Aybar & Anibal: Waiver Wire
Your Monday morning waiver wire features a shortstop and a starting pitcher, so let’s dive in…
Archive for May, 2011
David Ross, Jason Pridie, Greg Dobbs: Deep League Waiver Wire
In today’s edition of the Deep League Waiver Wire, we look at three options that may not be great, but who are worth your time in the short-term.
Nick Hundley and Carlos Ruiz: Catcher Injury Updates
While productivity can be limited for backstops, they also run the greatest risk for injury and before you know it, you’ve lost your guy and find yourself staring at the waiver wire wondering which set of scraps looks the meatiest. Today we’re going to look at the latest catcher injuries and who the guys are that will get the playing time moving forward. Read the rest of this entry »
Starting Pitchers ERA-xFIP Differential
May 9, 2011
As we continue through trading season, I like to use a quick and easy method to figure out which starting pitchers to target if I am need of an additional arm. Though xFIP is not perfect of course, it is the best metric that sums up a pitcher’s underlying skill into one tidy statistic. Every once in a while, I will take the difference between a pitcher’s ERA and his xFIP to give me an idea of which pitchers have been the most fortunate so far and which have suffered from some bad luck. Of course, the idea is that the pitcher’s ERA should soon trend toward his xFIP, assuming his underlying skills used in the xFIP calculation do not change. This could provide fantasy owners with a potential buy low and sell high candidate list. Below are the five pitchers with the largest differentials between their ERA and xFIP in each direction.
Week 6 Two-Start Pitchers Update
Here is the latest update to Week 6 two-start pitchers. Again this list is subject to change going forward.
Pitchers not listed on last update: Beckett, T. Hudson, Pelfrey, Blackburn and Sonnanstine.
Pitchers no longer scheduled for two starts: Price, Lester, Hanson and Liriano.
Of the new starters let’s look at Mike Pelfrey. The good news is that Pelfrey has pitched well in two of his last three starts. The bad news is that he still has a 6.06 ERA and both of his ERA estimators are over 4.50, higher than his last three seasons.
Pelfrey’s game plan has always been to pound the ball low in the strike zone. Last year he added a splitter to his arsenal, which already included a sinker. But this year he has gotten away from that style of pitching and the result is a career-high 40.9 FB%. In his last three starts, Pelfrey has 29 FB and 23 GB.
Last year when Pelfrey won 15 games, he really took advantage of his home park. He was 10-3 with a 2.83 ERA in Citi Field and 5-6 with a 4.95 ERA in road parks. This year sees a similar big split. Pelfrey is 2-0 with a 2.25 ERA at Citi Field and 0-3 with a 10.91 ERA in road parks.
This week, Pelfrey has road starts in Colorado and Houston. While neither park is playing as a strong offensive park so far in 2011, both have been hitter-friendly in the past. Given Pelfrey’s tendency to struggle away from Citi Field, it should be an easy decision to leave him on the bench this week.
Last week’s Sunday look was Jorge de la Rosa and the advice was to start him despite the two road starts. Here was his combined line for his starts against the Diamondbacks and Giants:
12 IP, 11 H, 6 ER, 7 BB, 13 Ks, 0 W, 2 QS
Updated Shortstop Rankings
It’s only been 30+ games into the season, but there have been a few substantial changes so far. Let’s take a look at who has moved, and how the stalwarts have fared.
Tier 1:
Hanley Ramirez
Troy Tulowitzki
Jose Reyes 
Despite his awful start, I refuse to move Ramirez from Tier 1. He’s too young and his track record is too good to give up on yet. If he’s still hitting below .200 with one home run come July, then we’ll talk. After a torrid start Tulowitzki has cooled off, but he still leads all shortstops in home runs with 8 and will likely end the season as one of the best players in all of fantasy baseball. Reyes is the newcomer to the Tier. Originally in Tier 2, his outstanding play, coupled with the overall blah-ness of the position propelled him up. A .329 average with 12 steals will do that for a person.
Jack Hannahan and Wilson Betemit as Stopgap Measures at Third Base
Third base has just been a minefield of excrement recently. Yes, I said excrement.
Jose Bautista has a bum neck, Ryan Zimmerman is out for another 6 weeks, Alex Rodriguez is on again off again with a variety of ailments, Pablo Sandoval is gone for breaking the bone all baseball players should have surgically removed, and even David Freese got in on the act with a broken hand of his own. Howard did a nice job of griping about third base on Thursday so I won’t try to continue that particular rant. What I’d like to do is look at a couple of players that some of us have had to turn to as we wait for something better to come along.
2011 Holds Rankings Update: May
Earlier this week we updated our closer rankings, and now it’s time to focus on the guys often pitching the most important innings, the middle relievers. This update is geared towards holds (here’s the preseason rankings), and frankly this list could go on for forever. I had to cut myself off at some point, so I did so at 30 players. Here’s the current holds leaderboard for reference…
Strategy in Pick Six: Daily, Quick Fantasy Baseball
Pick Six debuted last week, and since then it’s been sweeping the nation–or, at least, filling up my twitter feed. If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s a simple, free game that has you pick six players for the coming day’s action. The player who gets the most points that day wins! While it’s not an incredibly deep game, you do operate on a budget, and so you can’t just pick the best players at each position. Therefore, the question is, what should you do? I’m not exactly at the top of the leader boards right now, but here are some tips: