Fantasy baseball draft season is coming, so you best be prepared by delving through every major player on each team. Fantasy FanHouse is here to help with a quick once-over. Meet the...
Team that should have more doctors on staff. Lofty expectations turned sour when major keys to the Indians lineup went down with injury in 2008. Victor Martinez, Travis Hafner, Fausto Carmona, and Jake Westbrook all lost significant time to various maladies. The health and or hasty return of these guys, and the continued health of Kerry Wood are crucial to the Indians having any success in 2009.
The Breakout
What a second half at the plate for Shin-Soo Choo in 2008. In 242 second half at-bats he hit .318 with 12 home runs and 50 RBI. His flyball rate and HR/F ratio seem to be in line with past numbers meaning that the power we saw in 2008 is real and should be here to stay. I'll also share with you a skill set of his that he didn't show in 2008 but could in 2009. Five of the last six seasons in the minors, Choo stole more than 20 bases. In fact, in 2004 he stole 40 bases. If he gets the opportunity to run this season and gets to amass 500 or more at-bats he could easily hit 20 home runs and steal 20 bases.
The Bust
Cliff Lee won the Cy Young Award in 2008 and is going to attempt to follow up career marks set in wins, strikeouts, ERA and WHIP. Lee's numbers look to be in pretty good shape. He wasn't abnormally lucky (his hit rate was 30.2%) and his K/9 seem right in line with the past too. A few things bother me about Cliff Lee in 2009. First, he stranded an abnormally high (for him) percentage of runners last season. His 78.3% strand rate was a little less than 14 points higher than his 2007 total and more than eight points higher than his career high. If than number heads south, even at a normalization level, his ERA will spike. Lee also pitched 80 more innings in 2008 than he did in 2007. There are lots of pitchers who tend to have problems the year following such a huge uptick in innings thrown. Most important is the fact that a lot of people are drafting Lee as he is a front-line ace. Yes, he won a Cy Young Award. Yes, he won 22 games last year. But, if you draft him in '09 thinking he belongs in the crown with Dan Haren, Brandon Webb and company, you're going to pay way too much.
The Lineup
1. Grady Sizemore, CF
2. Mark DeRosa, 3B
3. Victor Martinez, C
4. Travis Hafner, DH
5. Jhonny Peralta, SS
6. Shin-Soo Choo, RF
7. Ryan Garko, 1B
8. Ben Francisco, LF
9. Asdrubal Cabrera, 2B
The Rotation
1. Cliff Lee
2. Fausto Carmona
3. Carl Pavano
4. Anthony Reyes
5. Aaron Laffey / Jeremy Sowers / Scott Lewis
The Bullpen
CL - Kerry Wood
SU - Jensen Lewis
SU -Rafael Perez
The Skinny
• Kelly Shoppach had a breakout year in 2008 when Victor Martinez went down. However, with Martinez back and Hafner healthy and playing DH, Shoppach is the odd man out. Unless something happens to give Shoppach the playing time he needs, he's only a back-up fantasy catcher; and should be drafted as such. If Martinez of Hafner go down, or the Indians decide to play Martinez at first base, Shoppach becomes much more valuable.
• The fifth spot in the rotation was leaning towards being Laffey's before Spring Training. However, Laffey isn't doing a lot to solidify his hold on the spot. Luckily, neither are any of the other competitors. The fifth rotation spot doesn't carry much fantasy weight. But this Cleveland team could win a lot of games in 2009 and if any one of these guys can get hot and win this job, they'd surely help an AL-only staff; maybe even a really deep mixed-league team.
• Ryan Garko is experimenting with a switch to the outfield. This is great news if it gets SHoppach extra at-bats. It's bad news for either Choo or Francisco, whichever one platoons or loses their job to Garko.• Kerry Wood has an Average Draft Position of 151.86. He showed us last season that he's built for the closer role. So, if he stays healthy, and this team does win more than last season, Wood's 13th round ADP is way too low. He's a steal there as he could save 40 games in 2009.
