The Fantasy baseball Generals A blog dedicated to illuminating the core theories and strategies of fantasy baseball. Statistics Unique Visitors: Total Unique Visitors: Outgoing: Total Outgoing: 0 0 14 2704

Articles from The Fantasy baseball Generals

Is There Hope For Ervin Santana? 2007-07-19 09:20:00 Demoted to the minors?? Not a pleasing development for his career. Has he really been that bad? Though I traded him for Stephen Drew in the offseason in my high stakes league, I still loved Ervin and tried to get him in two of my other leagues. Sometimes what you think is bad luck turns out to be good luck; he has legitimately performed poorly. But there are significant elements of bad luck in ...

What If The Astros Drafted Derek Jeter?? 2007-07-18 21:34:00 What would have happened if the Astros drafted Derek Jeter as Hal Newhouser insisted?? I try to quantify what would, and could, have occurred. Those readers who are even vaguely interested in baseball history undoubtedly know Hal Newhouser. He was a back-to-back MVP as a pitcher during wartime in the 1940s, and is a Hall of Famer (of marginal merit in my view). You can click on the link for his ...

A Big Thank You to our Readers 2007-07-18 09:43:00 Today we passed the 5,000 visit mark. To be honest, this surprised me; I thought we wouldn't get 5,000 visitors in a year! So, I just wanted to take the chance to say thanks to all of the readers. I hope we can continue to write articles that are worth reading, and i really hope that what we discuss here helps all of our readers do better in your fantasy games. Good luck!! ...

More on Why the Large Deal is Poor Strategy 2007-07-17 08:11:00 More on why the big trade is usually poor strategy and a piecemeal approach should usually be preferred. In The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli outlined two important principles on adaptability and flexibility. The first is that through foresight and forethought, especially in planning and preparation, the effect of chance can be minimized and the effect of skill maximized. The second is that most ...

The Latest Hardball Times Post 2007-07-17 08:09:00 Here is a link to my latest post. The text is below. In the America's Cup in 1983, Dennis Conner, captain of the U.S. entry Liberty, committed a fatal blunder, based on his failure to use a "follow-the-leader" strategy, leading to the first loss by America in that event. No, his blunder wasn't supporting Walter Mondale or betting the Mets to win it all. A key strategy in sailboat racing when ...

Proof of Rampant PED Use In That Sordid Era Of The 1960s. 2007-07-16 08:07:00 Proof that players in the 60's were taking performance enhancing drugs. So take that Tim McCarver!! I am not really sure how this missed the attention of The Mitchell Commission, hordes of baseball analysts and announcers, writers and those interested in the game, but my in depth perusal of statistics from the 1960's indicates clear and convincing evidence that the pitchers from the 60's were ...

Links to My Hardball Times Weekly Column for New Readers 2007-07-16 08:01:00 We are getting a lot more hits from various search engines. Most of these readers may not be aware that I am also writing a weekly column for The Hardball Times Fantasy Focus Blog, especially since I haven't mentioned it in a while! The columns are more in depth and detailed versions of my blog posts, given that the format of a weekly column is a bit more formal. So, I will be posting those ...

Ollie's "Back" 2007-07-15 19:06:00 Matt looks at "his guy", Oliver Perez. Born in August 1981 in Mexico, Oliver Perez debuted for the San Diego Padres (who signed him in 1999 as an amateur free agent) in 2002. Making 15 starts his rookie year, he struck out 94 batters in 90 innings and walked 48, with a 3.50 era and a 1.32 whip. During a "sophomore slump" year with a 5.38 era (with the same k and bb rate), he was traded with ...

Fantasy All Stars - Relievers 2007-07-12 14:31:00 Matt finishes the roundup of first half fantasy all stars with relievers. First, about the All Star game itself. I fell asleep. I was still exhausted after a loooong weekend and another loss at softball (we're 2-7, but "should" be 4-5 with 2 last inning collapses). I heard about the big controversy the next day - why didn't LaRussa pinch hit Pujols with the game on the line in the 9th? Listening ...

Granderson for Haren--A Failure of Trade Policy 2007-07-12 08:15:00 Analysis of a trade proposal in a 12 team mixed league. In my 12 team mixed league I made a trade offer that I thought was fair: Granderson for Haren. The opponent responded by saying "sure, and I will give you Hawpe for Utley." Was I that far off?? Haren has been great so far; but also lucky. My colleague on the Fantasy Focus blog at The Hardball Times just wrote a very interesting article ...

Part Two of Jeremy's Worst Trades 2007-07-09 09:29:00 Part two of Jeremy's Worst Trades List 11 – also March 1997- Garret Anderson, Brian Simmons and 1998 4th rd pick (Traded and turned into Shane Mack) for Shane Mack and Bill Taylor – Memorable for the Joel Youngblood-style PTBNL situation. Mack for Mack. And not even Alison Mack. Enjoy that one, Smallville fans. 12 – December 1997 - Jay Buhner, Dean Palmer, Luis Rivas, Jay Witasick and 1998 1st ...

The Worst Trades Ever in My Fantasy League-Part I 2007-07-09 09:15:00 From Pat--Jeremy and I have been in a league together for about fifteen years. Fortunately, Jeremy keeps a list of every trade made. This is his look of the worst ones ever. For all of my legions of fans out there in the Blogosphere, I apologize for my absence since my much-talked about first blog entry. Seriously, stop with the phone calls and the email blasts – there is only so much of me to ...

Making a Large Trade 2007-07-07 09:16:00 Looking at the large trade and why it is usually bad strategy. In a prior post I discussed The Big Picture. One thing that I frequently hear on podcasts and see in message boards is the "large trade" where one owner is trading five guys for another five or sometimes more. In higher stakes leagues where there are strict salary caps, positional eligibility issues etc this can be a necessity. But in ...

The Big Picture 2007-07-04 08:25:00 A short note on the genesis of this blog. Now that we have settled in here at the blog, I wanted to just discuss what our mission here is and why I started the blog. The genesis of the blog was the proliferation of bad advice out there, and the dearth of any serious advice to those who are looking at The Big Picture. I listen to lots of baseball related podcasts and radio shows, and have always ...

Holding Tight On James Shields 2007-07-03 08:27:00 Its all good, fellow owners of James Shields, so don't worry. With three straight losses, and a ballooning ERA, Shields' owners may be starting to get nervous. Lenny Melnick on his podcast with Paul Greco, addressed Shields as a sell high candidate. I agree with this, if you can get full value, but if you are trading him because you are worried about him, then let me assuage your fears. Arguably ...