Aviles & Wang: Waiver Wire
It’s the last full week of the regular season, so here’s some middle infield and pitching help for those of you needing to make up some ground in your leagues (or pad your lead, either works)…
Archive for Third Base
Juan Rivera and Juan Francisco: Waiver Wire Injury Replacements
Injuries at this time of year, especially to your star players, can be absolutely brutal. Head to head league owners are playing in championship games and every little bit of production helps as your roto season winds down. With the likelihood that your waiver wire has been picked cleaner than a Thanksgiving turkey at Fatty McButterpants’ house, grabbing a last minute injury replacement just might be enough to carry you to the end. For you NL-only leaguers and deep mixed league owners, here are two you might consider.
Keeper Strategy — 2012 Impact Rookies: Third Basemen
When it comes to looking ahead to the 2012 fantasy baseball season by highlighting the potential impact rookies at each position, there’s just no slowing us down. Why? Because it’s never too early to begin thinking about next year, even if you’re still trying to win your league right now. And for those of you in keeper leagues, particularly deeper ones, these primers will be especially helpful, because you’ll find out which young players may be worth snatching up now — before other owners get a clue — so you can hang onto them next season, when their value kicks in. Think of it like an investment requiring only a little up-front cost that could pay off big in the near future.
Much like my Mining the Minors columns on this site, which focus on current-season impact more than long-term upside, these 2012 rookie primers are meant for players who will fulfill or are expected to fulfill their rookiedom next year. Also much like my MTM work, the point here is to find the right mix of opportunity and talent, so that you’re picking up a player who can contribute, either in a starting role or as a reserve, from Day 1 or soon thereafter. Chances are, I’ll hit on many of these same players in depth at some point in future Mining the Minors columns, but for now, it’s good to get ahead of the curve with a snapshot of the talent at each position.
To give you a brief idea of just how this sort of thing can be worthwhile, I’m in two deep keeper leagues, one AL-only and one NL-only, and around this time last year, I picked up Mark Trumbo, Jordan Walden and Brandon Beachy. Worked out pretty well, if I do say so myself.
Click on the position to see previous primers: Catcher, First Basemen, Second Basemen
Time to get to the third basemen.
Third Base Updated Rankings: September
Sniff, sniff… the last full month of the season, and the final installment of the updated in-season rankings is upon us. Third base has been a bit of a roller-coaster this season, starting out devoid of virtually any worthwhile candidates to plug in at the hot corner until today, when many players have resurrected their seasons and others have quite frankly resuscitated their entire careers. It’s not the deepest position to be sure, but it’s not quite the mess that it started out to be.
I want to be clear that this is not third base rankings should a draft be held today for 2012. This is a reflection of the slow, methodical meander which is a 162 game baseball season and where these gentlemen currently belong, give or take a few slots depending on your format.
Tier 1
There’s simply little to substantiate Bautista having room up here in the penthouse. His wOBA is .448 — the next closest is Aramis Ramirez at .375 (edit – Alex Gordon at .382). He hit as many home runs in July and August as Alex Rodriguez has hit all season. You could come up with dozens of these examples, but I’ll spare you.
Casey McGehee and Rumors of Demise
In response to my fan mail as a preschooler, I once had Tom Paciorek of the Seattle Mariners write to me on a 4 inch by 6 inch piece of cheap Mariner notepad and tell me, “Kid, in baseball, you’re either the hero or the goat”. It took my folks a good number of days to explain why being a goat was a bad thing to a 5 year old, but to this day I often marvel at the wisdom of that singular line.
As I look at performances this season, I imagine Casey McGehee has a sense for this in 2011 where he’s mostly been of the two-horned variety.
McGehee was so bad in June that his triple-slash line was .177/.214/.208 for a whopping .422 OPS. His wOBA was .192. That’s just horrific. In all of June and July, he had 36 hits in 171 at bats, six going for doubles, one triple, one home run. He was as bad as any regular in all of baseball.
And then August happened.
Danny Valencia and Ezequiel Carrera: Late Season Waiver Wire Help
Just one month to go in the regular season, so every little bit of help could make the difference between a top 3 finish in your league and wallowing in the mediocrity of finishing sixth. With the numerous injuries that are popping up, you might just be in need of a quick fix, so here’s a pair of guys that can contribute in one way or another…
The Edwin Encarnacion Revival Project
Edwin Encarnacion was signed in the off-season to a pretty club-friendly deal with the expectation that he would DH and occasionally play some first base. After the Toronto Blue Jays made a rather surprising announcement about his starting at third base based on a small sample size and his being perhaps the single greatest omission on the best shapers list, Encarnacion’s bat struggled and his defense was as his nickname advertises. And the vultures started to circle.
In April, Encarnacion had a triple-slash line of .257/.282/.365 and followed that up in May with a .236/.257/.333 line. It was the combination of the same old glove defensively and the ineptitude offensively that thrust Jose Bautista back to the hot corner, and if not for Brett Lawrie’s injured hand, Encarnacion may have found himself without much of a role at all.
What has happened since the break is a brand-new-shiny version of Encarnacion as he’s gone .328/.438/.566. Whether or not he was motivated by the prospect of shopping for a new condo I don’t know, but what’s really interesting is to look at how he is a very different hitter in 2011 than he has been in the recent past.
Youk and a Yo-Yo: A Look at Kevin Youkilis’ Odd Season
With Kevin Youkilis taking his familiar place on the disabled list, it seems an appropriate time to reflect on what has been a bit of a strange season for him, and what better way to do that than to badger you with graphs?
The season started rather ominously as Youkilis struggled to keep his batting average above .200 through March and April and yet was still looking a lot like the walk-machine we’ve all grown used to. Much was made of an uncharacteristically low BABIP to begin the season that left his triple-slash at .218/.392/.487 headed into May. He was still hitting for power, but simply wasn’t getting much in the way of lucky bounces for a guy that has carried a pretty robust .330 BABIP on his career. With a BABIP rise and a concomitant batting average lift, his first half line represented classic Youkilis home cookin’ at .285/.399/.512.
Casper Wells and Jimmy Paredes: Deep League Waiver Wire
August 17, 2011
If you are still in the hunt for the cash, congratulations. If not, treat these waiver wire considerations as auditioners (not a word, but it should be) for your 2012 fantasy team. Unfortunately, these two hitters play on crappy teams, but hey, we cannot be picky with our pick ups at this point.