Roster Doctor
by Jonathan HalketJune 23, 2010
John writes in: "Non-keeper, 14-team, 6x6, R, HR, RBI, SB, AVG, OBP, QS, W, SV, ERA, WHIP, K. One DL slot. I've got to get my ERA and WHIP down. So do I dump one of my guys and reclaim Jair Jurrjens (he's available as a FA) or maybe pick up a couple K -heavy relievers for purely K, ERA and WHIP purposes?
My roster:
C Ryan Doumit
1B Victor Martinez
2B Chase Utley
3B Chone Figgins
SS Hanley Ramirez
OF Andre Ethier
OF Josh Hamilton
OF Brett Gardner
UTIL Adam Jones
Bench Denard Span
Bench Jorge Cantu
Bench Alberto Callaspo
P Jered Weaver
P Trevor Cahill
P Kris Medlen
SP James Shields
SP Jonathan Sanchez
RP Jeremy Bonderman
RP Evan Meek
Bench Jason Vargas
Bench Gio Gonzalez
DL Josh Beckett
John - I think you should pick up Jurrjens and drop Cahill. Cahill's walk-to-strikeout ratio is better than Jurrjens', but whereas Jurrjens' ratio may improve Cahill's will likely regress, based on passed form. You can afford to wait and find out too since you have Vargas and Gonzalez, both of whom are probably better for spot starting than Cahill.
I wouldn't shoot for middle relievers. You'd be losing ground on both quality starts and wins and, with their low innings pitched, they won't help you in your ratio stats all that much. Hopefully, when Beckett returns, this will become moot.
Meanwhile, you should start Span over Jones. Jones hurts you in OBP and isn't all that helpful in the power categories.
But most importantly, you should start Martinez at catcher, inserting Cantu in favor of Doumit. You have some wiggle room since you have Martinez, Figgins and even Callaspo, who all have multi-position eligibility. You should see if you can exploit that eligibility to either better your pitching or upgrade at third base. This is something I wrote about last week. Figgins is worth more as a second baseman, but you don't need him there. If you need the speed help, you can keep him but it might be worth it to try and find some other owner who's playing a better third baseman (or first baseman since Cantu is eligible at third) in his utility spot and needs an upgrade at second. Maybe you can even mix in Callaspo in a trade too.
If you have a question for the Roster Doctor email here. Emails in simple text with players' full names properly spelled are much more likely to get responses. Also be sure to include your league's player pool (mixed, AL-only, NL-only), number of teams, scoring format (roto, head-to-head, points, etc.), categories, whether or not it's a keeper league, and any other pertinent information.
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