Today's Fantasy Rx

Arizona: Stephen Randolph, LH Reliever
7-1 on a 43:34 K:BB in 52 IP over 42 G
with 42 H, 6 HR, a .66 G-F, and a 3.81 ERA.

Although he ranks among the league leaders in relief wins and owns a decent ERA, Randolph lacks the track record and current skills necessary to maintain this level of performance. While his 7.4 K/9 is in line with usual stats in the minors, I see no evidence suggesting pending improvement in his 5.9 BB/9 or poor ground-fly ratio. Both statistics instead indicate his qualitative stats will deteriorate over time, and although holding lefties to a .619 OPS gives him value to the Diamondbacks, he doesn't belong on roto rosters. Deal or cut Randolph as his downside more than negates his nearly complete lack of fantasy potential.

July Overachiever: Miguel Batista, RH Starter
Old stats: 7-6 on a 102:37 K:BB in 142 IP over 20 GS(27G)
with 134 H, 8 HR, and a 1.92 G-F; 2.92 ERA.
Recommendation: acquire.
Stats since recommendation: 2-2 on a 24:12 K:BB in 27 IP over 5 GS
with 35 H, 1 HR, and a 5.33 ERA.

Previous Overachiever: April: Matt Mantei; May: Oscar Villarreal; June: Brandon Webb.

Internet Challenge

While we don't normally burn our last move, we own back-ups at every position and a good variety of salaries. We need another outfielder to replace Kearns, and with Pujols playing five games over the first four days of the week, he's an obvious choice for our team, especially given he owns a better BA than Sosa.

SP(6)
Pedro Martinez: Fri:@NYY(A.Pettitte)
Curt Schilling: Sat:@SF(J.Schmidt)
Matt Morris: Sun:CIN(S.Etherton)
Kerry Wood: Sun:@MIL(D.Davis)
Roy Halladay: Sat:DET(N.Cornejo)
Jason Schmidt: Sat:ARI(C.Schilling)
Mark Prior: Sat:@MIL(M.Kinney)
Esteban Loaiza: Sat:CLE(J.Stanford)

No starts: Randy, Oswalt, Mussina, Millwood, K.Brown, and Ainsworth.

Morris, Wood, Halladay, Schmidt, Prior, and Loaiza seem much safer than Pedro or Schilling, and they give us the most cap room for our offense. Deploying Gagne in Colorado and Mantei in San Francisco against Worrell also all qualify as risks, but we believe each pitcher's upside outweighs the problems of employing Mike MacDougal at this time.

Sitting Hall, Durazo, and Matsui are easy given the slumps of the latter two and the weak schedule of the former, and then we don't like Berkman's odds in San Diego. Lastly, while we believe Soriano will continue rebounding, he'll sit for us this weekend since Aaron Boone looks much better and belongs in our lineup.

The Umpire Hunter(9th lg; 182nd overall)
Week 23b: September 5-September 7

C	Jorge Posada		1120
C	Javier Lopez		750
1B	Todd Helton		1850
1B	Aubrey Huff		610 
DH	Luis Castillo		1210
2B	Marcus Giles		400
3B	Aramis Ramirez		820
3B	Hank Blalock		500
SS	Alex Rodriguez		2010
SS	Nomar Garciaparra	1330
OF	Vlad Guerrero		2010
OF	Albert Pujols		1750
OF	Manny Ramirez		1610 
OF	Preston Wilson		1220
OF	Carl Everett		850
OF	Vernon Wells		750
DH	Orlando Cabrera		1030 
DH	Aaron Boone		1010
 
SP	Matt Morris		1300
SP	Kerry Wood		990
SP	Roy Halladay		890 
SP	Jason Schmidt		790 
SP	Mark Prior		750 
SP	Esteban Loaiza		680
RP	Eric Gagne		1430
RP	Joe Borowski		750 
RP	Tim Worrell		740
RP	Matt Mantei		700

Total Salary for Week 23b: 	29850

Today's Fantasy Rx: While we're somewhat biased after contributing to the site's Fantasy Football Guide each of the last two years, CREATiVESPORTS.com is the site we prefer for fantasy football information. A friend convinced us to join his league this season, so we recently participated in our first football draft. The CREATiVESPORTS site, as well as this year's Football Prospectus emerged as our most useful resources, and we recommend both to anyone seeking an edge on player analysis during the season as Rotohelp will remain focused on news analysis and rotisserie, fantasy, and simulation baseball indefinitely.