By JIMMY D / Fantasy baseball, steroids for Grimsley? | Jimmy's archive

Jason Grimsley probably never made it onto your fantasy team.

Or anyone else’s for that matter. But he was going to hit the baseball history books anyway, despite his non-descript 16-year career mainly as a middle reliever.

As a sometimes starter for Philadelphia in 1991, he put together a record-setting string of performances, throwing wild pitches in nine straight games - something not even wild-man Rick Ankiel or knuckle-chucker Tim Wakefield could manage.

Then in 1994, he ensured his place in baseball lore by admitting his accomplice role in the great corked-bat caper that trapped Cleveland slugger Albert Belle.
Grimsley snuck his way through duct work at Comiskey Park to get to the umpire’s changing room to swap an illegal bat that Belle had used in the game for a regular one.

It turns out that he wasn’t prone to only helping others cheat.

He got caught last week again as most of you have winced and read. Yup, steroids again. And human growth hormone. And it seems just about anything else that could him the extra edge to cling to his MLB career.

This was news and not news, but the fact investigators now have even more information and more names of alleged cheats mandates more fallout in the coming weeks and months.

Will anyone on your fantasy roster pop up on the steroid radar? It’s a sick thing to have to take into account and to have to make contingency plans for dopers on top of injury updates and recent stats.

Chan Ho Ruth?

Quick! Who leads the San Diego padres in batting average? It’s a surprise, but given how his walk total and ERA are always inflated, maybe it’s to be expected that Chan Ho Park would by 8 for 22, good for a .364 clip at the plate. Park has actually been having a decent season by his standards with a 4.36 ERA and opposing batters hitting .257 against him.

There is similar concern at the No. 1 spot in the Padre rotation where Jake Peavy continues to confound. The stingy ace struck out 10 in five innings Sunday, which sounds great, but he also got waxed for eight hits and six earned runs and another loss.

So why are the Pads hanging around in the NL West? Jimmy mentioned Chris Young last week and he was back at it this week, chucking six clean innings and striking out 12 against Florida.

Delirious De-Liriano

So nobody took Jimmy’s preseason advice to add Francisco Liriano to their roster? I figured anybody who did would be sending flowers or beer or at least email greetings now that the Twins lefty has taken off.

He threw seven innings of one-hit ball Sunday to go with a nice game he threw earlier in the week (when he was beaten by another stud rookie Felix Hernandez). Prior to that, batters managed just seven hits and a single run in three starts covering 17 innings.

Leave it to Weaver

Jered Weaver, a 2004 first-round pick and the younger brother of Angel righty Jeff, has made a splash in the bigs. He suffers from the same bad hair as his brother with those goofy tufts of semi-mullet-mop sticking from under his hat, but he’s 3-0 with 1.86 ERA so far.

His brother has always had great stuff, but lacked consistency and had some bad luck with run support. Anaheim gave Jered 10 runs in his first two starts and enough to get him his third last week against Tampa Bay. He’s another one to watch as you look to fill your rotation, perhaps plugging a hole left by Jay A.J. Burnett (who is targeting a June 23 return) or Cub Mark Prior, who is still making rehab starts in the minors.

Don’t Mench-in it

Before Sunday’s doubleheader in Boston where he homered and drove in three runs,  Ranger OF Kevin Mench had gone 23 games without a dinger and had driven in just 10 since the end of April. His numbers are still presentable because of his scorching start, but keep an eye on Mr. Mench.

Phooey or pooey

Jimmy was asked why he didn’t make a Belmont Stakes prediction so that he might go 0-3 on the Triple Crown events. Sarcasm aside, there was such little hype around the race after Barbaro’s leg imploded in the Preakness, that Jimmy didn’t even watch.

Not that he wasn’t reminded of horses after Mrs. Jimmy delivered two loads of equine fecal matter for her gardens and positioned it smack in the middle of the driveway.

Jimmy jr. expressed his contempt for this on many occasions and Jimmy himself was forced to climb in the passenger side of his 1973 Super Beetle because the pile of road apples was blocking the driver side.

It was ironic that during the same week, a reader unhappy with Jimmy’s anti-baseball suggested Jimmy’s head was full of the same material.

For the record, Jazil won at Belmont and I would not have bet on him.
Stay busy and stay lucky.

Jimmy D