Even though Sunday was technically Opening Day, Monday was the day that really felt like the true Opening Day, with tons of games going on. How exciting! The games actually count now! One of the best games of the day had to be the Orioles and Blue Jays where Mark Trumbo launched a big ol’ Trumbomb to win the game for the Orioles. He ended the game going 2-5 with a HR and 2 RBI. This is what he does, and he’ll probably have an awesome first half, like he always does, so enjoy it while it lasts.
Let’s take a look at some of the other performances from the day:
Yasmani Grandal – 2 for 5, 2 HR, 2 R, 3 RBI. The Dodgers absolutely demolished the Padres 14-3, and Grandal was a big part of that. This is what Grandal does, he crushes the ball, and he does it well. As long as he’s playing, he’s a threat to go deep at any time.
Xander Bogaerts – 2 for 4, 2 SB. Now on pace for 324 steals, Bogaerts went 2-4 without any RBIs or runs, but he stole two bases. We know Bogaerts is fast, but two steals in one game, maybe Bogaerts is going to make a bigger point of stealing bases this year than we anticipated. His baserunning got exceptionally better last year, maybe it’ll get even better this year.
Byron Buxton – 0 for 5. This is one of those “don’t panic” entries. Buxton went 0-5, and guess what? This is going to happen with him. But don’t give up hope, Buxton is far too talented to just be terrible for so long. His potential is through the roof, hang on, it’ll be OK.
Rougned Odor – 2 for 4, 2 HR, 2 R, 4 RBI. Odor had quite a nice game and while he only got the two hits, both were home runs, and that’s the kind of power we can expect from Odor. His free-swinging tendencies still scare me, as they’re not particularly reliable, but there’s no denying his talent or his power.
Corey Seager – 2 for 5, 1 HR, 1 R, 3 RBI This just in! Corey Seager is really good! Seager joined in with the Dodgers beatdown of the Padres, crushing the ball along with everyone else on the team. Seager is an amazing hitter and one of the safest players at just about any position, enjoy.
Justin Turner – 3 for 5, 2 R, 1 RBI. Another Dodger who joined in to kick the Padres in the face, Turner ended the game with two doubles and a nice delivery of some solid counting stats.
Asdrubal Cabrera – 3 for 5, 1 R, 1 RBI, 1 SB. Cabrera ended the day stuffing up the statsheet, but don’t expect to see too many more stolen bases out of Cabrera. He might be good for only like four more, but do expect some power and a decent average.
Mark Reynolds – 2 for 4, 1 HR, 2 R, 3 RBI. Yea, I mean, this was cool and all, good for Mark Reynolds, but don’t expect much from him. Reynolds is a guy who, on the year will give you league average offensive production. Long gone are the days of 30-40 home runs and 100 RBIs. Reynolds is semi-useful in very deep leagues and obviously in NL-only leagues.
Ryan Schimpf – 2 for 4, 1 HR, 1 R, 1 RBI. Schimpf is an older player with limited MLB-level experience. He was able to smack 20 home runs in only 330 plate appearances last season, so the power is there, he just strikes out a ton and will have an exceptionally low average, so I wouldn’t trust this. But hey, nice night, right?
No love for K-Davis? That’s okay, he’ll be traded from my team soon anyways :(
^ was a sad face
Surprised Khris Davis didn’t make the cut with his 2 homer performance.
On Khris Davis not being it….Maybe this got written before the As/Angels game, since Trout didn’t make the cut either. Just my guess.
We’re still working on finding the perfect format for these articles, you can expect more batters being included in future editions, which would certainly highlight any player hitting 2+ HRs.
At the end of the day though, not much changes for Davis owners – we all know he has elite power, so his exclusion is a little different than, say, if Josh Bell launched two bombs.
That makes a lot of sense. I just felt like Khris Davis is a notable person because a lot of ranking sites (this one included) are not ranking him like a 35+ HR, 90+RBI, .245 hitter. And him hitting two homers already is at least pointing towards the power being real (even if it is absurdly small sample size).