In Depth look at AL and NL players

Our weekly in-depth look around the majors to help AL-only and NL-only owners.

With nearly two months of the 2008 season complete, we're far enough into the year that owners can begin to trust some of the numbers they're seeing.
Whereas two weeks into the season Chipper Jones was hitting a ridiculous .443, he's now back to a more normal .410. OK, bad example.
Try this one: After two weeks, Carlos Pena led the majors with six homers despite a .191 average. In the five weeks since, he has hit three more homers and added only 24 points to his batting average.
Pena has been passed in the home run category by David Ortiz, who has 10 of them. Ortiz opened with a .113 mark and one homer in his first two weeks.
Ah, the beauty of baseball and its numbers that can be sliced and diced in more ways than you or I can count. I've dug through some more stats to see if we can learn anything by taking a closer look at the numbers.
Stats that will amaze (or not)
The top two hitters with runners in scoring position are catchers: John Buck (.481) and Ryan Doumit (.478).
Josh Hamilton, who leads the majors with 49 RBIs, has hit "only" .333 in those situations, which puts him just outside the top 50. However, Hamilton has been perfect in three at-bats with the bases loaded; a single, a double, a grand slam and two walks have provided 10 RBIs in those situations.
Edinson Volquez has a 1.33 ERA. (Guess I jumped on that bandwagon a year too soon.) That's pretty amazing for a guy with 30 walks in 54.1 innings. Volquez has electric stuff, but if he doesn't get the walks under control, his owners might look like they stuck a finger in an outlet later this year.
Brett Myers has an 8.18 ERA in four road games. He has pitched deeper than five innings only four times in nine starts. It's good to see that temporary move to relief last year hasn't had any negative side effects. (What in the ... his skin has turned purple and he's growing a second head!)
Cliff Lee has not allowed a run in 21 innings the first time through the lineup. His K/BB ratio in those innings is 19:3. Hitters are much more likely to get to Lee the second time through, when he has a 0.87 ERA (with a 14:0 K/BB ratio). OK, so teams don't score in the first five or six innings off him, but after that. ...
Did you realize that 19:3 and 0.00 are the same K/BB ratio and ERA Billy Wagner has in 17 innings? That's spooky in a dominant pitcher sort of way.
Shaun Marcum leads the majors with 47 strikeouts at night. That's one more K than Ryan Howard has in night games. Howard homered off Marcum in the first inning Sunday. Somehow, we suspect the outcome might have been different at night.
If you think Howard is swinging and missing too much, note that it could be worse. Seattle rookie Jeff Clement has 20 K's after 48 at-bats. Fellow M's rookie Wladimir Balentien isn't faring much better: 23 K's in 64 at-bats.
Johan Santana has given up 11 homers, but he has a 3.30 ERA. Of the four other pitchers who have yielded that many homers, Roy Oswalt has the lowest ERA (5.43). Remember that Santana gave up 33 home runs last year in what was a solid but not Santana-dominant season.
Burning questions for AL-only owners
1. Why did you pick up Bartolo Colon? In case you couldn't tell from the woman with the whip who's kicking me below the belt, I'm a glutton for punishment. Colon has posted an ERA below 5.00 only once in the past four seasons. Yes, he did win the Cy Young that one year (2005), but that was back when his fastball had some giddyup to it. Since he first hurt his shoulder a couple years ago, that heater has been MIA. Reports have the speed back in the 93-mph range, which could be adequate but won't be dominant. He'll have to mix up his pitches more, hit his spots and get run support. Oh yeah, that's why I added him. Pitching for Boston will help Colon score for me in a points league where wins are big.
2. Who is the happiest person that Jacque Jones is out of a job? That would be Matt Joyce , who replaced Jones on the Detroit roster earlier this month and has homered four times in 30 at-bats. Joyce, a 12th-round pick in 2005, hit 17 homers last year in 456 at-bats at Double-A, the highest level he had played before this season. Who can pick out the two signs from the previous sentence that suggest this early power display will not continue? That said, it's rare that AL-only owners have the opportunity to add an in-season free agent poised to play regularly. I say pick him up but don't expect him to amaze you.
3. Who's hotter: Cleveland's starting pitchers or outfielder Ben Francisco? I'd have to go with the pitchers, but Francisco does deserve some love. He's hitting .372, which is only 150 points better than fellow Indians outfielder Franklin Gutierrez. That difference might help explain why Francisco has started the past five games, including the past three as the team's No. 5 hitter. Some people had Francisco pegged as a platoon hitter who would see the short end of the playing time split with David Dellucci, but in fact, only eight of his 43 at-bats this year have been against lefties. Forget platoon option; he's well on his way to supplanting Gutierrez as a starter.
Burning questions for NL-only owners
1. What is Jayson Werth? No, it's who is Jayson Werth and what is Jayson worth? With a .272-9-26 line, he has been a valuable outfielder for NL-only owners, if they've had him in the lineup. Some unfortunate owners might have had him seated for last week's three-homer, eight-RBI outing because many view him as a righthanded platoon hitter (and that's not the side of the platoon you want to be on). I see Werth differently. I still remember the dangerous hitter who could have been an everyday player for the Dodgers if he had avoided that major wrist injury in the spring of 2005. He won't stay on this pace, but I could see him starting a majority of the Phils' games and hitting 20-plus homers.
2. How about Atlanta's Matt Diaz? Now he's in a different boat. Diaz is in the top 10 in the majors in average vs. lefties with a .362 mark, but his struggles against righthanders (.167 in 54 at-bats) have led the Braves to ditch any plans of making Diaz an everyday starter. In fact, Diaz has had only nine at-bats in the past week. That's not cutting it for fantasy owners. There's another split to note with Diaz, although it's one you should put less faith in. He has hit .385-2-10 in 15 games at Turner Field compared to .167-0-4 in 19 road games. Because Atlanta plays all six games at home this week, those splits might earn Diaz a temporary reprieve from being demoted or dropped in your league.
3. When we look back on their careers, who will be the better Cardinals reliever: rookie Chris Perez or 1986 12th-round pick Mike Perez ? Although Mike Perez gets props for saving hundreds of games for my teams on "Ken Griffey Jr. Major League Baseball," he had only 22 saves during his eight years in the majors. The Cards' rookie with 100-mph heat should top that level, but don't get caught thinking he's the immediate answer for the Cardinals' current ninth-inning void. I still expect Ryan Franklin to pick up the saves until Jason Isringhausen returns to the role. Perez still could merit a look in deeper formats as a middle reliever with K ability and an outside chance at contributing a couple saves.