2nd Half Sell High Candidates

A flip side view of the buy low / sell high coin has also been posted by Aaron Gleeman at RotoWorld.com. The highlights of his second half sell high list include:

• Justin Duchscherer
• Brian Fuentes
• Daisuke Matsuzaka
• Xavier Nady
• Scott Olsen
• Joe Saunders
• and more...

Check out Aaron's full analysis in his Baseball Daily Dose article.

Sell High for the Second Half [Rotoworld]

2nd Half Buy Low Candidates

An integral ingredient in building a winning team involves making at least one good move to acquire a player who is about to really take off to provide your team a boost. One of my all-time favorite personal buy-low deals was back in early May 2002 when I dealt Matt Herges (then the de facto Expos closer) and Scott Williamson (apparently on the cusp of reclaiming the closer job for the Reds) in exchange for Jason Schmidt who had just left a start after two-thirds of an inning with a stiff shoulder. Herges ended up with six saves on the season, Williamson with eight saves, and Schmidt went on to win 13 games with 196 strikeouts, 3.45 ERA and 1.192 WHIP in what became his breakout season. I love that story. But enough about me! This is about you!

Aaron Gleeman at RotoWorld.com has done the work for you! The highlights of his second half buy low list include:

• Jonathan Broxton (too late now perhaps?)
• Robinson Cano
• Manny Corpas
• Brad Hawpe
• Alexis Rios
• Nick Swisher
• and several more

Check out Aaron's full analysis in his Baseball Daily Dose article.

Buy Low for the Second Half [Rotoworld]

Recent Rehab Assignment Updates

At present, there are a number of potentially high impact major leaguers on, or just wrapping up rehab assignments. That list includes:

• Bobby Jenks
• Troy Tulowitzki
• Hank Blalock
• Mike Hampton (wha-huh?)

Get the latest scoop on these guys and more from John Halpin's Fantasy Sports Blog on FoxSports.com.

Morning Baseball Update: Maggs Back, Jenks Solid in Rehab Outing [Fox Sports]

Top 100 Player Rankings for Second Half

Unless you're playing in a second half league, there's not a tremendous amount of value in straight ranking lists at this point. However, it is possible to gain some insights into the opinions of experts based on their ranking of certain players in relation to the overall 'norm'.

The latest list comes from the experts at razzball.com - here are the highlights:

A little on the high side?

#13 - Miguel Cabrera
#14 - Mark Teixeira
#27 - Vladimir Guerrero
#34 - B.J. Upton
#70 - Kevin Kouzmanoff
#92 - Jeff Francoeur

A little on the low side?

#17 - Josh Hamilton
#26 - CC Sabathia
#61 - Pat Burrell
#83 - Chad Billingsley

Check out the whole list which includes some commentary on the rankings.


Fantasy Baseball Top 100 for Second Half of 2008 [Razzball]

All-Star Break Trade Rumors

From the All-Star Break through the end of July, MLB trade rumors really start to pick up steam. Will Carroll from Baseball Prospectus provides some interesting insights regarding some recent rumors:

• With Hideki Matsui's injury status, do the Yankees become buyers or sellers?
• Is Erik Bedard staying in Seattle?
• What impact is A.J. Burnett's contract having on the Blue Jays efforts to deal him?
• Who are the Twins looking at as a 3B upgrade?
• Will C.C. Sabathia finish the season as a Brewer?

Check out Will's latest BP Unfiltered post.


Some Milling Around [Baseball Prospectus]

Second Half Expectations: Center Field

As usual, Marc Normandin provides a detailed, meaningful analysis of player performance to date, how it stacks up to pre-season projections, and what story the numbers inside the numbers tell with regard to future performance expectations.

Marc dives deep to provide insights on:

• Pursuing Nate McLouth as a trade target - good idea or not? (Answer: good idea)
• What's going on with B.J. Upton's power outage
• Chris B. Young - ride out his low production or deal for what you can get?
• Lastings Milledge - victim of bad luck? Second half saviour?

All this can be found in Marc's most recent (and free) BP Fantasy Beat article.


Mid-Season Retooling: Center Field [Baseball Prospectus]

I'm back baby!

After a seven-week hiatus, I'm back. One of the biggest problems with blogging is trying to figure out what your focus should be - and obviously it needs to match up well with your interests. Within the roto-realm, I have a particularly keen interest in tracking the development of and forecasting the impact of prospects. This is evidenced by my previous focus in this area. The problem there is that getting out four posts a month just isn't going to get it done in terms of trying to establish a truly useful blog - and the level of detail going into each of those four monthly posts was not providing the best 'bang for the buck' in terms of my effort.

So after a lot of thinking - I'm effectively 'relaunching' today with a model similar to some of the most successful blogs across some other domains.

I hope you like the new model and would appreciate any feedback.

Also - if you like what you see, please help support the blog by visiting some of the sponsor ads.

Thank you!