Fantasy Baseball Advice

In fantasy baseball, it’s imperative to trade away overrated players before they lose their luster and trade for underrated players. Then there’s simply the rated ones. If this reads vaguely familiar, it’s because I’m cribbing Chuck Klosterman, who I think is brilliant. Here’s the relevant quote to better understand what follows:

If you are the kind of person who talks about music too much, there are two words that undoubtedly play an integral role in your workaday lexicon: “overrated” and “underrated.” This is because those two sentiments pop up in 90 percent of all musical discussions.

He goes on to list bands that are overrated (Wilco, Sonic Youth) or underrated (Duran Duran, Tortoise), coming finally to bands that simply rated, which are no more or less than their reviews (The Beatles). Klosterman’s theory also applies for fantasy baseball. Let’s look at some overrated, underrated and rated players.

OVERRATED

Ryan Braun - As I said earlier today, “I had Braun 22 overall. It’s not like I had him between Hank Blalock and David Ross. I think his average is below .285 and he’s below 15 steals. He’s basically Carlos Lee with 3B eligibility and without the track record. Carlos Lee does Braun’s thing for 7 years and Braun does it for four months and Braun should go ten spots before him? I just don’t get it.” When you put a player twenty-two overall and people say you are unfairly down on him, that player is the definition of overrated. (BTW, I have a picture of Jesus in my office and it’s signed, “Grey, Thanks for steering me away from Ryan Braun. You are a Fantasy God. Love, Your Savior. P.S. What do you think about Lackey for Alex Gordon? I’m good on starters, but have Cust as my Utility.”)

Ryan Zimmerman - Before the Anti-Defamation League of Ryans contacts me, I swear I have no prejudice towards the name Ryan. I even just picked up Ryan Franklin in a league and I’ve eaten at Ryan Gosling’s Moroccan Restaurant — the couscous was overcooked, but the bastilla was good. Then again, who’s ever had a bad bastilla? Someone who puts catsup on egg noodles and calls it pasta, that’s who.

Dustin McGowan - He threw too many innings last year. If you like math — Pitcher who has a good season + overworked = overrated. (More math problems, MTV reality shows = mindless wonderfulness. Republicans = Democrats. Hispanics + peanut butter and jelly sandwiches = Unhappy Hispanics.)

Any AL Starter - Hater Bell covered this in this post. I don’t like trading apples for apples (starter for starter, third basemen for third basemen, etc.), but I can almost get behind a trade like Lackey and Cliff Lee for Wainwright and Maine. In fact, I likey. Hey, I just made a hypothetical trade with myself.

Any Closer - Think of them as a necessary evil and you’ll be better off. I love to do trades like Mariano Rivera for Josh Hamilton then turn around and trade Josh Hamilton for Trevor Hoffman and Matt Capps then turn around and trade Capps for Victorino. Closers are like girls. You will overvalue them at first, grow to despise them, wish you traded them for their sister, not understand how they can get over you so fast when you drunkenly call them at three in the morning. Finally, you find a replacement then get a sex tape in the mail of your ex with your best friend time dated to the afternoon of your one year anniversary. Or maybe that’s me. Anyway, don’t get too attached.

UNDERRATED

Any Setup Man - Rudy claims he taught me how to use middle men many years ago. I don’t remember it, but maybe. Or maybe that’s his consolation for losing to me last year. And three years ago. And four years ago.

Any Big-Bellied 1st Basemen that is Currently Struggling - These guys could go 100/40/100 in their sleep. Howard’s average might leave something to be desired, but he’s a .265 hitter. What, you wanted a fat Ichiro?

Any Padres Pitcher - I could have a 4.50 ERA in Petco and I throw like a girl.

Aaron Cook - He’s a ground ball pitcher. It’s hard to hit ground balls out of the yard.

Any NL Starter - See 5 3/4 inches above.

Me - I think I’m good for about seven to eight posts a week. Maybe 500 to 700 words per post. Everyone has off days, but I think at the end of the season, you’ll be better off with me than without. And I can beat you in checkers. (Union County Checker Champion grades 5 thru 7. That horn is twenty years old and I’m still tooting it.)

Shawn Hill - As someone who has tried to beat the drum about about this guy, I can tell his fan club is not well-attended. In one of my leagues, I tried to trade Hill for Stephen Drew when Tulo went down. That trade got shot down quicker than David Eckstein trying to get on a roller coaster.

Melky Cabrera - Considering the Yankees hype machine it’s weird to find any Yankee on this list, but somehow people ain’t feeling Melky. Even after being crowned the best name in baseball according to Larry King.

RATED

Eric Gagne - Backne isn’t on the juice anymore and it’s hurting him. Karma is your mother-in-law.

Nick Punto - Might even be unrated.

Carlos Lee - Everyone knows what you’re going to get.

Mike Cameron - 20/20/.250 for like forty years in a row. He was the only person who got caught sipping the cheating juice and no one lowered one single prediction.

Milton Bradley - Predictable, injury-prone loose cannon. I wonder if Cliff Floyd and him are buds. That’s one carpool I would not want to be party to. (”Milton, can you grab my Mary J. Blige CD from the backseat?” “Sure, Cliff, is it next to your diaphragm?” Car screeches to the side of the road, they jump out to fight only to simultaneously pull a hammy.)

On each Sunday we’re going to try and answer your 2008 fantasy baseball questions. Is this every fantasy baseball question we receive? No, but it’s a few of the better ones that were emailed directly to us at info[at]razzball.com. So if you want some fantasy baseball advice that can’t get answered in the comments section, then there you go. Please ask the minor questions i.e. Should I drop Chad Cordero for Santiago Casilla? (yes, you should) in the comment section. It’ll be a quicker answer there from Grey or I (or even a regular commenter). Thanks, we really do appreciate your support and feedback. (But if you try to hug me, it might get weird.)

QUESTION:

Now, I am not going to say which side of the deal I am on but here is a trade that went down in my league yesterday:

Team A agreed to deal Yovani Gallardo to Team B for Nick Markakis yesterday morning.  Unfortunately, we play in a league that votes on trades (I know…whole other topic there).  The commissioner announced the deal prior to the Brewers game.  Four votes trickled in before the news broke today regarding Gallardo being out for the year.

My question is this:

Should league owners be voting on this trade based on when the deal was agreed upon or based on circumstances that have occurred since then.

ANSWER:

Your league owners SHOULD be reviewing this trade without factoring in the injury news as that was the status of Gallardo when the trade was made.  Same as if Gallardo went out there and threw a no-hitter or gave up 8 runs in the first.

Whether they will or not is another matter.

I think there’s a fair argument that Markakis is worth more than Gallardo in any case.  Not enough that I would veto (Razzball is anti-veto) but the case could be made by a veto-friendly owner.  (The tough part is knowing whether the injury pushes them over the edge.)

Let us know how it turns out.

QUESTION:

In the 9-team 8×8 roto league with L, CG, K/BB, H, TB, and XBH added to basic Yahoo! 5×5.  I’m trying to become more independent of experts and pundits and such with my analyses and player projections, and I think I’m getting the hang of it.  What I would like to know is how you get your BAO, briefly, and what your BAO lines are for 2008.  I think I found your batting lines of

C – 47 / 13 / 57 / 2 / 0.273 (Paul Lo Duca, Johnny Estrada, AJ Pierzynski)
1B – 63 / 18 / 68 / 1 / 0.279 (Matt Stairs, Conor Jackson, Aubrey Huff)
2B – 79 / 11 / 61 / 9 / 0.288 (Orlando Hudson, Brendan Harris, Mark DeRosa)
SS – 72 / 11/ 60 / 11 / 0.279 (Brendan Harris, Jack Wilson)
3B – 70 / 18 / 72 / 4 / 0.279 (Kevin Kouzmanoff, Mark Reynolds, Aubrey Huff)
OF – 67 / 14 / 65 / 6 / 0.273 (Luis Gonzalez, Austin Kearns, JD Drew)

but I do not have anything for pitchers except a reference to Carlos Silva and 3.96 / 1.32.  What are the expectations for SP and RP BAO this year?

As for my team, I’ve done tons of trades since the beginning of the season and it’s changed quite a bit.  My current roster:

C - Geovany Soto
1B - Garrett Atkins
2B - Chase Utley
3B - Aramis Ramirez
SS - Ryan Theriot
OF - Matt Holliday
OF - Alex Ríos
OF - Carl Crawford
Util - Josh Hamilton
BN - Justin Upton
BN - Conor Jackson
BN - Evan Longoria
DL - Troy Tulowitzki

SP - Cole Hamels
SP - James Shields
RP - J. J. Putz
RP - Joe Nathan
P - Matt Capps
P - Javier Vázquez
P - Santiago Casilla
BN - Max Scherzer
BN - Garrett Olson
DL - Rafael Soriano
DL - John Lackey

Now for a few specific questions about my team, if you’d be so kind.  Is Putz something to worry about?  He pitched 94 and 95 mph consistently during that blown save, just never in the strike zone.  I already made an offer of Geovany Soto for Bobby Jenks today (Dioner Navarro and Jeff Clement are FA) just in case.  Next, I kicked Brett Myers to the curb the day before Gallardo blew his ACL.  Is the long toss really his answer, or is he trash this year?  I’m personally beginning to think he punched his wife on a ‘roid rage.  My other available options besides him are Jonathan Broxton, Wandy Rodríguez, John Danks, and Shawn Hill.  With Soriano likely losing his job to Smoltz I have also had an eye on Rich Harden, who may come back for 10 to 20 minutes in the near future.  What do you think?

Also if you see any glaring weaknesses in my team (besides CG, I don’t have one yet and am one of only 3 teams with none) let me know.

RUDY’S ANSWER:

Here’s the 2007 BAO for pitchers:
Starters - 11 W, 4.15 ERA, 1.34 WHIP, 191 IP, 132 Ks
Relievers - 4 W, 6 SV, 3.31 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, 68 IP, 61 K

(The 3.96/1.32 is the composite of the two)

The BAO methodology is laid out HERE.

I can’t provide it for 2008 as it requires having a full year of stats and then determining the replacement level totals for each stat for each position.  I could’ve done this based on 2008 projections but I moved to the Point Shares methodology (explanation and methodology HERE.  It’s an improvement in our eyes as it ties back to Roto points.

If you’re trying to do something based on BAO, I’d just work off the same totals as last year.  It’s too early to assume any major shifts between the two years.

I don’t see why you’d trade Soto for Jenks as you seem set on closers.  Too early to bail on Putz.  Nathan and Capps are solid.  I’d think Smoltz would close if he relieves, so Soriano would be out.  If you can get anything for him, go ahead.  Otherwise, he’s probably useless in your league.   Hamels, Shields, and Vazquez are a solid starting three.  Lackey is due back on May 14th.  Nice you got Scherzer.  Not sure why you have Olson - is he a friend of the family?  I don’t see any FA out there that would replace your pitching lineup so it’s not a big deal.

Tough break with Tulo.  Theriot is your weakest link but he’s been hot. Assuming no one is stashing SS on their bench, you should be able to rotate SS for a while.

Francisco Rodriguez went down with an injury. JJ Putz went down with an injury. Eric Gagne went down on his ‘trainer’ and asked for more ‘roids because he’s looked like crap ever since he stopped taking them. Closers come and go but one thing remains the same, you need saves. Now the best thing you can do is let go of what you paid at a draft and try and focus on value. This is even more pronounced with closers because they are really only as good as the saves they are getting you. So my advice is forget where you drafted your closers and begin to trade them away.

TRADE these closers NOW:

Brandon Lyon - I’m not saying trade him for Cristian Guzman, but you should try and get someone that can help your team, because soon Lyon won’t help at all. In his save yesterday, he looked like taco diarrhea. Blake DeWitt nearly hit a home run, Mark Sweeney(!) hit a bullet to Drew and Andruw Jones struckout on a ball three feet outside of the strike zone. Grab Pena, trade Lyon. You’re welcome.

Eric Gagne - He may not have value for too much longer. Get what you can. Riske and Turnbow haven’t looked much better, you say. Yeah, but this will be a headache all season. You should get out now with some value.

Rafael Soriano - He’s already on the DL. See if someone believes he can come back and stay healthy, because I don’t.

Huston Street - He’ll be sitting on your DL in June and you’ll be like, “Grey told me to trade him back in April. Man, I should’ve listened.” Every day you wake up and look at your team, you should expect Street to be on your DL, that’s a problem.

George Sherrill - Probably not a better sell high guy right now. If you trade him today, you might already have a quarter of his season’s saves. Trade this guy before this weekend while he’s still has peak value.

Jose Valverde - Last year he had a great year, before that he was a Croser (crappy closer). He doesn’t really have anyone breathing down his neck to take over but that doesn’t mean he can’t blow a bunch of saves.

Kerry Wood - Trade him while he’s still the closer. For Christmas sake, he gave up a home run to Jason Bay! Either an injury or lack of success is going to get the best (or worse) of him.

Brian Wilson - If you can even get anything for this guy, I’ll be impressed.

Chad Cordero - Trade him before he comes back and reveals that he’s still not healthy.

JJ Putz - He could be this year’s BJ Ryan. News sounds okay coming out about his rehab, so why not trade him before he re-injures himself?

DON’T TRADE any of these questionable closers (unless the deal is just too good to pass up of course).

Joe Borowski, Matt Capps, Brad Lidge, Todd Jones, Trevor Hoffman, Jeremy Accardo, Jason Isringhausen, Joakim Soria, Kevin Gregg, Troy Percival and last, and kinda least, CJ Wilson - If you can, trade Joe Nathan and somebody for Alexis Rios and one of these closers. The Indians don’t care that Borowski is hurting your fantasy team. They’re not replacing him. As I said a few days ago, Hoffman is not going anywhere. Matt Capps is fine. Brad Lidge, while a basket case, is not losing the job to Gordon. Todd Jones sucks dog balls, but he’s the closer. Whatever, you just want saves.

All other closers? They’re all tradable (in fact, everyone is for the right price). Papelbon? Try and get Miguel Cabrera. Francisco Rodriguez? I’m not that worried about this injury, but if someone’s making the right offer, pull the trigger.

Major league closers are constantly changing and there’s always being discussed. So let’s do that. WTF, Putz is injured? Who’s backing up Gagne? Who’s setting up Huston Street? Who is Jason Grilli? Chad Cordero is injured and Rauch is closing, not or yacht? And do I need to know any of these things? Yes, no, no, yes, no and yes. So here’s a look at the closers that need to be watched for this week.

JJ Putz is injured and I tried to warn people against taking the first closer off the board (or even a top closer). Putz seemed to pull something (ribcage, if you must know). Mark Lowe’s now closing for the Mariners. This might get worse before Putz gets better, so look to Sean Green (not the Jew that retired) or Eric O’Flaherty in case Lowe falters.

Eric Gagne’s on his way out. He was ‘roided and now, as Thing 1 and Thing 2 from Flavor of Love would say, he has been exposed. As I said in the comments on this post, “I just choose between the three (Mota, Riske, Turnbow) in one ten team league and I went with Riske. Seems to be the safest even if he’s not the one called. It’s tough though because Riske is probably the best, Turnbow’s got the longest history there and they’ve seen him close before (though it was scary at times) and Mota’s supposedly the set-up man. We’ll see what cream of the crap rises up. My guess for saves would be Turnbow, Riske then Mota, but I couldn’t afford the Turnbow WHIP hit in the league I picked him up.” Hey, I’ve been quoted! I am an expert! Riske was nasty to the Cubs yesterday. I think you have to grab him. But I still wouldn’t be surprised to see Mota or Turnbow grab some saves. You must monitor Gagne. He’s a timebomb.

Brandon Lyon was lights out the other night against the Reds. The Reds strikeout more than that kid from “The Last American Virgin” who drove the girl for an abortion then was dumped. I have Brandon Lyon on one team and I’m hoping Tony Pena is dropped so I can handcuff him.

Chad Cordero handing off the closer duties to Jon Rauch…. For one game, supposedly. Chad Cordero’s a heffin’ liar. Cordero is going on the DL. Today? Tomorrow? Next week? I don’t know, but it’s happening. If you order a “stiff shoulder,” you lose the closing job for a period of time.  I’m doubtful Rauch is available in any of your leagues, and, if he is, I don’t think your league is very competitive.

Huston Street looks like a man that is going to lose his job. I saw it happen with Valverde one year. Happened to Fuentes last year. My gut says Street is going to be figuring things out in the 6th inning soon. With that said, do you really want to pick up Alan Embree, Keith Foulke or Joey Devine? Well, Alan Embree was figuring things out in the 6th inning yesterday and gave up a home run to Ortiz. Keith Foulke will never be on one of my teams. Devine? He’s yet to proven himself in the majors. With the A’s being dreadful this year, you might have to avoid this whole mess.

Matt Capps and Damaso Marte both got hit the other day, but I think Capps has great job security. So why mention him? Capps was walking hitters (something he rarely did last year) the other night. I think Capps would have to be injured to lose this job. Walks could be a sign that he’s hiding an injury. Hopefully, he’s not.

Kerry Wood is the closer while Carlos Marmol is the setup man. Kerry Wood looked like crap. Marmol cruised through four hitters, striking out three. To be continued.

CJ Wilson hasn’t had any problems yet this year. I still see ‘perts grabbing Kazuo Fukumori and Joaquin Benoit. As of right now, I see no reason to handcuff Wilson.

Tom Gordon is being dropped in some leagues of mine. I wouldn’t do this just yet, because of Lidge’s uncertainty, but I would put Gordon on my bench until further notice.

Participated in my first league last night. It was a 16 team H2H league, which had all kinds of fangled rules, hitting (R, 1B, 2B, 3B, HR, RBI, SB, BB, TB, AVG) and the other (IP, W, CG, SV, K, HLD, ERA, WHIP, QS) that was organized by Bleeding Blue and Teal: a Seattle Mariners blog. Am I secretly a fan of the Mariners? Nope, but I hadn’t joined a H2H league yet and they had an opening so there I was. Since this league is for and by Mariners’ fans, I expected Ichiro to go in the first round (nope), Bedard in the second (yup) and Kenji to be someone’s utility (nope). It turned out to be less “root root for the home team” than I originally thought (though there is a team named, Olerud’s Main Dude). Anyway, here’s my team:

1.      (4)      José Reyes      SS
2.     (29)     Álex Ríos     OF
3.     (36)     Adam Dunn     OF
4.     (61)     Corey Hart     OF
5.     (68)     Alex Gordon     1B,3B
6.     (93)     Edwin Encarnación     3B
7.     (100)     John Maine     SP
8.     (125)     Jeff Kent     2B
9.     (132)     Jhonny Peralta     SS
10.     (157)     Matt Capps     RP
11.     (164)     Carlos Delgado     1B
12.     (189)     Adam Wainwright     SP
13.     (196)     Jonathan Broxton     RP
14.     (221)     Brandon Lyon     RP
15.     (228)     Carlos Ruiz     C
16.     (253)     Zack Greinke     SP,RP
17.     (260)     Pat Neshek     RP
18.     (285)     Manny Parra     RP
19.     (292)     Mike Jacobs     1B
20.     (317)     Jon Rauch     RP
21.     (324)     Franklin Gutiérrez     OF

Here’s what I was thinking in various rounds:

1. Can’t believe Reyes is falling to me. He’s an automatic #2 for me, even with this league’s rules. Wow, Pujols went sixth. He’s putting in a good spring, but that injury could be killer. Matt Holliday fell to seventh; that’s who I was planning to take if Reyes didn’t fall to me.

2. 16 teams… Ugh, this is going to take forever to get back to me. (Actually, I thought this every round.) Granderson’s goes 17th? Well, it wouldn’t have been me. Beltran goes 19th, not liking that pick. Peavy 20th, have to like that value, no matter how much I devalue pitching. Bedard goes 22nd (Webb goes 30th); there’s some hometown bias. At 29, I’m more than happy to grab Rios.

3. First off the board in the third round, George Sherrill. Then went—Wait! What? Okay, I probably would’ve taken Percival over Sherrill and maybe 300 other players, but it’s definitely a way to go. (I’ll see if I can get the Sherrill owner to write a guest post about why he didn’t take Jamie Walker in the fourth round to handcuff Sherrill.) Now that I had Reyes and Rios, I felt I needed some wombat, so I went with Dunn. At this point, I started to think I was going to wait a while for pitching and focus on Holds, Saves, ERA and WHIP. Lots of names went this round that I was glad to be no part of: Mauer, Roberts, Byrnes, Russell Martin, Manny and Beckett.

4. I could have gave birth to an elephant in the time it took my to draft again. I went with Corey Hart (61). Markakis went at 57; I was pissed. Atkins went at 59; I was equally po’d. I almost took Konerko or Adrian Gonzalez because I felt like I could have used a bit more pop, but both of these schmohawks have as many negatives as positives with some of the categories we’re playing with in this league.

5. Alex Gordon! Any daily readers of the site knew I was going to take him. There were a lot of names on the board I could’ve opted for. But none gave me the 20/20 balance I see Gordon putting together. If nothing else, my team is balanced. Except of course for my pitching…

7. With the 100th pick overall, I took Maine. Leaguemates seemed amused by this choice, but the only names on the board (pitching-wise) that were close in my book were Hill, Shields, Dice-K and Javier Vazquez. All are in the AL, except Hill. Also, Maine and Hill have the most upside. Here’s Maine’s numbers from last year, 191.0 IPs/15 Wins/1 CG/180 Ks/3.91 ERA/1.27 WHIP/17 QS. At 26 years old, on arguably the best offensive team in the NL? I think I made the right choice. But Hill was very, very close. Shea got a slight nod and the winds at Wrigley scared me away…

13. All I had was Capps (10) at this point for relievers so I figured I needed to be aggressive in trying to get holds and saves with the same guys so I targeted relievers that could conceivably get saves or holds. Worse case scenario being I only get one of the two. Remember this league weighs them equally, so why not take the best guy rather than the one most likely to get saves? So I passed Wood, Gregg, Jones and Borowski for Broxton. (I would have passed on Sherrill here too, but he went in the third round.)

14. Then I grabbed Brandon Lyon next because if his spring training continues into the season Tony Pena’s going to be the closer real soon and Lyon will be relegated to a Holds position. And if Lyon gets some saves, so be it. It’s a win-win. Later, I grabbed Rauch and Neshek. Again, I was always taking the best guy on the board and the guy who will get Holds and could possibly get saves. If I went for Jones, Gagne, Borowski or Gregg there was a chance I would get saves, but I can’t imagine these guys ever becoming the setup men.

15. Carlos Ruiz! Do I have to say more? At 228? Are you kidding me? Joking aside, Varitek was taken right after him and I almost took Varitek but… I love me some Ruiz. Here comes 17/10. Okay, maybe 14/7, but I’ll take it.

19. Mike Jacobs with the 292nd pick? I can’t imagine how he fell that far considering how deep this league is, but there he was. Honestly, I try to avoid hitters towards the end of a draft, but when Jacobs is looking at you almost 300 picks in, you gotta.

20. Another hitter? Yes, but Franklin Gutiérrez is 25 and about to get the right field job on one of the best offensive AL teams. Gutiérrez could go 70/20/80/.270/20 in the ninth hole. Not to mention how deep this league was, some of the names that were picked at the end of this draft were Kendall, Jack Wilson, Tony Gwynn (I think Junior), Noah Lowry (scheduled to start throwing in a month) and some catchers (for people who punted).

Tonight’s an ‘pert league with a bunch of fantasy writers so I’ll be filling you again on Thursday. Until then, how do you think I did on this draft?