Glen in NYC wrote in about my projected Top 25 for fantasy baseball next year, which admittedly probably has some holes.  But not this one:

how did you leave roy halladay out of your top 25 roto players for next year???? after santana he’s probably the number 2 pitcher.

Oh Glen, you poor, misguided son of a bitch.  While Halladay is a good pitcher, he is certainly not the number two guy.  Hell, he might not even crack my top ten of starting pitchers. 

There is one simple reason for this: Roy Halladay doesn’t strike anyone out. 

Few roto baseball players realize that having a pitcher on your team with a low K/9 rate actually hurts your team.  To prove this, let’s take one of my leagues from this year.  Each of the eleven teams maxed out their allotted 1400 innings.  The person who "won" strikeouts, getting 11 points in that category, finished the year 1242 strikeouts.  That’s an eyelash under 8 K/9.  The person in the middle (earning a 6) averaged 6.9 K/9 and the person in last (getting a 1) averaged 6 K/9.

Roy Halladay threw 220 innings and struck out only 132.  That’s only 5.4 K/9, well under the average for a typical last place finisher in strikeouts in any roto league.  So if you draft Halladay, you’re putting yourself in the red for K’s.  And as he will likely be your first pitcher taken, you will need to subsequently draft many high K guys, which might be difficult, as these guys typically go off the board faster than other pitchers.  And if you pick up another low K guy - Wang (3.13 K/9), Garland (4.77 K/9) and Kenny Rogers (4.36 K/9) all finished in the top three in the major leagues in wins, but were downright embarrassing in the K department – you’re basically submarining your team and guaranteeing a finish in the bottom three in strikeouts.

So while Halladay may have 15+ wins and low peripherals, his low strikeout rate – combined with his potential health issues (pitched only 133 and 144 innings the previous two years) - kept him out of my top 25.

(FYI: Halladay’s career K/9 rate is 6.34.  Better than this previous year’s, but still not very good.  Also, this can be viewed a bit skeptically.  In 2005, Halladay pitched 141 innings and struck out a respectable 108, good for very nice rate of 6.9 K/9.  However, Halladay was shut down in the second half of the year due to injury.  The second half of the year is typically when pitchers start to lose gas and thus strike less people out.  If Halladay continued to pitch the second half, his K/9 rate would have almost certainly come down a bit.)

Nate from Longview, Washington, who I correspond with so much we’re practically dating, wrote in to take umbrage with my comment that Donovan McNabb is the MVP of the league right now.

mcnabb doesn’t = mvp.
Peyton Manning is having a way better season.  And to think I could have had him in my fantasy draft but took LJ.  WTF?

This one is easier to debunk, because Manning is not only having a "way better" season than McNabb, he’s having a worse season.

Numbers are numbers, folks.  Here’s how the two stack up in major statistical categories, with NFL rank in parentheses:
 

	P. Manning	D. McNabb
QB Rating	97.7  (6)	106.0  (3)
Yards	1112  (2)	1248  (1)
Yards/Game	278  (3)	312  (1)
TD	6  (t-4)	9  (1)
Int	1  (t-2)	1  (t-2)
Total TD	8  (t-2)	11  (1)

McNabb trumps Peyton in every category, even if he is 6′5" with a laser rocket for an arm.  The only QBs with higher ratings than McNabb are David Carr and Damon Huard and I don’t see those guys winning the MVP anytime soon.  A case could be made for Rex Grossman as MVP, but the Bears defense is giving up 7 points per game.  Take Rex out of Chicago and they’re still a good team; without any statistical analysis, I’d say Grossman is good for +/- 3 wins.  Take McNabb off the Eagles and, well, we know how well that worked out last year. 

As it stands right now, Donovan McNabb is my pick for the NFL MVP.  Now let’s hope he holds on, for my sake and the sake of Philly fans everywhere.  Because, and I think I speak for all of us, we’re just totally fucking sick of it.

(And Nate, I think that LJ pick will work out fine.) 

Have a sports or fantasy question?  Email me at jason@jasonmulgrew.com and I will dominate you.  Be sure to include your name and location.