Mailbag: July 19, 2012

Each week I’ll be answering questions that have been sent to me at the BaseballGuys’ Twitter account in my never ending attempt to replace myself by explaining to everyone how I evaluate players thereby making myself obsolete.

Who would you rather have for 2nd half of season… Josh Hamilton or Mark Trumbo? Hamilton is slumping badly.
– @mysports1

I got this question and thought it was a joke. It wasn’t. There followed a couple of tweets that pointed out that since June 1st that Trumbo had outproduced Hamilton. OK, well, let’s play that parsing game and see what we come up with.

April-May
Hamilton: .368-21-57-39 with a 1.184 OPS
Trumbo: .348-10-26-22 with a 1.029 OPS

June-Current
Hamilton: .207-7-21-17 with a .725 OPS
Trumbo: .269-16-39-25 with a .954 OPS

Hamilton dominated the first two months. Trumbo has dominated the last month an a half. But…

Overall
Hamilton: .300-28-78-56-6 with a .988 OPS
Trumbo: .309-26-65-47-4 with a .991 OPS

Overall Hamilton is still the better performer, though it is obviously a lot closer than most of us would have thought before looking at the numbers. Still, there is no comparison between the two when it comes to talent. Hamilton is a vastly superior talent. He’s dynamic. I’ll give Trumbo full credit for what he has done, it has surpassed everyone’s expectations, and he does qualify at first base and the outfield in all leagues adding to his versatility (maybe even at third in some leagues). Still, I honestly don’t know a single “expert” who would say they prefer Trumbo in this matchup. Not a one. If you don’t buy the talent argument then how about this one – Hamilton has shown himself to be this hitter for a while now. Trumbo? It’s pretty hard to think he can maintain a 26.3 HR/F ratio – a massive total that would have been the best in baseball last year, in 2010, in 2009… you get the point. It’s also pretty hard to take Trumbo at face value. The guy was a .275 hitter in six minor league seasons. He hit .254 last year. That .309 average isn’t supported by his history or by his 15 percent line drive rate this season.

Trumbo’s been great, and he’s performing better the past six weeks, but the odds are still heavily tilted toward Hamilton being the better performer the rest of the season.

Drop Chris Davis for Wil Myers in a keeper? I can only keep five guys, but in the round drafted, aka 24th for Myers, I’d consider it.
– @JeffSchaffer13

Davis has had a productive season for the Orioles hitting .260 with 14 homers and 41 RBIs in 77 games, putting him pace to be a .260-28-80 type of hitter. Davis has the skills to do that. However that doesn’t make him a keeper in any league that protects only five players. His production also isn’t to the level that he’s keeping your team afloat this year either (at least I hope not). Bottom line is that you could move on from him with an eye to the future if it made sense (i.e. your team could handle the loss right now).

Myers has a luminous future, a fact I pointed out last November in AFL – 2011 Review when I was able to interview Myers at the AFL Rising Stars Game. Myers has killed it all year long, at Double an Triple-A, hitting .319 with 28 homers, 76 RBIs an a 1.057 OPS in a mere 90 games. The only thing holding him back from roaming the Royals outfield right now is that they don’t have a spot for him with Lorenzo Cain being healthy (he’s joined by Alex Gordon and Jeff Francoeur). Perhaps the Royals will move Frenchie at the trade deadline to open up a spot for Myers. At least that would be a logical move. Regardless of what happens at the deadline, it would be a shock if Myers wasn’t in the starting lineup on Opening Day 2013. Does that make Myers a keeper in a five keeper league given his 24th round value?

A brief history lesson. Here are some of the names of some recent elite level prospects that were looked at as can’t miss options who missed in their first season.

Brandon Wood
Cameron Maybin
Travis Snider
Justin Smoak
Pedro Alvarez
Domonic Brown
Brandon Belt

I could go on, but I think you get the point. We’ve all been spoiled by the success of Bryce Harper and Mike Trout. The game just isn’t that easy.

I’ve got no idea who you’re other keeper options are, but in a league that protects only five guys I’m not inclined to keep Myers for 2013, even at a 24th round value.

Need ERA/WHIP. Send Paul Konerko for C.J. Wilson? I can slide Michael Morse or Kevin Youkilis in at 1B.
– @chiloubrown

Konerko has had an excellent season with a .322/.402/.511 slash line (the average and OBP would be career bests). Still, his performance has been really rough lately. Over his last 35 games he’s gone deep just three times with 11 RBIs while his slash line has been pathetic at .244/.331/.336. What’s going on? First off I’d posit some normal regression as he was simply performing over his head early in the year. Second, he had that minor wrist procedure that knocked him out of action for a few days, and he’s been pretty awful since then. Is the wrist still bothering him? Third, let’s not forget that he’s 36 years old. I know we have been spoiled with a lot of players being good into their last 30′s, but traditionally 36 year olds slow down. I’m not saying Konerko should be viewed as a drag on any fantasy team moving forward but I’m also not exactly in love with what I’m seeing either.

Wilson had his worst effort of the year Wednesday allowing seven runs in six innings, but even so he still owns a 2.82 ERA with a 1.20 WHIP on the year. Moreover, that’s 54 starts with a 2.90 ERA and 1.19 WHIP since the start of last season. Wilson continues to be one of the most effective hurlers in baseball, and there is no reason to think that he’s likely to see a major regression any time soon.

If your goal is to improve your ratios Wilson is a fine target. Since you’ve got Morse/Youkilis to also fill in at first base, go ahead and send Konerko packing.

Think Santiago Casilla is permanently out as closer or needs a breather? Seems SF will give Casilla every opportunity as they want Sergio Romo left as setup guy.
– @cwhittemore33

All I can say about this situation is that I’ve been extremely frustrated all year. As I have said, consistently since January, Romo is the best reliever the Giants have. Period. Nothing, not a single thing, that he has done this year has changed my opinion at all. In fact, Romo is one of the five best relievers in baseball. Period. Think I’m crazy? Look at the numbers.

0.66 ERA
0.73 WHIP
11.20 K/9
4.25 K/BB
.128 BAA

You hear this crap all the time about how he can’t handle lefties. What are those people talking about?

In 2012 lefties have hit .143 with a .374 OPS against Romo.
For his career lefties have hit .189 against Romo with a .483 OPS.

It’s a completely fallacious argument.

The only valid argument for keeping Romo out of the 9th is that the club doesn’t think he can work a full inning every other day because of an often tender elbow.

Given the totality of the data, Romo should have been closing the moment that Brian Wilson went down with injury. Period. Instead the Giants went with an inferior pitcher in Casilla. For the majority of the first half Casilla was admittedly impressive, he converted 19 of his first 20 save chances, but he’s turned into a disaster of epic proportions of late blowing five of eight save chances as his ERA has gone up two full runs over his last 10 outings. Hopefully the Giants will finally do the right thing and use Romo in the 9th inning, but even if they move on from Casilla, as they should, don’t be surprised is Jeremy Affeldt sees some 9th inning work.

Ray Flowers can be heard daily on Sirius/XM Radio on The Fantasy Drive on Sirius 210 and XM 87 from 5-8 PM EDT, Monday through Friday.

Nirvana

In the grand scheme of things a championship in sports means nothing, and the life of one person is also rendered insignificant when placed in the context of the world. But I gotta tell you, in this corner of the sphere that we all inhabit, there have been few things that can rival what has occurred over the last 24 hours.

I’ve never been married or ever welcomed a child into this world, so I don’t have that frame of reference to draw upon, but I can tell you this – in the pantheon of events that have shaped my life, this event ranks near the top of the list.

Willie May, Willie McCovey, Orlando Cepeda, Juan Marichal, Barry Bonds – some of the greatest players ever to done a uniform – were never able to bring a World Championship to San Francisco. In more recent years players such as Jeff Leonard, Will Clark, Kevin Mitchell, John Burkett, John Beck and Jeff Kent were also unable to bring the World Series trophy home to San Francisco.

On Monday night, November 1st, 2010, that all changed.

The names will likely be forgotten in a few years if you aren’t a Giants fan. Honestly, some of the players might not even be at the forefront of your mind right now (Sergio Romo, Travis Ishikawa, Javier Lopez, Jeremy Affeldt, Mike Fontenot, Nate Schierholtz), but isn’t that the wonder of baseball? The sport is more than one great player leading a team to victory through sheer will and determination. The grind of six months of a regular season an another month for the playoffs offers the chance for numerous players to make history or to step to the fore at a moments notice. Cody Ross? I mean seriously, unless you were a Marlins’ fan or a fantasy baseball addict, did you even know who he was prior to the postseason? Edgar Renteria? Wasn’t he washed up and heading off into retirement after the worst season of his career (.276-3-22)? My goodness, he didn’t even start the first five games of the playoffs for the Giants. But that was the beauty of the 2010 Giants. They may not have been a team filled with “names,” but they had timely hitting, excellent work behind the bench by Bruce Bochy, and some of the best pitching the game has seen in this century.

As for me, the day after is surreal. For every year of my life that I have consciously been aware of the game of baseball, I have lived and died with the Giants. I’ve lost sleep worrying about games, I’ve skipped out on dates with pretty ladies to watch games, and I’ve nearly given myself an ulcer with each gut wrenching failure I have endured along with the club. So when Brian Wilson threw that final strike last night, what was my response? Did I jump up and down? Did I scream at the top of my lungs? Did I get plowed to the point that I forgot my own name? The truth is I didn’t do any of those things. Instead, I looked over to my parents, both of whom who have been there right with me nearly every step of the way, and simply smiled and said “wow.”

It may not have been a celebration for the ages in the Flowers’ household, but I can tell you this – other than those major life events, like my parents wedding, my brother and I being born, my brother having two wonderful children of his own, it was one of the happiest moments of our lives.

Thank you San Francisco Giants. It was a long time in coming, but as I’ve written before, it was all worth it as I can now walk down the street, #1 finger held high in the air, with a huge smile on my face. We, and yes I’m including myself and all the Giants’ fans in the world, WE are World Champions.

By Ray Flowers

Free Agent Bidding

I was thinking about how the fantasy baseball free agent bidding process, and I’m continually amazed at how the process works. Before I get into why that is, let me briefly describe what I’m talking about.

Total Free Agency
Back in the day, and in some leagues still, players are on the free agent wire to be picked up at any time. While this might be the easiest way to do things and the way that most of us grew up with playing the game, the fact is this is really an unfair system. Let me give just one example that illustrates why. Let’s say you live on the west coast, and let’s posit that Brian Wilson blows his arm out at 11:45 PM in the 14th inning of the game (this is NOT true – it is only an example). On the telecast, right after the game, manager Bruce Bochy says that Jeremy Affeldt will be the new Giants closer so you run an pick him up off waivers. If you live on the east coast and are in bed because it’s 3 AM and you have a job, you are screwed. You never even had a chance to grab Affeldt.

Weekly Free Agency
Let’s assume the above scenario. However, let’s say that this happens on Tuesday night and your leagues free agency period ends on Sunday night at 8 PM, EST. That means that you have Wednesday through Sunday to put in a bid on Affeldt so that everyone has a shot. In this scenario teams are offered players based on the reverse order of the standings. That means, if you are in a 12-team league that the team in 12th place gets the first choice of free agents, team 11 second, all the way down to the first place team getting last shot. However, once a team picks up a player it goes to the back of the bus. Let’s say the 12th place team doesn’t need closers so they pick up Chris Coghlan off waivers first. They then drop to last in line and the team in 11th place would get a shot at Affeldt or whomever else they wanted and so on.

FAAB Bidding
This is the way that most of the “money” leagues do it. In this process each team is given a budget of Monopoly money, i.e. fake dollars, and they get to bid on free agents. Just like weekly free agency, most of the time there is one day a week when bids are due, though some leagues implement this FAAB process on a daily basis as well. FAAB means Free Agent Acquisition Budget by the way. This is my favorite style because everyone gets a chance at every player, provided they have any money left, and it adds an extra element of strategy to the mix. Continuing with our example, let’s say we have a $1,000 budget to work with for the year and we owned Wilson and now would like to have Affeldt. We’re not sure he will be able to hold the job down, but we need the saves, so we drop a bid of $135 dollars on him. Another team, super desperate for saves bids $210. Another team who is also desperate for saves might think Affeldt will eventually lose the job to Bobby Howry so they only bid $41 dollars on him. The point is, you not only have to identify the players you want in this scenario, you also have to identify how much is an appropriate amount to spend, because once your money is gone you can no longer bid so it makes no sense to simply toss out an outrages bid like $400 on Affeldt.

To show the diversity amongst owners, here are FAAB from Sunday the 17th on C.J. Wilson who will close until Frank Francisco returns from biceps tendonitis. Current reports have Francisco back on Friday, and the belief is that he will slide right back into the closers role. As a result, I personally bid $24 dollars on Wilson thinking I might pick up a week’s worth of saves because his work this season has been miserable (1.53 WHIP, 5.51 K/9, 1.11 K/BB) rendering him useless without saves. How did my $24 bid stack up? Well, I didn’t “win” Wilson, he went for $68 in my league, and here is what he cost in a host of the other National Fantasy Baseball Championship (NFBC) leagues this past weekend.

C.J. Wilson $200
C.J. Wilson $53
C.J. Wilson $116
C.J. Wilson $76
C.J. Wilson $129
C.J. Wilson $97
C.J. Wilson $65
C.J. Wilson $88
C.J. Wilson $157
C.J. Wilson $249
C.J. Wilson $75
C.J. Wilson $105
C.J. Wilson $195
C.J. Wilson $54
C.J. Wilson $63
C.J. Wilson $111
C.J. Wilson $89
C.J. Wilson $106
C.J. Wilson $169
C.J. Wilson $43
C.J. Wilson $57
C.J. Wilson $54
C.J. Wilson $52
C.J. Wilson $21

As you can plainly see we had winning bids from $21 to $249, a massive spread. In my league where he went for $68, there was one other bid for a dollar more than me at $25. What his means is that the $68 dollar bid would have been a winner at $26 dollars meaning that the “winner” ended up wasting $42. Still, as you can tell from the other bids, in a good deal of leagues even the $68 bid would have come up way short.

To me, this added layer of the free agent bidding process sets leagues like this apart forcing you to use yet another skill set in order to emerge victorious in your fantasy league. If your league doesn’t use this process I highly suggest moving to it in 2010 as there is nothing like being able to bitch about getting screwed by two dollars or lording it over your friends when you are the one that came out on top.

By Ray Flowers