Gordon Beckham, the pride of Surrey, wrote little ol’ me a letter last week. It went on for three pages and his penmanship left a lot to be desired, but let me share with you an excerpt. “Hey, Grey, Gordo here. I’m probably not going to be that great for an extended period of time in 2009. But I appreciate you supporting my efforts. Please share with your readers my plate disclipine and above-average speed. I’m probably nothing more than a doubles hitter right now with the occasional dinger (the word dinger makes me giggle). I don’t want to toot my own horn (though if I could, I’d never leave the clubhouse), but when you look at other MIs in your fantasy league, am I really that much worse? As the President of the Debate Club, I once argued in favor of keeping Ben Grieve over Roy Halladay, so what do I know?” Thanks, Gordo! I think he covered everything. At MI, ride the white lightning. Anyway, here’s some more players to buy or sell this week in fantasy baseball:
BUY
Casey McGehee – When I grow up, I wanna be just like Casey McGehee. Be touted relentlessly by me and do just okay in the major leagues. You wanna be fair? Okay, let’s be fair. McGehee is a serviceable MI. He’s not winning you leagues. But without serviceable MIs, our great sport wouldn’t be nearly as proud.
Martin Prado – I rank them Beckham, McGehee then Prado, in that order. And that’s me figuring someone’s gonna ask me that in the comments!
Pat Burrell – You would think A) I actually like Burrell. B) He’s done something to warrant being included in back-to-back Buy/Sells. C) There’s no C. D) Why would there be a D if there’s no C?
Marlon Byrd – He went 22/4/20/.393/2 last August. When the weather heats up in Texas, the caged Byrd sings.
Chad Gaudin/Kevin Correia – This Hodgepadre of starters are worth owning and starting, at least, at home.
Jason Hammel – He’s the inverse of the Gaudin/Correia daily double. Start him in Away games.
Dallas Braden – Hasn’t given up more than 2 earned runs in his last seven starts.
Ty Wigginton – Hit a homer two days ago. Exciting, right? Now what if I told you he just played his fifth game at shortstop? Ah, now your wheels are turning.
Garrett Jones – A Pirates has-been rookie? Please, Grey, I had Mexican for lunch. I know, random italicized voice. Not all that attractive. But in deep leagues, he’s worth a flier to see what he does with playing time. He can’t be much worst than Delwyn Young. But Delwyn Young sucks! That’s sorta my point.
Leo Nunez – Owned in 6.7% of ESPN leagues. That means about 93.3% of ESPN leagues are abandoned.
SELL
Torii Hunter – He’s at 17/13. He’ll get to 27/22. My gratutity calculator is telling me if you own Hunter, you’ve gotten more production from him than you will if you continue to hold him. No one’s saying to sell him for Felipe Paulino and an old TV Guide cover with Kermit and Miss Piggy, but I’d explore options.
Daisuke Matsuzaka – Hey, he had a good run. Not this year. This year he was terrible. He had a good run last year. I wouldn’t own him this year with your team. If you don’t have room on your DL, lose Dice-BB.
Glen Perkins – No one’s buying Perkins, so this is less a sell, more of an Ignore. Can’t throw the speedball by anyone. He could be a participant in my All-Star Game festivities where he faces off against Chris Davis. The Movable Object vs. The Movable Object. Whose flaw will be more pronounced?
Vladimir Guerrero – I know in the beginning of the year you Rochambeau’d your buddy to own Vlad, but Guerrero’s being outslugged by Scott Hairston by almost 200 points. Oh, nuts, Vlad’s bad. And not bad as in good, but bad as in bad.
