Horrible No Good Terrible Very Bad Decisions Part Deux

On Sunday I decided to bench Jermaine Dye this week. Dye had been fighting a nagging calf injury and had sat out two of the three games of the weekend series, plus Nolan Reimold was facing 5 lefties this week. Sadly, this decision did not work out well.

Reimold did all right, going 5/18 (.278) with a homerun, 3 RBI, and 5 runs. Dye had his best week of the season, hitting 12/24 with 3 homeruns, 6 RBI, and 5 runs. As if to rub it in, he also hit 4 doubles. During this week alone Dye raised his average from .268 to .287 and would have raised my team average a full two points from .274 to .276.

At least my pitching had a great week.

As a HNGTVBD bonus, here is Trevor Cahill's line while in and out of my lineup. Impressive, isn't it.

	IP	W	ERA	WHIP	K	K/9
Out of Lineup	50.67	4	3.38	1.28	30	5.33
In Lineup	30.67	1	5.87	1.60	13	3.81

Weekly Update June 28

I'm the big winner this week, although I could have done even better had I not benched Jermaine Dye. Tough weeks for Mark, Taylor, and Kate and Spencer's team shows some signs of life after his mammoth fire sale (although before said fire sale actually goes into effect).

Weekly Update		R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHIP	IP	Total Pts	Net Pts
1	Oh Balls!!!	35	5	34	8	0.001	3	2	52	-0.09	0	62.1	58	1
2	Mr Bill's Boppers	46	10	42	5	0.003	6	1	43	-0.03	-0.01	54.8	55	3.5
3	I Ain't Got My Taco	35	10	31	3	-0	1	5	33	-0.01	0.01	33.8	50	-0.5
4	Soap Box Yakkers	33	4	25	9	-0	3	2	40	0.09	0.02	46.9	48.5	-2.5
5	Smell The Glove	38	6	31	1	-0.001	3	4	32	0.04	0	39	45.5	-4.5
6	Soo Choo Train	32	7	34	6	-0.003	4	1	33	-0.03	-0.01	38.1	40.5	-2.5
7	The Chones	32	9	31	3	0.001	4	2	24	-0.15	-0.03	36.1	38	3
8	A-Roid's RagingRotos	32	4	29	5	-0.002	3	4	44	-0.14	-0.02	43.1	24.5	2.5

I've also included a chart showing the overall standings since I started keeping track of daily stats. The biggest 1 month gain has been 12 points for Andrew (49 on April 27 to 61 on May 27), 9.5 points for me (45.5 on May 27 to 55 on June 27) and 8.5 for Luke (26.5 on May 20 to 35 on June 20). Luke also gained 13.5 points over a shorter period of time (26.5 on May 20 to 40 on June 10) but unfortunately (for Luke at least) he proceeded to give back 7 of those points over the next week. While it will be harder to gain points later in the season, this should give hope for some potential punters. What won't is the fact that Andrew has been in first place since May 5th, when Taylor briefly tied him and Caleb got within 1 point on June 16th, but other than that he has been unchallenged. However, since his peak total of 64 on May 10 his overall score has slowly but steadily dropped.

Ouch, Mark.

DeRosa traded and Beltre out for 2 months, both on the same day? That'll put a solid dent in your CI situation.

Don't suppose you're interested in Mike Lowell...

trading waiver priorities

So, I may have asked about this before, but can we trade waiver wire priorities? If I remember right, Mark can set them manually. If he can, are people OK with this?

League change?

I thought about posting this under Andrew's post, but I decided it should get its own. Should we move the trading deadline to the end of July? It is currently August 23rd and that seems a little late for a keeper league. I think it should be a fairly hard decision whether or not to "dump" and give up on the season but with a deadline 5 weeks before the end of the season the league could be decided by who gets the most in dump trades.

From Hardball Times

"Mariners 4, Padres 3: Brandon Morrow the starter had his longest and best go of it yet (5 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 4K). Yuniesky Betancourt injured his hamstring and will be out for a while. The game story casts this a negative. I have this feeling some Mariners fans may not feel quite the same way."

Endy Chavez claims his revenge!

Possible change to keepers

I know that now is probably the worst time to bring this up, since it is mid season and a big trade has just gone down, but how would people feel about changing the keeper rules slightly? Right now, a player can be kept 3 times, and we have our increasing draft pick costs, and all that. I was thinking it would be cool if teams could have one single "face of the franchise" type player, with each team being allowed to keep one player indefinitely. I haven't given a whole lot of thought to it, but I think it would be cool to have players be associated with certain teams. Obviously, this could be really imbalancing, and I haven't looked at what this would mean for each individual team, but what do you all think?

One thing Bill just suggested is maybe inflation should be increased on franchise players, so that way if you do want to keep a player for a long time, you'll have to pay for it. Also, a special thanks goes out to Spencer, for seeding this idea by suggesting I look in to ways to keep Longoria forever!

Edit: I bolded my edits to make it clearer that this would only be for one player

CI or Util Anyone?

After this trade with Spencer I have a bit of a surplus at CI and at Util. So either Hafner or Ortiz is available, as well as either Lowell, Rolen, or Overbay. I'm looking for an MI and/or an OF, but I'm open to other possibilities as well.

I'll Kick It Off

Alright, well I'll kick off the trade analysis from my perspective only. As I surveyed the league it became immediately clear that people only wanted 4 players from me really: Teix, Felix, Damon, and Rivera, with most of the focus on Teix and Felix. So it was going to be tough for me to pull of multiple trades.

I view this trade as high risk / high reward for me. Cruz, Hill, and Quentin are all late round keepers with at least 2 years more of keepability, which was big for me (I was looking at some other offers with players who could only be kept one more year, so I like the long-term potential here). That said, they all have question marks - Cruz, regarding average and whether he can do this for a full season, Hill regarding injuries and again, putting it together for a full season, and Quentin with injuries.

2011 will be an interesting year in the league as tons of the best players will come off the books. If this trade pans out and Cruz and Quentin mash next year and I have them in the late teens round-wise, I should be in great shape for that year. I had better trades in terms of next year, but I like this long-term wise for me.

Anyway, I don't have much else to trade so for now I'll go quiet. If Smoltz, Liriano, or Chamberlain start to heat up or anyone has an interest in Aaron Hill or A-rod, they'd be the two keepers that I'd still look to upgrade.

So no trade analysis

on the Andrew/Caleb move? I personally like to for Caleb as he got the best player in the deal (Rios), the only keeper, and Wood seems to be shitting the bed quite regularly.

I think I have a new favorite player

Clay Zavada

Rest in peace Endy Chavez (tag)

This is what happens when you cut Yuniesky Betancourt. He is prone to pouting and complaining to the media when he gets benched, so acting out when he was cut from the league leading "Oh Balls!!!!" was unsurprising. Andrew, you should consider yourself lucky that he just took out Endy Chavez' ACL rather than your own, but somehow I think he knew about the Endy Chavez tag and how much joy you would lose when you can't use it for the rest of the season. Who knew that Yuniesky could harm you even when he was off your team.

The Market is Open

Well, I was hoping to at least make it to the mid-way point of the season before tanking it but the weekly updates have made it clear that while I'm no longer falling further behind in the offensive categories, I ain't making up any ground either. So with that in mind, dumping season is officially open.

For those short of patience, here are some of the players that might look good on YOUR team, for the price of a mere keeper :)

Mark Teixiera
Kevin Youkilis
Alex Rodriguez
Johnny Damon
Felix Hernandez
Mariano Rivera
George Sherill
Joba Chamberlain
John Smoltz
Rick Porcello

Anyone and everyone is available, so shoot me an e-mail and let dumping season begin.

Spencer is breaking the rules!

I thought we decided that Podsednik was ineligible? Perhaps we need to have a master list of players that can't be picked up?

This league needs more trading.

In the aftermath of my trade with Andrew, I'm in possession of a bit of a starting pitching and outfielder surplus. I'm looking to trade from one or both of these positions, preferably for a CI with power, but would also consider MIs or catchers (my roster is pretty flexible). Anyone is on the table. I might make a few offers in the next day or two, but let me know if you have any ideas.

Weekly Update, June 21

Mark is the big gainer this week and 2nd to 5th has become extremely tight with only 1.5 points separating my team from Taylor's coming into today. Taylor is really starting to lag behind in inning pitched though.

Rank	Team	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHIP	IP	Total Pts	Net Pts
1	Oh Balls!!!	37	13	35	8	-0.004	1	3	43	0.01	0.01	35	57	-1
2	Mr Bill's Boppers	32	11	37	12	0.001	4	2	47	-0.14	-0.02	49.1	51.5	1.5
3	Soap Box Yakkers	34	13	36	10	-0	3	6	39	-0.16	-0.05	53	51	3.5
4	I Ain't Got My Taco	35	12	25	3	-0	4	1	33	0	-0.01	53	50.5	-2
5	Smell The Glove	38	13	36	0	0.001	3	1	19	-0.05	0	23	50	1
6	Soo Choo Train	36	7	27	6	0.002	1	0	23	-0.12	0.01	37.1	43	-1.5
7	The Chones	31	4	28	7	-0.002	6	3	48	-0.06	-0.03	48.8	35	-0.5
8	A-Roid's RagingRotos	30	10	36	3	-0.001	2	3	24	-0.16	-0.02	33.9	22	-1

Let the record show...

...that Caleb once offered me Zobrist for Andy Sonnastine, which I promptly turned down.

Awesome.

Look out!

I'm inching up in HR! I might, just might manage to not be in last place for homers. Mr Bill, with your amazing spreadsheet can you tell me when that last was, or does your spreadsheet not go back that far?

Weekly update

Here is the weekly update for June 14th. I continue to slowly bleed points, while Caleb, Bill, Taylor, and Mark keep trading points. all in all it was a big week offensively for most everyone, with all but 2 teams hitting double digit HRs, and all the teams except one plating 30+ runs. Also, my SB lead is getting a little gaudy.

Weekly Update		R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHIP	IP	Total Pts	Net Pts
1	Oh Balls!!!	28	12	35	12	-0	2	1	27	0.02	0.01	35.1	58	-1
2	I Ain't Got My Taco	39	12	32	4	0	2	4	32	0.08	0.02	52	52.5	-2.5
3	Smell The Glove	32	12	39	2	0.001	3	7	33	-0.06	-0.01	37.1	50	-1
4	Mr Bill's Boppers	32	7	29	7	-0.01	4	0	38	0.12	0	45	49	0.5
5	Soap Box Yakkers	38	10	32	4	0.001	2	4	32	-0.09	0	40.9	47.5	2.5
6	Soo Choo Train	42	15	48	3	0	2	0	31	-0.13	-0.03	38	44.5	2
7	The Chones	38	7	24	5	-0	4	0	43	0.16	0.02	45	35.5	0.5
8	A-Roid's RagingRotos	28	10	30	3	-0	3	3	33	0.03	0	48	23	-1

Now you're living the high life

With Sean Rodriguez up, I now have three Angels middle infielders in the bigs! I'm living the high life, baby!

And as much as Julio Lug sucks...

He's still better off than Yuniesky. Yuniesky was just "benched for cause," which is apparently a three word term for sucking. Sucking, really, really ,really REALLY, hard. With all the issues the Sox have at SS, at least they don't have Yuniesky Betancourt.

Julio Lugo's warped perception of reality (and the rantings of an angry, angry man)

http://boston.redsox.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090606&content_id=5178644&vkey=news_bos&fext=.jsp&c_id=bos

Julio Lugo says his leg is fine and he's sick of being asked questions about it. He also doesn't understand why he is being platooned. Julio Lugo has an EQA of 240, an OPS of 671, nearly 18% of his flyballs are infield flies. His FRAA is -4 (in 26 games, or -23 runs/150 games), and his UZR is -5.3 (-34/150 games). Plus, he looks absolutely totally fucking terrible out there. He's cost the Red Sox about 10 runs (between offense and defense, in limited playing time) over the course of 26 games.

The Sox have scored 300 runs in 57 games, or about 5.3/game. If you factor in Julio's sterling -5 BRAA, he has single handedly, in those 26 games (sometimes when he barely even played!), reduced the Sox overall output by about 5% compared to the average SS. On defense, it's not much better. The Sox have allowed 257 over 57 games, and Julio's ineptness have cost the Sox something in the neighborhood of 5% of their runs allowed. Incedentally, for those of you watching Penny's start against the Rangers, they all could have come during that game. Also, it's a bad sign when your first "highlight" video on your MLB page has the title "Lugo fails to turn two." Basically, everything- two different defensive metrics, his offensive work to date (which doesn't seem to be negatively impacted by luck), and our horribly, horribly biased eyes tell us that Julio Lugo is fucking toast. He's toast that's so burned it's not even toast anymore. It's just a loose collection of carbon atoms that's barely held together in a vague toast shape. And after all this, he has the gall to wonder why he's being platooned? As opposed to what, taking him out back and shooting him?

I'm sure that there are all kinds of similar statistical arguments that could be made about Ortiz, but at least with Big Papi there is the hope that he'll return to previous form and be a solid hitter. Julio was hardly ever a solid hitter, and the defense, where he was always somewhat prone to errors, has fallen off a fucking cliff.

PS- the attached image is the very first result from the google image search "Julio Lugo sucks." I found it quite fitting.

Dump trades

So, do we have any "rules" as far as dump trades go? Obviously they are a part of any keeper league (and are the reason that my offense doesn't quite look like Spencer's), but if wehave some sort of system I think it would help. What do people think about a team either posting to the blog or sending out an email when they are looking to dump, and maybe have no trades made until a week after that? That way, everyone can have a chance to get in touch with the dumper and try to work out a deal.

Podsednik

Not that I'm this desperate or anything, but is Podsednik eligible for our league? Looks like he was dropped by the Rockies on March 31, and added by the White Sox on April 15. I'm guessing he's not eligible, but maybe my understanding of the rules is wrong.

Weekly Update June 7

Lots of movement in the standings this week. Caleb and I are the big winners this week, gaining 3.5 and 5 points respectively. Andrew and Taylor are the big losers, giving up 2 and 3.5 points respectively.

Weekly Update		R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	W	SV	K	ERA	WHIP	IP	Total Pts	Net Pts
1	Oh Balls!!!	28	4	13	9	0.000	3	3	38	-0.19	-0.04	32.9	59	-2
2	I Ain't Got My Taco	39	11	40	5	0.000	5	1	44	-0.03	-0.03	46.1	55	3.5
3	Mr Bill's Boppers	32	10	37	5	-0.004	4	0	44	-0.16	-0.02	55.9	51	5
4	Smell The Glove	23	9	27	1	-0.004	2	4	38	0.1	0.01	38	48.5	-3.5
5	Soap Box Yakkers	33	8	33	7	0.000	2	2	39	-0.13	0	61.1	45	-2
6	Soo Choo Train	26	3	24	7	-0.005	2	0	35	-0.06	-0.04	33.9	42.5	-2
7	The Chones	38	8	37	4	-0.001	4	2	52	-0.18	-0.02	52	35	1.5
8	A-Roid's RagingRotos	34	11	38	4	-0.002	1	3	28	-0.09	0	36	24	-0.5

Depressing

I was poking around on hit tracker online (hittrackeronline.com) and looking at various homerun distances and paths, when I came across this depressing tidbit. David Ortiz is 2nd in the AL in "lucky" homeruns - a home run that would not have cleared the fence on a calm 70 degree day. These can be influenced by parks though - so a lucky home run in Petco can still be a massive home run. Sadly, that isn't the case for Ortiz. His home run tonight (part of a "big" game, according to the broadcasters - 2/3 with a solo home run) hit the Pesky Pole. It would only have been a home run at Fenway Park and traveled a depressing 311 feet. His first homerun, also hit at home, was to center field, but was aided by a strong tailwind that added 16 feet of distance. On a calm, 70 degree day that ball would have been a homerun in 0 of the 30 major league ballparks. The nice cherry on top to his inability to drive major league pitching is that he hasn't pulled a single double at home this year. The 7 doubles that he has hit at Fenway have all been off the Monster or in the left field gap. And it isn't as if he's hitting balls that are getting caught in the large right field. Ortiz has hit no balls to RF over 300 ft that became an out. He has hit two over 350 - one to right center and the other to left center. Although the Sox are still leading the AL East, at some point you have to wonder if they'll make a move for another bat, or upgrade shortstop by adding someone like JJ Hardy.

Who would you rather have?

	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG
A	52	4	25	13	0.239
B	46	3	44	12	0.258
C	42	15	44	11	0.281

I think it is pretty obvious that the player to have is player C, who has a much better batting average and has hit 4 times as many homeruns. The interesting part is that player A is the combined contribution of Spencer's middle infielders (a mix of playing time for Alexei Casilla, Chris Getz, Alberto Callaspo, Julio Lugo, Howie Kendrick, Maicer Izturis, and Adam Kennedy), player B is the combined contribution of Andrew's middle infielders (Akinori Iwamura, Mike Aviles, Maicer Izturis, Chris Getz, Erick Aybar, and Yuniesky Betancourt), and player C is Ian Kinsler.

Looking at the above numbers, it is amazing that Andrew has remained in first place despite the pathetic output from his middle infielders.

Edit: I also wanted to mention that Andrew was the first person to bring it up, so I'm not an asshole, he's a masochist.

Gordon Beckham

has made 3 outs on 3 pitches tonight. He's a true White Sox now.

Also, Pavano went 9 scoreless, 6 Ks.

These two things maaay be related.

Translate YOUR You Throw Like A Girl Skills into COLD HARD CASH

Date Posted: May 8, 2009Job Title: Fantasy Baseball WriterJob Type: full
Job Description:MLB Advanced Media, L.P. (MLBAM) is the interactive media and Internet Company of Major League Baseball. MLBAM manages the official league site, www.MLB.com, each of the 30 individual club sites, and is the most comprehensive Major League Baseball resource on the Internet. We are looking for a part-time fantasy baseball expert to post breaking news and notes on nights and weekends. If interested, please send resume to jlc@mlb.com with 'Fantasy Writer' in the subject line. No phone calls, please. Requirements:-A flexible schedule is required -Journalism experience and command of AP style are major pluses -Must be able to work in a team environment and have strong multitasking skills Contact Information:Email: jlc@mlb.com

BIG NEWS!

LF Delmon Young came inches away from his third extra-base hit of the season Wednesday, but the ball landed just foul down the right field line. Young returned to the plate and struck out looking -- his 40th whiff of the season, with No. 41 following to end the game. He's now batting .231 this season.

So, Bill

Did you see a Jered Weaver breakout coming are are you just obscenely lucky?

Where is FJM When you Need Them?

Jim Leyland on Curtis Granderson's boost in homeruns and corresponding drop in doubles and triples:

"Instant runs are huge, but I don't want him trying to hit home runs."

Something in the Way

This is totally non baseball related, but does have Endy Chavez relevance: Does anyone else find "something in the way", the final song on Nevermind, a complete and total let-down? Like you WANT it to be this phenomenal closing song with a softer tone (like, say, "where did you sleep last night" from unplugged) but instead it's just kind of OK and there's no great melody and it's kind of boring. It's like the Endy Chavez of closing album songs.

Maybe the league is a little too deep

Fangraphs has a nice feature where you can look at the leaders in terms of batting runs, fielding runs, and marginal value. The guys topping the list for the AL aren't very surprising - Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Evan Longoria, Jason Bay, and Kevin Youkilis. The guys at the bottom of the list are a bit more depressing.

David Ortiz, for example, has been worth -$5.2 million to the Red Sox and is just outdone by Delmon Young's -$5.4 million. Including defense, Delmon Young may very well be the worst regular in all of major league baseball. The table below is sorted by batting runs above replacement (or, in the case below replacement). Note that due to positional adjustments and defense the worst hitters aren't necessarily the least valuable players.

Of the 20 worst offensive players in the AL, 17 are owned in are league and one was drafted and later cut (Punto). 15 of these 17 players are starters, 5 were keepers (but may not be for very much longer), and 2 were drafted within the first 3 rounds of the draft. I "lead" the way with two horribly underperforming keepers.

Rank	Name	Team	Batting	Fielding	Replacement	Dollars	Status
1	Orlando Cabrera	Athletics	-14.6	-2.4	7.4	($3.20)	Starter
2	David Ortiz	Red Sox	-13.7		6.9	($5.20)	Starter
3	Mike Aviles	Royals	-13.4	-1.3	4.2	($4.00)	DL, starter
4	Adrian Beltre	Mariners	-12.5	9.3	7.3	$2.10	Starter
5	Dioner Navarro	Rays	-12.3		5.4	($1.70)	Starter
6	Jose Lopez	Mariners	-11.4	-2.9	6.9	($3.10)	Keeper
7	Alexi Casilla	Twins	-10.9	-0.9	3.4	($3.50)	Owned
8	Nick Punto	Twins	-10.2	-0.3	5	($1.50)	DL, Free Agent
9	Ty Wigginton	Orioles	-9	-1.1	5.1	($2.90)	Owned
10	Josh Fields	White Sox	-9	-6.1	6.2	($3.70)	Starter
11	Rob Johnson	Mariners	-8.4		3.1	($1.40)	Free Agent
12	B.J. Upton	Rays	-8.4	3.2	7.1	$1.10	Keeper
13	Carlos Guillen	Tigers	-8.1	-1.3	3.4	($3.50)	Keeper
14	Delmon Young	Twins	-7.7	-6.7	3.9	($5.40)	Starter
15	Howie Kendrick	Angels	-7.5	5.1	5.7	$1.80	Starter
16	Placido Polanco	Tigers	-7.5	7.7	6.8	$3.40	Starter
17	Alexei Ramirez	White Sox	-7.4	3.7	6.2	$2.10	Keeper
18	Brent Lillibridge	White Sox	-7.3	-1.6	2.6	($2.60)	Free Agent
19	Yuniesky Betancourt	Mariners	-7	-9.7	6.1	($3.70)	Starter
20	Chris Davis	Rangers	-6.9	2.8	5.9	($0.80)	Keeper