Edwards Kings Weekly Blog

[Edwards Kings]

And Homer Bailey gives up two earned runs in 6 1/3 with six K's. Marshall comes in for the 9th with a two run lead. He set down the Giants just yesterday on nine pitches. He only has to face the bottom of the Giant line-up, gives up a walk, a hit, gets an out, then serves up a three-run tater to Angel Pagan, who up until this point of the year was batting 0.230 and 0.188 against left handers. I was following this and I just knew this was going to happen. And the beat goes on...

[Glenneration X]

Ummm could be worse Wayne. You could be the Marshall owner in the league.

[Edwards Kings]

Ummm could be worse Wayne. You could be the Marshall owner in the league.

So it is YOUR fault...

Sorry about the Marshall blow-up, dude. No lead is safe this year.

[DOUGHBOYS]

Ummm could be worse Wayne. You could be the Marshall owner in the league.

Or the owner of those pants.....

[gpchurchill]

Ummm could be worse Wayne. You could be the Marshall owner in the league.

Or the owner of those pants.....

if i wear those pants, can i get into the pair facing?

[Edwards Kings]

Ummm could be worse Wayne. You could be the Marshall owner in the league.

Or the owner of those pants.....

if i wear those pants, can i get into the pair facing?

Yes. That is about all it takes. May as well go ahead and plan your post-coitus visit visit to Dr. Drippy!

[redsfaithful]

And Homer Bailey gives up two earned runs in 6 1/3 with six K's. Marshall comes in for the 9th with a two run lead. He set down the Giants just yesterday on nine pitches. He only has to face the bottom of the Giant line-up, gives up a walk, a hit, gets an out, then serves up a three-run tater to Angel Pagan, who up until this point of the year was batting 0.230 and 0.188 against left handers.

The best part was the HR pretty clearly came on strike 4.

[Edwards Kings]

Week Four Results – Another week, another mid-pack set of results. Now I am falling behind in my targets. Not by so much as to freak, but I need a good week. I am eight or nine homeruns down (only had six last week and no one had more than one), down a handful of Runs and RBI’s, and my BA is a dozen or so hits off. The only offensive stat I am at par with is SB, though I may have to change that target. I had targeted a fraction over six SB per week and that is what I am getting. I am not far off the mark in my league with 22 YTD, but this is only good enough to be close to the top third in total points in the overall. Starlin Castro has continued to be the man here and already has 10 SB.

My offense was seriously hampered this week by Huff (whom I started the first half of the week as SF had five games scheduled) and Delmon Young (who cannot hold his liquor or his tongue). In essence, I was down one player all week. I still managed 282 AB this week, which is not too bad considering. Maybe I should change my team name to that…”Not Too Bad Considering”!

I continue to whine about wins. I had nine starts last week, two had bad results, one had poor results, and six were great though it netted me only two wins. In two weeks with 21 starts, that is only three total wins. There are only about fifty teams doing as bad or worse than I am. Unless the pendulum swings way back past the mean, this will be an issue I will have difficulty resolving.

Saves also continue to be an issue, though Axford did get me three last week. No relief is in sight for a long-term solution to the second (or third) closer. I have successfully (and hopefully not foolishly) resisted paying hundreds for low-impact closer “rentals”. The six saves I have YTD leave me in the third division.

What is strange about my starting pitching in general is I am getting the strike-outs (90% ratio to innings pitched with 66 K’s this week alone) with good control (nearly 3:1 K to BB ratio). A handful of blow-ups has my ERA up by a half run or so, but this can be (crossing fingers) brought down over a relatively short period of time. My WHIP is huge as my team has literally been singled to death. Josh Johnson is the primary culprit, but Nova and Blanton have stung me as well in the early going. In short, only my strikeouts are even close to my targets as we close out April. Down in four categories is not death to my season this early, but I know I cannot under perform for much longer and have any real expectations of competing.

Week 5 FAAB – There was really only one player I wanted this week. I am always on the lookout for guys with long-term prospects for full-time AB, as opposed to platoon goons and bench-meat. This guy is young and has struggled in the early going to the point that a very savvy NFBC veteran cut him last week. And he plays in Petco batting left-handed. Despite all that, I believe that Yonder Alonso is a hitter, especially if a right-handed pitcher is on the mound. When Quentin comes back, he may lose some AB against left-handed pitchers, but there just are not that many mostly full-time batters who MAY be able to have an impact. I dropped Huff and won Alonso with a $51 bid ($38 was the runner up). When Delmon Young comes back (soon hopefully), I will have my choice of Alonso or Seth Smith (talk about your platoon goons) as my Utility. I also placed a token bid on the closer-du-jour Downs, but knew I would not get him (bought for $326 by someone whom I have competed against before and whose opinion I respect which means I am obviously missing something).

Week 5 Planning – On offense, I am benching Young for the first half unless I hear he is going to play. They say the decision might come Tuesday, so the most games I could miss of his time is two. Alonso will take his spot. On the bench I also have Beckham (who just ain’t getting it done) and Plouffe, who has seen some regular AB while Parmelee was hurt. Outside of his first HR, Trevor hasn’t been much to look at. I am not sure how long I can continue to carry these splinter-monkeys.

Pitching is a little more interesting. I will start eight again with one coming from Dempster (expected to start in Cincinnati), Masterson (at the White Sox), or Nova (versus Baltimore). Great American is not the best place to wonder if a pitcher is going to be rusty the first time back from the DL (though Dempster has been awesome so far this year). Masterson has not put up K’s at near the rate the others have and has walked just about as many batters as he struck out. Nova got tagged last time but has owned Baltimore in the past. I think I will stay with Nova despite his bad last start.

I noted that a few people are starting to pick up Joaqun Benoit given Valverde’s issues (seven walks and eleven hits in less than ten IP). I am not sure how much longer Detroit will stick with Valverde being in a virtual tie with power-houses Cleveland and Chicago. I hope Leyland makes a change sooner rather than later. More closer blow-ups as well could help Brett Myers out of Houston. There are no good options in Houston, but David Carpenter, such that he is, may be one of them and I am going to sit on him for at least another week.

There is an old saying “You cannot tell which way the train went by looking at the track.” Though I know this is true, I feel that I was caught looking down trying to figure it out when the NFBC Express ran over my head as it passed me by. I can still catch it at the next turn if my team actually starts playing well now.

No, I'm not in denial. I'm just selective about the reality I choose to accept.

[Edwards Kings]

A WIN! Holy Crap! A WIN!

Three hit shut out by Blanton. Only owned in 28% of the leagues. Only started this week in 13%. Once in a great while you actually CAN make the right call.

[751542]

A WIN! Holy Crap! A WIN!

Three hit shut out by Blanton. Only owned in 28% of the leagues. Only started this week in 13%. Once in a great while you actually CAN make the right call.

congrats!

[Edwards Kings]

Another mediocre to poor week. My team is dropping like a cheap pair of socks.

And right now I do not care. I was going to write my usual bitching blog, but an event occurred last week that reminded me again that this is for fun only and I have been taking it too serious, it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things, and no matter what has happened in the past, you cannot fix it but only look forward and doing the best you can. You see, a boy died sometime late last Thursday night or Friday morning. He was not related to me, but I knew him since he was about a kindergartener as he and his family live two doors down. And I say boy, which is how you sometimes represent people in your mind when you see them grow up. He used to cut my grass. Was always the kid with a cast on something because he was also the one always to say “hey guys, watch me do this!”

He was 24 or so when he died. About a decade or so ago, he starting visiting the foul-up-fairy on a regular basis. He was kicked out of our local high school permanently on his first day of his freshman year because his was in possession of distributable amounts of drugs and was high. From then on he never seemed to have his head on straight to me. Got into vandalism, booze, more drugs, and jail time. In and out of schools made available to him. After he passed high school age, he was in and out of his Dad’s house (a guy I played tennis with) down the street. I didn’t like it when he was around as the traffic of his “friends” stopping by for cash transactions was obvious. Lately he has been on his own again. Last Thursday, his Dad picked him up so he could take him to the dentist Friday morning. Before leaving for school, his little sister (my daughters age) went to say good bye and found this boy gone cold. The neighborhood tongues are wagging as to probable cause and I have my own suspicions, but in the end, the final cause doesn’t matter. I am sad for my friend and his family and of course the boy himself. And I am mad at the boy. Waste. Just a damn waste of a life. He paid in full for his mistakes, but my guess is that 90% of the world will never have the opportunities he had.

So anyway, forgive my downer post. I am just in a somber mood right now. We will pick up where we left off next week as we do as we all must do and move on. Thanks for listening.

[751542]

sorry to read wayne, a somber post but sometimes we need reminders how fleeting life can be!

[Edwards Kings]

Back to baseball.

Heaven help me, I have five pitchers going tonight. Talk about your high anxiety!

[Cocktails and Dreams]

Nice looks like I will be falling back into 12th place in that league. That is quite a squad I drafted. Just an awful club. Good luck with the pitching tonight. Make your move.

[Edwards Kings]

Nice looks like I will be falling back into 12th place in that league. That is quite a squad I drafted. Just an awful club. Good luck with the pitching tonight. Make your move.

I don't know Chad. Between the two of us, it could be quite a race for "Best Towel Boy - Third Division"!

Is it too late to say it is still early?

[Edwards Kings]

More griping about wins. Year to date, I am winning only 20% of games started. From Period 3 onwards to date, I have five wins in 36 games started, or 14%. Considering about 2/3 of those starts had my pitchers giving up 3 earned runs or less, the 14% is simply an amazing statistic. And I have no way to fight it.

More griping about injuries. Juan Rivera is my latest DL darling. He is not one of my team anchors by any means, but on the heels of Longoria and Werth, not to mention Rueben Tejada, he is not easily replaced. Tejada is off my team and I have replaced him with Beckham, whom I drafted and has shown small signs of life. Tyler Greene now becomes my reserve MI spot (I picked him up last week for $8). I moved Headley from CI to 3B for Longoria (far from an even swap) and placed Yonder Alonso into that spot. Seth Smith moves from Utility to OF for Werth, another downgrade as this part-timer is not liking the AL West. Conor Gillaspie, whom I picked up last week in a purely speculative move, becomes my Utility. Last week, he was playing every day. This week, not so much. And my other speculative player, Trevor Plouffe, whom I drafted slides into Rivera’s OF spot. He is actually seeing some playing time with Morneau down and Valencia demoted, but more is not full time. My outfield, not a strength this year, is very much weakened by having Plouffe and Smith as starters. Greene is my only healthy bench bat and with Werth out for three months, Jason will have to be dropped as I go in search of a healthy bat, preferably getting full time AB. Not looking good.

As my team continues to dive due (in my mind at least) to injuries and bad luck, I decided to look back on my FA performance so far. I have purchased 10 ball players for just over $200, three of whom I picked up last week and three more are still on my roster:

Tyler Greene
Conor Gillaspie
Casey Janssen
Yonder Alonso
Seth Smith
Marco Estrada
David Carpenter (released)
Javier Lopez (released)
Paul Maholm (released)
Ruben Tejada (released)

My “big” buy so far has been Yonder Alonso for $51. Several were conditional purchases. I could have bought eight of them for $1 as there were no runner up bids. The two that had runner up bids were Alonso and Estrada. I guess it is good news is that I still have nearly 80% of my money to spend. The bad news is I do not see anyone on the horizon that will be worth spending it on.

From a league perspective, AJ Ellis, Brett Jackson, David Hernandez, Jack Hannahan, Joe Saunders, John Jay, Kyle Drabek, Kyle Seager, Michael Saunders, Randall Delgado, and Steve Cishek are the only players who have been purchased twice of the 136 total winning bids so far this season. Of the eleven winning bids of over $125, eight were for closer-du-jour types like Hector Santiago, Scott Downs, Rafael Soriano, Santiago Casilla, Rafael Dolis, Fernando Rodney, Joel Peralta and Steve Cishek. These guys have chewed up 12.5% of my leagues available FA budgets, though all had runner up bids that, on average, was 67% of the winning bids. Smart bidders.

Of the 136 winning bids, slightly more than half (70) had no runner up bids of which 36 were winning bids of less than $10. The largest winning bid with no runner up was $77. The largest discrepancy between winning and runner up bids to date is $151.

From this, I think I have learned a few things. First, very few of the big money spends have provided any real value (Fernando Rodney is one exception). Second, I do not care whom I have to poison, I will leave next years draft with three closers or I will abandon the category all together. Third, for this year I have a bucket of money and no one worth spending it on.

[Edwards Kings]

Week 6 Results – My team continues to struggle considerably. Reasons are really unimportant. We are 5.5 weeks into this season, so I have 20 weeks for the changes I make now to correct the issues. Looking at my year-to-date numbers, I am down pretty much across the board but that does not mean I need to focus on all categories. For example, my targeted batting average for the year is 0.2778. As it stands right now, I am at 0.2716, which is only ten hits behind or one really good week. Russell Martin, Delmon Young, Nick Markakis and Lucas Dudaday are underperforming in that regard and should improve, so not too much to do there. I am only about two off my stolen base targets so again just a hot couple of days sets me right there. My next three offensive stats are tied together. For RBI’s and Runs, I am sitting about 1/2 week shy of where I want to be, so I see no reason to push the panic button yet. It has helped that even with the injuries, I have been able to maintain a little better than 290 AB per week. However, I am nearly two weeks down on power. I lost Longoria (mid-June return from partially torn hamstring) and more recently Werth (probably out three months with broken wrist so I dropped him) as well as Rivera (ruptured hammy and also dropped). Longoria I was hoping would be my best power candidate and Werth had the potential to rebound to decent in that department. I have no players with double digit home runs yet (Markakis with six and Pedroia with five lead my team). So here is where I will have to concentrate most of my efforts and FA bucks (i.e. here is where I press the panic button).

On pitching, strikeouts are actually about a half week ahead in that category, but that is to be expected as I have been pitching eight starters since the week after Brian Wilson went down. My WHIP looks pretty bad (1.368 compared to my target of 1.277), but in truth, that is about 30 hits or walks too much for my IP. For ERA, I have about ten earned runs too many (4.094 compared to target of 3.811). Most of these excesses can be attributed to Josh Johnson though Haren, Nova, and Axford have all likewise under-produced. I am not going to find adequate replacements to these quality pitchers in the FA pool so there is not much I can do here, though I will still look and move pitchers in and out of my last two spots in my rotation based on match-ups. I, with so many others, struggle with saves after I lost Wilson. So far I have avoided two risky temptations…big bucks on closer rentals and ditching the category all together. I got lucky in picking up Janssen for $16 a week before he got hot. Santos just started playing catch last week, so still has to go out on rehab assignment. Santos was not that hot before the DL, so with luck I can get three or four weeks of closer work out of Janssen. This will still be an area that I can use resources on to my advantage, especially if a couple of my league-mates drop the category.

And then there are wins. My favorite whining topic. Most of my pitchers are pitching well enough to win on competitive to good teams. But they are just not dropping. I can help myself to a literal handful from the FA pool, but that works best when you are replacing under performing pitchers. I am better more than two weeks behind in this category. My best hope for improvement is correction to the norm (last week I only had 2 wins in 9 starts and 7 wins in 40 starts over the last 3.5 weeks or a 17.5% win rate) and continuing to troll for back-end rotation options.

Week 7 Free Agents – With the injuries, I had several players to replace. Werth will be out too long, so he as well as Rivera were dropped as was Masterson. Masterson may be a mistake, but I have no faith in Cleveland this year long-term and he is walking way too many with generally poor results all the way around. The Conor Gillaspie experiment was a bust as SF sent him down. I needed OFers. I made a reasonable bid on Roger Bernadina. He has been given a job to lose as before and done just that. The winning bid was three times mine. I settled on Michael Brantley ($31 with an unlucky runner-up bid of $31) who may end up being David DeJesus with more speed from down in the Indian line-up. He will not help my power and no player available seemed to be able to do that. However, he should get full time AB. I was using Gillaspie as my emergency back-up if Headley gets hurt, but had to use him as my Utility when I lost Rivera and Werth. Likewise, his replacement, Mister “Not-Really Help You Much” Placido Polanco is now filling the same role ($12 with a runner-up bid of $4). Again, full-time AB who hits second about half the time.

Then, I kind of went off the board for me. Russell Martin in under performing and at least three of the teams in my league lost catchers last week at this very volatile position. Jesus Flores ($51 with a $42 runner-up bid) was being looked upon as a middle-of-the-road catcher option a few years ago until he suffered a torn labrum. With Ramos going down with a torn ACL, Flores should get full time AB even as Washington brings up Sandy Leon. Until I get a little more healthy, Flores will hopefully be a nice insurance policy/option. And there was a little bit of blocking going on with this pick as well.

I dropped Masterson. Just not getting it done, but a prime candidate to turn it around. Despite getting hammered Sunday, I bid $13 on Alex White (no runner-up). He and Estrada will push Blanton and Nova for the six and seven spots in my starting line-up.

In summary, this was a weak effort on my part as I did not address my power needs. Barring something unforeseen, I will be looking for some punch next week, no matter what the cost.

Week 7 Plans – The Twinkies are talking about sending Parmelee and Plouffe down. Shame. I have been sitting on Plouffe waiting for him to have an opportunity and when he finally got it, he did not perform. He rides the pine this week with another underperformer, Tyler Greene which is a shame because I may need him (or some other option) to replace Beckham, who stunk last week. Flores and Longoria of course round out the bench. I will stick with Russell Martin this week to see if he can break out of his funk. With all the injuries in Oakland, Seth Smith is seeing full time AB and will be in the OF for me. Polanco will be my Utility (stinks). The rest of my roster is pretty set, but offensively weak on power.

I will go with only seven starters this week because I have Janssen to go with Axford. Still, with the full schedules, I should rack up thirteen starts. My one start pitchers are Marcum, Axford and White. All three have good match-ups, but I will stick with Marcum.

Good luck this week, ladies and gentlemen. No more injuries, for goodness sake!

[Edwards Kings]

How bad has the Great 2012 Closer Debacle been for my league? By my count, we have spent 20% of our available FA dollars on 37 reasoned speculations, closers, closers-in-waiting, and shots in the dark. There have been four 300+ winning bids, one in the 200's, and six 100+. Of those 37 players purchased, we have released 16 already. Of the players purchased, only 17 have had a save all year (yet) and only 10 of that group are still on teams. Of those 10, only six have actually contributed saves to their five respective owners. Of those six, four have contributed six saves total so far (Dolis, Thayer, Downs, and Soriano). The other two, Rodney and Casilla, have contributed nine and eight saves respectively.

Over $3,000 FA bucks spent. For that, the league has collectively netted about two dozen saves. A handful may keep getting saves and the owners will be glad they spent the money, but saves are risky and expensive to say the least.

[Outlaw]

Good Stuff Wayne. This year so far 147 Blown Saves out of 421 for a 35% failure rate. 274 saves converted by 71 different relievers. Not only those abysmal Stats, but most of them closing are blowing up ERA and Whip all over the place.

45 players have 2 or more saves. Its no wonder so much has been spent.

[Oaktown]

How bad has the Great 2012 Closer Debacle been for my league? By my count, we have spent 20% of our available FA dollars on 37 reasoned speculations, closers, closers-in-waiting, and shots in the dark. There have been four 300+ winning bids, one in the 200's, and six 100+. Of those 37 players purchased, we have released 16 already. Of the players purchased, only 17 have had a save all year (yet) and only 10 of that group are still on teams. Of those 10, only six have actually contributed saves to their five respective owners. Of those six, four have contributed six saves total so far (Dolis, Thayer, Downs, and Soriano). The other two, Rodney and Casilla, have contributed nine and eight saves respectively.

Over $3,000 FA bucks spent. For that, the league has collectively netted about two dozen saves. A handful may keep getting saves and the owners will be glad they spent the money, but saves are risky and expensive to say the least.

Ugh, Hector Santiago.

[Edwards Kings]

How bad has the Great 2012 Closer Debacle been for my league? By my count, we have spent 20% of our available FA dollars on 37 reasoned speculations, closers, closers-in-waiting, and shots in the dark. There have been four 300+ winning bids, one in the 200's, and six 100+. Of those 37 players purchased, we have released 16 already. Of the players purchased, only 17 have had a save all year (yet) and only 10 of that group are still on teams. Of those 10, only six have actually contributed saves to their five respective owners. Of those six, four have contributed six saves total so far (Dolis, Thayer, Downs, and Soriano). The other two, Rodney and Casilla, have contributed nine and eight saves respectively.

Over $3,000 FA bucks spent. For that, the league has collectively netted about two dozen saves. A handful may keep getting saves and the owners will be glad they spent the money, but saves are risky and expensive to say the least.

Ugh, Hector Santiago.

Yup. Most of us were right there with you on that one Scott. You "won", but it ended up being a reverse fairy tale...turned into the frog AFTER the kiss....sorry about that buddy.

[Edwards Kings]

Good Stuff Wayne. This year so far 147 Blown Saves out of 421 for a 35% failure rate. 274 saves converted by 71 different relievers. Not only those abysmal Stats, but most of them closing are blowing up ERA and Whip all over the place.

45 players have 2 or more saves. Its no wonder so much has been spent.

It is crazy. Glenn Lowy and Dan Fallon won the lottery in my league with Rodney (did I just write that?) and Casilla. It is so bad that I am feeling lucky that I got one last night from Janssen!

[Edwards Kings]

What to do? What to do? At this stage this year as my team languishes deep in the third division, my thoughts move away from winning the overall (that ship has sailed) to what can I do to win back some of my money. Now, that ship may have also sailed, but I have convinced myself that the I can just make out the crow's nest on the horizon. In my league, about six teams have 90+ points, a couple sit mid-pack, and the rest of us are fodder for the top teams. So, what can I do to make sure this current team doesn't end the year as a never-was? This post may be a little disjointed as I am typing just what I am thinking at this moment with no edits planned.

First, I am looking at my targets. For example, if I was on my targets, where would I be? The answer is a tale of two groups. On offense, I would have 62.0 points, scoring above my 12.0 target per category on BA and Runs. I would be right on with HR and RBI and down on speed to the tune of about eight stolen bases. But all in all, my initial targets are not off by much, so to my mind no unexpected MLB trends have occurred which make me want to change the way I think. My biggest current hole to target is home runs. And it is more than losing Werth and Longoria and Rivera. I drafted my team to be balances with several guys who could/should bang out 20 HR. I have most of my team under performing in that regard. I can't afford to just wait for regression. In order to move up in the standings, I have to field the most punch I can to try and catch up one week at a time. That will be my key area of concern (basically upping my weekly target for HR by 10% as I cannot wait for "one big week" to catch me up), followed by stolen bases. Talk about needing opposite skill sets. I any regard, punch and speed do make themselves available on the waivers. I will be aggressive in trying to improve on my fourth and fifth outfielders as well as my middle infield and utility spot with maybe two targeted at power and two at speed.

The other side of the ledger has pitching. Even if I was on target, I would only have 43.0 points in my league. And this may indicate another trend towards an even greater "Year of the Pitcher". Seven teams in my league right now have ERA's under 3.800 with seven teams have WHIP's under 1.265. Strike-outs (the only category my team is doing well at) is running very hot. Again, seven teams are "on-pace" to get 1,300+ strike-outs with three others just below that mark. That is incredible. Here there will be a little less I can do since quality starters are scarce on the waiver wires. Streaming starts from the waivers is also a risky proposition and I have not have better than 50/50 success at doing this. Plus, I still like my starters. The other counting stats are also problematic. I have bemoaned my lot with wins enough. My top seven starters have won their games at an anemic 23.6% since the beginning of the year. All I can do hear is continue to maximize the opportunities and hope for normalization. Like my power AND speed quandary, I also need wins AND saves. I do not have nor am I likely to have three closers to stream into my pitching staff. I am sitting on about on-third of the saves I had planned for the year and am close to ditching the category since starters can have more impact on wins, ERA and WHIP.

When breaking down the stats and targets by groups of players, it does not seem too bleak offensively. For example, if I get four home runs average out of my outfielders for the rest of the year, I will hit that target. That is one more a week than I have been averaging so far. Sounds good, but I know that is a mirage. That means I will end the year with the players inhabiting my OF spots will average 20 for the year. When you are talking about the likes of Markakis, Seth Smith, Delmon Young, Alejandro De Aza and Michael Brantley (the guys I will start this week), it is not really possible. Some of the other areas will have to help. In the middle, I have Pedroia, Starlin Castro, and Gordon Beckham. There is more speed there than power so it is still iffy if that group will hit their own targets. Longoria will help my corners when he comes back (fully healthy I hope), but Duda or Yonder Alonso or Headly will have to step up. I do not have much speed targeted for this group, so maybe some knuckle dragger who is CM eligible will come available. Catcher has also been a disappointment as may Martin owners will tell you, but the bigger surprise is Miguel Montero, who only has two home runs so far this year. One a month will not cut it. Utility is a revolving door for me again and I would love to latch onto some player that will help me in a few categories.

My starters will pretty much week-in and week-out be Haren, Josh Johnson (who recently has made meat out of some of the weaker offenses out there), Marcum, Dempster (talk about your bad luck), Billingsley (disturbingly his control has weaken considerably after allowing two base on balls or less in four of his first five starts), and Nova (gotta get wins somewhere). Blanton, Estrada, and White will stream in depending on who is playing the Padres, Astros, Pirates, A's, Royals, Twins, et al. Maybe I don't drop saves. There are a lot of teams out there in the same spot I am in. If I stick to my guns I could make up some ground there.

A bit different again from my other weekly posts. I have pretty much no where to go but up. I have 19.5 weeks to make steady progress. Next stop, 13th place.

[PGromek]

this game can bring you to your knees sometimes

[Edwards Kings]

Another week, more poor results. My team is just not producing and it is not like I am leaving a lot on the bench. Bad team mix, bad luck, what ever, the results are just not there and we are nearing the 1/3 mark on the season. With the Estrada injury, I in essence lost two of my eight starts this week. I ended up getting two whole wins out of the remaining six starts and only one save. The hole is getting deeper. The only good my team did pitching was get 50 K's in only 47 IP.

I am still trying though. Our collective avenue for improvement is the FA pool and there were some options. My friend John Menna won the Matt Adams lottery though it cost him nearly half of his remaining FA budget. Still, it is a good pick up for him I think as he is in a real dog fight with Rob Silver Dan Fallon for the league lead and there are three other teams that are easily within striking distance. With my bid on Adams, I only succeeded only in now having the second most FA money in the league by $100 bucks or so. I am not a big fan of price enforcing from the rear, but that is what I have.

My second choice was Juan Francisco on a two week rental with Atlanta, though his BA and strike out rate stink. If he is smart he could use the time as a tryout for next year since the Braves will be Chipperless. I do not think he has the brains or guts to take advantage of the situation. Still, he has pop and he could help my team. Losing him (I believe I had the runner-up bid) does not disturb me too much. I ended up with Alex Liddi, whom I like. He has been playing four games out of five, though all over the batting order. He has shown serious pop (though in a Mark Reynolds sort of way) in the minors. Seattle in on the road next week (at Texas and against the White Sox) so the $22 may be a good gamble in a couple of good road parks for hitters. I dropped Plouffe. He had all the opportunity in the world to step up with the Twinkie injuries and he just could not do it. In any regard, I will use Liddi as my Utility player in place of Wigginton this week.

I also took a gamble on Estrada's replacement. This is more of a watch player. Control artist Cole De Vries is not like the rest of my Shandler-esque staff (big arms), and I will not use him this week even with a favorable home match-up versus Oakland at Target Field. I will probably watch to see how he does against a good team before I put him in but week 10 he has two starts, one in KC and one against the Cubbies, so he may get in early.

I have three catchers and none are really healthy. The injuries appear minor so I hope Montero and martin will be ready this week (I got 14 total AB out of them last week. Duda is my first baseman, though he has been another disappointment, maybe the 15th baseman in points. Headley is my third baseman and he has been OK or would be OK is Longoria was not hurt. Yonder Alonso has been an empty BA for me at CM. Pedroia and Starlin Castro have been excellent in the middle. Beckham continues to show life and I have Tyler Greene as back up. Outfield is a mess. De Aza, Markakis, Delmon Young, and Michael Brantley offer little more than speed as a group so far. Seth Smith will be my fifth OF and he is a poor one.

I hope Janssen and Axford get some save chances this week. The hard luck boys will be my starters again (Haren, Josh Johnson, Marcum, Dempster, Billingsley, Nova, and Alex White. Blanton is also on my bench.

No earth shattering changes. I just keep trying to get the best opportunities for the players I have. Maybe I can see some results soon.

Happy Memorial Day!