Posts Tagged ‘Fantasy Baseball’

Let’s call it Wednesday

Posted: August 5, 2015 by Sports Time Radio in baseball
Tags: , , , ,
0

On Sunday’s Mr. Fantasy and I do 2 hour of fantasy baseball talk on the Sports Time Radio podcast. Now from time to time we’ll talk about what we’re going to do with the money league baseball team we co-manage. Are teams has struggled with injuries and poor pitching for most of the season, but lately it’s been performing better and we have a shot at making the playoffs. Sunday was our trading deadline and we tried to make a deal, but couldn’t get anyone to trade with us. Now there were some minor deals in the league; Arodys Vizcaino for Wellington Castillo, Nathan Karns for David Ortiz and Aaron Hicks for Mike Leake. Nothing to out of the ordinary, but I doubt I would’ve dealt Leake for Hicks, but it was a father and son trading with each other; so that’s how it goes. Now pretty much all season long we’ve had one team that has been head and shoulders about the rest and sure enough they made a deal at the trade deadline. The best team in our league sent Lorenzo Cain and Lance McCullers to what I believe was the worst team in our league for Erasmo Ramirez and Mike Trout. Yes, you read that right; the best team in our fantasy league got the best player in baseball and all they had to give up was a solid outfielder and an average pitcher. It’s a garbage trade and everyone in the league knows it’s a garbage trade, but they have always let these things go unlike our other leagues which have fail safes for ridiculous trades like this one. In the other leagues a trade has to be approved by the other owners and in a worse case scenario the commissioner can step in and veto and bad deal. I can understand letting trades go as is and if one guy can fleece another in a deal that’s the one guys problem for being dumb enough to make that kind of a deal, but this is more than a total fleecing. As an owner that’s just hoping that his team can find a way into the playoffs it’s tough to see the best team in the league add Mike Trout without having to sacrifice anything to get him. It’s hugely frustrating for me and it’s a good thing that I don;t have to make a decision if I’ll return to this league next season because I would probably say no right now. I’m sure when the time comes next season I’ll  be over this embarrassment of a deal and be ready to draft. Sadly there’s nothing I can do but come on here and complain about it, but hopefully this will help me feel better about the trade. If there;s any justice or karma the team that made the deal for Trout will some how get knocked out of the playoffs very early, but since they’ve dominated the league pretty much all season I doubt that will happen.

The New York Mets have taken over 1st place in the National League East from the Washington Nationals. Right now the Mets have a 1 game lead over the Nationals, but Washington has played 2 less games. Now this looks like it’s going to be a pennant race were just the winner makes the playoffs; so it will make it even more interesting to see what the Mets do with their group of young pitchers. There was a little talk about the Mets monitoring the innings of their young pitchers and not allowing them to throw over 180 innings. Jacob deGroom won N.L. Rookie of the Year last season and is the Mets leader in innings at 133 1/3rd. Matt Harvey is right behind him with 133 innings on the nose and since  Noah Syndergaard was called up after the start of the season he’s logged just 94 2/3rd innings. So if 180 innings is the number then deGroom and Harvey would have between 7 and 9 starts left this season. Could or would the Mets actually pull the plug on their young pitchers down the stretch of a pennant race. Remember the Nationals did this with Steven Strasburg is his rookie season and even though they’ve had a good team Washington has yet to win a World Series. It looks like the Mets have 3 very talented young pitchers that may possibly turn into 4 if Zack Wheeler returns from Tommy John surgery next season and is fully healthy, but there’s no guarantees in baseball and if the Mets decide to shut these pitchers down they may not contend next season. It’s a tough decision to make, but with the way they handle pitchers it wouldn’t surprise me at all f they cut deGroom and Harvey’s season short even if the team is in the pennant race. If this does happen I’d be more than interested to see how Mets fans would react to this decision.

Since I seem to be rolling along with baseball today let’s keep going with it.

It caught me off guard yesterday when it was announced that the Detroit Tigers and Dave Dombrowski had parted ways. Dombrowski’s contract was due to expire at the end of this season, but both parties reached an agreement to end their relationship early. Dombrowski had been the Tigers General Manger for 13 seasons. Dombrowski’s longtime front-office assistant Al Avila will take over as general manager in Detroit. He is the father of Tigers catcher Alex Avila. It doesn’t look like Dombrowski will be out of work long unless it’s his choice to take some time off. Dombrowski’s name has already been linked to teams like the Boston Red Sox, Toronto Blue Jays, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, Seattle Mariners, Baltimore Orioles and Milwaukee Brewers. Would Dombrowski try to rebuild a team like Milwaukee or try to get the Red Sox back on track or take a team like Seattle that people thought would win this season. Maybe he’d like to try and add another World Series title to his resume; so teams like Toronto, Baltimore or the Angels might be more appealing. It would be interesting to see if Dombrowski could get David Price to sign with the Blue Jays as a free agent this off season after he was the guy who traded Price there. That is if he takes a job with the Blue Jays. Where do you have Dombrowski landing his next job at?

Listen to Sports Time Radio on BlogTalkRadio.com

You can follow me on Twitter @Burketime

Advertisement

Let’s call it Wednesday.

Posted: February 25, 2015 by Sports Time Radio in baseball, sports
Tags: , , , ,
0

So it was a bad week to be a Busch brother. Saturday in the first  Xfinity Series race of the season Kyle Busch crashed late in the race and suffered a broken right leg and a broken left foot. He was transferred from Halifax Health Medical Center in Daytona Beach, Florida, to a Charlotte-area hospital for treatment. Matt Crafton filled in for Busch in the #18 Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) car for the Daytona 500 on Sunday and finished 19th. There has been no timetable set for Busch’s return. For now veteran David Ragan will take over the #18 ride for Busch and  JGR development driver Erik Jones will replace Busch in the # 54 Xfinity Series car this weekend, with a replacement for future races in that series still to be determined. Ragan has two career Cup wins in 291 career starts. He spent his first five seasons at Roush Fenway Racing. He has driven for the underfunded Front Row Motorsports since 2012. Jones, a JGR development driver who competes in the Camping World Truck Series for Busch and also was scheduled to compete in several Xfinity races for JGR this year, has four wins in 18 career truck starts and a career best of sixth in four Xfinity starts. Toyota sponsors Jones’ truck and thinks highly of the driver, who doesn’t turn 19 until May. Busch hired Jones to drive his truck part-time two years ago after Jones held off Busch to win the late-model showcase Snowball Derby in December 2012. Jones competed in both the truck and Xfinity races at Daytona, finishing second in the trucks and 18th in the Xfinity race after being involved in the same accident in which Busch suffered his injury.

In the case of Kyle’s brother Kurt Busch he was suspended indefinitely Friday after a Delaware judge said the 2004 champion almost surely choked and beat his former girlfriend, Patty Driscoll, last fall at Dover International Speedway. A three-judge panel denied his first appeal Saturday. He had one final chance to plead his case to Moss, who is in his first year as NASCAR’S final appeals officer. Then a final appeals officer upheld NASCAR’s suspension Saturday night. Gulfstream President Bryan Moss made the decision, ending Busch’s already-slim hopes of racing Sunday in the season opener. Busch represented himself in the first appeals hearing at NASCAR headquarters, located across the street from Daytona International Speedway. Jim Cassidy, senior vice president of racing operations, represented NASCAR. The panelists were former NASCAR executive Paul Brooks, former driver Lyn St. James and Kevin Whitaker, operator of Greenville Pickens Speedway in South Carolina. Regan Smith filled in for Busch in the Stewart/Haas Racing (SHR) owned #41 at the Daytona 500 finishing 16th. It’s unclear what SHR will do beyond Daytona. Busch’s car is funded out-of-pocket by team co-owner Gene Haas, who hand-picked the former champion to drive a car adorned with Haas’ machine tools building company. He wanted Busch because he believed Busch could get the car to victory lane. Haas has not commented since the Friday suspension, and he may not be willing to pay for the car if Busch is not behind the wheel. Smith drove co-owner Tony Stewart’s No. 14 car last season at Watkins Glen after Stewart hit and killed a fellow driver who got out of his car in a short-track race. Smith, who has one Cup victory, also filled in two races in 2012 while Dale Earnhardt Jr. recovered from a concussion.

It’s almost time for the baseball regular season to get rolling and your fantasy drafts have to be just around the corner. We’re looking for some players to fill out our 20 team standard snake style league. It’s a free league that we run through Yahoo. All we ask is that you play the entire season. If you’re interested in signing up you can use this link to do so.  Hope to see you in the league.

I play in three fantasy baseball leagues. There’s the league above that I invited you into then there’s a 20 team auction league that I play in and finally there’s a 14 or sometimes 15 team money league where Mr. Fantasy and I co-manage a team. This money league draft is March 8th which is very, very early for us this season. Mr. Fantasy and I are picking 8th and we’re starting to look at who might be available when it gets to us. For some reason outfielders don’t get any respect in this league, but Mike Trout should be long gone by the time our pick comes up. There is a chance that players like Andrew McCutchen of the Pittsburgh Pirates or Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins might be sitting there when the pick gets to us. I’d like to think that we’d grab one of these two players very quickly and move along to the 2nd round. Now if the draft flows in a regular type of order there’s a chance that we’re looking at a player like  Carlos Gómez of the Milwaukee Brewers; who by the way Mr. Fantasy loves. We might be looking at  José Abreu of the Chicago White Sox, Adam Jones of the Baltimore Orioles or Jose  Bautista of the Toronto Blue Jays. Would you take one of those players or would you look at a pitcher like Felix Hernandez of the Seattle Mariners or Chris Sale of the Chicago White Sox. There is a chance we could actually land two of these players if the draft falls right and we make the correct 1st round pick. The early part of this draft doesn’t concern me all that much; it’s the later rounds. With a draft this early there are quite a few questions still out about players and if you miss your season is done early and no one wants to have that type of season. Last year Mr. Fantasy and I where able to select Tom Koehler of the Miami Marlins. Now it’s not a flashy pick, but it’s the kind of pick late in a draft tat can get your team into the playoffs. Koehler made 32 starts posting a 10-10 record with a 3.81 ERA. He struck out 153 batters while walking 71. Now it’s not a Cy Young winning season, but Koehler is the kind of guy you need to fill in when a starter goes down or if he just has a great match up. What I’m wondering for Mr. Fantasy and I this season is who is this seasons Tom Koehler?

Just so everyone knows we don’t let Schaumburg Stu play in the fantasy baseball leagues because he draft all Chicago Cubs players. Of course this season that might not be the worst strategy.

About 5:30 p.m. tonight Phil Watson from DairylandExpress.com will join the podcast to talk about the Wisconsin sports scene. You can listen to the Sports Time Radio on BlogTalkRadio.com

You can follow me on Twitter @Burketime