Starts like last night’s from New York Yankees starting pitcher Hiroki Kuroda will help our free agent fantasy team to bounce back from a slow start. Find out more below. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports
We are now two weeks into the season, so it is time to check in on how the free agent fantasy team is doing.
The only real move this week is Cody Ransom was designated for assignment by the Padres. Remember, I picked Ransom over Cesar Izturis when the season started, releasing Izturis. Considering Izturis is still on the Reds’, it looks like I made a mistake. Since Ransom was designated for assignment, and is currently in that limbo period, I could put him in the minors/inactive part of the roster. However, since that part is full, and I don’t want to release someone in hopes of keeping Ransom when he could be released himself, I am just going to go ahead and release him. Speaking of released players, I had Endy Chavez in spring training but when he was released by the Royals and then signed by the Mariners, I didn’t sign him again. He has made the Majors with the Mariners now and has been playing in some games. So for now, I will go with a 24 man roster. I have middle infielders, so I don’t need to bring anyone to play “replacement” for me, and I don’t have anyone else from my minors coming up. So for now, I’m stuck with 24 players.
Baseball Reference has started updating their value numbers, so we can post those as well now. I also changed how I logged the WAR data for released players. From now on, I am only keeping track of how they did when they were with my team. This makes things easier for adding up how I did, as I don’t confuse post-team numbers with their numbers that they put up when they were on my team. This post goes up on Mondays, so the numbers are actually taken from Sunday morning, so they don’t include Sunday games.
The Kraken
| Name | fWAR | rWAR | WARP | WAA | Position | 2013 Contract | Future Contract |
| James Loney | 0 | -0.1 | 0 | -0.2 | 1B | 2 mil | |
| Maicer Izturis | 0 | -0.3 | -0.1 | -0.4 | 2B | 3 mil | 6 mil |
| Marco Scutaro | 0.1 | 0.3 | -0.1 | 0.1 | 2B | 6.66 mil | 13.33 mil |
| Jeff Keppinger | -0.3 | -0.4 | -0.3 | -0.6 | 2B | 4 mil | 8 mil |
| Jack Hannahan | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 3B | 2 mil | 2 mil |
| Eric Chavez | 0 | -0.1 | 0 | -0.1 | 3B | 3 mil | |
| David Ross | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0 | 0.1 | C | 3.1 mil | 3.1 mil |
| Geovany Soto | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0 | 0.1 | C | 2.75 mil | |
| Yorvit Torrealba | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | C | .5 mil | |
| Juan Pierre | -0.2 | -0.1 | -0.1 | -0.3 | OF | 1.6 mil | |
| Melky Cabrera | -0.1 | 0.2 | 0.1 | 0 | OF | 8 mil | 8 mil |
| Dewayne Wise | -0.1 | 0 | 0 | -0.1 | OF | .7 mil | |
| Andres Torres | 0 | -0.1 | -0.1 | -0.1 | OF | 2 mil | |
| Nate Schierholz | 0.5 | 0.1 | 0.6 | -0.1 | OF | 2.25 mil | |
| Oliver Perez | 0 | 0.2 | 0 | 0.2 | RP | 1.5 mil | |
| Shawn Camp | 0.1 | 0 | 0.2 | -0.1 | RP | 1.35 mil | |
| Jason Grilli | 0.2 | 0.3 | 0.2 | 0.2 | RP | 2.75 mil | 4 mil |
| Hisanori Takahashi | -0.1 | 0 | -0.1 | 0 | RP | .5 mil | |
| Jeremy Guthrie | 0 | 0.2 | 0.1 | 0.2 | SP | 5 mil | 20 mil |
| Hiroki Kuroda | 0.1 | -0.1 | -0.1 | -0.2 | SP | 15 mil | |
| John Lannan | 0.3 | 0.4 | 0.2 | 0.3 | SP | 2.5 mil | |
| Scott Feldman | -0.1 | -0.3 | 0 | -0.4 | SP | 6 mil | |
| Kevin Slowey | 0 | 0.5 | -0.1 | 0.4 | SP | .5 mil | |
| Bartolo Colon | 0.2 | 0.1 | -0.1 | 0 | SP | 3 Mil |
Minors
| Name | fWAR | rWAR | WARP | WAA | Position | 2013 Contract | Future Contract |
| Scott Baker | SP | 5.5 mil | |||||
| Randy Wells | SP | MiLB | |||||
| Michael Olmsted | RP | MiLB | |||||
| Carlos Torres | RP | MiLB | |||||
| Ryan Madson | RP | 3.5 mil | |||||
| Mitch Maier | OF | MiLB | |||||
| Brian Bogusevic | OF | MiLB | |||||
| Rich Thompson | OF | MiLB | |||||
| Thomas Neal | OF | MiLB | |||||
| Bobby Wilson | C | MiLB | |||||
| Mike Fontenot | 2B | MiLB | |||||
| Matt Downs | 2B | MiLB | |||||
| Travis Ishikawa | 1B | MiLB | |||||
| Dan Johnson | 1B | MiLB | |||||
| Ryan Ludwick | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | OF | 7.5 mil | 7.5 mil |
Former/Released
| Name | fWAR | rWAR | WARP | WAA | 2013 Contract | Future Contract |
| Freddy Garcia | MiLB | |||||
| Ryan Sweeney | MiLB | |||||
| Hector Rondon | MiLB | |||||
| Zach Braddock | MiLB | |||||
| Endy Chavez | MiLB | |||||
| Chris Volstad | MiLB | |||||
| Kyle McClellan | MiLB | |||||
| Ryan Sadowski | MiLB | |||||
| Brandon Allen | MiLB | |||||
| Cesar Izturis | MiLB | |||||
| Nate McLouth | 2 mil | |||||
| Tim Brydak | MiLB | |||||
| Tim Wood | MiLB | |||||
| Ryan Reid | MiLB | |||||
| Neal Cotts | MiLB | |||||
| Jason Bourgieous | MiLB | |||||
| Zach Phillips | MiLB | |||||
| Mike Ekstrom | MiLB | |||||
| Bill Bray | MiLB | |||||
| Dan Wheeler | MiLB | |||||
| Cody Ransom | -0.2 | -0.2 | -0.2 | -0.2 | .5 mil |
Here is how my team breaks down so far:
1 fWAR
1.2 rWAR
.6 WARP
-.7 WAA
If we assume that my team has played 11 games so far, here is how my team record breaks down, with the WARs added to each one’s specific baselines:
4.234 Wins 6.766 Losses according to fWAR
4.434 Wins 6.566 Losses according to rWAR
4.12 Wins 6.88 Losses according to WARP
4.8 Wins 6.2 Losses according to WAA
Apr 11, 2013; Washington, DC, USA; Chicago White Sox second baseman Jeff Keppinger (7) hits an RBI single during the fourth inning against the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park. Mandatory Credit: Brad Mills-USA TODAY Sports
So it hasn’t been a good start so far. Of course it is really early, so we shouldn’t freak out about slow starts by players like Jeff Keppinger or Hiroki Kuroda. There is no need to make panic moves yet, but I think this team is better than they are playing on a whole. It will also be interesting to see how the Scott Feldman situation plays itself out. He has been pretty poor so far, and it looks like he will miss a start with a back injury. He hasn’t been put on the disabled list yet, but he could be, and that would really test my pitching depth.