Fantasy Baseball Pitcher Pickup And Drop Ideas For Wednesday 5/25/11

Two Weeks Ago's Recommendation - Drop Jose Lopez and Pickup Scott Rolen

Lopez has been hitting .353 over the last two weeks, but has picked up just two runs and a single stolen base.  Rolen has hit for a similarly solid average at .342 but has been much better in the counting stats, picking up six runs and five RBIs with a stolen base.  This is going to continue to go this way.  Rolen plays in a better offense so he'll pick up more counting stats, and he will hit for a better average as well.

Last Week's Recommendation - Drop Josh Tomlin and Pickup Madison Bumgarner

It's harder to evaluate a pair of pitchers after just one week because generally they will only have one start each, and that's what happened here.  Both guys did turn solid starts in wins.  Bumgarner went a little deeper into the start so he had a better ERA, but Tomlin let up less hits and walks so he grabbed a better WHIP.  That was the only difference between the two through one week.  We'll keep an eye on this for a while, but I have to insist that you drop Tomlin.  He's going to blow up soon.  He's not this good of a pitcher.

This Wednesday we are also going to look at a pair of starting pitchers.  I write about spot starter recommendations every day, but that doesn't help you evaluate pitchers that are owned in more than fifty percent of leagues.  One to drop and one to pickup coming up...

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.