The daily grind 6-13
The Daily Grind provides daily match-up advice based on my every-morning waiver wire search. I welcome advice to help make this column more effective. Ownership rates are from Yahoo!
Today’s grind
Felix Doubront is up to 44 percent owned. If he’s still available, he faces the Marlins today.
To recap what I said yesterday, Nathan Eovaldi is liked by other writers I respect but I haven’t had an opportunity to form an opinion on him. The Angels aren’t the most difficult match-up in baseball, but it certainly isn’t an easy assignment. Avoid unless you think you know something I don’t (which is very possible).
J.A. Happ against the Giants could go very well. Then again, most of Happ’s season could have gone very well thanks to solid peripherals… but it hasn’t.
The Mariners have a troop of lefties facing Jason Marquis. Justin Smoak, Mike Carp and Michael Saunders, come on down.
Seth Smith returns to Colorado to face Alex Smith.
Raul Ibanez has a solid match-up against Tim Hudson.
Tomorrow’s grind
Tomorrow marks what I believe is the inaugural recommendation of Barry Zito. He’s 28 percent owned and will take on the Astros.
Joe Blanton has the coveted Twins match-up, but he’s burned me frequently this year. I’m wary and will probably pass on the opportunity.
On the other side of that match-up, Scott Diamond gets the pleasure of facing a mostly ineffective Phillies lineup.
Reliever watch
Nothing to report.
Yesterday’s results
Wei-Yin Chen survived his not quite “safe” outing with a win and otherwise undesirable numbers: 6.1 IP, 4 K, 5.68 ERA, 1.58 WHIP
Alex Cobb had a rougher go of things: 6.2 IP, 6 K, 6.75 ERA, 1.50 WHIP
Clay Buchholz should be rostered after last night’s win: 7 IP, 9 K, 1.29 ERA, 1.00 WHIP
Max Scherzer had a typical evening: 6 IP, 8 K, 4.50 ERA, 1.67 WHIP
Ryan Doumit was 3-for-5 with two runs.
Ben Revere was 3-for-5 with two RBI.
Jim Thome was 2-for-4 with one run, two RBI, and one walk.
Andruw Jones turned in an 0-for-3 night.
Rajai Davis was similarly disappointing with a 0-for-3 performance.
Colby Rasmus was 1-for-4.
That “coveted” Twins match-up has been a nightmare for the past 2 weeks. I wouldn’t touch Blanton with someone else’s team. If you want a guy to start tomorrow, look at Erasmo Ramirez. He gets the Padres in Safeco. 7K/9, 1.7BB/9, under 1HR/9 in the PCL this year.
It was that extra .1 that killed WY Chen. I mean, they had to send him out for the 7th given where his pitch count was at, but he then got caught by the completely inexplicable Clint Barmes hot streak.
Kept McCutchen down though, for the most part.
Question: Who is Alex Smith? I see Josh Outman as the listed starter for the Rockies.
Smith was listed as the probable yesterday. If they changed that, it’s something I would definitely overlook at 6:30 AM.
It is indeed Outman now, so DO NOT start Smith.
Brian Roberts is up and lead off yesterday, he could make an interesting gamble. His ownership spiked a bit already but he wasn’t someone hugely stashed so he might be under the radar in some leagues. Both Oliver and ZiPs projects a .270ish average with a 10ish homer and 20ish steal pace over a full season. It’s obviously unclear how much he can or will play, but the O’s aren’t exactly brimming with 2B options and the fact that they hit him leadoff right away suggests he’ll have an opportunity if he can produce and stay healthy.
Got one Mark. I would recommend rostering him for the next 10 days while he is healthy.
The coveted Twins now have a 120 wRC+ at home and a ML best 165 wRC+ over the last 7 days. They do suck (79 wRC+) against RHP though.
Let’s be serious here, the Twins have a pretty terrible lineup.
It doesn’t matter how bad you think the names written on the lineup card are, the fact remains they’ve performed much better than people have given them credit for this year. If you’ve consistently played opposing pitchers in Target Field this year, you probably haven’t done all that well.
They are the 4th best hitting home team in the majors after the Rockies, Rangers, and Cardinals and 10th best overall in terms of wRC+.
Let’s look at the names though: Willingham (168), Mauer (135), Plouffe (120), Mourneau (118), Span (111), Doumit (103) all better than average hitters this year. That’s 2/3 of their lineup.
I posted on the daily grind yesterday about my need for a catcher in a 14 team h2h points leauge and the top five catchers are as of 6/13 are:
1. John Jaso
2.Rod Barajas
3. Ryan Hanigan
4.John Buck
5.Nick hundley
My Catcher right now is Ryan Doumit are those catcher any better then him?
Definitely stick with Doumit.
Not So Fast even left off Ben Revere who has been on an absolute tear. Jamey Carrol has also been hot in June. They just put 7 (6 earned) up on Cole Hamels in 6 innings.
The Twins have scored 144 runs in the last 25 games, 5.76 rpg, since Justin Morneau returned from the DL on May 16. As long as their key guys are healthy, I think they’re probably not such a “coveted” match-up for opposing pitchers, anymore.