Roto Riteup: June 7, 2013
Being the StarCraft fan (read: nerd) that the present author is, the onus of informing the masses about the ongoing World Championship Series Finals falls upon these narrow shoulders. Check out arguably the best StarCraft II players in the world as they compete for their share of the $150,000 prize pool. If you have any free time this weekend, please take some of it and watch any one of free available HD streams.
On today’s agenda:
1. Will Middlebrooks‘ uncertain future
2. Daniel Descalso’s hot streak
3. Assorted roster moves
Will Middlebrooks‘ uncertain future
Everyone’s future is uncertain, however for Will Middlebrooks, his immediate future in the majors could be up in the air. While he is rehabbing his knee in Triple-A, the Boston Red Sox manager John Farrell hinted that Middlebrooks may stay in Triple-A after he is healthy. With third base a pretty desolate scene, any extra time that Middlebrooks spends in the minors will be frustrating to owners. On the other hand, his .201/.234/.429 line wasn’t soothing the mind of fantasy owners either. In re-draft leagues, if someone inquires about him, Middlebrooks should be available to discuss and trade. He isn’t that hot of a commodity at this point. Naturally, keeper leagues should be a bit more hesitant to move him.
Daniel Descalso’s hot streak
After yesterday’s 3-for-5 performance that included his third homer of the year, Daniel Descalso continues to crank out hits. Since May 21 (arbitrary alert!) Descalso has 14 hits in 12 games and has raised his triple slash to .274/.339/.443. Mix in his four steals and baby, you’ve got a stew going. With second base, third base, and the all important shortstop eligibility, Descalso is worthy of being owned in deeper leagues, at least while he is hot. Descalso generally hits lower in the order so his counting stats will be low, though as a shortstop, he is more than a warm body. He fits better as a MI than as your starting SS, however Descalso’s current .337 wOBA is better than the likes of Ian Desmond, J.J. Hardy, Jimmy Rollins, and Asdrubal Cabrera. Not to say that Descalso will continue to outperform those names, but what he has accomplished to date is worth recognizing.
Assorted roster moves
Texas Rangers – Mitch Moreland was placed on the 15-day DL with a hamstring strain and Chris Mcguiness was called up to fill in for Moreland. Manager Ron Washington made it be known that Mcguiness and not Lance Berkman will be playing first base for the majority of the time that Moreland is out. Mcguiness has 26 extra-base hits in 228 plate appearances in Triple-A thus far, though the vast majority of those, 19 to be exact, have been doubles. Expect him to draw some walks and hit a few doubles, but Mcguiness shouldn’t be a game changer. With the replacement level for 1B/CI so high, Mcguiness is probably best left to the waiver wire.
Chicago White Sox – Jake Peavy hit the DL with a broken rib and will be sidelined for four to six weeks. The good news is that it isn’t an elbow or shoulder injury, so silver linings and whatnot. The club called up Deunte Heath and Ramon Troncoso to help with any needed bullpen help and Hector Santiago will take Peavy’s rotation slot. None are worth a second look for almost any fantasy league. Neither Heath nor Troncoso should see any save chances and Santiago’s walks are too much to trust him right now.
San Diego Padres – The Padres welcomed back Cameron Maybin yesterday, but said “see you later” to Yonder Alonso after placing him on the 15-day DL with a right hand contusion. Maybin being back is great for those looking for steals as he is the fast type and easy to pick up. There is an ex-girlfriend joke in there somewhere. Maybin is owned in just 13% of ESPN leagues, 14% of Yahoo! leagues, and 21% of CBS formats.
Bonus: Andrew Cashner had another “meh” performance yesterday. A NotGraphs open letter of encouragement may be on the way to him soon.
You can catch David spouting off about baseball, soccer, esports and other things by following him on twitter, @davidwiers.
Cashner was pitching at Colorado, so three runs over seven innings is fine.
Ya, the ratios were fine, the meh part is the 4 k’s. His walk rate has been better, but the K/9 is very disappointing. Safe to say, not what we’ve been hoping for.
3.86 ERA in 7 innings with a I think a 1.27 WHIP. Very meh, but yeah, given the environment I’ll take it. I’m waiting for the strikeouts to come.
While you’re waiting for the Ks to come, he will have more outings like he did vs Seattle. Without the Ks, he’s at best an average starter and when a bit unlucky on hit balls like vs SEA he’s a fantasy wrecker.
I wouldn’t play him till you see a few games with a K/9 of 7 plus.
Hector Santiago is replacing Peavy in the rotation.
Updated and edited, thanks.
Not exactly related to any of the write-up, but figured I’d ask here anyway. Starting to get a little star-struck about Puig. I can trade Rizzo for him (also have Goldie at 1st) but wondering if I’m paying too much given that Puig’s playing time will be questionable when all OF are healthy. Am I being crazy or should I make the trade (12 team, roto)?
Rizzo is way too much for Puig. Way, way, way too much.
You can get more reliably better players for someone of Rizzo’s caliber.
I second the open letter. Will they let him throw his stupid slider already?
Co-sign the letter and the next stop is Congress!
Pretty sure Hector Santiago was named as Peavy’s replacement in the ChiSox rotation. Rienzo hasn’t exactly been dominant this year.
Yep, fixed. Thanks though.
Hmmm, I have Casto, but picked up Drew to wait out Castro’s current funk. Would you call Daniel Descalso a better option than Drew going forward?
Descalso’s current pace won’t be what he does RoS. At this point, given what you’ll be using Drew or Descalso for, it probably doesn’t make much difference.
I’d be inclined to grab Descalso while he is hot, but if you have a moves made limit, it isn’t worth it.
I noticed Oscar Taveras in one of my leagues sitting on the wire, it’s a 14 team 4 keepers league. I can pick him up this Sunday but my fear is that he doesn’t really contribute for me this season and if I decide to use a keeper on him I might be very uncompetitive next season as 3 out of my 4 keepers will probably spend significant time in the minors. Surely I should just pick him up and see what happens rather than get someone like Doumit or Mayberry Jr right?
Are you competitive this year? If so, don’t grab Taveras. If you’re middle of the pack and down around 20 points, I’d punt this year — and maybe next year too — and grab Taveras. Can you trade for picks or extra money in the draft? I’m in a keeper league that is like that. I love swinging deals for this year and the future, that is the beauty of keeper leagues after all.
Long story short, if you’re in the running, don’t grab him. If you are out of it, think about forgetting this year and going all in in next year or even 2015.
Thanks for replying. I’m 2nd in the league right now. It’s kind of a limited league in terms of options so I dont believe I can trade for extra money and the 4 picks are mandatory. I need to talk to the league owner to get some clarification but that’s it I think.
And yeah I’ll just go a different route, maybe I’ll even stick it out one more week with Jon Jay
Happy to try and help. If you are looking potential keepers currently in the minors, maybe Gose, or going deeper guys like Abraham Almonte, Oswaldo Arcia, or a personal favorite (not just because I’m an A’s fan, but also because he is awesome), Michael Choice.
As a Jays fan I watched all of Gose’s at bats when he was up a little while ago, looks like a nice player. Might go down to Buffalo to watch a Ricky Romero implosion soon so I’ll definitely keep my eye out for Gose
Since trading for Gardner he has 3hr and 0SB – how many SB can I expect rest of season? and is it worth trying to move him to an owner less savvy than me?
With Yonder Alonso on DL I dropped Brantly and picked up Nix; good move?
moved matt carpenter to First, so nix replaced Carpenter at MI
I’d expect 20+ more steals the rest of the way for Gardner. I don’t know if I’d be selling him though. I don’t think he maintains his 9.8% HR/FB, but I think the steals make a rebound when the power dips to his career norm. If he ends the season with 12-15 home runs and 30 steals, I’d be very satisfied.
I’m not crazy about Nix, but Brantley is nothing to write home about either. I probably would have held on to Brantely though.
roster is pretty inflexible with granderson, lawrie, stanton, on DL (and Reddick until recently) If I held on to Brantley I’d have to drop Yonder.
Oof. I will pour one out for your fallen roster. I’m staring at $45 worth of Stanton on one of my Ottoneu benches too.
Sigh.
I could probably get Pedroia for Justin Upton, should I?
he might ask for Seager as well, which makes it tougher to do.
If the Justin Upton bandwagon was a tour bus, I don’t think I’d be driving it, but I’d certainly be the over-excited announcer telling you to look out the window to the left and see his 137 wRC+ this season and his potential to go 30-20 with 100 runs and 90 RBIs.
That was a long sentence, but you know what I mean. I love Upton. I wouldn’t trade him for Pedroia, even with position scarcity factored in.
Happy Friday David. ROS please rank for 5×5 redraft (need Ks badly): Lackey, Cingrani, G. Cole, Haren, Cashner, Kendrick, Chatwood, Kluber, Gausman and Archer. Appreciate it as always. I need two of them, for now.
Cingrani, Lackey, Cashner, Archer, Gausman, Kendrick, Haren, Kluber, Cole, and Chatwood,
A lot of those guys have playing time questions, so this is probably a conservative guess on raw strikeouts. If you are looking for K%, K/9, or wanting to stream them on an individual start basis, the list would be quite different.
K% rankings would be:
Cingrani, Archer, Gausman, Lackey, Cashner, Kluber, Haren, Cole, Chatwood, and Kendrick.
Thanks David. I currently own Lackey and Cingrani (and recently dropped Cash). On same page.
Nothing about the death of Ian Kennedy’s career last night? Never seen such a mentally checked out pitcher. Something is on his mind and it’s not baseball.
I think calling it the death of his career is overstating things, but I’ll pass the info along and see if someone will write a longer piece on Kennedy.
His “Fantasy” career for sure … and his real life options for the future in this, his contract year, have been dimmed considerably. He’s going to have to prove to baseball execs that he is not the walking dead.
I honestly think he’s just been unlucky with LOB%. His fastball is fine, as is his SwStr% and Contact%. His HR/FB% is poor as well, which corresponds strongly with his crappy LOB%.
I’d call this a bump in the road, not needing to prove himself all over again. But I’m not a baseball exec.
I watched much of the game with an eye on pitch f/x. He was grooving his fastballs flat and down the middle one after the other after the other. It was like he could only hit that middle square of the zone.
I used to watch Kennedy a lot back in 2011. He was a hardnosed competitive guy, trying to beat the hitter each pitch. This outing, he honestly looked like he didn’t care, that he had somewhere to go and wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible.
Maybe it was just a bad command day. But it was uncanny how he could groove it right down the middle each time! And then he broke down totally after throwing the ball to the wrong guy on a double play ball. On a quick grounder that he fielded cleanly, he turned and threw to the second baseman who was not covering and 10 feet plus off the bag.
Didi made a fantastic grab of the errant throw and got the out at first. But 7 ER followed what should have been an inning ending double play. Kennedy just melted. Zero mental fortitude. I can’t imagine he’ll be trusted much going forward. He has a lot to prove.
Rank the following ROS:
Darvish, Felix, Bumgarner, Cain, Minor, Gio, Fister, Dickey, Tehran.
In 5×5 for redraft? I’ll assume as much:
Darvish, Felix, Gio, Cain, Bumgarner, Minor, Dickey, Fister, and Teheran.
the important question – can anyone stop Soulkey????
He’s up against the previous GSL champion in the Ro8, so that should actually be a good ZvZ. I don’t love mirror matchups, but the TvT’s should be good and I’m really rooting for Alicia in the PvP.
This weekend should be full of excellent games!
beast