Fantrax/CDM Fantasy Sports

bobknightfan said:

I purchased Haniger and got 2 at bats from him before he went on the DL. At least the DL has been reduced to 10 days this year....which I think is a good thing. 15 days was kind of a long time in situations where you a team needed to replace a guy on the roster but he might only have a slight injury that was not going to take half of a month to heal.

Hope Strasburg gets a start this weekend. If not that will make 7 SPs with two starts next week and I would have to waste one, because I can only have 6 SPs each week.

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At the same time it makes it harder to guess the extent of the injury. Before they may just rest them if they could come back in a week or so...now they just put them on the dl.

Thru games of April 26th:

Bronze: 3-3-2-3 --- 49/650
Silver: 7-7 --- 16/90

Payout with those finishes would be $565.

Yesterday was another frustrating day....almost a carbon copy of Tuesday. Scored decently with only one SP going (92 points), but lost some more ground due to mostly the same reasons: My Colorado hitters weren't hitting at home in Coors Field and two Washington hitters that I don't have (Turner & Murphy) were hitting there. And more injuries....

Still, all six of my teams remain in the money and a lot of the ground that I have lost so far this week has been due to a lack of SP starts....which should be reversed later in the week. I checked some of the silver teams that have moved ahead of me, since that is where most of the damage has been done, and I should have 2 starts more than most of them during the remainder of the week (4 starts to 2 starts, in most cases). That could be 40+ points if both of those starts resulted in a win.

The nightmare week continues. Syndergaard scratched from his start today. The Mets said that he might be able to pitch this weekend...but this eliminates his 2-starts for next week.

And Altuve is out of the lineup again tonight. Nothing like having a $3M guy in your lineup and sitting on the bench.

One of my old sleeper favorites from 3 or 4 years ago seems to be back and heating up again after a year or two lost to injuries: Michael Brantley. And I really like Jose Ramirez hitting 5th in that packed Cleveland lineup. He is the same price as Bregman. Sure wish I had taken him instead for my backup 3rd baseman. Also like Murphy hitting cleanup behind Eaton, Turner & Harper and in front of a red-hot Zimmerman. Finally, I like Cesar Hernandez as well at 2B.

One thing I like to do is look at a player's last two years to see if I can spot a definite upward trend in his career....and that looks very good for Ramirez & Hernandez, in particular.

Right now, instead of those four guys I have deadbeats Peraza, Bird & Santana....and a high-priced Machado who has also been a deadbeat so far.

My pitching is solid, but my hitting still leaves a lot to be desired.

Zimmerman being able to lay off the high fastball may turn his career around. I got burnt by him more than once. lol

bobknightfan said:

Thru games of April 24th:

Bronze: 1-2-2-2 --- 19/650
Silver: 2-3 --- 4/90

Payout with those finishes would be $2,195

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The above is where I was sitting after Monday's game.....and it has been downhill every day since then. Losing more ground tonight. Every time I've thought I could stop the bleeding and have a good day, another key player gets hurt. Tomorrow is Friday and I think I have only had 3 SP starts so far this week. Strasburg & Syndegaard both got scratched. That could have been 50 points right there.

What are your thoughts on Michael Brantley, Jose Ramirez, Daniel Murphy & Cesar Hernandez?

What are your thoughts on Michael Brantley, Jose Ramirez, Daniel Murphy & Cesar Hernandez?

Ramirezhas similar numbers as Lamb.
Brantly is cheap if he can get back to his old self.
Murphey has really hurt me.
Cesar Hernandez is not getting a lot of rbi's to be hitting over .300

Sorry but not much time this mourning....some of us still working. lol

Thru games of April 27th:

Bronze: 3-4-2-4 --- 62/650
Silver: 7-8 --- 20/650

Payout with those finishes would be $410.

All six teams still in the money....barely. Can't afford to slide any further. Only had 59 points yesterday. No SPs. You need those 20+ point days from SPs to get big scoring days.

(Hernandez is the Phillies' lead-off guy. His job is more to score runs than to drive in runs. He made a nice improvement from 2015 to 2016, and seems to have stepped it up quite a bit this year from 2016. And as I said, that is the same situation with Ramirez.)

I need big games from both Carrasco and Taillon tonight.

For the first time this year I am in double digits scoring in every category. This is a pretty tight grouping.

1 Molten Memory 198
2 Dock's No-Nos 188.5
3 Daffy 184
4 Life of Riley 183
5 SAFLA 182.5
6 River Bats 180
7 HoffHornets II 178.5
8 highlanders 175
9 The Helmet Of Roto 167.5

Thru games of April 28th:

Bronze: 2-5-3-4 --- 70/650
Silver: 10-9 --- 23/90

Payout with those finishes would be $155.

The slide continues. Scored 106 points but it wasn't enough to prevent both silver teams from slipping out of a money spot (pays top 8 places in a 30-team league). I've thought about numerous changes that I should make, but just as quickly thought of reasons why I shouldn't make them. I've looked at 9 different players.....only one of which was a pitcher (Dylan Bundy for Kevin Gausman). I may end up doing nothing, as I have the deep-down fear that I may be overreacting to a temporary bad four days....and I'm still not in a terrible position. It's mostly that, after Monday, I could visualize moving into 1st place with all six of my teams on Tuesday (only trailed by 8 to 13 points with all of them) and have lost ground every day since then. Hopefully the weekend will boost my morale a little bit. LOL.

I have been gaining due to some improvement in pitching categories. My hitting numbers have been terrible this week. I have used up my cushion and it will affect my team real soon if things don't change. Turner on the bench has killed me. He is having a career week and I took him out for Thames who got hurt.

Thru games of April 29th:

Bronze: 3-4-3-5 --- 68/650
Silver: 9-7 --- 20/90

Payout with those finishes would be $280

Didn't gain much ground, but at least I stopped the bleeding....for one day, anyway. April 29th will always be a fondly remembered day for me. Got out of the army 46 years ago today. It was like being released from jail and being a free man again.

I have Archer & Syndegaard going tomorrow, so hopefully I can at least hold my own and maybe gain just a little ground.

Pleasantly surprised to see I got a win with Darvish last night. I turned the game off in the 4th inning when the umpire called a ball on a pitch right down the pipe on Trout which should have been a strikeout. Even Trout couldn't believe and started toward the dugout. Of course he then hits a double for an rbi and an error gives the Angels another run. So after 4 Darvish is down 2 nothing and already approaching 100 pitches. Haven't even checked to see what happened after that, but it was a much needed win.

Looking back at it, I'm wondering if maybe we shouldn't have picked up Zimmerman instead of Thames. In the points leagues Thames is 1650K and Zimmerman is 1390K. Zimmerman is hitting .410 now with 11 HRs. I realize he isn't going to continue doing that, but he's 32, has a solid career of hitting around .280 with 20+ HRs and is hitting in a great lineup. Even after his hot start, Thames remains much more of an unknown.

I'm also beginning to wish that I had not taken Correa & Springer.....especially Correa. I now think that either Turner or Lindor might have been a better choice. Correa hasn't done squat so far this year...and he's pretty expensive at 2390K. And Braun at 2420K might have been a much better pick than Springer at 2690K.

As I said, I think I made some great picks with my pitchers, but I really screwed up with several of my hitters.

And I've got one more SP pick that I think might end up in the cheap group of good producers like Paxton (in particular), Taillon & McCullers: Dylan Bundy. He is also very cheap (1310K) and has had all 5 quality starts so far this year. I think he was the overall #1 pick in the draft a few years ago. If he wasn't #1 he was in the top 3 or 4, anyway. Baltimore has brought him along slowly, but he has continued to elevate his game in the last couple of years and now he is solidly in the rotation. I made about my only pitching mistake in my initial roaster when I took Kevin Gausman (1790k) as my guy from the Orioles. He seemed to be the guy who would lead that rotation, but he has been absolutely awful.....giving up 5+ runs in each of his last three starts with an ERA around 7 and a WHIP around 2.

I'm dropping him for Bundy, who gets two starts next week. That also gives me an extra 480K to improve my hitting....where I still have 4 or 5 guys that I think were mistakes: Bird, Broxton, Santana, Bregman, etc.

Syndergaard wasn't quite ready to come back. lol At least I wasn't alone with the damage.

aceeight said:

Syndergaard wasn't quite ready to come back. lol At least I wasn't alone with the damage.

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I had already taken him out of my lineup for next week....when I'm going to have a full 12 starts: Kershaw, Sale, Verlander, Paxton, McCullers & Bundy.

Hope that will help me turn things around after a very disappointing Week #4.

ETA: Syndergaard was scheduled for two starts this week. Everyone who had him on their roster would have had him in the lineup this week. As you said, that's the only thing that limits the damage a little bit.

Next week

I am going to have to take out Goldschmidt, Betts and Arenado to make cap next week. That sucks considering I am 15th in hitting in my league this week. That is the only way I can get seven 2-start pitchers in my lineup. I think I have to go with the pitchers even though some of them are not great starts. I can control when my hitters play, but not my pitchers starts....gotta try and make hay.

aceeight said:

I am going to have to take out Goldschmidt, Betts and Arenado to make cap next week. That sucks considering I am 15th in hitting in my league this week. That is the only way I can get seven 2-start pitchers in my lineup. I think I have to go with the pitchers even though some of them are not great starts. I can control when my hitters play, but not my pitchers starts....gotta try and make hay.

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I took out Goldschmidt & Arenado, but I still have Betts in my lineup. He has 7 games and those other two guys only have 6. I'm also not crazy about having Thames in there with 7 games at St Louis & Pittsburgh. Those are two pitchers' ballparks. Rizzo & Bryant have 7 games at home.