Prince Fielder is a big guy who swings hard and hits a lot of home runs. Not surprisingly, he also strikes out a lot; those things tend to go hand-in-hand. Except, well, not this year.

I noticed Fielder’s strikeout rate a couple of weeks into the season, but at that point, he was one of a handful of sluggers who were making a lot of contact early in the year. Most of the others – Miguel Cabrera, Paul Konerko, Adrian Gonzalez, Matt Kemp, and Alex Rodriguez, to name a few – have gone right back to striking out as frequently as they had before. For them, it was just a blip on the radar.

Fielder, though, has kept making contact at a crazy high rate. Since that post was written, Fielder has struck out in just 13.1% of his plate 221 plate appearances – not exactly what you would consider regression to the mean, and the sample is getting larger by the day.

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Last year, offense declined so precipitously that we had to put up with a few million Year Of The Pitcher references. While run scoring had been trending down, the drop off was so significant – a .329 league wOBA in 2009 became a .321 league wOBA in 2010, the lowest mark since 1992 – that it was only reasonable to expect some kind of bounce-back. So, in April, we watched to see how much offense would return to baseball.  It Turns out, the answer was none.

The league average wOBA for the first month of the season was .316. The league average wOBA hasn’t been this low since 1989, which was back when Omar Vizquel was just a rookie breaking into the Majors. Most of the players drafted this week were not alive the last time the game was this heavily slanted in favor of the pitchers. But it was April, and an unseasonably cold April at that. Once the weather warmed up, we’d see some more offense.

In May, the league wOBA held steady at .316. But, the early part of May was still pretty cold in a lot of places, and we really needed to wait for summer to show up – then the ball would start to fly again.

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It has begun: the annual rite of teams all magically deciding at the same time that their top prospects have proven enough in the minor leagues and have earned a promotion to the big leagues. So far this week, we have already seen Dee Gordon get the call in Los Angeles, and reports are circulating that Team Joy Squad captain Charlie Blackmon is on his way to Denver at the same time the Padres are preparing to promote Anthony Rizzo. Injuries played a role in the first two call-ups, but no one had to get hurt in San Diego (besides the people trying to watch that team score runs, anyway) to inspire the Padres to give Rizzo a chance in the big leagues.

More promotions are almost certainly coming in the next week. Expect Dustin Ackley to get called up by the offensively challenged Mariners, Brett Lawrie to join the Blue Jays, and Jemile Weeks to find his way to Oakland (possibly as soon as today). All of these teams need help at the positions where these kids play, but that’s been true all season, so what has changed now?

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In the run-up to tonight’s MLB draft, the Pirates have been linked to a host of various players at different times, but this weekend the chatter all began to point toward Pittsburgh selecting UCLA right-hander Gerrit Cole. This morning, Jonathan Mayo reported that the decision had been made, and Cole would indeed be the first player taken in the draft. The Pirates are choosing Cole over Rice third baseman Anthony Rendon, fellow teammate and RHP Trevor Bauer (who has frequently out-pitched Cole this year, especially of late), Virginia southpaw Danny Hultzen, and high school standout outfielder Bubba Starling.

In terms of stuff, no one can compete with Cole in this draft, and few pitchers in Major League Baseball can match up either. He’s routinely been clocked in the upper-90s, touching 100 at times, and comfortably sits in the 94-98 range. Velocity is not a question for Cole, but what made him so exciting earlier in the spring was that his changeup was drawing rave reviews. He’d always had the power fastball/slider combination, but adding a nasty changeup gave him three plus pitches that he could throw strikes with, and given his size and velocity, he’s essentially a scout’s dream.

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Every season, there’s always one thing in demand at the trade deadline — starting pitching. Nearly every contender outside of Philadelphia is in the hunt for another rotation arm, and the demand always outstrips the supply. While there’s no Cliff Lee on the block this year, there are still some interesting arms who could make a difference down the stretch. Here are the best candidates:

PLAYER: Edwin Jackson
TEAM: White Sox
POSSIBLE DESTINATION(S): Yankees, Red Sox, Reds
CONTRACT STATUS: $8.35 million, free agent at end of year
PROJECTED WAR: 1.8

The White Sox might end up trading Jackson even if they get back in the race for the AL Central title, as they currently have six starting pitchers for just five slots. Jackson is no stranger to changing teams, as he’s been dealt by Los Angeles, Tampa Bay, Detroit, and Arizona since arriving in the Major Leagues. Given the White Sox surplus of arms and his impending free agency, he’s a good bet to be packing his bags once again.

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Yesterday, I took part (along with Jonah Keri and 28 other contributors to ESPN’s baseball section) in a Franchise Player Draft. We were tasked with selecting one player who we would want to build our franchise around, and in this hypothetical world, actual contract status was irrelevant. I ended up drawing the fourth pick in the draft, giving me an embarrassment of riches to select from, especially after my request to trade down was denied.

By the time my pick was up, Troy Tulowitzki, Evan Longoria, and Felix Hernandez were off the board. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t get a crack at Tulo, who was a pretty easy call as the first player selected. I figured Longoria would probably be gone as well, and wasn’t surprised at all when Keith Law snapped him up. David Schoenfeld made my life easier by taking Felix, which meant that I didn’t have to worry about whether or not I should consider drafting a pitcher – the only one worthy of that kind of selection in my mind was already gone, allowing me to focus on a handful of elite position players to choose from.

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The hottest team in baseball are the Arizona Diamondbacks, winners of seven straight and nine of their last 10. Their run has vaulted them into first place in the National League West, and as we head toward June, they head up the list of surprising contenders throughout baseball. How have they managed to go from abysmal failure last year to early season success story this year? Essentially, it comes down to one word — balance.

They aren’t being carried by an MVP candidate having a monster season; in fact, it might be hard to identify who their best player has been this year. Ryan Roberts leads the position players with +1.9 WAR, but the team has also gotten +1.2 WAR or better from the starters at every other position on the field besides first base, and even that “weak spot” is now being manned on a daily basis by Juan Miranda, owner of a .250/.370/.490 batting line.

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Quick, guess which team’s pitching staff has the lowest HR/FB rate in baseball. Okay, the subject probably gives away the answer, but even if it didn’t, the smart guess would have been San Francisco. After all, they’ve been dominating this category for the last decade.

We spent a decent amount of time this winter talking about the Giants ability to prevent home runs. It started off talking about Matt Cain, moved on to a broader discussion, and then shifted towards looking at whether Dave Righetti might be the key to understanding why San Francisco continues to keep the ball in the park better than any other team in baseball. While we don’t have a concrete answer yet, as more data piles up, three oft-cited factors are seeing their potential influences diminished – the pitchers themselves, sample size of the data, and park factors.

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