Fantasy Baseball Advice

This week’s Fantasy Roundtable (it really is round!) is being hosted by Fantasy Baseball Generals. Because Rudy’s basking in the Basque region of Spain and Spumoni’ing down the Amalfi coast like he’s a Soprano, your very own, Grey, took the reins. Go see what I had to say about:

THE TOPIC: Who are the top pitchers for 2010?

Justin Duchscherer is headed to the DL with a bad hip. (That’s the exact medical term. I checked WebMD.) How about them Athletics?! Talk about an ironic team name. Bobby Crosby, Street, Chavez, formerly Harden, etc. How about un-Athletic? What, too obvious? Whateves. You add the clever for once. Duchscherer might come back in two weeks. There’s only five weeks left! You’re going to wait around for this schmohawk? Cut bait as they say on the Country Music Channel or The Nashville Network or whatever channel Jeff Foxworthy’s hosting a show on. Oh, wait, that’s Fox. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Derek Lowe – 6 1/3 innings, 1 ER. I’m on him for home matchups like Alyssa Milano’s on Valtrex.

James Loney – HR yesterday. Headed to Philly for a weekend series. Stock up on your Dodgers’ bats. Loney’s probably one that is out there.

Greg Smith – 6 IP, 0 ER. Against the Mariners. It’s like being able to hit the ocean with a golf ball from a pier.

Yunel Escobar – HR yesterday. If he gets to ten home runs and five steals with a .290 average, you’re going to look at him next March and think about drafting him. Remember the five months of yawnstipation. Remember.

Brandon Webb/Cliff Lee – 19th and 18th wins respectively. Now disrespectfully, Cliff Lee?! Holy heffin’ hey, are you serious? He’s 29 and his K/BB ratio tripled this year.  What the eff? Imagine if the Indians were good and hadn’t been Pronk’d! Cliff Lee would be looking at a 40 win season and free blow from Drew Carey for life.

Hideki Matsui – First home run since returning three games ago. This is a win for Godzilla, anime and porn.

Joey Votto/Jay Bruce – Both homered yesterday. They should totally watch Beaches together, because Votto’s totally Barbara Hersey and Jay Bruce is Bette Midler. While Jay Bruce is rocking out on Broadway in a musical about Otto Titsling, Votto’s living for some detached jerk and biding his time until he has a baby. But things only appear wonderful for Bruce. His spouse is two-timing on him, he can’t have a kid and he’s butt freakin’ ugly. Wait, I was all ready for a good cry when I realized this was supposed to have something to do with Votto, Bruce and fantasy baseball? Oh, that’s right! Votto’s just as good as Bruce, but he’s getting cold there in Bruce’s shadow.

This week we’re starting a new weekly column that will be here every Thursday, it will be all about fantasy baseball keepers. Since many fantasy baseball keeper leagues don’t decide on their keepers until the start of the new season, I figured I’d go over some fantasy baseball keepers from now until next spring. If you can remember all the way back to February, Hillary Clinton was headed for the Presidency, the Indiana Jones trilogy hadn’t yet been ruined and Cueto was better than Volquez. Well, we know what happened on the way to the Prom. In a surprise move, Volquez was asked by the Head Cheerleader and went from total geek to total chic. Meanwhile, someone shit Cueto’s house. Unfortunately, at the Prom, someone noticed Volquez was actually doing the African Anteater Dance and not some cool hip dance that he just extemporaneously (Word of the Day) came up with, while Cueto went back to mowing lawns, saved a few dorks and eventually received a slow clap from the whole league.

In the minors, Cueto averaged over a K/IP and his walk rate was sick. (That’s sick as in very healthy, not sick as in sick.) Volquez was not the better pitcher coming into the year because of his wildness. Unusable wild? No, he showed that in the beginning of this year. Now, as the year comes to a close, Edinson/Edison/Julio Reyes is taking the slow Green Mile walk to a 3.00 ERA, while Cueto has quietly strung together some quality starts. So don’t be shocked if next year Cueto has more value than Volquez next year. Anyway, here’s some more fantasy baseball keepers for ‘09:

Andy LaRoche – Who know how JD Drew kinda made you want to draft Stephen Drew even though Stephen hasn’t shown too many signs? Well, reverse that shizz for the LaRoches. Andy’s better than his schmohawk older brother.

Jeff Franceour – I’m just not convinced it’s over for this dooode. If you’re out of it in your NL-Only keeper and you can get Frenchy for very cheap, like, one dollar cheap. I’d do it. Not a huge endorsement, but he’s still young.

Alexei Ramirez – Sometimes you have to watch a guy to fall fully in love with him. Well, I watched Alexei. He looks like premenopausal Alfonso Soriano.

Adam Lind – The dealer’s showing Pat Burrell. That’s a push.

Adam Wainwright will start on Friday replacing Joel Piñeiro. I’m putting him in immediately. I have faith in The Author of Tonyball, Dave Duncan and Adam Wainwright. Will he be lights out? Well, I hope so. He has been good in his rehab. There’s a chance he’s ineffective, but Wainwright’s worth the chance that his ailment’s been mended and he’s can handle the ball. When he left, he was a solid number two for fantasy baseball purposes. Hopefully that’s how he returns, and not a number two that leaves you feeling ill and burns when you sit down. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Al Reyes – To the Mets. That sounds familiar because I told you three days ago Reyes would close for the Mets. Of course the Mets picked him up. The Mets are so desperate, they went to see Giuliani throw to see if he could close, but he just talked their ear off about the tremendous job he did for 9/11. Reyes will get some saves within a week or two. Probably end the season with 5-7 saves.

Hanley Ramirez – Day-to-day after taking a ball off the thumb. There goes his spot-on Fonzie impersonation.

Ryan Church – Will be a backup to Tatis. Aren’t you glad you grabbed him for that DL slot? Zoinks!

R.A. Dickey – Gave up 8 ER in 2 innings. Which is sad for him and for Rudy who was sonavabenched on his Razzball team.

Mark Reynolds – Took fielding practice at 2nd. Well, that’s cool, Grey. And I took a dump in a Wendy’s parking lot yesterday. You going to tell us everything these schmohawks do? Okay, wiseass. When Upton returns, the outfield will get crowded, which could force Dunn to 1st, Tracy to 3rd and Reynolds over to 2nd. Reynolds is startable in just about all leagues if he gets 2nd base eligibility.

Wandy Rodriguez – Got a bum scoring call on a Hardy first inning “hit.” Wait, why am I being apologetic for Wandy? Honestly, I’m not sure. He was very wild and the game could’ve been much worse if he was facing the Brewers A-team. After all, Gabe Kapler was batting third. Not exactly Hannibal.

Emilio Bonifacio – 2-for-4 with a steal with a modest one game hitting streak going. (Though he has hit in six of the last seven games.) I’m jumping ship in all mixed leagues, but holding in NL-Only leagues and deep leagues I really need steals.

Brett Myers – Complete game shutout against the Nats. Yesterday I said, “The only pitchers I wouldn’t spot start against the Mariners pitch for the Mariners.” That goes double for the Nats. If that monkey from the movie Ed made a comeback (No, not Matt LeBlanc. The real monkey.), I’d spot start him against the Nats.

Jacoby Ellsbury – 3 steals in the last two games. Might be the start of him running wild.

Jair Jurrjens – I’ve jumped ship on Jurrjens in ten team mixed leagues. In 12-team leagues, I’m holding him loosely like .38 Special. His innings are way too high for him. We had a good run. Peace, see ya later. Later? (LATER!) Later, alligator.

Mike Pelfrey – See one centimeter above. He gets the Astros next. I’d hold him for that start, but get ready to bail.

Jeff Francis – Looked respectable against the Dodgers. His next start is against the Giants. I’d go there with JF.

Jerry Hairston Jr. – Returning to the DL. Not surprising. We’re headed to September, he has a nagging hamstring injury and a lot of his value was coming from his legs. Punt. If it’s hurts for you to cut Hairston loose, you have bigger fish to fry. Beans don’t burn on the grill.

Jon Rauch – Picked up the save yesterday. Three weeks ago, I would’ve told you to immediately grab Rauch, but he hasn’t looked good at all. Not even compared to Lyon. Melvin says he’ll conitnue to go to Lyon, I’d believe him. It’s not worth the agita, unless you’re desperate like that kid in The Last American Virgin.

Franklin Gutierrez – The Big FraGu went deep against Joakim Soria and the Indians rallied to win. The victory was also thanks to Kelly Shoppach’s earlier homer and Jensen Lewis shutting the door. Okay, now picture you’re an Indians fan who was in a coma for three months and you just read the last two sentences. You’d be like, “Jensen who? Franklin what? Shoppach huh? Wow, the Indians must be really kicking ass if these role players are chipping in.” Um, yeah. Listen, comatose Indians fan, you might want to sit down.

The Fantasy Baseball Hall of Fame in conjunction with Razzball.com, are electing the All-Star teams of the Fantasy Era. For every season from 1980 to today full 23 man rosters will be created and analyzed. In the second installment the 1998 through 2000 seasons are identified.

Year: 1998
First Time All Stars: 4 – Vinny Castilla, Derek Jeter, Tom Gordon, Jason Kendall
3 Time All Stars: 4 – Trevor Hoffman, Chipper Jones, Alex Rodriguez, Curt Schilling
5 Time All Stars: 8 – Albert Belle, Barry Bonds, Craig Biggio, Roger Clemens, Ken Griffey Jr, Randy Johnson, Greg Maddux, Mike Piazza
10 Time All Stars: None
Future FBHOF’ers: 14 –Belle, Biggio, Bonds, Kevin Brown, Clemens, Griffey, Johnson, Jones, Maddux, Pedro Martinez, Piazza, Rodriguez, Schilling, Sammy Sosa
Snubs: 2 – Jeff Bagwell (11.1), Vladimir Guerrero (11.0)
16 Pt Season: 1 – Sosa (16.7)

Last week we saw how the 1997 squad ranked best overall among the 28 all star teams. While this is true in a statistical sense, many fans will likely look towards the 1998 team as the one to beat. Their team average FBHOF score is different only by the smallest percentage points – 12.08 vs. 12.07 – and frankly, this means there is no difference as I do not pretend that the math behind the FBHOF scoring system is reliable up to the hundredth decimal point.

Further, and more telling, the starting rotation is entirely made up of Fantasy Baseball Hall of Famers, 5 of 6 of which are likely headed to Cooperstown as well. Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Greg Maddux, Pedro Martinez, and Curt Schilling are joined by Kevin Brown, an excellent pitcher in his own right.

On offense, many names remain the same: Craig Biggio, Barry Bonds, Nomar Garciaparra, Ken Griffey Jr, Chipper Jones, Mike Piazza, and Alex Rodriguez make back to back All Star appearances. But there were a couple of upgrades, in name at least, too. Mark McGwire replaces Andres Galarraga, Albert Belle ditched Tony Gwynn, Juan Gonzalez instead of Raul Mondesi plus Sammy Sosa had his career year in 1998. For the first time ever all batters and staring pitchers reached 10 or more FBHOF points. This team had no weaknesses.

The ‘for fun’ fact that brings it all home? FBHOF’er Jeff Bagwell and Vlad Guerrero weren’t good enough to make this team; in 1997 the snubs were Tino Martinez and Vinny Castilla. There is no comparison.

The World Series featured the 114 Win New York Yankees, represented only by Derek Jeter. They defeated the San Diego Padres 4 games to none. Kevin Brown, the fantasy pitcher of the year, was their #1 starter.

Positional Ranking Among the 28 Teams
C: 4th
IF: 3rd
OF: 14th
SP: 5th
RP: 15th
Overall: 2nd

Year: 1999
First Time All Stars: 9 – Shawn Green, Vladimir Guerrero, Mike Hampton, Jose Lima, Kevin Milwood, Manny Ramirez, Mariano Rivera, Billy Wagner, Scott Williamson
3 Time All Stars: 9 – Roberto Alomar, Jeff Bagwell, Kevin Brown, Nomar Garciaparra, Chipper Jones, Pedro Martinez, Mark McGwire, Ivan Rodriguez, Sammy Sosa
5 Time All Stars: 3 – Ken Griffey Jr, Randy Johnson, Mike Piazza
10 Time All Stars: None
Future FBHOF’ers: 9 –Alomar, Bagwell, Brown, Griffey, Guerrero, Johnson, Jones, Martinez, Piazza, Ramirez
Snubs: 2 – Rafael Palmeiro (11.3), Juan Gonzalez (11.0)
16 Pt Season: 2 – Martinez (18.1), Johnson (17.8)

This year’s version of Pedro Martinez and Randy Johnson make up fantasy baseball’s historical best 1-2 punch. Martinez was technically awesome. Only five pitchers in the fantasy era have maintained a WHIP of 0.92 over the course of 200 or more innings, and despite starting just 29 games, he laid claim to 23 wins. On the other hand, Johnson was a workhorse. His WHIP was a full .10 higher and his ERA 0.40 higher, but Johnson was only 3-tenths of a FBHOF point behind Martinez for the #1 ranking of the year. Why? Innings pitched.

Above you can see that Martinez outperformed his NL counterpart in these critical rate statistics, especially in strikeout to walk ratio.  Johnson’s numbers were great in their own right, but no one could conclude that he was the ‘better’ of the two.  However, Johnson made 6 more starts than Martinez and lasted a shade deeper into each.  The question becomes would a fantasy owner rather, for instance, a 2.07 ERA in 213 IP or a 2.48 ERA in 271 innings?

Simple math.  Assume a standard fantasy rotation of 6 starters and 3 relievers, and pretend they each maintained an exact league average ERA of 4.37.  Replace a starter with Martinez and compute the new team ERA.  Then swap out Martinez for Johnson and compute his impact to the team.  Answer – the impacts are exactly the same:

4.022488 – Team ERA w/Martinez
4.022957 – Team ERA w/Johnson

Moral of the story?  Innings pitched matters.  A great deal.

Kevin Millwood and Kevin Brown were very good 3rd and 4th starters but Mike Hampton and Jose Lima (! – 21 W, 1.22 WHIP, 3.58 ERA) were worse than average for All Stars.

On offense, Mike Piazza and Ivan Rodriguez combined to make the best All Star catching tandem in history:  .320 AVG, 216 R, 75 HR, 237 RBI, and 27 SB between them.

Elsewhere, Barry Bonds played in just 102 games (batting .262 in the process) and misses an All-Star nod for the first time since 1989. He would go on to be elected each year from 2000 to 2004, giving him 14 appearances in a 15 year stretch.  Recurring All-Stars Albert Belle, Craig Biggio, Nomar Garciaparra, Ken Griffey Jr, and Mark McGwire made their last team in 1999; Roberto Alomar, Shawn Green, Vlad Guerrero, Manny Ramirez, and Billy Wagner made their first.

In the World Series the New York Yankees won their 3rd title in 4 years, pounding the Atlanta Braves 4-0.  Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera represented the AL Champions while Chipper Jones and Millwood stood for the NL victors.

Positional Ranking Among the 28 Teams
C: 1st
IF: 9th
OF: 20th
SP: 2nd
RP: 14th
Overall: 3rd

Year: 2000
First Time All Stars: 6 – Armando Benitez, Johnny Damon, Darin Erstad, Todd Helton, Richard Hidalgo, Jeff Kent.
3 Time All Stars: 7 –Roberto Alomar, Jeff Bagwell, Kevin Brown, Pedro Martinez, Robb Nen, Alex Rodriguez, Sammy Sosa
5 Time All Stars: 5 – Trevor Hoffman, Randy Johnson, Chipper Jones, Greg Maddux, Mike Piazza
10 Time All Stars: 1 – Barry Bonds
Future FBHOF’ers: 13 – Alomar, Bagwell, Bonds, Brown, Vladimir Guerrero, Helton, Johnson, Jones, Maddux, Martinez, Piazza, Rodriguez, Sosa
Snubs: Troy Glaus (11.6), Andruw Jones (11.1), Frank Thomas (11.1)
16 Pt Season: 1 – Pedro Martinez (18.2)

The freak rosters made up of abnormal amounts of All Time fantasy greats continued in 2000, though the quality of seasons diminished. Dropping 14 slots, the first team of the new century is ranked just 15th, mostly due to an outfield crew that was in the bottom third in All Star history. Darin Erstad, Johnny Damon, and Richard Hidalgo had very good seasons but not even they would argue they were equal to those they replaced: Manny Ramirez, Ken Griffey Jr, and Larry Walker.

Starting pitching continued to be great and 2000 was the 4th consecutive season where the position was in the Top 6. Pedro Martinez became the first player in fantasy history to have back to back 18+ FBHOF point seasons. Take you pick as to which is better:

1999 – 213 IP, 23 W, 0.92 WHIP, 2.07 ERA, 313 K
2000 – 217 IP, 18 W, 0.74 WHIP, 1.74 ERA, 284 K

The first subway series in 44 years transpired in October, with the Yankees winning 4 games to 1. Flushing featured Mike Piazza and Armando Benitez as All Stars while the Bronx Bombers countered with, well no one, not even a snub.

Positional Ranking Among the 28 Teams
C: 9th
IF: 11th
OF: 22nd
SP: 6th
RP: 24th
Overall: 15th