Which baby-faced pitcher from a certain Midwestern club is blushing with shame after a saucy prediction about how this would be his breakout year blew up in his face? This cute-as-a-button hurler was pipped by the boys at Baseball Prospectus to have a monster year, but the only monster here was his crappy season, which went down the tubes with a royal flush! His best hope might be to “ankiel” it over to the National League — his batting average in interleague games is way better than his 10th percentile projection!

Someone’s been a naughty boy! He started out hot, but it turns out that this beefy left-fielder has a sad tendency to droop in the clutch, if you catch our twee drift. His team could have used his equine-en-español abilities (hint hint) during its second-half struggle towards respectability, but our guy, sadly, hasn’t been getting it up into the stands with the freak-wency (10 homers since July 1? He hit 10 in June alone!), and even his okay last month will not elevate his post-All-Star Game OPS over .800. Maybe this Panamanian “stud” needs a shot of Raffy-approved Viagra!

Oh, the stories we could tell about what that certain 37-year-old mustachioed manager has been doing with that team full of young boys! Just between us, sweeties, they’ve been dropping it like it’s hot in the AL Central in the second half, and are creeping up like a wedg[i]e on that pale-hosed assemblage with the unstable Venezuelan at the helm. Maybe our hirsute guy’s Spartan-ism will reward them all with a post-season splurt to match their recent surge!

On a similar note, what long-derided high-altitude band of brothers just did damage on their division’s much-disparaged leader? These “rockie” rookies hung a 20-1 spanking on their “daddys,” and are looking quite lovely into the future. Could it be that there is a purple reign in the (oh-so-thin) air for 2006?

And here’s a quickie: word is that those crimson-legged God-squadders are looking to add a certain suspended staff member of that brand-new-but-formerly-Canadian team to their clubhouse for the crazy last few weeks! Additional word is that their teenaged GM, an M.O.T., isn’t so crazy about the idea. We’ll let you know….

Think of “On The DL” as the baseball version of Ted Casablancas…but even cutesier! We make it hot and juicy for you, but we’ll never tell who it is we’re talking about, unless, of course, we’re hounding for links by sending the answers to the ones no one cares about to Deadspin. Hey, us girls gotta eat too, you know!