Ricky Nolasco $24. Other bids: $13, $12, $10, $0.
Nolasco became available in our league due to salary cap considerations and the announcement of his knee injury. Of course, he then decided to go out and tough it out against the Braves. Good thing for the owner that waived him, as Nolasco got pounded. The team that bid $24 is trying to make things happen from 4th place, so no blame there. Nolasco has said that the knee is fine and that his poor outing against the Braves was a "rust" issue. His next four starts on a bum knee are against the Braves, Phillies (x2) and Cardinals. Good luck to you if you are contending and choose to take the flier. Non-contenders, however, should be formulating his keeper value for next year and putting in a bid reflective of that value. $13 was the number in our league.
Todd Helton $15. Other bids: $15, $10, $8, $6, $5, $5, $3, $0.
Helton was another salary cap victim last week. Since the announcement that Helton would not see everyday ABs, he has played every game except one, and is 10 for his last 24, with two home runs to boot. While I am not sure what his role will be for next year, he should be able to help the contenders down the stretch, so bid aggressively.
Micah Hoffpauir $8. Other bid: $0.
Hoffpauir is the guy sabermatricians love (or used to love), but apparently cannot hit on the Major League level. His 73 AB in 2008 looked pretty sexy, but while he has popped a few home runs, he can't really hit and can't really get on base. Combine that with an .077 BA so far this year, and you see that the message is steer clear.
Chris Valaika $3. Other bids $0.
Valaika is filling in nicely as a bench player for the Reds with Brandon Phillips nursing a wrist injury. He is a C+ prospect with very few OBP skills and minimal speed, but he could put up a decent average with his ability to put the ball in play. If you need to fill a completely dead spot, you could do worse.
Chris Capuano $1; Darwin Barney $0; Luis Castillo $0; Mark Melancon $0; Mike Hessman $0.
Darwin Barney may be the most interesting of the group only because he has a great name. I wrote about Capuano here. Not much has changed, though he is striking out more than a batter per inning. Castillo is playing a little bit, but not enough to really contribute at all. I refuse to comment on Melancon and Hessman until they contribute something of significance to your fantasy team.
4 comments:
Sorry for the delay in getting the FAAB log up - we had some transaction snafus on Sunday night, so we couldn't complete transactions until Monday afternoon. [okay, actually, I was on the roof of my building contemplating a jump after watching my AL team collapse, but I thought transaction snafus sounded better]
I apologize for the delay.
Dear M&M boys, a friend and myself were berating follow owners in a 5x5, AL only, keeper league for failing to pick up via a waiver claim both Granderson and Victor Martinez at $20 each, primarily for the benefits to be hopefully gained next year. I know without knowing the exact inflation for next year for our league makes this a more difficult question, but just wondered your gut feeling about this. I think we can safely assume the hitting inflation in this league will be at least 15-20%. As always, thanks so much or as Peter used to say, "until next time." Good luck to both of you down the stretch.
Gypsy - funny you should mention this, because I think there will be a post coming about "etiquette" and waiver claims in keeper and non-keeper leagues at some point. We've written about the issue before, but there are really some tough calls to be made.
As an example in a non-keeper league, I was offered a trade in the CBS AL Analyst League right before the deadline. Frankly, the trade would have helped me move up from my blech 8th place spot to perhaps as high as 6th, but I likely would have handed the other team a title. I turned down the trade on that basis alone, and I think I made the right decision.
In keeper leagues with minor league drafts, there are better justifications for making waiver claims...whether we think such a claim is "right" or "wrong," the claiming owner will always say that he was trying to move up to improve his minor league pick, etc. and so on.
I haven't looked at the numbers on Granderson or Martinez, but if someone said a lower placed team made a claim on one or both of those guys, and you could keep them for next year, I certainly wouldn't complain about it.
Look for a longer post later.
Hey Toz, I am sure you made the right decision also to turn down the trade offer as it seems to be far more important to have the other owners look favorably upon you then to gain two places in the standings and still only finish 6th.
In our league if you move up in the standings you get worse players in our minor league draft not better. It is a straight draft with reverse order of previous years standings and it isnt even a snake draft.
BTW, neither of you are in Rotoman's Regs League, are you?
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