Wednesday’s Wide World of Waivers: End of Season Review - 3 comments

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Welcome to the final waiver column of 2009. Hopefully you’re reading this as champion of your league, and if a suggestion or two from this column helped, so much the better! For myself, I won one league (a 16-team dynasty) finished runner-up in a couple more, but finally relinquished my H2HWS title after four straight years of success. C’est la vie …
 
Anyway, as we settle back to enjoy the post-season (once again without my beloved Mets, although at least this year I knew they were done well before the final day!), here’s a final review of the waiver wire selections from Tom and myself, picking up from where we left off (June 10th).
 
Unlike that column, there’s little point in including the Yahoo owned % now, as it’s totally irrelevant to any leagues! It will simply be my personal reflections on the picks we made — and the final scores may give you a hint as to which of us is the more reliable when it comes to decision-making in 2010!
 
June 17th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Jose Lopez	Mixed	A	16 HRs since recommended, raised average by 24 points
Jeremy Hermida	Mixed	F	Contributed very little and hardly played in September
Willie Bloomquist	AL	D	Played most days, but stopped running, except in September
Casey McGehee	NL	A	Mixed league graduate

 
June 24th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Dexter Fowler	Mixed	C	10 SBs in July, but injury led to only 3 from there out
Ricky Romero	Mixed	F	2nd half was simply horrible
Luis Valbuena	AL	B	Played most days, lots of runs, not much else
Kevin Correia	NL	B	Few hiccups here and there, but became solid mixed league spot starter

 
July 1st
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Adam LaRoche	Mixed	C	14 2nd-half HRs OK, but not quite as good as usual
Aaron Cook	Mixed	B	Unfortunate that injury derailed a very nice 2nd half
Franklin Gutierrez	AL	B	11 HRs, 11 SBs since July 1st, playing every day
Willie Harris	NL	D	Lots of runs; absolutely nothing else!

 
July 8th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Hideki Matsui	Mixed	A	Excellent 2nd half included 18 HRs
Elvis Andrus	Mixed	A	18 SBs and 40+ runs post-July 1st
Brett Anderson	AL	A	Gave up more than 4 ERs only once in 2nd half
Brian Moehler	NL	D	Not enough Ks and too many rough outings to balance the good

 
July 22nd
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Garrett Jones	Mixed	A	Arguably the 2nd-half MVP
Joe Blanton	Mixed	B	Great August, mixed September
Erick Aybar	AL	B	Did enough to warrant AL consideration
Everth Cabrera	NL	C	Never matched heights of July, but still serviceable

 
July 29th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Miguel Montero	Mixed	A	One of the best catchers in the final two months
Leo Nunez	Mixed	A	Solid 2nd-tier closer the rest of the way
David Murphy	AL	C	9 HRs in August and September
Kyle Blanks	NL	F	Production slipped before DL spelled early end to season

 
August 5th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Kevin Kouzmanoff	Mixed	C	Mediocre at best before disappearing in September
Mat Latos	Mixed	D	2 good starts, 4 bad before being shut down
Rajai Davis	AL	A	Speed demon quickly became valuable mixed leaguer
Gerardo Parra	NL	C	No power or speed; other numbers fine for NL-only

 
August 12th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Billy Butler	Mixed	B	Quality final two months
Elijah Dukes	Mixed	C	22 RBIs in August before fading
Trevor Crowe	AL	D	Failed to make most of late season ABs
Jason Hammel	NL	B	3 ERs or less in 8 of last 10 starts

 
August 19th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Mark Ellis	Mixed	C	Excellent August proved to be the anomaly
Carlos Gonzalez	Mixed	A	Worthy of mixed-league starts all the way
Brandon Lyon	AL	A	Much better out of the closer role
Jonny Gomes	NL	D	The Trevor Crowe of the NL

 
August 26th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Adam LaRoche	Mixed	C	For reasons already stated
Lastings Milledge	Mixed	C	2 HRs and 3 SBs in Sept/Oct fewer than anticipated
Brett Tomko	AL	A	3 good starts out of 4 is great for an AL spot-starter
Angel Pagan	NL	B	Hit for average, but SBs faded in Sept

 
September 2nd
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Drew Stubbs	Mixed	A	5 HRs, 7 SBs in September
Andy Marte	Mixed	D	Mendoza imitator for final month
Felix Pie	AL	D	Did nothing before early end to season
Homer Bailey	NL	A	3 ERs or less in every start from September 2

 
September 9th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Seth Smith	Mixed	F	On a roll until recommended here!
Bronson Arroyo	Mixed	A	Helped fantasy teams all the way to the wire
Michael Brantley	AL	C	Only 5 SB attempts from here on out
Cory Sullivan	NL	F	Too little playing time to help fantasy teams

 
September 16th
 

Player	Format	Grade	Comments
Matt Diaz	Mixed	B	Unspectacular but solid in final two weeks
Juan Uribe	Mixed	B	Would have been ‘A’ but for cold final few days
Nolan Reimold	AL	F	Hit the DL day after this column
Vicente Padilla	NL	C	Excellent final day performance masks the two poor ones

 
And so we reach the end of the 2009 WWWW review! If you’ve got this far, no doubt you’ll be on tenterhooks to see which columnist ended up with the better record for recommendations, so without further ado, here it is, using the scoring system from the first half; namely, A=5 down to F=1:
 

	Chris	Points	First half points	TOTAL	Tom	Points	First half points	TOTAL
A	6	30	25	55	9	45	20	65
B	5	20	24	44	4	16	8	24
C	6	18	6	24	5	15	21	36
D	3	6	6	12	5	10	10	20
F	4	4	4	8	1	1	2	3
Total				143				148

 
So we have a result! Tom overturns a first half deficit to come roaring back in the second half (and that doesn’t even include the final week, excluded from these scores in order to keep the number of predictions even). The question is, did Tom perform a Twins-esque late season surge? Or did I suffer a Tiger-like collapse? Either way, Tom has pogoed his way to victory in our little personal battle!
 
That’s the end of WWWW for this season. Leaving our personal duel aside, we do hope this has proved useful to you over the last six months. If you have any suggestions as to how the column could be proved, please put them in the comments below, or drop a PM to either of us via the Cafe.
 
Until next season, enjoy the playoffs, knowing that you no longer have to keep watching those waivers (for a few months, at least)!
 

 
Chris Routledge is one of a growing number of Brits infiltrating the Cafe, and is the double reigning champion of the H2H World Series, much to the chagrin of token Cafe Padres fan, wrveres. Catch up with him in the Cafe under the username chris8.
 

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