Quantcast
Channel: Fantasy Sports Locker Room »» Anthony Rizzo
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 2

Fantasy Baseball Week 6 Preview: Highlighting key matchups and their fantasy impact

0
0

By now you know the drill, this piece cues up a few of baseball’s biggest matchups for the week, as determined by storyline, standing, or fantasy baseball relevance. On the slate for Week 6: the Los Angeles Dodgers head to Washington to take on the Nats, and the Chicago White Sox take on the Cubs in the city’s North side.

Fantasy Baseball Week 6 Preview: Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Washington Nationals

Clayton Kershaw pitched well in his last rehab outing for the Chattanooga Lookouts. His long awaited return comes this week (Photo: Tim Barber/Chattanooga Times Free Press).

Clayton Kershaw pitched well in his last rehab outing for the Chattanooga Lookouts. His long awaited return comes this week (Photo: Tim Barber/Chattanooga Times Free Press).

This matchup loses a bit of its intrigue (from a media standpoint, anyhow) without the Harper vs. Puig young gun storyline, but it does feature two potential playoff teams and may have implications down the road with both teams out to strong starts. Beyond that though, this series has something that fantasy owners have been waiting more than a month for: the North American debut of Clayton Kershaw. While the Dodgers just put Hyun-jin Ryu on the shelf and therefore won’t have their rotation at 100% Kershaw’s return is set to bolster a rotation that finds itself in an early race atop the NL West.

Owners who drafted Kershaw after the Australia series (when any sane commissioner held their fantasy draft this season) have yet to see their (likely) first round pick in action. That changes this week as Clay takes the mound against a Nationals team that has scored the third most runs in the National league. The matchup then is less than ideal, but the consensus number one fantasy pitcher heading into the season hasn’t let that bother him before. Indeed, it is an upgrade in quality of competition over that which he faced in his most recent rehab start for the Chattanooga Lookout’s (their logo is a pair of eyeballs, awesome), but the results of that outing suggest he is ready for game action. Kershaw went five innings, throwing 86 pitches, and struck out nine AA opponents while allowing one earned run.

I don’t need to use this space to tell you to roll with Kershaw, or to remind you of his combined 2.21 ERA and 9.2 K/9 over the last three seasons. I could use it to point out that he may not yet be in mid-season form, as the above linked article suggests he was hitting the radar gun at around 90 MPH which is down a few pegs from last year’s average of 92.5, but I won’t push too hard on that either. What I will say is that I’ll have my  eye on this series to see how Clayton Kershaw fares in his long overdue 2nd start of 2014.

Projected Starters: Zack Greinke vs. Jordan Zimmerman (Monday), Clayton Kershaw vs. ? (Tuesday), Dan Haren vs. Stephen Strasburg (Wednesday)

With Kershaw out of the lineup, Zack Greinke leads the Los Angeles staff in pretty much everything with five wins, 46 strikeouts and a 2.04 ERA. None of that comes as a big surprise mind you, but his 5-0 record to start the season is a big reason why Los Angeles has been able to weather the Kershaw-less storm. With 11.7 K/9, he’s throwing well above his career average in that area, but noting that the Nationals strike out the 9th most in the Majors, he could be a strong daily game play again this week. His opponent, Jordan Zimmerman, has his ERA down to 3.27 after a solid 6.1 innings of shut out baseball his last time out, but note that he sports a 6.65 career ERA against the Dodgers.

Again, all eyes (or both of mine anyway) are on this series to get a look at Clayton Kershaw on Tuesday. His opponent on the hill is not yet known, as the demotion of Taylor Jordan leaves a hole in Washington’s rotation. Doug Fister is set to return shortly and fill it, but his first start won’t be until Friday so Washington will have to do some juggling. Perhaps they’ll move Stephen Strasburg, though that seems unlikely and at the moment he is set to pitch in the final game of the series. At 2-2 with 22 runs (16 earned) given up through 40 innings, he hasn’t exactly been dominant to start the season but the 25-year-old has certainly been strong. With 58 strikeouts in those 40 frames, he is sporting a ridiculous 13.05 K/9, but the strikeout has been his only weapon in terms of retiring hitters so far this season – opponents are batting .388 on balls in play to date. He’ll see Dan Haren on the other side, who is defying his slow starter label and posting a strong bounce back campaign so far with a 2.39 ERA and four wins through six starts, with the earned run average nearly half of his 2013 mark. He’ll look to keep that going against the Nats, and will need to have his best stuff to keep up with Strasburg as the series anchor.

Players to Watch:

  • How long can the Adam LaRoche mirage continue? I actually love LaRoche as a fantasy asset, he’s traditionally been a cheap source of production at 1B, worth considering as a fill in bench bat or CI. With that said, while the five home runs and 19 RBI aren’t unbelievable stats, the fact that he is hitting .323 to start the year comes as a surprise. His heightened average gives him a .958 OPS to start the seasons and owners would be wise to take note of the impressive start. Again, that average is bound to come down (he is a career .266 hitter) but if he stays hot against the impressive arsenal Los Angeles is rolling out this week it truly will be time to start taking him seriously.
  • On Saturday, Yasiel Puig gave one of the more emphatic bat flips on one of the longer home runs you’ll see. Unfortunately for Puig, Sunday was a less exciting day as he wound up hurt crashing into the fence trying to save the game for LA. He didn’t, and he wound up hurt. The good news is that the injury is considered day to day and we may see him for all, or part, of this series.
  • Our Esten McLaren gave you the heads up on Dee Gordon” href=”http://lockerroomfantasysports.com/time-scoop-sweet-dee-gordon/”>’Sweet’ Dee Gordon a few weeks ago and he’s still hot. A player I myself thought was just holding the second base position until Alexander Guerrero was big league ready is refusing to release the spot. Batting .357, with 19 steals through the first month and change he’s been one of the more dynamic players in the league to date. Gordon has registered at least one hit in 10 of his last 11 games and has stolen a base in six of them (nine steals total), including a dominant 5/6, three steal night against Miami on Saturday. Jose Lobaton has been tough to run on this season (throwing out runners at the 4th highest clip league wide), but expect to see Gordon on and moving regardless.
  • Denard Span has picked his meager .232 average up 21 points over his last 10 games but that won’t be enough to replace the production of Bryce Harper in the Washington outfield. The Nats need more from him out of the leadoff spot. Span, for what its worth, is 9/31 in his career against Greinke. Speaking of hitters vs. pitchers; Hanley Ramirez and Matt Kemp are a combined 14/32 against Monday’s starter Jordan Zimmerman.

Fantasy Baseball Week 6 Preview: Chicago White Sox vs. Chicago Cubs

Neither of the two windy city combatants have a record above .500 with the Cubs trailing only the Diamondbacks and Astros for the worst record in baseball, so we won’t be watching this one for the quality of play. Nevertheless, its always entertaining when two teams from the same city link up. The White-Sox come into the week leading the all-time regular season series 49-45 and with the hot hitting Jose Abreu mashing in the middle of their order, they look to outscore a Cubs team that has put up the 4th fewest runs in the league.

In their last meeting, July of last year, the Cubs took four games from the White Sox on the South Side.

Projected Starters: Jose Quintana vs. Jeff Samardzija (Monday), Hector Noesi vs. Edwin Jackson (Tuesday), John Danks vs. Travis Wood (Wednesday)

The Cubs send two of their three leaders in ERA the hill this series, starting with the team leader in Jeff Samardzija. Long a pitcher who showed an ability to strike out the opponent, but struggled with giving up more runs than you’d like Samardzija appears to be figuring it out through the first month of the season. His swinging strike percentage is down to 7.2 from 10.5 last year and his overall contact rate is up considerably to 84 percent but his walks and hits are down, and with less runners on base less of them score. Whether it is a conscious decision to pitch to contact or just a unique sample presented through his first handful of starts remain to be seen, but the results have been strong for the 29-year-old starter.

Travis Wood is trending the opposite direction, with nearly 9 K/9 but a WHIP over 1.25. Nevertheless, he’s handling things well enough on the mound with a 3.35 ERA. He has sandwiched two strong starts around an ugly, five run 5.2 inning outing against the Brewers and will look to keep the good starts coming on Wednesday against John Danks. Edwin Jackson, meanwhile, has been getting roughed up considerably with a 5.24 ERA. The reason for that is fairly simple – while he is doing a good job limiting the big hit, he still has yielded 37 of them through 34.1 innings. Add in a team leading 17 walks and there are simply far too many runners on base to contend with.

On the other side, the Whit Sox don’t have a single available starter with an ERA under 4.00 with Chris Sale shelved. Jose Quintana leads them into battle against Samardzija on Monday and leads qualified starters in ERA as well at exactly 4. Beyond him, it isn’t great in this series with Danks joining Jackson in the scary walk range, at 20 – it seems to be his magic number with 20 runs yielded and 21 strike outs to date. Noesi will take another start after taking on the Tigers on April 30th. He’s already on his third team this season, and went just 3.2 innings last time out. In short, the White Sox need an arm to run out there and will hope that he can get them a bit deeper this time around. Again, his counterpart Jackson hasn’t been lighting things up, suggesting that Tuesday’s contest may be a good game for daily players to run with their Chicago hitters on both sides.

Players to Watch:

  • This isn’t much of a hot tip, but Jose Abreu is worth watching this week. With another home run on Sunday, he’s carried his hot April into May. Lets be honest about his shortcomings, with 32 strikeouts he’s got as many Ks as he does hits but with 1/3 of those hits leaving the ball park Abreu is a ton of fun to watch and a major fantasy asset.
  • With the injury to Adam Eaton, you’re going to see Jordan Danks getting regular playing time for the Sox. Calling the downgrade significant is an understatement though: Danks is batting under .100 on the season and doesn’t project to contribute much in Eaton’s absence. No action here, but do take note. When contemplating opposing pitchers it should be noted that he has struck out in 16 of his 35 at bats this season.
  • This Emilio Bonifacio story isn’t going away. He comes into the series having been held hitless in four of his last 10 games but is still 10/38 during that time frame with four multi-hit games. He won’t help you in the power categories, but in his defense, it isn’t as if he’s faded into uselessness after a hot start. Again, he’s an asset in terms of runs, maybe average, and little more but he’s still finding his way on base for the Cubs.
  • It hasn’t been a bad week for Anthony Rizzo, who hit home runs in three straight games Thursday-Saturday, collecting four hits and walking six times during that span. With a .940 OPS on the season, Rizzo is enjoying a strong start to his season. He has never homered against the White Sox but is clearly seeing the ball well right now and overall this season – his walk rate is up, K rate is down (just 14.9% of his plate appearances) and his swinging strikes are down a touch. All part of a recipe for what could be a career year for Rizzo.

The post Fantasy Baseball Week 6 Preview: Highlighting key matchups and their fantasy impact appeared first on Fantasy Sports Locker Room.


Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 2

Latest Images

Trending Articles





Latest Images