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August 17, 2012

Weekly Planner

Week 21

by Paul Sporer

I hated to put Mike Fiers among last week’s “sits,” but with the trip to Coors on the docket, I just had to. That decision paid off as he hit his first real blip of the season.  I think we’ll see him rebound against the Phillies this weekend, though, and he is a good play going forward.  In the AL, both Matt Moore and Hiroki Kuroda have remained white-hot as they head into their weekend starts. 

NATIONAL LEAGUE
Auto-Starts: Clayton Kershaw, Madison Bumgarner, R.A. Dickey, Roy Halladay, Adam Wainwright, Jordan Zimmermann, and Cliff Lee

What a week for studs in the Senior Circuit.  Some head-to-head teams could feasibly have three or four of these guys and could be poised for some insane numbers this week. 

Start
Tim Lincecum (@ LAD; vs. ATL)
Trevor Cahill (vs. MIA; vs. SD)
Mike Leake (@ PHI; vs. STL)
Mark Buehrle (@ ARI; @ LAD)
Joe Saunders (vs. MIA; vs. SD)
Wandy Rodriguez (@ SD; vs. MIL)

I think we have to get used to a dud start every three or four outings from Lincecum for at least the remainder of the 2012 season.  He has left many skittish since his ERA hasn’t been below 5.35 all season, but I’ll stick by him after the four-inning, four-ER outing against the Nationals.  The four good starts out of five before that outing on Wednesday earned him some confidence. 

Cahill has been alright, on the whole, this season.  He has a shutout, an outing with seven shutout innings, and five one-run outings.  He hasn’t really been destroyed in any single outing, but he does have eight four-run contests; his floor has been relatively high with the upside for greatness.  That definitely works, especially against a pair of hapless offensive units.