2012 Positional Review – Catchers

Now that the 2012 season is over, it’s time to review how my predictions went for each position in fantasy baseball. To that end, I will review my top-10 at each position and give a brief rundown on how each of the ten performed. I’ll also list which player was a “Hit” (someone who lived up to expectations) as well as a “Miss” (the player who simply failed to impress).

Note: All of these rankings are taken from the 2012 BASEBALLGUYS DRAFT GUIDE

For more on the Draft Guide you can click on the link.

For an update on what you missed in the Draft Guide, click on the link.

2012 CATCHER Top-10

1 Carlos Santana
2 Mike Napoli
3 Matt Wieters
4 Brian McCann
5 Joe Mauer
6 Miguel Montero
7 Buster Posey
8 Alex Avila
9 Yadier Molina
10 J.P. Arencebia

Santana had a monster second half (.281-13-46-41 in 74 games) that helped him to a strong season in the counting categories (18 HRs, 76 RBIs, 72 runs) even if his batting average of .252 was disappointing. He was the only AL catcher to go 15-75-70.

Napoli had 24 homers exactly matching his 2008-11 average. Too bad he also hit a career worst .227 with his lowest RBI total in three years (56 after years of 68 and 75).

Wieters had an impressive season with 23 homers and 83 RBIs. He was the only catcher in the AL go go 20-80. Like Santana above though, he failed to live up to expectations in the batting average category at .249.

McCann recorded 20 homers for the fifth straight year and six time in seven seasons, but that was his only highlight. He failed to record 70 RBIs, with 67, for the first time ever (not counting his 180 at-bat first season). He scored 44 runs, his first time under 50 ever (other than his abbreviated first season). He hit a career worst .230, only .049 points below his career average. Obviously his injured shoulder was a major issue. Hopefully surgery will fix what ails him but he may not be 100 percent by the start of the 2013 season.

Mauer, in retrospect, should have been ranked higher as he did what he always does. Mauer led all AL catchers in batting (.319) an all catchers in OBP (.416). He was also the only catcher in baseball to score 80 runs (he had 81), he went deep 10 times and drove home an AL position leading 85 runners and stole eight bases for good measure.

Montero started slowly hitting .252 with two homers in his first 41 games, but he closed like gangbusters leading to a second straight season hitting .280 with 15 homers, 85 RBIs and 65 runs scored (.286-15-88-65).

Posey will likely win the NL MVP, but don’t forget that he was coming off a significant leg injury causing everyone to doubt whether or not he would ever return to his previous glory. Boy did he return all right, and then some. Posey led baseball with a .336 batting average while going deep 24 times with 103 RBIs, while he had a .408 OBP an an over the top .956 OPS. He was the most dominating catcher in the game, and if someone tells you otherwise stop talking to them about baseball cause they are a moron.

Avila was a total stinker. He lost 10 homers (down to nine), 34 RBIs (down to 48), 21 runs (down to 42), .042 points in batting average (down to .242) and .155 points in OPS (down to .736). A miserable season that leaves in doubt whether or not he will ever get back to his 2011 levels (.295-19-82-63).

Molina played superb defense, and this season his offense reached never before seen heights with career bests in all the fantasy categories (.322-22-76-65-12). A truly remarkable fantasy season for a player who most had ranked 5-8 spots lower than me.

Arencebia’s season was marred by an injury that limited him to just 347 at-bats, 96 fewer than 2011. He still socked 18 homers with 56 RBIs but he continued to K a ton (108) while never walking (18 free passes) leading to an unacceptable average (.233) and OBP (.275).

Hit: Ryan Doumit (#15), Wilin Rosario (#28)
I singled Doumit and Rosario out as two of my players to target at the position this year after the top-10 were off the board. Boy did they deliver. What did I think that Doumit could do this year? In his Player Profile I wrote the following: “Per 450 at-bats, a total Doumit should reach in 2012 if he can stay healthy, the average Doumit season has produced a 5×5 line of .271-15-61-54-2.” He went .275-18-75-56-0 in 484 at-bats. Rosario led all catchers with 28 homers – in just 396 at-bats. He also knocked in 71 runners and scored 67 times himself in a truly dominating effort that cost you peanuts on draft day.

Miss: Alex Avila

 By Ray Flowers

Daily Joust – Wk 10: Did We Learn Anything?

To get your daily fantasy baseball fix make sure you head over to DailyJoust.com to set your salary cap club.

GAINERS OF THE WEEK

Clay Buchholz (+112, $339,000 in Daily JoustSalary)
He’s got a 5.77 ERA and 1.58 WHIP, and the last time he was worth anything in the fantasy game was 2010. Still, the seeds of improvement are here. Over his last three starts he has allowed four runs and four of the last five times out he’s allowed two or fewer runs. A big key? He’s reigned in the walks with only four in his last three starts. Still, I’m not a huge fan. I just don’t like his overall game.

Jonny Gomes (+24, $79K)
The guy has power. He has five homers this year in 107 at-bats, and dating back to last season he has gone deep 19 times in 418 at-bats. At the same time he has hit .211 in that time – he’s hitting .215 this year – though he does have a rather impressive .333 OBP given his lowly average. He’s nothing more than a depth option in AL-only leagues since he’s really not a very good hitter against right-handed pitching.

Ian Kennedy (+97, $329K)
Kennedy has allowed a total of one run in his last two starts as he’s racked up 19 Ks in just 13.2 innings. Kennedy was never going to match his performance from last year (21-4 record). Wasn’t gonna happen. Still, his K/9 rate of 8.44 is up from last season (8.03) while his BB/9 rate is the same at 2.26. Honestly though, he’s pitched pretty similar to what he offered last year (xFIP was 3.50 last year, this year it’s 3.86).

Miguel Montero (+19, $84K)
Montero has two homers and seven RBI over his last five games signaling that perhaps he is finally on the cusp of returning to the hitter everyone thought they were drafting this year. A season after hitting .282 with 18 homers and 86 RBI, Montero’s power is way down (four HR) while his average is also lagging (.249). I still believe he could be the hitter he was last year the rest of the way. Time will tell.

Wei-Yin Chen (+89, $264K)
He’s pitched well in his first 11 big league starts with a 3.49 ERA and 1.30 WHIP. Still, his K/BB is 2.32. His GB/FB is 0.90. His BABIP is .283. His HR/9 is 0.94. The end result? That’s a whole lot of league average numbers isn’t it?

LOSERS OF THE WEEK

Dexter Fowler (-25, $91K)
Hitting .281 with a .382 OBP, people are starting to get a wee bit nervous with Fowler after 9-games without a homer and nine Ks in his last four games. Perspective people. Has he been cold for a week? For sure. Was he insanely hot the week before? You know this. He’s on pace for a 20 homers, 75 RBI, 90 run, 15 SB season. Hold fast.

Mike Moustakas (-19, $75K)
Hitting .273 with a .336 OBP, Moose has been solid but not great. The nine homers and 28 RBI put him on pace to be a top level option at third base in the power department, but he’s also hit only one homer in 10 games, and in 54 at-bats against lefties he has a .583 OPS. Still has a ways to go, but a solid start.

Ivan Nova (-74, $219K)
He’s 8-2 and he has a rather amazing, for him, 69 Ks in 77.2 innings (his 8.00 K/9 mark is more than two an a half batters above his career rate entering the year). He’s also allowed just one run in 15 innings over his last two starts. At the same time he’s got a 4.64 ERA and 1.42 WHIP and he’s allowed five or more earned runs in five of his last nine starts and his ground ball rate is on the decline (52 percent his first two seasons down to 47 percent). Tread carefully.

Bud Norris (-49, $182K)
On May 25th Norris had a 3.14 ERA. Now? That number is 4.65 as he has been blown up for 16 runs over his last three starts (12.1 innings). Obviously he’s struggling to get batters out at the moment, but he’s also struck out 18 batters in that time so he’s still providing some value. He’s likely not a 3.14 ERA guy, but I also don’t think he’s a 4.65 guy either.

Buster Posey (-20, $75K)
Hitting .290 with a .810 OPS, Posey is just about back to the hitter he was in 2010 when he took the Bay Area by storm. Still, that’s if we look at his overall game because after hitting .353 in April he’s hit a mere .256. He’s a legit .290 hitter though, so don’t expect his average to fall much further.

DAILY CONTEST

Today you can sign up for the King Arthur’s $50 Free Roll on DailyJoust. No entry free is required to get a chance to play the game and earn your free chance to take home part of the $50 prize pool. All games that start at 7:05 PM EDT or later are open to add players to your daily fantasy baseball squad. So get over to DailyJoust, put together your one day lineup, and get ready to win some free $.

By Ray Flowers

Mailbag: May 24, 2012

Each week I’ll be here answering questions that have been sent to me at the BaseballGuys’ Twitter page.

What do you think of this trade offer: Dan Haren for Ryan Zimmerman?
– @toastedonry

Haren has lost his last four trips to the hill and he’s given up at least three runs in all four of the outings. He’s also dealing with a bit of a wonky back, an overall he’s 1-5 with a 4.37 ERA and 1.33 WHIP. Is it time to grab a pitchfork and a flaming torch to storm the castle? Not so fast. Haren is matching his K-rate from last season, though it is in the 7.2′s for the second straight year after 3-straight seasons over eight. His walk rate would be an 8-year high but we’re still talking about a 2.26 per nine mark. His BABIP is slightly elevated (.315) while his LOB% is slightly down (71 percent), and his GB/FB ratio of 1.08 is within shouting distance of his 1.19 career mark. He hasn’t pitched anywhere near as poorly as it would appear from his record and ERA. There are some signs of erosion of course, but it’s a gradual thing and not something that should add a run to his ERA and cause him to lose 15 games this season.

Zimmerman continues to be bothered, at least somewhat, by his shoulder. The result is a poor slash line of .248/.341/.350 from a guy who has career mark of .287/.354/.475. That’s right. Zimmerman’s current SLG is below his career OBP. A look at the rest of his line this year reveals a 0.62 BB/K mark, slightly above his 0.55 career rate, and his BABIP of .300 is just a hot week or two away from being right there with his career mark of .318. What has changed this year is a lack of fly balls, and this is a concern. Since the start of last season Zimmerman has hit more than 50 percent of his batted balls into the ground, that the is going to make big homer totals impossible to attain given his 12.5 percent career HR/F mark. In fact, his 1.50 GB/FB ratio since the start of last season is something you want to see on the back of the ball card of a 30 steal guy, not a middle of the order thumper.

Both these struggling options should improve as the season progresses. Third base has been hit by some injuries this year, including the one that has felled Zimmerman, so it would be understandable to add the Nationals third sacker with the hope that he is healthy. Given that I’m not sure he is, I’m going to side with Haren here but under the proviso that there are certainly setups in which it would make more sense to add Zimmerman (i.e. if your roster was deep in pitching and you needed a boost at the hot corner).

Stay the course with Miguel Montero at catcher?
– @Kronis_kek

Last year Montero was a top-5 catcher as he hit .282 with 18 homer, 86 RBI, 65 runs scored, a .351 OBP an a .820 OPS. This season he has been far from that level as he has hit .255 with two homers, 21 RBI and 16 runs scored. However, he’s still on pace for 75 RBI and 57 runs scored, numbers right in line with his production last year. He also is sporting a .350 OBP which is virtually identical to last season, and his 0.44 BB/K mark is just under the 0.48 mark he had last year. The average should come up, Montero has hit .282 the past three years, and it’s unlikely that after 4-straight years with a line drive rate of at least 19 percent that he’ll continue to struggle along at 16 percent the rest of the way. The power? That’s the big issue here. An 11 percent HR/F guy for his career, that number is just 5.7 percent this year. Of course, if Montero hits three homers in the next week that number will be right back where it should be. Bottom line for me is that Montero should still be a solid #1 catcher by the time the season is over if he stays healthy and you remain patient.

Do you think Felipe Paulino is a better value than James McDonald or Carlos Zambrano?
– @andy1mat

Paulino has always had a big arm, one that has produced a total of 349 strikeouts in 373 innings. Unfortunately injuries have long been a part of his game, as well as the fact that teams haven’t been sure if he would be best served as a starter or reliever. The Royals are committed to him as a starter, an in four starts this year has has allowed zero runs three times as he’s blown away hitters with 29 Ks, and just seven walks, in 25.1 innings. Obviously it would be wise not to read too much into four starts, so let’s look a bit further back. In 25 career appearances with the Royals (24 starts) Paulino has a 3.66 ERA, 1.33 WHIP and 148 Ks in 150 innings. Could I see him pitching at that level this season? He certainly could given his power arm. There is a question about durability though. Here are his innings pitched totals for his career starting in 2006: 126.1, 131, 0.2, 132.1, 95.2 and 139.1. Clearly he is far from certain to be a guy we can bank on taking the ball in September.

McDonald has made nine starts this season and he has yet to allow more than three runs in a start leading to a 2.51 ERA. He;s also been rather stingy with the walks allowing no more than three in any outing which has helped him to post a 0.99 WHIP. James has also struck out 58 batters in 57.1 innings as he is fulfilling the potential that had the Dodgers so excited about him for years. However, consistency has always eluded him which brings up the question of what expectations should be for the rest of the season? Is McDonald going to be able to hold on to his batter per nine gain in the strikeout column? Is he going to be able to hold on to the batter per nine inning reduction he’s provided in his walk rate (Currently 2.83 per nine)? Is he going to continue to be so stingy with the home run ball which seems unlikely given that his 0.31 HR/9 mark is less than half his career 0.88 mark? Is he going to continue to have a BABIP of .264, below his .299 career mark, which has enabled him to hold batters to a .198 batting average?

Until Wednesday, Zambrano had been off to a remarkable start to the season. Even with the beating he took at the hands of the Rockies (seven runs in five innings) his numbers are still rather impressive highlighted by his 2.85 ERA and 1.12 WHIP. Still, his K/BB continues to languish at 1.76, his BABIP is about .045 points low at .233 and for a guy has had a GB/FB ratio under 1.25 in each of the past three seasons it’s pretty hard to believe he’ll be able to sustain the 1.76 mark he currently owns. Zambrano has a great set of ratios, but they are deceiving. He really hasn’t pitched much different than “normal” and there is always the possibility that he could go postal on something at any point which has to make you nervous.

If I was ranking these guys, and let’s face it that’s what I’ve been asked to do, I’d go McDonald, Paulino and Zambrano.

Would you drop Josh Willingham for Matt Adams? Keeper league, but competing for 1st this year.
– @AdamTuteur

Willingham has tanked of late as he’s hit .212 in May with only one homer in his last 12 games. However, let’s not be too short sighted here. Willingham was terrific in April so in total he’s hitting .283 with eight homers, 27 RBI and 24 runs scored putting him on pace to go .281-30-100-90 which would  be the best season of his career (his previous bests are .277-29-98-75). Willingham has also ramped up his walk rate helping lead to a .400 OBP while his .565 SLG is nearly .100 points clear of his career mark (.479). Overall, a terrific start to his Twins career.

I touched on the outlook of Adams earlier this week in the On Deck Circle where I mentioned that Adams has a big bat but that he lacks experience. I also mentioned that playing time could be an issue since Matt Carpenter was around to potentially take at-bats from Adams. Consider one road block removed as Carpenter was placed on the DL with an oblique issue. The Cards will welcome back Allen Craig shortly, but Adams should be given an ample opportunity to secure a full-time position given the bat he possesses.

It’s a keeper league and that certainly swings the pendulum toward Adams, but at the same time if you’re playing to win this year you have to hold on to Willingham. Not only is he the one locked into a full-time role, he’s also the one who has the experience/success at the big league level. Put it this way – Adams hopes to one day be what Willingham is right now, so if you’re goal is to win now keep Willingham.

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.  

Around the Horn: May22, 2012

(1) D’backs call up Josh Bell to replace Ryan Roberts.

(2) Bryan LaHair really slumping in May.

(3) James Loney heating up.

(4) Chris Capuano pitching like Sandy Koufax.

(5) Kyle Drabek living on the edge.

(6) Adam Lind solid start down at Triple-A.

(7) Miguel Montero and Ryan Braun dealing with groin issues.

(8) Jimmy Rollins out a couple of days to be with first child.

By Ray Flowers

2011 Positional Review – Catchers

You remember back to March when I gave away all my position player rankings for free, right? For those of you who want to revisit my greatest hits, here’s where you would go to get all my rankings for hitters – 2011: BBGuys Hitter Capsules.

I’m nothing if not accountable, so I’ll review my top-10 predictions at each position as well as point out my biggest “hit” outside of the top-10 and my biggest “bust.” This should be fun.

Today, I’ll start with the catchers position.

2011 CATCHER Top-10
1 Joe Mauer
2 Victor Martinez
3 Brian McCann
4 Buster Posey
5 Geovany Soto
6 Carlos Santana
7 Mike Napoli
8 Matt Wieters
9 Miguel Montero
10 Kurt Suzuki

Mauer was injured from start to finish and he ended up with a .287 average, three homers and 30 RBI in 296 at-bats. It was a dismal season for a man who owns a career .323 average and a Hall of Fame bat.

V-Mart showed an astonishing lack of power with only 12 home runs, but he knocked in 103 runs while hitting .330 in what was a rather remarkable season.

McCann failed to hit .275 for the second straight year (he hit .270), and he also posted a 6-year low in RBI with 71. Still, he hit 24 homers and was the only catchers in the NL to hit more than 18 homers.

Posey‘s year ended after just 162 at-bats when he was plowed over at the plate trashing his leg. He is back to catching bullpens already and the Giants hope he will be at 100 percent by spring training next year.

Soto would have been my bust of the year if not for the failings of Mauer. Soto did hit 17 homers and knock in 54 runs, but he batted .228 while his OBP of .310 was .038 points below his career mark.

Santana was the best catcher in the AL not named Martinez. Santana, in his first full season in the bigs, was the only catcher in baseball with 20 homers, 70 RBI and 70 runs scores (27, 79 and 84). The 84 runs led the position.

Napoli was a superstar this season, and I wrote all about his efforts in Player Profile: Mike Napoli.

Wieters was one of three catcher eligible players to hit 20 homers with 65 RBI and 70 runs scored (he had 22, 68 and 72). Matt killed it in the second half hitting 14 homers with a .840 OPS in 61 games.

Montero was a rock all year for the D’backs. After hitting .294-16-59 in 2009, he was injured in 2010 and limited to 85 games. He bounced back this year with the best effort of his career (.282-18-86-65).

Suzuki was my #10 catcher because of one main reason – consistency. He did appear in 130 games for a fourth straight year, and his total of 14 homers was an exact match for his 2009-10 average, but his average fell to a career worst (.237) while he lost 37 RBI from 2010 (71) and 44 from 2009 (88).

Hit: Chris Iannetta #14
The Rockies have still never given him 350 at-bats in a season, but with 345 this year he blasted 14 homers, knocked in 55 runs and scored 51 times. Only 11 catchers in the game went 14-50-50, and only three went 14-50-50 with a .370 OBP (the others were Alex Avila and Napoli). He may have hit only .238, but he walked 70 times leading to that impressive .370 OBP.

Bust: Joe Mauer #1
What more needs to be said? He stunk.

By Ray Flowers

Top-10 C for 2011

Taking a look back at 2010 and trying to project what will happen in 2011 is what we do at Fanball. To that end, Ted Carlson has been sending out assignments for the staff to rank our top options at each position for the 2011 season. Today, I’ll explain my rankings for the Top-10 Catchers for 2011.

For the other reviews in this series, click on the following links.

Top-20 SPs: Latos and Jimenez?

Top-10 RPs for 2011.

Top-20 OFs for 2011.

Top-10 SS for 2011.

Top-10 3B for 2011.

Top-10 2B for 2011.

Top-10 1B for 2011.

My Top-10

Joe Mauer – The best hitting catcher in the game, period. Mauer hit .327 with 75 RBI and 88 runs scored, not to mention a .402 OBP, in 2010. Not worth the top-15 overall selection he was taken as last season, Mauer hit just nine homers, and if we remove his anomalous 28 homers season of 2009 we find that Mauer has averaged 9.4 homers in his other five seasons (I’m not counting his six homer effort in 107 at-bats in his first season).

Victor Martinez – The last six seasons that he has accrued at least 450 at-bats he has never failed to hit at least 16 homers or to produce at least 79 RBI. Toss in that he owns a career .300 batting average and you have yourself the second best fantasy catcher in baseball.

Brian McCann – Since 2006 McCann has hit at least 18 homers with 77 RBI each season. Moreover, since 2006, McCann leads the position in homers (107), extra base hits (283) and RBI (443). A rock solid option.

Buster Posey – If you watched the Giants all year, you’re sold on Posey. If you paid close attention in the playoffs, you should be sold as well. I worried about Posey’s ability to go deep heading into the year, but 18 homers in 406 at-bats would seem to waylay that fear. The young man can hit, and it’s not a stretch to think that he could match the production of V-Mart or McCann in 2011.

Geovany Soto – The Cubs’ catcher rebounded from a down 2009 to produce some solid totals. He nearly doubled Mauer with 17 homers, knocked in 53 runs, and hit a solid .280. Soto also was third at the position in OBP (.393) while he actually led catchers with a .890 OPS (Mauer was second at .871).

Carlos Santana – His season ended when he needed knee surgery, but he should be 100 percent by opening day. If he maintained his pace from last season and had 450 at-bats in 2011 he would hit .260 with 18 homers, 66 RBI and 69 runs scored. Given that his OBP was .401 last year, you have to think that his batting average could easily climb.

Kurt Suzuki – He didn’t match his breakout 2009 effort (.274-15-88-74) hitting .242-13-71-55, but he played more than 130-games for a third straight year and was still pretty darn effective for a catcher. He’s not an elite option, but he should still, easily, be a top-10 selection.

Matt Wieters – From the penthouse to the outhouse. After hitting .288 with nine homers in 354 at-bats as a rookie, Wieters slumped to .249 with 11 homers in 446 at-bats leading everyone to bail from the bandwagon as quick as they can. I’m not – I’m holding on for dear life. Wieters walked more frequently in year two while striking out less boosting his BB/K from 0.33 to 0.50. I like that. I also think his 15.4 line drive rate should improve in 2011, and with it his .287 BABIP, allowing that average to climb as well. Buy low on this guy.

Miguel Montero – Montero was a fantasy star in 2009 (.294-16-59-61) who failed to match his production in 2010 (.266-9-43-36). However, he had to come back from knee surgery and received 128 fewer at-bats, so his production actually wasn’t substantially different. At the same time he has only one season with more than 300 at-bats, one season of an average of .270 and just one season with more than 36 runs scored. I’d like to see another strong effort from him in 2011, but he is clearly still a top-10 option.

Mike Napoli – I’d rank him higher if I knew he would get the at-bats that he deserved. However, I just feel like that won’t ever happen unless he leaves the Angels. Napoli owns a strong .831 OPS in his career, and he has gone deep at least 20-times each of the past three years despite averaging a mere 353 at-bats a season. He may only have a .251 career average, but he has hit in the .270′s two of the past three years.

By Ray Flowers

Injuries and Failures

Today was a good day. I accomplished all the writing I had hoped to get to, answered a ton of emails, had a strong podcast this morning with Kyle Elfrink, and closed down the day with a nice two hour shift of Live Advice. Before I drift off into the mist of Friday night, and a potential date (keep your fingers crossed), I thought I would wrap up the day with some notes from what is going on around the diamond, so here goes nothing.

Giants fans, here is your catcher update for the week. Bengie Molina is second on the Giants with eight RBI and he is batting .317 through 12 games. Amazingly, he also has two walks already, a breakneck pace for a guy who walked 13 times last year in 132 games (how pathetic is that and the corresponding .285 OBP?). Down on the farm the heir apparent, Buster Posey, is batting .373 through 15 games. Buster also has eight walks against nine strikeouts helping him to post a .457 OBP and a .949 OPS. There is no doubt that Posey already has a better approach at the dish than Molina, but Molina has enough power at the plate, and works very well with the staff on defense, so don’t be at all surprised to see Posey continue to toil away in the minors for a while unless there is an injury with the Giants.

The A’s Kevin Kouzmanoff has hit .215 with .308 SLG and a .572 OPS in his first 17 games with his new club. Some other disturbing numbers with KK follow. (1) He is hitting .056 with RISP (1-for-18). (2) He is batting .156 with runners on base. (3) Fifty-eight of his 66 ABs this season have come out of the cleanup spot. The A’s finally dropped him to sixth in the order the other night.

Manny Ramirez has been placed on the DL with a calf injury. It’s being called a strain so let’s hope that 15 days on the sidelines will be enough to cure him. Xavier Paul has been recalled from the minors to take his roster spot, though it looks like Reed Johnson and Garret Anderson will likely take Manny’s place in the everyday lineup. None of those three have close to the presence of Manny, and none figure to be able to match his early season work at the dish either (.415 with a 1.159 OPS through 13 games). I really went out on a limb with that statement didn’t I?

The Red Sox have been about as successful throwing out attempted base thieves this season as I have been trying to convince beautiful ladies to go out with me. Let’s just say neither of us has had a high success rate, but I would have to think my mark is better than the what the Red Sox have been getting from Victor Martinez and Jason Varitek (the Sox have thrown out just one of 38 steal attempts). The rumor is that the Sox have an interest in bringing Chris Snyder out east to join their club. Of course, this won’t happen for a while as the D’backs can’t afford to move Snyder at least until Miguel Montero returns from his knee injury. Snyder has thrown out just 25.9 percent of base stealers in his career, and is only 2-for-12 this year (16.7 percent), but the Sox are fairly desperate at this point because of their inept duo.

Ryan Zimmerman is out of the lineup on Friday after injuring his other hamstring. He also figures to miss Saturday’s game, but the belief is still that he should be good enough to go come next week. Cristian Guzman will continue to fill in with Adam Kennedy at second and Ian Desmond playing short.

Ben Zobrist was given a 5-year deal that could be worth up to $32.5 million dollars after last year’s breakout season. Apparently he’ll get about $18 million guaranteed with a couple of option years that could take the deal up to that original total. The Rays aren’t usually wrong with their talent evaluation, and they certainly have to be proactive given their financial situation, but that seems like a fair bit of loot to lavish on a guy who has only one full big league season under his belt.

Finally, here are a couple of links to stories I wrote on Friday.

What are the Cubs thinking with their move of Carlos Zambrano to the bullpen? Impact Report: Gorzelanny/Silva/Zambrano.

For those of you who have a special place in your heart for hockey, here is a quick jaunt around the frozen pond where I discuss all the first round playoff matchups. Frozen Pucks.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: April12, 2010

What is the deal with the massive amount of injuries to all-star caliber players in the opening month of the season? Here is a list of the players I’ll touch on today.

C: Miguel Montero

1B: Lance Berkman, Derrek Lee

2B: Mark Ellis, Aaron Hill, Ian Kinsler, Brian Roberts

3B: Ryan Zimmerman, Chipper Jones

SS: Jose Reyes, Jimmy Rollins

OF: Jacoby Ellsbury, Grady Sizemore, Carlos Gonzalez

SP: Cliff Lee, Scott Kazmir, Chris Young

RP: Joe Nathan, Brad Lidge

Also —

(1) Jack Cust accepts minor league deal. Does he have any value?

(2) Nelson Cruz bashing. Already has five homers leading to 38 HR, 85 RBI and 20 SB in his last 134 games.

(3) And Prince Fielder who wants at least $180 million, maybe more than $200, to sign long-term.

By Ray Flowers