Daily Joust: The Weekend Ahead

It’s Friday, and that means a couple of things. One, it’s about time to cut loose and have some fun. Two, I’ll be giving some plays for Friday and Saturday that would seem to be in prime position to succeed.

For those of you unaware of just what DailyJoust is and what the offer, click on the link. The bottom line is DJ allows you the chance to play daily fantasy baseball, choose a team today an another one tomorrow if you want, all the while giving you the chance to make some real money. Today, I’ll give some advice on how you might choose to fill out your lineup for Friday or Saturday.

HITTERS – FRIDAY

Elvis Andrus vs. Jered Weaver: A tough matchup on paper given Weaver’s dominance and fly ball ways, Andrus has had no issue whatsoever getting on base against Jered as he’s posted 21 hits in 49 at-bats (.429).

Joe Mauer vs. Luke Hochevar: Mr. Mauer has one homer against Mr. Hochevar and six walks, but it’s the 11 hits in 23 at-bats (.478) that grab ones attention. Oh yeah, that .586 OBP ain’t too bad either.

Rickie Weeks vs. Homer Bailey: Hitting .197 on the year and .182 the past week, Weeks just can’t get anything going. You’ll know it’s a lost season of he doesn’t get a couple of knocks in this matchup given that he’s hit .524 with two homers and seven RBIs against Bailey in 21 at-bats.

PITCHERS – FRIDAY

Trevor Cahill vs. Astros: Call this one a hunch. Cahill hasn’t pitched well at home with a 3-4 record, 4.78 Era and 1.45 WHIP. He’s also never faced the Astros, and he’s lost three of his last four starts this season. So why suggest starting him? After the Astros made that huge move to add seven players I’d figure the clubhouse is in a bit of shock.

Kevin Correia vs. Marlins: The last time he faced the Fish it was a disaster as he allowed six runs in 3.2 innings back on May 15th, but he has won his last four decisions. He’s also had a lot of success this year at home with a 3.50 ERA and 1.12 WHIP in seven starts though you shouldn’t be expecting many punchouts (he has just 17 in 43.2 innings at home).

Luke Hochevar vs. Twins: His career numbers against the club from Minnesota stink (4-4, 5.14 ERA, 1.43 WHIP), but he’s been pitching pretty well of late. He’s 3-1 in his last four decisions, isn’t beating himself (12 walks in seven games), and he’s lowered his ERA from 6.63 to 5.16 over his last seven trips to the bump.

HITTERS – SATURDAY

Bobby Abreu vs. Miguel Bautista: This matchup goes back years and Abreu has come out the victor an awful lot with a .387 batting average and 1.072 OPS in 31 at-bats (he has gone deep once with nine RBIs as well).

Matt Diaz vs. Jon Lannan: The Nationals lefty will get his chance to shin in a return to the big leagues, but he’s going to want to make sure he avoids Diaz if possible as the Braves outfielder has hit .424 with a 1.032 OPS against John in 33 at-bats.

Ian Kinsler vs. Ervin Santana: Kinsler only has one homer and five RBIs in the matchup but he also has 18 hits in 47 at-bats, good for a .383 average and 1.038 OPS. Michael Young also bears watching as he’s hit .351 with 13 RBIs in 74 ABs against Santana. Oddly Young has 16 Ks in 74 at-bats.

PITCHERS – SATURDAY

Bronson Arroyo vs. Brewers: Talk about some success. Arroyo has held the Brew Crew to a .213/.274/.360 line in 272 at-bats. Remove the four homers of Ryan Braun and the other Brewers have taken the homer prone hurler deep just five times in 229 at-bats.

Scott Diamond vs. Royals: Diamond is sporting an 8-3 record with a 2.96 ERA on the year, but he’s coming off a poor start that saw him allow five runs and nine hits in six innings. Still he’s been successful this year and current Royals batters are hitting .207 off Diamond with a .499 OPS in 29 at-bats.

Edwin Jackson vs. Braves: This is a risky call. On the one hand Jackson has been bombed over his last three starts allowing 16 runs over his last 13.2 innings. On the other hand he’s had a lot of success against current Braves batters holding them to a .206 average, .559 OPS and no homers in 68 at-bats.

CONTESTS

Are you looking to show off your baseball acumen?

Is your team floundering because of injury after injury?

Are you still looking for a way to get your fantasy baseball fix?

To sign up for any game with DailyJoust simply click on the link. DJ can help you to redeem your 2012 fantasy baseball season. You head to the site, sign up, and off you go with a myriad of options to play. The best part? The games are DAILY. You don’t need to worry about losing Brett Garnder all year and what that’s done to your team. Every day you can choose a new lineup. It didn’t work out Thursday? Well pick some new players on Friday. Want to roll with the same lineup on Saturday again? You certainly can. You’re also free to completely change things up and go with a whole new squad in your quest to make some cash.

By Ray Flowers  

Around the Horn: August30, 2011

(1) Andrew McCutchen one steal from joining the 20/20 club.

(2) Miguel Cabrera is simply phenomenal yet again.

(3) Carlos Lee on fire of late, RBI streak continues.

(4) Mark Buehrle is boring, but the guy is really good.

(5) Luke Hochevar pitching very well in the second half.

(6) Nick Swisher on fire, six homers in seven games. Has he lived up to my expectations? See 2011 Player Profile: Nick Swisher.

(7) Jose Reyes back from injury while Nelson Cruz is out yet again.

By Ray Flowers

Diamond Musings

You got a chance to see my beautiful mug earlier today in Around the Horn – Slow Starts . Now you’ll get a chance to also be bored by my written word.

Alex Gordon has looked great so far justifying the Royals decision to bat him third in the lineup (I still think it’s a bad idea, but for now it’s clearly working). Through that massive sample size of 24 at-bats, Gordon is hitting .375 with a 1.067 OPS as he has scored six times and knocked in three runs through five games. Have the Royals actually, inconceivably, done something right? They have have here, but…

Luke Hochevar was the #1 pick in the country in 2006, and since then he has been a monumental bust. Completely miscast as the Royals’ opening day starter, Hochevar owns a career ERA of 5.61 and a 1.46 WHP over 399.1 innings. He also owns a poor 5.97 K/9 mark and an equally unimpressive 1.95 K/BB ratio. I know the Royals took Hochevar first overall in 2006 because of cost and signability concerns about others in the draft, but look at some of the other first round arms that were taken that year: Brandon Morrow (5th overall), Clayton Kershaw (7th), Tim Lincecum (10th) and Max Scherzer (11th). Now you know why the Royals stink year after year. Let’s give them at least some credit. It’s not like the Rockies (#2 – Greg Reynolds) or Tigers (#6 – Andrew Miller) used their picks wisely either (in retrospect of course).

I got an awful lot of flack from people about having Howie Kendrick ranked so highly this year in the Baseball Guys’ Top-300. It’s only been five games of course, but early returns are very positive as he is hitting .429 with three bombs and six runs scored. He continues to fatten up against the Rays who he has absolutely demolished in his career to the tune of .443/.483/.722 slash line over 97 at-bats. He’s also knocked in 15 while scoring 20 times in those 26 games. Yowzah.

Help me out here Angels. You head into the year with Fernando Rodney as your closer. Everyone tells you it’s a bad idea, I think even the Rally Monkey could have told you that, but you pushed on anyway going with the veteran who saved 37 games in 2009 for the Tigers. So what happens? Rodney goes out and makes two appearances and loses the job? He did walk for guys in 1.1 innings, but honestly Angels, what did you expect? I simply can’t fathom why a team would bail on a player after two games. I’m sitting here castigating people for wanting to abandon ship in the fantasy game, telling them to remain patient, and you go and do this? Fantasy gamers who drop players after a week are stupid. A major league team that demotes a player after a week is monumentally misguided, and that’s being overly kind. So what happens when Peter Bourjos goes 1-for-13, will he lose his job? If Scott Downs returns from the DL and allows runs in three straight outings will he be released? I don’t see how this move helps anyone on the team – all it does is instill fear in the players that they’ll lose their job at the first sign of adversity. Jordan Walden takes over in the 9th inning by the way, and with his dominating stuff he is a must add in all leagues if he’s still sitting on the waiver-wire.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: June 23, 2010

(1) Stephen Strasburg suffers first loss, being outpitched by Brian Bannister.

(2) Edwin Encarnacion stays with Blue Jays after passing through waivers.

(3) Josh Beckett (back) improving, but unlikely to return before All-Star Break.

(4) Gil Meche (shoulder) and Luke Hochevar (elbow) hope to rejoin Royals around the All-Star break.

(5) Johnny Cueto rebounds after rough start to June.

(6) Joey Devine (elbow) shut down again.

(7) Rays to stick with Wade Davis over Jeremy Hellickson.

By Ray Flowers

Your Convenience Store

Random homers, tipping pitches, idiotic lineup changes, injuries, playoff races and even a little NFL talk. That’s right. I’m a one stop shop in this entry.

Garrett Atkins went deep on Thursday, his first home run at Coors Field since April 25th. How the hell does anyone, let alone a perennial 20 homer bat like Atkins, go over four months between home runs at home? Simply amazing, though I’m still more shocked to see that he is hitting just .227 on the year, this after batting .329, .301 and .286 the past three years. Talk about a guy who needs a change of scenery.

Looks like Jeremy Hermida might be done for the year with that troublesome right oblique strain as he has yet to do much of anything other than shower and shave for the past week. “We’ve done as much as we can for it. It’s unfortunately one of those injuries you can’t really rush,” Hermida said. As a result, Cameron Maybin becomes a potentially big play down the stretch for those that held on to him all year or took a chance on picking him up when he was recalled recently. Over the 21 at-bats since he was recalled Maybin has seven hits leading to a .333 average, and he has gone deep once while scoring seven runs. As encouraging, he seems to have a much better grasp of what he is doing at the dish as he has walked six times with only five strikeouts, this after posting eight walks against 31 strikeouts earlier in the year. Now that’s progress.

Luke Hochevar has found out why he has been hit so hard of late- he has been tipping his pitches. So now we know why his ERA is over eight in his last eight starts. Either that or because he is just awful. I think I might lean toward option #2.

I’m glad the Phillies finally decided to bench Brad Lidge and replace him with Ryan Madson (you can read about it in Around the Horn). Oh yeah, I’m also happy that I benched Madson this week because of some struggles of late (four earned runs in his last five innings) in favor of Brandon Lyon who was supposed to take over closing duties with Fernando Rodney serving a suspension for the Tigers. Of course, Rodney appealed the suspension remaining active, and Madson was given the closing role in Philly. I’m two saves from moving into third place overall in my National Fantasy Baseball Championship league, so care to guess how many saves I’ve lost out on this week? Two of course. Ever feel like no matter what move you make that it just won’t work? So frustrating. Where is my ripple? I know it’s around here someplace.

Is it possible that the Rockies won’t just win the Wild Card in the National League, but that they will catch the Dodgers for the NL West title? Crazy as it sounds, the Rockies are now closer to the Dodgers (two games behind) and than the Giants are to them in the Wild Card standings (4.5 games back). No team has every gone from 15.5 games down in a season to capture the division title. The Rockies could be the first.

NFL BLOTTER

For those of you counting the seconds for the NFL to get under way —

Michael Crabtree remains on the sidelines, still unsigned as the NFL regular season begins. Don’t know how that makes any sense at all. Maybe he is being advised by Alex Rodriguez.

The Cowboys have the most expensive ticket in the NFL this season at $159.65 according to Team Marketing Report’s survey. To compare, the average NFL ticket will set you back about $75. There is no truth to the rumor that Cowboys games are twice as fun, that the team will be twice as good, or that the seats are twice as comfortable. You will get to look at a massively oversized television screen that hangs above the field and interrupts play when hit by punts though. Only in Texas.

By Ray Flowers