Currently in the Fantasy Gameday league, I am struggling to overcome injuries to some key players on my team. The other issue that I am experiencing revolves around the middle infield positions. I will admit, that I got caught with my pants down, and did not get any of the players that I had targeted. Out of the draft I started with Dan Uggla, Felipe Lopez, and Ty Wigginton. So needless to say, I have been scrambling ever since.

Once Felipe Lopez lost his starting job, I did dome research and selected Jeff Keppinger to play shortstop to start the year. So far that has panned out pretty well for me. However, with the return of Alex Gonzalez on the horizon, my days of Keppinger playing everyday are numbered. Fortunately, The FukuHomies dropped Yuniesky Betancourt, and so I now have him to cover my shortstop position. There is still one problem… Wigginton is still on the DL, and so I am still looking for a stop gap within my roster at the Middle Infield slot.

So this led me to do some research on Jose Lopez, and I figured I would share my thoughts with you. Currently He is on waivers in the league, and has been picked up and dropped several times. Lopez is off to a very nice start to the season posting the following line:

• 52 AB, 2 HR, 9 runs, 9 RBI, 2 SB, .308 AVE

So are these numbers legit? If he for real? The way he has been added and dropped indicates to me that other owners do not believe that he will sustain the numbers. Here are some other stats to consider:

• 7.70% HR/FB, .154 ISO, .304 BABIP, 92% contact rate, 4 Ks, 0 Walks

I like the 92% contact rate, but the lack of a walk hurts. Let’s just say that instead of having 4 strike outs to start the season he had 8. His average would actually be at .281. Let’s say that instead of 0 walks and 4 Ks, he had 4 walks and 4 Ks. His batting average would be .304. So the low amount of strikeouts has inflated in average. However, a .280 average with 2 homeruns and 2 stolen bases is nothing to sneeze at.

Speaking of homeruns, did you know that both of them would have been homeruns in 28 of the 30 ballparks? That means they were solid shots. Along the same lines, his Flyball rate of 52% is a career high by almost 12%. If he were to have a 40% FB rate, and a HR/FB rate of 11% (considered to be average) he would have posted the 2 homeruns so far, and his average would be right around .300. Currently he is on pace to hit 20 homeruns.

All of this hypothetical stuff leads me to believe that the average is slightly inflated, but .285 is not inconceivable. Also, the power is fairly legit, making it quite possible that he hits 15-18 homeruns with 550 at bats. If he throws in 10 steals during the year, then we have a solid Middle Infield replacement player.

So what am going to do about it?  I put in my waiver claim.  I dropped Brandon Inge, who is going to loose playing time when Granderson returns.