Brooklyn, NY — In three innings of work against the Brooklyn Cyclones, Hudson Valley Renegades pitcher Jaime Schultz fired his way through his sixth start of the season. Despite the Renegades eventual 3-1 loss, he gave them a chance to win.
Showing a loose, live arm, he held the Cyclones offense to one hit and didn’t allow a run, bouncing back from a four-run outing the week before. He also kept the walks to a minimum again, giving up just two.
You’re at the point where you need to start filling games played, you need warm bodies in your lineup to keep your head above water while you’re trying to stay in the hunt for whatever prize it is that your league has agreed upon. Third base has seen it’s share of ugliness recently. David Wright is out with injury. Pablo Sandoval is hurting and has a .291 slugging percentage over the last month. Evan Longoria is hitting .185 since July 1. Pedro Alvarez has a .250 on base percentage in his last 25 games. Of course, I’m not saying you should bench Longoria, but there are a variety of reasons why there are many of you out there looking for answers at the hot corner. And there might be a couple.
There are just two weeks left in August and then, come September, rosters expand and your league’s waiver wire gets flooded with names filled with potential. But until then, you’re stuck sifting through the same old names, desperately hoping someone catches fire and can help boost your fantasy totals, even if for just a short time. Adding help at the corner infield spot can be a difficult task at this time of year, but it’s certainly not impossible. Read the rest of this entry »
Third base help is on the way! If you’re like me in my Tout Wars league, you may have been juggling third basemen all season long. I have endured Kevin Youkilis, Luis Valbuena and Lonnie Chisenhall with fingers crossed that Aramis Ramirez does indeed return from the DL this weekend. Now deep league owners have two more options to consider.
It’s often said that almost anything can happen in a single month of a baseball season. We can list endless examples of unexpected hot streaks from replacement-level players to illustrate that point, and as fantasy owners, we often get cajoled into trusting those small sample sizes. We all want to admit we don’t attempt to “ride the hot streak,” but we all do it. For example, I owned Brian Dozier in June for a couple weeks because I was desperate up the middle.
Luckily, it worked out, as my team was simply trying to hold it together up the middle until Jose Reyes returned from the disabled list.
When looking at the “last 30 days” split on the leaderboards, though, some hot streaks don’t appear to be out of place. Mike Trout owns the highest wOBA (.477) in all of baseball over the last 30 days. No one should be surprised by that. The second-highest wOBA (.470) in the last 30 days belongs to third baseman Kyle Seager. Considering he’s been a four-win player already this year and has a .300/.363/.496 slash line, he also shouldn’t trigger any alarms.
Hold on a moment. Kyle Seager — the same guy who was the 14th-ranked fantasy third baseman last year — suddenly doesn’t appear out of place amongst the top hitters in the league? Well, that’s significant.
News today is that Cody Asche is being promoted from AAA Lehigh Valley and conventional wisdom says it’s not to be a bench bat, which means Michael Young is likely to be dealt before the trading deadline. If Asche does indeed find himself the starting third baseman for the Philadelphia Phillies, all formats take notice.
Asche was selected in the fourth round of the 2011 draft out of the University of Nebraska at Lincoln after hitting .327/.424/.639 with 12 home runs and 27 doubles in 208 at bats. In two and a half years in the minors, he’s amassed a career .287/.343/.438 line with his best year being 2013 at AAA where he hit .295/.352/.485, totaling 15 home runs, 24 doubles, and 11 stolen bases over 404 at bats.
As we close in on the Major League trade deadline, non-contending teams are making moves to open up spots for their prospects. This is a blessing for deep league owners as finally there are more choices available to pick up besides fifth outfielders and the last man in the bullpen. Both the Astros and Cubs are looking toward the future and have recently introduced us to some new faces.
Chase Headley and Lonnie Chisenhall have both failed to meet reasonable expectations this year. As recently as yesterday, they ranked 14th and 31st at third base on this very site. They started the season ranked 5th, and 21st, respectively. In just four short months, the fall has been precipitous.
Third base certainly still boasts its share of superstars, but if you have a few 12-team league teams, there’s no doubt one of them has caused you problems at the hot corner. There number of disappointing black holes have been abundant. But there are a couple players that have been showing signs of life lately that should register on your radar if you’re looking for help.
Third base has to be the group with the most movement.
But mostly I love the ones that don’t move. Like Michael Young, ending a nine-player chain of movement. Yeah, he’s still Michael Young. And was Michael Young last time we ran the third base rankings. And then David Freese and Chris Johnson, okay, they’re older fantasy role-players that might not move much, but Trevor Plouffe and Juan Francisco are pretty much what we thought they were,too?
There are some nice names on this list. Could be the best in baseball, relatively, at the end of the year. At least on the infield.
Third base hasn’t necessarily been a complete black hole, what with the arrivals of Manny Machado, Josh Donaldson, and a resurgent Pedro Alvarez. But it’s not a plentiful field from which to choose from either. There have been many managers scrambling for answers at third base since guys like Mike Moustakas, Chase Headley, Brett Lawrie and a cast of others left us out in third base purgatory.
One of those answers seemed to be waiver wire darling Luis Valbuena, who through April and May was hitting .264/.372/.464 with six home runs and 17 RBI. He was a player that seemed to have decent enough success at high levels of the minor leagues that he should be able to produce at the major league level, and it appeared that his potential had finally made the conversion. And then there was June.