John Lackey 3.29 ERA, 1.04 WHIP, 9.34 K/9 Prior to his implosion at Miami Lackey sported a 2.78 ERA and .98 WHIP. With the Mets rolling out its miserable offense that includes James Loney, Kelly Johnson and their rookie lead-off hitter Brandon Nimmo Lackey should have no problem managing his way to a win. | Wei-Yin Chen 5.00 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, 7.51 K/9 If you look at the season long stats you would run away from Chen, but dive deeper. Chen has had 63 at bats against him by Braves and they have managed a mere .206/.239/.366 slash line. He is a mild sleeper, can anyone really be a sleeper against the Braves, but worth taking the gamble as your second SP. |
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If you are a Red Sox fan or an avid fantasy baseball player who tracks prospects then you are likely familiar with Yoan Moncada. Moncada is a Cuban born 2nd baseman currently playing AA Portland for the Red Sox. As the number one prospect in Boston's organization there is a lot of optimism about what Moncada will do for the team's future. In Single-A this year Moncada played 61 games and had a .307/.427/.496 slash line with 36 stolen bases in 44 attempts. Now at Double-A he has played in seven games and has a .281/.281/.406 slash line with 1 stolen base in 1 attempt.
Nearly every analyst feels the future is bright for this 21 year old middle infielder, but when will his future with the big league club happen? I believe it should happen next year. With David Ortiz retiring at the end of the 2016 season Boston will have an opening at the DH spot that they haven't had in many years. In addition they have a first baseman who would be better as a DH in Manny Ramirez. My suggestion is this, after 2016 move Ramirez to DH. That opens up first base for Travis Shaw who currently plays third. With third open you could bring up Moncada and let him play there as scouts have said he can play second or third. Not only have you improved your defense by getting Ramirez off the field, but three fourths of the Red Sox infield would be 26 or younger. It is unlikely that Moncada starts 2017 with the big league club, but if the Red Sox are reading this they really should give it some thought. We are quickly closing in on the halfway point of the MLB season and All-Star voting is in full effect. By now we can start to see what fantasy players are likely to be busts and which are breakouts. It's important however to not only look at those out of nowhere players, but to also look at the fantasy all-stars. One consistent thing that I have found looking at site after site is that the majority of fantasy baseball analysts still put Bryce Harper ahead of Mike Trout and this baffles me to no end. What statistical numbers, ranking system or crystal ball do these analysts use to put Harper higher than Trout? So, I dug deeper. If we look at 2016 stats Harper has played in 73 games, Trout 76. Harper has 15 home runs, Trout 16. Harper is hitting .249, Trout .313. Harper has 43 RBIs, 43 Rs and 9 SBs, Trout has 52 RBIs, 53 Rs and 10 SBs. In fact the only category I saw that Trout was behind Harper in was walks and games suspended. Which makes me ask how can Harper be ranked ahead of Trout? Analysts will point out what an amazing year Harper had last year and I agree it was amazing, but that was last year and it was only one year. Have we forgotten that Trout has been pretty amazing every year he has been in the majors? Trout has a better three year batting average, better three year average home run total, and as a matter of fact a better walk, rbi and run average over the past three years. So, can there be any justification for ranking Bryce Harper ahead of Mike Trout? I will continue to be baffled by this, but I guess when rankings are purely based on an analyst's opinion then they don't actually need facts to back themselves up. If you have any answer to why Trout is behind Harper in most fantasy baseball rankings we would love to hear from you. With around 70 games already played in the baseball season the American League East is still very much up for grabs. All of the top three teams in the division have demonstrated powerful offenses and are all within 2.5 games of first. With all that being said we want to know who you think wins the AL East?
Recently I have seen some ridiculous tweets going around discussing the Angels trading Mike Trout. This isn't the first time this season that a Trout trade has been talked about in the media or on the internet. My question to those who are suggesting Trout should be traded is what is the best you can hope to get for him? In any trade involving Mike Trout you would expect to get back a number of top notch prospects or young talent that is already in the majors. That sounds great, but really what you are hoping with any prospect you get is that you can find a Mike Trout. So, if you already have the best all-around player in baseball, who is only 24 years old and you have him under team control until 2020 at a very team friendly salary why would you ever trade him. There is no prospect in baseball or player in the league that is going to even come close to matching Trout's talent. Maybe you get back two or three top rated prospects and maybe two of them make it in the majors, but can they replace Mike Trout? Trout is a once in a generation type player. A guy you can and should build your franchise around. Any team would be foolish to trade a star like Trout who is only going to get better over the next five years. I know that my common sense approach to this topic will not make sense to many of you out there, but this isn't fantasy baseball. This is real life and you don't trade away the face of your franchise for the next ten years hoping to get back some top prospects that may or may not make it in the big leagues. Could we please, once and for all, stop the Trout trade talk? If you disagree we would love to hear from you. Today the Colorado Rockies designated SS Jose Reyes for assignment. At 33 Reyes is an aging veteran and has seen his All-Star level play take a hit over the past few seasons. However, at the end of last season you would have been hard pressed to find someone who would acknowledge that on June 15th of 2016 that Reyes would be DFA’d. Where does Reyes go from here? An even better question may be, is Reyes going to be the first players to really pay for his off the field mistakes? Will the business that is MLB finally say enough is enough and let this still viable player find his way in to early retirement? Had rookie up and comer Trevor Story not been off to such a tremendous power outbreak would Reyes be manning the middle infield for Colorado? We will never know. What we do know though is that it appears Reyes’s time in Colorado is over, unless he finds his way on to their AAA roster. Is him being DFA’s a sign of the Rockies not tolerating his actions or just an easy way to side step the issue because Story is playing so well? In the next ten days we will know what Reyes’s short term future will be, but will we have a better understanding of MLB’s views on domestic violence as well? |
AuthorWe are avid baseball fans, both real life and fantasy, but in the end just a couple of guys arguing over baseball. If you enjoy our content then consider supporting our cause by clicking the donate butting below. Any amount helps us to keep our site going.
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