Pitching & Roto

Welcome monseur,

On today’s menu we have pitching and some rotisserie… - I have a couple comments about Tim Redding, some thoughts on Eaton’s performance, and I had already been planning on talking about my Roto team and loyal reader Howard Lynch asked as well… Hey, it’s Biblical, “…ask and you shall receive.”

Union Tribune’s Bill Center wrote an article that had the following quote from Phil Nevin, "I think we've found ourselves a No. 5 starter.”

I know I moaned about Redding’s acquisition. O.k., I was wrong. Later, commenting with my friend Paul, a displaced San Diego living in New York City while keeping his anti-Yankee thoughts to himself, I pointed out that Redding might be our best bet to rest our bullpen.

Peavy is a decent bet, but coming back from the groin issue and with his still-young age, he’ll be babied a bit (as he should be). Eaton has a history of throwing a high pitch-per-inning count that often leads to an early exit. Lawrence is known as guy whose numbers often look bad if exceeds 90 pitches in an outing. And lastly Woody Williams is getting up there in age and doesn’t get as deep into games as he used to. – It’s a good thing we have a talented ‘pen.

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Eaton’s line from Monday:

6.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 BB, O SO, 86 pitches

After the above concerns with Eaton and other pitchers, it was encouraging to see Eaton perform as he did today. He still has “ace” potential. We’ll continue to monitor his performances with a particularly critical eye.

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I am in a pretty competitive, 10-team, AL-only (most of us are Padre fans, this way we don’t have to root against the Padres when “our” players are playing) roto keeper-league. We play with a $14.00 cap and bids are in nickel-increments.

We don’t play with “normal” roto leagues. We don’t have “active” and “inactive” players; we have a 25-man roster (14 hitters, 11 pitchers). Our league is a 5x5 league (again, not normal) using Batting Average, Home Runs, RBI, Runs, and Stolen Bases for offense and ERA, Wins, Innings Pitched, Saves, and Strike Outs for pitchers.

We also have a minor league draft portion to our league, so some of my players were drafted rather than acquired in the auction (players that came through my “farm” will be marked with an “F”) and are thus cheaper.

Here is my team:

"Rake Cru"

1B – Mark Teixiera - $0.30 – F
3B – Eric Chavez – 1.45
CI – Rob Quinlan – 0.10
2B – Mark Belhorn – 0.10
SS – Russ Adams – 0.15
MI – Jorge Cantu – 0.25
C1 – Rod Barajas – 0.05
C2 – Doug Mirabelli – 0.05
OF1 – Vladimir Guererro – 2.30
OF2 – Ichiro – 1.95
OF3 – Manny Ramirez – 2.00
OF4 – Rocco Baldelli – 0.55
OF5 – Joey Gathright – 0.05
UT – Calvin Pickering 0.50

P1 – Johan Santana – 1.25
P2 – Rich Harden – 0.30 – F
P3 – C.C. Sabathia – 1.20
P4 – Zach Grienke – 0.15 – F
P5 – Juan Cruz – 0.20
P6 – Jason Johnson – 0.25
P7 – Scott Kazmir – 0.50
P8 – Brandon League – 0.10
P9 – Pedro Astacio – 0.05
P10 – Shigetoshi Hasegawa – 0.05
P11 – Jason Davis – 0.05

I still have Felix Hernandez (RHP, SEA “King Felix”) and Matt Moses (3B, MIN) in my farm and 3 picks (out of 20; 13, 14 & 20) in this year’s minor league draft portion of our league.

I won the league last year (for the first time). Though I am obviously weak in Saves (I have none) I am in a good position to win again this year.

I'll try to post updates throughout the season on how the league is doing...