As a Justin Verlander owner in 2013 and part of 2014, I know what some of you must be thinking. “What exactly is the conundrum here? That he’s garbage or hot garbage?” Hmmm… I feel like you’ve painted me into a corner there. Garbage, I guess? It’s true that Verlander has been a shell of the player that he was during his peak seasons in recent years, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that his days as a useful fantasy contributor are over. The goal of this post is to determine whether or not he has anything left in the tank as objectively as possible. That means forgetting about the irreparable ratio damage that he inflicted upon our teams over the past few seasons. And ignoring the Scrooge McDuck-like money rooms that undoubtedly exist at each of his houses. Not to mention his ability to motorboat Kate Upton whenever he feels like it. I’ve got my bear pic all queued up and ready to go! Oh, right. Gotta stay unbiased. With that in mind, let’s take a look at Verlander’s numbers throughout his MLB career:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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See all of today’s starting lineups

# MLB Starting Lineups For Sun 8/3
ARI | ATH | BAL | BOS | CHC | CHW | CLE | COL | DET | HOU | KC | LAA | LAD | MIA | MIL | MIN | NYM | NYY | PHI | PIT | SD | SEA | SF | STL | TB | TEX | TOR | WSH | ATL | CIN | OAK

Are the Red Sox grasping at proverbial straws here?  I mean, let’s go to the waiver wire in real life… Grab a reliever, Jean Machi, that has three career saves, and let’s say we’ll think about him being the closer for our team.  It sounds weird and crazy, but then you look at the Sawx record (it’s the worst in the AL by the way), and realize maybe it’s not such a far fetched idea.  Hanley Ramirez has nine freaking doubles all year. NINE!  I just hit four at Fenway the other day, until I realized they were hamburgers.  Okay, back to closers.  So the Red Sox, with the loss of Koji Uehara to the DL, will turn to just about anyone to see if they can close the 8-10 chances they will get the rest of the year.  The front runners are Junichi Tazawa (has 4 blown saves in the last 30 days) and Jean Machi, and the sleeper candidate is the former All-Star closer Ryan Cook.  Who in himself was traded for that spectacular fantasy asset: PTBNL.  The situations for closers is getting bleaker with the bad teams losing actual options and not having a genuine fall-back option that you could tie your waiver wire dollars too.  Best advice is don’t chance saves from all these guys, it will nuke your numbers elsewhere.  Concede that you will only get seven points from saves instead of nine. Friends don’t let friends drive drunk while texting or making waiver claims.

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How about those Jays? Running through the six with their woes, amirite? The Jays are now in first place after making up eight games in just 14 days to overtake the Yankees. Now, not taking anything away from Toronto because they have been white hot, but man have the Yankees made it easy on them.

All of the sudden, the Yankees first five hitters look like the Atlanta Braves at the dish. They’ll rebound, but for now, I’m taking advantage of the struggles of Jacoby Ellsbury, Brett Gardner, Alex Rodriguez, Mark Teixeira and Brian McCann. Trevor Bauer is frustrating because he can go from looking like a Cy Young candidate one night to looking like a position player on the mound the next. I like to make a tournament lineup with Bauer in it when he pitches because of the potential. Put his potential with the Yankees struggles, and I’m OK with rolling him out today.

Straight to the cash, homie.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 20 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

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Hishashi my dashi — slurp SLURP! Yesterday, Hisashi Iwakuma threw the AL’s first no-hitter since 2012, a span of three years (nice math skills, Grey stache!) This wasn’t an easy, rollover and let me scratch your belly, Padres club he was no-hitting either. This was no “Get out your Slinky and drop it from the top of the stairs and it’ll go all the way to the bottom,” this was more of a “Drop your Slinky and watch it get two stairs down, and then Chris Davis comes up and flattens one into the Pike’s Market concourse, and then one of the fish guys throws it back and then Machado comes up orders a Flat White with almond milk and he hits one over one of the 16,000 Starbucks* in the greater Seattle area.” Wow, I got totally lost in that analogy. Iwakuma’s ERAs are all over the place in his time in the states, but I’ll say this, everything else is nearly identical. His K/9 is always within point five, his xFIP is 3.29 now and it was 3.28 in his 2nd major league season, his fastball velocity was 88.9 last year; it’s 88.9 now, his walk rate is 1.5, it was 1.1 last year. This year, he’s given up more homers, that’s been the difference. You’d have to assume in Safeco homers would come down and Iwakuma would go back to being a mid to low-3 ERA pitcher. *I did the Segway Seattle tour during the All-Star break counting them. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

With just over a month and a half left to play, it’s still a tight two-horse race between Razzball’s J-FOH and Hannibal Montana for the first Razznasty championship. The big story right now though is MattTruss (The Hippos). Truss has gained nearly 20 points in the standings since our last league update in early July and now sits comfortably in third place. How has he done it? Basically he’s dominated the rest of us since July 1st – leading the league in RBIs, wins, and strikeouts over that span. But that’s not all. The Hippos have also been top five in four other categories, including hitting the second most homers and posting the second best ERA since the beginning of last month. In other words, it’s been a balanced attack on the standings, and I am now officially scared of hippos. There is still a lot of ground between Truss and our two leaders, but anything can happen when you’re a 2-ton animal on the move.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

On a day where pitching isn’t deep and very top-heavy, it gets really hard to look past the tops of the charts. Clayton Kershaw you say? Don’t mind if I do. Jacob deGrom? Yes please may I have some more. For me, I’m looking at a guy who gets to face the Atlanta Braves. Said Atlanta Braves sit tied for last in wRC+ since the start of the second half. Also, said Atlanta Braves are missing their best bat in Freeman and have so much scrub in the lineup I’m about to start calling them the Scotch-Brites. Guaranteed to keep the scoreboards clean! But the biggest thing Jake Odorizzi has going for him isn’t even the opponent. Actually, it’s where he’s pitching. Jake is a home schooler. Through 51 innings at the Trop, Jake owns a 1.41 ERA. Sure, he’s a little lucky in that regards as his xFIP is more than double that at 3.44 but you know what helps you luck out? How about a 9.12 K/9 rate and a 20.2% K%-BB%. Overall, given the higher end options, many may find it hard to look Odorizzi’s way. Don’t be one of those people who says Odor’in ain’t easy Izzi and go with Jake. But enough about my strange rap and hip hop references, here we go. Let’s look at my it’s getting hot in here takes for this Wednesday DK slate…

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

*Grey adjusts his chiseled body, places himself on a seat, props his chin up with his hand, makes sure that he’s not covering his mustache.* “Welcome to today’s symposium on the intersection of art, science and fantasy baseball. Thank you for joining me at the New Brunswick Holiday Inn. For those arriving late, please fill in the front seats. Don’t groan, my handsome will distract you from wherever you’re sitting if you allow it. Carlos Rodon showed yesterday what he’s capable of — 7 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 11 Ks — but his 4.61 ERA shows everything else. Yes, he will be a 2016 sleeper; his stuff is just so nasty. He has a 10 K/9 in 91 2/3 IP this year (good for sixth best in the majors if he qualified). Yo, Prince, what you say to that? He’s a sexy M.F. Unfortunately, his walk rate is 5, which is as awful as his K-rate is good (would be the worst qualified starter’s BB/9). You know who that reminds me of? Just about every hard thrower when they first came up: Scherzer, Randy Johnson, Sale, Carrasco…. Even Kershaw’s first full year’s BB/9 was 4.79. I’m not saying Rodon will be that good next year, but he’s 22 years old and by the age of 24 he could be a top ten starter. Okay, that should be enough for you to digest for now. For the five ladies joining us, I will continue this in the hotel bar, The Cheeky Monkey, for refreshments and chicken fingers.” Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Luis Severino (+29.7%) was the most added player in fantasy baseball this past week. You know that the MLB youth movement is officially underway when even the Yankees refuse to part with their top prospects at the trade deadline in order to acquire a veteran rental for the stretch run. “I just traded Severino and Aaron Judge to the Mariners for Hisashi Iwakuma. Suckers! We just found our Hiroki Kuroda replacement, and it only took a couple of unproven kids to get him. You’re welcome, New York!” That’s pre-2015 Brian Cashman gloating about a potential deadline deal that might’ve been made in seasons past. Fortunately for Yankees fans, Severino was off-limits in trade talks and was promoted to the big league club just under a week ago instead. The 21-year-old phenom flashed his impressive arsenal (mid-90s fastball, slider, changeup) against the Red Sox in his debut and more than held his own, allowing just 2 hits and 2 runs (1 earned) over 5 innings of work while walking none and striking out 7 batters. Severino has excelled at limiting the long ball, allowing only 8 homers in 320+ minor league innings throughout his career. He’s exhibited impressive control in the minors (2.3 BB/9) while striking out just over a batter per inning (9.1 K/9) during that time period as well. However, as is the case with most young pitchers these days, Severino’s workload is likely to be closely monitored in the coming weeks. He’s already thrown over 100 combined innings this season, and he seems to be in store for roughly 35-40 more (or 6 more starts) if the Yankees follow the old +30 rule for young pitchers. He looks like the real deal, but is likely to be skipped/shut down by mid-September, limiting his fantasy value for the rest of this season. Until then – giddy up!

Here are a couple of other significant adds and drops in fantasy baseball over the past week:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

A player’s eligibility is a huge factor in evaluating their price or draft status. All else being equal, a 20 home run outfielder is very different from a 20 home run shortstop. Of course, from this season to next there will be a number of hitters losing specific position eligibility, and thus their value takes a dip as well. The season is not yet over so these could change, but as of right now, we’re losing a lot of third base eligible players.

A few quick notes:

  • The players are separated into their respective divisions. The following is not every player losing eligibility, just those most fantasy relevant.
  • I’m using Yahoo! eligibility rather than CBS or ESPN not because of any specific fondness, but Yahoo! has the most lax requirements at 10 games appeared or five games started.
  • I considered splitting up center field specific players from the general outfield, however in standard leagues no such distinction exists.
  • All these players can be plugged into a utility spot, so when I say outfield only, I’m implying UTIL as well.
Please, blog, may I have some more?

I’ve been running out of ideas for titles but this one was a slam dunk. I have said many times before that I’m a huge Steely Dan fan. They are one of a few artists to ALWAYS soothe this beast and take me to a good childhood place. But hey, enough about me, I want to talk about you, but not all of you. The “you” I can’t talk about is the top 20 overall. Due to some computer issues, we don’t have an updated master standings this week. Sorry guys… and girls, we will hopefully have them next week when Rudy returns from his vacation.

Before I move onto the RCL data, I wanted to talk up our Razzball day at the Angels game one more time. Below is my rather poor attempt at combining two pictures, sorry for the pixelation. Below is Grey and myself sporting our sweet new Razzball shirts. To show you how much I want this to be about you… and Grey, I cut my face out so we get Grey times three! If you want to buy one, let me know in the comments. To the right is Teddy Heater, with Hector Santiago (I think?), walking off the field after he threw out the first pitch. Damn our boy can throw. So proud how hard Teddy represented Razzball with his sweet jersey. I had a nice chat with Teddy about today’s topic: the RCL’S. In his first year he has really picked up on the strategies and was already talking about next years draft strategy. You guys… and girls should try to play an RCL with Teddy next year.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

 

When you think about Rob Schneider’s career, his Richmeister character was bordering on prophetic. I mean, the first time we saw the character, ok, that was fun. Annoying and yet you get the gist of it why it’s funny and it was in a small enough sample size for you to actually enjoy it and not be frustrated. And then they kept doing the skit over and over and making the skits longer and longer. The reason it was funny was that you get it, the dude is annoying. But is it really funny annoying your audience? Not really. I mean, who the eff watched Deuce Bigalow? Wait, don’t answer that, especially with a ‘yes’ cuz I want us to stay friends. Basically, Rob Schneider in small doses can work (YOU CAN DO IT!) but if you have to deal with him for longer than five minutes, you’re basically trying to annoy your audience to death. Speaking of annoying your audience to death, there’s me not talking about Luis Severino. Let’s fix that, shall we? Severino’s first start of the year wasn’t perfect but it was spectacular as he K’d 7 through 5 and only gave up 2 hits, though those two hits were smacked pretty hard and one left the yard. But said hits were in Yankees stadium and by lefties in a lefty friendly park. Progressive Field still plays well to lefties but it pales in comparison to that Bronx short porch. And though I wouldn’t call that offense lost at sea entirely, it is made up of guys still learning the game and castaways at this point as they shed payroll and try to build for 2016. Meanwhile, New York is still playing for something and Severino looked so good his first time out, I’m hard pressed not to go back to him on a day where he may go underowned because of all the other higher priced pitchers. So join me in rostering the Sevman…the Sevmeister…the Severino, won’t you? Meanwhile, Schneider looks forward to reprising his cameo roles in another Adam Sandler movie. My hatred there is for another time cuz it’s time we move on to some other calls. So here’s my red hot chick takes for this Tuesday DK slate…

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

The Red Sox season is like the guy that knocks over the Jenga structure with the first block pulled, then manages to somehow knock every single block off the table, even the ones on the very bottom. Koji Uehara hit the DL with a fractured wrist, and is done for the season, as originally speculated here after reading between the lines at other sites. I also read between the lines that aliens constructed Tikal in Guatemala. And I thought Tikal was constructed by Method Man. Also, I have a bone to pick with read, why is the past tense still spelled read? Siri can’t even figure that shizz out to speak. You messed up, English language! Any the hoo! With Uehara out, this opens a hole for Jean Machi or Junichi Tazawa to walk through. Tazawa is Asian, though I’m not sure that’s a requirement, Machi is ugly. Again, may not matter. Either way, I’d go Machi first since Sawx manager, John Farrell, indicated that Machi would fill-in as the closer, adding, “And Sandoval is still fat.” Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?