“Pat the Bat Goes Splat” was the alternative headline, but with widespread rumors that he is, in fact, Brian Wilson’s neighbor, “The Machine“, I thought it best to keep it simple and spare the little baby ears of some of the easily offended. But the bottom line is that, as a fantasy commodity, Pat Burrell is rapidly losing value….as he should be. Read the rest of this entry »
There’s really no need to be embarrassed. It’s a very common problem. In fact, I hear that it happens to a lot of fantasy owners. I, myself, have been known to experience it from time to time. No, no…I’m not just saying it to make you feel better. It happens to everyone. Believe it or not, even to girls. Read the rest of this entry »
In remembrance of the formerly-talented, forever-volatile Milton Bradley, who was designated for assignment yesterday by the Mariners following two ejections and a one-game suspension last week, here are three other American League outfielders rostered in about three-quarters of leagues that owners shouldn’t feel bad about giving the Bradley treatment at this point in the season.
Blame it on the injuries. Blame it on the fact that the once lush and dense forest of talent to be found at third base is thinning out faster than a middle aged guy’s hairline. Blame it on Rio or the bellboy, I don’t really care. The fact of the matter is, the position is like a fantasy nightmare that picks right back up where you left off no matter how many times you wake yourself up and try to calmly fall back asleep. And it just keeps getting scarier each time. Read the rest of this entry »
For two of the last three off seasons, Michael Young dominated the headlines with his contempt for the Texas Rangers and his demands for a trade. He was angry with the team for asking him to move from shortstop to third to make room for Elvis Andrus back in 2009 and then the whole story repeated itself this past winter when the team signed Adrian Beltre, asked him to move to DH and then traded for Mike Napoli, who was supposedly going to steal some at bats from him. The fight was getting bitter and every time you turned around, there was a new rumor popping up as to where Young was going to land. Read the rest of this entry »
For years I have preached about the immense depth at starting pitching. You can find plenty of quality starters for cheap in your draft and, with the help of the waiver wire, can build a successful fantasy rotation without having to invest heavily in an ace or two. With a nice complement of some quality relievers, you can go cheap on starters and, in turn, bulk up on better hitters. In the end, your team dominates in the offensive categories, puts up a solid showing in almost all of the pitching categories, and leaves you at the top of your standings by season’s end. Read the rest of this entry »
My wife was late last week. Not late for dinner late, but late late. To subdue the paranoia, it was a quick trip to the drug store and back home for her to pee on the stick. We sit and wait. Can’t be, can she? Apologies to my Catholic readers, but she’s on the pill. We couldn’t possibly be part of that unlucky 2% could we? We look and see a plus sign. That can’t be good. It’s not. I hand her another one. This time it looks negative but there’s some coloration that still makes us nervous. Rather than reach for the nearest coat hanger, I make her a doctor’s appointment and luck out with an 8am opening the next day. She goes in, the doctor confirms a false positive and the bullet gets dodged. Phew! Read the rest of this entry »
“He’s a prime sleeper candidate”. “He has great breakout potential”. “He has huge upside this season”. Blah blah blah. Sometimes I get bored reading about all the potential sleepers and breakouts for the coming season. Too much optimism. I need some balance in my life. Avoiding the season’s busts, or in this case, the pitchers who will not earn their cost, may be just as important as unearthing the surprise stars.
Since we are around the halfway point of the season, I have decided to look into which pitchers have ERA’s that differ the most considering their FIPs, xFIPS and BABIP. I used all 3 values helps to find out truly lucky or unlucky pitchers have been this season and the reasons why (i.e. high home run rates or low BABIP).
To start with I took all the pitchers that have pitched over 20 innings so far this season. From this group, I averaged 3 numbers. ERA-FIPs (E-F) is already provided here at Fangraphs. Also, I easily calculated the ERA-xFIPS for the second value.
For the third value, I did a calculation of expect ERA using the batter’s BABIP from this quick calculation of Tom Tango.
The BAPIP ERA formula ends up working out to be:
(((0.300-BABIP)*(Total Batters Faced)) * 0.75) + Earned Runs)/(IP/9)
Explanation of constants (these 2 values can be adjusted if a someone wants to calculate the values themselves):
0.300 = league average BABIP
0.75 = Run value for an extra hit
With all three values calculated, I averaged them into a value determining how much a pitcher’s ERA differentiates from their expected ERA.
I have collected at the pitchers and posted them in this following Google Spreadsheet.
Note: For ease, I will use pERA as the projected ERA considering the pitcher’s FIPs, xFIPs and BABIP
Here are some highlights:
Chad Qualls – (ERA = 8.60, pERA = 4.03) – Chad is by far the unluckiest pitcher so far this season. He has not be exactly lights out, but no pitcher can be good with a BAPIP of 0.468.
Jose Valverde – (ERA = 0.92, pERA = 3.13) – No real surprise that a pitcher can’t mainly a sub 1 ERA. He got to the low ERA with a 0.169 BABIP and giving up only 1 home run so far this season. Jose is actually is striking out less and walking more batters than Chad Qualls.
Tim Hudson – (ERA = 2.30, pERA = 4.04) – Tim’s ERA has been helped in that he has 0.232 BABIP. He has needed a low BABIP since he has not been striking many people at all with a K/9 of 4.5 to go along with a BB/9 of 3.2
Francisco Liriano – (ERA = 3.86, pERA = 2.69) – Most people would complain too much about a starter with a 3.86 ERA, Mr Liriano looks like he should be doing better. He has a great K/9 of 9.8 and BB/9 of 2.5 while allowing only 2 home runs so far this season.
Last week we talked about Felipe Lopez coming back and Brendan Ryan struggling. We recommended picking up Lopez because he would probably take the starting shortstop job. Now that he’s back, and it’s looking like that’s the case, we’re the ones looking stupid for not having followed our own advice. And yes, that’s the royal ‘we.’ On to this week’s recommendations.
Casey Blake (47% owned)
Bet you didn’t know that Casey Blake was 36 years old, did you? The fact that he debuted old (30 years old) isn’t good news for the bell curve of his career. We do know that players that debut later usually leave the league earlier, too. That seems to be the case whether that’s because players that debut later need to be closer to their peak in order to be MLB-quality, and therefore drop out earlier as they age because they fall from that peak level, or whether it’s for some other reason. Well, Blake has had a decidedly okay run, but things aren’t looking great. He’s got a six-year low in ISO and a career high in strikeout rate. It’s not luck that’s keeping him down, at least not batted-ball luck – his BABIP is .291. Instead, he’s seeing a career-low of pitches in the zone and swinging at a career high of pitches outside the zone. His contact rate is at a career low. Hmmm… why would you want to pick him up again? Well, because .260-hitting corner infielders with a little bit of power don’t just grow on trees. In certain leagues, he’ll be useful. In just such a league of mine he was dropped. Just don’t go trading your starting 3B because you picked him up is all I’m saying.
Jim Thome (5% owned)
Thome’s ownership levels are surprisingly low for a guy that’s blasted five home runs in only 75 at-bats. The good news is that he’s still his old three-true-outcome self – walking (17.6%), striking out (27.6%) and jacking dongers (.267 ISO). Though he’s also seeing a career-low pitches in the zone, the rest of his swing rate statistics are mostly in line with his career. It seems that he’s in a crowded house, but 75 at bats over 39 games is on pace for about 311 at-bats, and if he keeps hitting home runs, he’ll get more time against righties, against whom he’s done well this year (.280/.438/.600) and career (.294/.429/.614). If you have a space on your bench and can be vigilant about who is starting in Minny on a daily basis, Thome will collect you some home runs for sure.
Marc Rzepczynski (1% owned)
Maybe this is my ‘hunch,’ but Rzep/Scrabble just made his first rehab start today and might join the Jays within a week. Then again, he gave up nine runs in 2 1/3 innings in that re-hab start and Brandon Morrow and Brett Cecil are enough a part of the future and have shown enough this year that they should keep their jobs even when Scrabble returns. So that leaves Dana Eveland as the crux of the argument. Certainly his ERA (4.98) doesn’t argue for his inclusion in the rotation, and his secondary stats are even worse (4.15 K/9, 5.19 BB/9, 5.58 xFIP). Doesn’t seem like too much is in Scrabble’s way. As long as he can find his old groundballing (51.2% last year) and strikeout (8.8 K/9 last year) ways, he’ll be a much better solution. Hopefully the Jays will also see things this way.
Ownership numbers from Yahoo Fantasy Sports.