Trade Away Your Closers
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.
