Jason Castro - Castro is 4-7 with a pair of doubles and a homer over the past few days, and there are a few reasons for optimism in the 25 year old's underlying stats this year. Castro was indeed a 1st round pick by Houston 4 years ago, but he was a bit of an overdraft at the time, and outside of his time at Lancaster (the place where everyone hits) his minor league stats were unimpressive to say the least. In the 112 games he's managed to stay healthy enough to play at the MLB level, however, Castro has been able to hit line drives at over a 20% rate, and he's shown that he is patient enough to sustain a walk rate over 10% as well. He's shown a solid power increase thus far this season despite hitting more balls on the ground, and all in all he's starting to look the part of a guy that could become a #1 catcher over the next season or two, as we all know that catchers tend to take a bit more time to develop offensively in general. For now he remains a solid #2 backstop, but there's a bit more upside here than I expected to see at the start of the season.
Logan Forsythe - Forsythe has hit in three straight as appears recovered from his abdomen injury, and it looks like he may have the starting 2B job for the time being. The 25 year old is an exceedingly patient hitter with a bit of speed and some solid LD rates, so basically he's a pretty reasonable 2B and #2 hitter (although the Pads are hitting him down in the lineup) with perhaps a bit more pop than he's given credit for...it's a bit tough to tell as he's only played more than 108 games in a season once since turning pro. I'd rather take a chance on a guy like this than a known mediocrity, so for those in deeper leagues and NL-only leagues that are looking for an IF (particularly in formats that reward OBP), Forsythe may be worth a waiver claim.
Ricky Nolasco - I decided to gamble on Nolasco with two home starts this week in two of my leagues, and halfway through it's looking OK as he managed to hold the Cards to an unearned run (charged after he left the game) over 6 2/3 innings. Nolasco is in decline in just about every meaningful statistical category save GB rate, but he has remained serviceable at home, rattling off four straight quality starts following last night's performance. The warning signs are definitely there for either an injury or a complete collapse for Nolasco, but despite the risk he does remain a reasonable option in many formats for his home starts only.
Norichika Aoki - Aoki walked and homered last night to provide most of the Brewer offense against Mat Latos, and the leadoff man is now hitting 280/348/445 for the season. Aoki had as many as 20 homers in a season over in Japan, and he stole as many as 41 bases, so the 30 year old does have the skill set to provide some contributions across the board. He now has 4 HR's and 9 SB's in what amounts to about a third of a season, making him a very solid contributor in SB, a bit of a help in R and AVG, and he isn't hurting you in HR. On the whole, a pretty solid OF bat in NL-only leagues and possibly even some deeper mixed leagues as well. Getting his GB rate under 60% would probably add to his assistance as well.
Nate Eovaldi - Eovaldi was tagged for 10 hits and 8 runs last night in just 5 innings against the Giants as he remains winless on the year. Eovaldi has excellent stuff, an improving GB rate and BB rate, and a tremendous ability to keep the ball in the park (14 HR allowed in 413 career IP), but he just simply doesn't miss enough bats to be a consistent contributor in anyone's rotation. It did appear that he was turning the corner last year at AA as far as the K rate goes, but he's been as hittable as ever thus far here in 2012. There are a lot of things to like here, and his weekend start against the Mets is a reasonable one to use him for in most formats, but the inability to miss bats severely limits his upside. For me he's only a spot-starter in deeper formats.
