The summer is winding down, but your fantasy team still needs furious updating for the final push, so don’t neglect it. Here is a duo of players, one for shallower leagues, and one for deeper leagues.

David Murphy, Rangers (17% owned)
Murphy has started 34 of the Rangers last 37 games, so the idea that he’s primarily a bench player seems outdated. Of course, he’s been getting more time with Josh Hamilton on the schneid with rib issues, but as this Rangers juggernaut rolls into the final couple weeks of the season, they’ll only have more incentive to rest their studs and get Murphy into the lineup. Murphy took a nice step forward this year, as he held on to the gains he made at the plate last year (9.9% walk rate last year, 9.7% this year, 8.7% career) while reducing the strikeouts from a career-worst level last year (18.3% this year, 24.5% last year, 19.9% career). Unfortunately, his ISO took a hit once he stopped swinging so hard (.144 ISO this year, .175 career) – and it’s a little surprising to see ZiPs RoS predict that the ISO will drop even further (.118 ZiPs RoS ISO). Here’s a bet that he can keep his ISO around league average going forward, which will make him playable with the better batting average that goes with the reduced strikeout rate. Murphy is also working on a career high in stolen bases (12) and since he’s only been caught once, it seems that the opportunistic thievery can continue. If you need a little bit of everything right now, Murphy could be your man.

Brayan Pena, Royals (2% owned)
Back on August thirteenth, I mentioned in a post about Ned Yost that the Royals manager was going to play his backup catcher more often. More often at first meant that Pena would start a couple games and rest a couple games, but then Jason Kendall got hurt and he’s been playing almost every day since. He’s under team control for a couple of years still, so it behooves the team to give him the at-bats to see what he can do. His wRC+ values over the last two years (96 and 92) don’t seem to suggest he’s a great sleeper for fantasy leagues, but it’s a tough position and players like Chris Snyder (owner of a similar wRC+ this year) have been owned periodically in many leagues. He’s worth a look. His walk rate right now (8.7%) is a little high given his minor league number (6.9%), but so is his strikeout rate (16.2% this year, 13.2% career, 10.1% minors). He could make a little more contact and keep a similar line. He won’t have much power (.100 minor league ISO), but his current line is sustainable – and he’s hot, hitting .421 over his past two weeks. He’s a borderline guy in the deepest of leagues, but he could help the right team.

Just last week, R.J. Anderson took a look at Bobby Abreu from a real-life standpoint. He asked for a reason why the Angels outfielder had a low BABIP to right field this year, suggesting perhaps a drop in speed, a change in the defense, issues at the plate or normal variance for Abreu as possible reasons for this aberration. We’ll get into these a little bit, while trying to focus primarily on the meaning for Abreu’s fantasy keeper and 2011 draft value.

First, Anderson basically discounted a change in defenses, so let’s leave that off the table. Second, a random variance is certainly possible, as BABIP doesn’t even normalize over one season and can be unpredictable from year to year, but is less interesting for our purposes, so let’s see if we can find something to sink our teeth into. That leaves us with power and speed as possible culprits for Abreu’s meh season – and it’s about as meh as a 20/20 season can be.

At first blush, Abreu is enjoying a power resurgence. He has his best ISO in five years and should hit 20 home runs for the second time in those five years. But not all power spikes are built equally. This one seems to be attributable to the second-best flyball rate of his career (36.4% this year, 31.9% career). It’s not built on his line drive rate (17.% this year, 22.3% career), and in fact you can see from his line drive rate that he’s not centering the ball like he used to. While it’s possible that the stringers in the Angels park are more cynical than his former venues, Abreu has seen his line drive rate drop below 20% the last two years after consistently living above that threshold for most of his career (and over 24% for most of his peak). Two below-average line drive rates in row would be less worrisome if he didn’t have a bit of a bad body and wasn’t 36 years old.

The second component of his decline is also in a non-obvious slide. A back of the baseball card glance might produce Abreu’s 19 steals and an affirmation that he’s the same old big man with passable wheels. But then you might notice that he’s been caught ten times this year, that his 65.5% success rate is the worst of his career, and that the second-worst success rate of his career was in 2008 (66%). His 2010 Bill James’ four-component speed score is also the second-worst of his career. Add in some subjective reports of slowing foot-speed and the fact that he’s been poor in the field, and it’s reasonable to wonder if the end is nigh for the outfielder-slash-DH.

If the speed is waning, and the power (as represented by his line-drive percentage) is also iffy – and hasn’t been plus since his peak – Abreu’s fantasy stock is on the decline. We can say this even if some parts of this decline may be random variation, and we could probably use his age as an ersatz single stat anyway. A big-bellied 36 year old who derives much of his fantasy value from steals is an iffy proposition – you can probably pencil him in for fewer than 20 stolen bases next year, even if it would be the first time in twelve years that he didn’t hit that benchmark in the category. Give Abreu a slight tick down on your 2011 cheat sheets and think hard before keeping him this offseason.

It’s getaway day for a long weekend, but I refuse to admit the summer is nearing an end. I’m holding on for dear life. Oh, and here are a couple players that should be on your waiver wire and might be interesting to you.

Yuniesky Betancourt, Royals (18% owned)
Long a laughing stock of baseball, Betancourt is getting some love recently. Longtime critic Joe Posnanki even tweeted the other day that his OPS+ was higher than Derek Jeter’s this year. How’s that for a drink-snarfing moment? Hopefully your league does not count OBP, because he still is walking only 3% of the time this year (3.2% career) and featuring a terrible .289 OBP. Then again, hopefully your league doesn’t count slugging percentage either (.432)… but hey, look at that, the average slugging percentage for shortstops in the American League this year is a paltry .362. So that’s what Betancourt is – a semi-slugger at a position full of limp noodles. In any case, he’s hitting .313 with eight home runs over the past month, so he’s hot. Who knows how long it will continue, but but his BABIP (.273) is still below his career norms (.287), and his line drive percentage, though not great, is decent (18.1%). Betancourt could run into a few home runs while your regular shortstop is hurt, and as much as it pains this skeptic to say it, he has some use in fantasy leagues. Maybe if Jeff Francouer was a shorstop, he would have use in fantasy leagues, too!

Nolan Reimold, Orioles (15% owned)
This is one of those writeups that may inspire a ‘why should we pick this guy up again’ comment. But it’s worth taking a look at a player that will get some playing time this September, whether because of Adam Jones and his wonky shoulder or because the team would like to know if they have the flexibility to trade Luke Scott this offseason. Playing time alone is fantasy gasoline, but the talent has to be the spark to really get the flame going. Earlier this season, Reimold was walking (10.7%) and striking out (24.7%) about the same as career rates (11.35% and 22.1% respectively), but his power had fallen off a cliff (.124 ISO, .174 career, .215 in the minor leagues). Then the team sent him down, and he put up a nasty .249/.364/.374 line that doesn’t inspire any confidence that he found what he was looking for. His .125 ISO down there looked like a middle infielders’ output. There was certainly some poor luck at play – his MinorLeagueSplits.com luck- and park-adjusted line reads a little better (.288/.397/.433) – but the power is still on the lam. Looking at his batted ball profile, his poor line drive percentage in the major leagues stands out (14.1%), but at least he puts the ball in the air and had many .200+ ISO minor league seasons before this year. At 27, he’s no longer as young as you might think, and his time to grab a regular role may be running out. He seems a best fit for a fantasy manager that is out of the running in a deeper keeper league and is looking for a final keeper. Maybe he turns it on in the final month, the team trades Scott in the off-season, and things all fall into place for a cheap outfielder with a little pop. The rest of us can pass, as those are a lot of hurdles for a big firstbaseman to jump before he’s a great option.

It’s the final final day that teams can trade players, so there will be some post-deadline analysis coming. Here are a couple guys that are more sure things, as they are already on their teams and we have some historical data to analyze. Then again, there’s plenty of historical data that suggests that Jeff Francoeur and Manny Delcarmen are not good pickups no matter what team they are on.

Marcus Thames, Yankees (7% owned)
The book on Thames is that he mashes left-handers, and his platoon splits back that up. In 781 plate appearances against lefties, he has an .860 OPS that is eminently useful. Tom Tango’s the book says that we should regress his performance against lefties against 2200 plate appearances for right-handed batters, and his minor league stats going back to 2005 don’t show this same split, so we are justified in being skeptical. On the other hand, Thames is getting most of his at-bats against lefties and his team obviously believes he can hit southpaws best. This might sound like bad news – Thames is on a crowded team, and there are fewer lefties in baseball than righties – but it’s not. Predictable playing time is useful, since most fantasy teams have benches. Put Thames on your bench, and he’ll play once Lance Berkman comes back anyway. You see, Curtis Granderson has a split in the other direction, which makes moving Brett Gardner over to center and playing Thames in the outfield the probable course of action for the Yankees against southpaws. Finding an .800+ OPS batter that you can slot in against lefties is nice. Finding one that has hit six home runs in the past six games is just the cherry on top.

Mike Morse, Nationals (2% owned)
Morse is battling Willie Harris, Roger Bernadina and Justin Maxwell for playing time in the Nationals’ corners right now, but there are reasons to like this former shortstop’s chances of carving out some time for himself. For one, he’s hot, with ten hits in his last 15 atbats. Another thing that Morse has in his favor is power. He’s suddenly found his power stroke since moving to the weaker league, with a .231 ISO last year and a .243 ISO this year. Of course, those numbers have only come in 240 plate appearances and are not yet statistically significant, but a quick check of his minor league ISOs shows that a definite trend is in place. Last year, he had a .219 ISO in the minor leagues, and this year at Triple-A Syracuse, he turned in a .216 ISO. He’s a little over his head right now, and he usually hits too many balls on the ground (career 34.1% flyballs) to show this kind of power, but he’s worth a shot in the deepest of leagues. Harris is a career utility player or backup type, and while Bernadina is exciting and young, Maxwell is neither as young as he used to be (going on 27 now), nor as good as we though he might be. Right now he’s just not making any contact with a 20% walk rate and a 40% strikeout rate. Morse has a chance to carve out some time for himself as the regular right fielder.

Cameron Maybin, Marlins (Owned in five percent of Yahoo leagues)

Maybin, 23, has another shot at big league playing time following San Francisco’s pick up of Cody Ross. Maybin has logged nearly a season’s worth of MLB plate appearances spread over four seasons, and the results are vexing. The tooled-up center fielder has a .249/.310/.379 line in 512 PA, which translates to a .308 wOBA and an 88 wRC+. He has struck out 31.4% of the time, and he hasn’t drawn enough free passes (7.2 BB%) or slugged enough (.130 ISO) to compensate for the K’s.

CHONE and ZiPS are split on Maybin’s chances of being an offensive asset at this point. The former projection system pegs the erstwhile Tigers prospect as a .272/.351/.424 hitter, while the latter has Maybin languishing at .241/.319/.373. There are still sound reasons to believe that Florida’s big get in the Miguel Cabrera deal will be a long-term asset — he’s a plus defender at an up-the-middle position and he’s not helpless at the dish. However, his bat is of most concern to fantasy owners, and it’s hard to say what sort of offensive player he’ll be. Maybin is not a hacker, but his walk rate has dipped at the upper levels of the minors and is below-average in the show. He’s got a lanky 6-foot-3 frame and Baseball America predicted he’d eventually hit for plus power, but he has smacked the ball into the ground 55.5% of the time in the majors. Maybin has the skills to develop into a strong batter, but he’s got a long way to go in refining those talents.

Dan Hudson, Diamondbacks (36%)

Talk about making a good first impression with your new employer. After six exceptionally strong starts with the D-Backs, Hudson has 8.49 K/9 and 2.88 BB/9 in 59.1 big league innings this season. His 3.03 ERA is the product of some fortuitous bounces — Hudson’s BABIP is .269, and he has left nearly 81% of base runners high and dry. Also, the extreme fly ball pitcher (30.5 career GB% in the majors, 32.9 GB% at Triple-A) has given up homers on 8.2% of fly balls hit against him, a mark that’s likely to rise considering the MB average is closer to 11% and Chase Field inflates homers per fly ball hit by about six percent.

Even so, Hudson holds a quality 4.01 xFIP. There’s little question about his bat-missing ability, as he punched out 132 hitters in 117.1 innings at Triple-A over the past two years. In the big leagues this year, he has an 11.1 swinging strike rate (8.4% MLB average). Hudson’s three main pitches are all getting whiffed at often — eight percent for his 92-94 MPH fastball (six percent MLB average), 23.4% for his low-80’s changeup (12.6% MLB average) and 15.6% for his mid-80’s slider (13.6% MLB average). According to Pitch F/X data from Joe Lefkowitz’s site, Hudson’s fastball has induced a pop up 15.7% of the time that it has been put in play, compared to the 9-10% average for four-seamers.

The Old Dominion product’s fly ball tendencies should be monitored, particularly due to the unforgiving environs of his home ball park. But Hudson is well worth grabbing in mixed leagues.

For those of you past your trade deadline, the waiver wire is increasingly important. At this point in the season, it’s also probably time to start thinking about particular statistics. A targeted push will make much more of a difference than an attempt to find across-the-board boosts. In that effort, here are some (slightly) one-dimensional players that should be interesting in the final weeks.

Peter Bourjos, Angels (1% owned)
It’s obvious that some people on the front of the site have a little mancrush on Bourjos. It’s irrational, but so are some aspects of Bourjos’ game. In a mere 17 games, he’s already accrued 5.2 UZR (a redonkulous 96.9 UZR/150 which leads the universe I’m pretty sure without checking). Also, Bourjos currently has an 8.6 four-factor speed score, which would lead baseball if he qualified. On the basis of those two aspects alone, he’ll have a pace in baseball… and a long leash. Long leashes are important when you are sporting a .202 BABIP on a team that doesn’t seem to care too much about advanced statistics. In particular, Bourjos is still playing every day because his glove is required, and he even strung together five hits in his last 18 at-bats, so deeper league stewards seeking stolen bases should select this speedster straight away. (Suffering succotash.)

Mitch Moreland, Rangers (1% owned)
It’s not terrible to be in a platoon if you’re the left-hander and are getting the bulk of the at-bats against right-handers, and that’s where Moreland finds himself. Moreland is also probably scraping the upper levels of his upside right now. A high BABIP (.359) is floating his batting average a little bit, but his walk rate (13.2%), strikeout rate (27.6%) and ISO (.190) are all in line with what might be expected from a man with his minor league walk rate (10%), strikeout rate (15.9%) and ISO (.196). In fact, as that BABIP regresses to the mean, he may actually strike out a little less often and keep his overall line looking very similar. Call him the anti-Chris Davis because he probably won’t put up the same strikeout and power totals as the former first sacker, but that doesn’t sound like denigration after all the troubles Davis went through. Jorge Cantu can’t quite cut it any more at first base with a .138 ISO and a poor walk rate, so this might just morph into a situation where Moreland starts and Cantu is a multi-position backup. With the injury concerns on a team that seems like a lock for the postseason, Moreland looks like he might get playing time either way.

Some thoughts on a couple of Dodgers to help wrap up the day. Please note that I will not actually be working blue during this article, because I like this gig and would prefer not to lose it.

Dodgers Closers

It’s been a wild ride, but it appears that Jonathan Broxton is back in the closers role. Joe Torre removed Broxton from the ninth inning almost two weeks ago, and after three dominant innings, Torre’s confidence in him was restored. He gave up two runs on Sunday, but he’s still a dominant pitcher on a .500 team, so don’t worry about him.

In his stay, Hong-Chih Kuo picked up a save on August 14th. Two days later, he gave up three runs and was charged with the loss, leading Torre away from the flame throwing lefty. Torre may have considered turning to Octavio Dotel, but he blew the game in the tenth inning a couple of days later.

The boys in blue have three hard throwing relievers who know how to strike batters out, and Torre isn’t afraid to turn to turn to any of them in high leverage situations. Broxton is the closer for now, but Dotel (36% owned) and Kuo (32% owned) aren’t bad guys to have on your roster.

Jay Gibbons | 0% Owned

A former two-and-a-half win player, Gibbons has been given a chance by the Dodgers. He destroyed Triple-A pitching this year, hitting 19 homers in under 400 plate appearances. While he hasn’t gotten too many chances in the bigs, he’s hit two homers in 22 trips to the dish. He had a great line-drive rate in the minors, and while it doesn’t feel like it, he’s only 33 years old. He could still be a major league contributor at the dish, and the Dodgers did well to give him a shot. While he won’t play everyday, keep an eye on Gibbons and add him if something goes down in the Dodgers outfield.

It’s Friday, you’re ducking out the door early, and you got somewhere to be and some adult beverages to drink. That makes sense. But here are a couple waiver wire candidates to ponder while you are still supposed to be pretending to work.

Carlos Lee, Houston (77% owned)
He’s 34, overweight at best, and in the middle of a very obvious and painful decline. His HR/FB, line drive rate, and ISO have all dropped off precipitously in the last three years. Let’s not mince words. But he’s hitting better recently – .277 with four home runs and two stolen bases over the last thirty days – and he has some regression coming in his favor, too. Even for a low-BABIP player (.287 career BABIP), his current .244 BABIP would be the worst of his career. That should normalize, even if, not surprisingly, his line drive rate is currently the second-worst of his career. He doesn’t strike out a lot – that part of his game has remained steady (10.1% this year, 12.9% career) – so all those balls he puts in play should help the BABIP regression along. He’s still 70 or so plate appearances away from having a reliable ISO, so his career-worst ISO (.161) has a chance to grow over the next few weeks as well. He’s pretty much a DH in the field, and without his power he will be nigh useless, but owners looking for an offensive shot in the arm from their bench should look his way. El Caballo will trot around the bases a few more times before he’s turned into glue.

Chris Young, San Diego (7% owned)
Young is having shoulder troubles, and that’s never good. But supposedly he’s pain free and ready to pitch a simulated game this weekend, which would have him on track to join the major league rotation in early September. It’s not immediately obvious who would drop from the rotation, but the Padres have talked about limiting the innings for Mat Latos (so great he only needs one ‘t’) and his young arm, so he could spot start there. Also, Kevin Correia has oscillated between starting and relieving over his career, and is currently sporting a 4.64 FIP. Young has never relieved and has a career 4.22 FIP even after all the damage he’s put on his career numbers with his recent injury-addled performances. The point is, the team could use him, and if he’s finally healthy again, maybe he can find his old control (3.5 BB/9 career, over four the last three years) that makes his stuff play better. We know Young likes PetCo – his 2.93 ERA and 1.11 WHIP there in 255.1 innings is almost reason enough to pick up Young and stash him on your deep league disabled list.

This waiver wire is New York Mets-themed because Mets fans need some solace in what is increasingly looking like another lost season. A 0.5% chance at the playoffs remain for the Mets, but these two players with lower ownership rates can help you better your own chance to get to your fantasy playoffs at least.

Hisanori Takahashi (14% owned)
Of course, Bull Durham taught all of us not to punch with your pitching hand, but perhaps Francisco Rodriguez has not seen the movie. His rage lead to an opening at the Mets’ closer position, and since Jerry Manuel is a creature of habit, it looks like Tak-san is already the winner. Of course, an argument could be made that the team needs to look to the future, and Bobby Parnell or even Chad Cordero offer more hope for cheap, controllable seasons in the future than does the 35-year-old, one-year contract Takahashi. But New York is the type of market that fosters an ever-present win-now mentality. Call it media pressure, or the new-stadium-driven need to get fans in the seats, but this is not a team that looks like it will be rebuilding any time soon. Most of this team is under contract for 2011, so the guess here is that, after some bluster and blarney, Rodriguez is back in the closer’s role next year. That means that Takahashi is left as the best stop-gap option, and will be garnering saves for the Mets for the next six weeks. You can mention Pedro Feliciano, but his 4.94 FIP against righties (822 batters faced) is an effective argument against. Here are some more words on the subject from a team future standpoint, but from a fantasy standpoint, Tak-san looks to be the winner here. Those doubting his ability to closer should take a look at this pitch f/x piece here (with the caveat that our Patrick Newman thinks the slider looked more pedestrian in Japan), and also note that this rates have been better as a reliever (10.22 K/9 and 4.14 B/9).

Fernando Martinez (0% owned)
It’s hard to call this a recommendation for a pickup at this point, but the nice news is that he’s only 117 plate appearances into his career, so his .087 ISO is still 400+ plate appearances away from meaning anything. He’s still just months past being named the number one Mets prospect by Maven Marc Hulet, too. But Dave Cameron warned us that a couple months can mean a lot when it comes to prospects, so what have we learned this year? Well, we learned that Martinez got injured yet again, and that these injuries are concerning. We also learned that a .209 ISO in Triple-A at 22 is part of his package, which is good news. It would be nice to see a year out of him where we didn’t mention his age, but that’s for the future. The bad news is that his platoon splits continued to be poor. This year at Triple-A he had a .832 OPS against righties, .691 against lefties, and the larger sample size, his entire minor league career, features a .819 OPS against righties / .689 against lefties. Even if that larger sample is only about 380 plate appearances against lefties and splits don’t become reliable until somewhere around 1000 plate appearances for left-handed batters, it seems the Mets will platoon him with Jeff Francouer and limit his development going forward – because that is how they roll. There’s still a chance here for some decent power from this outfielder. Judging from the ownership numbers, deep keeper leagues may find him on the wire, and a rebuilding team may want to take a shot on F-Mart.

A pair of hot hitting outfielders worth considering for your squad…

David Murphy | Rangers | 9% owned

So far this season Ron Washington has shown that he will ride the hot hand, and Murphy is that guy right now. Acquired from the Red Sox in the ill-fated Eric Gagne deal, the lefty swinging outfielder has hit .357/.426/.643 with four homers and as many walks as strikeouts (five) over the last two weeks, taking over the everyday leftfield duties with Josh Hamilton sliding over to center. Murphy does have a rather considerable platoon split for his career (.350 wOBA vs. RHP, .297 vs. LHP), so you probably don’t want to start him when the Rangers face Jon Lester this weekend and David Price early next week, but otherwise go for it. It might only be a short-lived hot streak, but every little bit helps.

Mike Stanton | Marlins | 27% owned

Stanton came up with much fanfare earlier this season, but he unsurprisingly struggled a bit out of the gate (.217/.283/.409 in his first six weeks as a big leaguer). High strikeout guys tend to do that, and hey, it’s not easy being a big leaguer. However, the rookie has turned it on big time over the last month, with a .324/.405/.689 batting line capped off by last night’s 5-for-5, ten total base effort. No disrespect to Murphy, but Stanton’s the safer bet here; I don’t think too many people would be shocked if he performed at the similar level during the rest of the season.

Ownership rates are based on Yahoo! leagues.