#6 – Zack Greinke – RHP

Zach Greinke a.k.a. "Leeroy Jenkins"

Zack Greinke – Starting Pitcher. Vatican Assassin Warlock.

Beer to drink while he casts “Wizard’s Breathe” on you and your family: Miller Lite “Home Draft System”

The other day I received an email from a St. Louis fan about the fact that Zack Greinke is likely to start the season on the disabled list. “Serves you right for the Wainwright post,” the note said.

Well, allow me to retort by making another Adam Wainwright joke. “What do you get when you combine Adam Wainwright with the yoga fetal pose?”

“What?”

“16 months away from baseball. Now piss off, and enjoy losing Pujols in the offseason…”

The only lesson that I learned was that Zack Greinke isn’t good at basketball, and if Yovani Gallardo is going to be the opening day starter, then explain to me again how our team is worse than a Wainwright-less Cardinal franchise that has Ryan Theriot as their leadoff hitter. I take everything back that I say about Rickie Weeks in my earlier post.

Ryan Theriot?

That is absolutely adorable. Why not go out and sign another crappy white scrub like Nick Punto while you’re at it? Oh, wait, you did that as well, didn’t you?

Zack Greinke was the premier off-season move that the Brewers faithful hope will put them over the top. Now, we have to wait a few weeks. And that’s perfectly fine. Narveson apparently heard that we were questioning his skills, and he’s lighting it up in Arizona. Add that to the fact that Zack Greinke will still start 30 games and win 15 of them, then I think we’ll be in good shape. The Brewers won’t play the Cardinals until May 6, and someone gets back into the rotation a week or so prior.

Do you know who that is Cardinals fans? Hint: it’s not Adam Wainwright.

The thing is: I simply do not believe for one second that Greinke is even injured. He probably isn’t fazed by the teams he’d be facing in April and would prefer to have his first start of the season on the road against Roy Halladay in Philadelphia. We can then find out once and for all who is the better pitcher to leave for the Senior Circuit. Actually, I’m 100 percent confident that he’s just looking for two extra weeks to play World of Warcraft, which he claims is something of which he is a huge fan.

At the team’s annual fan convention, Greinke participated in a “Family Feud” type game in which one of the categories was “Something you take for granted now that you couldn’t have imagined years ago”. While many people said cell phones and email, Greinke answered “World of Warcraft.”

And that’s most likely what he’s doing right now. So, whoever on the training staff is in charge of Greinke’s cast spell and potion distribution, please get him together again and make sure that he has plenty of manna in store for the season. What the hell am I talking about? I honestly have no idea. I have never played World of Warcraft. However, my friend Rob was forced to give up playing World of Warcraft after he got married. His wife used to wake up in the middle of the night and found that he had been “pretending” to fall asleep, only to wait for her to dose off so that he could go on a “quest” with his online nerd friends. Despite my being a “Noob” or something, I have some knowledge of the game. I have seen the most famous video ever made about World of Warcraft.

And the Brewers are poised to reenact it:

It starts when Greinke arrives to the clubhouse in Philadelphia about 15 minutes late for the team meeting. In the locker room, Braun will be discussing strategy for beating the Phillies in late April. Calling themselves the White Bay Spire, the Brewers will conspire to raid Philadelphia’s Citizens Park. Knowing that the Phillies have an excellent pitching staff and that Greinke will most likely have his first start against Roy Halladay, the Brewers will likely have to clear out the Rookery. Preparing for battle, Prince Fielder will layout over his walkie-talkie how the raid of the stadium will play out. LaTroy Hawkins will go in by himself at first and act as a sacrifice so that the Brewers are able to test the firepower of the Phillies bats. After that, Kameron Loe will begin examine the overall numbers and use his Snake Charm powers in order to lull the Phillies bats to sleep. From there, Zack Braddock will urge caution regarding the weekend series, as the Phillies are the preseason favorites to win the World Series. He will state that the odds of defeating the Boss Pitcher of Citizens Park, the one they call “Doc”, is “44.4444 percent. Repeating of course.”

And just as they are moments away from starting their attack, Zack Greinke will burst into the locker room shirtless. He will not have paid any attention to what the plan was, and simply grab a beer from the fridge and scream, “All right chums, time’s up, let’s do this…” As he runs onto the field of Citizens Park alone, he’ll howl, “LEEROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOY JEEEEEEENKIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINS!!!!”

The Brewers will hand Halladay his first loss of the year 2-1. And from that moment on, whenever Greinke strikes out a batter in Miller Park, we will hear that famous rally cry through the loud speakers and from the fans as the batter returns to the dugout with his head held low.

Fantasy Outlook

W 15

L 4 (You heard me!)

K 172

ERA 3.36

WHIP 1.13

Boars Slain to Enhance Wizard’s Cloak: 2.4 million