Archive for Uncategorized

Before we do an early-early 2011 ranking for these positions, let’s do one last update on shortstops and second basemen around the league. We’re still playing 2010 ball, for another couple of weeks at least.

Ryan Raburn, Tigers (57% owned)
There’s probably no better way to inject some power into your shallow league middle infield than picking up Ryan Raburn and sticking him at second base. His current .207 ISO is impressive for a second baseman (qualifying second basemen average a .1396 ISO this year), and not far off of his career pace (.196). It looks sustainable, if only because he is again hitting most of his balls in the air (46% this year, 47.7% last year, 44% career). He’s also steadily cut down on his infield fly balls (8.6% this year, 12.1% career). He’s a flawed player – he strikes out too much (24.3% this year, 25.2% career) to really put up a nice batting average, and his UZR/150 at second base (-27.4) suggests that he’s no long-term solution at the position. But right here, right now, watching your league slip away from you – Raburn can give your team a short-term power boost at a tough position.

Jose Lopez, Mariners (37% owned)
You hit three home runs in one (major league) game and you’ll get a writeup in this space too. The amazing thing about how bad his season has been is that even with that outburst, he’s hitting .200/.218/.347 in September and .237/.267/.337 on the year. At least he’s predictable. Lopez has now had five seasons with below-average power and his career ISO (.134) is also sub-par. Because he also doesn’t walk (3.5% this year, 3.7% career), he’s left with one sole skill in his offensive bag of tricks (and it’s offensive for sure). He still doesn’t strike out (10.9% this year, 11.9% career). Also, his fielding is mostly rated as positive. But that’s not enough to start on a good team, so either Lopez will be starting for a bad team next year, or he’ll be a backup. For now, pick him up at your own peril. Honestly, those 37% of Yahoo owners must include about 35% of owners that have checked out on the season.

David Eckstein, Padres (2% owned)
It’s nice to know that fantasy owners are 98% immune to the guile of the average local baseball columnist – and that Fire Joe Morgan came back for a day to remind us how bad sportswriting about Eckstein can be. Even though his proponents might say that his skills don’t translate on paper, there is one nice thing about playing Eckstein in the final weeks of your deep league, and it does show up in the boxscore (on paper). He doesn’t walk (5.4%) or strike out (7.7%). Sure, he doesn’t have any power (.062 ISO), but he’ll make the most use of his at-bats in the fantasy sense. Walks and strikeouts can be largely negative things when you are looking for batting average and batting average alone. Play Eckstein if you are looking for an average boost because he’ll get the most of his at-bats in a box score sense – and his grission level is off the charts, too. With Jerry Hairston Jr out for the year, he should play every day too.

Two last minute pick-ups for your team…

Craig Breslow | RP | Athletics | 3% owned

Oakland lost closer Andrew Bailey for the rest of the year with elbow issues, and while Mike Wuertz figures to get the lion’s share of the ninth inning duties from here on out, Breslow will get the opps against lefties. He’s had a fine overall year (3.12 ERA, 4.31 xFIP, 8.70 K/9) but has been death to lefties with a 9.25 K/9, 2.96 BB/9, and .189 AVG against. Breslow should get a few chances to close out some games during the season’s final weeks with the somewhat lefty heavy Angels and then the Mariners on the schedule. At this point, every save counts.

Mike Morse | 1B, OF | Nationals | 3%

It took some time after releasing Elijah Dukes, but the Nationals finally managed to find their everyday rightfielder. Morse stepped into the job for good in early August, and he hasn’t give the team any reason to regret that decision. If we play the arbitrary end point game, we can see that he’s hitting .292/.345/.523 in his last 235 PA and a robust .354/.433/.582 in his last 90 PA. As contending teams clinch playoff spots and start to rest their regulars, the Nats will keep running Morse out there to evaluate him for next year, and that’s good for your fantasy team. Depending on your league, he might even have SS eligibility from his time with the Mariners, but that was a seriously long time ago.

Ownership rates are based on Yahoo! leagues.

The summer is winding down, but your fantasy team still needs furious updating for the final push, so don’t neglect it. Here is a duo of players, one for shallower leagues, and one for deeper leagues.

David Murphy, Rangers (17% owned)
Murphy has started 34 of the Rangers last 37 games, so the idea that he’s primarily a bench player seems outdated. Of course, he’s been getting more time with Josh Hamilton on the schneid with rib issues, but as this Rangers juggernaut rolls into the final couple weeks of the season, they’ll only have more incentive to rest their studs and get Murphy into the lineup. Murphy took a nice step forward this year, as he held on to the gains he made at the plate last year (9.9% walk rate last year, 9.7% this year, 8.7% career) while reducing the strikeouts from a career-worst level last year (18.3% this year, 24.5% last year, 19.9% career). Unfortunately, his ISO took a hit once he stopped swinging so hard (.144 ISO this year, .175 career) – and it’s a little surprising to see ZiPs RoS predict that the ISO will drop even further (.118 ZiPs RoS ISO). Here’s a bet that he can keep his ISO around league average going forward, which will make him playable with the better batting average that goes with the reduced strikeout rate. Murphy is also working on a career high in stolen bases (12) and since he’s only been caught once, it seems that the opportunistic thievery can continue. If you need a little bit of everything right now, Murphy could be your man.

Brayan Pena, Royals (2% owned)
Back on August thirteenth, I mentioned in a post about Ned Yost that the Royals manager was going to play his backup catcher more often. More often at first meant that Pena would start a couple games and rest a couple games, but then Jason Kendall got hurt and he’s been playing almost every day since. He’s under team control for a couple of years still, so it behooves the team to give him the at-bats to see what he can do. His wRC+ values over the last two years (96 and 92) don’t seem to suggest he’s a great sleeper for fantasy leagues, but it’s a tough position and players like Chris Snyder (owner of a similar wRC+ this year) have been owned periodically in many leagues. He’s worth a look. His walk rate right now (8.7%) is a little high given his minor league number (6.9%), but so is his strikeout rate (16.2% this year, 13.2% career, 10.1% minors). He could make a little more contact and keep a similar line. He won’t have much power (.100 minor league ISO), but his current line is sustainable – and he’s hot, hitting .421 over his past two weeks. He’s a borderline guy in the deepest of leagues, but he could help the right team.

Just last week, R.J. Anderson took a look at Bobby Abreu from a real-life standpoint. He asked for a reason why the Angels outfielder had a low BABIP to right field this year, suggesting perhaps a drop in speed, a change in the defense, issues at the plate or normal variance for Abreu as possible reasons for this aberration. We’ll get into these a little bit, while trying to focus primarily on the meaning for Abreu’s fantasy keeper and 2011 draft value.

First, Anderson basically discounted a change in defenses, so let’s leave that off the table. Second, a random variance is certainly possible, as BABIP doesn’t even normalize over one season and can be unpredictable from year to year, but is less interesting for our purposes, so let’s see if we can find something to sink our teeth into. That leaves us with power and speed as possible culprits for Abreu’s meh season – and it’s about as meh as a 20/20 season can be.

At first blush, Abreu is enjoying a power resurgence. He has his best ISO in five years and should hit 20 home runs for the second time in those five years. But not all power spikes are built equally. This one seems to be attributable to the second-best flyball rate of his career (36.4% this year, 31.9% career). It’s not built on his line drive rate (17.% this year, 22.3% career), and in fact you can see from his line drive rate that he’s not centering the ball like he used to. While it’s possible that the stringers in the Angels park are more cynical than his former venues, Abreu has seen his line drive rate drop below 20% the last two years after consistently living above that threshold for most of his career (and over 24% for most of his peak). Two below-average line drive rates in row would be less worrisome if he didn’t have a bit of a bad body and wasn’t 36 years old.

The second component of his decline is also in a non-obvious slide. A back of the baseball card glance might produce Abreu’s 19 steals and an affirmation that he’s the same old big man with passable wheels. But then you might notice that he’s been caught ten times this year, that his 65.5% success rate is the worst of his career, and that the second-worst success rate of his career was in 2008 (66%). His 2010 Bill James’ four-component speed score is also the second-worst of his career. Add in some subjective reports of slowing foot-speed and the fact that he’s been poor in the field, and it’s reasonable to wonder if the end is nigh for the outfielder-slash-DH.

If the speed is waning, and the power (as represented by his line-drive percentage) is also iffy – and hasn’t been plus since his peak – Abreu’s fantasy stock is on the decline. We can say this even if some parts of this decline may be random variation, and we could probably use his age as an ersatz single stat anyway. A big-bellied 36 year old who derives much of his fantasy value from steals is an iffy proposition – you can probably pencil him in for fewer than 20 stolen bases next year, even if it would be the first time in twelve years that he didn’t hit that benchmark in the category. Give Abreu a slight tick down on your 2011 cheat sheets and think hard before keeping him this offseason.

It’s a situation if you call it one, but it could also be a quagmire or a black hole too. The Mets are having open tryouts for second base next year, and the contestants are… shall we say, underwhelming. Still, it’s interesting just because these guys are all similarly challenged, what with the limp noodlery at the plate and all. Someone has to win and that someone might just be relevant in a really deep league, right?

The manager won’t help much, it seems:

“Hernandez is playing pretty good,” Manuel said. “I kind of like what I’m seeing with him. I think Tejada could use a breather here and there. So I’d like to see what we get from that combination. And we still have Louie [Castillo]. We still have [Joaquin] Arias. So we’ll see how it fits going down the stretch.”

Luis Castillo
The old man is suddenly the dark horse in this scenario, but he might provide the team’s best chance to actually get a 100 wRC+ offensive line from their second base spot. On the other hand, it’s probably not happening as the power as completely left him (.033 ISO, .061 career) and he’s had line drive rates around 15% three of the last four years, so the BABIP has started to come down (.257 this year, .329 career, .267 in 2008). His defense looks scratch by the numbers this year, but after two years of declining UZR/150s, it’s probably best that Castillo see his playing time reduced.

Joaquin Arias
Spiderman doesn’t walk, like at all. But he’s quick (like a spider?), and could someday put together a BABIP-influenced league-average second baseman line with perhaps a little less on-base percentage at his peak. It wouldn’t be impossible for him to do something like .275/.315/.390 with a bunch of steals. He’s had 47 of those suckers over the last two years in Triple-A. But with his approach at the plate, a lot of luck would have to factor into him even putting up anything close to the league average. He’s probably a backup too.

Ruben Tejada
Since his first season in rookie ball, Tejada has also eschewed the walk. He didn’t hit average walk rates in Single-, Double- or Triple-A. He also had a career ISO of .075 in the minor leagues (and flyball rate that fell as he advanced, which seems to predict little future power), so he kind of looks like a younger Castillo without the walks and a little better defense. The defense is the reason management thinks he is best candidate for this year, but the offense will limit him to a backup most likely. If only he walked more, or even had the exciting speed of Arias, he would have a secondary skill beyond defense and upside for more value.

Daniel Murphy
Murph has done everything the team has asked of him, with moves from left field to first base on his resume already. Might he move to second base? He had two games at the position of his eight total games at Triple-A this year, and the team could definitely use his bat at the position if the glove can fit. A career .275/.331/.437 line would play much better at second base and that above-average isolated power (.161) probably represents the most power they could get from the candidates. The question his glove represents is a tough one to answer. Total Zone numbers had him as a scratch defender at third base in the minor leagues, and small samples in the major leagues have shown him to be a good first baseman and a poor outfielder. Even if it seems unlikely that he would be a good defender at second base, it’s worth remembering back to his days as a third baseman before counting him out completely. He’ll have the AFL to show he can be a decent second baseman, and if answers that in the affirmative, he might actually be the front runner in the spring.

Luis Hernandez
Hernandez is a 26 year old with almost 900 career minor league games and a career .250/.302/.331 line that does not even hold water in this light-hitting group. He has played his high-contact game into some decent batting averages the last two years, if light on the power and OBP. He’s a little like Arias without the speed, but he does have one thing over the spidery one: he can play shortstop. At least, Total Zone thinks he can. if the backup second baseman is supposed to be the backup shortstop, which makes sense from a roster flexibility standpoint, then Hernandez might actually win a spot on the team next year.

Reese Havens
Havens is by all accounts the future at the position for the Mets. He’s done some nice things, but it’s important to keep down expectations considering he hasn’t yet compiled more than 360 at-bats in a single year. Injuries have been a problem. Though his biggest sample – High A St. Lucie – doesn’t seem great at first blush (.252/.363/.431), the Florida State League is a notoriously tough league and he showed a nice eye at the plate (55 walks against 73 strikeouts in 353 at-bats). This year he really upped the flyball rate and the power before succumbing to injury yet again. The lack of at-bats make it hard to know exactly how special Havens is, but what he’s shown so far (12% career MiLB walk rate, .206 ISO) is enough to prove that he has the highest upside of this group. Most likely, the Mets start the season with something like Murphy and one of the better defenders (Arias, Tejada or Hernandez) splitting time while Havens proves his mettle and comes up later in the season, although this analysis assumes that the Mets can treat Castillo as a sunk cost and let him go, which is no sure thing given the Mets history. Act accordingly.

A couple of years ago, Collin Balester showed enough promise to make Nationals fans think he could be a part of their big league rotation. At twenty-one years of age, he performed very well in Double-A during the 2007 season, posting a K/BB just north of 3.00. The next year, during his second stint in Triple-A, he posted similar numbers outside of a higher home run rate.

When it came time to pitch in the majors, Balester’s stuff didn’t transfer over as well as anyone would have hoped. He struggled in over 100 big league innings, earning an xFIP around 5.00. Strangely enough, when he was sent back to the minors, he continued his struggles and effectively killed his chances of being a big league starter.

While pitching in the rotation, Balester’s fastball was hovering around 91 mph, but the problems came from his reliance on only two pitches, allowing hitters to easily guess what was coming. Something needed to change, and it needed to happen fast.

After starting the season in the Triple-A rotation, Balester was eventually moved into the bullpen, a move that gave him a chance to rekindle his career. He struggled out of the gate, but something amazing happened in late July. Balester was called back to the bigs, and something clicked for him. He had a brief stint in Washington where he looked great, striking out hitters again and keeping the walks to a minimum. He was eventually sent back to the minors, where he continued the trend.

Balester was recalled a couple of days ago, and picked up right where he left off. He’s been mowing hitters down with ease, looking like a big time asset in the major league bullpen. But, why is this happening?

It’s pretty simple, actually, and he’s been the template for many failed starting pitchers. Coming out of the ‘pen, Balester’s fastball has been sitting around 94 mph, and his two-pitch approach works much better. He has the prototypical frame of a power pitcher (6’5”), so no one should be surprised that he’s bringing the heat.

His sample size is small, but Balester has great velocity, tremendous movement on his curveball, and a chance to be a great major league reliever. At only twenty-four years of age, there is still plenty of time for him to have a major league career, and a sweet moustache should he decide to regrow it. If you’re in an NL-only league and are looking for some strikeouts out of your bullpen, give Balester a shot.