Johnny Peralta and Carlos Pena: Waiver Wire

In today’s edition of the Waiver Wire, we take a look at two tigers and a cub. Oh my.

Jhonny Peralta | 32% Owned (Y!) | 54.4% Owned (ESPN)
After what Peralta did for the Tigers last season, the shortstop was an offseason value pick of mine if you decided not to pay for the group of more established fantasy shortstops. It’s only been a month and a half, but Peralta is making me look very, very good. Peralta has the best contact rate of his career, and he’s been hitting line drives almost a quarter of the time he puts the ball in play. Peralta’s BABIP is right in line with his career average while his line drive rate is higher, so a slight rise in his batting average wouldn’t be surprising in the least. For those of you in OBP and OPS leagues, Peralta is also walking at a league average rate and has his highest OPS since his breakout in 2005. If for some reason Peralta is available to you, take advantage and add him to your roster, even if you don’t necessarily need a shortstop. He could end up being a great trade asset if nothing else.

Carlos Pena | 48% | 50%
Pena struggled mightily during the first month of the season, striking out over 36% of the time and failing to hit a single homer. To be fair to Pena, he did hit a good deal of line drives in April, but his BABIP didn’t exactly reflect it. Once the calender turned, Pena decided to start going boom-boom and has hit three homers in his first nine games in May. Sadly, it may be because he’s “pressing” a bit and trying to jack the ball out of the yard instead of just making good contact, and it that trend continues, it’s going to be a problem. If you need power, Pena should at least be on your radar or your bench.

Al Alburquerque | 2% | 1%
I know Al Squared wasn’t listed in the title, but I bet you can guess why that is. Al Squared is a strict fastball-slider pitcher who has good movement on his heater and a very vertical release point. His velocity and movement allow him to get ground balls at a high rate, but he does walk quite a few batters. If you’re looking for a reliever to take a chance on who can still help you in the meantime, Al Squared is your man.