“Who is the Dodgers ace?” asks the Fox Sports newscaster in Los Angeles, after the special report on “Where are the stars shopping for their Emmy gowns?” and “Juicing? Is it good for you?” and “A high-speed pursuit ends in an In-N-Out drive-thru,” and “Actresses over 24 years old may not be washed up after all,” and “Shopkeeper puts up sign to ‘Vote Republican’ and gets looted.” So, who is the Dodgers ace? On Saturday, Clayton Kershaw went 8 IP, 0 ER, 3 baserunners with 14 Ks, ERA down to 2.68. My Magic Eight Ball says this is the year the Dodgers hop on Kershaw’s back, march through the playoffs and justify every crackers move Mattingly’s done in his managerial career. Sometimes knowing the future really bums me out. Not to be outdone, on Sunday, Zack Greinke went 8 IP, 0 ER, 4 baserunners with 11 Ks, and lowered his ERA to 1.30. Soon he won’t be able to lower his ERA anymore (math is my strong suit). I’m totally done doubting Greinke…or am I?! No, not the ellipsis reversal! Ah! As I ranked in the top 100 for the 2nd half, Kershaw is way above Greinke in terms of, well, everything. Greinke is also not a 1.30 ERA pitcher, but no one really is, except maybe Kershaw. Greinke is definitely a number one though; this isn’t all luck. He has a 8+ K/9, 1.4 BB/9 and 3.05 xFIP, which is essentially nice, aw sooky, nice. A “nice aw sooky” sandwich, if you will. Then there’s the fact that Greinke hasn’t allowed a run in 43 2/3 IP. Orel Hershiser doesn’t scoff at that, maybe he yawns, then does a small double take when no one is looking. Anyway, here’s what else I saw this weekend in fantasy baseball:
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I sat down Friday night and started watching Shark Tank for the first time. Wow, have I been missing out on a beautiful reality show. No B.S., I have been binge watching it all weekend. I know, I know, Grey has been pimping this reality masterpiece for years. Grey, you were right and I won’t doubt your reality lotharioness ever again. This show got me thinking about how I choose my creeper and how in some ways that I am the shark. I’m looking at numbers and schedules every week to buy the creeper. Based on the arguments in my head, I choose my player to invest in. Pretty easy. Now, what would you guys… and girls think of this new concept I thought of yesterday while chatting with Grey? Each week next season, instead of one contributor picking a creeper, we have several contributors each make one sell for a creeper? Take all those sells and combine them into one post and you peeps can decide what creeper you believe in. Just a thought.
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Even with the break thanks to All-Star festivities, injuries happen, and thus, Ambulance Chasers happens. The majority of today’s blurbs are positive, which is rare for the Ambulance Chasers. Three cheers for mostly good news! For even more good news, we here at Razzball have partnered up with The Infirmary Report to showcase their lovely and comprehensive spreadsheet of injuries. You can find the full spreadsheet from The Infirmary Report below the player blurbs.
Francisco Liriano, Pirates: The southpaw was a late scratch from yesterday’s schedule start with the team citing neck tightness. The Bucs announced Vance Worley would take Liriano’s start less than an hour before game time, though no word on whether or not Worley will take Liriano’s rotation spot if need be.
Please, blog, may I have some more?We’re living in an incredibly scary time. Bill Cosby is a villain, Donald Trump is running for president, and people are playing the “Boys Are Back In Town Again” back to back to back until bars riot. This is the sort of chaos that invades our daily lives and can make just keep, keeping on impossible. Fear not noble reader, DraftKings is here to take over your mundane, meaningless, and sad life. You will now have purpose, and that purpose is to win money from your wealth of useless fantasy sports knowledge. Haha, laugh no longer single long term girlfriend and wildly successful older brother, for I am Ralph, King of Drafts! Sorry guys I smoked way too much nutmeg and now I can’t seem to write anything remotely coherent. Hey give me a break, you spend your Saturday nights playing Call of Duty with your roommates and smoking from your penis shaped pipe. I, on the other hand, sort through pages of stats to find you the days best plays while mixing in a little BBW porn viewing when I need a break. So you should take my word for it when I tell you to start Chris Sale. Or that big girls can be sexy. I mean it takes genuine fantasy knowledge and superior intellect to identify these things. It’s not like Sale leads the world in K/9 or anything. It’s also certainly not true that K’s are by far the most important requirement for a DFS starter besides not giving up 10 runs in an innings and a third. Sale costs $13,100 so your going to have to make sacrifices but you know what they say about sacrifices. Actually I don’t know what they say so if you figure it out, please share. We have a comments section for such things. I’ll just be here keeping busy with Randy Widettes 7.
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Every other week Razzball ranks the prospects closest to contributing to your fantasy roster. The list is limited to players who still have rookie eligibility (less than 130 at bats or 50 innings pitched) and who are currently in the minor leagues. It’s not a list based on talent alone, but rather it’s a mixture of talent and opportunity. It will change frequently over the course of the season as prospects graduate to the majors, injuries occur, or service time roadblocks are passed. Here are the top 15 prospects on the cusp of the major leagues for 2015 fantasy baseball…
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Two Start Pitchers, Week 16: Pounding On The Lunch Table
July 18, 2015 | Two Start Fantasy Starters | 31 Commentsby: Geoff
Growing up everyone had their favorite school lunch. Didn’t matter if your Mom packed you one or if you paid Bertha $1.25 for the crap they served on the foam divided plate. Everybody had a favorite. Maybe you were a lima beans and ravioli guy, a P,B, and J-er, did you crush fluffernutters like a boss? Or did you wait all week for pizza on Friday? I had several favorites and they evolved as I got older, I’m sure that’s the same for you too. So this week we compare pitchers to some of my favorite brown bag meals. Excuse me while I go heat up some Dino-shaped chix nuggets. Yummmm weird chicken type meat smoothered in sweet baby rays….Yummmmmm. So anyway we’re all starving for some fantasy baseball coming out of the break, and what better way to ring in the second half than a little elementary school nostalgia? Two Start Pitchers week 16 gentlemen and four LADIES.
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The Cubs have recalled super catching prospect Kyle Schwarber to split catching duties while Miguel Montero is out for the next six weeks. Kyle was 3-for-4 with a run scored Friday night. We know the Cubs have a crazy amount of young talent on their roster, but Schwarber could be the final piece. I’ve seen enough baseball movies to know the hot-shot catching phenom usually comes in half way through the season to unite a bunch of ragtag misfits and lead them to victory, even though the owner wants to move them to Albuquerque. Schwarber is likely no exception. In a brief call up in June to serve as DH, Kyle slashed .364/.391/.591 with a homer and 6 RBI in 22 at bats (6 games). Extrapolate that! Let’s see…6 over 22 is equal to, carry the 1, cross-multiply, take the cosine and divide by zero…87 home runs! Whoa! Even I underestimated Schwarber’s ceiling, I guess! Or perhaps my math is off? Regardless, Schwarber is an immediate add in all leagues. In the minors, between AA and AAA he combined to hit .323/.430/.591 with 16 homers and 49 RBI. Prospector Mike ranked Kyle 7th on his Midseason Top 50 Prospects list, and Grey told you to BUY. Seventh is in the top 10 you guys. That’s right, more math. I’m just saying there is some serious upside here and Kyle Schwarber could be the biggest and smartest pick up you make all season. Now bring on the catcher questions!
Here’s what else I saw in fantasy baseball Friday night:
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I continue to standby the fact that spending the most money on pitchers is the smartest strategy in DraftKings. It’s not necessarily the safest, because your pricey pitcher could get lit up on any given day. It’s no secret that DraftKings has priced pitchers higher than any other position. It pretty much forces you to pay the price for a pitcher, unless you catch one on a day where a highly touted prospect gets his first opportunity in the big leagues. At this point, I’m sure we’ve all tried different strategies, and got various results. Clayton Kershaw is $14,000 today. That number is correct, and not an error. At first glance, I wasn’t sure how anyone would fit Kershaw into their lineup at this price, but he’s back to being the dominant pitcher like last year. He’s had 9 straight Quality Starts, and 87 strikeouts during that streak. I might be one of few to pick Kershaw in a big ‘Guaranteed’ entry, as it is very easy to scroll down past the most expensive player. Kershaw and the Dodgers are on the road against the Nationals, which should shy away your fantasy opponents.
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.
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Greetings! Hmmm, it seems I’m leaving the good ole U.S. of A on Tuesday to go fishing, and I somehow just realized I don’t get internet reception where I’m headed. Ain’t that bout a be-yatch! I’m not fond of leaving my readers “hanging” as I prefer you all erect… err, anyway, your flaccidness shan’t be a problem, for I’m leaving you with a short post with my second half predictions. Oh, you think yourself to me more intelligent than the Elder Gods and myself, do you? Oh-hoho! Well, I’ll be your huckleberry. Leave all predictions in the comment section, but beware, the Elders seldom allow my defeat and are known to curse generations of my opposition’s families for centuries.
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With the first half now in the books, it’s time to take inventory on the OBP/OPS delights and surprises and forecast a bit for the second half.
Let’s start at the top with the undisputed OBP/OPS King of the first half of 2015, Bryce Harper. Harper has paced the league in both categories since late April and hasn’t looked back yet. Harper has a .464 OBP and a whopping 1.168 OPS. Only Miguel Cabrera and Paul Goldschmidt are really in the neighborhood with respect to either category. I do expect Harper’s blistering first half to be the best we’ll see from him. I don’t expect another 1.168 OPS going forward, but he should still wind up in the top spot or so in the season’s end, so don’t expect significant regression. Remember those commercials that showed Harper yucking it up next to the Bambino, in grainy, black and white? It seemed absurd at the time, and it still is, but Harper is at least holding up his end of the bargain when Sports Illustrated dubbed him “The Chosen One.” I’m all in on Harper for the second-half and in 2016 and beyond.
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Last week I put together comprehensive year-to-date, rest of season and end of season rankings for batters. Quite honestly I think it was the bees knees, but that’s just me tooting my own horn. Do bees even have knees? If you are in a points league and missed it, I highly recommend you check it out. And when I say I “highly” recommend it, that does not mean I ate pot brownies two hours before making said recommendation. I was just standing at the top of a 30-foot ladder.
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For many a year, it’s been well documented that Jorge De La Rosa was a bit of a homeschooler. Of course, that in and of itself isn’t something that would make a person curious; plenty of pitchers have road splits that make them look pedestrian. But Jorge is a Rocky and two things go with that. One, your bats are terrible away and two, your pitching is terrible at home but Jorge is not about that life. He’s had a ton of success at Coors Field which makes my call maybe seem odd given the context but Jorge is doing a bit of a reverse of his already seemingly reversed splits so far this year. Over 32.1 IP this year, Jorge has held his opponents to a 1.67 ERA to go along with 26 K. I know, those Ks don’t sound appealing but they just got a nice bump via the opponent in the Padres. Despite being a heavily righty lineup, San Diego boasts the highest K% against lefty pitchers in all of the MLB and they’re near the bottom in wRC+ and ISO against them to boot. Starting a road pitcher is never safe, of course, so I’m just recommending Of The Rose for tourneys only but there I could see putting him as your SP1 cuz you’re gonna get another cheap option from me below. Ooooh, foreshadowing! So lets not dawdle any longer. Here’s my hot takes for the start of the second half of the DK MLB slate…
New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 25 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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