Yesterday, I was thinking how Miguel Gonzalez, who went 7 IP, 2 ER, 5 baserunners, 5 Ks, is a’ight. Has nominal value in mixed leagues against weaker teams and a solid back-end guy for AL-Only leagues, which could describe the entire O’s staff. With the O’s, you gotta mind your P’s and Q’s. Excuse me, I had Alphabet Soup for lunch and just burped. Those O’s starters are okay, but I crave excitement. I’m an adrenaline junkie. Sometimes I’ll blog with no pants on just for the RUSH I get. While in Starbucks. While holding my dog over my junk so I don’t catch charges. I’m a responsible adrenaline junkie. So, when I heard Kevin Gausman will make his major league debut on Thursday, you can imagine how awkward it was carrying my dog over my junk without any hands, while working my cellular mobile device trying to pick up Gausman. I’ve gone over Gausman as recently as two weeks ago. He was my Wheeler before Wheeler. I lurve Gausman. The O’s staff is iffy at best, so Gausman could definitely stick around. His numbers in the minors this year are insane. In 46 1/3 IP, he has 49 Ks and 5 walks. He could be the best called up pitcher this year. More likely, he’ll have some extreme ups and downs in the AL East. I’d still grab him in all leagues just in case his ups far outnumber his downs. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Please, blog, may I have some more?Ian Kennedy
I went ahead and picked up Jarrod Dyson this past week only to watch him sprain his ankle before even entering my lineup. ESPN has him listed as 0.0% ownership, so apparently my team doesn’t even count in their world. I was about to get all depressed about it and throw on my Skinny Puppy t-shirt and black eyeliner when I realized that this is a SAGNOF world, and that means when one speedster goes down, we just go to the heap for another. We’re about 1/4 of the way through the season already, and that means it’s time to take a look at some stats for pitchers, catchers, and teams to try to exploit when chasing steals. I’ll also take a look at what Will Venable is up to and how Pedro Florimon may be a possible source of cheap speed in very deep leagues. At the beginning of the season, I posted the 2012 numbers for pitchers and catchers who should be exploited or avoided when it comes to steals, as well as team SB allowed for matchup purposes. Here are those same stats through the first 40 games of the 2013 season.
Please, blog, may I have some more?
Did you realize that there was an epic breakthrough in the world of baseball analytics this week? Well, it happened! We did it! On Thursday, Ken “The Hawk” Harrelson joined Brian Kenny on MLB Network’s “MLB Now”, offering his thoughts on these newfangled sabermetrics. According to Hawk, WAR, and VORP, and OPS+, and all other products of science and reason fall short of his fresh new statistic — something he calls TWTW, or “The Will To Win”. Evidently, Hawk understands how to quantify this unmeasurable attribute, and he truly believes it is the most telling component of player evaluation. You can check out the video here, but most importantly, please make sure you apply Hawk’s lessons to your two-start browsing this week. Before you grab one of these guys off waivers, ask yourself: Is this a TWTW guy, or is this a non-TWTW guy? We only want the TWTW’s here. Choose wisely.
Please, blog, may I have some more?
We at Razzball realize that exporting our views across the country has damaging consequences on the blogosphere. To help make amends, we are reaching out to leading team blogs and featuring their locally blogged answers to pressing 2013 fantasy baseball questions regarding their team. We feel this approach will be fresher, more sustainable, and require less energy consumption (for us anyway). The 2013 Diamondbacks Fantasy Baseball Preview comes courtesy Jim McLennan from AZ Snakepit.
Please, blog, may I have some more?For those of us who prefer our fantasy baseball leagues to mirror our fantasy football leagues, there are weekly H2H formats. Sure, H2H is a poorer measure of fantasy skill than rotisserie — weekly snapshots of baseball statistics are hardly indicative of a team’s overall value. But the one-on-one element of H2H provides owners with weekly closure, and adds quite a bit to the competitive nature of the fantasy game. Simply put, H2H is fun. One way to stay ahead in these weekly formats is to maintain a flexible roster and stream two-start pitchers. So every Saturday in-season, we’ll be providing a glimpse at the upcoming week’s two-start landscape.
Please, blog, may I have some more?Yesterday, went over the top 20 starters for 2013 fantasy baseball. Today is, you guessed it! The top 40 starters for 2013 fantasy baseball. There’s fifteen pitchers in these twenty that I will draft. Can you guess which ones? No, not the ones named Chuck. There are no Chucks. Are you even trying? You’ll see from these twenty starters that even the ones I like I’m not quite as jazzed about them. I’m thinking I’m gonna end up with Greinke, Moore and Samardzija on every team and be done with the top 40 starters. Due to drafting about six to seven bazillion teams (rounding up a kajillion), I might mix it up here and there. All of the 2013 fantasy baseball rankings are there. As always, my projections and where tiers start and stop are includamente. That’s Spanish. Anyway, here’s the top 40 starters for 2013 fantasy baseball:
Please, blog, may I have some more?
Yes, I went Crazy Town on you. Look, the more and more you do this, the more you realize there are good title days and bad title days. And let me tell you this friends. Today is an amazing day. You know what the opposite of amazing is? Tim Lincecum in your left ocular region. Even though his star had been dimming slowly each year since 2009, many if not most did not predict such a precipitous drop. And when I say drop, it’s a landing that made a convincing doo-doo splat, but with fake dubstep. I feel like I am just too close to up-WUB you. You know, that’s a good ZZZZUHHHH CHUHHHHHHH BZZZZZZZAAAAAA Doo-doo splat! WAAAAAAW WAAAAAAAAWA WAWAAAHHHH!!!! During the two seasons before 2012, his strikeout rate dropped while his walk rate increased, both trending in a non-zesty direction. While he had a slight up-tick in his fastball velocity in 2011, the improved velocity did not show up in his SwStr% (swinging strike percentage), scoring a 10.7% from a 11.0%. It was an unlikely proposition that he would ever return to a 10.0+ K% pitcher, but it was rational to expect at least a strike out per inning while still holding league average control and still inducing grounders at an above average rate. After all, those three things are still ingredients for a top of the rotation starter.
Please, blog, may I have some more?So, how’s everyone holding up without fantasy baseball every day? I don’t know what to do with myself! This weekend I wandered into a Starbucks and told the coffeerista about Giancarlo Stanton for 2013. Then I laughed hysterically for a good twenty minutes until someone asked me to leave.
Please, blog, may I have some more?The Tigers playoffs hopes just took a shot in the lower extremities. Now if they get to the playoffs, they’ll have to pitch Verlander 4 times in a 5 game series with Miggy pitching the other game. That’s not our concern though, is it?
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Aroldis Chapman is being shut down ‘for a couple of days’ with shoulder fatigue. Dusty actually admitted ”We’re lucky we got to this point” which made every Cub fan both nod and shake their heads. To be fair to Dusty, his usage of Chapman seems reasonable.
Please, blog, may I have some more?