Archive for Starting Pitchers

I have to admit, these posts are a joy. In no other article could you possibly recommend a hitter slashing .243/.305/.360 AND a rookie pitcher who allowed six runs over four innings in his Major League Debut and avoid losing your entire readership. I could do no wrong!

Juan Rivera, LAD OF | 6%

Usual lefty-mashing Marcus Thames was released yesterday and the Dodgers subsequently replaced him with Rivera. Initially, it appears he will take over that same role, only facing left-handers. This makes sense of course as in his career, he has posted a .357 wOBA against southpaws, but just a .326 mark against righties. Even this season, despite his overall struggles, he has put up a .393 wOBA against lefties, albeit in a small 55 at-bat sample. Obviously, you don’t really want Rivera if he only faces left-handers. However, Tony Gwynn, Jr. is no one’s idea of a starting left-fielder, even given his excellent defense. At age 33, it is certainly in the realm of possibility that Rivera is done. But we cannot forget he hit 25 home runs just two years ago. If he hits well out of the gate, he could easily win more playing time and provide some deep league value.

Kyle Weiland, BOS SP | 4%

This may be the first recommendation that literally throws up zeroes for the rest of the season. That is, it is very possible he does not pitch another inning for the Sox this year. But, with Jon Lester’s status up in the air, and no other clear-cut options, Weiland may stick around for a little while. He posted a strong set of skills at Triple-A this season and has seen his skills improve as he climbed the minor league ladder, which is a great sign. He has induced an above average percentage of grounders and his fastball averaged 93.1 miles per hour during his first outing. Control may be an issue, as it has not been great during his minor league career and he threw just 40.9% of his first pitches for strikes during his debut. At least he has the powerful Sox offense backing him, so he could luck into some wins even if he does have some struggles, assuming he makes it through five of course.

After a ho-hum second stint in the Bronx last year and a disastrous beginning to his Marlins career, most fantasy owners stuck a fork in Javier Vazquez. After all, the soon-to-be 36-year-old was struggling to hit the upper 80s on the radar gun while ensuring that every person in attendance at Sun Life Stadium went home with a souvenir home run ball.

But there has since been a twist in Vazquez’s seeming destiny to finish his career by getting pummeled in front of droves of empty orange seats: he’s starting to pitch more like the workhorse who routinely posted impressive strikeout-to-walk ratios.

Take a look at Vazquez’s K/BB ratio and xFIP by month:

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Here’s a pair of Padres pitchers (always a good demographic to target) that could give your pitching staff a boost…

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Let’s take an All-Star break look at the top five starting pitchers who are most underperforming their xFIP marks. We are still nowhere close to reaching the number of batters faced for ERA to stabilize, as research has found it to be above the 750 PA mark, which represents the high value of the interval tested. As a result, going forward xFIP has much more predictive power.

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Back on April 21st, I wrote a Kicking Rocks piece entitled, “Don’t Chase the Ace” in which I lamented going pitching heavy in my draft.  I was disgruntled with the fact that my offense was anemic while I continued to watch my ratios explode with each and every start from my supposed stable of high quality aces.  While there were several of you that felt my pain, there were also many of you that criticized me for my concerns so early on in the season.  I was then asked to re-visit this 3 months into the season, so as we get ready to head into the All Star Break, here we go… Read the rest of this entry »

You’ve heard about Howard Bender’s draft. And you’ll hear about Jason Catania’s draft and Jeff Zimmerman’s draft. Because we all got together and decided to pick six, deep league style. Our CI, MI, OF, C, SP and RP all had to come from a pool of players that was owned in less than 10% of Yahoo leagues. Here are my picks and why. In the order I drafted. I had the third pick of four.

Chris Heisey
A disclaimer about deep leagues and waiver wires: One thing you want are live bodies with some upside. It’s the usual caveat. So Heisey has flaws — he’s now struck out in 18.2% of his at-bats in his first 396 plate appearances, so he might have that flaw. Then again, his minor league rates were closer to 20% most years. He could improve in that category. His BABIP is fine (.308) and though his current ISO (.209) would rank high in his minor-league work, it would still fit. And he’s got a .192 ISO so far in the majors. He stole 27 bases against two caught-stealings in High-A, and had very good success rates all along. So he has good speed. And power. And could improve his strikeout rate. And is battling for playing time with a guy with a .245 career batting average and a strikeout rate over 33%. Yes please.

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It’s nearly All-Star break time and my fantasy team is running out of time to remember how to hit. Since offense is crazy again this year, my brain is hurting trying to figure out these wacky hitter seasons. So, let’s talk about pitching…American League starting pitching of course. Last month’s rankings for your enjoyment. Oh, and yes, I did realize I have no fallers in the rankings. Not sure how that happened, but it is mostly because any fallers were only a couple of spots within a tier and did not warrant a shiny down arrow.

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Ever wonder how the starting pitchers representing the NL in the All-Star game ranked in terms of fantasy value? Wonder no more!

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For the first time this season, I nabbed a waiver wire pick from the “most dropped” players in CBS leagues. Since fantasy owners are generally as bad as non-professional stock market investors, picking up the hot players and dropping the cold ones just to watch the trend reverse shortly thereafter, I will continue checking out that list.

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Zack Greinke is currently starring in ‘The Peripheral Disconnect,’ but Felipe Paulino has been a worthy leading man for the role during most of his career. The 27-year-old righty, long a scouting favorite for his mid-90s gas and upper-80s slider, has nearly a run-and-a-half difference between his xFIP (4.06) and ERA (5.50).

Yet Paulino, now in his third different organization within the past year, appears poised to get off baseball’s D-list by matching process and results with the Royals. Given a chance to start in K.C before another wave of upper-echelon pitching prospects arrives, the former Astro and Rockie is making Dayton Moore look like a smart man.

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