Big Derf Sports is Back!

Welcome back to blog loyal readers.

As I explained via my twitter(@bigderfsports), my old laptop was having major problems and had fallen off from inconvenient to outright unusable for writing.  That forced me to put the blog into a hibernation of sorts for a while while I was saving up for a new laptop.  My pimp new HP dv6 Laptop came in last week and is a dream to use and type on, and I spent a week getting it generally set up and just plain playing with it before I decided that it was time to bring back the blog today.  I've spent far too long not getting my opinion out there.

While the NBA is in season now, I'm primarily going to focused on gearing up for the NFL off-season and the Fantasy Baseball season.  I've got a few large scale plans in mind for this baseball season, led by the return of last year's daily spot starting pitching column, as well as in depth looks at different fantasy strategies throughout the year.

I'll also be rolling out plenty of NFL off-season coverage, including rapid reactions to player movement and fantasy analysis at every step.  Last season I endeavored to touch on all 32 teams throughout the off-season and that proved too much, so this year I'm going to instead try to take a look player movement through a more case by case lens, including the obvious Peyton Manning column at some point.

Not that I'm going to be leaving the NBA alone, I'm just going to be covering it from a different angle.  I'm admittedly not an NBA expert, and have been following the NBA for much longer than I've actually been watching games, so unlike with the NFL, my on-court analysis is going to be basically non-existent.  Instead I'm going to take on the NBA from much more casual angle, likely saving my "analysis" for raving or complaining about my Knicks (yeah I'm still a homer).

Also, despite this being Big Derf Sports, you'll likely also see at least a handful of television columns on the horizon, as that is my other big love, and I doubt I'll be able to stay quiet about it for too long.

Thanks in advance for reading.

-Fred "Big Derf" Tobin

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Best&Worst: Best MLB Teams Post-Deadline

This is the second installment of the "Best&Worst" segment and it details the best teams in the MLB after the deadline. The trade deadline has shaken up baseball, as is standard procedure, so here is where I rank the teams after those deals. I decided to remain consistent and just do a top 5 list (I started with a top 15 but the article got way too long). These teams all have a legitimate chance to win the World Series. This is my unintentional playoff predictions (I made the list first then noticed I had a division winner and 4 teams from each league) so call it what you want.

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickups For Tuesday 8/2/11

Sunday's Starter Recommendation One - Freddy Garcia - 6.0 Innings Pitched - 6 Strikeouts - Win - 3.00 ERA - 1.17 WHIP
Sunday's Starter Recommendation Two - Brandon McCarthy - 6.0 Innings Pitched - 9 Strikeouts - Win - 4.50 ERA - 1.33 WHIP
ESPN Week 16 Final Starter Stats - 43.2 Innings Pitched - 49 Strikeouts - 10.10 K/9 - 5 Wins in 7 Starts - 3.09 ERA - 1.24 WHIP
Cumulative Starter Stats - 670.2 Innings Pitched - 495 Strikeouts - 6.64 K/9 - 46 Wins in 107 Starts - 3.41 ERA - 1.20 WHIP
Cumulative Starter Spreadsheet Viewable Online Here

Sunday capped off a nearly perfect week on Sunday night.  Both starters picked up wins and plenty of strike outs in the process.  The ERA and WHIP on the week were both very good, and five wins in seven starts is a great rate, especially when you are throwing for more than a strikeout per inning.

Unfortunately, I have to try and follow up that amazing week here in Week 17 as i start on Tuesday.  As always, the recommendation is available in more than 50% of ESPN leagues....

Best&Worst: Best Divisions in Sports

I like lists. They're neat and organized. So I decided to start doing a Best&Worst segment (nothing set, just as often as I want) which will either count down the 5 Best, 5 Worst, or both of a specific topic. The first one is "Divisions in Sports", in case you couldn't read the title, and this first article is the top 5. Since I find this topic interesting and it's the first of the segment I will be posting a Worst 5 soon. This list takes a look at success/talent/competitiveness in the past decade, with extra emphasis on the most recent season. Enjoy and feel free to tell me how wrong you think I am.

The Mets are Wheeler-ing and Dealing at the Deadline

Fred likes to only talk about fantasy, so I guess I'm here to talk about what's actually happening. The big trade so far this MLB trade deadline is Carlos Beltran going to the San Francisco Giants with right-handed pitching prospect Zack Wheeler coming to the New York Mets. Everyone is talking about the impact Beltran can have in San Francisco this season, but nobody is talking about how Wheeler could be a household name in 5 years.

Fantasy Baseball Hitter Pickup And Drop Ideas For 5/9/11

In what should become a second daily column here on Big Derf Sports, I'm going to give you an idea of a hitter that is officially droppable and offer you a pickup idea for a player at that same position.  Hopefully this will keep your roster in tip top shape as we drive towards summer here in fantasy baseball...

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickups For Tuesday 5/3/11

Monday's Starter's Stats - Bartolo Colon - 7.0 Innings Pitched - 7 Strikeouts - No Decision - 3.86 ERA - 1.00 WHIP
Cumulative Starters' Stats - 240 Innings Pitched - 195 Strikeouts - 7.31 K/9 - 15 Wins in 39 Starts - 3.56 ERA - 1.16 WHIP
Cumulative Starter Spreadsheet Viewable Here

On the first day of week five, Bartolo gave us seven very workable innings.  The 3.86 ERA isn't great, but it's coverable, and you have to be excited to pick up seven strikeouts and a solid seven innings of 1.00 WHIP.  Bartolo is going to eat a lot of innings for the Yankees this year with stats very similar to this, except with a good chance at plenty of wins.  As a note for the starters today, Kyle McClellan and Anibal Sanchez are both under the 50% owned line as i write this on Monday night, but will both likely elevate over the 50% line by Tuesday proper.  As such I'm not ranking either of them...Both should be owned but I'm not really excited about starting either of them  If you want the guy I am excited about, Tuesday's spot starter is coming up...

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickups For Tuesday 4/5/11

Monday's Starter Stats - Brandon Beachy - 6.0 IP - 7 Strikeouts - No Decision - 1.50 ERA - 0.83 WHIP

Cumulative Starter Stats - 29.2 IP - 23 Strikeouts - 3 Wins - 2.73 ERA - 1.11 WHIP

Got another great spot start yesterday out of Beachy.  He let up just one run over six innings and kept the WHIP down while racking up over a strikeout per inning.   He is someone who should be owned in way more leagues than he currently is.  The Brewers are a solid hitting team and he just made them look goofy.  Of his 88 pitches 61 were strikes and he threw first pitch strikes to 18 of the 24 batters he faced.  He's going to have a very solid overall year and can be having it for you if you scoop him up between now and his next start.  Click through the jump to find out who is available in more than 50% of standard ESPN leagues that I like tomorrow...

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickups For Monday 4/4/11

Sunday's Starter's Stats - Zachary Britton - 6.0 IP - 6 Strike Outs - 1 Win - 1.50 ERA - 1.00 WHIP

Cumulative Starter Recommendation Stats - 23.2 IP - 16 Strike Outs - 3 Wins - 3.04 ERA - 1.18 WHIP

As you can see, Zach Britton worked out wonderfully as a spot start yesterday and through four days worth of recommendations the total stats are very workable. Obviously could use a few more strike outs, but that total is being brought down by Mark Buehrle's 0 strike outs the other day. Going to be looking to grab more strikeouts in the future but not going to sacrifice ERA and WHIP in order to do it. Find out my recommendation for today right after you click through the jump...

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickups For Sunday 4/3/11

Another day, another spot starter recommendation from me.  If you'd been following along so far, I've recommended Derek Lowe, Mark Buehrle, and Carlos Zambrano on the first three days of the year.  The  Buehrle and Zambrano picks suffered because their managers left them each in too long, but combined the three have thrown 17.2 innings of 3.66 ERA and 1.27 WHIP ball with 2 wins and ten strike outs.  Not bad numbers considering these are guys you are getting off of the waiver wire.  Sunday presents the best opportunity for pick ups yet, as teams get to their third ,and generally less owned, starters.   See who i like today after the jump break...

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickup For 4/2/11

Whether you are streaming starters or just looking for a spot start because of injury, you've come to the right place. Everyday here on my blog I offer the best starting pitcher that is readily available in espn.com standard leagues and rank the rest of the available pitchers in the order I would pick them up.  See who I recommend today right after the jump.

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter Pickup For 4/1/11

Any good fantasy baseball player knows that acquiring free agent pitchers is huge for any kind of fantasy team.  If you drafted a lot of relievers, streaming starters can be a great way to accumulate innings and strikeouts and even if you have great starters, picking up the right free agent pitcher can be great help on days when your starters have bad match ups.  Everyday I post my recommendation for starting pitchers to pick up for the next days games.  If you read this space yesterday for today's (3/31) games you would have picked up Derek Lowe and got great value out of him.  Lowe pitched 5.2 innings of no run ball with just three hits and two walks...picking up six strikeouts and a win with a slick 0.88 WHIP.  Lowe had a great day but won't have another good matchup for a while, so you can drop him for tommorow's (4/1) pickup if you need to.  So who do I recommend for Friday?  Find out after the jump....

Daily Links For 3/31/11

NBA Investigating Jay-Z - Jay-Z Was in the University of Kentucky locker room after their win over North Carolina and there are photos and video to prove it.  As a part owner of the Nets, Jay-Z should know better than that and I'm betting he does.  However, I think that Jay-Z, like everyone else, just doesn't care about the NCAA.  Because he's not an athlete, the NCAA can't really punish him and the NBA has already set a precedent of just fining executives for smoozing up to college players.  Jay-Z can afford to pay a fine or two.  The NBA should make an example out of him or someone for this kind of activity, whether it's a draft penalty or something else it shouldn't be just a fine.

Wilpons Continue To Try And Sell Part of The Mets - The Wilpons need to come back to reality.  Everyone knows that the Mets aren't doing too well financially...No one is going to buy part of the team from them if it's not a majority share.  It'd basically be a sunk cost to give the Wilpons the money for a minority share of the team.  You're just buying in to the ability to lose money with the Wilpons.  And everyone knows that the Wilpons absolutely need to get capital.   Each time you hear about what the Wilpons are willing to sell, the share gets bigger and bigger.  If investors just wait it out they know they'll be able to eventually work out a deal for a majority share of the team and likely get it at a good price as the Wilpons will be desperate.

Warren Moon angry about Cam Newton's treatment - Warren feels that people's dislike of Cam Newton stems from the fact that Newton is a black man playing quarterback.  That is crazy.  It has nothing to do with the fact that he is black.  Newton has proven himself a bad character guy.  He had problems at Florida before transferring.  He not only stole a laptop but was also caught cheating three times.  That is a red flag.  At the Combine, before he's played a NFL down, he was calling himself an entertainer and icon and talking about himself in the third person.  That is a red flag.  It's not because he's black, it's because he has shitty character.  Moon brought up the fact that people had seemed to get over their racial bias after JaMarcus Russell went first overall, but JaMarcus had horrible character and was not a hard worker off the field which is why he failed.  Teams don't want to draft Newton for his amazing potential and have the same thing happen with Newton that happened with Russell.

Pegged Cap was NFL Players Idea - The NFLPA was complaining about the NFL's cap offers and the fact that anything over the predetermined cap would be going mostly into the owners pockets...But as it turns out the pegged cap was the players idea.  It makes sense.  The pegged cap protects the players if the NFL ends up falling short of revenue projections.  It gets them a guaranteed cap set point even if the NFL itself isn't making money.  But because they are getting that, they shouldn't be complaining about the NFL getting more of the money over projections.  If the players want that protection from the NFL not making enough revenue, the NFL owners should get some sort of compensation for offering that protection, and that should be the owners getting a greater share of the money over projections.

Chad Pennington Tears ACL in Basketball Game - Only news because Pennington is such a class act.  He's a guy who has come back from injury after injury and was working his way back from another shoulder injury when this happened.  He's likely to miss the whole 2012 season, and is expected not to come back after that.  Hopefully he catches on as a coach somewhere next year if he's not going to be playing.  Too smart a player to end his relationship with football just because he won't be playing.

Fantasy Baseball Spot Starter For 3/31/11

Every good fantasy baseball player knows the value of the spot starter.  In head to head leagues, good spot starts can help you win four categories a week and in roto leagues you need to use spot starters to accumulate more stats when your starting pitchers either have bad days or are injured.  That's why I'm going to offer daily recommendations for spot starter pickups.  Obviously I'm only going to offer guys that are readily available in most leagues but I haven't decided on the official ownership cut-off yet.  Also, the plan is to offer these spot starters a day or two in advance so you have time to put in the pickup and get the player starting on your roster before the day that it happens.

Daily Links For 3/29/11

Football Outsiders' Aggressiveness Index - Cool article about who are the most aggressive coaches in the league and all time on fourth down.  Statisticians over the last few years have determined that NFL teams don't go for it often enough on fourth and short in opposing territory.  Football Outsiders tries to determine if teams have been following that logic or not and then takes a look at coaches' general aggressiveness.  Fun data tables in there to check out even if I don't know how useful they are.  Everyone knows that Bill Belichick is extremely aggressive and Mike Tomlin is extra conservative.

Dez Bryant Needs To Grow Up - Dez Bryant now has two civil lawsuits against him totaling about 850,000 dollars.  I love to say I told you so... So I told you so Jerry Jones.  Before the draft, everyone knew that Bryant was an elite talent but that he also had off the field personality issues.  But Jones was enamored with his talent and traded up in the draft to get him.  Now he's got nearly a million in lawsuits against him before accounting for damages and legal fees.  Even Deion Sanders has walked away from helping him.  Bryant needs to grow up fast and not waste all of his potential.  Physically he could be one of the best receivers in the league but between this news and his inability to make it to meeting on time and stay awake through them...It's clear that he is not even close to being one of the best mentally.

Iowa's Adrian Clayborn Accepts Draft Invite - This is only news because the NFLPA was attempting to get the highly touted rookies to not go to the actual NFL draft event.  This is the first player I've seen accept his draft invite and likely signals that the NFLPA won't be successful.  I've established I'm with the owners in this lockout, so anything that hurts the NFLPA I'm probably going to report on.

Fantasy Baseball Injury Updates -
Mat Latos On 15 Day DL - Mat Latos is eligible to come off the DL on April 6th but any DL stint has to worry you after his massive innings increase last year.
Chase Utley Doesn't Have a Timetable for Return - The Phillies still don't know when Chase Utley will be back.  He's losing all kinds of value here. Don't know when he'll be back or if he'll be effective when he gets back.
Jason Bay Could Start Year On DL - Jason Bay wasn't drafted that highly to begin with but him going on the DL hurts his value even more.

John Hollinger Rates Every NBA Team's 4-12 Players (Link For ESPN Insiders Only) - Hollinger uses his PER system to rank each team in the league based on their 4th-12th best players.  Surprisingly the Nuggets grade out as the best 4-12 team and totally unsurprisingly the Heat ranked last.  Not going to spoil more than that, but it's getting more obvious now that many people were right. The Heat can be good with their big three but need to get more players over the next off season or two and improve before they are going to be winning any titles.

MLB Announces 7-Day DL for Concussions  - Great great move here by Major League Baseball.  Hopefully the 7-day DL will have teams be more cautious with players with concussions and help prevent players developing bad post-concussion syndrome in the future.

Daily Links For 3/25/11

Browns Fan Sues NFL Over Lockout - The suit is so small that it's not going to get anything done quicker negotiation wise.  Just mentioning it because I think he's suing the wrong people.  While technically his "contract" of his seat licence is with the NFL... It's the players association's fault that we are in a lock out right now, not the NFL's.

Twitter In The Lockout - Column from Mike Tanier of the New York Times about what has been happening on twitter during the lockout.  Just a round-up of what NFL players have been up to on twitter for the last week or two.  Good read for those who haven't been following on top of every little thing.

Cubs a 2011 Sleeper? - Jay Jaffe over at Baseball Prospectus takes a look at the Cubs chances as a sleeper team this year.  The NL Central is more open as a result of the Wainwright injury but the article doesn't see that as putting the race wide open.  The Cubs are still pretty mediocre on paper and would need some exceptional performances to win the Central.

Carolina Panthers Need a QB - Kerry Byrne in an article on si.com explains the obvious.  That Carolina needs to draft a QB with their first overall pick.  Mocks I've seen have been keeping Carolina away from a quarterback but not providing a good reason for them to be taking players for their already solid defense.  They should draft Blaine Gabbert and not look back.

More QB Needy Teams - Mike Lombardi breaks down the teams that need quarterbacks and how he believes they can go about acquiring one.  Best link in here... You can tell by how little I'm writing about it... Just click through and read it.

Boise State's Mike Coughlin Getting Buzz - Coughlin is the backup quarterback from Boise State but has been generating interest after wowing scouts in Boise yesterday.  QB is one of the hardest positions to find quality players and Coughlin wouldn't be the first backup college QB to be drafted.  Both Tom Brady and Matt Cassel were backups in college.

Fantasy Draft Live Blog - 3/24/11

Hey guys.  Doing my main fantasy draft with my buddies tonight and am going to try and live blog the draft here. Going to provide insight to my own picks and make fun of everyone else all night.  Going to live blog it here with CoverItLive.  Check it out

MLB Fantasy Sleepers: Gio Gonzalez Can Help Your Team More Than Albert Pujols

In fantasy baseball, everyone knows that Albert Pujols is the best player available.  If you have the first pick in a draft you take Pujols and then go get a snack because you have two rounds till your next pick.  But Pujols isn't going to win you the league.  If he gets hurt you he might lose you your league, but if you don't do a good job with the rest of your draft it's not going to matter what Pujols does.

If you want to win your league you are going to do it later in the draft.  Here is an article that features data from last years leagues.  It shows the players who were on the highest percentage of top teams in yahoo leagues last year.  Not a single guy on the list of top eleven players there was drafted in the first round.  Instead the list features guys like Carlos Gonzalez (ADP 143.6), Buster Posey (ADP 238.1), and Mat Latos (ADP 248.6).

This should be common sense, but it's not.  Fantasy players are focused on the figuring out the top guys at each position.  But guys drafted in the first few rounds are basically all going to be good players, you're not going to win your league by drafting guys that are only marginally better than the guys going in the spots around them.  However, if you pick up someone in the 15th round who ends up as the best player in fantasy (like Carlos Gonzalez last year) you are at a huge advantage.

So this is a list, in no particular order, of five players whose ADP is 200+ but who will give you more value than your typical 21st-25th round pick.  It's a mix of players who are just plain undervalued (like the guy mentioned in the title, Gio Gonzalez) and players whose upside potential I believe to much higher than where they are being drafted.

Daily Links For 3/18/11

Jim Tressel Self Increases Suspension - This came out late last night.  Because his players received a five game ban for their actions but Tressel only received a two game ban for knowing about them, he volunteered to have his own suspension increases to match his players' suspensions.  Classy Classy move in my opinion.  There are too many guys like Rich Rodriguez who bail on their players.  For Tressel to stand up and ask for his suspension to be extended is a great move on his part.

Mets Cut Luis Castillo - This is only news because somehow they cut Castillo but Oliver Freaking Perez still has a job.

More Union Said League Said In Lockout Talks - Union now saying NFL was changing status quo with their last offer.  NFL says union could have kept negotiating about it.  I personally don't care as long as they figure it out soon.

Also a little programming note.   MLB Fantasy Sleeper Column coming Monday.

Daily Links For 3/17/11

100 Fantasy Baseball Facts By Matthew Berry - I know that I'm a day late on this one, but unless your fantasy draft was yesterday this is still useful.  Berry brings it as usual and does a great job proving the same point he does every year...Stats can be made to be misleading.  To prove it he wrote a paragraph about Player A... Using Stats Describing a player you would never want on your team.... And another paragraph about Player B... Using stats that describe him as a good player who should have a great year this year... And then reveals that both paragraphs are about B.J. Upton.  The column would be worth the read for that reminder itself but he also gives you 100 facts about other players this year.

Shogun Rua Sports Science - I'm a sucker for ESPN's Sports Science web shorts.  Nothing mind boggling here but still a decent way to blow three minutes.

Worst Fans In Sports By GQ - Not that GQ is any kind of sports news source.  But I had to link it because they put Phillies and Eagles fans in a tie for first place... Right where they should be.

Former NFL Officiating Head Mike Pereira On The Proposed Competition Committee Rule Changes - Another post that was technically from yesterday but it was updated at 11:54 P.M. so sue me.  Pereira breaks down what he thinks about the rule changes and the lack of a fix in the Calvin Johnson catch.  Even under the new proposal... The Megatron catch from week 1 won't be considered a catch.  I still think that is just ridiculous to anyone who watched the play.  He had won the game for his team and put the ball on the ground as he went to stand up.  He shouldn't have to stand up after the catch for it to count.

Late Edit Additions

Michael Wilbon on the Hill Rose issue - (Warning: Link leads to column that contains use of the n word) Wilbon brings it on the issue of what does in our society constitute "blackness" as opposed to what should.  I'm not someone qualified enough to get in on the society-wide discussion that Rose and Hill have provoked but Wilbon knows what he is talking  about and does a great job of it as always.

San Diego Linebacker Kevin Burnett Whines About Goodell - Burnett whines that Goodell has fined players and "change[d] a game that [he's] never played." Newsflash Kevin - THATS HIS JOB!  Just because he's never played the game doesn't make him unqualified.  Burnett says that Tagliabue was better, without mentioning that he's never played the game either.  Burnett also whines about drug suspensions and lack of a drug program but doesn't know what he's talking about there either.  He claims 1st offense is a six game ban, but its not. It's a 4 game ban for a first offense with performance enhancing drugs.  If you test positive for something like Marijuana you don't receiver a ban for your first offense.  In fact, they don't even tell anyone that you were caught, they put you in their drug program. You can see the entirety of the NFL drug policy here