The punch Francisco Rodriguez threw at the grandfather of his children might as well been aimed at the stomach of every single Mets fan out there. While his torn tendon in his pitching hand is by no means the signal of the end of the season for the Mets, which ended somewhere in Philadelphia, K-Rod kicked Mets fans while they were down.
Since 2006, Mets fans have endured epic collapses, futile free agent signings and now an angry closer doubling as a Mixed Martial Artist in Flushing.
From a fantasy perspective, K-Rod KO’d his owners and left them scraping for saves as the fantasy season windless away. Luckily, there are many viable options on the wire that can carry your team and avoid urges to knock out relatives at the ball park.
Percentage of players available taken from Yahoo! Fantasy Baseball leagues
Aaron Heilman (ARI-RP): 18 percent owned- A visit into Mets relievers of Christmas past, Aaron Heilman is the main man in the desert after Chad Qualls was sent packing to the Rays at the deadline. While Arizona sports one of the worst records in the league at 47-73, finding a primary closer this late in the season is a valuable asset to have heading to into the twilight of your fantasy season. Heilman sports a 3.33 ERA over 54 innings of work with the D-Backs while fanning 41 batters on the season.
Brandon Lyon (HOU-RP): 17 percent owned- Astros closer Matt Lindstrom lost his job earlier this week so it’s on to his handcuff, Brandon Lyon to vulture the saves. Lyon has been mediocre as the Astros eight inning man, stringing together only 39 K’s in 56 innings of work out of the pen with a pedestrian 3.70 ERA. You can’t expect great closing options at the end of the season but the chance of scrounging some saves at this point of the season is too much to pick up. Lyon is one of many options to pick up some rouge saves during the stretch run.
Hong-Chih Kuo (LAD-RP): 37 percent owned- After Jonathan Broxton’s nightmarish outings against the Phillies, manager Joe Torre pulled the reins on Broxton’s tenure as the team’s closer until he restores his confidence. Enter the flame throwing left-hander Hong-Chih Kuo. Kuo features a 95 MPH fastball from the left side with a deadly slider that’s helped him post some of the best numbers as a reliever this season.
Kuo has struck out 52 batters in only 42.1 innings of work this season with a microscopic 1.49 ERA. Despite a blown save in Atlanta on Monday night, expect Kuo to carry the load until Broxton proves himself worthy again to Joe Torre.