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So you want to fix things, do you?
You don't like the brew? You want to stick your hand in the pot and stir it around a little?
Well, it's hot. And sticky. And chances are, if you try to do too much too soon, you'll end up doing more harm than good -- to both it and your hand.
These things take patience. In a season of ups and downs, you can't expect to hit the high points without enduring the low points.
Fantasy Baseball - Dear Mr. Fantasy: Lineup dilemmas already upon us : FantasyNews.CBSSports.com
And sometimes those low points come right out of the gate.
What is your take on the painfully slow start for Jimmy Rollins this year? I took him as my first pick in a deep NL-only league (Hanley Ramirez and Jose Reyes were already gone), but I'm starting to wish I had just given up on the shortstop position and gone with a different strategy altogether. Of course, I know he's a great player and will eventually straighten things out, and I'm not going to give up too soon. My question to you is this: Do you think he is in a real funk and worthy of sitting behind my only other option at shortstop (Clint Barmes) while he works through his slump, or is this just a matter of a small sample size, making him one hanging curveball away from busting loose? -- Jonathan Emmons, Houston
SW: I think after nearly two weeks of pathetic numbers (four hits and zero stolen bases -- what's that?), we can safely say Rollins is in a slump. But for your predicament, you didn't give me enough choices. I want a combination of the two.
Because you can't sit him -- not for Barmes, not for anybody. Granted, you don't know how long this slump will last, but that's precisely the point. Players' numbers tend to fluctuate above and below their normal numbers during a given season. In other words, Rollins won't have to pay for this cold start all season, gradually working up his numbers until he gets them back to normal on Sept. 30. He'll have a hot streak to compensate for this cold streak -- maybe even overcompensate for it -- and it'll likely come out of nowhere. By drafting him so early, you chose to live and die by him, and missing out on his best week, when he contributes a significant portion of the numbers that made him a first-round pick in the first place, is even worse than enduring the occasional bad one.
Rollins would have to play this way through mid May before you could honestly consider benching him, even in a 10-team league.
Ryan Ludwick already has five bombs so far in 2009.
(US Presswire)
Why does Tony La Russa keep benching Ryan Ludwick? I was counting on him as my No. 2 outfielder this year. Should I look to trade him? -- Reid Guarnieri
SW: Yes, Ludwick has lost at-bats on occasion -- a direct result of the Cardinals' decision to begin the year with top prospect Colby Rasmus in the majors -- but let's not lose our heads here. He's the most established member of the Cardinals' outfield rotation, which also includes Rick Ankiel and Chris Duncan. When he's in the lineup, he bats cleanup, so the team obviously trusts him to play a huge role on offense this season. La Russa just wants to make everybody plenty of at-bats.
Usually, situations like this one, where a team has four players for three positions, work themselves out. Somebody gets injured or slumps his way out of the rotation. Either way, if Ludwick keeps hitting the way he has this year and did last year, the Cardinals will have a harder and harder time taking him out of the lineup.
That said, his hot start has probably quelled much of the doubts many Fantasy owners had going into the draft, which enabled you to get Ludwick at a bargain price in the first place. You could try dangling him to see if the owners of Carlos Lee and Matt Holliday get desperate enough to bite -- long shots, both -- but don't trade him just for the sake of trading him.
In a 12-team Head-to-Head mixed league with standard scoring, which underrated second baseman do you think will have the best year: Aaron Hill or Orlando Hudson? -- Don Brown, Rochester, N.Y.
SW: When answering this question, I can't understate the influence of Manny Ramirez.
He makes an otherwise simple decision much more complicated because he offers, quite simply, the best lineup protection in baseball. Anybody who bats in front of him instantly becomes a better player, be it David Ortiz, J.D. Drew or Andre Ethier, who had a .998 OPS in the second half last year, mostly by hitting in front of Ramirez.
And guess who has that distinctive honor now.
Already, Hudson has demonstrated its effects. He hit for the cycle last week and has six extra-base hits, two of them homers. He's also stealing bases and already deserves more of a look in Fantasy now than he ever did last season.
But he's no Hill, who clearly has more offensive talent than Hudson when you compare the players by themselves. As a former first-round pick who looked on the verge of a breakout with 17 home runs in 2007 before suffering a serious concussion last season, he's already showing signs of a power breakout at age 27 with three home runs in 45 at-bats.
When comparing two players, you have to side with talent over any external factors that could change on a manager's whim. As soon as the Dodgers hit a snag and Joe Torre feels the need to juggle his lineup, Hudson might not have so much value anymore.
Hill should end up with more Fantasy points than Hudson. Plus, Hudson has more of an injury history, disregarding the one concussion for Hill. Go with the upside player here.
I love this time of year in Fantasy Baseball because people give up on potential studs after slow starts and I clean up on the waiver wire. I've noticed Chris Davis' name has popped up on the waiver wire in a couple of my leagues and I've quickly snatched him up, dropping Hiroki Kuroda and Shin-Soo Choo respectively. Isn't a week or two into the season too early to be giving up on a young slugger that was drafted in the middle rounds? Did I get myself a steal? Or do these other people know something I don't? -- Frank Wyatt, Chester, Va.
SW: Obviously, you shouldn't give up Davis or anybody else you drafted in the early or middle rounds this early in the season. You should only tinker with your late-rounders, disregarding a major injury, of course.
Davis has already shown signs of coming around, having homered in back-to-back games entering Thursday. A young slugger with a high whiff rate will endure his share of struggles throughout the season, making him a bit of a nuisance in Head-to-Head leagues, but when he smacks seven homers in a span of two weeks, those people who cut him will wish they could turn back the clock.
So yes, you made the right decision by adding Davis, though I wish you could have figured out a way in that one league to hold on to Choo, who hasn't done anything to disappoint after his breakout in the second half last year. Davis has more value because of perception, and therefore deserves a spot on your roster more than Choo does, but Choo might actually end up with more Fantasy points in Head-to-Head leagues that factor walks and strikeouts. Plus, he's far more consistent than Davis, not that it matters if you play in a Rotisserie league.
Don't cut Davis, but try to get Choo back if you can.
I'm in a 12-team 5x5 Rotisserie league with 30-player rosters. We have 25 moves for the entire season. My five outfielders are Manny Ramirez, Matt Kemp, Hideki Matsui, Shin-Shoo Choo and Nelson Cruz, along with Billy Butler and Todd Helton as my designated hitter and corner infielder, respectively. A certain seemingly awesome guy named Adam Lind is sitting on my bench, and he already has bigger numbers than all of these guys, almost combined. In the interest of patience and not overreacting, Lind is still on my bench, but my question is how long do we wait for the other hitters to catch up? I'm pretty happy with my starters right now, but it hurts watching Lind rake and Butler go 0-for-93. -- Brian Davino
SW: You can make only 25 moves all season, including changes to your starting lineup? Wow. That sounds ... scary ... and no fun.
But it is what it is, so let's do what we can with it. By now, you pretty much have to go with Lind. His hot start comes as somewhat of a surprise, but he isn't exactly Endy Chavez. He hit .318 in 1,581 minor-league at-bats with enough power to become a home-run hitter in the majors. His lack of plate discipline bothers me, but I can overlook it a little easier in Rotisserie leagues than Head-to-Head.
I don't mean to give anybody the wrong idea when I tell you to sit Butler, because I don't think anybody should "give up" on him, but when push comes to shove, he doesn't project as that much better than Lind, so you have no reason to show him any loyalty over Lind. You might end up subbing Butler back into the lineup for Matsui or Helton at some point, depending on which surgically repaired has-been continues to struggle (hopefully not both), but you can afford to stash him on your bench and see if he develops without it affecting your team's numbers.
Who do you grab if both are available: Randy Winn or Denard Span? Is Span a younger Winn with more upside? Or is Span a Winn wannabe, a less-dependable Winn? Who will out produce whom this year? Inquiring minds want to know. And so do I. -- Dennis Dagliolo, New York
SW: As a man who has recently come to appreciate Winn and all of his subtle contributions, I still have to opt for Span here. Some would disagree -- strongly, even -- but I think Span has the upside to surpass Winn as soon as this season.
Some look at the entirety of his minor-league career and point to his lack of power and on-base ability and everything else that would make him not even remotely special. But during that final minor-league season, in only 184 at-bats, he had a breakout, hitting .340 with a .481 slugging percentage.
On its own, you could excuse it as an aberration, a fluke resulting from too small of a sample size, but it continued into the major leagues, when he hit .294 and slugged .432 in 347 at-bats. He has power -- not enough to hit 20 homers, but enough to rank among the league leaders in doubles and triples. Plus, he has more upside for stolen bases than Winn, who has never stolen 30 in a season.
From the beginning, I've called Span a sleeper for Shane Victorino-like numbers, and I'll stick with that comparison because Span has lived up to it so far. Brian Roberts fits that same mold, just to give you another comparison, and you obviously would have drafted Victorino and Roberts well before you drafted Winn.
SW: Well, you obviously wouldn't drop Sabathia, Lester or Garza. They've all emerged as must-start Fantasy options and still have plenty of good years ahead of them. I know some people might advise you to forget Zimmermann altogether and stick with what you have, but in my eyes, his strikeout potential makes him more valuable than Carmona and Cahill.
At first, I planned to tell you to toss Cahill, but I assume you mentioned you play in a keeper league because you play in one so deep that you might need to keep all of these guys. In such a league, the long-term talent can spread pretty thin, and you don't want to give up anybody with a ceiling as high as Cahill's.
Cahill is one of the best pitching prospects in baseball and has the ability to strike out more batters as he matures. Carmona, though still young, has shown that when he goes cold, he goes cold -- too cold for you to use him. His pitches have so much movement that walks might continue to plague him, and even at his best, he doesn't get many strikeouts. Even if he improves his wins and ERA, you have to wonder if he'll ever help you in WHIP and strikeouts.
So I say throw back Carmona. I see the upside, but he hasn't given you much reason to stick with him over two emerging aces in Zimmermann and Cahill. I'd keep an eye on Carmona, though, and if he suddenly starts outperforming Jurrjens, you could go ahead and swap the two of them.
I'm in an eight-team, NL-only league, and I have Ramon Hernandez as my catcher. John Baker is available and looks good slotted in the No. 2 spot for a heavy-hitting Florida team. Baker should score runs and seems to hit for a high average for a catcher. What do you think of Baker, and do you think I should make that switch? -- Dave Zimmerman, Philadelphia
SW: Baker entered the season as one of the more underrated catchers in Fantasy, and I don't totally understand why. True, he didn't have much of a pedigree, and the Marlins didn't care to add him to the team until after his 27th birthday, showing they weren't exactly counting down the days until his arrival. But if he could simply repeat over a full season what he did in 197 at-bats last season -- numbers not at all inflated by the small sample size -- he would rank among the top 12 catchers in Fantasy.
That's not to say anyone should have drafted him there, but I ended up with him late in a couple of standard Rotisserie leagues and can't say he has disappointed me yet. The best part about him is he bats second, a rarity for a catcher but a role he deserves given his high on-base percentage. Batting that high, he'll get more at-bats and score more runs than most catchers, and he'll still get a decent number of RBI batting behind the bounding Emilio Bonifacio, who makes 90 feet look like 45.
What can those numbers do for you? Well, in standard Head-to-Head scoring, Baker already ranks among the top 10 catchers, and he hasn't even homered yet. I don't have a problem with Hernandez. He should hit more home runs than Baker. But Baker is the better all-around hitter, and by the end of the year, those extra at-bats from batting second will add up, even if loses a few to tough left-handers. He obviously doesn't rate with the studs at the position, but he deserves a look if you drafted a nobody.
You can e-mail our staff your questions at DMFantasyBaseball@cbs.com. Be sure to put Dear Mr. Fantasy in the subject field. Please include your full name, hometown and state. We'll get to as many as we can.
