Investing & Maybe Fantasy Baseball

Cody Ross will not be ready for Opening Day because of the strained left calf. Once a position of strength, the Diamondbacks are now short of outfielders with Adam Eaton out for two months too. A.J. Pollock, who profiles as a 4th outfielder, is likely to be the starting right fielder. If Pollock played the entire year he could be a 10/10 player with a .265 batting average.

Jemile Weeks was optioned to Triple-A. It’s still a mystery who becomes the Athletics second baseman. Eric Sogard, Scott Sizemore, Adam Rosales and Hiroyuki Nakajima are all candidates. The front runner appears to be Sizemore, but everything I’ve read suggests he’s been awful. I wouldn’t be surprised if Nakajima is at second and Jed Lowrie is at shortstop.

Brett Lawrie will start the year on the DL. However, the Jays expect he’ll miss no more than two weeks.

David Freese will have an MRI on his back. It’s possible he will not be ready for Opening Day.

Oscar Taveras is still with the big league club. Originally, he was supposed to be optioned to Triple-A, but Carlos Beltran is still being bothered by a bad toe. It’s highly unlikely Taveras starts the year in the Majors if Beltran will only be out for a couple of weeks. What’s more likely is Allen Craig will be in right field and Matt Adams at first base if Beltran isn’t ready for Opening Day.

Pablo Sandoval’s right elbow showed “no new unexpected findings.” It looks as though his availability for Opening Day in jeopardy. However, since his injury could be backdated, he could only miss the first four games of the year as long as he doesn’t play in any games in Spring Training.

Vernon Wells was traded to the Yankees today. Is Wells good? No, but he could be a cheap power source. Last year he had 11 home runs in 262 plate appearances and in 2011 he had 25 home runs in 529 plate appearances.

David Murphy took batting practice yesterday and reported no discomfort. David Wright also participated in batting practice on Sunday, the first game action since March 14. Both Wright’s and Murphy’s availability for Opening Day is up in the air, but I have a gut feeling they’ll both play on Opening Day.

Tyler Greene of the Houston Astros was released today. Since he’s out of options the Astros will have a few days in order to trade him. In conjunction with this action, the Astros signed Ronny Cedeno, who is now expected to be the starting shortstop.

Derek Jeter is likely to start the year on the DL. The length of time time he’ll miss is still up in the air, but since the DL designation was backdated to March 22, the earliest he could be back is April 6. Eduardo Nunez is projected to be the starting shortstop. He’s below average defensively, but that doesn’t matter for fantasy. His primary asset is speed; if he plays a few weeks he could easily slot in your MI position for the first few weeks.

Jon Garland was released by the Mariners yesterday; as of now, Garland is likely heading to the Rockies. Garland has no fantasy value to speak of, but what this means is Erasmo Ramirez, from my standpoint, is all but assured to have a spot in the pitching rotation. Jeremy Bondermon, Blake Beavan and Brandon Maurer. Of the three, Maurer is the only pitcher that could be owned in a 12-team mixed league because he has the ability to miss bats with an above average slider with an average changeup and curveball. Prior to 2012, Maurer was plagued by injuries; elbow problems in 2010 and shoulder problems in 2011. Last year he was completely healthy was able to throw the most innings he’s thrown in his career (138).

Aaron Hicks will be the Twins starting center fielder on Opening Day. Hicks is still raw and probably isn’t ready for the Majors, but if he plays a full year he’ll hit .240 with 10 home runs and 15+ stolen bases. I bet Hicks will start to be overrated by fantasy owners because we tend to overvalue our dreams of an unknown.

Early reports out of Cleveland is Chris Perez should be ready for Opening Day.

Brian McCann is still recovering from right shoulder surgery and when he’ll be able to play is still up in the air. The early indication is he’ll miss a significant portion of April. Based on this news I moved him down seven spots from 12th to 19th. McCann really scares and I may drop him even lower. Geraild Laird is expected to be the Braves primary catcher with feel good story Evan Gattis serving as the backup.

Jason Motte will be out at least a week with a mild strain in his elbow. The last thing I want to hear with any pitcher is elbow problems because when there’s smoak (I literally typed “smoak” first instead of smoke) there’s fire. I originally had Motte as a top 5 closer, but I dropped him to 19th overall in my closer rankings. Mike Matheny, the Cardinals manager, said Mitchell Boggs will get the first opportunity at closing duties. If Motte misses a substantial amount of time Trevor Rosenthal, not Boggs, will end up becoming the closer.  Boggs walks too many hitters (7.1% walk rate) for his low strikeout rate (19.6%) so he’ll eventually blow too many games. When I have my NFBC 15-team draft on Tuesday I’ll target Rosenthal with my last two picks because if he becomes the closer, he could be a top 5 closer.