As the season winds down and bullpen committees continue to populate the landscape, change could be upon us in fantasy baseball. This site featured a terrific article detailing how handling relievers evolves in an interview with A.J. Hinch. Blended bullpens, new roles and keeping pitchers healthy make this column a necessary stop if chasing saves. For starters, 10 different relievers have recorded a save for the White Sox this year. Joakim Soria (16), Nate Jones (5), Jace Fry (4), Hector Santiago (2) and Luis Avilan (2) to this point, although only two of them remain on the roster. Also, Chris Beck, Xavier Cedeno, Juan Minaya, Bruce Rondon and Thyago Vieira each own one save this year. Last night, Ian Hamilton attempted his first career save but incurred the loss giving up a walk-off grand slam to Jason Kipnis. The inning started with Juan Minaya facing one hitter, Josh Donaldson and allowing an infield single after review. Then Caleb Frare entered yielding a hit to Yandy Diaz and recording the innings only out on a popped up bunt by Melky Cabrera. Hamilton then entered and hit Yan Gomes with a pitch prior to the Kipnis slam.

What does all this mean? The team will continue to audition relievers the rest of the season to try and see what roles will be applicable during their rebuild. Jones will handled carefully and it appears will not pitch in consecutive outings. He will be a factor in saves the last week and a half, but not overworked. Jace Fry pitched 1.2 scoreless innings giving up only a walk, but his ability to work more than one inning, along with Minaya make them valuable and not just ninth inning options. It stands to reason, if chasing a save, to avoid this bullpen due to the volatile usage and auditions still to come as the White Sox evaluate their young arms in high leverage. Read the rest of this entry »

If you listen to the podcast, you know Justin Mason started up his Too Early Mock series and we’re off and running with eight leagues hosted by Fantrax. The always-excellent Smada is also running an ADP tracker for all eight drafts. Make sure to follow him on Twitter for plenty of baseball goodness. I’m in league 2, by the way.

So many of these leagues are shark tanks which makes them even more fun because you’re unlikely to really see anyone slip too far. If anything, you’ll have to pop your gems early if you want to land them here. Our very own Al Melchior is in my league as well as personal friends Doug Thorburn and Chris Welsh! Again, the whole group is strong.

Here is the rundown in order of picks:

1. Chuck Anderson
2. Frank Aquila
3. Chris Welsh
4. Brandon Bruckman
5. @batflipcrazy
6. Matt Thompson
7. Al Melchior
8. Doug Thorburn
9. Kyle Bishop
10. Brian Slack
11. Me
12. Mike Tanner

Here are my first 5 rounds and I should have made my 10th pick by tomorrow so I’ll write up those 5 as well.

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With the smaller Thursday game slate, I expanded my normal Fantrax ownership out to 25%. In all, there are a couple decent options.

Jason Vargas (25%) at Nationals

Look at those home runs (1.9 HR/9) and the .325 BABIP. That’s what happens with a lefty is sitting at 86.5 mph, he gets hit around. His 6.47 ERA would even be worse without his 7.9 K/9.

As for his value in this game, he’s very borderline and it may come down to league depth. The Nationals are middle of the pack against lefties and are going with unproven Joe Ross. The chose to use him is a coin flip.

Jorge Lopez (19%) at Tigers

Like with Vargas, the outlook isn’t great but some of the other options are horrible. Lopez has been able to be a productive low strikeout, high walk pitcher by limiting the damage done by batted balls (.289 BABIP, 0.5 HR/9). His 47% GB% doesn’t point to him being either a groundball or flyball pitcher but he’s both.

His four-seamer (29% GB%) and slider (36% GB%) are high flyball pitches. His curve (61% GB%) and change (65% GB%) are the groundball pitches. His major issue is that his sinker, which he throws more than any pitch, has a middle of the road 44% GB%. Also, it has the lowest swinging-strike rate (5%) of any of this pitches. There are signs he could be more. I’m just not sure it’ll happen this season.

He’s a reasonable streamer except for those owners needing to protect their WHIP. He’s always been prone to giving up walks and this season it’s no different (3.8 BB/9).

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It was Zach Britton, and not Dellin Betances, who got the save for the Yankees in their 3-2 win over the Red Sox in Tuesday night’s series opener. I have made Britton and Betances co-closers in the grid below, with both receiving the “Hot Seat” label. However, it’s not Britton’s adventure of an inning or Betances’ recent struggles that have put them on the hot seat, but rather that Aroldis Chapman could return as soon as Wednesday. It appears that Chapman’s worst-case scenario is a Thursday return, in the event that Aaron Boone wants to give the lefty an additional day of rest following Monday’s sim game.
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You’re running out of time to hit your games played and innings pitched caps in traditional fantasy leagues. Luckily, you have a free resource available in the form of Streaming Wars.

AGENDA

1. TDG Invitational
2. Weather Reports
3. Pitchers to Use and Abuse
4. SaberSim Says…
5. Déjà Vu Again

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It’s been a fun season covering discount starting pitcher options here at Rotographs, and with under two weeks remaining, I’m shifting this piece to focus on options through the rest of the week to consider to stream to pull ahead through the weekend.

I’ll be keeping them under 30% owned per usual, with all numbers pulled from Fantasy Pros’ consolidated ownage metrics.

Steven Matz vs. Philadelphia Phillies + Washington Nationals – Matz has two starts left this week, playing in just an hour against Phils and on Sunday against the Nationals and his low ownage rate shocks me. He’s sporting a 2.67 ERA with a 3.03 SIERA to back it across his last five starts, averaging seven strikeouts and over six frames per start. He’s increased his slider usage from 8% on the season to 15% in that time frame, returning an impressive 2.8 pVal, which has also amplified the effect of his heater. Batters are more aware of Matz’s strong slide piece that they can’t sit on heaters, creating tougher at-bats, and more efficient starts for Matz. Meanwhile, the Phillies and Nationals are far from strong offenses – lineups Matz has produced against recently – and should make for productive outings for Matz owners.

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Wednesday’s slate of starting pitchers is not fully set, as there are still no fewer than five teams listing TBD as their starter as of this writing. I have filled in some of the blanks, projecting that Stephen Gonsalves will be the Twins’ primary pitcher and Sam Gaviglio will start for the Blue Jays. That increases the number of widely-available projected “starters” to eight, using a 25 percent ownership rate on Fantrax as a cutoff point.

While most owners are forsaking these hurlers, a few are reasonable streaming options, particularly in deeper formats.
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Here’s today’s chat transcript. It was a good one.

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It’s a slate of studs with several aces going, but there are still a host of useful starters to run out there in your playoff or roto chase to the top.

(I’ll be citing the FantasyPros roster rates)

Joey Lucchesi – SD v. SF (26%)

Lucchesi is a slam dunk spot start thanks to the easiest matchup a lefty can get in the second half. The Giants are 30th in wOBA against lefties since the break at .262. Meanwhile, it’s not just the matchup that is appealing here as Lucchesi’s had a useful 4.13 ERA and 54 strikeouts in 48 innings.

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Chris Stratton is my favorite pitching target for tomorrow in Streaming Wars.

AGENDA

1. TDG Invitational
2. Weather Reports
3. Pitchers to Use and Abuse
4. SaberSim Says…
5. Vogelbomb

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