Daniel Hudson:
Despite being staked to an 8-1 lead after 3 innings, Daniel Hudson was unable to pick up a win in his 2010 debut as he failed to go the requisite 5 innings. Hudson finished the day allowing 5 ER’s on 6 hits and 3 BB’s, while striking out 4 in 4+ innings. Hudson’s an intriguing young pitcher with a terrific minor league K Rate (10.6 K/9) and as such is on a lot of fantasy owners radars, but is he mixed league worthy this year? Hudson gave us a small sample to look at last season posting a 6.8 K/9, 4.3 BB/9, 1.4 HR/9 skill-set in 18 2/3 major league innings. A look at his minor league numbers the last two seasons show some similar issues at AAA with command (3.4/3.2 BB/9) and the home run ball (0.4/1.3 HR/9) that make me think the adjustment to the majors may yield slight improvements over last season’s smaller sample, but general difficulties for fantasy owners. With a mid 3’s BB Rate and a 1.0 HR/9 , he’s going to need to strike out a lot of batters to keep the ERA below 4.25. Given that the K Rate struggled to translate last season, I’m not expecting much from Hudson beyond AL Only formats. As evidenced by the struggles against the Royals lineup on Sunday, there’s going to be an adjustment for the youngster and while he has displayed a healthy upside thanks to the K Rate, I’m not expecting it to come together in ’10. Tread carefully in non-keeper formats.
CJ Wilson:
We’ve been warning that the peripherals for CJ Wilson were starting to deteriorate and for the first time in almost 6 weeks we saw some of that deterioration show up in the results. Wilson was only able to get through 4 2/3 innings before being pulled. He allowed 3 ERs, but walked 5 and gave up 3 hits while picking up his 5th loss of the season. Wilson has walked at least 3 batters in 7 of his last 8 starts and while we haven’t seen it eat into his results yet (3.17 ERA, 1.31 WHIP during that span), it’s almost a guarantee that it will at some point. Sell high probably isn’t the right term with someone like CJ Wilson as he doesn’t have enough “cache” to sell high, but that’s exactly what you should try to do if not be careful utilizing him going forward. His first start after the break will be in Boston against a patient Red Sox lineup; not the type of matchup I’d want to utilize Wilson in. My guess based on the command issues is Wilson won’t have very much value in the 2nd half the season. Remember Wilson hasn’t been a starter since 2005 and hasn’t topped 75 innings since then. With Wilson having already surpassed 110 innings this season there is legitimate reason for concern about Wilson’s increased BB Rate coming from fatigue.
Justin Smoak:
I’ve been one of the biggest supporters of Justin Smoak this season even suggesting he’d have a monster 2nd half and while Smoak has struggled its not the results that have me reconsidering his value, but simply his change in location. Moving from one of the best and deepest lineups in baseball along with one of the best hitters parks to one of the weakest lineups in baseball and one of the worst parks to hit in; Smoak’s value took a tremendous hit with the Cliff Lee trade. Yes the peripherals suggest a rise in both his power and batting average as a .237 BABIP doesn’t line up with a 24% LD Rate, but the M’s lineup is devoid of opportunity and Smoak’s not elite enough to carry his fantasy value without some help from his lineup. I’ve cut him in almost all the mixed leagues I own him in and now only view him as dynasty league or AL Only league worthy.
Ben Zobrist:
Zobrist hasn’t been able to replicate the big power improvement he made last year, but the Rays are finding ways to help give fantasy owners a nice consolation prize. Zobrist has recently been moved to the leadoff spot in the Rays lineup and as a result we’ve seen an increase in his Runs and SB pace since the end of June. He’s scored 10 Runs and swiped 6 bases here in July and is now on pace for a .285-80-10-80-38 season. It’s a far cry from the 27 HR – 17 SB campaign last season, but the bump in the lineup should help Zobrist recover some of the value from the lost power and help him push towards a 10-40 campaign. Those looking a rebound in the power department shouldn’t expect a big surge from Zobrist going forward. His GB Rate has increased up to 45% and his XBH Rate is down across the board.
Daisuke Matsuzaka:
Dice-K improved his record to 6-3 with 6 solid innings against the Blue Jays in Toronto. He allowed just 2 ER’s on 6 hits and perhaps most impressively 0 BB’s. This was just the 4th time all season (12 starts) that Dice-K walked less than 3 batters and not surprisingly all 4 of those outings were quality starts. Dice-K’s mix of fringy control and high FB Rates is a death mix for pitching in the AL East and not surprisingly Dice-K has managed just a 4.56 ERA and 1.39 WHIP. A look at the peripherals suggest actually suggest things could get worse for Dice-K. With just a 3.5% HR/FB Rate and a 46% FB Rate with any sort of normalization Dice-K’s ERA could jump to over 5 pretty easily. Dice-K used to get by with a better than average K Rate that could help him pitch around some of the walks, but with the K Rate in decline for the 3rd straight year Dice-K looks a poor bet to regain the form that lead him to an 18-3 season in 2008.
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