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Didn't see this coming

By Phil Gurnee

As Ryan Ludwick goes for his sixth straight game with a home run I thought it would be a good time to take a look at this years group of players who would have drawn a few smirks at your local roto draft if they had been offered up. Some of these are good players who are just have having great years (Nady, Huff ) but most these guys are "are you kidding me".

OPS+ Rank Name OPS+ AtBats POS
7 Ryan Ludwick 161 426 OF
11 Xavier Nady 149 402 OF
14 Ryan Doumit 144 303 C
25 Matthew Joyce 140 157 OF
30 Aubrey Huff 136 472 DH
31 Denard Span 136 168 OF
35 Ramon Vazquez 134 282 3b
40 Ryan Spilborghs 134 224 OF
43 Ryan Church 133 231 OF
44 Mike Fontenot 133 203 UT
45 Fernando Tatis 133 195 OF
47 Rick Ankiel 132 391 OF
49 Mike Aviles 130 231 SS
50 Nate McLouth 130 501 OF
52 Adam Lind 129 160 OF
53 Kelly Shoppach 129 243 C
58 Jerry Hairston 127 218 UT
63 Sean Casey 125 159 1st
64 Eric Hinske 124 315 OF
65 Chris Iannetta 124 256 C
70 Marcus Thames 122 248 OF
71 Ty Wigginton 122 276 3rd
74 Casey Blake 122 412 3rd
78 Jody Gerut 121 286 OF
81 Gabe Kapler 117 182 OF
82 Scott Hairston 117 322 OF
86 Jorge Cantu 116 488 3rd
87 Omar Infante 116 186 UT

Quite a few of these guys have been career utility players. Ramon Vazquez, Mike Fontenot, Jerry Hairston, and Omar Infante are all players who have spent significant time in the major leagues and never tasted success like this.  Then we have guys like Aviles who was on nobody's radar in the KC organization and boom, this guy has the highest OPS+ for an AL SS. We got Berroa they promoted Aviles. 

Ludwick who is the star of this group was once a decent prospect in the Indian orgranaztion but man that was years ago. Injuries derailed his career but he kept at it and has helped keep the Cardinals in the pennant race.  Gabe Kapler was retired and has come back to hit better then our best players prior to the Manny deal.

For all the praise we heap on our young kids it is interesting to see this motley crew of rejects kicking our butts in production.  There are some kids on the list who once showed promise like Lind but the list is also populated with players that we would have been very unhappy if Ned had acquired. Huff, Vazquez, Spilborghs, Fontenot, Tatis, Hairston, Casey, Hinske, Wigginton, Blake, Gerut, Kapler, Hairston, Cantu, and Infante. Yet all of them have outhit our best hitter.

Our only guys in the top 100 OPS+ (100 Rank) with over 150 at bats this year is a player who hasn't played in months(Furcal) and the guys we just acquired in deadline deals(Manny, Blake).  We all expected Kemp, Martin, and Loney to be somewhere in the mix, but they aren't .

It would have been nice to have at least one surprise, one guy who did something we didn't expect on the positive side instead of guys who did something we didn't expect on the negative side(Jones, Kent).

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