As I consider next weekend's updated projection set, there are three pitchers likely to see a huge dive in projected innings for the remainder of the season, all of them National Leaguers.
Oliver Perez is supposedly keeping his spot in the rotation even after his latest disaster, which saw him walk 7 batters in 3.1 innings, but I expect keeping him in the rotation is a scramble to get something in return for the big contract the Mets gave him back before the start of the 2009 season. After a strong 2007 season and a wild but still effective 2008, Perez then signed a three year deal that is paying him about $36 million total over the life of the contract. Certainly, the lack of control can't come as a surprise and I now believe he's going to end up in the bullpen within the next couple of months.
Charlie Haeger should be so lucky to end up with such a fate as becoming a reliever. Haeger was placed on the DL yesterday with plantar fascitis in his foot but I'm thinking that the move just delays the inevitable and that is that Haeger is going to end up losing his roster spot entirely. In Saturday's outing, just after the cutoff point for our latest projection set, he didn't retire a single batter, walking three and giving up five runs, bringing his ERA up to 8.49 on the season. If your fantasy league allows you to take players off the roster only when they end up on the DL, now is your chance to cut him.
One name who always seems to come up in the "falling short of expectations" category is San Diego pitcher Chris Young. We listed Young not only as a very risky player prior to the start of this season but in the numeric version of our risk ratings, he was listed as the 19th riskiest pitcher in all of baseball. He's living up to that as his return from the DL just keeps getting pushed back and given the latest news the past day or two, I'll be surprised if he's pitching again in the majors before mid-June. He's poised for a massive downgrade.
In fact, what separates Young from the other two here is that I believe Young can pitch well if he can get active and is probably the only pitcher of the three worth stashing if you can, especially because of the home park. That still won't stop me from downgrading him to perhaps 70-85 innings projected in the next projection set.
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