This offseason, as transactions unfold and news breaks on the big league level, we’ll take a look at how the ripple effects shake out on the prospect side, focusing primarily on 2013 fantasy impact, with an eye toward the future, too.
This week: Baseball’s best first base prospect gets suspended, and two top young hot cornermen currently remain depth chart victims.
Over the last week or so we’ve done plenty of articles discussing the impending move of the Houston Astros to the American League and how it will impact those in the fantasy baseball community. But no matter how many times we attempt to look on the bright side and find the silver lining in it all, there’s one common thing that seems to come through in every piece. It’s like that early montage in the movie Major League where the Indians’ fan base is looking at their 40 man roster in disbelief — from some guy asking who Mitchell Friedman is to the groundskeepers’ claims that “these guys are sh*tty”. There’s almost no love for the 2012 Astros and very little hope for the club moving forward. However, just like the old fantasy adage (is there such a thing?) that states that even closers on bad teams can be good and helpful, the same can be said about everyday players from Houston. Just because the team is in relative shambles, doesn’t mean that you can’t find some helpful players at a bargain cost.
The Houston Astros are headed for the American League West in 2013 in order to provide balance among divisions, and in the process, apparently raise the ire of the Houston faithful. The move certainly has fantasy implications for the Astros pitchers as most research points to fewer strikeouts and higher ERA’s when players move from the NL to the AL. But one player that could be impacted by the move is Brett Wallace.
First of all, you have to admit that it’s a fitting punctuation to Wallace’s travels that his entire team is moving divisions. After being the first selection in the 2008 draft by the St. Louis Cardinals, Wallace has already had three more employers. He was traded by the Cardinals in July of 2009 in a package for Matt Holliday, traded five months later to the Blue Jays for Michael Taylor, and then dealt six months later to the Astros for Anthony Gose. Perhaps he’s run out of geographical locations as a fit and whatever karma he’s carrying decided that his entire team needed a fresh change as well. But I digress. A lot.
It’s not the statistical effect of moving from the NL to the AL that will impact Wallace necessarily — it’s the availability of the designated hitter. So let’s take a brief look at why.