We have agency in our life. Also advertising agencies. We have many agencies in our life, but our personal agency is rooted in medieval Latin agencia, roughly translated as “doing.” Even when we’re Busy Doin’ Nothing, as Brian Wilson once splendidly wrote about, we are still using our agency to actively avoid doing anything. In fantasy baseball, there are only a few doings that can be considered primary after the draft is complete:
- Waiver bidding
- Adding/Dropping a Player
- Line-up management
- Trade proposals/rejections
These primary doings act as the simple bedrock of our hobby. These doings are as natural as breathing or subscribing to a newspaper so you can use it for your compost bin. For some, straying beyond these “doings” defeats the purpose of the “fun.” Then there are the Secondary Doings, those activities that help a passing interest blossom into the beautiful Corpse Flower of obsession.
- Check line-up card websites
- Use 1-month totals plus Rudy’s Rest-of-Season projections to address team needs
- Read blurbs either casually or obsessively
- Read this dadgum (this is an alternate spelling to daggum, but now both spellings look odd) website
- Use Fangraphs and Baseball Savant to find hidden numbers
- Accuse managers of collusion when trade is completed that’s projected to drop you in the rankings
I could go on. Once again, I am not here to judge how people get on with their doings. However, after Anthony Bender picked up a save Wednesday night while being listed as Day-to-Day in Yahoo leagues, the player note feedback was hard to ignore. For context, when a player has a blurb next to their name, you can click it, and in the lower right-hand corner is a Pandora’s Box of a button labeled “Discuss.” The following comments were made regarding Anthony Bender’s save:
“Thanks for the update Yahoo.”
“Well yahoo. Thanks for your update.”
“Day to day save?”
Let me first state the obvious: We don’t know where Yahoo gets their lineup and MLB transaction information. Maybe they just use MLB.com, or follow beat writers on Twitter, or they know a guy who knows a guy who has a hot tip on lineups on the daily. Or. Most casual players don’t realize they farmed out blurring to TheArtistFormerlyKnownAsRotoworld (not hate, CBS farm their blurbs out to Rotowire, etc.). Apparently, ESPN doesn’t even do their own staff projections. What I’m trying to say is that FMLB success is derived from small details gleaned from primary sources.
General Best Practice Tip: I check my lineups when they’re first posted about two hours before game time, and again ten minutes before the first pitch. Two hours can change anyone’s life! Heck, I could saw off my left arm in two hours! The first hour would be me hemming and hawing, and the next half hour would be finding and purchasing a bone saw in uptown Chicago. The rest is pure commitment.
Do not slough off your mismanagement on farmed-out updates provided by your website of choice. Be Santa Clause. Make your list, check it twice, and also the couch cushions for spare change and even a cell phone if he’s lucky. Santa has to eat too!
A Blurbstomp Reminder
We will analyze player blurbs from a given evening, knowing that 1-2 writers are usually responsible for all the player write-ups posted within an hour of the game results. We will look at:
- Flowery Diction – how sites juice up descriptions of player performance
- Friendly Reminder – when a blurb insists upon itself
- Q and Q – when a site contradicts a player valuation on back-to-back blurbs
- Hex Enduction Ow’er – when a blurb jinxes an injured player
- Stephen A. Smith IMG_4346.jpeg Award – Given to the player blurb that promises the most and delivers the least
The hope is that by season’s end, we’ll all feel more confident about our player evaluations when it comes to the waiver wire. We will read blurbs and not be swayed by excessive superlatives, faulty injury reporting, and micro-hype. I will know that I have done my job when Grey posts, and there isn’t a single question about catchers that he did not address in his post. Onward to Roto Wokeness!
Flowery Diction
Sam Long’s spot start Monday lasted just one scoreless inning against the Brewers.
Long was pitching on two days’ rest, so he was probably going to top out at two innings tonight. That the Giants pulled him after one was likely a function of the Brewers putting out a lineup designed to face a lefty. They countered with a parade of righties for the next six innings before giving Jake McGee the eighth. Long could get another start this weekend and perhaps go longer. He’s yet to allow a run in 5 2/3 innings this season.
Source: Rotoworld
Long was pitching on two days’ rest, so he was probably going to top out at two innings tonight.
Come on. Don’t be coy.
That the Giants pulled him after one was likely a function of the Brewers putting out a lineup designed to face a lefty.
Give it to me. Don’t make me beg.
They countered with a parade of righties for the next six innings before giving Jake McGee the eighth.
We’re entering the realm of anti-humor now. The shmucks have already left. The consumers of True Art remain.
Long could get another start this weekend…
Yessss. Yessss.
And perhaps…
Bursting at every seam of my velour jumpsuit…
…go…
Full Super Saiyan!?!?!
…longer.
Edged into oblivion, was I! Was that good for you? It was good for me, and that’s all that matters to my reader person.
Hex Enduction Ow’er
Luis Robert (groin) is expected to return to the White Sox’ lineup Wednesday afternoon against the Royals.
With the start time for Wednesday’s contest moved up due to freezing temperatures in Chicago, the White Sox have decided to push back Robert’s return an additional day to avoid him playing in back-to-back games in less than 24 hours. Fantasy managers should expect him to be back out there in center field on Wednesday afternoon.
Source: Rotoedgesportsworld.com
I read this blurb on Tuesday and immediately thought, “Hmm, so he’ll be going on the back-dated IL on Friday.” It’s Thursday and he’s out of the lineup again. I swear that there is an organism out in the universe tethered not to a celestial body whose sole purpose is sucking in optimistic injury blurbs, and spewing back out “renewed discomfort” onto all of your injured players. Don’t we all suffer from Renewed Discomfort at all hours of the day? How about when you remember an embarrassing middle school foible while doing the dishes? Renewed Discomfort. Still don’t fit into those goal jeans? Renewed Discomfort. Reading a blog only tangentially related to FMLB? You guessed it, Renewed Discomfort.
Think I have the name of my new Substack?
Q&Q
Adam Frazier ripped a bases-clearing double Tuesday in the Mariners’ win over the Rays.
Frazier broke open the game with his two-bagger during what turned out to be a seven-run fourth inning. It was his only hit on the night, although he did draw a walk. The batting line hasn’t been great for Frazier so far, but he has already driven in 10 runs.
Source: Rotoedgesportsworld.com
The dude is hitting above .200 in a year where it feels like the league at the Mendoza line. He’s the leadoff hitter for the Seattle Mariners, and he’s driven in 10 runs despite having Jarred Kelenic and Julio Rodriguez batting in front of him? He’s the 14th ranked 2B on the player rater, and no one had him in the top this year at the position, right? The batting line has been better than Brandon Lowe, Javy Baez, Ryan McMahon, and other more coveted keystone cowards.
On a side note regarding Kelenic and Julio Rodriguez, has everyone forgotten the PCL-bump the prospects get on the West Coast? Is that a thing anymore, or did they humidor/move the outfield walls in? I’ve always tempered my expectations for any PCL-hype-prospects based purely on the goosed offensive output. I guess I’ll stay the course.
Name De Plume
Mariners recalled RHP Penn Murfee from Triple-A Tacoma.
Murfee is back on Seattle’s active roster and still looking to make his major league debut.
Source: Rotoedgesportsworld.com
Sure, his name looks like someone sat on their keyboard for a moment. But what if I told you that he looks like the lead singer of Nickelback? Still interested?! No?!
Rats. This didn’t work at all.
Stephen A. Smith IMG_4346.jpeg Award
Brandon Belt went 0-for-4 in Wednesday’s loss to the A’s.
Given that the Giants managed just three total hits in the contest, Belt was far from alone in his ineptitude on Wednesday. The veteran first baseman is slashing .242/.367/.470 with four home runs and nine RBI across 66 at-bats this season. He had recorded multiple hits in two of his last three games prior to coming up quiet against the A’s.
Source: Rotoedgesportsworld.com
This is a glorious update that hits so many different categories. They wrote a blurb about an 0-4 hitting performance, despite Belt not hitting terribly all year. The blurb is employed to point out that the Giants had a terrible offensive day, rather than glean anything more insightful than his overall batting line if one looked up season totals and was wondering why one didn’t draft this perenially named-after-a-supportive-article-of-clothing first baseman.
The answer to that old chestnut is that Brandon Belt is boring, though alliterative. Drafting Brandon Belt is like sitting in the waiting room while your car is being serviced. If you work hard enough it can be almost pleasant, but everyone in that room’s Doings involves watching time creep by while wondering what sick freak would put on Maury Povich wall-spanning HDTV, at a volume level that intimates that said freak is sitting next door at the customer service desk, surreptitiously creating mass slow-drip Renewed Discomfort while fondling the so-called missing remote control. So yeah. That’s what drafting Brandon Belt is like.
That’s it for this week of Avoiding the Blurbstomp. You don’t have to think for yourself to win your leagues, but you are responsible for whatever flim-flam guides your decision-making process. Find your flim-flam, people!
