Catch-22: Taijuan Walker

[Edgy MD]

NAME: Taijuan Walker
AGE: 29
POSITION: Starting Pitcher Guy
NUMBER: 99
LUFTBALLONS: 99
NICKNAME: "Tai-Weezy"
fWAR IN 2021: 1.4
ZIPS PROJECTION FOR 2022: 1.1

Hey, folks! It's time for the next installment of the series no one is talking about! But the forum is dead and the FCC says we have to air something or lose our license!

I'm Taijuan Walker. I'm a starting pitcher. And in 2021, I was a legitimate All-Star in my first half, and little more than a replacement player in the second half. I was probably hurt. I should know whether I was or wasn't, but let's just say that I was.

So I'm back in 2022, and my season so far has been a microcosm — if not a micro-microcosm — of 2021. I contributed two lovely perfect innings, and I disappeared. But time plows on and so must we. This afternoon in St. Louis, I threw 64 pitches in a simulated game, and Burt Sugarman or whoever our manager is says I'm going to be back in the rotation this weekend! That could totally happen!

What happens after that? I say the arch-filled sky is the limit. But reality has other things to say. What say you?

[MFS62]

I think he's losing his grip, but not in the psychological way.
He's losing it because he can't use the sticky stuff any more.
And that goo was the glue that held his pitching repertoire together.
His numbers will more closely resemble those in the second half of last season, after the stuff was banned.
4.78 ERA, 1.38 WHIP in 128 IP this year

Later

[Lefty Specialist]

6-6, 4.25 ERA. Not as bad as the second half of 2021, but not as good as the first half either.