Frank Victores – USA Today Sports
In sports, there are always guys who get a ton of credit, and also those players who consistently perform but never get the recognition.
This also applies to fantasy baseball, as many quality contributors often fly under the radar, only to play well year after year. Finding these solid veterans for cheap can be invaluable for your fantasy team, so we are going to create a full squad of underrated performers to help your 2013 squad.
To start off this series, we’ll look at veteran starting pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds, Bronson Arroyo.
Now in his 14th year in the bigs — which shows you he must be doing something right — Arroyo has been a rock in the Reds’ rotation since joining the team in 2006 and has made at least 32 starts in nine straight seasons. Among active starting pitchers currently employed by a Major League Baseball team, Arroyo ranks 15th in games started with 329 and 16th (and counting) in innings pitched with over 2,115.
Arroyo has a respectable career ERA of 4.22 and has had an ERA under 3.90 in three of his last four seasons. He is coming off one of his best years in 2012 in which he won 12 games with 129 strikeouts, a 1.21 WHIP and 3.74 ERA. This season he has gotten off to another nice start, pitching four quality starts out of his first six.
While he doesn’t strike out nearly as many batters as he used to, he is still usually good for about four or five per game while walking only one per game as well. Currently owned in less than 10 percent of ESPN leagues, Arroyo is a great streaming option when the matchup is right and can certainly be held onto in deeper leagues.
Stay tuned for the next edition of the 2013 Fantasy Baseball All-Underrated Team on www.Rantsports.com/fantasy
Rich Arleo is a fantasy sports expert with Rant Sports. Follow him on Twitter @Rarleo, ‘Like’ him on Facebook and add him to your networks on Google.
