Trevor Cahill has mostly been a disappointment in fantasy leagues. Much of that has to do with lofty expectations from his owners following a lofty 2009 prospect ranking. Cahill happened to win a spot in the Oakland Athletics’ rotation that season, but wound up disappointing, failing to carry his above-average strikeout numbers in the minors to Oakland. An inability to record strikeouts has been Cahill’s major flaw over his four big league seasons. Last season, Cahill made some strides in that area, posting the highest strikeout rate of his career, which contributed to his strongest season to date. While Cahill is far from a fantasy ace, the improvement could make him a solid mid-to-late round pick this season.

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This morning, we published the results from rounds 6-10 in the early RotoGraphs mock draft. Apparently, I was asleep at the wheel because I missed the request for drafters, which is why you don’t see my name as a participant. Though it is unfortunate to miss another chance at experiencing the best part of every fantasy season, at least I can remain an unbiased observer. As the resident American League starting pitcher analyst, let’s go through those pitchers who were selected at this point in the draft, including where they were picked in last year’s RG mock, of which I did participate.

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Yesterday, the Cubs officially inked Edwin Jackson to a four-year contract. Good for Edwin, now he has a chance to actually be with one team for four seasons. In just 10 seasons in the Majors, he has been with a whopping 7 different teams! Let’s see how the move from Washington to Chicago might affect him.

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The “will he start or will he relieve?” game continues on as Brett Myers is once again moving back into the rotation. This time, he heads to Cleveland after apparently agreeing to a one-year deal yesterday. Myers began his career in Philadelphia as a starter in 2002, then became the team’s closer in 2007, returned to the rotation the following year, then was forced back into the bullpen after returning from injury in 2009, rejoined the rotation as a member of the Astros in 2010 and 2011, then pitched in relief all year once again last season, which included his move to Chicago. Phew. Let’s figure out how he might before as a starter again with the Indians.

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When preliminary announcements suggested the Twins had acquired two pitchers for Ben Revere, you’d have to understand my immediate worry. I figured the big piece of the trade might be Tyler Cloyd — he of the 87 mph fastball — and maybe the Twins would nab Kyle Kendrick for good measure.

I was wrong. Read the rest of this entry »

A couple of weeks ago, I was helping fellow writer, Chris Cwik, look for possible reasons James McDonald fell off the cliff in the second half of the 2012 season. As Cwik pointed out, the 27-year-old McDonald started falling apart after he threw 122 pitches for his only complete game (CG) of the season. I decided to see how young pitchers performed after throwing just one complete game during a season.

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Jon Niese has turned into a steady, decent fantasy play. While he is not one of the biggest names in the league, he has given consistent results over his short career. He is a nice addition to fill out a fantasy pitching staff as a draft progress.

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The Chris Capuano rejuvenation tour made its second trip around the NL in 2012, and with it came similar results. Capuano appeared in the same number of games (33), but made two more starts than he had in 2011, leading to 12.1 more innings pitched, a 0.5 increase in WAR, and pretty much everything fell into place as it had in 2011. Read the rest of this entry »

Though fantasy owners may have hoped for better, Adam Wainwright’s return from Tommy John surgery has to be deemed a success. He threw nearly 200 innings, struck out 184 batters and contributed positively in WHIP, though his 3.94 ERA was a bit higher than we’re used to getting from the Cardinals ace. However, his skills suggest that his results should probably have been better than they actually were.

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You probably had to own Hisashi Iwakuma to really appreciate how helpful he was down the fantasy baseball stretch in 2012. Iwakuma flew under the radar perhaps because he was pitching for a team that was taking a wet noodle approach to their youngsters by mid-July, already trying to figure out who might stick in 2013. Iwakuma, in real baseball, was largely ignorable. But in looking ahead at 2013, he might warrant your attention in fantasy baseball.

Iwakuma pitched in in 30 games and posted a 3.16 ERA (4.35 FIP) with a real affinity for giving up home runs, a ho-hum 8.3% walk rate and an equally thrilling 19.5% strikeout rate. If that were the story right there, you could move on to, I don’t know, Ervin Santana in hopes of solving your starting pitching problems on the cheap.

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