The man, myth and legend Ray Flowers joins Justin Fensterman and Trevor Ray on “The Fantasy Beat” to give his take on the young 2013 fantasy baseball season. The guys talked about hitters and pitchers who have garnered a lot of attention over the last few weeks.
Brandon Crawford, Josh Rutledge, Michael Cuddyer, Paul Maholm, Ross Detwiler, Bartolo Colon, John Buck, Giancarlo Stanton, Justin Ruggiano
I get questions all day from folks. Many of them come from people who are panicked about the struggling the players they own, while some come from folks who overestimate the value of the players on their roster leading them to think they’ve got the championship in the bags. In the following piece I’ll give my thoughts on a series of players and let you know whether you should be buying or selling in the fantasy baseball game.
I’M NOT WORRIED – BUY
Matt Cain – People have lost their minds. Giving up on Cain. Why? It’s AMAZING to me how much people panic with a guy like Cain who has been so rock solid impressive the past four years. It’s like nothing I ever say gets through to some people. Sure his ERA is 6.59, but I could care less. His 8.16 K/9 mark would be a seven year best. His 1.88 BB/9 would be a career best. Pretty sure his HR/9 isn’t going to stay at 1.88 as his career mark is a mere 0.78. And then there is this. His current 3.82 xFIP mark is exactly the same as it was last year, and 0.04 above his 2011 mark. His ERA’s in those two years were 2.88 and 2.79.
Ike Davis – He’s hitting .164 with three homers and six RBIs. Last April he hit .185 with three homers and eight RBIs. He ended 2012 with 32 homers and 90 RBIs. I’m not saying he’s a lock to get there against this season, but I’m just pointing out that he started out extremely slowly last year and by the end of the year he was a productive power force.
J.J. Putz – The majors leader in blown saves with three. The issue, as it often is, revolves around location. He’s walking five guys per nine innings right now. That will come down. The last two years he hasn’t even walked 1.90 batters per nine. The other issue is homers. He gave up four taters in 2010, four in 2011 and four in 2012. He’s already allowed two in nine innings this season. For 7-straight years his HR/9 mark has been under 0.80 (it’s been under 0.68 the last four seasons). Pretty sure that number isn’t going to stay at hia current 2.00 level. Putz also has 12 Ks in nine innings.
Giancarlo Stanton – He’s hitting .200 with zero homers. Last season in April he hit .247 with one homer. He ended the year with 37 big flies in a mere 123 games. I told you all, repeatedly, that he was not a .300 hitter. I also told you I was worried about his team situation and mental health. Can’t say I didn’t warn you as I was emphatic about saying I wasn’t going to take Stanton in the top-20 this season. At the same time, you’re nuts if you’re selling this talent for .80 cents on the dollar. You should be trying to add this power monster, not deal him away.
I’M WORRIED – SELL
Tony Cingrani – Through two starts he has a 2.25 ERA, 1.08 WHIP and 17 Ks in 12 innings. Wow is right. Still, he’s no lock to even be in the rotation in three weeks as Johnny Cueto rounds into shape. Plus, Tony’s still throwing his fastball 81 percent of the time through two starts. That’s a huge number. Once teams start to pick up on his motion and the movement on his fastball the results will change, and I’m pretty sure he’s not going to be able to hold onto his 64 percent ground ball rate either.
Bartolo Colon – He’s 3-0 with a 2.42 ERA and 0.92 WHIP. He’s walked one batter in 26 innings. Come on now, has he turned into Greg Maddux? Colon is striking out less than six per nine and the last time he threw 165 innings in a season was 2005.
Chris Davis – Finally fell under .400 at .382. Here are the facts. (1) He has one homer in his last 11 games. (2) He has three RBIs in his last 11 games. (3) His walk rate is double the last two years. It’s highly unlikely he sustains that growth. (4) His K-rate is 33 percent of what it has been the five years. Pretty tough to think he maintains at that level. (5) His .413 BABIP is light years ahead of his career .339 mark. Career bests in homers, RBIs and average are certainly possible given his hot start, but there is nowhere to go but down.
Ross Detwiler – Wow has he been good. Through four starts he owns a 1.38 ERA and 1.15 WHIP. He’s also sporting a horrific 4.50 K/9 mark. If he throws 180 innings this seasons that’s 90 Ks folks. Ninety. From a starting pitcher. He’s also lopped off a batter from his BB/9 mark from the last two years, and he’s not going to hold onto all of that. His HR/9 mark has dipped more than 50 percent from his career rate (down to 0.35). He’s not holding on to that either. Oh, and his 88.2 left on base percentage is unsustainable. Heed the warning of his xFIP (4.20). See his Player Profile.
Paul Maholm – Someone sent me a note on Twitter that they were happy to be able to deal Stanton to get Maholm. I’m serious. From his Player Profile. “Maholm will never be elite. He’ll never be someone to build a staff around… he’s not someone to reach for on draft day, ever. Still, if you’ve got five or six solid arms in the rotation in a mixed league, and it’s the 25th round, you could do worse than calling out Maholm’s name on draft day.” Seems like most aren’t heeding my advice here either. The two biggest things that stand out: (1) His .212 BABIP is nearly .100 points below his career .304 mark. Since 2006 that number has been between .281 and .327 every year. (2) His 8.54 K/9 rate is THREE batters above his career mark which is an unsustainable pace. He’s only had one season with the mark over six the past four years.
Jose Valverde – He’ll be called up and given a chance to close for the Tigers. Here are three of my Tweets about him from last night.
Have none of you seen Valverde pitch lately? ’12 = career WORST K/9 (6.26) & K/BB (1.78) hint at scary times ahead.
Valverde ’12 = LUCKY 3.3 HR/F ratio 1/3 of career. 0.77 GB/FB 2nd worst of 9 yrs. XFIP 5.01.
Jose Valverde K/9 last SEVEN years: 12.59, 10.91, 10.38, 9.33, 9.00, 8.59, 6.26.
To see how others are evaluating players don’t forget to go to Fleaflicker.com where you can check out the owned percentages of all your favorite players.
By Ray Flowers
For all of you fantasy basketball players, Justin and Trevor talk about players that you can still find on your waiver wire who can help you win your fantasy basketball league. The guys also recap the first week of the 2013 MLB season and talked about which players came up huge. The guys make some serious predictions.
NBA: Carl Laundry, Derrick Favors, Kyle O’Quinn
MLB: Chris Davis, Tyler Flowers, Michael Morse, Josh Hamilton, Giancarlo Stanton, Tyler Colvin, Carlos Marmol, Kyuji Fujikawa, Yu Darvish
Last season only two outfielders in major league baseball had more RBIs than Josh Willingham while only four outfielders hit more homers than Willingham. In retrospect it was a bad decision to view Willingham as nothing more a mid round draft pick in fantasy baseball on draft day in 2012 (many expected the move to Minnesota to erode his value somewhat). Should that view be changed, that Willingham is nothing more than a solid option for 2013, or should he be an early round draft pick because of the power that led to 35 homers and 110 RBIs last season?
By the way, Josh Hamilton (128) and Ryan Braun (112) had more RBIs. Hamilton (43), Curtis Granderson (43), Braun (41) and Ginacarlo Stanton (37) had more homers. As I also pointed out the other day in Things You Should Know, his production last season leaves a very favorable impression when his numbers are compared to those of Giancarlo Stanton.
Here is what I know.
Willingham set a career-high in homers in ’12. He had never hit 30 homers in a season before with his previous best being 29 in 2011.
Second, Willingham set a career-high with 110 RBIs. He had never reached 100 RBIs before (98 in 2011).
Third, Willingham set a career-high with 85 runs scored. His previous best was 75 back in 2007.
Part of the reason for all those counting category high’s is that he set a career best with 145 games played in his seventh season (his 615 plate appearances were also a career best). It should be noted though that this fella has failed to reach 525 at-bats in any season as a big league player (just pointing that out). Willingham has long been an injury risk and just cause he was out there a lot in 2013 shouldn’t cause you to forget that since he became a full-time player he has averaged 131 games a season meaning that over the past seven years he’s averaged a full month of missed games. That’s something you need to keep in mind when evaluating Willingham.
To sign up for your baseball league this year make sure you check out Fleaflicker.
As for the power, the guy does have 64 bombs the past two years, so it’s pretty hard to write his pop off as something anomalous. It’s also pretty impressive that he hit 29 homers in 2011 in Oakland and 35 in Minnesota in 2012 despite Park Factors in the home run column of 26th and 14th. Neither park is a homer haven by any means. The fact is that Josh has posted HR/F marks of 17.5 and 21.2 percent the past two years, both big numbers (career 15.5). I won’t say it’s a pace he can’t sustain though as he has proven that he can have that level of success. He also hits a lot of fly balls, over 48 percent in two of the last three seasons, so his homer total pretty much rests upon how many games played he can drag his body out onto the field.
IF Willingham can remain healthy, he still has three major issues in the fantasy game.
(1) He isn’t a very good all-around hitter. A career .261 hitter, Josh has hit better than .268 only once in seven years (.277 in 2006). He’s consistently league average. That’s all he is.
(2) He never steals a base. For his career he’s swiped 32 bases, and in four of the past five years he’s been limited to four or fewer thefts.
(3) He plays in the outfield, a position that has a lot of strong hitters, so his offensive exploits aren’t over the top good, especially with no base stealing speed and an inability to do anything other than match the league average in batting average. He’s just not an exciting player, especially when you toss into the mix his injury filled history.
I’m not saying Willingham is useless, he’s far from that. You can’t be useless if you are 11th in baseball with 64 homers the past two years and 8th in RBIs (208) – eighth (who knew?). But consider that he is tied for 55th in runs (154), is 92nd in batting average (.253) and 133rd in steals (15 tied with seven others). Toss in the fact that’s he’s failed to play 140 games in four of the past five years and that he plays outfield, and there just isn’t the pull for his services that you might think there should be. Willingham is a solid add for a club, but don’t go reaching or you will end up being disappointed (there is a chance others will view him the same way and he will fall on draft day in which case he would become a solid target – it’s all about the cost with this slugger).
By Ray Flowers
Today I’m going to break down a handful of players an attempt to refute the prevailing wisdom about at least one aspect of their game. Hopefully the piece will be a thought provoking one, even if you disagree with my conclusions.
Robinson Cano‘s Power
Cano hit 33 homers last season, the first time he reached 30 in his career. The assumption is that Cano is now a 30 homer hitter. It’s obvious, right? He hit 30 homers last year. He plays in New York were the stadium had a Park Indices mark of 146 last year for left-handed home run hitters (46 percent above the AL average). He’s Robinson Cano. Despite all that, he’s not a 30 homer hitter. Besides the obvious fact that he’s gone deep 30 times just once in eight seasons there are a couple of salient points. (1) Cano’s 1.89 GB/FB ratio last season was a career-high (his career mark is 1.55). (2) Cano hit fewer fly balls last season than ever before at 25.8 percent. A career-high in homers despite a career-low fly ball number – is there something rotten in Denmark (a quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet. How dare he speak of my homeland in such a way)? (3) Cano’s HR/F ratio last season was a career best 24.1 percent, a massive step up from his career 13.7 percent rate. It was also the first time he posted a mark above 17.0 percent. Unless Cano hits a lot more fly balls this season he isn’t going deep 30 times again (if he does hit more fly balls, it could end up costing him in the batting average category).
Chase Headley‘s Power
I explained all about Headley’s like power outage this season in his Player Profile.
Torii Hunter‘s Batting Average
Hunter hit .313 last season, a career best. There’s no chance he repeats it. For more, check out his Player Profile.
Can anyone save SMASH?
Matt Kemp is Injury Prone
I’ve been hearing this a lot on The Drive, my radio show on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Monday through Friday, 5-8 PM EDT). I just can’t understand why people think this. In 2010-11 Kemp missed one game. One. From 2008 through 2011 he appeared in at least 155 games each season. Kemp’s total of 637 games played those four years were the 6th most in baseball and just seven behind Prince Fielder‘s leading total of 644 games. So Kemp has a couple of ailments limit him to 106 games last season and all of a sudden the 28 year old is a big time injury risk? Don’t consider me part of that camp.
Giancarlo Stanton is Worth a First Round Draft Pick
Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that Stanton posts the following numbers this season: .292-39-122-103-2. I’m not saying he gets there, those are huge numbers and likely unattainable (at least the average and runs scored marks), but let’s just say he does. If he does that, gets those numbers, he’ll earn about $28 or so dollars this season. That’s just not first round value folks.
Joey Votto‘s Power
I got in a Twitter discussion the past 12 hours about Votto vs. Cano, and one point that was mentioned was that Votto’s power was in decline so his value was waning. Really? The facts. (1) Votto owns a .553 career SLG. The mark was .567 last year. He had a better than career average SLG last season folks. (2) Votto had a 1.18 GB/FB ratio last year. His career mark is 1.19. (3) Votto did post a four year low fly ball rate of 32 percent, but that was just slightly off his 34.4 percent career mark. (4) Votto did hit only 14 homers in 374 at-bats last season. However, that knee injury of his crippled his ability to drive the baseball late in the year. In fact, he didn’t hit a single homer over his 87 at-bats in the second half of the season. Let’s remove those 87 at-bats for a moment. When he was healthy, the first 83 games, he went deep 14 times, hitting one long ball every 20.5 at-bats. For his career, that mark is one homer per 19.5 at-bats. Status quo here folks.
By Ray Flowers
There’s an outfielder with the Red Sox who is a huge question mark heading into the 2013 major league season. A Cubs’ hurler is working back toward health. An ace from 2012 is having a hard time finding a job. The funniest major league baseball player on Twitter is trying to get his career back on track. Is the real Marlins’ slugger, you know that outfielder that changed his name, worth taking a shot on at the top of a draft? Finally, why can’t the guy who leads baseball in saves the past three years find a job?
Jacoby Ellsbury will hit leadoff for the Red Sox this season. Duh. It’s a huge season for Ellsbury personally, and for his fantasy outlook as well. I know that he had one of the greatest fantasy seasons ever in 2011 (.321-32-105-119-39) but consider these facts before going all in with Ellsbury. (1) In two of the last three years he’s failed to appear in 75 games. (2) He’s has one season of 10 homers. (3) He’s had one 10/10 season. (4) He’s hit under .275 in two of the last three years. (5) The last time he stole 40 bases was 2009. Tread carefully.
Matt Garza‘s lat strain sounds like it will end up being a minor issue. He’ll likely start throwing in a few days to make sure that he’s physically good to go as he works his way back from last years elbow issue. I believe he’s currently a sold draft day bargain given his suppressed cost (the NFBC has him listed as the 42nd starting pitcher off the board). Remember, this guy is as stable an option as any in the game. He owns a 3.84 career ERA. That mark has been between 3.32 and 3.95 each of the past six years. His WHIP is 1.29 for his career. The mark has been between 1.18 and 1.26 each of the past five years. It should also be noted that that last two seasons he’s produced the two best K/BB ratios of his career (3.13 and 3.00), and for the first time his K-rate has been over 8.30 in two consecutive years.
To sign up for your baseball league this year make sure you check out Fleaflicker.
Kyle Lohse is still looking for a home. Turns out the draft pick compensation, a team could lose a first round draft pick if they sign Lohse, is causing a bunch of teams to be very wary of signing Lohse. I’d caution any team looking to sign him that they should also read his Player Profile to learn that the guy they are looking to buy might not actually be the guy they think they are getting.
Logan Morrison has started to run on a treadmill as he works his way back from knee surgery that he had in September. Hard to think that it’s been five months and he’s just starting to run is a good thing, but he did have his patella tendon repaired so it wasn’t a minor situation. The Marlins desperately need LoMo to help protect Giancarlo Stanton in what is shaping up to be a rather anemic lineup. Can LoMo fill that role even if he’s healthy? I have doubts. In 1,002 career at-bats, Morrison has gone deep just 36 times while batting .250, and that .339 OBP is nothing to get all worked up over either. The bottom line is that he’s failed to live up to expectations to this point, unless we’re talking about his work on Twitter which is flipping excellent. Will 2013 be the turnaround to what ails him? Speaking of Stanton…
Giancarlo Stanton was hit in the noggin’ by a pitch from phenom Jose Fernandez, but the good news is that he escaped serious injury – there is no concussion. The question that we should now all be asking is Stanton worthy of being a top-20 selection this year (he’s even been going in the first round on occasion). For his career, let’s give him a 550 at-bat season at his established levels, Stanton has produced a .270 average, 39 homers, 96 RBIs, 83 runs and seven steals. I know his potential is immense, but are those really first round numbers? Last season Josh Willingham hit .260 with 35 bombs, 110 RBIs, 85 runs scored and three steals. Have you heard anyone even talk about drafting Willingham in the top-100 overall this season? Just some food for thought.
I’m in love… with DORITOS Spicy Sweet Chili Flavored Tortilla Chips.
SO YOU WANT TO DRAFT A CLOSER?
Jose Valverde is still looking for a home, and it doesn’t sound like the Tigers are any more inclined to bring him back into the fold now than when they let him walk after his contract expired. This story may seem like nothing, especially since Valverde is no longer the pitcher he once was (his K/9 rate has literally gone down for 6-straight years and it was just 6.3 per nine last year), but there is this angel to consider.
Last season Valverde had 35 saves, tied with John Axford for 8th in baseball.
Over the last two years Valverde has 84 saves, the second most in baseball (Craig Kimbrel has 88).
Over the last three years Valverde has 110 saves, the most in baseball.
The guy with the most saves in baseball, the most, can’t find a job. Major league teams don’t even value the save. You shouldn’t overspend on draft day for closers… it’s such a fickle position.
By Ray Flowers
Drew Stubbs was dealt from the Reds to the Indians this offseason in a deal highlighted by Shin-Soo Choo heading to Cincinnati (Trade Breakdown: D’Backs, Indians, Reds). In case you missed it, here is a Stubbs fact from that piece that many may not be aware of: over the past three seasons that Stubbs has averaged 17 homers, 86 runs scored and 33 steals. So let me ask you, how many guys do you think went 17-86-33 in 2012? Let me save you the trouble of looking it up. There weren’t’ ten guys, nor seven, nor four, nor three. The answer is one. Only one man in baseball hit 17 homers with 86 runs scored and 33 steals, numbers that Drew Stubbs has averaged the past three years. The answer is Mike Trout (Stubbs fell short with 14 homers, 75 runs and 30 steals). Should you be paying more attention to Stubbs on draft day than his current ADP in the 250 range suggests?
Stubbs is coming off his worst full season as a big leaguer. Still, he hit the same amount of homers as Alex Gordon, scored the same amount of runs as Giancarlo Stanton and stole the same amount of bases as Ryan Braun. And that was Stubbs worst effort in three years.
Stubbs isn’t a big power hitter, but he hit 22 in 2010 and clearly has show himself to be a 15-20 type of threat. The move from Cincy to Cleveland isn’t likely to help – according to Park Indices the past three years right handed batters in Cleveland have a 72 mark in the homer category (28 percent below league average) while in Cincinnati that mark is 143 (the best in the NL) – so it would be best to set exceptions at the 15 or so level this year.
Are you old enough to remember the Rubik’s Cube?
As for the steals, Stubbs has stolen at least 30 bags in each of his three full seasons (he’s one of only six players over 30 each of the last three years: Michael Bourn, Coco Crisp, Rajai Davis, Jose Reyes and B.J. Upton are the others). He’s a tremendous athlete with speed to burn, so there’s little reason to think he won’t extend his streak to four years, especially since his career success rate is over 80 percent.
The runs scored, now there is an area that he should be productive in yet again, though there is something we need to talk about despite Stubbs’ solid totals in that category (91, 92 and 75 runs the past three years), and it also happens to lead right into the biggest concern with Stubbs.
Stubbs owns a career .241 batting average and .312 OBP. Those are terrible numbers that fall well below the league average during his career as a big leaguer (.261 and .329). Given those marks his ability to steal bases and to score runs is in question. Miscast as a top of the order hitter for long stretches with the Reds, he’s hit leadoff or second in the order in 286 of 486 career games, he’s likely best suited to be a #6 hitter. If he does indeed hit lower in the order in Cleveland remember that each successive spot in the batting order that a player drops he loses 15-20 plate appearances over the course of a season. If Stubbs hits 6th all year, for example, that’s likely to lead to roughly 90 or so fewer plate appearances than if he were to bat leadoff. Fewer plate appearances mean less times to run, and likely fewer chances to cross home plate.
Now to the hulking pink elephant in the room. Stubbs’ batting average.
Who wouldn’t want an outfielder with 17 homers, 86 runs scored and 33 steals on their team? Would you still want that guy if he was a career .241 hitter?
Stubbs is never going to produce in the batting average category. Never. However, it’s not at all a stretch to think that his .213 mark from last season will be a lower water mark for his career. Just look at two simple factors to explain what happened. (1) After 3-years with a BABIP mark of at least .325 the mark fell to .290 in 2012. (2) The owner of a nearly a 19 percent line drive rate heading into last season Stubbs saw that number fall to 14.9 percent. If his BABIP and line drive rates go back up, as they should, his batting average should rebound. Now by “rebound” I’m still talking about a mark that may not reach the league average which was .255 last season. The reason is obvious – Stubbs strikes out more frequently than I do at a bar on Friday night. For his career Stubbs averages a strikeout every 3.05 at-bats. That means he’s pretty much going to average more than a strikeout a game. Last season he struck out 166 times, a three year low, but he also had fewer plate appearances than the previous two years. The truth of the matter is that his 30.5 percent K rate was a career worst (career 29.3 percent). Stubbs will never stop striking out. His average will never be impressive. He has to hope that his manager understands that and doesn’t bench him for it.
Stubbs is an elite athlete who is one year removed from 40 steals and 92 runs scored. There are certain holes in his game, there’s no way to whisk that away, but there is still value to be had here because so many have been scared off his trail. If you draft Stubbs in a mixed league you will have to augment his addition with a couple of big batting average bats, but as a fifth outfielder Stubbs profiles as a player who might just return a tidy profit this season.
By Ray Flowers
The Marlins have done this before. They’ve ripped apart a team, torn it down after having success (well not this time), to save money. They outdid themselves Tuesday night when they agreed to a deal, not yet approved by Major League Baseball, with the Blue Jays. Before I delve into the deal, here are a few of the Twitter responses by people to the deal.
#Marlins insist Grooms sculpture will not be traded for the Hard Rock Café at Rogers Centre. Sculpture is not convinced. – @jonmorosi
#Marlins opened season with a payroll of roughly $100MM. After this trade, non-arb 2013 obligations will be ~ 25MM. Historic salary dump. – @jonmorosi
#Marlins will have no $$ committed to payroll in 2014. At this moment, Dobbs and Nolasco are only players #Marlins are committed to in even 2013. – @Joelsherman1
Remember: The #Marlins do not award no-trade clauses. – @Ken_Rosenthal
Report: #Marlins sending their stadium to #BlueJays as part of the deal. – @BaseballGuys
Alright, I’m pissed off!!! Plain & Simple. - @Giancarlo818
Here’s the deal as we currently understand it in what is the most lopsided trade potentially in the history of professional sports.
Blue Jays receive: shortstop Jose Reyes, right-hander Josh Johnson, left-hander Mark Buehrle, catcher John Buck and utility player Emilio Bonifacio and $4 million.
Marlins receive: shortstop Yunel Escobar, right-hander Henderson Alvarez, Cuban prospect Adeiny Hechavarria, outfield prospect Jake Marisnick, pitching prospects Anthony Desclafani and Justin Nicolino, and catcher Jeff Mathis.
TRADE REVIEW
The Blue Jays get an elite shortstop, and when healthy, a borderline elite arm on the hill. Reyes is a top-5 shortstop in terms of offense, and his defense is solid. Johnson is coming off his worst season, but that effort still included a 3.81 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 7.76 K/9 and 2.54 K/BB. Those are still pretty solid numbers. Buehrle, for the 12th straight season, threw at least 200-innings while winning 10 or more games. Buck is a catcher with 20 homer power, though one that is far from stable at the dish given his swing and miss ways. As for Bonifacio, he was on pace to lead baseball in steals last season before he was waylaid by injury. He played 51 games in CF and 15 games at second base, this a year after he also played 36 games at third base and 67 at shortstop. Here’s a potential lineup for the Blue Jays.
1 Jose Reyes, SS
2 Emilio Bonifacio, 2B
3 Jose Bautista, RF
4 Edwin Encarnacion, DH
5 Brett Lawrie 3B
6 Adam Lind, 1B
7 Colby Rasmus, CF
8 J.P. Arencebia, C
9 Rajai Davis
Looking at that daily lineup, you have to be pretty impressed. Speed, power — the only thing they really don’t have is batting average production. Could be a lot of homers and steals though. Maicer Izturis, who signed a 3-year, $10 million deal, now becomes a very expensive super sub. There’s no way around the fact that Toronto has just massively improved their roster. At the same time, two concerns. (1) How will Johnson and Buehrle perform in the AL East? It’s not exactly an easy place to pitch. (2) The Blue Jays took on about $165-$170 million in salary in the deal.
The Marlins received Yunel Escobar, a player who needed a change of scenery. He’s a middle of the pack major league shortstop. Henderson Alvarez, who I wrote about before the season in this Player Profile, performed exactly like I expected – relatively poorly (9-14, 4.85 ERA, 1.44 WHIP, 3.80 K/9). My review of Jeff Mathis? A strong defender behind the dish who might be the worst hitter of his generation.
In terms of on the field product the Marlins were taken about behind the woodshed, hit in the head with a stick, had their wallet stolen, their clothes stripped from their bodies and then were tied up. The offender then took their keys, went to their house, packed up their flat screen TV, their fancy refrigerator and pocketed their jewelry. They then went on line, emptied the victims bank account, and erased their identity. Not finished, they then burned the house down, ran their car into the river and and defecated on what was left of the front lawn. You get the point, right?
BASEBALL IN MIAMI
It’s over. If you are a fan of the franchise, I have to think that ended yesterday. How could it go any other direction? In addition to gutting the franchise yet again, the Marlins did a complete 180 degree turn less than a year after they plotted a new direction for their franchise. After signing all those big money deals last offseason (see Angels/Marlins Spending Like Drunken Sailors), don’t forget they already traded Heath Bell to the D’backs, they gutted their team on Tuesday. Not only have they weakened their on the field product immensely, they have also turned their nose up at their fans, flipped them off, punched them in the face, and stolen their lunch money. Remember, the Marlins just built, at a cost of nearly $640 million, a stadium of which they only paid $125 million for saddling the public with the remaining cost (the County spent roughly $376 million, which will have to be raised in taxes, while the City of Miami also chipped in $132 million). The Marlins also received an interest free loan of $35 million to help with expenses which they will have to pay back at a rate of $2.3 million a year. I’ll just say it – Jeffrey Loria is a crook. Plain and simple. Make sure you read Tim Brown’s review of the deal to get a fuller understanding of how the most greedy man in pro sports is running the Miami Marlins.
It might be football season, I’m not blind to that, but you know at BaseballGuys that I will always keep up the good fight, leave no stone unturned, in my attempt to help you to win a fantasy baseball championship. To that end, here are a few players who I noticed some pretty interesting things about last night when I was perusing the old box scores.
Everth Cabrera is a name everyone sort of kind of knows, kind of like when you look through an unfocused pair of binoculars. You know what you are looking at, but you just find it difficult focusing on the object. In the case of Cabrera we all know he is fast, but did you noticed that he’s stolen 41 bases, the highest total in the National League? Read that again. Cabrera leads the NL in steals.
Jarrod Dyson is even less known in many circles than Everth, and that’s saying something. In fact, he is one of three players in the game who has stolen 30 bases this year with less than 375 at-bats (Cabrera has 385 by the way). Emilio Bonifacio had 30 steals and 244 at-bats while Dyson has his 30 thefts while picking up just 283 at-bats (the other player is Dee Gordon who has 31 thefts and 302 at-bats). The speed has made Dyson a tremendous option in AL-only leagues but the fact that he has zero homers and just nine RBIs is shockingly terrible news is it not?
Chase Headley has gone deep 31 times this season. Thirty-one. The last two seasons Headley had 15 homers, and he had never hit more than 12 homers in a single season before this year. Amazingly, he’s blown past those totals this year. Look no further than his HR/F ratio. If you add up his HR/F ratios from the past three years – 7.6, 6.4 and 4.3 – you end up with a mark of 18.3 percent which is lower than his 22.1 percent mark this year. There is simply no way that Headley will be able to replicate that 22.1 percent mark next year, one that is more than double his 10.3 percent career mark. Moreover, Headley has actually seen his homer total increase to the level of stardom despite a career worst fly ball rate. A career-low. You can’t more than double your career home run mark when you are hitting fewer fly balls than ever before (31.4 percent this year versus a career mark of 35 percent). Be careful in 2013.
On television right now is a produce that helps you to make tortilla bowls in the oven. Does anyone really need that? I mean it might be nice to have for Cinco De Mayo or something, but for anything else, I just don’t see the need. I need my cabinet space to store my copious amounts of alcohol.
Hunter Pence has knocked in 104 runs this season. One hundred and four. Is this the quietest 104 RBI season that you have ever seen? I bet 90 percent of the folks out there didn’t know he had crested 100 RBIs. Maybe it’s because he’s split time with the Phillies and the Giants, but still, he’s had a pretty impressive season. Pence has knocked in 45 runs in 56 games with the Giants while helps one to look past his pathetic .229 batting average and .695 OPS with the team. Well, sort of. He’s done a few things poorly, his .257 batting average and .753 OPS are career worsts, but he’s also hit 24 homers, driven in 104 runs and scored 87 times. This is the 5th straight year he’s hit 22 homers and the third straight season that he has crossed the plate 84 times and driven in at least 91 runners.
Clayton Kershaw has a 2.58 ERA, the best in the NL (R.A. Dickey is next in line at 2.69). If Kershaw does indeed win the NL ERA crown he will become the first pitcher in the NL to have won two ERA crowns before his age 25 season going all the way back to 1893.
Giancarlo Stanton has 91 homers in his young career, the 6th highest total in the game for a player through his age 22 season (he’s tied with Ted Williams). Stanton’s season has been up and down as he’s been forced to play through injury, but it’s been a rather impressive effort as he’s gone deep 36 times with 85 RBIs an a .290 batting average in 120 games for the Marlins.
By Ray Flowers
Justin Fensterman and Trevor Ray discuss players to buy and sell at this midpoint in the season. They will discuss guys like Giancarlo Stanton, Pedro Alvarez, R.A. Dickey, Mike Trout, Derek Holland, Adam LaRoche and Trevor Plouffe.
The FSWA winner of the Best Baseball Series of 2011, BaseballGuys.com is the only source you will need for your fantasy baseball knowledge. OK, you might need other sources, but BaseballGuys.com should be on your daily list of must reads for the insights an analysis it provides on the world of baseball.
The co-host of The Drive on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87: M-F at 5-8 PM EDT), Ray has spent years squirreled away studying the inner workings of the fantasy game to the detriment of his personal life. Specializing in baseball, football and hockey, some consider him an expert in all three. Ray's work can also be found as feature writer for: Fantasy Alarm, Rotoinfo, Rotowire and Sports Illustrated.
You can contact Ray through e-mail at fantasyfandom@yahoo(dot)com or on Twitter.
