I’ve got an abundance of quality pitching in a head-to-head league that counts the following categories for starting pitchers: IP, W, L, CG, SHO, H, ER, BB, HBP, K, QS.
I’d really like to pick up Brett Anderson before he comes off the DL, but I’m not sure who to drop for him. (Dropping a hitter isn’t an option.) I’ve got:
Tim Lincecum
Ubaldo Jimenez
Zack Greinke
Ricky Romero
Francisco Liriano
Mat Latos
Tommy Hanson
John Ely
Steven Strasburg
Which of these would you consider dropping for Anderson? (Before you say Ely, take a look at his peripherals. Dude’s gonna be a star.) Obviously Lincecum, Jimenez, and Greinke are off the table; presumably Romero and Strasburg too. Latos? Hanson?
Is Ely even slated to start as an SP when he gets called up? There’s no use for RPs in your league, and you didn’t mention it being a keeper league. Cut him.
Ely is currently 3-1 after five starts with a 3.41 ERA, a 1.04 WHIP, and a K/BB ratio of 28 to 4. These numbers have come in the level above AAA…I forget what that one’s called.
(Oh, and three of those four walks – and five of his twelve total runs allowed – came in his first start.)
Fine. Just look at your league and settings. You’re in an H2H league. You have ELEVEN categories for pitching, 6 of which favor the SP, but only if you pick up a CG or SHO - otherwise it’s 5-4-2 in favor of [del]RPs[/del] not putting a single pitcher on your starting roster. Do you think Torre will ever let him sniff the 9th inning this season?
If you cut Hanson in any league that has more than two teams, you are an insane person, in my opinion. Anderson’s very good – all these guys are very good, obviously – but I think you would be a very remorseful buyer if it came to that.
Romero to me is the clear runt of the litter, especially if you’ve bought into Ely (which I wouldn’t, but hey). Lincecum, Ubaldo, Greinke, no discussion. Strasburg I wouldn’t remotely consider releasing from my sweaty eager hands. Speaking of peripherals, look at Latos. With Romero, at least you can point to an absurdly low HR/FB rate and overall HR%, and a little bit of luck on balls in play, and say he isn’t quite this good. I don’t think you can really say any of the others aren’t this good, and there’s good reason after an atrocious start in May to say Hanson’s better than some of his current numbers.
Of course, there’s also the question of whether you want to take the risk of adding Anderson for this year at any of these guys’ expenses, since he’s a stud 22 year old with an arm problem, but if it’s me I’m picking between Ely, Romero, and Anderson, and not thinking about touching any of the others.
My last post was probably too opaque (that’s what I get for trying to make a joke): Ely has already started five games this season for the Los Angeles Dodgers. The numbers I provided are his numbers with the Los Angeles Dodgers. As a starting pitcher. For the Los Angeles Dodgers.
…The Los Angeles Dodgers are in the major leagues.
Right - I checked before my last post to recheck that. You might want to go through my post again as well. I’m saying that unless an SP has a chance at a CG or SHO, he’s not going to provide much more to your roster. That precludes your league having an IP min or max for pitchers each week, of course. If there are none, you go 5-4-2 in the pitching cats by starting zero pitchers against a team that doesn’t manage to pick up a CG or SHO, and 5-5-1 against a team that just gets a CG and not a SHO.
If you think you can pull off a series of trades that rids your roster of your dominating SPs in exchange for filling up a ridiculous offense, it may be something to look at. (The best way to do it is get multiple teams to send YOU offers that you’ve put together/proposed, so that you can accept them all at the same time before anyone has a chance to withdraw the offer.)
Ah - well that totally changes it. I can probably guess pretty close as to what it comes down to (I’m in a non-H2H points league). I’m also guessing you want a limited bench of offense to maximize your starts each week as well…
Based on the assumption that, like my league, it boils down to Wins (and to a lesser extent, Quality Starts), I’d be looking to make a trade. I’d put 2 of Romero, Liriano, Hanson and Latos on the block for 1 other SP to make room. It’ll have to be a big upgrade, because I don’t think Anderson is a great fit for this league.
I would drop Ely without thinking too hard about it. Hanson is a fantastic young pitcher. Latos is a fantastic young pitcher who is slightly less far along but throws in pitcher heaven. Romero has been good long enough to prove that this isn’t a fluke. Ely has had a nice few weeks, but he doesn’t have the pedigree of these guys.
I want to purchase some Joey Votto insurance, so I’m making a deal for a first baseman. I have a taker, that would like to upgrade his shortstop position. I’ve got Jeter, Reyes, and Furcal for Billy Butler or Lance Berkman. I’m thinking that Reyes-for-Butler is the best thing I can do, although I lose out on stolen bases (if I spring another trade and gain a roster spot, I’m going to pick up stolen bases from free agency just to have it and win that category.)
I dunno. Reyes for Butler isn’t terrible, and Votto hasn’t been 100% healthy in the past. But if you’re willing to put a guy off the free agent on your roster to pick up SBs, why not just pick up a 1B off the market and keep Reyes?
I’ve got 3 shortstops. Ideally, I’d have liked to package Reyes and Jeter (or really any two of the three) to get a really good player, but that deal doesn’t seem to be out there.
Don’t trade just to trade. So you have 3 SSs. All that means is that the supply for everyone else is terrible. No one likes seeing a SS in the Util spot, but it’s not like it’s Mike Aviles in that slot. If anything, trade Furcal to someone who needs a SS backup for someone like Adam LaRoche or Garret Jones.
Fun fact: this is the second time I’ve traded Silva. I picked him up before he got good, played him for a few starts, used him in a trade, that person dropped him, I picked him up for his last start, and now I’m trading him again.