JLB Week 3: Scouting for the future

With some JLB teams that are more accustomed — or at least have gotten comfy — to being at the top finding themselves at the bottom, panic has set it.

“Time to plan for the future,” is what is going through their minds right now. 

Time to panic trade. Time to panic drop/add.

Let me help you take that panic to an even higher level: Time to panic scout for 2033.

Robbie Vaughn, a.k.a. Junior Cheese Steak, hit a huge bases-loaded two-out single on Saturday. I didn’t get the final line from his papa, but I can only assume he went 5-for-5 with 9 RBIs and 5 run scored.

The little guy is climbing through the ranks of the Little Leagues and it won’t be long before his name finds its way into Fantrax player pool.

“Future Steak,” Jim Vaughn said, proudly.

It got me thinking about how cool that would be. The JLB is in its 11th year with a strong group of owners who shouldn’t be going anywhere soon, so feasibly, in 15 to 18 years from now, several JLB fathers (and mother) could be in the situation where their little ones are in the Fantrax player pool.

I’m not saying we have any MLB stars, but remember, Fantrax will add any player that has a decent chance of being drafted by an MLB team in June.

Even if your little one is an at-best 35th-round draft pick, you may one day go into the JLB March Draft wondering: “When do I draft my son?”

Seriously. Think of the scenarios. You have to take him first round, right?

What would the conversation be at Thanksgiving if he found out you let Choo get him in the fifth round because you decided to get a closer instead.

Ouch.

With all this in mind, it’s never too early to start scouting and projecting our little ones. I’ve gone ahead and done some of the legwork for you all, so here are the JLB’s six future stars’ scouting reports. Disregard the numbers. They’re not rankings. I just use numbers because I like to be organized.

1. Robbie Vaughn, SS, Emmaus: This guy knows how to hit, but he’ll age quickly, so buyers beware. All the colleges will be coming after him because, for some odd reason, all his homers and great plays will be landing on the nightly news. He must know someone.

2. Lucas Johnson, 1B, Parkland: He’s listed as a first basemen, but we all know he’ll be just like his father and trade in the bat for a chance at pitching, and that will end with an endless string of poor outings at Triple-A before fizzling out. It will go down as the worst position change in history.

3. William Getty Walter, CF, Navy: That’s right, Navy. The Outs little guy will have to go the Mitch Harris route to the majors because he’s going to the Naval Academy to become a fighter pilot. He loved baseball and excelled at it all four years at the Naval Academy before flying all the planes his dad spent hours making replicas of.

4. Colin O’Reilly, LHP, Parkland: Strangely, he became the best player in Pennsylvania baseball history to play with his right hand tied behind his back. You see, he wanted to be a shortstop, but his dad tied his right arm behind is back — because shortstops can't be lefty throwers — and forced him to pitch. “You pitch lefty or I bar you from seeing your girlfriend Lily ever again,” Papa Crox would say. Colin was in love, so he listened. Amazingly, he got so used to the arm being behind his back that when he pitched untied he was off-kilter. His junior year of high school, after a horrific untied sophomore year, he went back to the “Single Chicken Wing Windup” and it paid off with a 20-2 record and an 0.92 ERA with 103 strikeouts. He was 20-0, but when teammate Lucas Johnson traded in his bat, Colin lost a pair of 1-0 complete games.

5. Tar Xi Dunbar, LF, Beijing, China: Parker Dunber ordered an Ian Happ jersey from China in August 2017, and for the first time in his many, many orders, the jersey came with the kid who sewed on the Cubs logo. At first, Parker was lost. What should he do? But then, he did what any crazy cheap jersey hoarder would do: He adopted the little guy and turned him into a slap hitter. Ichiro 2.0 is what they call him and he's ready to be a JLB first-round pick. Parker just has to decide which of his three 2033 first-round draft picks to use on Tar Xi.

6. Micah Vaughn, SS, Emmaus: Yes, another shortstop, just like his brother, Robbie. It's a product of seeing Trevor Story fatheads all over the walls of their home as kids. "Who's that Rockie?" they'd ask Papa Vaughn. He never answered and just walked away dejectedly. Mama Vaughn would answer, "What have I told you boys about asking Daddy about Trevor Story?" Still, they were intrigued enough to be shortstops... No wait, better shortstops.

NOW, TO THE JLB

That was quite the random thought. About as random as our first-place teams after three weeks.

The Sex Panthers and the Urban Achievers are you leaders through three of 21 weeks. Still early, yes, but certainly not what many expected when looking at teams on paper.

The Urban Achievers to me is the bigger shock because of his dominance. The Sex Panthers are 34-27-5, which is respectable. But Mr. McJerk is 38-15-13. Just 15 losses through three weeks. That’s incredible.

And whereas I knew the offense would be there for the McJerk — I really liked his lineup heading into the year — I was uncertain about the pitching.

“Who knew,” he said. “My pitching has been way better than I expected.”

That’s for sure.

He’s ranked fourth in the JLB in pitching, posting 18 quality starts with a 12-10 mark, 213 strikeouts, 11 saves, 6 holds and a 3.54 ERA.

Yu Darvish, Jerad Eickhoff, Matt Harvey, Jameson Taillon and Micheal Pineda have all led the way. Darvish has 31 strikeouts and a 3.03 ERA, while Eickhoff had 25 and a 2.55 ERA. Pineda has a 29:3 K:BB ratio and Harvey is 2-0 with 17 strikeouts and a 2.84 ERA.

It’s really looking good on the pitching side, and with Bryce Harper (.400, 7 HRs, 20 RBIs) leading the way offensively, the McJerk is nothing to laugh at. He’s a competitor from here on out.

This week will be the first big test as the Cheese Steaks are right there behind him in the standings and of course he faces them. Strange how that schedule works out. He has now faced the team directly behind him in the NL standings in back-to-back weeks.

His next division matchup after that is the JimmyJam Slammers, so this trend bodes well for me!

HELLO, OFFENSE

After Week 2, Cheese Steak had to wonder if he would ever hit. Watching his son hit Little League ball had to make him wonder why can't his professional hitter barrel up.

Well, Week 3 was much different. He batted .310 with 10 homers, 34 RBIs, 3 triples, 56 singles and 41 runs scored.

His outfielders A.J. Pollock and Andrew Benintendi combined for 21 hits, and his boy Trevor Story had a first-week-of-his-career week, hitting 3 homers with 8 RBIs. He still struck out six times to zero walks, so yeah, NOT BUYING IN STEAKS!

Sorry, I have to forever stay on the side of Story being a non-story.