Fantasy Detroit

Coming into the season, the Tigers were everyone's darlings. Why not? They had a ridiculous offense and a starting rotation capable of piling up the wins with the large expected run support. The problems that most overlooked were that the bullpen is awful (with injuries to Fernando Rodney and Joel Zumaya the main benefactors), Dontrelle Willis sucks, and Kenny Rogers is ancient. Personally, I didn't like them as much as others because of all this. Still, though, no one expected Justin Verlander and Jeremy Bonderman to struggle this mightily. Both should have been armed and ready for a big season.

Bonderman is still only 25 -- doesn't it seem like he's been around forever? -- and has shown the ability to strikeout hitters (202 K in '07) and control his pitches (only averaged 56 BB/season from '05-'07) with the best. His ERA has never been stellar, but with a natural progression and the bashers supporting him you had to expect he'd be able to garner the victories in '08.

Verlander is also 25, and he's a phenom. He won 35 games in the past two years while upping his punchouts to 183 last year in just over 200 innings. With a triple digit heater and some filthy off-speeders, you'd figure him for the Cy Young race this season.

Instead, something is wrong. With both of them.

One thing that I have always enjoyed about the NHL Playoffs are those blue-collar plumbers and grinders that go on an incredible streak and get a little bit of limelight to themselves. Guys like Chris Kontos, Dave Lowry, and John Druce were typically third line players that got little notice through most of their careers, but earned some fame for some unexpected playoff heroics.

As a Panthers fan, back in 1996, I'll never forget Dave Lowry leading the Panthers in playoff scoring with 17 points and 10 goals. This, after scoring just 24 points during the whole season. Yowsa!

This season, Detroit's Johan "Mule" Franzen has leaped into Conn Smythe contention with 11(!) goals, three assists, and +9 in 13 games, including two hat tricks. Not bad for a guy who had just 27 goals and 38 points in 72 games during the regular season.

Even more impressive is that Franzen's 11 goals scored is a Red Wings record for one playoff year. That's quite a feat, given the Wings have had many great postseason performers, such as Gordie Howe, Steve Yzerman, Sergei Fedorov and Brendan Shanahan.

The Mule still has one or two more series to go, and just may put that team record out of reach for good.

Picking up Armando Galarraga in a league this evening, I got a little excitement out of the transaction, just because I started thinking about the "Big Cat", Andres Galarraga. The "Little Big Cat" went six and two-thirds innings on Wednesday night, holding the Indians to one hit, a David Dellucci first inning tater. Galarraga struck out six and only needed 81 pitches to pick up the win, retiring 17 straight Cleveland batters at one point in time.

Before you get excited though, there's a good news/bad news thing here. First the good: he's a two start pitcher next week, and he's a very legitimate start in AL-Only or deeper mixed leagues. He's also pitching for the suddenly hot Tigers, so in H2H formats, I'm taking the gamble. Now the bad: as Tom Herrera pointed out, he "seems like a AAAA player, but he could surprise". That's a pretty accurate statement; he plowed his way through the Cleveland lineup by pounding the strike zone with low 90's fastballs and a slew of sliders with some nasty bite to them, but he got a lot of quick outs from some free swinging Indians.

In other words, you have to wonder how much good a little patience would have done Cleveland. By the time they did start sitting back and taking some pitches, he was pretty dialed, and racked up some mid inning K's. In fact, he was dialed enough where he probably could have gone the distance but -- and we fantasy owners should applaud this -- Jim Leyland pulled him after he plunked two guys in the seventh and started getting a little wild through only 81 pitches.

I'm not expecting two outings like tonight's next week, but I feel like I can almost guarantee at least one win (which is rare enough already) and decent ratios with middling strikeout totals. That's more than worth the pickup in my mind, especially with the upside he could have in a one week league.

To get you ready for draft season, Fantasy FanHouse will be running through each major league team, covering lineups, rotations and sleeper/busts.

Meet the ...
"Playmakers." And I don't mean in game either. I mean, sitting around in the offseason, and someone in the front office said, "we need to make a damn play". And that's how the Tigers ended up shipping uber-stud Cameron Maybin to the Marlins for already-stud Miguel Cabrera and overrated sidewinder Dontrelle Willis. Of course, the Tigers make plays in games too -- Boston aside, this might be the most fantasy friendly roster in the bigs. The lineup is straight up stacked and the rotation combines a lot of youthful upside with some solid consistency. Oh, and some chicken. Giddeyup.

The Breakout
There's no one in either the starting lineup or the five man rotation that can be considered under the radar enough to really be called a breakout. However, Jeremy Bonderman is not getting a ton of love this year. That is probably because of his 2-8, 7.00 plus ERA second half of an egg that he laid last year. He got shut down early, pitching only 174 innings and ended up with a 5.01 ERA on the season. Bear in mind though, that Bonderman was coming off a 214 IP season in 2006 and spent the entire portion of the season that he struggled fighting through injury. Biggity, biggity bounce back.

The Bust
Magglio Ordonez is going too high in most fantasy drafts this year. That's because he hit a ridiculous AL leading .363 last year while smacking 28 taters. He will still be good this year, but if you draft him expecting last year's totals, or pay the auction price he will command, then you are going to be at the very least disappointed. Maggs' health used to be an issue, so that's a small risk, but more than anything it will be just too hard for him to repeat 2007.

A regular look at 30 people who will affect the 2007 NFL season.

Has any receiver in NFL history ever been demoted out of the starting lineup the year after leading the conference in catches? That may have happened to Lions receiver Mike Furrey, who led the NFC with 98 catches last year but will now apparently become the Lions' No. 3 receiver, behind Roy Williams and rookie Calvin Johnson.

Of course, in the offense run by Lions coordinator Mike Martz, the base offense includes three receivers, so that's not much of a demotion. But it is a little odd that a team that already had Furrey and Williams felt the need to add Johnson with the second overall pick. Then again, everything the Lions have done in the Matt Millen era is at least a little odd.

The point is, don't forget about Furrey. Williams and Johnson make more money and more highlight-reel catches, but Furrey is a great athlete who has found his niche playing for Martz.

Bottom line: There's way too much optimism coming out of Detroit this year, and the Lions will be lousy again, but it's completely reasonable to think Furrey could have another 90-catch season in 2007.

30 to Watch: See them all

It didn't take "Dirty" Dallas Drake long to find work after being bought out by the St. Louis Blues.

His new destination? Detroit Red Wings, the division rival with which he started out his long NHL career.

"He's a very physical player who will add grit to our lineup and make our team even more difficult to play against," Red Wings general manager Ken Holland said in a statement. "He's a veteran player, and you can never have enough experience and leadership on a team."

At this point in his career, Dallas Drake is an absolute zero on offence.

SEASON TEAM GP G A PTS
03-04 STL 79 13 22 35
05-06 STL 62 2 24 26
06-07 STL 60 6 6 12

The benefit? Dallas Drake can still kill penalties (he led Blues' forwards in PK time last season), get under the skin of opposing players, and generally be a pain in the ass.

Detroit has always been extremely good at bringing in tossed-away players (Larry Murphy, Joey Kocur, and Daniel Cleary, for example) and getting the most out of them in specific roles. Just don't expect more than 10-15 points.