Padres ace and reigning National League Cy Young winner Jake Peavy has been scratched from his scheduled start on Monday due to elbow soreness. He is expected to miss at least one start and the team isn’t completely ruling out a stint on the disabled list.

Peavy has explained how he feels the discomfort on every pitch he throws, telling the San Diego Union-Tribune, “It’s not normal soreness, which is why we’re going to have it looked at. It’s been about for three or four starts that I’ve felt a little something. I do feel something in the elbow. It’s better to be safe rather than sorry and have it checked out.”

The Padres ace will have an MRI tomorrow and be evaluated later tomorrow or Tuesday.

“Jake pitched his last three starts with a little bit of soreness,” said Padres manager Bud Black. “It’s to the point where we have to take a step back.”

There is no question that fantasy owners should bench Peavy for the upcoming week and take it week-by-week thereafter. Until the MRI results come back it’s too early to take drastic measures. That said, if you have roster spots to spare, it might make sense to claim a potential temporary replacement like the Orioles’ Jeremy Guthrie,  Athletics’ Justin Duchscherer, Yankees’ Mike Mussina, or Marlins’ Andrew Miller, among others.

Photo courtesy of Egloos.com

Recently I was talking with a former colleague at Fanball and he was asking my opinion of a trade he was going to make in a deep keeper league I used to be a part of it. This is a 5×5 rotisserie league in which rosters consist of 40 players and draw upon both the National and American League. Very few prospects go undrafted, and those prospects have to play a game in the major leagues before they are eligible to be kept for subsequent seasons.

In this league there are teams that set up shop to start their fire sales insanely early in the year. Yep, after one month of play they have already started, including a the first deal I would have vetoed if I still was in control of the league–Johan Santana (1) and Carlos Lee (2) for Matt Kemp (26), Dana Eveland (30), and Daric Barton (late 20s),  (2008 rounds in parenthesis are approximate).  This propensity for the fire sales to start ablaze early benefits my friend because he always drafts well, ending up with more young talent than he needs and thus is able to peddle some of it to fill holes as he chases another championship.

He came to me with an offer he received from another owner that had him giving up the Marlins Scott Olsen and Devil Rays pitching prospect Jake McGee and getting back Torii Hunter and Micah Owings in return. Olsen used to be a high-profile prospect, but he’s struggled both mentally and physically and hasn’t been able to stretch out his sporadic strings of success. He still has upside, and was pitching well before some arm soreness, but probably lacks an elite level ceiling at this point. McGee has dealt with some forearm soreness this season, but is every bit as promising as scouts claim. He had only a brief stint at Double-A in 2007, but it was impressive, as he struck out 11.4 batters per nine innings and didn’t seem overwhelmed by the promotion.

His success has continued this season with the most notable development being his cutting down on his walks slightly. Despite this success and the accolades he’s earned as a pitching prospect, we had to look at this trade offer constructively. The Rays already have Scott Kazmir, James Shields, Andy Sonnanstine, and probably Matt Garza firmly entrenched in their pitching rotation. Barring HUGE unforeseen collapses, none of them figure to lose their spots any time soon. Then there is Edwin Jackson, who has enjoyed a very productive first month of the season, but could be bumped from the rotation down the road when one of the Rays top pitching prospects is ready for the bigs.

The problem is, McGee has a couple arms ahead of him in that pecking order. It’s possible that he’s passing up fellow Biscuit (Double-A Montgomery’s team name) Wade Davis on that depth chart, but not a certainty. There is little chance he passes up 2007 first-round pick David Price, who despite a bump in the road in the form of left elbow soreness this spring, profiles to be a front-of-the-rotation type of starter.

My argument for my friend became, how does McGee squeak his way into that pitching rotation in the next 1-2 years? I don’t see it. The investment made in Garza suggests that the top three rotation spots are locked indefinitely (Kazmir-Shields-Garza) and I believe that the success Sonnanstine is enjoying is no fluke. McGee fits the profile of a reliever far more than Price does and you want to give up Hunter and Owings to acquire a reliever who may not be closing out games? Even if he does, it could be a couple years before the saves start rolling in.

So while my buddy didn’t commit a raping and pillaging akin to that Johan/Carlos Lee deal, he helped his team’s chances and didn’t have to deal his most elite prospects. Kudos.

Photo courtesy of The Bleacher Report

Nearly every fantasy owner wanted it. A feel good story in the form of a Mark Prior bounce back from the edge of oblivion. Don’t count on it.

Prior’s agent, John Boggs confirmed on Friday that an MRI exam taken at the office of Dr. James Andrews earlier in the week showed a tear in the capsule of the pitcher’s right shoulder–the same shoulder he had surgery on in April.

“It’s a setback, but in terms of how big of a setback, we won’t know until you know how [Prior] is feeling,” Boggs told MLB.com. “We just hope it’s not a major setback. Mark is looking at it in a positive way. He will just lay low for a few weeks and let the shoulder settle down.”

The 15-27 Padres could use anything in the way of positive developments, but Prior isn’t going to deliver those. I’m not a doctor, nor do I play one on this blog, but I would like to issue a prediction some may consider bold, I consider very realistic: Prior will retire before the 2009 season starts. I wanted to say before the end of the current season, but the stubbornness of pitcher and agent is enough to keep him attempting comebacks for approximately another season.

That’s not reason for fantasy owners to long for the days when it looked like he would dominate the league for the next 10 years. If you love something, set it free and in this case, hope that Prior can get a coaching job with his alma mater, USC. It would be better for everyone.

Photo courtesy of MLB.com

At this time last season, Yankees starting pitcher Mike Mussina was 2-3 with a 5.86 ERA and 1.36 WHIP.

What a difference a year makes.

A Yankees pitching rotation that has seen everyone but Mussina and Chien-Ming Wang largely struggle so far this season. Through nine starts, Moose has enjoyed an early season renaissance of sorts, going 6-3 with a 3.99 ERA, 1.17 WHIP, and the kind of veteran presence the Yankees have needed so badly. “I am trying to hold them to one or two runs and it has paid off,” Mussina told the New York Post.

With one of my fantasy teams growing desperate for starting pitching I hopped aboard the bandwagon today, but can I really count on his early season success continuing? A 4.0 K:BB ratio is the most positive sign of success continuing, and his 1.1 BB/9IP is enough improvement on his 2.1 mark in 2007. I wouldn’t lose sleep over his modest 4.4 K/9IP, because it’s been many years since he’s racked up significant strikeout totals.

So I remain cautiously optimistic, because the Yankees will eventually provide him with more consistent run support and even though his early season numbers will probably regress slightly, he seems like someone fantasy owners should ride as long as they possibly can.

Like the paper towel maker Brawny, outfielder Ryan Braun is the Brewers quicker picker upper.

I think back to the the month of July of last year, during which he hit 11 homers, scored 18 runs, and drove home 25 while flirting with a .400 average. Braun was in something of a slump to start the season, though still putting up reasonable numbers, but something has seemed to click since he picked up a pink bat for Mothers Day/Breast Cancer Awareness day last Sunday.

“There was something about those bats,” Braun told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. “All the guys were saying it, even in the batting cage. They just felt right. They felt harder and the ball sounded louder coming off them.”

He quickly clubbed a homer with one of his other black-finish bats, to dispute his superstition. It wasn’t his impressive bomb off Cardinals’ pitcher Adam Wainwright that impressed his manager Ned Yost though. Yost cited a more modest at-bat in the Brewers’ big third inning that convinced his young slugger was officially out of his funk. After swinging at a first-pitch curveball in the dirt with runners on second and third and one out, Braun adjusted and worked a six-pitch walk.

“That’s a situation where he gets so anxious, trying to drive those runs in, because he’s a run producer,” Yost said. “That opened up a big inning for us, because it allowed the other guys to do what they do. When I saw that at-bat, I knew ‘Braunie’ was back to being the Ryan Braun we know.”

Fantasy owners look like they could be in line for another big month in the mold of last July. Hopefully you didn’t buy into all the analysts claiming he’d be a bust this season, because it’s clear that for the Brewers and fantasy teams alike, he can indeed be a quicker picker upper.

I’m attending the Jays/Twins games tonight and tomorrow so I don’t have time for a length post, but I am eager to direct your attention to the guys at Project Prospect and their latest update to their list of Top 25 players under the age of 25.  On the rise in this update of the long-running column are Giants pitcher Tim Lincecum, Rays pitcher Scott Kazmir, and Orioles outfielder Nick Markakis.

There are very few things more irritating that seeing a major league club sit down an injured star for nearly a week, all the while assuming they’ll return in a matter of days, and then placing them on the disabled list. Such is the case with Dodgers shortstop Rafael Furcal.

I didn’t head into the season targeting Furcal as the starting shortstop for my fantasy teams this season, but when the dust settled from my drafts, I had done just that in two of my three leagues. I was well aware of the injury risk he presented, but somewhat intrigued by the breakout many fantasy analysts have projected for him for the past three seasons…and after knocking out 49 hits in his first 32 games it certainly seemed as though he was on that path.

Then he hit that road bump on Monday, being placed on the 15-day disabled list with a lower back strain that forced him out of the last five games. Dodgers manager Joe Torre told the Associated Press this weekend that he was hopeful Furcal would return to the lineup Tuesday night, but the 30-year old shortstop admitted Sunday he was worried about his back, saying the pain was the same he felt last September when he had to sit out 12 games.

“This is the type of thing where it feels fine one day and it doesn’t the next,” Furcal said, adding he couldn’t run without pain.

So how Furcal’s fantasy owners react to the news? Well, if you’re lucky you finally gave up waiting on his return and plugged in an alternative this week. The alternative the Dodgers are relying on is promising shortstop prospect Chin-Lung Hu, who enjoyed a breakout season in 2007 at Triple-A and took home Futures Game MVP honors during his most productive professional season to date. He’s only hit .208 this season, but it was in just 48 at bats and he hasn’t gotten regular at bats, which is at least partly to blame for him not being able to find his groove at the plate. He’s enjoyed some success at the upper levels of the minors, so it’s conceivable that he could be an above average major league shortstop.

If Hu doesn’t seem like an adequate answer for your team, and in smaller leagues he probably isn’t, check and see if there is any chance that the Reds’ Jeff Keppinger or Rockies’ Clint Barmes are still available on your league’s waiver wire. They probably aren’t, but who knows…you could get lucky.  If you need to look deeper, consider the Blue Jays’ Marco Scutaro or Nationals’ Cristian Guzman. The former has put together productive streaks while with the Athletics and should get regular at bats for at least a few weeks and the latter hasn’t been productive in many years, but has certainly rediscovered his stroke this season and could be productive at least temporarily until Furcal returns.

We can hope that like the back injury of Tigers second baseman Placido Polanco, a little rest (and in Furcal’s case a cortisone shot) can do the trick and get him healthy again for a productive run through the last four and half months of the regular season.

My peers who have read anything I’ve written are probably ridiculously sick of hearing about it, but the research Baseball Prospectus once did regarding Angels second baseman Howie Kendrick is jaw dropping.

They have a statistic called Translated Batting Average, which is without question a less flawed statistic than it’s older brother, batting average. It expands all seasons to the usual 162-game schedule and the average number of regular player at bats (650). This research was done in 2006, so it’s possible another player has presented himself since, but the data showed that since 1998, there are 54 players (including major leaguers) who posted a translated BA of .300 or better in a season in which they were age 22 or younger (minimum 300 AB). Only seven of those players made the list twice:

• Sean Burroughs
• Miguel Cabrera
• Howie Kendrick
• Joe Mauer
• Albert Pujols
• Tony Torcato
• David Wright

Obviously that list is quite impressive, well, and then it includes Tony Torcato and Sean Burroughs as well. Nevertheless, it clearly stated at that time, we were justified to salivate over the potential Kendrick had to win batting titles.

Then he was given the chance to play regularly.

Before I had much of a chance to gloat over one of the players I had secured long-term on my most valued keeper league roster, the injuries started piling up. People (including myself) overlooked the fact he was limited to just 75 games in 2004 due to injuries and heading into a 2007 season which many people expected to be his breakout season, a broken finger held him to just 86 games. While he hit .322 over the course of that abbreviated season, the frustration of his missing significant chunks of seasons was mounting.

Enter 2008, where Kendrick hasn’t played since April 13 due to a hamstring injury and was forced to call off a minor league rehab assignment last week when the injury simply wouldn’t respond. He’s now seeing a physical therapist in hopes it will help his hammy loosen up.

“Hopefully we’ll get some good news on him on Monday and see where he is,” manager Mike Scioscia told the Los Angeles Times regarding Kendrick, whom the Angels had hoped to activate on the trip. “But it’s tough to give a time frame with the nature of these things. You don’t want to do anything now that’s going to irritate [what] he’s feeling and push it further back.”

It’s equally as tough for the Angels to set a timeline for Kendrick’s return as it is for his fantasy owners to remain patient and optimistic they’ll get significant production out of him the rest of the season. I’m remaining cautiously optimistic, but teetering towards skeptical and one more setback or new injury and I’m likely to pull the emergency stop cord and jump off this bandwagon.

Photo courtesy of CNN.net

Just a quick post to let you know that after some encouragement from readers I’ve decided to update my Top 30 Prospects list each month as well as the Player Rankings. The first update has been made and you can find it if you follow the Top 30 Prospects link off my home page.

Photo Courtesy of Dallasbat.net

After blowing his league-tying fifth save on Friday, Cardinals closer, err, reliever Jason Isringhausen has been removed from the closer role for the time being.

“I’m just getting sick of embarrassing myself and letting my team down,” Isringhausen told the Associated Press on Friday night. “We should be five more wins in the win column in my mind, so we should be ahead in first place even more. But they can’t keep sending me out there when I’m pitching the way I’m pitching. We’re going to have to figure out some kind of remedy. I’m sure that remedy will give me some time off and get somebody in there that can do a better job right now. I’m just pitching like a second-grader.”

Izzy will get some much needed time to work on his addition and subtraction, spelling words, writing in cursive, taking other kids lunch money, and other activities common to your average second grader. In all seriousness, he chalks it up to a mental break, but his manager Tony LaRussa remains non-committal as to how long of a break Izzy will get and exactly who will replace him as closer in the meantime.

“We’ll mix and match,” La Russa said. “I think all things, everyone rested, [Ryan] Franklin and [Russ] Springer are the guys that match up the best.”

That begs a comparison of Franklin and Springer’s 2008 stats through 37 games.

Ryan Franklin vs. Russ Springer (Inside the Numbers)

It’s blatantly obvious that Franklin has been the better pitcher. While Springer has the edge in strikeouts per nine innings pitched, Franklin has continued to try to build on the improvements he made with his control and command last season, albeit not to the extent he enjoyed in 2007. Considering it’s often not realistic for fantasy owners to tie up two roster spots with both saves candidates, my money is on Franklin being the more valuable of the two. It would behoove you to claim him immediately, realizing that it may only be a half dozen saves you get from him before Izzy is back in the closer role. That said, every cheap save counts.

Photo courtesy of MLB.com