Printer-friendly

Contact Author

July 13, 2012

Weekly Planner

Week 15

by Paul Sporer

This week’s Weekly Planner, more than ever, is rife with uncertainty as teams still haven’t put their rotations in stone, so this is definitely subject to change. I did my best cobbling a few sources together as well as my own leg/guess work.

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Auto-Starts: CC Sabathia and Jon Lester

There is a wide chasm between these two, obviously, but Lester isn’t killing you like some would-be aces (I’m looking at you, Timmy), so you have to keep him in there despite sub-optimal performance. He actually is sporting a three-year high in strikeout-to-walk ratio at 3.1 thanks to a career-best 2.4 BB/9, so even though it has felt like a completely awful season from him, it hasn’t been one.

Start
Phil Hughes (vs. TOR; @ OAK)
Matt Moore (vs. CLE; vs. SEA)
Jason Vargas (@ KC; @ TB)
Roy Oswalt (@ OAK; @ LAA)
Drew Smyly (vs. LAA; vs. CWS)
Gavin Floyd (@ BOS; @ DET)
Bartolo Colon (vs. TEX; vs. NYY)

Plenty of names I like here, but many are facing less than ideal matchups.

Hughes has been really good since that four-homer shelling against Atlanta back on June 20, and he was quiet excellent for a stretch before that too. Despite a tough lineup coming to the homer haven that is Yankee Stadium, I think he is a clear start for the week.