Earlier today, we took a look at the players who were leading the league in WAR to begin the month of June. If we are anything here at The Outside Corner, it is fair and balanced. As such, in the interest of equal time, let’s take a look at the other end of the leaderboard to see who is “winning” the race to have the worst WAR in all of baseball this year.
Hitters
Cody Ross (-1.1 WAR)
Cody Ross has been one of the many, many reasons for the wildly disappointing season of the Diamondbacks. Ross has just been terrible across the board as he is sporting a 23 wRC+ and has been rated quite poorly on defense. He’s done this in just 34 games, mind you. Just to add a little salt to the wound, the D’Backs appear to be stuck with Ross for awhile longer with Mark Trumbo suffering a setback in his recovery from a stress fracture in his foot and A.J. Pollock landing on the DL recently. They just can’t quit Cody Ross.
Jedd Gyorko (-1.0 WAR)
With a 37 wRC+ and that -1.0 WAR, the Padres have to be feeling pretty good about that six-year, $35 million contract extension. Unlike the other hitters on this list though, Gyorko remains firmly entrenched in a full-time starting gig. The Padres are just going to stick it out and hope that Gyorko manages to turn it around. For that reason, Gyorko is our odds on favorite to finish the season with the worst WAR in baseball. Go Team Jedd!
Chris Colabello (-0.9 WAR)
Remember when Colabello was driving in all those runs at the beginning of the season and looking like a feel good story? Ah, good times. Since then, times haven’t been so good for Colabello who saw his wRC+ drop to 83 and combined that with some truly dreadful defense according to the advanced metrics. As a result, Colabello was demoted to Triple-A late in May.
Freddy Galvis (-0.9 WAR)
You have to admire Galvis’ efficiency. He’s been this terrible but only needed 16 games and 46 plate appearances to accomplish it. He even managed to mix in a brief trip to the minors. In case there was anyone holding out hope that he might quickly remedy his .156 OPS(!), I have bad news. Galvis is out until July due to a shoulder injury.
Michael Choice (-0.9 WAR)
With Prince Fielder out for the season, Texas could really use some production from the likes of Michael Choice. So far… NOPE! He’ll continue to get chances to turn things around. If anything, Fielder’s absence should help because it means Choice will get to spend more time at DH and less time in the outfield where he has racked up a lot of negative value.
Pitchers
Paul Maholm (-1.0 WAR)
Maholm has accomplished the very rare feat of having more walks than strikeouts. Oh, and he’s given up eight homers already as well. The Dodgers shifted him to the bullpen a few weeks ago for very understandable reasons. If anything, Maholm should consider himself lucky that he even still has a job.
Wandy Rodriguez (-0.8 WAR)
Pittsburgh only needed to see 26.2 innings from Wandy this year to realize that they had made a horrible mistake. He somehow managed to allow ten dingers in that limited action. Unsurprisingly, the Pirates recently placed Rodriguez on unconditional release waivers. That will end his Pirates career and could very well end his career overall.
Bryan Morris (-0.8 WAR)
Morris only has a 3.80 ERA, but that’s almost a miracle. His strikeout out to walk rate is 1.17 and his HR/9 rate is 1.52. He’s simply been awful. That might explain why the Pirates recently decided to cut bait and traded him to the Marlins. But, hey, good for them because they just got the 39th pick in the upcoming draft in exchange for the third worst pitcher in baseball so far in 2014.
Eric Stults (-0.7 WAR)
A holdover from last month’s update, things have actually been getting slightly better for Stults. His real problem is the longball, having already coughed up 12 homers this year. This despite only allowing 18 homers all of last year and playing his home games in Petco Park. I’m just saying anytime you have a nearly 1:1 homer-to-walk ratio, something is either going very wrong or very right. Stults is definitely doing it wrong.
Jeanmar Gomez (-0.6 WAR)
You know, this whole disappointing season for the Pirates is starting to make a whole lot of sense as we are now on our third Pirate on this very short list. What’s really special about Gomez is that he has done all of his damage in relief. It’s hard to rack up this much value, positive or negative, as a reliever, but Gomez has found a way to do it. Bravo, sir!
