I am going to be honest here.
I’ve seen the writing on the wall in the National League for a few years now. Whereas I once spent so much time worrying about pitching, I’ve shifted heavily on offense, and the Dude’s lineup is certainly a reason why.
Just look at this monster roster.
It’s scary good, and as if he needed any boost, he added Mookie Betts and Trevor Story to join a group that already boasted Jeff McNeil, Rafael Devers, Alex Bregman, Michael Brantley, Cody Bellinger and Yordan Alvarez.
This team is going to mash. It’s going to destroy. It’s going to … we need to have Webster’s create a new word for this.
“I sure as hell hope so!” the Dude said. “If we need a new word then this offense is doing its job. On paper, these men matchup with any offense in the JLB.”
Matchup? … I’m not sure about that at this point. I play the Dude in Week 1 and I’m not sure he’ll have to worry about “matching up.”
I mean, I was scared of this offense before he got Betts.
And let’s talk about that. Was that really necessary? You took a Cy Young caliber pitcher off of this team to add more offense?
“I actually think yes,” the Dude said. “I never expected last year's offense to be so productive, so I think there's some regression in the cards for the Dude this season. By acquiring Betts and Story, I'm hoping that'll be enough to offset that. Plus, it's really fun to improve my team by trading with Choo! It hasn't failed me yet!”
Yes, it’s always a good move. Just never do a trade-back. (Facepalm over Acuna.)
So yes, the Dude will mash, but will he be vulnerable on the pitching side without the absolute dominance of Gerrit Cole?
“Not worried as the ‘mash’ should be able to support it, but it's going to be a tougher road this season without Cole and now with Price opting out,” he said. “I like the bones of the pitching staff and I feel like most weeks it'll do enough to get by. This staff will not win the rotisserie title like last year's did, you can mark that down.”
Patrick Corbin is now the front-man of this staff, and outside of Hyun Jin Ryu who moves from the NL West to the AL East, there really isn’t a starter that scares you right now.
This is where teams will really have to hope to pick up wins when facing the Dude, because you’ll be lucky to snag six batting categories against him.
Then again, quarantine has been so long, we tend to forget that there are a bunch of Astros who were cheating, and many of them are on the Dude’s team.
Could they be due for a regression this year?
And if they do regress, do we consider the Dude a harborer of cheaters?
“To be honest, I forgot I even drafted him,” the Dude said, laughing out loud. “Not proud of that but his giant eyes must have seduced or scared me into clicking DRAFT. The Astros cheated, so what, these guys are still beasts. Bregs is an alpha. Brantley is a professional hitter. Yordan was the second half MVP but now has bad knees, not just one bad knee, but two bad knees and covid. I feel like someone has a voodoo doll in this league trying to keep the Air Yordan™ grounded.”
[Hides voodoo doll.]
I can’t imagine anyone stooping to that level.
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