Ah, September is approaching quickly. September is perhaps the most
exciting month of the year for fantasy owners because of the personnel changes
going on. Yes, it is the month when rosters expand, so fantasy owners
have a lot of decisions to make. Are any of my starters in danger of
being benched? Who can I sneak off the waiver wire? Which teams are
in the playoff hunt and unlikely to play many of their prospects?
Hopefully, the following list will help, as they are almost assured of not only
securing a spot on the expanded roster, but also getting a fair amount of
playing time:
1. Jess Todd - SP (St. Louis Cardinals): St. Louis still has
some playoff hopes, sitting only 3.5 games behind Milwaukee. They have
some pitching problems with Joel Piniero being inconsistent, at best, as the
fifth starter, Adam Wainwright just recently returning from a lengthy injury,
and Chris Carpenter's status for the rest of the season very much unclear.
Cue Jess Todd, who has had no trouble getting professional hitters out.
Soon after he was drafted last year, Todd showed he had the stuff it took to
rise quickly through the farm system, striking out 69 in 58.1 innings in the
low-A New York-Penn League and posting a 2.78 ERA with a 1.06 WHIP. This
year? Even better. After dominating high-A hitters (1.65 ERA, 0.91
ERA, 35 K in 27.1 IP), he moved up after only seven games and four
starts. No problem. At AA, Todd had a 2.97 ERA and 1.00 WHIP,
though his strikeout rate dipped considerably (81 in 103 IP).
Nonetheless, the fact remained that he was getting hitters out (.216 AVG
allowed), and the Cards had no choice but to promote him to AAA, where, again,
he has been dominant. In two AAA starts, he has thrown 13.2 innings,
allowing only five hits and three walks, though he has hit two batters.
If the Cardinals continue to struggle with their pitching in September,
especially if Carpenter can't come back effectively, look for Todd to get some
work in for the big club.
2. Juan Miranda - 1B (New York Yankees): Miranda's
status will completely depend on the Yankees' playoff hopes. While his
team, the Scranton-Wilkes Barre Yankees, are in the playoffs, the big club's
status is far less certain. Miranda will stay in AAA until the
Scranton-W/B Yankees are done, but after that, who knows? If the Yankees
are out of the playoffs, then they have a tough decision to make about the
future of Jason Giambi. Do they pick up his $22 million option? Do they
decline it, then re-sign him? Do they let him go? A lot of that
decision-making may depend on the performance of Miranda, a Cuban defector who
has shown pretty good power ever since playing baseball in America. This
year, he has only 12 HR in AAA, but he has also hit 21 doubles and slugged
.465. One problem with Miranda is that he is virtually useless against
lefties, but the Yankees may want to see what he can do against major-league
righties. If the Yankees are effectively out of the race by the time he
is done with the International League playoffs, Miranda may get plenty of looks
at 1B in the last days of Yankee Stadium.
3. Dallas McPherson - 3B (Florida Marlins): Once one of the
top, if not the top, prospects in the Angels' system, McPherson hit on some
hard times in recent years. Always a strikeout artist in the bad way,
McPherson was nonetheless one of the fiercest power threats in baseball.
He suffered from terrible back problems the last two years, however, causing
him to play in a total of only 78 games. The Marlins snatched him up and
sent him to their Albuquerque team in the Pacific Coast League, and he has done
nothing but maul AAA pitchers. In 121 games, he hit 40 HR and drove in
91, slugging .619 in the process. Sure, he has struck out 158 times, but
Mike Jacobs has been striking out a ton without getting on base at all.
The Marlins are fading fast from the playoff race, and though Jorge Cantu has
been a nice story, is he in their future plans? Don't be surprised to see
McPherson getting a significant number of at-bats in a tri-platoon arrangement
with Jacobs, Cantu, and McPherson rotating time at 1B and 3B.
4. Carlos Carrasco - SP (Philadelphia Phillies): Obviously, the
Phillies are in the thick of a playoff race and won't be looking to test out a
youngster for no particular reason. However, their pitching is still
rather thin, and there could be major problems if any of their starters go
down. Even if the starters stay healthy, there could be an opportunity
for Carrasco in the bullpen, since any team can use a power arm like Carrasco's
in the bullpen. Though he has given up 33 hits in 30 innings during his
short stint at AAA, he has struck out 37 in those 30 innings. Carrasco
definitely has strikeout stuff (he also had 109 K in 114.2 IP with AA Reading),
but he has also been quite inconsistent (4.32 ERA and 1.34 WHIP at AA).
The Phillies might look more to use him as a bullpen arm in September and use
J.A. Happ as the emergency starter, but one never knows what will happen.
5. Aaron Cunningham - OF (Oakland Athletics): With Carlos
Gonzalez and Rajai Davis not cutting it in CF (.277 OBP/.649 OPS and .255
OBP/.567 OPS, respectively), the A's may be forced to look at Cunningham sooner
than expected. Couldn't hurt, could it, particularly when Cunningham has
not been fazed at all this season? Cunningham has only 15 AAA games on
his resume, but he has done pretty much all he could possibly do in those 15
games, hitting .327 with a .433 OBP and .600 OPS in 55 at-bats. This,
after hitting .317/.386/.507 at AA. Cunningham's walk rate is not
fantastic, which must gall the A's brass, but he certainly could not be much
worse than Gonzalez and Davis. If he is going to be their CF of the
future, then the A's may want to take a look at him now. In fact, if you
are looking for young players to fill out your roster in September, you may
want to examine the entire A's roster closely, since they, perhaps more than
anyone, will put youngsters out in the field.
