It has been some time since I just rambled on about some things going on in Fantasy Sports. At this time of year I get to write about Baseball and Football. Hockey registration has also begun on Yahoo, but who seriously plays Fantasy Hockey? So here are my random thoughts:

Gio Gonzalez is a pitcher that you need to have on your radar for September call-ups. He has struck out 185 batters in 150 innings. That translates to 120 strikeouts on the major league level. I witnessed Gio pitching a one hitter in Reading one night. The White Sox are terrible, and they may try anything in September.

Along the same lines as Gonzalez, Joey Votto (CIN) and Evan Longoria (TB) may also get called up in September. Both players are highly touted prospects that may receive plenty of playing time for their teams in September.

Shane Victorino is not as hurt as it may look. He is not running at 100%, but he is still doing just fine. Jason Werth has played so well that there is no reason to risk aggravating the injury. This situation has hurt Victorino’s value quite a bit even though he is brought in late in games.

Garrett Anderson has been on fire as of late. The 10 RBI game was the ultimate if you have him on your team. However, he is owned in only 7% of ESPN leagues. He has hit .345 with 4 homeruns over the last two weeks. The Angels have 7 of the last nine series against teams below .500. Three of the teams (TB, CWS, BAL) have team ERAs that are above .480.

Josh Fields has hit 17 homeruns since being called up when Joe Crede went on the DL. He also now has outfield eligibility in Yahoo leagues. He should remain there the rest of the year, and possibly beyond.

Blame Rafeal Furcal’s lack of steals on Juan Pierre. Of Pierre’s 557 at bats, 59 ended on the first pitch and 156 ended on the second pitch. That is 38.6% of Pierre’s at bats ended on either the first or second pitch. One other item of interest is that Pierre has had a 3-0 count only 5 times this year.

Looks like Matt Diaz may get to play regularly after all. Diaz had gaudy numbers and deserved to start regularly. The benching of Willie Harris has also allowed Kelly Johnson to re assume the leadoff spot in the lineup. His slugging percentage is 203 points higher against left handers then it is against right handers.

I would like to say that I am sorry to all of the owners of Geoff Jenkins. I mentioned him in my On The Wire article, and he promptly has hit a miserable .132 over the last two weeks. Be happy though, at least one of those 5 hits was a homerun.

Manny Ramirez is doing to Fantasy Baseball owners again by getting “hurt” down the stretch. I dealt with his issues last year during my H2H playoffs and eventually dropped him when he came off of Yahoo’s undroppable list. Manny’s value has dropped low enough that I don’t think he should be taken in the first five rounds in next year’s draft.

On June 25th posting of “Random Thoughts” I stated that Andruw Jones was not in a slump, and that his extremely poor performance was actually a trend dating back to August of 2006. He has hit better of late and raised his season average to .224. At least he got 24 homeruns while killing your team. this is one of the few times you will hear me say this, but…I told you so.

David Garrard is now a viable option as a backup quarterback in deeper leagues. Also, do not think that Delhomme’s job in Carolina is safe. David Carr is a player that should remain on your radar throughout the beginning of the NFL season.

From the world of bold predictions, Larry Johnson will not earn enough fantasy points to be ranked in the top 5 for running backs. However, Shaun Alexander will.

That’s all for today.