Here's your winning lineup for fantasy golf this weekend at the PGA Championship

Glory's Last Shot.  The PGA is really the last exciting golf weekend of the year.  We still have a few compelling story lines heading into Whistling Sraits tomorrow.  The World #1 Rory McIlroy is making his return after missing the British Open with a ruptured achilles he sustained playing soccer.  Jordan Spieth is looking to add to his historic season with a third major championship in four tries.  Dustin Johnson will be looking to erase some awful memories from this course back in 2010 when a two-shot penalty on 18 cost him a playoff birth and a chance to win the PGA.

All of that aside, if you really want to make this weekend interesting then you're going to get involved in some fantasy golf, i.e. Draft Kings.  I've spent the last hour or so carefully dissecting the playing field and I've come to the conclusion that I've just put together the most auspicious six-man fantasy golf lineup ever assembled.  So without further ado, I present to you the six golfers who are going to make you rich this weekend.

1.  Justin Rose, $10,000

This has been my guy all year long.  The 6th ranked golfer in the world comes into this weekend playing really well.  In his last three tournaments he finished T-6 at the British, T-4 at the Quicken Loans National and T-3 at the WGC.  He also finished T-2 at the Masters earlier this year and has played well on Pete Dye courses lately despite struggling at Whistling Straits back in 2010.  He's been right there all year and I have a feeling this will be the weekend where Rose puts it all together and comes away with the Wanamaker Trophy.

2.  Phil Mickelson, $9,600

Had it not been for a couple big blunders, Lefty might have very well been in contention at the end of the British Open a few weeks ago.  He didn't play so well at the WGC and he hasn't had the best year but he's always dangerous at a major.  Plus he's spent the whole week making bets and talking shit to Jordan Speith and Rory during their practice rounds so you know he's ready to go.

3.  Brandt Snedeker, $7,900

Snedeker has had a pretty solid year, making 17 of 21 cuts with one tournament win at Pebble Beach and another second place finish.  After missing a few weeks with a hip injury this summer he came back for the WGC and finished T-33.  Apparently he was very off with his short game which was probably due to rust.  He typically is great on the greens and if he can return to form there he may be a nice sleeper pick this weekend.

4.  Justin Thomas, $7,200

The 22-year-old rookie finished T-4 at the Quicken Loans National a couple of weeks ago and in his last start prior to that he finished T-5.  He's playing as well as he's ever played right now and he may be poised to impress some people at the PGA. 

But is this guy kidding me with these arms?

I didn't read this guy's scouting report but I have to imagine he just hits the ball 90 yards at a time with some serious accuracy.  Station to station.  

5.  Shane Lowry, $7,500

The winner of the WGC shot a bogey-free, 4-under 66 this past Sunday to take the Championship from Bubba Watson.  The big Irishman is carrying a lot of momentum into this weekend and some people seem to believe that the 19th ranked golfer in the world is ready to take the next step and win a major.  At $7,500, I'll take it.

6.  Brooks Koepka, $7,8000

Talk about a guy playing good golf.  Koepka goes into Whistling Straits with five consecutive top 20 finishes including a T-10 at the British Open, a T-3 at the FedEx St. Jude Classic and a T-6 this past weekend at the WGC.  He's made 16/17 cuts this year.  He won the Waste Management Phoenix Open earlier this season and a lot of people are picking him to win the PGA.  And here you can get him for the affordable price of $7,800.  How can you go wrong? 

Yanks lose to Indians 5-4 in 16 innings

There's two ways to look at this.  One is that you could probably not take a more depressing loss than the one the Yankees endured tonight.  The unblemished Andrew Miller picked the worst game possible to blow his first save, the offense failed to correct itself from this past weekend and the Blue Jays continued their torrid play with a win over the A's.

But you can also look at it like this....at least it's over.  I mean that was a brutal game to watch.  I love baseball.  It's my favorite sport.  But games like tonight are awful.  It's not good baseball when teams go inning after inning without scoring off of middle relievers.  Once you hit the 12th inning of a regular season game the result is pretty much going to be a coin-flip based on which team's last bullpen guy will blink first.  If this wasn't such a big game I would have been asleep hours ago.


But it was a big game and tonight was really discouraging for a number of reasons.  The first is that this offense is in a serious funk.  Ellsbury and Gardner continue to be just fucking awful (0-13 combined with 5 K's.  Brett actually had an opportunity to make an impact play in the 9th with A-Rod up and predictably got thrown out trying to steal second).  But it wasn't just those two.  A-Rod and Tex haven't been great lately but they also haven't had any opportunities to bat with runners on. 

Meanwhile, the Blue Jays cannot stop winning.  They beat Oakland tonight and have now won nine in a row and 12 of 13.  The lead in the division is now just two in the loss column and no, I'm still not panicking.  Not yet.

PS - It's easy to forget but Severino pitched tonight and he had another really solid performance.  Early on it felt like it was going to be a short night for the kid but he settled down, gave up a couple runs in the first two innings and was able to get through six having allowed just the two runs and retired 10 of his final 11 batters. 

PPS - Didi is becoming one of the better players on this team.  He's become so dependable in the field and he's hitting better than pretty much everyone in this lineup right now.

Geno Smith Got Punched in the Face by a Teammate, Out 6-10 Weeks With a Broken Jaw

ESPN -  New York Jets quarterback Geno Smith will be sidelined at least six to 10 weeks with two fractures in his jaw, the result of a locker-room altercation Tuesday morning with reserve linebacker IK Enemkpali.
  
"It was nothing to do with football. ... It was very childish," coach Todd Bowles said. "He got cold-cocked ... sucker punched, whatever you want to call it, in the jaw. He's got a broken jaw, a fractured jaw."

Enemkpali, a sixth-round pick in 2014, was released immediately by the team.

"The team knows it. It's something we don't tolerate, something we can't stand," Bowles said. "You don't walk up to a man and punch him in the face."

Smith, who was the presumptive opening-day starter, will have surgery, according to Bowles.


Same old Jets.  In addition to all of the offseason acquisitions, one of the most exciting parts about this upcoming season was going to be the culture change.  New coach, new GM.  No more circus acts or empty bolstering.  Just prepping for a football season with a really talented roster.  And now this.  What could've possibly possessed this moron to assault the starting quarterback in camp while you're trying to earn a roster spot?  You have to be the dumbest motherfucker alive.  I hope this guy goes to jail because people this stupid cannot be aloud to live in normal society.  You cannot make this shit up.  I'm not even mad.  I'm just flabbergasted.  Just when this team is getting ready to be taken seriously they revert back to being a punchline.

You're definitely going to hear a lot of Jet fans tell you that this is the best thing that could've happened to the team.  That's bullshit.  I'm not saying Geno was definitely going to take the next step this year but at least there's room for improvement.  This is the best core of receivers Geno would have ever had and with a couple of years under his belt and a new coaching regime, there's reason to believe that he may be able to elevate his game this season.  But now all of that is on hold.  Everyone knows what Ryan Fitzpatrick is.  He's as mediocre as it gets.  Turns the ball over a ton, doesn't stretch the field and offers pretty much no upside whatsoever.  The Jets were thin at QB and now they're even thinner.

Yanks, Indians. Series Preview.

The Yanks are coming off a miserable weekend in the Bronx where they were swept by the Blue Jays while plating just one run in three games.  The lead in the loss column has now dwindled down to 3 and the world is ready to anoint Toronto American League East Division Champs.  Fans are very fickle and a few wins in Cleveland over the next three days will change that rhetoric very quickly.  But if this team is going to get back on track then the bats are going to have to wake up and that starts with the guys at the top, most notably Jacoby Ellsbury.  The guy has been awful since coming back from the DL.  I thought maybe that big home run against the Sox the other night might get him going but he still looks lost at the plate, not to mention the fact that he hasn't stolen a base since coming back on July 8th. 

Cleveland is not a good team, but they're not an awful team.  They just put up 34 runs over the weekend against the Twins and their pitching is pretty good.  Thankfully Corey Kluber, one of the best pitchers in baseball, isn't slated to pitch this series but the Indians will be sending out plenty of good, young, talented arms to try and keep the Yankee offense stifling.

Pitching Match-Ups

Tonight, 7:10 PM.  Luis Severino (0-1, 1.80) vs. Carlos Carrasco (11-8, 3.76)

Carlos Carrasco is one of the best young pitchers in baseball.  He's coming off back-to-back nine-inning performances, having allowed just one run in those 18 innings.  For a stretch during those two starts, opposing batters were 0-38 against Carrasco.  So yea, he's throwing the ball well.

Severino will be looking to build off his last and only start in the majors where he allowed just two hits and one earned run against the Red Sox in five innings.  He wasn't very economical his last time out and seemed to have trouble putting hitters away despite striking out seven and walking none.  But his arm looked live, he looked very confident and composed and now he'll have to throw on the road greys for the first time and try to do it against an offense that's swinging the bats really well.

Wednesday, 7:10 PM.  CC Sabathia (4-8, 5.34) vs. Danny Salazar (9-6, 3.38)

Salazar has great stuff but was never really able to fully harness it until the second half of last year.  He throws hard and has two pretty good out pitches, a nasty slider and a split-change.  In four starts since the All-Star break he has a 2.03 ERA and has never faced the Yankees.

He'll be opposed by Carsten Charles Sabathia who probably had his best start in three seasons Thursday night against the Red Sox.  He touched 93-94 on the gun with his fastball for the first time in years and finished with a very respectable line (6 IP, ER, 8 Ks, 3 H) while getting a no-decision in a game the Yankees would eventually win.  This is a pretty big game for CC.  We saw a guy the other night that we had not seen in quite some time and now we're going to see if that guy's here to stay.

Thursday, 7:10 PM.  Nate Eovaldi (11-2, 4.15) vs. Trevor Bauer (9-8, 4.06)

Bauer is another guy who was a highly touted prospect but has been very enigmatic on his way to becoming a fortified big league starter.  He throws hard and misses bats but his numbers aren't all that impressive otherwise.  His command isn't great and he's been known to give up a few long balls so that should play right into the Yankees' hands.

Nate Eovaldi, coming off what I thought was his most impressive start of the season against Toronto on Friday, will take the ball in game 3.  He's 6-0 in his last nine starts and has been fantastic since the debacle in Miami.  Is he in the circle of trust yet?  He's getting there.  He still gives up a lot of hits, doesn't get a lot of strikeouts and can't go deep into games.  But he limits damage, gets out of trouble and is usually good for 5-6 quality innings.  He doesn't exactly inspire confidence as a postseason starter but if he keeps pitching like this he may force his way into the conversation.


Though you may have been lead to believe the Yankees are trailing the Blue Jays in the division, they are in fact LEADING the AL East by 3 games in the loss column.  So let's be real for a second.  The Yankees certainly aren't as bad as they played this past weekend and the Blue Jays definitely are not as good as they've played since the trade deadline.  There's a lot of baseball left and plenty of opportunity to pad that lead.  But be that as it may, this is still a huge series for the Yankees as they are very much in the thick of a pennant race.  They catch a little bit of a break visiting Cleveland this week while Jason Kipnis is on DL with a shoulder issue.  The best player on the field for the Indians is Michael Brantley (.313/.388/.460).  Carlos Santana has some pop but is otherwise a very flawed offensive player.  Their closer Cody Allen kind of sucks.  The most exciting player on the team is probably rookie shortstop Francisco Lindor who's supposed to be ridiculous defensively.  Overall, this is just a very mediocre team.  Oh, and we just missed our old pal Nick Swisher who was shipped to Atlanta a few days ago after the non-waiver trade deadline.  I guess in Cleveland being the ultimate bro isn't enough to mask the fact that you suck at baseball.

Curb Your Enthusiasm Is Coming Back.

(Source) – It looks like a new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm might finally be on the way, with Larry David teasing HBO with a notebook full of ideas for it. HBO president Michael Lombardo recalled how David discussed the show with him at the premiere of his new Broadway play Fish in the Dark a few months back. “[He told me,] ‘Do you know what this is? This is the next season notebook’,” he said at the TCA press tour. It seems after spending time on Broadway David might be ready to return to TV, and there are certainly plenty of foibles in 2015 culture for him to send-up. “I don’t think it’s out of his system,” Lombardo added. “When he has something to say, he will come back. “I certainly see this as a continuing dialogue with him – a long one, but a continuing one.” David has he isn’t done with Curb before. Last year Lombardo asked him if he should “emotionally get Curb out of [his] head,” to which the Seinfeld creator replied: “No, no, no, no, no.”


Words cannot really explain how much I need Curb Your Enthusiasm back in my life.  With as many awful, painfully unfunny movies and television shows out there today, the world needs a healthy dose of Larry David.  It's been about 4 years since the last season of Curb but I never lost hope that the show hadn't ended.  I always felt that when the time was right, Larry would be back.  He put together an HBO movie (Clear History, which is hilarious) that he wrote and starred in, he did his thing on Broadway (Fish in the Dark, which was also great) and now it looks like he's got a notebook full of ideas for a new season of Curb.

There are very few artists in the world, whether it's in movies, music or television that make decisions purely based on creative merit.  Larry David is one of those guys.  He doesn't have to make another season of Curb.  He's got more money than god and he could easily spend the rest of his life playing golf with Obama and watching Yankee games.  So when you hear he's got a boatload of new ideas for another season of Curb, you know he put his heart into it.  Who knows how long it will take for the wheels to be put in motion but this is a great sign for anybody who loves to laugh.

 

Let's Not Get Into Panic Mode

Well this weekend could not have gone any worse.  Toronto came into the Bronx on Friday with all kinds of swagger after their deadline moves, having won five games in a row while scoring a million runs.  These three games were a true test for a Blue Jays team looking to make a serious playoff push, and they delivered in a big way.  After the Yankee bats spent the weekend setting all kinds of records for abysmal performance over a three game stretch, Toronto gained three crucial games in the standings and all kinds of confidence heading into the dog days of August.


Folks will tell you that it's time for the Yankees to go into panic mode and that the Blue Jays are the team to beat in the division.  Most of that rhetoric is merited but I for one am not ready to start panicking yet.  There have been peaks and valleys this season and every time this team has gotten punched they've gotten up and punched right back.  Yea, this weekend SUCKED but I'm going to tell you a few reasons why it didn't suck as much as you may think.


The Standings 

It's fun to say that the Blue Jays are only a game and a half out of first place in the division, isn't it?  That 1.5 really looks like Toronto is right on the Yankees' heels.  But in reality, the lead is three games.  The loss column is all that matters.  You can't make those games up.  So while this weekend was a big hit, the Yankees have a little more breathing room than how it's being perceived.
Yankee magic number = 50


The Pitching

During the week and a half that the Yankee lineup was pummeling opposing pitching staffs, the talk around the team was whether or not the starting pitching was good enough to win in the postseason.  Well Tanaka went out on Sunday against the best lineup in baseball and limited them to two runs on solo shots by Donaldson and Bautista.  Eovaldi probably pitched his best game of the season on Friday and Nova pitched great on Saturday until the grand slam by Justin Smoak.  I wouldn't be worried about the offense's long term success and while this lineup was historically bad all weekend long, at least you can be encouraged by a few really good starting pitching performances.


Peaks and Valleys

The Yankees have been a very inconsistent team for the most part this season.  Fortunately for them there's been far more good baseball than there's been bad.  Every time they've played poorly this year they've come back and played well again.  This is a team of veterans who have won before.  They won't get down.  They can easily go into Cleveland here and win three straight.  They also have an opportunity this Friday to go into Toronto and get some quick payback.

But if they're going to do that a few things have to change.  They have to get more aggressive on the base paths.  I understand they have three guys in the middle of their order who hit the ball out of the ballpark but you can't depend on that all the time.  Sometimes when your offense is stagnant you have to find ways to generate runs.  They had a lot of opportunities to swipe a bag on Friday and instead they grounded out into a billion double plays.  Two of the best bag-swipers in the game rest atop this lineup and they need to start playing like it.

Also, Girardi has to do a better job with the bullpen.  This was not a good series for him.  First he  lifts Andrew Miller after throwing just 6 pitches in the 9th inning on Friday night and brings in Brandon Pinder to face the meat of the Blue Jay order in the 10th.  That's a game you have to win and preserving Miller for Saturday with a game to win on Friday was a horrible move.  And wouldn't you know it, Miller was a none factor for the final two games of the series.  Then on Saturday Nova was clearly cooked after loading the bases in the 6th.  Girardi left him in to hang a fat breaking ball over the plate and lose the game on a grand slam by Justin Smoak.  Add that in with the bizarre move against the Red Sox earlier in the week when he took out Justin Wilson with a 1-2 count in favor of Betances and you have a very questionable stretch of bullpen management by Girardi.  When the Yankees bullpen starts to impact the game it should be an advantage, not a disadvantage.  He has to be better.
 
Yankee Magic Number = 50.

Yanks/Blue Jays, Series Preview

So you may have heard the Blue Jays are coming into the Bronx this weekend for a three game set starting tonight.  The Yankees have a six game lead in the loss column today so the pressure is most certainly on the Toronto.  Since making the two biggest splashes at the trade deadline, the Blue Jays are searing.  They're coming off an 8-2 homestand and they are scoring runs even more frequently than the Yankees are.  They've had the most potent lineup in baseball all season long and they bolstered it last week by adding the oft-injured Troy Tulowitzki.  There's no telling how long he'll hold up on that artificial turf at Rogers Center, but for now he's healthy and one of the best players on the planet.  They also added the crown jewel of the trade deadline by bringing aboard David Price.  Not too shabby.

Pitching Matchups:

Tonight (7pm)
Nate Eovaldi (11-2, 4.30 ERA) vs. R.A. Dickey (6-10, 4.06 ERA)

Not feeling great about tonight.  I know the Yankees have a knack for scoring when Nate is on the mound but you can't count on that.  Eovaldi has been good.  He's gotten more consistent and he's much better than he was earlier this year but he's still very hittable.  He throws a a good, hard fastball without a lot of movement but this is a GREAT fastball hitting team.  This is a big test for Nate.  We just have to hope that a lot of those loud outs he usually gets end up being outs and not home runs.

On the other side R.A. Dickey is pitching really well lately.  He hasn't given up more than two earned runs in five straight starts and he's won three straight games.  The Yanks just struggled against Steven Wright on Wednesday so we'll see if the recent experience gives the Yankees a better look tonight or if it's just going to be more of the same.

Saturday (1pm)
Ivan Nova (4-3, 3.10) vs. David Price (10-4, 2.45)

Nova has looked solid since coming back from Tommy John.  He hasn't given up more than 2 earned runs in his last three starts and he's coming off a really strong effort against the White Sox on August 2nd.  He still has room to improve.

The Yanks will see a familiar face in David Price on Saturday.  Price had a masterful outing in his Blue Jay's debut, striking out 11 over 8 innings.  He hasn't pitched well historically against the Yankees but this team is different than the ones he used to face in Tampa.  Still, McCann and Ellsbury both own him so they'll have an opportunity to do some damage on Saturday.  Price doesn't scare me.  Good pitcher....Really good pitcher.  But he doesn't scare me.

Sunday (1pm)
Masahiro Tanaka (8-4, 3.84) vs Marco Estrada (9-6, 3.40 ERA)

Tanaka was ok his last start against the Red Sox.  For a few innings he looked to be in complete control and then sort of unraveled in the fifth.  At this point we're all thinking postseason and we're waiting for Tanaka to pitch like the ace of this staff.  A game against the big bad Blue Jay lineup is a huge barometer test for him to see where he's at, and if he's ready to take that title and run with it.

Estrada hasn't been in the rotation for the entire season but since he was moved there in May he's been good.  He mixes his speeds really well but he doesn't throw very hard.  The Yankees tagged him earlier this season for 5 runs in 4.2 innings back in May.  Very hittable pitcher.

All of the pressure right now is on Toronto.  They're the ones who are six games back in the loss column.  They're also the ones who never win a game when they come to the Bronx so excuse me if I'm not ready to anoint them AL East champs.  I've never been scared of the Blue Jays a day in my life and I'm not starting today.