Fantasy MLB Spot Starting 08.30.11

Welcome back to Spot Starting.

For games on Wednesday August 31st these selected pitchers might be had in your league (less than 50% owned in Yahoo! or ESPN) with percent owned Yahoo/ESPN, (team), and opponent:

Phil Hughes 43% / 35% (NYY) @ BOS

Randy Wolf 42% / 49% (MIL) vs. StL

Jake Peavy 41% /36% (CWS) vs. MIN

Derek Lowe 40% / 28% (ATL) vs. WAS

Josh Collmenter 39% / 42% (ARI) vs. COL

Rich Harden 21% / 14% (OAK) @ CLE

Rick Porcello 15% / 10% (DET) vs. KC

Chris Capuano 12% / 5% (NYM) vs. FLA

Jo-Jo Reyes 1% / 0.1% (BAL) vs. TOR

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The Casual Sabermetrician – First Half 2011 analysis

Welcome back to the Casual Sabermetrician.  It’s July, Summer is in full swing, and we’re at the half way point of the season.  We again look back on our pre-season exercise  and First Quarter Analysis of looking at tERA vs. ERA to find out which pitchers are pitching above their heads and which have been unlucky so far.  For fantasy purposes this translates to who we can sell high on and conversely who we might be able to buy low on.

Again, our method involves extracting tERA and ERA stats from Fangraphs into a spreadsheet and creating a formula to view tERA-ERA.  We can also look and see if the guys we looked at 7 weeks ago have regressed to the mean or not.

Killin’ the Odds & the Regular Season

Welcome back to Killin’ the Odds & the Regular Season! In the “Today’s Games” section, you will see my picks to win for the day. I will post either the “Money Line” or the “Run Line”. The money line is always a “straight up” bet which means your team will never need to win or lose by a specific amount of runs. The money line odds represent what amount has to be wagered or what can be won. For example, if there is a minus sign (-) next to an amount, you have to wager that amount to win 100. If there is a plus sign (+) next to an amount, you will receive that amount for every 100 wagered. When you see a “Run Line”, that means a spread is involved. In Baseball, the spread is always 1.5 runs but you can find alternate run lines on some websites. When I post a run line of -1.5, that means our team must win by two runs. When you see a run line of +1.5, that means our team can lose by one run and still win the wager. Listen to our show from April 5th, 2011 for more explanation and tips.

Fantasy MLB Spot Starting: 06.24.11

Welcome back to Spot Starting.  With another great outing last night by Capuano we’ve now won 4 consecutive picks.   I hope these have helped my loyal readers (all ten of you) and that you are doing much better in your leagues than I am.

For games on Saturday June 25th these selected pitchers might be had in your league (less than 50% owned in Yahoo! or ESPN) with percent owned Yahoo/ESPN, (team), and opponent:

Josh Collmenter 48% / 46% (ARI) @ DET

Brian Matusz 41% / 34% (BAL) vs. CIN

Bronson Arroyo 35% / 42% (CIN) @ BAL

Jonathon Niese 32% / 25% (NYM) @ TEX

Jeff Karstens 19% / 16% (PIT) vs. BOS

Wade Davis 14% / 23% (TB) @ HOU

Jason Vargas 14% / 11% (SEA) @ FLA

Danny Duffy 1% / 1% (KC) vs. ChC

Fantasy MLB Spot Starting: 04.30.11

Not a great night for pitchers around the majors last night, lots of blow outs and big innings.  For myself, I was too giddy being a Ben Zobrist owner to care much.  We have some good options heading into the weekend for all of you trying to win your head to head games.

For games on Saturday April 30th these selected pitchers might be had in your league (less than 50% owned in Yahoo! or ESPN) with percent owned Yahoo/ESPN, (team), and opponent:

John Lackey 45% / 32% (BOS) vs. SEA

Randy Wolf 39% / 60% (MIL) @ HOU

Tim Stauffer 35% / 3% (SD) @ LAD

Brandon Beachy 26% / 23% (ATL) vs. StL

Brian Duensing 20% / 10% (MIN) @ KC

Jonathan Niese 10% / 1% (NYM) @ PHL

Rick Porcello 4% / 3% (DET) @ CLE

My Pick: John Lackey vs. Mariners

Alternate: Randy Wolf @ Astros

Deep League Special: Rick Porcello

Fantasy MLB Spot Starting: 04.28.11

Well, after 5 straight quality start picks we were due for a clunker and boy did we get one from Brandon McCarthy last night.  Let’s hope Anibal Sanchez stops the bleeding tonight and that we pick a gem for tomorrow and we have some of our favorite options going.

For games on Thursday April 28th these selected pitchers might be had in your league (less than 50% owned in Yahoo! or ESPN) with percent owned Yahoo/ESPN, (team), and opponent:

Kyle McClellan 43% / 42% (StL) @ HOU

Scott Baker 28% / 10% (MIN) vs. TB

Fausto Carmona 18% / 8% (CLE) vs. KC

Livan Hernandez 7% / 6% (WAS) vs. NYM

Jeff Niemann 5% / 1% (TB) @ MIN

Brad Penny 3% / 1% (DET) vs. SEA

Chris Capuano 2% / 0.1% (NYM) @ WAS

My Pick: Scott Baker vs. Rays

Alternate: Kyle McClellan vs. Astros

Deep League Special: Chris Capuano vs. Nationals

National League East Previews: Mets

Today’s focus: New York Mets

2010 Record: 79-83, 4th Place NL East (10th in NL)

The Mets off-season made news for all the wrong reasons as the headlines have been filled, not with big name free agent signings, but with talk of Madoff, lawsuits, massive debt, plans to sell off team shares, and loans from MLB. This all coming on the heals of fun news items like closer Francisco Rodriguez’s assault arrest that also led to season ending surgery on his thumb and ace Johan Santana’s sexual assault charges and season ending rotator cuff surgery that will keep him out until June at the earliest. All-Star Centerfielder Carlos Beltran has combined for only 145 games the past two years on his surgically repaired knees and has just told the team that he needs to move to Rightfield to reduce wear and tear. Not exactly a ringing endorsement of health going into 2011.