Jovan's Goat Whale Pulse Check

Now that we’re around the All-Star break, it seems like there’s no better time to get a (just beyond) midseason pulse check on the goat whale. 

This was maybe my sharpest goat whale square read of all time. Austin Riley got his 2nd SB on April 13th and has gotten an additional 5 more since. You can go back to the article I wrote up on this one too, where I talked about expecting double digits, no big deal tho. Mind you he’s doing it all while having a career-worst season at the plate, hitting just above the Mendoza line after this past weekend. Imagine how many he’d have if he actually got on base. Ok enough self-glazing now to the squares we still actually gotta sweat.

(Pray for health because that’s the only thing that could prevent these guys from turning green)

Burg has gone through some up and downs all year with some hot hitting stretches and some quite the opposite. He’s even been moved down in the order a few times because of it. But one thing hasn’t changed, he mucks RBIs. Even in game where the Rangers offense does nothing (which have been quite often until recently), he’s the one driving in their only runs. At the start of the year, Wyatt Langford and Josh Jung were consistently either not setting the platter or destroying it altogether. Since Burger got moved down, it hasn’t been too much of an issue. The platter has been there. Assuming he stays healthy this is green before NFL preseason starts.

This was always a bet on Elly staying on the field. Thankfully despite missing about a month, his fast start carried more than enough weight to have us feeling good. He had 12 tanks through May, which is when he first went on the IL. Since returning on June 23rd, he added a quick 3 to his tally before the break. Elly overall started seeing the ball really well the last few weeks, hitting just shy of .300 in July so far. I think he comes out hot in the 2H, with a pretty solid start in Coors this past weekend.

(Grab your Gootz Gatorade towels because we’re strapping in for these)

After a solid start to the season, Gavin has come crashing down to earth in the last month or so. He was pretty dominant early especially in the innings department. Nothing kills ERA fades like those last clean innings on 100+ pitches. In all of April and May he only failed to pitch in the 6th inning once. In June he pitched in the 6th inning just once, only recording one out at that. He also pitched to a 6.04 ERA in June, helped by a disastrous 7 spot given up against the Brewers. Some of the command issues are starting to bite him, and those runners reaching on free passes aren’t being stranded as much. The Pirates had a nice HR derby against Gavin to begin his 2nd half, which was absolutely gorgeous. Everything is lining up as we expected, now we sweat.

Pretty easily the worst looking square in here. Salvy was one of the worst hitters in baseball in the first month or so of the season, really dug a hole for us early. Had it not been for a solid stretch from him in the past couple weeks, this for sure would be dead. He was fortunate to face some horrific arms from the Mets and Orioles to statpad against and we are thankful for that. There is another stretch looming like that in August where he goes to Coors then gets to see the Twins, Cubs, Angels, and A’s. That has the chance to be a nuclear stretch for Salvy. His projections sit mostly in the mid 120s right now, so as long as he can be not complete dogshit until that point I’d feel pretty good about him getting hot enough during that August stretch to clutch up. One cold stretch could be disastrous but if he's able to tread water and get us to Coors...That’s when the big sweat begins.