Well, lookie lookie!  If it’s not Carlos Beltran really back from over a year layoff after leaving the lineup initially with what was described as a day-to-day issue.  Those sure are long days, New York Mets?  They’re like Alaska in the summer days.  Beltran returned briefly last year in September, but he’s claiming that he wasn’t 100% at that point.  He is now.  How far you can throw Beltran is how much you should believe him.  As I mentioned in the top 100 for the 2nd half when I gave him the projections of 35/12/45/.270/4, “He comes with injury risk, might not be ready to hit major league pitching and who knows if he’ll be able to steal any bases…”  And that’s me quoting me!  We’re just as likely to see Beltran reinjure himself, come out of the closet and take Claire Danes to the People’s Choice Awards as a friend.  (On a sidenote, in a meeting I went to yesterday, I held a People’s Choice Award for about 12 seconds.  I knew I was in trouble when I picked it up and said, “I’d like to thank the 16 million Guatemalans who I paid a nickel each to vote for me.  This is as much yours as it is mine, but you’re still not invited to come visit it,” and was met with silence.)  About two weeks ago, I told you to sell Beltran.  Nothing’s changed on that front.  You do what you do, I’ll do what I do and we’ll run parallel and wave to each other.  Hey!  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Jose Reyes – Manuel said Reyes won’t return until he’s 100% pain free.  As someone who has struggled with oblique soreness… Oh, who am I kidding, I don’t even know where it is.  I’m not sure why they don’t just DL Reyes so I can at least do the same in my fantasy leagues.  Doesn’t anyone care about fantasy?!  C’mon, I’m juggling Bartlett and Hardy in my SS spot!  I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t see Reyes for another week to ten days.  <–optimistic

Matt Wieters – To the DL.  I have a suggestion for a new Matt Wieters Fact.  A Houston Astros fan swung a bat at a Brad Ausmus piñata and Matt Wieters fell out.

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By the dawn’s early light, why are you unhealthy again, Jose Reyes?!  Tough week for MIs.  Rollins must be contagious.  It’s the Middle Infieluenza Outbreak of Twenty-Ten.  This is like in 1918 when Skeeter McGillicuddy sneezed and the Brooklyn Robins entire team was in the hospital for two weeks with the Robins forcing a team of jailbirds and hooligans onto the field in the heart of the pennant race.  Or maybe that was a movie pitch I overheard in a Hollywood Starbucks.  Neverthehoo!  Right now, Reyes doesn’t sound too bad with only a stiff back and not an issue with his oblique, the mystery ailment that sidelines players and no one has any idea where in the body it is.  Reyes said he could’ve even played last night.  Excellent, now keep him away from any Met doctors that treated Beltran’s day-to-day thing last year that knocked him out for over a year.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Jimmy Rollins – 0-for-4 as he hits third for the 2nd straight game.  Yeah, it didn’t work for Reyes either.  Rollins is now batting .270 after returning from the DL with a .341 average.  Granted, that was only through 11 games, but they’re my small sample sizes and I’ll put them wherever I want.

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The average for caught stealing percentage in the Major Leagues is 28% so there’s not a whole lot of clubs that believe keeping the guy at first base is of much importance.  Of course, some pitchers and catchers are just much easier than others.  I remember watching one game where John Popper stole 2nd, 3rd and home on Chris Young while Run Around was playing on the stadium’s PA.  Or maybe I just made that up.  Either way, Chris Young’s terrible but he’s also a seven foot stick of injury proneness, which is a “u” and some fiber short of pruneness.  So let’s look at some guys who are actually playing and how easy they are to steal on for fantasy baseball:

Gil Meche – Leads the league in steals allowed at 13.  That’s also more than a third of the bases stolen against Kendall.  So Kendall sucks, but Meche is making the most of his suckiness.  Or the least.  Not sure, lost myself there.

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Sometimes when a player gets hurt, I feel bad if I told you to buy into them.  I’m like, “Shove your emotions into your cankles, you sissy!”  Alas, my inner Native American watching someone litter in a 70′s commercial comes out.  A tear forms in my eye and rolls into my mustache.  Then I leave it there to remind me of my fallen fantasy baseball comrades.  This mustache holds a lot of tears.  But when a player that I warned you against like Aaron Hill heads off to the DL with tightness in his hamstring, I do a little dance like MC Skat Cat.  You know the kid in high school that wore a helmet all day that you used to make fun of?  Okay, now remember when you were alone in the hallway and that same kid walk passed you and you said hello to him because no one else was around?  Today, that kid is Aaron Hill’s owners.  Save your ridicule until their back is turned.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Jimmy Rollins – Having an MRI on his right calf strain.  Mr.

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No one carries two catchers in one catcher leagues.  If you do, you probably suffer from mushy brain.  So in 12 team leagues, you have 10 to 15 catchers at any time to choose from.  Hey, Miguel Olivo’s dressed like Johnny Weir and he’s hitting!  What do you know, Rod Barajas looks less Barajas-y!  Skinny Pudge is seeing fat pitches!

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Went over the top 20 and top 10 for 2010 fantasy baseball.  Now, friends, it’s time for the top 20 catchers for 2010 fantasy baseball.  The top 20 catchers are the glass of warm milk right before you go to sleep.  Hey, I just drafted Jorge Posada!  Snooze.  I love Kurt Suzuki this year!  Yawn.  I don’t draft top catchers in one catcher leagues.  The fifth best catcher and the 15th best catcher are tomato, to-blah-to.  Because I ignore the top catchers doesn’t mean I’m starting the top 20 catcher list at number twenty-one (Barajas?  What’s Spanish for punt?  Punta?); some of you might want to know the top catchers.  You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them draft Napoli.  In two catcher leagues, catchers are a little more valuable, but I’d still prefer to avoid them.  You can see other top 20 lists for 2010 fantasy baseball under 2010 Fantasy Baseball Rankings.  Listed along with these catchers are my 2010 projections for each player and where the tiers begin and end.  Anyway, here’s the top 20 catchers for 2010 fantasy baseball:

1.

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It feels like yesterday that the baseball regular season started.  We frolicked, hand in hand, through the season.  You stopped to pick a flower and I said, “That dandelion looks like a French impressionist painting that you can see up close.”  Then we giggled and blew the parachute off its stalk.  Today, the parachute lands and I’m sad.  The regular season is done.  As an action movie sidekick once said right before he was about to be killed, “NOOOO!!!”  There’s a cure for the post-baseball season blues — recapping the preseason top twenty lists and being hand fed Doritos.

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Fangraphs, a great site to get lost in for a few hours, has this stat called O-Swing %.  I don’t know if they invented it, but they probably did because they’re smarter than us.  The O-Swing % is not the amount of times you can fail to satisfy a woman prior to her swinging her arm and knocking you to the floor.  Repeat, it is not that.  Though, if someone can come up with that stat, let me know.  No, the O-Swing % is, “The percentage of pitches a batter swings at outside the strike zone.”  Yes, they may as well call this the AlfonsO-Swing %.  Hackers score high, methodical, patient hitters score low.  Doesn’t mean high is bad and low is good.  Some guys hack and have always hacked.  B.

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If you drafted Manny this year, then you better make a new plan, Stan because Man-Ram is getting time off for bad behavior.  50 games to be exact.  The reason – he came up positive for human chorionic gonadotropin, or HCG, which can be used to boost testosterone levels.  Manny seems to be claiming his doctor prescribed it for erectile dysfunction but the drug is most often prescribed for…women’s fertility.  Huh?  And here we thought Alyssa Milano was the only person in the LA Dodger clubhouse taking those.  Maybe Manny got screwed by a bad boner doctor but our money is on Scott Boras.  He probably gave those pills to Manny, told him they were Flintstone vitamins, and Manny hallucinated Flintstone faces onto the vitamins.

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These top 20 catchers for 2009 fantasy baseball will be yawnstipating compared to the top 20 1st basemen or even top 20 shortstops, but you have to start somewhere, right? (That was rhetorical.)  You can check out our other top 20 lists for 2009 fantasy baseball under 2009 Fantasy Baseball Rankings.  I usually don’t draft a top catcher, instead I hold off until the later rounds and grab one of the late rounders.  That doesn’t mean I’m going to start the top 20 catcher list at number twenty-one (Varitek?  Oy vey.), cause some of youse like to gamble on a top catcher.  You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them draft Chris Snyder.  Listed along with these catchers are my 2009 projections for each player.  Feel free to also look at our 2009 fantasy baseball player rater.  Anyway, here’s the top 20 catchers for 2009 fantasy baseball:

1.

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