Roto Riteup — Presented by DraftKings: May 22, 2014
Today’s Roto Riteup author will be taking in his first live baseball game of 2014, enjoying the Mariners’ Salute to Sriracha night and the aftermath that follows.*
On today’s agenda:
1. Chris Sale to start today
2. Ben Revere on the bench
3. Alex Guerrero could be out 5 weeks after ear eaten
4. Fun with arbitrary endpoints
5. The Flaming Five
Chris Sale to start today
The Salesman is dying, but returning to the majors to face off against the Yankees in Chicago. Sale was pitching like his typical sexy self before having to hit the DL with an elbow injury, with his numbers right in line with his expectations. Sale dominated in his rehab outing, striking out 11 dudes over four innings, so he’s seemingly good to go.
Ben Revere on the bench
Revere originally missed three games due to a stomach bug, but it appears he’s no longer in the good graces of the Phillies’ coaching staff, missing the next two for no explained reasons outside of poor performance. Revere was hitting .268/.284/.297 on the year, so benching him may not be the worst option, but he was stealing a good deal of bases for fantasy owners, who still should have been satisfied with him in standard formats. Revere’s replacement has been Tony Gwynn Jr., who offers pretty much the exact same skillset as Revere. If this switch is even semi-permanent, it may be worth it just to swap out Revere for Gwynn on your rosters.
Alex Guerrero could be out 5 weeks after ear eaten
Guerrero had part of his ear bitten off by a Miguel Olivo, who we usually aren’t fortunate enough to see out of his natural habitat, and now Guerrero needs to sit out a while after undergoing plastic surgery to fix the problem. The Cuban middle infielder was hitting .368/.411/.737 in Triple-A, but with Dee Gordon hitting well in the majors, there wasn’t a great rush to call him up to the big league club. I suspect we’ll see Guerrero back before the five week mark, because it’s a friggin ear, not a torn elbow.
Fun with arbitrary endpoints
All stats through Tuesday’s games.
Brad Miller, 2013: 335 PA, .265/.318/.418; 21.6% LD%, 8.6% SwStr%, .294 BABIP
Brad Miller, 2014: 154 PA, .158/.230/.259; 14.6% LD%, 11.6% SwStr%, .198 BABIP
George Springer, April: 61 PA, .182/.262/.218, 31.1% K%
George Springer, May: 76 PA, .284/.368/.478, 38.2% K%
The Flaming Five
SP: Jake Arrieta, @SDP
SP: Roenis Elias, vHOU
1B: Adam Dunn, vNYY (David Phelps)
OF: Mike Morse, @COL (Jorge de la Rosa)
OF: Hunter Pence, @COL
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Zach is the creator and co-author of RotoGraphs' Roto Riteup series, and RotoGraphs' second-longest tenured writer. You can follow him on twitter.
I think Dee Gordon paid Olivo to bite Guerrero’s ear off to keep him in AAA a while longer.
Gordon hit 344 with a 141 wRC+ and 372 wOBA in April but 247 with a 74 wRC+ and 274 wOBA so far in May. If you take out his 9 for 17 stint in the first 3 games, he is hitting 194 with a 51 wRC+ and 242 wOBA over his last 16 games. I know, SSS, fun with arbitrary endpoints and all, but it’s disconcerting given his past MLB performance. It looks like Olivo’s chompers potentially gave him 5 weeks to turn things around.
The thing that I think has been overlooked int he Gordon/Guerrero talk is one of the big concerns with Guerrero was that his defense was spotty at times. I know a couple of scouts had said he looked stretched to play the keystone position.
Not saying he cant rake, but my guess is that was one of the reasons Gordon was going to keep the position for awhile anyway.
Agreed, if I recall, it was one of the main reasons Guerrero was sent down; to learn 2B since he was primarily a SS in Cuba. Gordon so far has been just about average (-0.3 UZR/150 and 0 DRS) as a 2B after being a horrible SS (-23.3 career UZR/150), so one wouldn’t expect and extreme drop-off unless Guerrero was completely incompetent. I can’t find advanced stats, but he has 4 errors in 137 chances so far in AAA, which would seem to indicate he at least plays 2B better than I do.
From a fantasy perspective, the ideal scenario would be to slide Hanley to 3B, slot Guerrero at his natural SS and keep Gordon at 2B with Uribe on the DL, but that doesn’t seem to be in the cards.