[Cynical]

For anyone wondering how this is turning out:


We're in early September now, one game behind in the division, and leading the wildcard, one game ahead of the Rays (who we'd be facing in the wildcard if the season ended today), and five games ahead of the Red Sox. A lot of that is luck -- we've overperformed our Pythatorean Record in July and August by quite a bit, but hey, playoff appearances are playoff appearances. As for some of the subplots:


Greinke got traded to the Twins for Garver. This ended up being a great trade for me; Greinke's ratings dropped quickly after I traded him, and then he got a season-ending injury in early August. Dodged a bullet and got a great catcher for myself.


DeGrom got it together, and is third in the AL in pitching WAR, third in strikeouts, and top 10 in ERA (you know things are getting crazy when 3.8-ish is "top 10 ERA"). If this was the real world, he wouldn't be in Cy Young award talks (that would be a contest between Cole and Snell -- #2 and #3 in ERA, #1 and #2 in WAR, #1 and #2 in Ks), but he's definitely become the team's ace.


George Springer's injury ended up being career ending -- a huge blow to the team. We've done a lot of trading around for outfield help since then, but we're down to having to start either Stuart Fairchild or Mike Gerber -- not ideal. We very briefly had Jason Lowe around to help as well, more on him later.


I've let Altuve hit 10/5 rights, which I know is a move I'm going to regret later -- his glove has already degenerated to the point that I have to play him as DH, and he's only been "decent" as a hitter this season... but I just bring myself to trade Altuve. Sentimentality wins out here, at least for now. I traded Rogelio Armenteros to the Braves to get Johan Camargo to play 2B, and he's doing shockingly well, with an OPS close to .900; I don't expect he'll remain this productive, but he's got one hell of a glove that he's projected to maintain, which should keep him on the team for a while.


Gausman got traded to the Mets (along with Lowe), where he continues to be mediocre-to-slightly-bad (5.3-ish ERA, but given how bonkers the offense has gotten in my world, that's not terrible). I saw Syndergaard on the trading block, and couldn't resist... yeah, he's a one year rental, but still, that's the sort of thing that can put you over the edge, and seems totally worth trading a "mediocre-with-potential" guy and a "good ratings but badly underperforming" guy for. Unfortunately, Syndergaard decided to suck hard as soon as he joined my team; since joining the Astros, he's got an ERA over 7, and a pitcher WAR of 0.5 (this trade was made almost exactly halfway through the season). Given how, even if we do end up making the playoffs, I don't think we have a real shot of winning it all (see below), this is a move that I'm really regretting.


I finally ended up releasing poor Verlander. I feel kind of awful about it, but he was angry as hell at me by the time I did it (he really didn't appreciate me trying to send him to the minors, then putting him on waivers in the hopes someone else would take him), he was impossible to trade, and there was no way in hell I was giving him the kind of role he wanted on the team, so it had to be done. He's now playing in -- and struggling in -- A+ ball on a minor league contract, for reasons I will never understand... dude, you have your millions of dollars and you're married to Kate Upton, go enjoy retirement!


In other news, Osuna got traded to the Yankees for Severino. I noticed in his first few starts that he couldn't get beyond about 70 pitches without hitting the wall and thought "WTF? This guy is showing as 65 stamina, what is going on here?" Then the OSA scouts updated his page with a "35 stamina" after about a month... gee, thanks for not noticing that one sooner, guys! My head scout still thinks he has 65 stamina, which has me seriously wondering about whether I trust him; sure, dude, your budget is low because we went over on our personnel budget, but are you even watching the games?!?! Correa is out for the season with a broken kneecap from a double-play slide, another huge blow for the team (and a big part of why I think that even if we do make it to the playoffs, we've got no real shot of winning it all -- the best I could do in the infield was bringing up Freudis Nova to play 3B, and a lineup of Garver(C)/Alvarez(1B)/Camargo(2B)/Bregman(SS)/Nova(3B)/Fairchild(CF)/Tucker(RF)/Brantley(LF)/Altuve(DH) with Gerber, Santana, and some random minor league callup for backup infielder sitting on the bench just isn't going to cut it.