It’s been a while since I went through all the major league closers and their setup men and where they should be ranked. So I figured I’d break it down for you because knowing all the closers and all of their setup man could be helpful for all of you. A million dollars and a naked Christina Ricci chained to your furnace could also be helpful, but I don’t have a furnace. Anyway, all the major league closers and their setup men seems like something all fantasy baseball players could use, so here it is. BTW, do you see how giving I am? I’m like Jolie-giving. Seriously, I should be wearing a habit and carrying a Malaysian orphan in a baby sling while talking on my solar-powered cellphone.

NO-BRAINERS

This tier is filled with a bunch of no-brainers (Papelbon — a no-brainer! Get it? Oofa!). These closers could get you the most in any trade. I would not hesitate to trade away any of these guys for the right price. In the end, closers are here to get you saves. You could end up with more saves from Rauch than Joe Nathan. When stacked with closers, unstack and trade.

1. Jonathan Papelbon, BOS (Hideki Okajima)
2. Joe Nathan, MIN (Matt Guerrier, Dennys Reyes)
3. Francisco Rodriguez, LAA (Justin Speier, Scot Shields)
4. Mariano Rivera, NYY (Joba Chamberlain)
5. Billy Wagner, NYM (Aaron Heilman)
6. Brad Lidge, PHI (Tom Gordon)
7. Takashi Saito, LAD (Jonathan Broxton)

BRAINERS

These closers seem like they have a lot more risk than they actually do. It takes a real brainer to see how potentially valuable some of these brainers are. If you trade a no-brainer for a brainer and another player, you’re likely coming out on top.

8. Joakim Soria, KAN (Ramon Ramirez, Leo Nunez)
9. Francisco Cordero, CIN (David Weathers)
10. Jon Rauch, WAS (Luis Ayala)
11. Bobby Jenks, CHW (Scott Linebrink, Octavio Dotel)
12. Brandon Lyon, ARI (Tony Pena, Chad Qualls)
13. Trevor Hoffman, SDG (Heath Bell, Cla Meredith)
14. Jose Valverde, HOU (Doug Brocail)
15. Brian Fuentes, COL (Manny Corpas, Taylor Buchholz)
16. J.J. Putz, SEA (Brandon Marrow, Sean Green)
17. Matt Capps, PIT (Damaso Marte)
18. Brian Wilson, SAN (Tyler Walker)
19. Kevin Gregg, FLA (Renyel Pinto)
20. Kerry Wood, CHC (Bob Howry, Carlos Marmol)
21. George Sherrill, BAL (Bunch of Schmohawks)

BRAIN FREEZE

At some point soon, you’re going to squeeze your temples and grimace like you just ate a pint of Dreyer’s. All of these guys should be traded after they go on a string of few saved games, assuming they go on a string of a few saved games.

22. Huston Street, OAK (Keith Foulke, Joey Devine)
23. Troy Percival, TAM (Dan Wheeler, Al Reyes)
24. B.J. Ryan, TOR (Scott Downs)
25. Manny Acosta, Rafael Soriano, Blaine Boyer, et al, ATL (John Smoltz)
26. Rafael Betancourt/Masa Kobayashi, CLE (Joe Borowski)
27. Todd Jones, DET (Clay Rapada, Aquilino Lopez, Fernando Rodney)
28. Eric Gagne, MIL (Salomon Torres, G. Mota)
29. C.J. Wilson, TEX (Eddie Guardado, Joaquin Benoit)
30. Ryan Franklin/Russ Springer, STL (Jason Isringhausen)

It’s very rare that a player of Big Papi’s caliber falls into this bad of a slump. Maybe burying that David Ortiz jersey had an adverse effect? Let’s look at some things we know. Ortiz bats third in arguably the best lineup in baseball. He pats his hands together before every pitch like he’s making arepas. He still knows how to take a walk. What we don’t know? His actual age. He’s supposedly 33 years old, but he’s Latin so I’d say he’s anywhere from 35 to 47 (which makes him anywhere from two to twelve years older than Pujols). For the purposes of this, we’re going to assume last year was a harbinger of things to come — that Papi’s best years are behind him. Let’s look at last year, he hit 116/35/117/.332. If that’s a sign of trouble, then I’d like to fill up my team with guys whose jerseys are buried under Yankee Stadium. But, wait, could his knee be bothering him? Sure, but it was bothering him last year and look again at those numbers. So he’s in the worst slump of his career, he’s hobbling around Fenway like a drunk Bea Arthur, yet I’m telling you this is the absolute best time to buy David Ortiz. That’s right, trade for Ortiz — steal him away from your opponents because his stock won’t be low for long. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday:

Evan Longoria - He looks really solid. I still don’t think you should sell your dead nana’s jewelry to acquire him.  Remember Braun’s ‘07 was the exception not the rule. Longoria hit a fastball in the seats. Off speed pitches are usually the bump in the rookie ride.

Nick Markakis - He has four steals already. If he gets to 30 homers (which he should eventually), you’re gonna wish you had him.

Carlos Gomez - In your box score it shows a K in the first inning. He struckout trying to bunt with two strikes. You’re thinking, “Well, that shows how committed he was to moving the guy over.” Dude, he was leading off the game! I really don’t think you want CarGo on your team right now. He doesn’t know what’s coming or going with pitch selection.

Alexis Rios - Sweet stroke meet Sherrill’s fastball.

Pat Neshek - I love middle men, there I said it. But when they’re struggling — ugh. I dropped Neshek for Dotel in one league I had him.

Zach Greinke - He should’ve got out of the third without giving up any runs. Did he crawl into a ball and start weeping? No. He handled it very well. He’s passed the mental health check so far. Unfortunately, he’s not striking out men like he should be. Am I worried? His ERA went up after giving up only one run in 9 innings. Of course, I’m not worried.

Adam Jones - He looked really solid. I still wouldn’t touch him.

Rafael Betancourt - It’s got to be a matter of time. Borowski cannot get people out. How long can the Indians let a guy who you wouldn’t trust in the seventh inning keep getting the ball in the ninth? I don’t think very long. If you have Borowski without Betancourt on your team, I would try and get Betancourt in a trade quick-fast.

(NOTE FROM GREY: Last week I sent out feelers to the top baseball team blogs to see if they would be generous enough to write a quick preview for their favorite team. So over the course of the next two weeks, mixed in with your daily fantasy info, you will get some of the most astute, in-depth coverage of teams around the major leagues for the upcoming 2008 season from the people that know these teams best. Each post will include a link to their site, please take time to visit these bloggers’ sites, because these posts are truly the tip of the iceberg for their team knowledge. Now enjoy the 2008 Minnesota Twins preview.)

Starting Pitching

For the first time in a half decade, the Twins will not have ace Johan Santana to count on. He will be missed, but the Twins and their fans have got to move on. With the losses of Carlos Silva and Matt Garza, it is fair to say that there are question marks all over the Twins starting staff. Fortunately, if nothing else, the Twins have a lot of young pitchers with abundant talent and little experience.

The Twins decided to start the season with ace-to-be Francisco Liriano making a few starts in the minor leagues while he continues to rehab from Tommy John surgery. His long-term value to the Twins makes this a no brainer, but expect him up soon. The Twins decided to sign the very hittable Livan Hernandez to eat up innings to save the bullpen some since the rest of the rotation is young. Scott Baker and Boof Bonser are the two pitchers with the most experience. Each has made just 48 career starts, but they will be counted on heavily. Kevin Slowey has an historical 2007 at AAA Rochester, and in September, he replaced Bonser in the rotation. His control  and moxie make him a future star, much in the mold of Greg Maddux. OK, how about Brad Radke? The fifth starter job was won by Nick Blackburn this spring. He will be given a few starts until Liriano is ready, but he has the stuff to stick around if he pitches well. If anything happens, it is important to note that the Twins have plenty of young pitchers who are, or soon will be, ready to contribute at the big league level. Philip Humber, Glen Perkins, Brian Duensing, Anthony Swarzak lead that list.

The Bullpen

The Twins have typically outperformed their Pythagorean win projection, and we wonder why? Well, it is probably because of the strength of their bullpen. They may not have had the offense to have many blowout wins, but when the team is in a close game, the dominance of the Twins bullpen always gives them a chance.

The Twins decided to sign Joe Nathan and keep him around for the next four years. He has been as good as any closer in baseball since the Twins promoted him to the position to start the 2004 season. Pat Neshek and Matt Guerrier were terrific in their set up role last year. This year, the Twins hope for a healthy Jesse Crain, who missed much of the 2007 season after shoulder surgery, as he was excellent to start his career. Juan Rincon looks to bounce back, and Dennys Reyes would love to prove that 2006 was no fluke.

The Twins bullpen will again be a very important part of their success in 2008

Position Players

Joe Mauer and Mike Redmond combine to be a very productive catching duo. Mauer is fully healthy and had a strong spring. If he can stay in the lineup, he is as good as it gets. Justin Morneau was the AL MVP in 2006 and had a strong first half in 2007. What he needs to do is put together a full season. His recently signed six year, $80 million deal is hopefully motivation to do just that. Michael Cuddyer signed a three year deal worth at least $25 million on the same day, and he will again patrol right field where he led the league in assists last year. The team acquired Delmon Young in an offseason trade and he will be set in left field this season. Jason Kubel put together a great second half in 2007 and should build on that as the team’s primary DH. (Craig Monroe will likely see some time as the DH and occasional OF as well) Those are the Twins two through six hitters, and should remain so over the next three or four years. Those five hitters should be very productive.

Adam Everett takes over shortstop duties after Jason Bartlett was traded in the Garza/Young deal. This is a big step down for the Twins offensively, but probably a small step forward defensively as Everett is as good as it gets. Carlos Gomez and Denard Span battled all spring for the starting CF job, and in the end, the Twins went with the very talented Carlos Gomez. He will be the Twins leadoff man as well, providing incredible speed to the top of the order, allowing those two through six hitters plenty of RBI opportunities. Mike Lamb, Everett’s teammate with the Astros the last several seasons, will take over at 3B for the Twins. Last year, Nick Punto put up historically horrible numbers for a player at the hot corner. Lamb’s defense may not be great, but the guy can take good at bats and hit gaps, so he will help the lineup as well. Finally, Brendan Harris, also acquired in the Twins/Rays deal will start the season as the Twins starting 2B. He put up very strong numbers last year as the Rays starting SS, and will move to the other side of the diamond for this season. Expect Punto to get some playing time here as well as Twins rookie Matt Tolbert.

Fantasy Must Haves

Many people are down on this year’s Twins team, but there is a lot of talent. My assumption is that fantasy baseball participants know this. Here are some guys to consider drafting:

Joe Mauer - There are only four, maybe five, catchers that you really want on your team. Joe Mauer is one of them. Even in a “down” season for Mauer, he provides good all around numbers. If healthy, he should reclaim the top spot among catchers.

Justin Morneau - Normally 1B has been one of the strongest positions in a fantasy draft, but this year, that isn’t as much the case. However, Morneau is still one of the guys that you will be happy to have on your team.

Joe Nathan - Over his four seasons as the Twins closer, he has averaged just over 40 saves per season. He has also had an ERA of 1.94 combined over that time.

Delmon Young - His lack of walks makes him a mid-round pick in rotisserie leagues where on-base percentage matters, but I think he could be a monster in points leagues. At just 22 years old, his power and average should continue to rise.

Francisco Liriano - With risk, there can be reward. Sure, in his first year back from Tommy John surgery, there is risk in drafting Liriano. However, let’s not forget that during his 2006 run (12-3, 2.16 ERA, 144 Ks in 121 innings), he was better than Johan Santana. That is how special he could be again.

Sleepers

Jason Kubel - his second half gives Twins fans hope that he has returned to full health and can be the hitter we projected him to be when he first came up to the Twins in 2004.

Michael Cuddyer - Don’t forget that in 2006, he had over 100 runs and 100 RBI. He is forgotten in the lineup that includes so many mashers.

Pat Neshek - Arguably the top set up man in the game, Neshek does well in strikeouts, WHIP and ERA. If anything happened to Joe Nathan, Neshek would be the guy to step in.

Summary

The American League Central is very tough. The Tigers improved themselves and we forget that Cleveland is back with much of the same team that was one win from the World Series. The White Sox and even the Royals will both be very competitive. But don’t sleep on this Twins team. As you can see, there is a lot of talent. Yes, a lot of things have to happen right for this team, but this is the beauty of baseball and its 162 game season. You just never know.

Seth

Seth Stohs runs  www.SethSpeaks.net

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?