Thank you, Captain Obvious: Drafting the pitcher with the fourth-best K/BB in all of baseball last year would be a wise move.
What’s not so obvious: That pitcher is David Bush.
As I was conducting some preseason research for my Eagle-Tribune fantasy column, I came across this stat, and it blew me away. I knew Bush had good command last year, but I had no idea he was THIS good. Bush’s 4.37 K/BB was better than Chris Carpenter, Roy Halladay, Brandon Webb, Randy Johnson and a litany of other star hurlers.
Bush is without a doubt The O-Zone’s sleeper of the year. Expectations aren’t immense for this guy -- he plays for a small-market club, and even in lil’ ol’ Milwaukee, he’s only the fourth-biggest name on the starting staff. But don’t let the lack of fanfare fool you. Bush boasts elite command, and he could be a top-10 starter in NL-only leagues this year. Maybe even top-5.
And while we’re talking about pitching…
Daisuke Matsuzaka made his debut tonight, tossing two scoreless innings against The Juggernaut Known as Boston College. Originally, I was going to write about this in The O-Zone, but what can I really say? Two innings against a college club doesn’t tell us anything we don’t already know.
That’s my problem with Matsuzaka: We just don’t know. And that’s also why I’ll be keeping quiet when his name comes up in my fantasy drafts this month.
I need to see a whole year of Dice-K before I’ll be confident making any sort of projection for him. I don’t care if he’s 6-0 with a 1.50 ERA at the end of April -- I need to see him succeed again and again and again and again before I’ll believe he’s the real deal.
