Archive for April, 2013

You Should Avoid Lincecum

Between 2008-2011, Tim Lincecum was arguably the best pitcher in baseball. He won back-to-back Cy Young Awards in 2008 and 2009, while posting four-consecutive seasons with at least 200 innings pitched. And in three of those seasons, he featured an ERA under 2.75.

In short, he was dominant. He earned the nickname “The Freak” and became a media darling across the country. His face was seemingly plastered on the cover of ESPN the Magazine or Sports Illustrated every other week, and SportsCenter did numerous featurettes on him throughout the baseball season.

All of the praise and attention was certainly deserved. Only Cliff Lee compiled a better FIP (2.79) than Lincecum’s 2.81 FIP amongst qualified starters in those four seasons, and the right-hander also had the fourth-lowest ERA (2.81).

That’s why it seems so awkward to say the following: fantasy owners should flat-out avoid Tim Lincecum.  There, I said it.

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Roto Riteup: April 12, 2013

The author missed last night’s new episode — not to mention season finale — of Archer. One could correctly assume that while not pleased with this turn of events, the author cannot complain, as he enjoyed watching Chopped instead.

On today’s agenda:
1. Denard Span’s early doings
2. A Houston Astro you might want to grab (no, really!)
3. Jockeying for position: Jordany Valdespin
4. An ugly fight breaks out, and so does an expensive shoulder

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Bullpen Report: April 11, 2013

• After my post deadline last night, the Royals’ Kelvin Herrera racked up his fifth career save by striking out the side (around a lone hit) against Minnesota. Before anyone gets too excited, current Royals closer Greg Holland was getting a day off after a laborious 27-pitch save the night before and Herrera’s appearance did not signal a changing of the guard. While he had a solid 22.4% K% in 2012, Herrera’s stuff has been eye-popping during his few outings this season. His fastball velocity is down a tick, but he’s also thrown the pitch less and gone to his changeup a whopping 42.1% of the time. For comparison, he went straight offspeed only 27.2% of the time last season. His SwStr% on the changeup was 21% last season and is up to 33% so far this year, so getting ahead of hitters and pulling the string could mean a serious jump in strikeout rate.

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MASH Report (4/11/13)

Recent injury data

 • Matt Harrison was placed on the DL because of continuing back discomfort. He displayed several signs of injury with his Zone% going from 51.3% in 2012 to 41.3% in 2013. Also, his fastball velocity went from 92.1 mph to 91.2 mph over the same time frame. The more I follow injuries, a low Zone% is more of an indicator or injuries than loss of velocity. Here are the current starter laggards in Zone% (min. 2 starts).

Name Team Zone%
Lucas Harrell Astros 38.9 %
Cole Hamels Phillies 40.0 %
Wily Peralta Brewers 40.2 %
Alex Sanabia Marlins 40.2 %
Matt Harrison Rangers 41.3 %
Tim Lincecum Giants 41.5 %
Ryan Dempster Red Sox 41.8 %
Rick Porcello Tigers 42.3 %
Jaime Garcia Cardinals 42.5 %
Jeremy Hellickson Rays 42.7 %

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Travis Hafner and Trevor Rosenthal: Waiver Wire

Playing for upside so early in the season can be risky. The always run the risk of parting with a guy too early, and buying into a tiny sample. But if you’re going to play the waiver wire early in the year, you might as well target high-upside players. This isn’t as easy as it sounds. Most of the time, the high-upside players on the waiver wire are also the riskiest players on the waiver wire. They are imperfect, and contain at least one significant flaw. But if you’re able to hit on a guy, you’ll receive strong, cheap value for the entire season. Here are two guys who might fit that category.

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Appreciating John Buck

If you polled 100 fantasy baseball owners a month ago and asked who would be the number one catcher through the first 10 games of the season, how many of them do you think would have said John Buck? One? Two? No way. Not even close. Not even if you limited your polling strictly to people in Flushing, Queens wearing a Mets jersey would you get that many. The guy was barely an afterthought heading into this season and anyone who actually drafted him, no doubt in the very last round of a very deep league, probably had already drafted Travis d’Arnaud a few rounds prior. But while his preseason value was the equivalent of a piece of gum on the bottom of your shoe, you’ve got to love what he’s done so far and you should be standing on the top of a mountain, singing his praises to the world. Read the rest of this entry »


Stream, Aim, Fire – Friday and Saturday Streaming Options

I guess I owe some of you an apology. Last week’s streamers went 1-for-4 in terms of successful starts. Doubront was mediocre, Tillman was lit up, and Fiers (who, you’ll remember, was more of a “buy” recommendation than a stream) was terrible. Luckily, my “deep” stream, the one most of you could have streamed due to ownership levels, was a treat. Dan Straily struck out 11 Astros, furthering the “Streaming ‘Stros” strategy until Brandon Maurer ended it on Tuesday.

Anyway, let’s hope for a better turn this weekend. Based on some feedback, I’ll ditch the spreadsheet since it’s available elsewhere in a cleaner format. I’m also working on some sort of “start potential” metric but it’s a bit early to employ without testing it out. And finally, I’ll try to make one recommendation at each of the 50, 25, 15 and 5 percent ownership levels to appeal to all league depths.
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Another Trio of Future Closers

Last week I took a look at three power arm prospects who could be handling the 9th inning soon for their major league teams. In that article I profiled Detroit’s Bruce Rondon, Toronto’s Marcus Stroman and Seattle’s Carter Capps. Today I thought I’d continue with that theme by looking at a few more players with similar potential who are the property of National League organizations.

Heath Hembree, RHP, San Francisco Giants

Hembree was a 5th round pick in 2010 out of the College of Charleston – a very underrated baseball school. The South Carolina institution has had three or more players drafted every year since 2005. The school hasn’t had a player taken in the 1st round, but they have had three 2nd rounders and also saw current Yankees outfielder Brett Gardner taken in the 3rd round. Hembree was the Closer for a Cougars team that made a run to the NCAA Regional Finals his draft year. A torn right meniscus in his knee and irregular usage somewhat limited his innings in college, but he generated a lot of buzz leading up to the draft. After being picked by the Giants the fireballer then struck out 22 batters in his 11 inning short season pro debut that year. He’s largely continued that success over the last couple seasons.

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Don’t Sleep on Carlos Carrasco

It might be odd to tout the virtues of a man who just allowed 7 earned runs in 3.2 innings during his 2013 debut against the Yankees on Tuesday. It is even stranger to gush about this very man given that he was just optioned to Triple-A. But if you hear me out, you will be convinced that this is a guy worth speculating on and stashing, especially in deep/AL-Only leagues and keepers.

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Roto Riteup: April 11

Today’s Riteup has news about everyone, and perhaps even some of their brothers.

On today’s agenda:
1. Matt Harrison can’t avoid DL
2. Carlos Carrasco gets demoted
3. Casper Wells goes to Toronto
4. Pushing back the Corey Hart timetable
5. Red Sox leave Rubby De La Rosa in the minors

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