Mark Mulder injured again

Mulder struggled mightily and was removed in the first due to an injury. Something still isn't right despite being back in the starting rotation. Once I find out more, I'll provide an in-depth analysis.

Buy Low Sell High Summary July 9th

After following my numbers for a while now (roughly a couple months) I’m really starting to see the results of my picks. There may be a little confusion as to what exactly I consider “buying low” and “selling high” so I want to review my methods, purpose, and what exactly you’ll find here before I go on to the summaries.

Some people question my methods about what buying low or selling high is, so far I only know of The True Gurus Show, but my methods are sound and based on fact not opinion. First, I evaluate the hitters or pitchers using statistics that they have control of and also ones that show whether or not someone is lucky or likely to regress. Knowing someone’s RBIs or Runs are important as they are the basis for most leagues but you can find that information anywhere and more importantly it’s hard to tell whether or not they will perform better or worse over the last part of the year based on these stats. For instance, take away 1 game and Delgado has 9 RBIs less but it makes his overall stats look a lot better even if you were drawing them out on a per game basis. Plus, no one can predict these types of performances so therefore I don’t focus on these. I focus on whether that player with play better or worse from this point forward and what you can potentially trade for him. I may say to buy low on someone who is having a good year, but that’s because the stats show he can improve and maybe someone in your league doesn’t believe he’ll keep it up. The other fantasy owner may view his production as lucky and you can maybe get him for cheaper than if the owner knew he could keep it up.

Next I give my explanation based on baselines or guidelines that others have noted to be effective and accurate. And finally, I always provide 3 or more actual trades that occurred in real mixed leagues that occurred within a few days of the posting. Please note the emphasis that these trades actually occur so this is the most up-to-date value that people are paying for or buying for. This is real world evidence of what the players’ current value is. Will it be 100% accurate in everyone’s league, no and that’s not my goal. I try to provide everyone a rough idea of what someone’s value is at that time, whether or not I feel that their performance will improve or begin to drop off, and let that fantasy owner make a decision.

Everyone has their bad picks (right now mine are Berkman, Uggla, and Dempster) but I stand by my methods and my picks and would like to see the numbers at the end of the year.

Right now, my picks are looking a lot better than the last summary from a couple of weeks ago.

	Buy	Sell
Hits	353	175
HR	60	23
AB	1308	634
PA	1510	734
OBA	0.352	0.366
BABIP	0.285	0.320
AB/HR	21.80	27.57
OPS	0.829	0.821
BB/SO	0.617	0.517
HR/FB	18.18%	18.70%

Right now it doesn’t look like my picks have been too distinguished as they look pretty even. The OPS is a little better but the HR/FB % is a little worse. These rate stats show that they are close to even which is not what you planned for while reading this. But the effects of Uggla and Berkman cannot be overstated.

	Buy	Sell
Hits	353	130
HR	60	12
AB	1308	540
PA	1510	540
OBA	0.352	0.306
BABIP	0.285	0.318
AB/HR	21.80	39.17
OPS	0.829	0.729
BB/SO	0.617	0.554
HR/FB	18.18%	13.95%

This is what it looks like without those two in the mix. I know picking and choosing after the results are in smells a little fishy but I want to prove my point of having a good track record. Also I never advocated selling Uggla or Berkman for a bucket of seeds, so you should have gotten a great return on them anyways as these are great players. All of the buys are better, especially in AB/HR, HR/FB, OPS, OBP, and the BABIP is right smack in the normal range proving that these stats are valid. The sell group has gotten a little lucky in the time I’ve recommended them and they still don’t measure up. Hopefully this will help to show that I do make good picks.

Now onto the pitchers:

	Buy	Sell
IP	230.3	416.0
Outs	691	1248
Hits	240	426
Walks	83	165
WHIP	1.40	1.42
FIP	2.68	3.12
Strikeouts	204	304
k/9	7.97	6.58
K/BB	2.46	1.84
AB	941	1700
BABIP	0.301	0.275

These numbers do not exclude anyone that I have picked. Dempster’s starts are included in the sell while Randy Johnson is in the buy. Neither of them have done exactly what I suggested they would. Here I would like to point out that my Buy recommendations have a much better FIP, K/BB, and k/9. Also my WHIP is lower despite having a higher BABIP. The numbers above don’t lie, my buy picks have produced better than the sell picks. Once everyone starts to regress on both sides, I firmly believe my numbers will be that much better.

Summary:

Like I mentioned before my goal of writing these recommendations was never to provide a concrete rule of who to sell for or who to buy for a particular player. It’s to give my wonderful readers a recommendation on what the player is currently valued and whether or not he will improve or start to tail off. Every league is different as is every team so the examples are just examples. The term “Buy Low” doesn’t mean that he has hit rock bottom, it means you might want to get him at a good price even if he’s having a great year so far. (See my Scott Baker recommendation). “Selling High” doesn’t mean that you should sell him immediately or wait at his absolute peak. It means that if you get great value in return and you expect the player to tail off, you should trade him. Most importantly it means using the perception of the player at that time to get the most value for him. If a guy had 3 great starts in a row, it’d be smart to shop him around to someone in the league despite having an ERA north of 5. His overall numbers may say that it’s not a great sell high but at that moment he may have good vaue for someone else. Get what you can for him even if it’s a better version of the crap that you and I have.

Buy Low/Sell High July 9th (Clay Buchholz/Oliver Perez)

Buy Low: Clay Buchholz

Key Stats:

Pitcher:	BABIP	K/BB	PTO%	qERA	ERA Dif	P/IP	FIP
Hitter:	BABIP	P/PA	BB/SO	GB/FB	HR/FB
2008	0.365	2.150	28.2%	4.02	1.509	17.85	3.58
2007	0.259	2.20	34.39%	4.07	-2.477	14.36	2.72
2006	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A

Clay has been named the starter instead of Masterson on Friday who is being turned into a middle reliever which give me another win in my Sell High point when I recommended selling him. Clay has been dominating in AAA over 8 starts with an ERA of under 2 and a WHIP under 1.20 on top of a k/9 over 9. During his time up here he was unlucky as evidenced by his BABIP and comparing his ERA, qERA, and FIP. His FIP is 2 runs better than his ERA. The only thing he needs to really work on is his efficiency and his K/BB ratio, which it sounds like he was doing quite well in AAA. Right now this is what Buchholz is going for:

Buchholz, Clay SP BOS for Ludwick, Ryan OF STL

Buchholz, Clay SP BOS and Upton, Justin RF ARI for Francoeur, Jeff RF ATL and Olsen, Scott SP FLA

Buchholz, Clay SP BOS and Hawpe, Brad RF COL and
Weeks, Rickie 2B MIL for Francisco, Ben OF CLE and
Wood, Kerry RP CHC

Sell High: Oliver Perez

Key Stats: 

Pitcher:	BABIP	K/BB	PTO%	qERA	ERA Dif	P/IP	FIP
Hitter:	BABIP	P/PA	BB/SO	GB/FB	HR/FB
2008	0.264	1.520	26.6%	5.26	-0.637	17.60	5.35
2007	0.278	2.20	29.15%	4.35	-0.787	17.03	4.21
2006	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A	#N/A

This one may be a little tougher than most to pull off due to his history but if you can pull it off it’ll be very valueable for your team, both in terms of production from what you get in return but also not having the bad starts that Perez would give you. Plus his value may not be any higher after his last two starts if he starts becoming inconsistent again. Nothing above is good for Perez this year but he has given a couple good starts against good hitting teams so his value might be high. It’d be worth it to throw it out there in your league if you’re in a deep league. Here are three trades from CBS leagues in the past 3 days that I think are pretty indicative of what his value is, plus you can remove the risk on your end as well.

Lester, Jon SP BOS and Perez, Oliver SP NYM for Hamels, Cole SP PHI

Burnett, A.J. SP TOR and Perez, Oliver SP NYM for Lackey, John SP ANA

Blake, Casey 3B CLE and Perez, Oliver SP NYM for Pena, Carlos 1B TB