Roto Baseball Guru

So the weekly hot hitter stats are up on the main site, and while updating those stats I was pleasantly surprised to see the Blue Jays own Alex Rios at the top of the list.  Alex has been tearing it up since the all-star break, hitting more home runs (a total of four) in the past week than he did in the entire first half.  It’s a bit sad if you think about it, but it’s really part and parcel with the pathetic Jays offense this year.  Viewing from a glass half full perspective, it’s good to see Alex starting to pick things up … it’s long overdue.  However I’m not holding my breath that he’ll keep this going.  I’m still kicking J.P. Ricciardi for the fact that he didn’t trade Rios for the current leading NL Cy Young candidate, Tim Lincecum.  Hindsight is 20/20 but that would have been a sweet trade … you can never have enough quality pitching!

On another note, when I was reviewing the weekly top hitters from the past month to look for any trends, it became apparent to me how quickly a player rotates in and out of a hot streak on a weekly basis.  Over the past 4 weeks, only 2 players were able to make it to the Top Ten list more than once.  Can you guess who they were?

If you guessed the usual suspects such as: Alex Rodriguez, Hanley Ramirez, Jose Reyes, Albert Pujols or even Josh Hamilton, you would be incorrect.  No, instead of these fantasy household names the two players that have earned this prestigious distinction are:

Ryan Braun (Mil - 3B,OF) - Ranked #2, Week of July 20-26 and Ranked #8, Week of July 6-12
Matt Holliday (Col - OF) - Ranked #3, Week of July 20-26 and Ranked #1, Week of June 29-July 5

What does that tell you?  One thing is that picking up the hottest player of the week doesn’t necessarily equate to that same player staying hot for the next week.  More often than not, that player will fall out of the Top 10 the following week.  The other is that baseball is a long season, and any metric at a specific point in time is not enough to make a good fantasy player evaluation decision.  It’s really a good mix following the latest news, as well as the weekly stats that will help you find that next hot fantasy gem.

Remember that you can always get the weekly top hitter stats for the fantasy baseball source: www.rotobaseballguru.com

So far this year, there has been a few feel good stories in baseball.  Josh Hamilton’s resurgence after winning his fight with cocaine addition is nothing short of remarkable. Cito Gaston’s return to the Blue Jays brings back warm fuzzy memories.  And in between all of that is Jason Giambi’s return to the limelight.  As a self-admitted steroid user, Giambi has not been the same since he’s been off the juice, or at the very least he has not been viewed in the same limelight.  His numbers have been decent:  .271 BA, 32 HRs, 81 RBIs, 74 runs in 2005 and .233 BA, 37 HRs, 113 RBIs, 92 runs in 2006.  Last year was a bit of a write off because of his injury, but perhaps it has been the stigma of being called a steroid user that have tainted his accomplishments since 2004.

However, for whatever reason it seems as though this year he is starting to receive his old accolades back.  The truest display of this is his near selection to this year’s All-Star game.  Again putting up very respectable numbers you can say that he earned the potential spot on the team.  Some have said that Giambi’s resurgence hints that he is on some performance enhancing substance again.  However, contrary to that belief, the true reason for Giambi’s resurgence is something a bit more innocent.  Behold exhibit A:

A slumping but smiling Jason Giambi.

The heroic Jason Giambi: Spot the Difference?

Although he looks ridiculous, some have even described it to me as a pedophile moustache, there is little doubt in my mind the correlation between the lucky pedophile moustache and the All-Star like production.  Baseball players (and sports players in general for that matter) are well known for their superstitions (recall Wade Boggs and his chicken routine), so far from it for me to say if something is ridicolous or not … especially if it’s working.  So here’s to Giambi’s pedophile moustache!  Whatever rocks his boat and gets him results.