MLB Opening Day - Pitching Fiasco

 MLB 2021 - April 1 April Fools'Day Joke on Starting Pitching

Where did the Elite Pitching go?

Opening Day was for the most part owned by hitters rather than Pitchers

Gerrit Cole?  Considered by many as the #1 Fantasy Starting Pitcher, Cole lost to Toronto 3-2 and that was one of the lowest scoring games.  Cole allowed 5 hits and walked 2 in 5.1 innings (WHIP = 1.37) and 2 Earned Runs so an ERA of 3.38    

Things would get worse, much worse.

Shane Bieber (CLE)          6 Innings  5 hits, 3 walks  WHIP = 1.33; 3 ER so ERA=4.50

Brandon Woodruff (MIL) 4 innings  6 hits, 2 walks 3 Earned Runs    WHIP = 2   ERA= 6.75

Kenta Maeda (MIN)        4.1  innings  6 hits and 2 walks  but only 1 earned run.  WHIP=1.95  ERA = 2.08

Luis Castellano (CIN)?   Starts the season with an ERA of 21.60 giving up 8 earned runs in just 3.1 innings striking out 0.  Yes 0 Ks for Castellano who entered the contest as one of the top strikeout pitchers in MLB.  Yes I have Castellano on one of my fantasy teams.  a WHIP of 3.22 to go along with the ERA.   

Kershaw (LAD)?  WHIP 2.11   ERA  7.94

Darvish (SD)?  WHIP 2.14  ERA 7.71

and then there were 

Brad Keller (KC) who gave up 6 earned runs in just 1.1 inning (WHIP=10; ERA=40.50); and

Kyle Gibson (Tex) with a WHIP of 70 and ERA of 135.

They picthed against each other.

It was a WILD opening Day for Starting Pitching.

But not all were bitten by the April Fools Bug  Tyler Glasnow and Sandy Alcantara faced off in a pitcher duel down in Florida.  Alcantara yielded 0 runs in his 6 innings of work, allowing just 2 hits and 2 walks while striking out 7.  Glasnow pitched better, also going  6 innings, but yielding just 1 hit.  No walks, no Runs.  

Neither pitcher got a decision. 

On to day 2.  The season is early.  The bad start for many pitchers can be put behind them as they build up endurance and innings.  

But to begin the season, hitters reigned.

Opening Day - tomorrow and already snags in the system.

 So April 1 is tomorrow; and it's not just April's Fool day but also MLB Opening Day.

Are you ready?

I'm not.

I'm ready for the season to begin but my MLB Fantasy Teams are not yet ready.

It's NOT my fault.

For some reason (unknown to me), some injured players are not yet designated as IR so I have been unable to place them on the IR and choose a replacement from the waiver wire.

NYY Luke Voit will start the season on the IR yet in my Yahoo League he is simply shown as DTD

The same is true of NYM SP Carlos Carrasco who is expected to miss maybe 6 weeks because of an injured hamstring.  While I have Voit in a single league and it is a Roto, I have Carrasco in several leagues and they are HTH.

That means I will lose some value right off the bat (nice idiom) because I won't have a replacement for some players until after the season begins.  That's life.

Updated 7 pm CT  

Voit has finally been placed on IR; a waiver claim was made for Trevor Rogers (SP MIA) since TOR SP Robbie Ray was placed on the IR by Toronto for his bruised elbow (he fell at home and bruised it; not baseball related).  I also made a claim for Maikel Franco to make up some power loss from Voit being on the IR.

As of my last check, CArrasco still hasn't been placed on the IR in my leagues.

Also Adalberto Mondesi - SS KC has been placed on the IR to begin the season.  I have high hopes of a breakout season from Mondesi - hopefully injuries won't be a recurring theme with him this season.