Fantasy Baseball Advice

In the preseason, I said Adam Lind could contend for the MVP.  Wow.  It’s almost like Matthew Berry put that thought in my head.  In a litany of dopey things I’ve said, that might take the cake, frost it and smush it into my face.  The Berry feeds the Grey (bad advice), the Berry feeds the Grey (bad advice)… Hi-ho, the marry-o… What was I thinking?!  In my defense, he didn’t have an ailing back when I said that flimflammery and I told you to drop him outright a few weeks ago.  Oh, well, that’s what you get sometimes from crazy predictions.  Just flat-out crazy.  Like I should be walking into traffic in a burlap sack crazy.  So the Jays added a third A to Lind’s first name, sending him to the minors.  Since he was hitting like an infant, it makes sense.  In his place, the Jays called up Yan Gomes.  What’s with people and the last name Gomes unable to spell John?  Yanny was hitting .359 with 5 dingers in Triple-A.  Whatever, right?  Well, he’s a catcher, so those are like MVP (dah!) numbers.  In AL-Only leagues, I could see grabbing him.  Right now, he’s behind J.P., Mathis, Lawrie and Encarnacion, but Lawrie’s got a suspension and Edwin just made an error and the Jays game doesn’t even start for 12 hours, so Yanny could see time all over the field.  Yesterday, he played third and went 2-for-3.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Brett Lawrie – Unable to decide on the shadow coat rack or just bad calls, he dropped his appeal.  He is also practicing counting to ten before blowing his top.  As soon as he figures out what comes after 6 it should be a breeze.

J.P. Arencibia – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 2nd homer in as many games.  I think he leads my RCL team in homers.  Now I will cry.

Mat Latos – 5 IP, 3 ER, 10 baserunners, 7 Ks which equals a pretty mediocre start in Metco.  This was his chance to string three quality starts together.  At best, that chance only comes around once every three starts!

Lucas Duda – I didn’t mention it yesterday when he had a 3-for-4 day because I wasn’t sure if it would be a 3-for-4 day followed by a 1-for-4 day or a 3-for-4 day followed by a 3-for-4 day or a 2-for-5 day.  It turns out that 3-for-4 day became a 2-for-5 day and now he looks like he’s a hot schmotato again.  And, sorry, I think my 3-for-4 day record is scratched; it keeps repeating.

Ike Davis – 0-for-2 to lower his average to .164.  He’ll be fine.  He has his family’s support.  You know who I really worry about?  That poor soul who drafted Hosmer and Ike Davis.

David Wright – 2-for-2 with his 4th steal.  I pledged a nickel to Jerry Lewis’s Kids for every time I mention Wright.  We’re up to fifteen cents.

Dayan Viciedo – 1-for-4 with his 6th homer and 3rd in the last 4 games, and hitting .381 in the last week.  As we know, Viciedo is Latin for I Swing Therefore I Am, and he’s living up to that.  In 118 ABs, he has 32 Ks and 3 walks, but if he’s swinging a hot bat, what do you care?

Chris Sale – 5 1/3 IP, 1 ER, 6 baserunners, 7 Ks as the White Sox let him throw 102 pitches.  Could someone help the White Sox tie their shoes because they’re wearing kid gloves?

Josh Reddick – 2-for-5 with his 10th homer.  I wouldn’t use Reddick’s towel to dry my hands, but I’m sure enjoying him on our teams.

Adam Wainwright – 5 2/3 IP, 2 ER, 10 baserunners, 1 K.  Far from a beautiful outing vs. the Melky-led Giants.  “Yo, Giants fans, you got Melky in your three hole.  Y’all is spoiled!”  That’s a Padres fan talking.  If you heard this week’s podcast, Rudy and I discussed Wainwright with some favorable mentions and whatnot.

Allen Craig – Out for a few days with a tight hammy.  Wouldn’t surprise me to see him hit the DL.  Poor guy, can’t have nothing nice with his health around.  It’s like Chipper Jones is his mentor. “Now, when you get out of bed, you’re gonna feel your quad tighten up.  That’s totally natural.”

Matt Carpenter – 3-for-5, 2 runs as he got the start in right field with Berkman back in the lineup.  He should continue to see starts with Craig pulling a Craig.  I’m also convinced that the Cards could put anyone in their lineup and they’d hit.

Charlie Culberson – The Charlie Culberson Era has officially begun!  That’s almost as electrifying as TBS’s George Lopez Era.  Charlie Culberson sounds like he has grit and other intangibles, but for s’s and g’s let’s see what tangibles he has.  This year in Triple-A, he hit 5 homers with a steal.  The year before in Double-A, 10 homers, 14 steals.  His glove’s a bit sloppy, i.e., Charlie Culberson makes fielding grounders cumbersome (say that fast 117 times!).  Sounds nice for fantasy, right?  Yeah, he might also hit .210.  Charlie Culberson not only has a name that only sounds right if you say the whole thing, but he also hasn’t seen too many pitches he doesn’t like.  In NL-Only leagues, you can find worse — like the other schmohawks the Giants were playing at 2nd.  In mixed leagues, let’s see how ol’ Charlie Culberson plays out.

Trevor Plouffe – 1-for-4 with his 3rd homer.  Plouffe goes the dynamite!

Justin Morneau – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 5th homer.  Don’t sleep on Morneau!  Seriously, because if you guys knock heads while laying on top of him, you may seriously hurt him.  If you really need a corner infidel, I’d go ahead and grab him.  Of ghrabi him, if you like things spelled to look like they’re in the Middle East.

Matt Capps – Perfect inning to notch his 8th save.  I’m totally jinxing him by even talking about him, but I remember distinctly during our RCL draft (after ending up with Cano instead of Votto!), Rudy saying to me how Storen and Valverde were the solid closers that I drafted, but how I’m gonna regret Capps.  This year more than most, it just proves SAGNOF!  Draft three closers, pray they work out and don’t overpay for them.

Mark Trumbo – 4-for-4 with a steal (hitting .370) while Pujols hit his 3rd homer and 2nd in as many games.  It only took Scioscia 39 games to figure out a lineup!  Don’t worry, it’ll take the Sciosciapath only a day to forget.   Oh, and good luck on buying low on Pujols now.  Oh, Part II:  The Return Of Oh:  This Pujols turnaround all started with the firing of the hitting coach.

C.J. Wilson – 3 2/3 IP, 1 ER, 10 baserunners (6 BBs), 3 Ks.  Fire the pitching coach!

Mitch Moreland – 2-for-2, 2 runs, 3 RBIs and 2 jacks.  Don’t you despise people who call homers jacks?  It’s not as bad as people who use the word uber, but it’s not far off.

Ryan Roberts – 3-for-5 yesterday, and, since his Creeper of the Week post on Monday, he’s 7-for-18 with a steal and two new tats.

Justin Upton – 1-for-3, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 4th homer to raise his average to .224.  If you had thoughts of buying low, time could be slipping, slipping, slipping into the frontal suture.  Damn you, Autocorrect!

Trevor Bauer – Was promoted from Double-A to Triple-A yesterday as he slowly makes his way to the majors.  He’ll be in this afternoon’s Buy/Sell.  Bob Sugar read it and gave me a thumbs up.

Orlando Hudson – Was released by the Padres.  You know who’s ears are perking up?  Brian Sabean.  He likes his meat aged, jerky!  I wish Orlando Hudson the best; I always loved his mom, Florida Evans.

Carlos Ruiz – 4-for-5, 3 RBIs and a steal.  He’s doing better than my Utility man in the RCL.  It’s sad, because it’s true.

Troy Tulowitzki – 2-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 4th homer.  That’s his first homer since April 27th.  That’s a long delay on the snooze button.

Brandon Beachy – 9 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 6 Ks to lower his ERA to 1.33.  Pretttay, pretttay good.  He could be a top ten starter this year, and that guy that has an ERA around 2.50 in September.  With Beachy, it’s no shore thing, but ride the wave.

Jordan Zimmermann – 6 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners, 6 Ks as he was beat by a Barajas homer.  Or as J-Z would say B*****s.

Dee Gordon – 0-for-3, lowering his average to .207.  If he doesn’t turn it around, we’re about ten days away from him being demoted.

James McDonald – 5 2/3 IP, 3 ER, 5 baserunners, 11 Ks.  Five and two-thirds and only 5 baserunners with 11 Ks but 3 earned?  That doesn’t even seem possible.  Raw deal, J-Mac.  A’ight, real talk, guys and 4 girls, McDonald used to be a top prospect.  It was a while ago now, but maybe he’s putting his shizz on lock.  You feel me?  Okay, you’re just touching the computer screen; you’re not actually feeling me.  McDonald has around a 8 K/9, a strong FIP (2.88), and his walks are in check.  If Mickey D’s is out there, I’d absolutely grab him.

Andrew McCutchen – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and 2 homers.  He’s going for the record of most homers with the least amount of RBIs.  The Pirates are doing all they can to support that record-setting goal.

Matt Moore – 6 IP, 3 ER, 6 baserunners, 8 Ks vs. the Red Sox.  I’m sure this was a bit of a sonavabench for a bunch of you, but I’d much rather have a struggling starter do well on my bench than continue to stink up the joint.

Ricky Nolasco – 4 IP, 4 ER.  Aw, how sad, he was Rudy’s streamboat in the RCL.  Oh, wait, he benched him.  Sonavawishhewasn’tbenched!

Jose Altuve – 3-for-5 and his 8th steal.  I asked Rudy the other day if he thought Altuve should start being dropped in 12 team leagues.  His words were something like, “He’s a .300 hitter with 25 steal speed at the top of a lineup, what do people want from an MI?”

Doug Fister – 6 IP, 3 ER, 11 baserunners, 5 Ks and took the loss as he ran into the hot-hitting Twins.  I’m not completely joking either.  They actually have scored some runs of late.  Though, Mauer, who’s hitting .265, sure hasn’t been involved.

Welington Castillo – 2-for-4, 2 runs, 4 RBIs and his first homer.  You think he gets this a lot, “Where’s the beef, Welington?”  Probably not.  I’m not going to say he’s a better option than Geovany Soto.  That’s obvious.  Soto has a bad case of can’t-hit-to-save-his-life-itis and a sore knee.  Welington had 15 homers last year in Triple-A.  Right now, he’s just for two catcher leagues, but I could see him stealing more time from Soto even when the latter gets healthy.

Johnny Giavotella – 1-for-4 to raise his average to .176 as the Guido played over Hosmer.  Sadly, it makes sense.

Brian Matusz – 6 IP, 3 ER, 8 baserunners, 2 Ks vs. Luke Hochevar – 6 IP, 4 ER, 8 baserunners, 6 Ks.  That sounds like a tailor-made matchup for some fingercuffing that didn’t work out great for either finger.

Dustin Ackley – 1-for-5 with a steal.  Hey, his cleats arrived from Japan!

Brandon League – 1/3 IP, 2 ER.  And on the fourth day, God said only Fernando Rodney and Jim Johnson can close with ERAs under 3.

Ichiro Suzuki – 0-for-6 to lower his average to .278.  Doode got old fast, right?  It’s my Morita Law of Asian Ages.  Pat Morita was young and spry on Happy Days, then five years later as Mr. Miyagi he looked ancient.

Hector Noesi – 6 1/3 IP, 1 ER, 8 baserunners, 5 Ks to lower his ERA to 5.61.  On a side note, I wonder if Carlos Beltran would pay for Jon Niese to have his last name changed to Noesi.

Achilles (Tennessee Mash – RCL 25) had another good week and increased their lead in the overall standings. Josh Hamilton, Joey Votto, Jay Bruce, Ted Lilly, and Brandon Morrow were the key performers for the top team. Their relievers were also strong, allowing just 4 runs in 18 innings of work. Trini’s team (also with Hamilton), Psychic Friends Network (RCL 22), took over 2nd spot while Navseal 7 (RCL 9) slipped to third. RCL 9 continued to hold the title of “Toughest League,” but perennial contenders ECFBL and Schmohawk in Training are right on their heels.

Washington’s Stache (Toads and Wet Rocks) gained 25 points and jumped from 464th to 136th place in the standings. Norce Force (Hotel, Dotel, Halladay Inge) also improved by 25 points, and moved into the top 20 from 257th.

Grey mentioned this week that RCL teams should be able to keep their ERA under 3.50. Right now, only 43% of teams are managing that. A couple wise commenters opined that all the relievers blowing up was making it difficult. It is tough to separate the RP stats to study, but they do seem to be frequently ruining ratios.

Expert League: RotoWire Del Don (Dalton Del Don) took over the lead after a week where he jumped from 70 to 90 points on the strength of solid pitching. He recorded 5 wins and 7 saves with ratios of 1.82 and 1.05, along with 80 strikeouts. Rudy and Grey each lost a few points this week, and sit in 5th and 6th respectively.

Trades: There were 19 trades this week, bringing the total for the year to 98. Albert Pujols was traded a twice – both times by Al Koholic. In the ECFBL, last-place Al gambled on Ryan Howard and Bryce Harper, trading Albert and Ernesto Frieri to first-place The Fredsies for the pair plus Rafael Dolis. In RCL Original Recipe, he sent Pujols and Grant Balfour to Popeye’s n Beer Recipe4disaster for Jay Bruce and David Freese. With Pujols continuing to struggle and Balfour losing the closer job, so far it looks like Al came out ahead in this one. Tim Lincecum and Nelson Cruz were also dealt twice, including in RCL 38 where they were traded for each other. In Cracking The WHIP, the Dukes of Flatbush traded Alex Rios and Matt Cain to eye-talian backstop for Cruz and Bryce Harper.  Team Beardown sent Lincecum and Anibal Sanchez to Bushwood Varmint Cong for Brandon Morrow, Johnny Cueto, and Edward Mujica in Epic Beardmen Division. In a somewhat questionable deal in Cust Kayin’, Pimpin Nipples gave up Troy Tulowitzki and Jordan Walden to acquire Jason Kipnis and Rafael Betancourt. You can find all the trades in the fantasy baseball forums. Look for the RCL under “Everything Else.”

Weekly Leaders

Norce Force was the top hitting team this week. They hit .339 with 27 home runs and 70 RBI, 60 runs, and 10 steals. Not surprisingly, they own Josh Hamilton (.467/10 Runs/9 HR/18 RBI). Carlos Beltran (.360/6 HR/13 RBI), Joey Votto (.429/3 HR/8 RBI), and Andrew McCutchen (.524/3 HR/1 SB) also provided big numbers.

Average: .347 (That Ticket Cli nic Commercial – RCL 24)
Runs: 60 (Norce Force – Hotel, Dotel, Halladay Inge)
HR: 27 (Norce Force – Hotel, Dotel, Halladay Inge)
RBI: 70 (Norce Force – Hotel, Dotel, Halladay Inge)
SB: 16 (Copales Charros – ECFBL)

Washington’s Stache set the pace on the mound with an ERA of 2.35 and 1.20 WHIP with 83 Ks, 9 wins, and 3 saves. Their lineup featured Edinson Volquez (2 Wins/10 K), Derek Holland (Win/0.00/1.00), Jordan Zimmermann (Win/ 9 K) and Brandon Morrow (Win/10 K).

Ks: 86 (Kemp Keep Me Down – Yu Ain’t Goldschmidt)
Wins: 9 (Washington’s Stache – Toads and Wet Rocks, All about  The WHIP – RCL 43)
Saves: 10 (Tennessee Jed – Robust Herd, Pliny the Elder – Myrtle’s Acres)
ERA: 1.07 (Bang Biscuit – RCL 41)
WHIP: 0.92 (Big Cuntry – Ones are GOOD right?, The AmishGangster – Epic Beardmen Division)

TEAM OF THE WEEK – May 7 – 13
Norce Force (Hotel, Dotel, Halladay Inge)
100/295 (.339) 60 R/27 HR/70 RBI/10 SB	72.2 IP 60K/3 W/2.48/1.03/3 S
As mentioned above, Norce Force led the RCL in hitting, and their pitching was solid, lacking only in wins. Brandon Morrow (10 K) and Derek Holland (0.00/1.00) did pick up wins, while A.J. Burnett had 14 strikeouts in 2 starts with an ERA of 2.25 and WHIP of 0.81.

I’m not putting that title up there to brag.  That’s really the name of the league.  But within a few rounds of bidding I tittered like a little school girl when Troy Tulowitzki went for $42 and Miguel Cabrera went for only $40 as proof that even Gods don’t do everything right.  I mean, have you seen what a platypus looks like?  But I digress, the draft didn’t go as perfectly as I wanted but I don’t feel bad about the end result.  With it being a 14 team league with no bench positions except for two DL spots, having a strong hitting crew was important; so important I broke a bit from the 180/80 strategy posted here.  I overspent by about $20 on hitting and left $3 on the table when it was done.  In hindsight, looking over my pitching staff and that remainder on the table, I wish I’d thrown a couple more bucks at Jordan Zimmermann who went for $12, but that’s what auction drafts are for: 20/20 thoughts about a time when you weren’t as strapped for cash as you perceived.  For the list of the entire draft results, click here.  Fooled!  Sorry, they didn’t make the league public but you should still click on that link for random awkwardness.  Now without further ado or foofaraw, here were the experts:

Razzball – ONC

FP911.com – Rich Wilson

FP911.com – Paul Greco

RotoRob – Tim McLeod

CBS Sports – Scott White

Fantasy Alarm – Ryan Hallam

Fantasy Baseball Sherpa – Bob S and Scott Swanay

Fantasy Sports Empires – Jeff Boggis

FantasyBaseball.com – Chris McDonnell

FB Tonight – RC Rizza and Todd Farino

FB365 – Charlie Saponara

RotoExperts.com – Dave Gawron

The Fantasy Man – Mike Kuchera

TPFS Baseball – Mike Myers

Full disclaimer here: I was a little nervous at first.  I mean, I was drafting to represent Razzball here.  I had a quick ‘palms sweaty, mom’s spaghetti’ moment as I had two spreadsheets on the right screen, draft on the left screen with my two hands on the keyboard and my third hand reaching for a slice of pizza.  Well, at least that’s what I must’ve been thinking when I ordered one.  Barely got a bite when nominations were posted and were alotting 15 seconds to bid.  But more to the ‘stop whining ONC, we don’t care just bring us the goods’ point: my offense is stacked.  Like a game of Jenga where the blocks haven’t been moved stacked.  With there being no bench, that’s important.  I can stream pitchers if I need it, but it’s harder to stream hitters.  I will probably move a bat in the near future for at least one solid arm to go with my core staff of Anibal Sanchez, Brandon Beachy, Shaun Marcum, and Ubaldo Jimenez but the trade will be on my terms.  I wanted guys like Zack Greinke and Madison Bumgarner but couldn’t justify their respective $25 and $20 pricetags.  The lone regret of my crew was the dreaded click slip – an embarassment on par with Tara Reid’s nip slip if she hadn’t been too coked out to notice - as I went to nominate Max Scherzer and wound up with Neftali Feliz for a $1.  I quickly fixed this, grabbing Henry Rodriguez for K’s and saves potential but did curse at the screen for a bit afterwards.  Thankfully, everyone had left work by that time or I might have been visiting HR the next day.

True to form from my catchers post, I treated my backstops like pole dancers, throwing singles at Josh Donaldson and Wilin Rosario at the end which oddly matched my keeper league catchers for the year.  I was saved from spending any money on Ryan Doumit when a mini-bidding war for his services came to pass, pushing his price up to $7 at the end of the draft.  I don’t have extremely high hopes for either of my guys but with how the rest of my offense came to be and how much Doumit went for – especially with the Justin Morneau as near full-time DH news – I don’t have to worry much about it.  My Evan Longoria steal left me feeling saucy.  So saucy, I actually dove right in on Hanley Ramirez when he came up and then shocked myself with a $17 Starlin Castro.  Auctions make for weird drafting patterns.  Its from SS I feel I have a good chance to grab myself a solid starter via trade if I need it.  I really wanted one of the top end first basemen but the prices were just too high to justify so I ended up with the savvy veteran – code word for ‘old as the hills’ – Paul Konerko for $17.  Not my most favorite pick, but even if he gets me 25 HRs and a .275 average, I don’t see a reason to complain.  With Eric Hosmer going for $30 and my Paul Goldschmidt and Mat Gamel pickups only costing me $11 in total, I’ve left myself plenty of trade space with Konerko as well.

Based on CBS projections and going off of this helpful Razzball post, we’re a little light in steals (148), almost in line with runs (1021), up on average (.274) & RBIs (1039) and flat out obliterating HRs (305) for a 14 team league.  As to be expected based off the draft, we’re behind on our pitching stats at the moment in wins (83), saves (66) and ERA (3.65) but are still far ahead in strikeouts (1226) and good in WHIP (1.24).  Considering there is no innings cap, we can stream for wins as needed and where appropriate.  As far as saves and steals well…SAGNOF suckas!  All and all, a bit off the beaten strategy path but still a team set to compete in a roto setting for 2012.

This post is not going to get into drafting strategy because Grey has already got that lined up so well and in such alignment with what I’d do, it’s not worth repeating.  Plus deep leagues usually don’t have a change to their pitching format so you don’t need pitcher pairings like you need SS pairings.  Madison Bumgarner will be the first pitcher I draft this year with how ADP shakes out and I hope to find Anibal Sanchez as well as Jordan Zimmermann on my team along with him.  I’m jumping straight to the do’s and don’ts and situations.  You don’t like it?  Don’t read it (though I secretly want you to).

I’ll Avoid:

Stephen Strasburg - The guy is a stud, no question.  He’s also got an ADP higher than Bumgarner and won’t pitch a full season…say what?  Sixth round is a little early for me to take a pitcher I know I have to get off my team by July or August.  I prefer my team to get me off, personally.  Let the other guy in your league gloat that he got Stras’ then watch as you get those ‘SUBJ: Strasburg’ emails by summer.  ‘Hey guys, Stephen’s having a great year and the Nats are pushing for the playoffs.  I’m willing to sell him for Ricky Romero or Matt Garza or something.  That’s, like, MAJOR value dudes’.  No it’s not, hypothetical Strasburg drafter and don’t call me dude.  I prefer not to be forced to replace 6th round value partway through the season.

Johnny Cueto - Yes, pretty stats:  2.31 ERA and a 1.09 WHIP.  Those stats sparkle brighter than Edward Cullen after getting bedazzled (as an aside, I’m really angry I had to look up Twilight to find that name; be thankful).  But under the hood we have a K rate less than 7 per 9, and a lucky 5.8% HR/FB rate and a 76% strand rate.  He’s looking like a high 3, low 4 ERA guy with minimal K upside and a 1.20+ WHIP.  I’m not drafting that when Gio Gonzalez is going quite near his 113 ADP.  Nope, not gonna do it.  Wouldn’t be prudent.

I’ll Go For:

Homer Bailey - This is what I love about pitching.  Even in deep leagues, when your late round guys flounder, you can drop them for someone else and have a reasonably good staff.  If Homer doesn’t build on his 2011 campaign, you’re not going to be hurt.  The Reds have been quite good at keeping his innings at a reasonable level over the last 3 years.  Or maybe its his injuries that have done it.  Well, whatever, most places have him only pitching 160 innings this year with a K/9 over 7.  I’m a bit more bullish and think you can get 180 to 190 innings out of that with a 1.30 WHIP and around 155 K’s and a won’t hurt you high 3, low 4 ERA.  Hey, you don’t like that, you can take Cueto 11 rounds earlier with less K’s.  It’s your bad idea/horrible season/death knell team, not mine.

Chris Capuano – I liked Capuano so much this year, I gave him his own post.  I’ve got a thing and it’s called Greydar love.

Situation to Monitor: St. Louis

There’s a lot of situations to watch when it comes to pitching so its hard to narrow down to one.  Personally, I’ll be watching and waiting for the Cardinals to call up Shelby Miller in the summer.  When I look for a rookie pitcher to pick up, I focus on three things.  First, are they coming up in an organization that has a history of success with their pitchers?  I’d say the Cardinals have a great history of turning guys like Kyle Lohse into serviceable pitchers and that says a lot.  Secondly, will they be brought up at just the right time so their flaws won’t be exposed?  I say this as I truly enjoyed Madison Bumgarner and Daniel Hudson on my team in 2010.  They were good pitchers who had a great end of season runs that weren’t hiccup’ed by a bad start with a 2nd or 3rd turn against a team.  When those guys are your 6th and 7th pitcher, you’re pitching drifts into the ‘kinda awesome’ area.  Third, are they talented?  I’d say Shelby’s minor league stats speak for themselves on that question.  Well, not literally, they’re numbers written in the next sentence.  In 86 2/3 IP in Double-A, 9+ K-rate and a 2.70 ERA.  Okay, they’re very good numbers.

Some analyses strike gold.  Some analyses are an immediate bust.  It’s the third type – the ‘fool’s gold’ type – that are the most frustrating.  After three years of middling predictions, I think my ‘risky pitcher’ analysis from a couple years ago is falling into that 3rd category.

Over the past 7 years, about 24% of pitchers coming off seasons with 2,700+ pitches fit one of the two dropoff criteria (< 2,000 pitchers or, roughly, missing 1/3 of the season or more) or have a significant drop in their skills (measured as xFIP increased by .75+).

I figured that if I could identify some commonalities among the injured pitchers in past years that it would help me predict which pitchers were more risky in upcoming years.  After 3 years of hitting the yearly average in my predictions, I’m resigned to the fact that the findings in my initial analysis were either fluky or I’m really bad at applying the findings.  (Or I need Tom Verducci’s assistance at being less self-critical.)

Below are my results from last year.  About 20% of pitchers had a dropoff season – my most notable misses are Josh Johnson (had predicted him the previous year), Jonathan Sanchez, Dallas Braden, Clayton Richard, Brian Matusz, and Brett Cecil.  (Wow, that list falls off fast, doesn’t it?).  My most impressive accomplishment was predicting Gio Gonzalez gets traded to the Nationals and being the first on record to nickname him Nat Gio.  Hopefully he keeps getting as much drop on his curveball as the breasts typically found in Nat Geo.

Despite my lack of success, I still shy away from drafting more than one pitcher with two of the following three criteria:   1) Throws a lot of sliders, 2) 700+ MLB pitch differential from previous year, and 3) Coming off first season with a full workload (2,500+ pitches).  See below for the dropoff statistics of pitchers that fall under these categories.

Here are ten otherwise solid pitchers that I’d prefer to have no more than 1 on my team if I could avoid it.  Consider my tepid performance to date before taking it too much to heart

(notes: pitch increase totals only include MLB, only includes pitchers who had close to a full season last year – obviously players who were injured most/all of last year like Santana and Peavy are risky.  Also shied away from known injury concerns like Marcum and Carpenter)

Michael Pineda (31.5% sliders, 2,688 pitches) – I’ve liked this guy the moment I first heard his name – probably because it made me think of empanadas which are delicious.  It seems like his poor 2nd half + velocity drop is scaring off a lot of drafters.  He went 136th in my 12-team ‘expert’ Razzball Commenter League.  Can’t argue with selecting him there but I had the 135th pick, planned to take Cory Luebke, and when he was gone, took a closer instead.

Madison Bumgarner (32.4% sliders, 1,500 pitch increase) – I love the Mad-Bum.   We drafted him in the 6th round of our 15 Team LABR mixed league.  Might’ve had him in a couple more leagues but the bidding got too high.  But last year was his first full year in the bigs and he throws a whopping 32% sliders – 4th highest among SPs – and it’s his most effective pitch (3rd best slider among starting pitchers with a wSL of 17.7 – i.e., his slider saved 17 runs above the average pitch).  His fastball came in about league average for effectiveness.  There are pitchers who can manage this type of pitch mix (Clayton Kershaw, CC Sabathia) but it’s a little more risky until they’ve proven they can do it in back-to-back seasons.  (NOTE: Commenters have noted that there is disagreement about Pitch F/X’s classification of Bumgarner’s cutter as a slider and that his true slider rate might be closer to 20%.  That doesn’t remove his risk but definitely a more sustainable usage rate.  I can’t think of another recent lefty who managed a 30+% slider rate and had a productive career except for Randy Johnson – I imagine Carlton had similar usage rates too.).

Jhoulys Chacin (18.9% sliders, +834 pitch increase) – Chacin was on my 2011 list but lived up to his draft value – delivering 11 wins and a 3.64 ERA.  But his K/rate dropped from 9.1 K/9 in 2010 to 6.96 in 2011.  The part that scares me most (and I mentioned this in 2010) is that he is highly dependent on breaking pitches for success and he’s in the worst home stadium for breaking pitches.  His fastball was the 7th worst in baseball amongst starters last year on a per-pitch basis (wFB/C) while his slider, curveball, and changeup were all above average.  His changeup might be his saving grace in 2012 as it was the only pitch of the four that improved in effectiveness between 2010 and 2011.  (Note:  We have him on our LABR team too….getting a little concerned.)

Brandon McCarthy (2% sliders, 2,499 pitch increase) – The formula for getting onto the cover of ESPN Magazine seems to be this:  one marginally successful season + good sense of humor + hot wife.  McCarthy was a prized prospect that White Sox GM Kenny Williams was able to swap for the Rangers’ John Danks (one of the few marks against otherwise awesome GM Jon Daniels).  He couldn’t manage more than 120 IP in a year (majors + minors) between 2005-2010.  When he did pitch, he had bad K and BB rates.  Then, after maybe spending a week at Dave Duncan sleepaway camp, he emerges in 2011 as a ground ball pitcher with great control (1.32 BB/9) to balance against a mediocre 6.5 K/9.  He’s a fine late round pick but I see little upside with a higher than average chance of missing significant time.  (Note:  For AL-only drafters, stock up on A’s SPs.  McCarthy and Colon will both likely miss time.  I like Tom Milone and Tyson Ross at the right price).

Tim Stauffer (0% sliders, 1,774 pitch increase) – Similar to McCarthy.  Prized prospect derailed by injuries.  Throws a lot of pitches that turn into ground balls once hit (I wanted to write ‘throws a lot of ground balls’ but that could be confusing and our blog is incomprehensible enough.).  His wife’s not bad to look at.  Maybe it’s his previous ‘prospect’ status that hides the fact he’s not particularly good.  He’s had a lot of success with his fastball the past two years but it’s hard to put much faith in a 90 MPH fastball that clearly doesn’t lead to a lot of swing-and-misses (6.2 K/9) or comes with pinpoint control (2.6 BB/9).  He’s a Hodgepadre so he’s got some value for home starts but I wouldn’t consider him any better than, say, Clayton Richard.

Jordan Zimmermann (24% sliders, 2,464 pitch increase) – The other Jay-Z came back from Tommy John surgery to post solid if not spectacular numbers in 2011.  His ERA and WHIP (1.15) were helped by low HR and BABIP rates.  His control was very good (1.73 BB/9) so he still projects to be solid at WHIP.  I’m wary of the fact he threw 24% sliders (his most effective pitch) and still had a mediocre K-rate (6.9 K/9).  He’s probably going to go higher in drafts than I like.

Ervin Santana (38.4% sliders, 108 pitch decrease) – I think I put Ervin Santana on the list every other year.  From 2006-2010, Ervin Santana was the bizarro-Saberhagen – good in the even years, bad in the odd years.  He broke the streak in 2011.  I just can’t sign up for a pitcher that is so dependent on the slider.

Dan Haren (0% sliders, 25 pitch increase) – Might as well go out on a limb for my 10th choice.  There aren’t many pitchers as consistently great as Dan Haren – 7 years straight of 215+ IP, 4 straight years of a sub-3.50 xFIP, a sub 2 BB/9 rate in 4 of the past 6 years.  So why the concern?  Much like Roy Halladay, Dan Haren has morphed from throwing a standard pitch mix (Fastball/Slider/Curve/Split-Finger) to relying heavily on a cut fastball.  After ditching the slider for a cutter in 2009, his cutter rate has gone from 23% to 27% to 48%.  In 2011, his cutter was the 3rd most effective on a per-pitch basis and by far the most valuable in aggregate (wCT of 30.5 runs above average was double everyone except for Halladay’s 19.5 and Gavin Floyd’s 15.5).  In fact, Haren’s cutter was the most valuable pitch in aggregate of ANY pitch in 2011.  Unlike Roy Halladay, though, Haren doesn’t have velocity to spare.  His fastball velocity has slowly decreased from 91.9 MPH in 2005 to 90.0 MPH in 2011.  His cutter was at 85 MPH (Halladay’s at 90 MPH), making it one of the slowest amongst starting pitchers.  He had great success with it in 2011 at this velocity – but the pitch really has nowhere to go but down in 2012 and the rest of his stuff isn’t good enough to warrant his ADP if the cutter fails him.