We all knew it couldn’t last. Nobody is THIS good. Forget Johan, Clemens, and Pedro, if Cliff Lee had kept up his sub 1.00 ERA through the season, the Cy Young Award would be renamed the Cliff Lee Award. No matter how many times you say it, it just doesn’t sound right.

Lee had to come down at some point. He went into the game with a career 10-1 record in interleague play against an inconsistent Cincinnati Reds team, so it’s only natural that Lee gives up more runs in those 5.2 innings than he had all season (that’s right, only 4 ER in over 50 innings).

Lee’s ERA has “skyrocketed” to an embarrassing 1.37. The honeymoon has ended. So now what? Lee has been a bit of an enigma all season, with no one really knowing if he is legit or not. Some of the stats say that he is (high strikeout to walk rate) while others say he has been a bit lucky (extremely high strand rates and very low BABIP).

I still feel that Lee will be a good, but not great, fantasy pitcher. I do not think he will be in the top five for Cy Young voting at the end of the season, but I can see him as a top 10 AL pitcher.

The interesting thing about this though is that Cliff Lee might actually be one of the rare fantasy players who you can both sell high and buy low on, depending on the other owners. Because everyone has differing opinions on him, you can expect to see a lot of trades with him in the coming days.

To some who think he is legit, this might be a perfect buy low opportunity with an owner who is panicking about this one bad start. For the Cliff Lee owners who think that his best days are behind him, now might be the time to jump ship before one bad start becomes a habit; there have still been seven terrific games to use as a track record for bargaining.

What do I plan to do in regards to Cliff Lee, you ask? Well, I do not own Lee in any of my leagues, and I am not looking to deal for pitching at this time, so I plan to sit back and watch not only what the other managers do but also to see how he responds in his next start, which is scheduled for Saturday (May 23) at home against the Rangers.

If anything, though, thanks Cliffy Lee, for all the memories from the first seven starts. Now the fun begins.