AL SP Notes
August 23, 2012
It’s that day of the week when it’s time to get caught up with all the happenings among American League starting pitchers.
Archive for Stock Watch
Hitter BABIP Leaders
August 20, 2012
With a little over a month left of the season, BABIP marks shouldn’t change too significantly through the remainder. The five hitters with the highest BABIPs could potentially be overvalued in fantasy leagues next year as a decline could trigger a drop in batting average. Let’s see if that may be the case.
August Fastball Velocity Decliners
August 18, 2012
On Monday, I identified the starting pitchers whose average fastball velocity had increased the most over a couple of August starts versus July. Today, I look at the opposite side of the coin, the pitchers who have experienced a velocity decline. Since on average, velocity should be around its peak at this time in the season, a steep decline may be a red flag.
AL SP to Avoid
August 16, 2012
It’s about time when you realize you need to make up some wins and strikeouts and start streaming starters, or pick up anyone with a pulse in an Only league. Well, if you have decided on this strategy for your team, then please, avoid these AL starters.
AL Playoff Push Prospects: Mining the Minors
Spinning off of the Baltimore Orioles’ surprising promotion of Manny Machado to the majors last week as they try to hang onto a playoff spot, it seems fitting to do a rundown of all the American League contenders and their prospects who might be in line for a call-up down the stretch, especially once rosters expand in September. Some of these players are on the verge of getting a shot, while others appear to be another half-season or so away — but then, so did Machado, and look how that’s turned out so far.
As for fantasy implications, the focus remains on 2012 impact, but this also will help any keeper and dynasty league owners whose settings require a player to debut in the majors before they can be acquired in fantasy.
Next time, we’ll examine the National League.
AL OF Stock Watch
Per usual, here are the Monday American League outfield stock watch updates.
Bullish:
Alex Rios – Since July 30, the 3rd best AL outfielder has been none other than Alex Rios. Commenter db thought that I should have ranked Rios higher in my last AL Tiered OF Rankings Update, and I may be inclined to agree more now than I was then. I still don’t love his projection, but a lot of his ZiPS is being influenced by his less-than-impressive 2009 and 2011 campaigns. To see this resurgency in Rios shouldn’t be taken lightly at this point. He is a five full category producer in standard roto leagues and barring a major collapse, should easily notch his second 20-20 season, but his first with a .300+ average.
Read the rest of this entry »
August Fastball Velocity Surgers
August 13, 2012
We have looked a lot at starting pitchers’ fastball velocity this year and we know that on average, it rises throughout the season. Pitchers will typically see a very slight uptick each month, but sometimes more significant spikes occur. These could be the result of many things, but whatever the explanation, it could portend a strikeout rate jump and likely performance improvement. Here are the five starters whose velocity has increased most in August versus July. The sample size for August is obviously small as it only encompasses one to two starts, so keep that in mind.
Straily and Pujols: A Little of This and That
Dan Straily – Dan started for the A’s this past Friday going 6 innings, striking out 5 and only walking 1 batter. It was the 23 year-old’s first MLB start after dominating the minors this past year. While it was just one start, there are some encouraging data from the right-hander.
* In the AA and AAA this season, he averaged 11.4 K/9 and 2.4 BB/9. While these numbers will not be as good in the majors, some decent results should be expected from him.
The Trade Deadline’s Impact on Prospects: Mining the Minors
There are so many ways to evaluate the trades over the past week or so, up to and including trade deadline day itself. In the interest of being as niche as possible, let’s look solely at the fantasy values of prospecty types whose roles for the rest of 2012 only could be — or already have been — impacted by the wheelings and dealings.
The players listed below are ranked in a very rough order of how much fantasy relevance they have from today through the end of this season only, based on a combination of their individual talent and their potential opportunity that opened up in the wake of a trade. Given that there’s only two months’ worth of games left, there’s a considerable skew toward players who have already been called up (or who could be soon), even if their current or future skillset rates behind some of the players below them.
Bold Prediction: Ryan Dempster is Worthless
August 2, 2012
I love coming up with bold predictions. Not those off the wall ones that have like a 1% chance of happening, but those that have been built upon a shred of reality and have a reasonable chance (say 20%) of coming true. It is especially fun when everyone is either optimistic or pessimistic about a player and you’re prediction argues the opposite of the crowd. I am guessing that this particular prediction doesn’t quite sit at that level though, but I would say it is still pretty bold nonetheless. As a result of being traded to the Rangers, Ryan Dempster will be worthless in standard 12-team mixed leagues the rest of the season.
