FanHouse Rajai Davis

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.

There was reason for concern with Cliff Lee. After storming out of the proverbial gates upon his entrance to the so-called Senior Circuit, he stumbled. Lee's first five outings yielded a 5-0 record with a 0.68 ERA and a 39:6 K:BB in 40 innings. His next three? Ugly. He got a win (going 1-2), but his ERA in 15 innings was 9.60, after allowing 29 hits, 16 earned runs and 4 home runs.

Tuesday night, Lee re-announced his presence with authority.

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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.

By now we all know of the greatness of San Francisco pitcher Tim Lincecum. He's the best pitcher in baseball this season, with a 2.34 ERA, 1.02 WHIP and 233 strikeouts in 200 1/3 innings. But there's another hard-throwing young kid in the Giants organization that, like Lincecum, has a shot to be one of the league's best very quickly. He's a guy you want to burn that No. 1 waiver priority on, in case he sticks in the rotation for the rest of the season. He is Madison Bumgarner.

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.

The ugly pitching line from Monday night shouldn't have been a huge shock to Jarrod Washburn fantasy owners. He went 5 2/3 innings, giving up 9 hits, 8 earned runs, 3 walks and 2 home runs. He struck out just 2. While it was his worst outing for the Tigers, he's been flat-out awful in Motown since he was acquired at the trade deadline. Sure, there was an 8-inning gem where he didn't allow a run. He also mixed in a quality start last time out for his first win in Detroit. Other than that, it's been horrifying.

We're at the point in most fantasy baseball leagues where the trade deadline has passed, so to make any kind of roster moves you need to rely solely on the waiver wire. But, that's not a bad thing. There's still lots of talent to be had.

In Tuesday night's version of the Fantasy Baseball Cram Session, Tom Herrera and I talked about finding different categories in rotisserie-style scoring where you can gain ground on the teams ahead of you. We focus on saves, stolen bases, wins and home runs and give you a number of players on the waiver wire who could help your team make up some of the difference between you and the guy(s) ahead of you in the standings. Listen to the podcast after the jump.

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Kansas City Royals pitcher Zach Greinke started the season and could virtually do no wrong. He won his first six starts and by the end of May he was 8-1 through 11 starts with a tiny 1.10 ERA. That's exactly when you should have traded him, at the highest point of his yearly value. I only say this with the benefit of hindsight. It's easy to look back and decide which moves should have been made.

Since the beginning of June, Greinke has made 14 starts and has a record of 3-7. His ERA has ballooned to 2.44. His earned run average is still great, he's top-five in the league, but he's losing half of his starts. How's that happening with such a great ERA?

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

Hey everybody, Pedro Martinez is back!

Well ... not quite.

You see, when it comes to marquee names like Pedro, the expectations are always a bit unrealistic. It would be nice if legends could harness the same stuff at age 37, but that's just not the way it goes. In fact, the Martinez we saw in his season debut Wednesday wasn't all that impressive from a fantasy perspective.

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

One of the most prized prospects in baseball is blossoming before our eyes. And his timing couldn't be better as the Colorado Rockies are in the thick of a Wild Card hunt.

Carlos Gonzalez did it all in the minor leagues. Before being called up he hit ten home runs and batted .339 in 48 games. He struggled a bit upon arriving in Denver, but now is really turning it on.

Over the last month, Gonzalez is batting .432 with a home run and three stolen bases. His 1.114 OPS shows that he's really creaming the ball and his eruption is fueling the Rockies' winning ways. On Sunday Gonzalez went 3-for-5 and brought his season batting average up to .283.

San Francisco Giants outfielder Dave Roberts landed on the DL this week, with a torn meniscus and "additional debris" behind his kneecap. I'm no doctor, but that doesn't sound good.

And indeed, Roberts could miss at least a few months with this injury. So, why would Giants fans be happy about this?

It's not any hostility towards Roberts, one of the few talented veterans left on the team, and by all accounts a really good guy. Though he's 35, he still has wheels, swiping 31 bags last year to go with his solid defense.

But there you have it -- he's 35.

Despite the fact that the Giants have won three straight games, no rational San Francisco fan thinks this is anything but a lost season. And well run teams do one thing in those kind of years -- find young talent to help them rebuild. So it was particularly galling for these fans to watch the season begin with youngsters like Fred Lewis, Rajai Davis and Eugenio Velez struggling to find regular playing time.
That all changes with Roberts taken out of the mix -- Lewis and Davis have gotten starts in the last three games (all wins for the Giants) and while they haven't played at an All-Star level, that's really not the point. At the end of the year, manager Bruce Bochy and GM Brian Sabean need to know what they have on their hands to help plan for 2009.

In the meantime, all three of these guys -- Davis, Lewis and especially Velez (who can play both outfield and infield slots) are not only helpful to the Giants, but to fantasy owners as well. They're all fast (Velez might be one of the fastest kids in the league) and stolen bases are a hot commodity.

So, in a season that Giants fans most likely will want to forget, there are a few positives -- though Dave Roberts might not agree.

Most people consider the trade deadline to be a time for contenders to stock up for the stretch run ... so what's a couple of last-place teams like San Francisco and Pittsburgh doing swapping players? That's what happened, as the Giants sent 32-year-old starting pitcher Matt Morris to the Pirates in exchange for 26-year-old backup outfielder Rajai Davis and the always popular Player To Be Named Later.

I suppose this makes sense for the Giants, who have a chance to get out from underneath Morris' contract. He signed a three-year, $27 million deal prior to last season and has responded with a 4.98 ERA last year and a 4.32 ERA thus far this season. He's not a bad back-of-the-rotation starter, but not a guy you want to give $9 million a year.

Davis may never be a star, but he's shown a proven ability (in the minors, at least) to hit for average, draw walks and steal bases. Plus, at 26 years old, he's 17 years younger than Barry Bonds, nine years younger than Dave Roberts and seven years younger than Randy Winn. Considering the Giants' lineup features six guys at least 35 years old (seven if you count the injured Mike Matheny), rolling the dice by trading a disappointing pitcher for a cheap kid who might compete for the team's leadoff spot within a year isn't a horrible idea.