FanHouse Jose Arredondo

Poppin' out of the box scores and right into your cubicle, the Roto Rush is your double espresso shot of fantasy baseball advice every weekday.

While the majority of the American workforce got a day off on Labor Day, some major league hitters were getting their power stroke on in a big way. With only 11 games on the docket, four players left the yard twice in one game: Derrek Lee, Billy Butler, Mark Teixeira and Juan Uribe. The fantasy fallout isn't huge, save for one; Lee's having a resurgence, Butler a breakout campaign and Teixeira an MVP-caliber season. Uribe, though ... that's news.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Angels general manager Tony Reagins said the answers for the Angels' uncharacteristic bullpen struggles are "in-house."

Unfortunately for the Angels, one of those answers, maybe the only one, just went on the disabled list.

Kelvim Escobar, who represents the Angels' best hope to settle their tattered bullpen, went on the disabled list on Monday with a recurrence of the shoulder problem that cost him the first two months of the season.

The Angels' company line is that Escobar had only a mild setback, similar to one he had in April, and he'll be ready to go in a week. Since he hasn't pitched since June 6, he's eligible to come off the DL next Monday. When he does, he'll try to get the Angels bullpen righted.

---

---

The tragic death of 22-year-old starter Nick Adenhart is definitely going to be the low point of the Los Angeles Angels' season -- at least let's hope they don't have to deal with another death -- but much less significant problems are continuing to plague the defending AL West Champions. Specifically, they can't escape the injury bug.

While John Lackey, Ervin Santana, and Kelvim Escobar try to fight their way back to the mound, Vladimir Guerrero has joined them on the disabled list and Dustin Moseley left Friday night's start after just three innings with an apparent elbow injury -- an elbow which was surgically repaired in 2007.

PHOENIX -- The beauty of spring training is watching all the young players and trying to figure out which ones are going to be stars. In the quest to separate the hyped prospects from the ones who are legit, I've been polling scouts in the Cactus League to get some of their impressions.

The players who could make their presence felt in 2009 are after the jump.

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 about to win about 15 less games this season. Teams in their division have closed the gap on the Angels, who are aging in some spots and not yet developed at others. The biggest factor to consider in fantasy is how many less games their starting pitchers will likely win.

When drafting in fantasy baseball, I often find rankings are a lot less useful than using the tier system. Simply group guys together with others who will perform similarly, and you won't focus on single players. Being frazzled when that single player is taken immediately before your pick is a good way to ruin your draft.

We're definitely not proponents of drafting closers high, but getting the last member of a tier at good value could work in the right situations.

When the offseason opened, Francisco Rodriguez and Brian Fuentes were the best free-agent closers on the market. K-Rod left Anaheim for Flushing and $37 million in Met money, so the Angels just dropped down to No. 2 on the list and signed Fuentes.

It's a two-year deal with a club option for a third for Fuentes. He posted 30 saves, his third time notching at least that many, to go with a 2.73 ERA in Colorado last season and converted his final 17 opportunities of the season. Fuentes stands 6-foot-4 and throws left-handed, which means the ninth inning will have a very different look than it did when Rodriguez was setting the single-season saves record.

The financial details haven't been released, but this is a bit of a head-scratcher for the Halos. Fuentes is a fine pitcher, but they have more pressing needs in the lineup now that Mark Teixeira has also left town for the bright lights of the Big Apple. Scot Shields or Jose Arrendondo could have filled the closer role for less money than Fuentes. If the desire for a brand-name closer exists and Fuentes' money winds up approaching $12 million per, why not just re-sign K-Rod?

That said, the bullpen in Anaheim is looking sound as a pound. The question now is if the lineup and rotation can hand them enough leads to make it worthwhile.

UPDATE: Buster Olney reports it is a two-year, $17.5 million deal with a $9 million option. At those prices Fuentes is a true bargain and the deal looks much better for the Angels.

Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2009.

The Angels led the majors with 100 wins, but in hindsight they were something of a paper tiger, quietly bowing out of the playoffs in four games against the Red Sox. What happened? For starters, their lineup was exposed.

This is a team that ranked 10th in the AL in runs scored, and with the exception of Mark Teixeira, who did most of his damage with the Braves, no one on this team topped 100 RBI. The heart of the lineup (Teixeira, Vladimir Guerrero, Torii Hunter) did its job, but the supporting cast simply didn't support. Over the course of a long regular season, this team racked up wins thanks to a outstanding pitching staff, but in a short playoff series, cold bats killed this team's chances.

Arte Moreno is willing to spend big to keep his team in the hunt, but even his pockets have a limit ... right? Is he willing to break the bank to retain his own blue-chip free agents, Teixeira and Francisco Rodriguez, and throw his hat in the CC Sabathia sweepstakes? We'll have to wait and see.

They say it's better to be lucky than good. At this hour, Joe Torre would agree with that statement. His Dodgers failed to record a hit against Jered Weaver and Jose Arredondo at Chavez Ravine this evening but still found a way to beat the Angels 1-0. It's only the fifth time since 1900 that a team won a game without getting a hit.

Weaver made an error on a Matt Kemp grounder and then catcher Jeff Mathis compounded it by throwing away a ball on a steal attempt to get Kemp to third. He scored on Blake Dewitt's sacrifice fly. Weaver left after six innings and Arredondo pitched the seventh and eighth but couldn't get any help from their offense, which got shut out for the second straight game. Chad Billingsley was the beneficiary of the Dodgers' good fortune.

Adding insult to insult for the Angel hurlers is that if they sit their grandchildren down in 50 years to show them that they once threw a no-hitter, they'll look crazier than Abe Simpson recounting his exploits in WWII. Because the Dodgers were at home and didn't bat in the ninth, the game doesn't go into the record book as a no-hitter. The last pitcher so dishonored was Matt Young, who no-hit the Tribe for the Red Sox in 1992 but lost thanks to seven walks and a Luis Rivera error.