Well, it looks like the clouds have lifted on the unsettled closer situation in the Bronx. Joe Girardi finally named Andrew Miller as the official closer of the New York Yankees. This was in the wake of the two-headed Yankee bullpen monster shutting down the Orioles. Dellin Betances came in and retired four Orioles before handing the ball over to Miller in the ninth. Unconfirmed reports have Girardi telling Miller before the game that he could be the official closer if he can go a whole inning without throwing a ball. Miller obliged. He did get a couple of chases out of the zone with the fastball. They aren’t really missing David Robertson. If you want to see pure domination, go back and watch pretty much any Betances or Miller appearance this year.

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Another rough week has put us in a hole we need to dig out of fast. I’m confident Trevor May will have a good start to pick up the second half of week three, but so far, no good you guys.

Here are the totals through half of week four:

4-10 record
5.48 ERA
6.3 K/9
2.4 K/BB
1.40 WHIP

Here’s a look at this week’s recs, with team wOBA in parentheses. Y! recs pulled courtesy of twitter pal @PandaPete21, whom you should give a follow:

RHP Alex Colome – 9.1% ESPN/14% Y! – v. NYY (.324), @MIN (.302) Read the rest of this entry »

Ideas spring from odd places at times, and this particular idea I owe to a rather spirited Millennial with whom I shared an adult beverage in the not so distant past. It just so happens we watched Austin Jackson steal a base and I overheard him mutter something to the effect of “don’t get used to that” — which, considering the sprained ankle Jackson suffered just days after, perhaps Jackson’s spiritual adviser might be interested in a chat. But I digress.

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Many fantasy baseball championships are won on draft day. But some fake baseballers are able bring home the bacon with shrewd waiver wire moves and smoothly navigating their league’s settings to identify certain loopholes they can use to their advantage.

In some league variations, owners are have a fixed number of starting and relief roster spots to fill each-and-every day, so identifying lesser-owned hurlers with dual eligibility could be more valuable than most imagine. With that said, here is a short list of arms that said owners could slot into either their starting or relief roster spots in an attempt to gain an advantage in needed categories.

All ownership percentages reflect Yahoo! leagues.

Zach McAllister | Indians | 1% Y!
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Check out last month’s rankings here.

I am, if nothing else, a man of the people. This month, I am integrating reader feedback to improve upon both the helpfulness and the overall fun factor of this feature. Regarding the helpfulness, as commenters pointed out last month, I should probably rank Mookie Betts, even though he’s not eligible in all formats.

As commenters also pointed out last month, I could have just ranked him instead of explaining why I am or am not ranking him, thus saving myself both time and effort. Still, I felt compelled to account for my actions, and here we are, several possibly unnecessary sentences later.

Now, the fun factor. I was encouraged to come up with clever names for the tiers, as opposed to my previous yawn-inducing numerical system. Therefore, I am this month grouping players into tiers based upon the relative subjective quality of cities I’ve visited. I enjoy travel almost as much as baseball, and I have strong feelings about the places I’ve been — both good and bad — that are quite suitable for comparison to second basemen. Why not.

TIER ONE – ANNECY, FRANCE
Jose Altuve

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We’ve hit our second stabilization point! Let me allay your concerns immediately: Despite last week’s similar theme, this won’t morph into a column dedicated to pointing out when exactly each stabilization point is reached. Walk rates stabilize at 120 plate appearances and many players have already hit that point, so the timing was right. Plus it fits well with last week’s column on strikeout rates. I’ll cover the three highest walk rates and the three lowest. I also cherry picked two more players who don’t quite have 120 plate appearances yet, but are well on their way to posting some interesting numbers. Statistics are through May 6.

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I’m enamored with Jimmy Nelson. I’ll get that out of the way immediately. Fair or unfair — and rational or irrational for that matter — I am a sucker for big pitchers, and Nelson fits the bill at 6-6 and 245 pounds. He’s built like a workhorse and has avoided any significant injuries. That said, he’s yet to eclipse the 200-innings mark. After pitching 180.1 innings across Triple-A and the majors last year, he’s in a position to make 2015 his first season of reaching or exceeding 200 innings. As you’ve probably guessed as a result of sharing my infatuation with Nelson, I expect them to be very good innings. Read the rest of this entry »

Agenda

1. More Program Notes
2. Daily DFS – Anderson
3. Tomorrow’s Targets – Rodon, Chen, Plouffe, Lagares
4. Factor Grid

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Episode 25 – A Chubby Set of Catching Gear

The latest episode of “Field of Streams” is live!

In this episode, Dylan Higgins and Matthew Dewoskin discuss Matt’s wife passing her driving test, Adam on Adam action, taking a good look at team splits for the first time, searching through worthwhile options that don’t happen to have the platoon advantage, forcing Matt to choose against Vance Worley, Carlos Rodon’s first Major League start, Matt being forced to watch White Sox baseball this weekend, Dallas Cy-chel, Matt attracting hate mail, and Dylan declaring his approval of Giancarlo Stanton.

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We read a lot about prospects and rookies but the coverage tends to fall off the map after the conclusion of a player’s freshman season. This ongoing series will chronicle the successes and failures of the sophomore class to help determine whose rookie season was a harbinger of even better things to come, and whose first foray into The Show was actually blanketed in smoke and mirrors.

The Sophomore Report, week 1
The Sophomore Report, week 2

Jose Abreu, 1B, White Sox: Let’s be honest, Abreu couldn’t have had a much better rookie season. But in doing so he set the bar extremely high as we all expect bigger and better things from players in the early years of their career. Abreu, 28, isn’t a typical rookie, of course, having played professionally in Cuba before his defection. So far this year, he’s a little bit behind his 2014 pace but a little regression was expected and his batting average on balls in play from 2014 has dipped from .356 to .300 and, as more of a slow-footed-slugger, he’s not the type of player that’s typically a perennial .300+ hitter. As the weather warms up in Chicago and elsewhere, though, expect his power to really kick in (His hottest prolonged stretch last year was June-August). Hopefully by then the players in the lineup around him are playing up to their potential.

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