Wednesday Live Chat Starts Now

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Wed May 12, 2004 8:00 am

Okay, Tom and I have finally remembered to start a live chat. Today we want to talk about why Kerry Wood left last night's game, why Tike Redman has more home runs than stolen bases and why we're working on fantasy football rankings in early May. Go figure on all of it.

Send in your thoughts about each and anything else in this thread and we'll all vent about our fantasy teams, our fantasy players and anything else that comes to mind during the next hour.

One subject that I definitely want to discuss is the availability of free agents in the NFBC pool each week. It's interesting to note that some guys are calling STATS out on this for being too late on some callups, when really STATS is doing this right. Let me explain how it works and then we'll determine what's wrong.

Thanks to the proliferation of fantasy information sites, minor-leaguers are being reported as being added to an MLB's 25-man roster earlier and earlier. Case in point, this Sunday it was reported that the Angels called up Casey Kotchman after putting Darin Erstad on the DL. All of the information sites had this by 1 p.m. EST, but the Angels didn't officially announce that until just before gametime, which was 4 p.m. EST. STATS has an official scorer at every ballpark and they enter these transactions as they happen. So in the case of Kotchman, who played in that game, he was added to the NFBC free agent pool by 4 p.m. EST, when it was made official.

Some guys e-mailed me before that and cursed at STATS for not being as up-to-date as the information sites, but again they are doing it when the moves are made official. It's not like MLB announces each move and everyone then makes it official. The teams announce them in their game notes and STATS is at every stadium to get them.

So be patient with some of these weekend callups as they are being announced on information sites before they are official. STATS does a good job of getting them in the system when they become official; there just seems to be a time delay from the time you first read about it online until you see the player in the free agent pool.

Hope this helps. Okay, now vent.

Tom Kessenich · Post by **Tom Kessenich** » Wed May 12, 2004 8:13 am

Latest on Wood is he left the game as a "precautionary measure." Wood said he could've pitched through the ailment if necessary. Cubs will know more after he undergoes some tests today. One thing's for sure, they can't afford to lose Wood with Prior still on the shelf.

And yes that was the understatement of the week.

nnoy · Post by **nnoy** » Wed May 12, 2004 8:17 am

WGN radio is reporting that Wood was scheduled to undergo an MRI at 11:00am. They also said that he was removed as a precaution and if the game was a “must win” he would have stayed in.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Wed May 12, 2004 8:21 am

Someone tell the Cubs my LABR team felt it was a "must win" game last night!

But I guess I'd rather have him healthy the rest of the way than see him get hurt even worse last night. The way the Cubs looked, Wood wasn't going to get a win anyway. Still, men, every game is a "must win" for our fantasy teams.

nnoy · Post by **nnoy** » Wed May 12, 2004 8:44 am

How many points do you think it will take to win the NFBC? My initial take was it would be between 1460-1560 (75% - 80%). I drafted a team with a lofty goal of 1600 points in mind, and I am managing my team to attempt to achieve 36th in each category (although since I have 3 closers I can shoot for lower standards in ERA and Whip.)

The Puffins and Jones have been consistently over 1600 for a few weeks now, and no one else has been able to hang at even 1500. I think some of the tightly bunched categories such as W’s will even out and 1550-1600 will likely win it. What’s your guess?

SoonerC · Post by **SoonerC** » Wed May 12, 2004 9:01 am

What's up all? I don't know where to start as far as venting goes since I have dropped from 4th to 40th in the standings in the last week or so but I guess not getting a win in a week would be a good place to start. CC Sabathia appears to be cursed. As far as Wood goes, there is no doubt that the Cubs can't make it without him with the way Maddox is pitching.

nnoy · Post by **nnoy** » Wed May 12, 2004 9:33 am

Maddux is coming around. His 1st start it was 30 degrees here in Chicago, his 2nd start the wind was blowing out dead to center. He’s had a few nice outings since and from a pure baseball perspective he’s a godsend to the Cubs.

CC is a nightmare. I own him as well. I also have D. Wells who’s ERA in my line-up is over 7 with 0 wins (I rotated him out his two good weeks.) If CC keeps pitching hopefully his W’s will finally come. But it would not hurt if he became more efficient with his pitch counts and stayed in there the whole 9.

rmurph3 · Post by **rmurph3** » Wed May 12, 2004 2:27 pm

Greg, just a point of clarification on the Kotchman thing. Your timeline is a little off. I'm one of those who emailed you and STATS on Sunday. I emailed STATS at 3:50pm when I did not find Kotchman in the pool, and I can tell you that STATS did not add Kotchman to the player pool until exactly 5pm ET.

Now, to me, that poses a possible problem. I understand about the need to have transactions made official, but the fact is that Kotchman was in the announced lineup for the 4:05pm game when I emailed STATS at 3:50. He wasn't added to the player pool until 5pm, which is a potential problem because of the 5pm cutoff time for player transactions to affect the current waiver period.

I don't know how you officially interpret that rule, but I think one interpretation could be that the player pool should be completely frozen from 5pm-7pm on Sunday. If so, the addition of Kotchman to the pool was right up against that deadline.

Please understand that I'm not complaining here... STATS got Kotchman into the pool in a timely fashion, he was available for bid, and I happened to have the high bid in my league. All is well. But I think there's potential for problems in this area going forward, and just want to point that out to you.

Ray

PittIsIt95 · Post by **PittIsIt95** » Wed May 12, 2004 4:28 pm

Greg, I definitely agree with the last post regarding Kotchman. I emailed the league email address as well as STATS at 4:58 PM Est. I checked the site at 4:59, no Kotchman. Checked again at 5:02 and Kotchman was there. It was a pain in the A$$ to have to wait till 5:00 when I wanted to bid on him at 4:00(I am lucky I could stay on my computer till 5:00 on Mother's Day, otherwise it would have been annoying having checked up till 4:30, then see he was available thereafter). But he was on there and that is the bottom line, just a little more expediency would be appreciated.