(1) Jacoby Ellsbury, Mike Cameron appear on track to return by next week.
(2) Giants to call up Eric Hacker instead of Madison Bumgarner?
(3) Ian Snell into Mariners rotation in place of RRS.
(4) Tommy Hanson allows eight runs – ERA goes from 2.88 to 4.18.
(5) Mike Leake hurls 7th quality start in eight outings.
(6) Jorge Posada to DL. Will be replaced by Francisco Cervelli.
(7) Mike Gonzalez faces batters.
(8) Kerry Wood’s epic struggles.
By Ray Flowers
In case you missed it, and hopefully you haven’t, we here at Fanball are the new owners of F&W Media, Inc. You can read more about the deal in our National Press Release. That purchase included two of the biggest, baddest, live events in the business. For those of you interested in joining the upcoming National Fantasy Football Championship (NFFC) on September 4-6, click on the link to the event. The even pays $100,000 to the overall winner, and last season almost $900,000 in prizes were awarded, so it certainly bears some investigating on your part if you aren’t already signed up.
Part of that deal also included our purchase of the National Fantasy Football Championship (NFBC), and with our purchase of F&W this will be the last time I’m allowed to play in either event (something about conflict of interest or whatever). Still, I’m in it to win it over the next month and a half in the baseball event, and here is a quick review of that squad.
* Out of the 390 teams in the main event, the squad is in 62nd place overall.
* In my 15 team league (30 players per squad), the squad is squarely in third place.
* The offense, led by names like Albert Pujols, Joe Mauer, Bobby Abreu, Ichiro Suzuki and Jayson Werth, has been spectacular. How good you ask? Let us count the ways.
(1) The club is first in batting average (.290), first in home runs (218), second in RBI (841), first in runs (890) and second in steals (150). I said they were dominant didn’t I?
(2) Amongst the 390 teams in the main event, here is how the squad ranks overall.
Average: 8th
Home Runs: 49th
RBI: 28th
Runs: 5th
SB: 27th
Yeah, the offense is killer.
However, this leads to the inevitable question – just how awful is the pitching staff? Putrid unfortunately. Here are the rankings of the squad in pitching: 15th in Wins (50), 7th in ERA (4.09), 15th in K (770), 6th in WHIP (1.322) and 9th in saves (49). So why is the unit just ninth overall? I’m not going to say it was bad drafting, I’m going with bad luck.
Joey Devine – Didn’t throw one inning before needing TJ surgery.
Joba Chamberlain – Just hasn’t taken the next step with a 3.98 ERA and a 1.46 WHIP.
Manny Parra – Too many walks leading to atrocious ratios (6.33 ERA, 1.82 WHIP).
Andy Sonnanstine – Failed to remotely match his work from last season with a 6.61 ERA and 1.53 WHIP resulting in half a season spent in the minors.
Jordan Zimmerman – Another TJ surgery for our squad derailing a solid rookie season for this hurler (1.36 WHIP, 9.05 K/9, 3.15 K/BB).
Ian Snell – Banished to the minors and then traded, he can’t seem to find the strike zone when in the majors (59 walks in 99.2 innings).
Sure some chances were taken with this pitching staff, but in amassing that offense it seemed like a risk worth taking. Think of it this way. If Joey Devine saved just 15 games this season, a completely reasonable total based on anyone’s preseason expectations, we would gain five points in the saves category, up to fourth, and the club would have 107 points overall, well within shouting distance of the 111 points of the first place club. This example shows why your attention should be 100% focused on what you are doing at the draft table with every single selection you make. Your decision, one way or another, could mean the difference between a fourth place finish and being able to hoist the championship trophy at seasons end.
By Ray Flowers
What to do with players in keeper leagues is one of the more difficult calls to make each season. Do you hold on to a guy who likely won’t help you this year but may be a future all-star in order to pick up that guy that could put you over the top this season? Do you trade your leading veteran slugger for an up and coming hurler with tons of upside? In today’s column I’ll address the question of keepers from two different angles – how do these hurlers grade out for the remainder of 2009 as well as moving forward?
I am in a keeper league, salary not a consideration. How would you rank these 3 pitchers: Fausto Carmona, Clayton Richard, Ian Snell
a) for the remainder of this season
b) as longer term keepers
— Don, Connecticut
I have to compliment Don for looking at this situation in both short and long term, exactly what you should be doing in keeper leagues. Here are my thoughts on each hurler before I grade them out.
Fausto Carmona: Flat out awful. Here is what I see, hopefully you will all agree, quickly, that my analysis is on point. Carmona was 19-8 with a 3.06 ERA and 1.21 WHIP in 2007 and that was the worst thing that ever happened to him given that it completely skewed the way that people view him. Talk about the planets aligning. I would be utterly shocked if Carmona ever produced a line remotely close to that one again. Why the dubious point of view? What does the number 1.39 say to you? To me it says plain awful when it’s put in the context of being his K/BB ratio for his career. To refresh your memory we look at 2.00 as the level we want our hurlers to reach (it’s the major league average), and Carmona isn’t even in shouting distance at this point. Moreover, that number has been 0.82 since the start of the 2008 season, and yes math whizzes, that means Carmona hasn’t even been 50 percent of average the past year and two-thirds. I don’t care how much sink you get on a 93 mph fastball you cannot, c-a-n-n-o-t have success in the big leagues with a number like that even with an impressive 2.69 G/F rate in his career.
Clayton Richard: This is a hurler who should clearly benefit from a chance of scenery moving from the move offensive minded AL to the NL. In addition, a move from the ballpark in Chicago to the one in San Diego is akin to trading in your Ford Festiva for Shelby Cobra (those are cars by the way). Richard has upped his K/9 rate this season to 6.82, more than a batter above his rookie mark last season though at the same time he has added a batter and a half to his nine inning walk rate completely negating his strikeout growth. In truth, it’s even worse than that as the struggles with the walk have dumped his K/BB rate down to 1.73. Still, Richard has shown a strong ability to keep the ball on the ground with a ground ball rate of over 49 percent in his brief career. The move to Safeco could really help this area of his game as it wouldn’t be at all surprising to see that Petco Park will help to reduce his HR/F rate of 11 percent a wee bit, and with that his ERA should fall. Richard has also done a very good job of late at limited runners from crossing the plate with five runs allowed over his last four starts (1.65 ERA).
Ian Snell: Awful with the Pirates, Snell asked to be demoted to Triple-A to work on his game while at the same time telling the team he had no interest ever pitching for the Pirates again. Snell went down to the minors and simply dominated like never before posting a 0.96 ERA, 1.10 WHIP, 11.33 K/9 and a 3.62 K/BB mark over 37.1 innings. Snell had a nice first start with the Mariners before imploding in his last outing (three runs, six walks and only four outs). Since the start of last season, a span of 48 starts covering 252.1 innings, Snell owns a 5.06 BB/9 mark, a pathetic 1.35 K/BB mark an ERA of 5.42 and a WHIP of 1.72. Face it, no matter how dominating he looked in the minors, Snell just cannot get big league hitters out on a consistent basis because for some reason he simply cannot control the strike zone at all.
For the Rest of 2009
1- Richard
2- Snell
3- Carmona
For 2010
1- Richard
2- Snell
3- Carmona
Snell has the best stuff of the three, but without more strikes it won’t matter.
Carmona has a sometimes dominating sinking fastball that records copious amounts of grounders, despite all the walks (6.03 per nine this season).
Richard is young, pitches in the best environment in baseball for a home ball yard, and also pitches in the National League.
Add up those facts and I would, at this point, say that Richard is the best bet, at least until the other two hurlers remember that throwing strikes is the name of the game.
By Ray Flowers
Wednesday was one busy day in baseball as a series of deals took place. Let’s hope that this won’t be the only foray in the trade market by many of the teams involved with the trade deadline looming on Friday. Regardless, for now, we have plenty to talk about.
The big deal of the day saw the Phillies add 2008 AL Cy Young winner Cliff Lee to the mix when the Blue Jays continued to ask for too much in the Roy Halladay sweepstakes. This marks the second straight year that the Indians have dealt their ace – they sent CC Sabathia to the Brewers in 2008. This is a great move for the Phils who add a terrific arm to their rotation, and they are the team to beat tin the NL yet again. To read more about this deal, give Ted Carlson’s Brother-Lee Love a read.
The Pirates have traded something like half their club over the past few weeks (not quite), and they continued to move parts around with a deal for the future that saw them send Jack Wilson and Ian Snell for a plethora of young talented, players from the Mariners highlighted by C/1B Jeff Clement. To read my thought on all the players involved, let me direct you to my piece entitled Pirates Continue to Tinker.
The Pirates, continued their day of deals by then pulling off another potentially big deal for the club down the road as they traded second baseman Freddy Sanchez to the Giants in exchange for minor league pitching prospect Tim Alderson. Here are my thoughts on the deal.
1- The Giants have greatly improve their lineup the past couple of days by adding Sanchez and Ryan Garko. Neither of these two batters are going to carry the club, but when the alternatives were Juan Uribe/Eugenio Velez/Matt Downs/Kevin Frandsen and Travis Ishikawa, obviously the club is in a much better spot now they were mere days ago.
2- Sanchez, as long as his back and knee are healthy (the knee held up the deal as doctors were consulted), should continue to be what he has always been, and that is a .300 hitter. Sanchez, who let injury and the pressure of a potential deal weigh him down the past few weeks (he has hit .176 over his last 51 ABs), should be invigorated by the move to a club that actually has a chance to make the playoffs. Another reason to expect his average to rebound somewhat is due to the fact that his line drive rate of 22.6 percent is about two percentage points below his career mark. It wouldn’t hurt if he cut his strikeout rate as well since he is currently operating at a 16.9 percent mark, a full five and a half percentage points worse than his career rate.
3- The Giants sent out their fourth ranked prospect according to Baseball America, Tim Alderson, to the Pirates in the deal (he was the Giants first round selection in 2007). A 6’6″ righty who profiles as a #2 or #3 starter at the big league level, Alderson is an extremely efficient hurler who knows his way around the strike zone. At just 20 years of age, Alderson owns a 20-6 record with a 3.07 ERA and 1.15 WHIP in his 249 professional innings. He has also walked a total of just 51 batters, or less than two per nine innings, a terrific number for a youngster with a K/9 mark of more than seven.
This is a fantastic deal for the Giants in 2009, but when we revisit this deal in 2012, I have the sneaking suspicion that this deal will rank right alongside that other fine move of Brian Sabean in which he traded Joe Nathan and Francisco Liriano to the Twins for 131 games of A.J. Pierzynski. Say it ain’t so Brian, say it ain’t so.
By Ray Flowers
The merry-go-round continues to spin as we approach MLB’s trade deadline on Friday. In today’s column we’ll simply run through some of the names that are in the news. I can’t be the only one who finds this alternative invigorating and frustrating as hell can I? I mean we hear rumor after rumor but often fail to come to any type of resolution with a boatload of these players who end up staying right where they are. Let’s hope this year sees a lot of movement (I’ll be writing about these things all day on Friday in my running Trade Deadline Diary).
The Indians have already moved Ryan Garko to the Giants, you can read about the deal in Around the Horn. The question now becomes do they try and also unload Cliff Lee and/or Victor Martinez? Depending on which source you read, chances of both being moved may be as high as 50/50. The bidding should be pretty strong considering that Lee is probably one of the 10 best lefties in the game while V-Mart is one of those rare catchers who can be a difference maker at the dish. The Red Sox are said to be heavily involved in talks for Lee as they are apparently unlikely to get Roy Halladay given that they would likely have to overpay to get a pitcher from a divisional foe.
Why would the Blue Jays announce to the world that they would explore potentially dealing Roy Halladay if they were just going to ask for half of every team’s young hurlers in any potential deal? Couldn’t they have just done that behind the scenes and spared us all the palace intrigue since it appears no better than a 50/50 shot that he will be moved.
Brett Favre won’t play, at least according to offseason rumor #312. Let’s hope that he won’t call a press conference to state that his last retirement press conference was real and that all the media should just refer to it if they need a quote for their columns.
Nick Johnson is still on the market, but with Adam LaRoche and Ryan Garko already with new clubs, who is still in the market for a first baseman? The team was hopeful of acquiring two potentially strong prospects for Johnson, but the impending free agent will likely have to be sold at a discount unless the Nats want to lose him for nothing at the end of the year. Someone should be interested, after all the man is hitting .295 with a .407 OBP this season. Don’t let his .405 SLG concern you – at least that’s what the Nationals will be telling other clubs.
Ian Snell continues to be on the Yankees radar. In six minor league starts the man has a 0.97 ERA and 47 Ks in 37.1 innings. Given all the money they have at their disposal, why don’t they just offer to pay everything left on Snell’s salary for this year and next and just float some mid-level prospects the Pirates way? In other Pirates news, they seem to be willing to sit pat with Freddy Sanchez and Jack Wilson. Apparently they only trade fantasy all-stars and not merely solid major leaguers. If they do move Sanchez, the Giants would love to be the recipient of the .300 hitting second basemen given that their second basemen have combined to post a .585 OPS this year. That’s just embarrassing.
The Mariners have “officially” announced that Jarrod Washburn is available on the trade market. Did I miss something? Since when do teams “officially” put someone on the market? Is there a website I can visit? Given the proliferation of the news media, virtually no major move occurs without the story leading so that we are made aware of it well before an actual deal happens. Take Washburn for example. We knew this guy was on the trade market about two months ago, but it’s good to know that the Mariners are going to do what everyone expected them to do all along.
By Ray Flowers
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.
