastball that found Mann Machado’s midsection earlier in the week that caused a brawl between the two clubs. Now, again depending on what you read and what you believe, Ventura may be on the trading block. Should the Yankees be interested? Better yet, will they be?

If you look at stats alone you will be left scratching your head wondering why I would even suggest that the Yankees acquire him. In 12 starts this season Ventura has posted a Michael Pineda like 5.32 ERA and is also tied for the AL lead in walks allowed with 35. His stats are not encouraging and he has a temper that has led to enough altercations that the Royals want to trade the 25-year old, why would anyone want him? Because he’s talented and his projections are through the roof, that’s why. Remember, and I’m not comparing the two, the last troubled right-hander that could throw in the triple digits but struggled with command and effectiveness? His name was Nathan Eovaldi and this sounds like a similar situation as far as pitching alone goes.

In the last two years Ventura has won a combined 27 regular season games for the Royals while posting a meager 3.61 ERA which does not include his 10 valuable appearances in the postseason and World Series for the Royals over the past two seasons. This kid is the real deal and he’s battled tested but with all these altercations his trade value and price is at an all-time low, which is also known as a Brian Cashman special around these parts. While the deal makes a lot of sense on paper that is exactly why I think Cashman and the Yankees won’t pull it off, it makes too much sense. It gets the team younger, cheaper, better and ready for the long run rather than the short haul, the ultimate plan in the Bronx, and yet I can’t see the Yankees GM pulling the trigger.

Call me pessimistic but I am using a bit of common sense with a recent history and sample size to come to my conclusion here. Cashman doesn’t like to give up top-tiered prospects and it would take that to land Ventura. He also doesn’t tend to make the blockbuster deal anymore and whoever acquires Ventura is going to receive a blockbuster of talent in return. I just can’t see that talent coming to the Bronx any time soon unfortunately. 

Game Thread: New York Yankees vs. Kansas City Royals 5/11

Game Three between the New York Yankees and the Kansas City Royals is about to go down but honestly I don’t know how much of it I’ll be able to watch. After watching the Lookouts last night and staying out far past my bedtime this game better be good if it’s going to catch my attention for long. Donned with the task of keeping me up tonight for the Yankees is Michael Pineda who will be looking for some consistency this season against another young right-hander searching for similar consistency in Yordano Ventura. The game will be played at 7:05 pm ET inside of Yankee Stadium and can be seen on the YES Network, ESPN’s Wednesday Night Baseball and of course MLB TV.

There’s only one more game after tonight in this series so you’re running out of time to see the Yankees live and in person in the Bronx. Click the Yankees tickets link at the top of the blog now to reserve your spot for the finale between these two American League teams and still have a few dollars in your pocket to eat on thanks to Ticket Monster. If you can’t make it live then you can always follow along and root for the home team from afar on Twitter by giving @GreedyStripes a shout. We are always around and try and live tweet each and every game, won’t you join us?

Pineda is ready and so are the Royals so let’s get to it. Go Yankees!

Game Preview: New York Yankees vs. Kansas City Royals 5/11

The New York Yankees and the Kansas City Royals will square off head-to-head for the third time this week tonight inside of Yankee Stadium. In this four game set we have been entertained by a few great pitching matchups on paper and the pitching matchup tonight hopefully won’t disappoint as well as the Yankees send Michael Pineda to the mound to face off with Yordano Ventura for the Royals. Ventura reminds me a lot of Luis Severino in a way, live arm but hasn’t quite put it all together yet, so this will be an interesting watch tonight in the Bronx.

Pineda pitched better in his last start against the Boston Red Sox and was extended farther than he had been all season but it still wasn’t enough to turn things around just yet. Pineda allowed two runs and eight hits in 106 pitches but opponents are still batting a staggering .307 against the Yankees right-hander this season.

Ventura has also looked less than stellar in his last few starts, especially his last two, which is not a great sign for the royals. Ventura has walked 11 batters in his last two starts and gave up six hits and five runs in his most recent start against the Cleveland Indians. If Pineda weren’t on the mound this would be the easiest win of the series for the Yankees on paper. We don’t play the games on paper though unfortunately.

The game will be played at 7:05 pm ET inside of Yankee Stadium and can be seen on the YES Network, ESPN’s Wednesday Night Baseball and of course MLB TV. It’s not very often that the Yankees get to flex a little bit against the defending World Series champions and it’s always fun to beat up on them so let’s have a little fun after a hard start to the 2016 season. Shall we?

Go Yankees!

Fantasy Baseball: The Undervalued & the Unappreciated

By now a lot of you have already had your fantasy baseball drafts but if you haven’t then I have some last minute crunch time additions for you to read over as you prepare. Over the course of the winter we have gone over the players that many don’t know about, many call them sleepers, but today we will go over some of the more recognizable names around the league. These names are recognizable in most households but in my opinion they are truly under-appreciated and undervalued as far as fantasy baseball goes. Well they were before today anyway. 

We begin with Justin Upton who has been playing in some of the most pitcher friendly ballparks in all of Major League Baseball over the past few seasons. While Turner Field in Atlanta is far from the spacious outfield in Petco Park it’s still tough to hit a home run there and Upton still has 26-plus home run seasons in four of his last five seasons. Him moving to Comerica Park in Detroit shouldn’t affect him too much in the power department and shouldn’t affect his 20 stolen base capability per season either. 

Like many positions the first base position is pretty top heavy but near the bottom of the upper tier is Los Angeles Dodgers first baseman Adrian Gonzalez. Quietly A-Gon consistently puts up 20 home run and 85 RBI seasons every single year and not many people talk about it. Must be all those West Coast games. 

We’ve said it many times before and we’ll say it again, even the worst teams in the league that lose 100+ games per season will get you 30-50 saves in a year. While the Baltimore Orioles and Chicago White Sox are far from the worst teams in the league and while neither will lose 100 games in my opinion they will both struggle to compete in their divisions. That doesn’t mean Zach Britton won’t strike out another 10 batters per nine innings and save 35 games again and that doesn’t mean David Robertson wont strike out closer to 12 batters per nine innings and save you 40 games in 2016. 

Matt Wieters enters 2016 in his second year removed from Tommy John surgery. I know the surgery doesn’t affect position players the same way it affects pitchers but it also affects everyone differently. I truly believe that many of his struggles in 2015 were due to the elbow ligament replacement surgery and in his second year removed I think we see more of the 22-ish home run power we saw from 2011-2013 and less of the product we saw in 2015 going forward. 

Most people only spoke about the first half Yordano Ventura that struggled with his command and effectiveness and not enough people noticed his second half correction. Ventura went back to striking out guys at an alarming rate during the second half of the 2015 season due in large part to a spike in first pitch strikes. If he can harness some control and keep batters off the base paths his defense and Kauffman Stadium should help him finally harness that huge potential in 2016. 

The final player is Jason Hammel. Hammel is living in the shadow of Jake Arrieta, Jon Lester and now John Lackey but Hammel has all the makings of being one of the best fourth or fifth starters in the major leagues this season. He is a consistent 9.0 K/9 ratio and a below 4.00 ERA every single season with a ton of innings. With this Cubs offense behind him he may win 15 games, all he has to do is keep it close. 

Does This Mean The Mets Wont Be Amazing In 2015?

The last time the Kansas City Royals won the World Series was the 1985 season when rookie pitcher Brett Saberhagen won a decisive Game 6. Saberhagen had some help as the Royals put up 11 runs on the board in that contest to force the Game 7 that Kansas City would ultimately win. Enter Game 6 of the 2014 World Series when rookie pitcher Yordano Ventura shut down the San Francisco Giants in Game 6 behind a 10-0 victory for the Royals. As we all saw in Game 7 the San Francisco Giants showed that a stud lefty is more valuable than home field advantage any day.

In 1986 the Amazing Mets won the World Series over the Boston Red Sox in the Bill Buckner series. Does this mean the Mets wont come out of nowhere and win the 2015 World Series? Hey, you never know.