Fantasy Baseball Sell High and Buy Low: July 2008
Written By: Aaron
This is where you win championships. I’m a firm believer that no one on your team should be “untouchable” or “untradeable”. Right now you are one of 3 teams: 1. Waiting patiently for the playoffs to start and your real season begins. 2. Fighting to get in to the playoff hunt. 3. Playing for next year. If you’re team 1 you’re probably going to stay put, team 2 will be the team most likely to deal, and team 3 will either be staying put or working to deal for better keeper type players. In reality, you should all be dealing! Every team has someone over-performing or under-performing. Finding these players and getting maximum value for them is the best way to ensure your team is always near the top of your keeper league. Here are some buy low/sell high candidates to consider for the post All-Star season.
Sell High
Chipper Jones - The last five years Chipper has been nicked up. If he’s on your team you cringe every time he tries to score from 1st on a double. Chipper is one of the players that I have vowed to never have on my team. He puts up nice stats but you never know when he’s going to go. If you’re a cellar dwelling team you should be trading him for younger players. If you’re up at the top, you could get a nice pitcher and replaceable 3b for him easily.
Milton Bradley - His home/road splits are ridiculous. He’s only played over 100 games twice in his career (141 career high) so there’s a good chance he’ll end up on the DL for a while this year. There’s also a good chance he’ll get traded. The Rangers have OF depth and they probably won’t want to dole out the money needed to resign Bradley next year. If he gets traded he won’t have the comfort of playing half of his games in Texas.
Jason Giambi - Chances are he’s not going to keep this pace up and first base is usually loaded. Someone out there needs power and you’ll give it to them, for a price.
John Danks - A nice young prospect. However, it’s alarming that he’s only gone over 100 pitches in 2 of his 17 starts and averages 6IP per start. Kudos to Guillen for knowing when to take him out but this could get old and breakdown the bullpen more than is liked. Danks seems destined to a career of flipping from relief pitcher to starting pitcher unless he finds a way to pitch deeper into games.
Solomon Torres/Kerry Wood - Two pitchers getting a good amount of saves this year and could possibly be out as closers next year. Chicago is molding Carlos Marmol into the closer of the future so this year or next could be Wood’s last year as closer. Also, there is little doubt that the Brewers will find someone else to close in the future. If you’re out of the hunt this year, turn these one cat wonders into some hitters for your future.
Buy Low
Carlos Beltran - Numbers seem to be going down each year but they are still good numbers. He’s a top-notch fantasy player but you rarely hear his name come up when the subject arises. Some owners still feel he’s a stud but there’s a good chance that others are ready to move him.
Andruw Jones - You can probably get him for scraps. The risk would be minimal but the reward could be great. Has anyone dropped as fast as “Fat” Andruw Jones? Surely he remembers how to hit. If he somehow snaps out of this two yearlong slump, you’ll want him on your team. Give it a try if you can get him cheap.
Delmon Young - Where’s the power? He still has it but the Twins have probably sucked it out of him wanting him to hit more for average. He’s still a nice young prospect (only 22 years old!). Many owners are probably thinking he’s not going to live up to his billing. Don’t be one of them. So far this month he’s been traded 1 for 1 with Randy Wolf, Carlos Quentin, Max Ramirez, Rafael Betancourt, Shin-Soo Choo, and Michael Cuddyer. Try and get him.
Ted Lilly - He’s starting to pick up now so it might be too late. Lilly is a nice strikeout pitcher who was off to a slow start. He could be had for cheap right now and he’d be a nice 3rd pitcher on any fantasy team.
Matt Cain - Stuck on a horrible team, he’ll never amass many wins, but his K rate, ERA, and WHIP will always be low. He’s had a rougher than expected go so far having trouble with walks, but he’s seemed to put it together now. He should be lights out for the rest of the year.
Those are just a few of the buy low/sell high candidates you should be looking at. There are plenty of others that I’ve left out. The main thing to remember is not to be stagnant. Don’t be the team standing by the wayside when a big deal goes down saying, “Why didn’t I go after that guy?” Go after him, be aggressive, and don’t sit on your team. Making the right moves at the right time is the key to keeping your team at the top of the standings year in and year out.
This entry was posted on Thursday, July 3rd, 2008 at 4:04 pm and is filed under Fantasy Baseball. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
