The daily grind: 5-3-13

The Daily Grind provides daily match-up advice for tinkerers and daily fantasy players. I welcome advice to help make this column more effective, including notice of impending weather events, new injuries, and changes to platoon situations. Ownership rates are from Yahoo!

The daily picks are a mixture of Daily League specific advice and information for the more typical fantasy owner.

Today’s grind

Pitcher (to start): Jonathan Pettibone is today’s auto-start. The Stanton-less Marlins have been preventing their opponents from putting up great fantasy lines thus far.

I refuse to change my tune on the Yankees until their lineup has more than two players with an expected wOBA above league average. I do think it’s prudent to avoid starts at Yankee Stadium when CC Sabathia is pitching, but A.J. Griffin is a pretty good pitcher.

Felix Doubront remains intriguing, but this might be the start to sit him if you don’t need the innings. He faces the Rangers.

Pitcher (bum): Seeing Jason Marquis, Shaun Marcum, and Jeff Francis starting today takes me back to 2007. All three are prone to crooked numbers.

Hitter (power): Jonny Gomes and Daniel Nava are seeing a lot of face time here recently. Nava’s been a little more responsive to my favor than Gomes.

Juan Francisco faces Marcum tonight, but he sometimes sits when he should start, like last night. *shakes fist at Chris Johnson/Fredi Gonzalez*

We need a taser because Ryan Raburn is streaking. I hope that joke hurt your insides as much as it hurt mine. But seriously, he’s known to go on these streaks where he’s a top player in the game, it’s just been awhile.

Hitter (speed): Nate Schierholtz, Craig Gentry and Gerardo Parra rep Team Speed today.

Tomorrow’s grind

Pitcher (to start): I’m a little more uncomfortable with Bartolo Colon against the Yankees lineup. He’s a better play for H2H leagues, since his strikeout rate is fairly low.

Speaking of Yankees, Phil Hughes has been solid in three straight outings.

Some extra luck has taken Pat Corbin past my 50 percent ownership threshold. But if he’s still available in your league, a start at Petco is a must-own.

Pitcher (bum): Jon Garland at Coors still strikes me as very exploitable.

Clayton Richard is on the other side of that Corbin match-up, and he’s looking like a minor leaguer these days.

Even the Twins can hit Scott Kazmir…is what I’m saying by recommending against him. We’ll see if it’s true.

A Hardball Times Update
Goodbye for now.

Hitter (power): Scott Hairston should be back in the lineup for Tony Cingrani. At some point, that boy is going to give up a couple long balls.

We’re back to Seth Smith and Brandon Moss for the Hughes match-up. As you see, I’m hedging my bets on that one. Let’s just include Travis Hafner against Colon while we’re at the hedge.

Tomorrow is a Chris Johnson day.

Hitter (speed): Try Leonys Martin, I haven’t used that name in awhile.

Alternatively, Chris Denorfia is likely to start against Corbin.

Noteworthy news

Roy Oswalt signed a minor league deal with the Rockies, which is not an ideal destination for him. I’m expecting to see him out of the bullpen, honestly.

Weather watch

The midwest is expected to see showers throughout the day, which affects the White Sox, Royals, Reds and Cubs.


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Benzedrine
10 years ago

I think Juan Francisco outright lost the 3B job. Not much of an option until Chris Johnson goes back to his normal self. Had to drop him in my league.

Brad Johnson
10 years ago

I just dropped him as well. I had been platooning him with LaRoche, but a mega-offer including JUpton for keepers forced me to do a roster shuffle.

Morgan Conrad
10 years ago

Wow, good call on A.J. Griffin