Wait, What?

Nelson Cruz has scored 15 runs this year. He's smacked 13 home runs. Who says runs scored is a team event?

D. J. LeMahieu, that's who. The Rockies' catcher is batting .423 in 72 at bats and his teammates have pushed him home five times. Five.

The NL team leader in scoring is...the San Diego Padres. That's despite the Majors' lowest Park Factor of 91. (In other words, you can expect the Pads and their opponents to score 9% fewer runs at Petco than at an average ballpark.)

In his first 37 innings, Astros hurler Dallas Keuchel has already garnered 2.3 wins against replacement this season. In his 15-year Major League career, Randy Wolf has earned 2.3 or more wins for his team over an entire season just four times.

The St. Louis Cardinals pace the Majors with a 2.28 team ERA. That's better than all but 21 individual pitchers with at least 24 innings pitched. And two of them are Cardinals.

Adam Wainwright's record right now looks like this: 2-1, 1.44 in 25 innings. Three walks, 18 strikeouts and no home runs allowed. Dang fine work. And that will be his line for the year.

The Yankees are in first place in the AL East thanks to the hitting of ARod and the back end of their bullpen. Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller have pitched 27 innings and allowed nine hits while fanning 46 batters. I'd tell you their ERA but they don't have one. 

Bruce Chen has delivered a 2.78 ERA for the Orioles in 23 innings so far this year, which leads us to conclude, Bruce Chen is still in the Majors? Oh wait, that's Wei-Yin Chen.

My eyes tell me the Kansas City Royals, whose right fielder is someone named Paulo Orlando, are batting .306 as a team and have scored the second most runs in the Majors. And the Houston Astros have the second best record in baseball and a six game lead in the AL West. I have got to stop taking those pills at night.

Miguel Cabrera is on pace to hit .360 with 32 homers and 110 RBI. Okay, I feel better.

The leading Rookie of the Year candidates at the 1/8th pole are Blue Jays' second baseman Devon Travis, Cubs' rightfielder Jorge Soler and third baseman Kris Bryant, Dbacks' starter Archie Bradley, and Dodgers' center fielder Joc Peterson. Each is older than Bryce Harper.

Mid-April Noodlings

Chris Colabello led the Majors with nine doubles for the Twins at this point last season. He was batting .361. The big first baseman finished the season with 13 two-baggers while batting .229. He’s not on the roster this April.

Nelson Cruz has more homers in five games last week than the Twins, Brewers, Marlins, Cardinals, and Indians each have all season.

The Yankees’ lineup on April 14: Jacoby Ellsbury, CF; Chase Headley, 3B; Carlos Beltran, RF; Mark Teixeira, 1B; Brian McCann, C; Garrett Jones, DH; Stephen Drew, 2B; Chris Young, LF; Didi Gregorius, SS. That includes one player from the team two years ago, and that was Mark Teixeira, who played most of that season for the Disabled List.

Aaron Harang is pitching in his 14^th season in the Majors. He’s won 123 games, earned 23 pitching wins against replacement, collected $60 million and hit like a girl. His .091/.100/.107 includes four walks and 278 strikeouts. In about a season’s worth of at-bats he has cost his teams four losses at the plate. 

With his first home run of the season, and the 155^th of his six-year career, Giancarlo Stanton became the career leader for the Florida Marlins, passing Dan Uggla. That’s the fewest to lead any franchise, but it won’t be for long. Once Stanton reaches 164, he will pass San Diego’s all-time leader, Nate Colbert. The only other active team leader is Evan Longoria with 185 for Tampa Bay.

On April 17, Mike Trout became the youngest player to 100 home runs and 100 steals, breaking Alex Rodriguez’s record by two months. Trout is more than three months shy of his 24^th birthday. The list of players to 100 homers faster than Trout – 10 in all – includes six Hall of Famers, one HOF-worthy (ARod), one future HOFer (Giancarlo Stanton) and two good players -- Tony Conigliaro and Andruw Jones. And hitting home runs isn’t Trout’s signature skill.

Diamondback hurler Josh Collmenter might want to retire now. He became the first pitcher to complete a game in 2015 with a four-hit whitewashing of the defending champs last night. He also threw the first shutout in baseball this year. He also piled up three hits, a run scored and an RBI.

Nelson Now Seattle's Cruz To Bear

There are few endeavors more narcissistic than what you are about to read, and for that this blog offers you a most humble apology. That said, you are commended to peruse this post from February, in which we surveyed the value of slugger Nelson Cruz.

To save you the distaste of consuming a product based on the producer's own review, I will summarize: Nelson Cruz should have accepted the Rangers' $14.1 million qualifying offer last year because no GM was stupid enough to offer him more. I suggested that Cruz is a one-dimensional player headed away from his peak.

In fact, Cruz's best offer was a one-year, $8 million deal with Baltimore, which cashed in on a league-leading 40 home runs that helped them win the vaunted AL East. His 140 OPS and 4.7 WAR earned him an All-Star berth, MVP votes and a fat new four-year contract from Seattle.

So that's $57 million worth of consolation for Cruz and four years of a declining asset for the Mariners. Cruz had a wonderful run with the Orioles, achieving career highs in HR, RBI, runs, walks and WAR. He also largely became a DH. And he got a year older.

Which means Seattle has shelled out top dollar for a one-position player whose skills, as he enters his age 34 season, are likely to begin declining in a home stadium (Safeco Field)  that will mask some of his primary skill -- hitting for power.

As you might imagine, this is a good signing.

Wait, what?

Let's take this one concern at a time:
1. Cruz is coming off his best season. You're paying for his peak performance.
The Mariners have the money, World Series aspirations and a roster they think is close to winning it all. The cost wasn't really an issue for them.

2. Cruz is a DH at this point.
Perfect! The Mariners might as well have batted their pitchers at DH in 2014. Seattle DHs Mendoza'd .189/.271/.302 at the plate. They hit fewer home runs as a group than Cruz hit at Camden Yards alone.

3. He won't hit 40 home runs playing half his games at Safeco.
But every home run he hits there is worth a little more. So it's a wash, except if you're worried about his counting stats. But the Mariners are worried about wins, and now they have a DH and a cleanup hitter to bat behind Robinson Cano, which they didn't have last year.

4. His skills will surely decline soon.
Yes they will. Nelson Cruz almost certainly won't be worth $28.5 million in the final two years of his contract. But he'll earn every penny of 57 large if he leads them into the playoffs and, optimally, into Seattle's first World Series appearance in the first two seasons. 

So the Cruz signing is a gamble, as is any free agent signing, but a gamble based on need and a real desire to win. And if that's your team, you have to be happy because in 2014 Nelson Cruz was doing this against you and in 2015 he'll be doing it for you.

It's Hard to Find a Stupid GM

While there are plenty of baseball fans and writers allergic to the new ideas of the sabermetric movement, there aren't any general managers left in that camp. They can't afford to be; they'll get their clocks cleaned by their more sophisticated competitors.

That one fact explains why Nelson Cruz spit the bit by declining the Rangers' qualifying $14.1 million offer to enter the free agent sweepstakes.

Cruz was banking on at least one GM salivating over his big bat (123 OPS+, primarily because he slugs 34 homers per 162 games) and inking him to a fat deal. 

He may instead be firing his agent. Cruz waited out the market until pitchers and catchers reported and settled on a one-year, $8 million pact that will allow Cruz to attempt a reset on his reputation following a 50-game PED suspension.

But that's not what cost Cruz his lottery ticket. Smart brass did. 

General managers are no longer chipmunks reacting to every shiny bauble. All 32 GMs looked beyond the home runs and saw a pile of mediocrity. Cruz is 33 and won't be younger next year. He makes a lot of outs. (OBP under .330 each of last three years.) He has batted in a friendly home park outside Dallas. He's a DH in right field clothing. Signing him requires the loss of a first-round draft pick.

Not many clubs are lacking in immobile semi-slugging defensive liabilities, and if they are, they can get 90% of Cruz's value for half the cost and keep their draft picks while they're at it. So Nelson Cruz's market value, which he and his agent pegged at somewhere above $14.1 million, turned out to be $8 million, and only then with an asterisk.

The Orioles could sign Cruz only because three conditions existed simultaneously. First, they had a help wanted sign on the DH slot. Second, Camden Yards, like The Ballpark, inflates offensive stats, so the O's could offer Cruz a chance at rehabilitation under sympathetic conditions.

Maybe most importantly, Baltimore already spent its first round pick on Ubaldo Jimenez, meaning the pricetag on a Cruz singing dropped to a #2 pick. That's a significant difference that allowed them to offer Cruz more than other teams could. 

Nelson Cruz is out $6.1 million because teams no longer see a player who batted .266 with 27 homers and 76 RBI in just 109 games. They see a defensive albatross worth two wins-a-year and headed in the wrong direction. 

Perhaps Cruz should make his case to a sabermetric-averse baseball writer. He'd have a chance at three years/$40 million with them.