"I'm not out of it yet..." I remember saying, "but I'm definitely not in it at the moment."
This season could've easily started off in a much worse way than it has, but at the same time I've caught a bunch of bad breaks early. I made the choice in the "preseason" to trade Cliff Lee, BJ Upton and Sergio Santos to Roland before the keepers were announced for a definite keeper shortstop, Brandon Morrow's strike-throwing young arm and potential closer Johnny Venters. If Cliff Lee continues to age well, it means that I'm trading 3+ years of elite pitching away but hopefully right at the point where he has the most value (assuming a bit of age-related decline since he's in his early 30's). Upton had underperformed last year, as he had the year before, but still provided some pop and speed in an outfield slot. And Sergio Santos, whose name will come up again later, had been a lockdown reliever in his rookie season with the White Sox. One of the open secrets of last season was strong pitching teams using these high K, low ERA relievers such as Daniel Bard, Matt Thornton, and Kuo to lower their team ERA's to augment the results from their starting pitchers. A mediocre outing from a starter that lasts 5.2 innings with a no-decision due to a few earned runs doesn't have the same negative impact when you add a reliever who goes an inning with 2 K's and no earned runs - and maybe a win for the cherry on top.
Looking at my team going into the draft, I thought that adding strong starting pitching was the most critical task, unless an uber-prospect dropped my way. Sadly, I got distracted in the first round when I noticed that Ricky Nolasco was available, and whiffed it on the chance to pick up Mike Trout, who fell to Roland (much the same way that Aroldis Chapman did last year). I end up going with the pitching inclination twice, going Nolasco and Edwin Jackson. Then went Ackley as a superprospect for the future, Luke Scott for power production, Montero as a value superprospect, Justin Masterson and Phil Coke. A few moves were immediately necessary, as Brandon Morrow and Brad Lidge started the season on the DL.
And then the season started, and I had two things happen that have just crushed me: Matt Thornton proved ineffective in his new role as closer and Evan Longoria got hurt immediately. Instead of starting out the year with Thorny in his usual unhittable, potentially big save position, the White Sox defense has crapped the bed repeatedly and Thornton's made mistakes, leading to big runs and losses. Longoria, on the other hand, was my MVP, a strong offensive Third Baseman and the waiver wire is amazingly devoid of true talent. Can my team survive without saves and with an offensive void at Third? I'm skeptical. While I did make a quick pickup of Jed Lowrie, and nabbed the Marlins' setup guy, it might be time to get creative.
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4 comments:
Given your early season setbacks, your team has done a good job treading water. Although, I will say that when Sale failed at his first shot to seize the closer job, I was surprised to see that Santos was available. I remember him (Santos) being on your team last year. Looks like you traded him to Roland, who subsequently dropped him. Here's hoping that Santos can be the guy to seize the closer role, although my best guess is that it will be by committee for a while.
Along the lines of Greg's thought, treading water is OK. You don't win the league in April, and it's pretty hard to lose it. Pretty much, you play things out through May/June, and then you figure out what your team looks like. All you've gotta do is figure out how to keep everyone within sight.
Well, I'm still having to get creative to work around the injuries my team's sustained. Right now the offensive void at Third Base and lack of Saves really had me in crunch time. I've burned through my waiver claim pretty quickly in getting to Jed Lowrie and Jorge Posada. I had a claim in for Casey McGehee but Milwaukee Craptastic won that one. Sadly, I just cant get any quality off the waiver wire for 3B.
And oddly enough, I just took a look at my team and while my slugging percentage isn't the worst, I'm generating no home runs right now. Which is weird, and hopefully will balance out considering that other than Coco Crisp my outfield should all produce 30 home runs over the season.
Crisp, oddly enough, has actually contributed a LOT to my team in speed, runs and rbis. It just shows how much my hitting is underperforming right now. Hopefully Adrian Gonzalez's shoulder heals fast and he gets his power swing back. Fingers crossed, gents.
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