2011 MLB Spring Training Fantasy Report: Ubaldo Jimenez, Jose Bautista and More!

Injuries are cropping up all over the Grapefruit and Cactus Leagues, and that dominates the news in tonight's Spring Snippets. Luckily, none of them appear to be serious as it is a lot of the nagging pulls, strains and tweaks, but some of the stars of the game will be missing a week or so.

We also take a trip through some of tonight's box scores to look at some players that are interesting as we move closer to Opening Day. There was more drama with the Cubs, a former front line pitcher that I am warning fantasy players against, and one of Fantasy Alarm's sleepers getting off to a good start.

The injury to Chris Carpenter has been determined to be minor the day after, and the Cardinals are optimistic that he might only miss one start, but no more than two and he is still in line to be on the mound for the Cardinals on Opening Day. The St. Louis clubhouse couldn't handle any more bad news, so this is welcome although Carpenter did say in an interview that if the season went really badly that he would be open to trade discussions.

The 2011 season hasn't even started yet, and already the Cardinals are having a rough year.  They seemed to have avoided disaster on this one however, and Carpenter's value shouldn't really be effected by this.

Josh Beckett still has small lingering effects from the concussion he suffered after getting hit in the head earlier in the week, and while he is going to be just fine, he will not be making his scheduled start on Thursday. Beckett should stay on his turn though, and be on the mound next Tuesday. It appears that there will be no long-term problems with him in this area.

Ubaldo Jimenez missed his spring start due to an infection in his finger, but this doesn't seem like anything that will have a major effect on the pitcher's preseason routine.  Jimenez had the infection on the fingernail drained, and has already resumed playing catch. The Rockies ace who blew up into fantasy relevance last season says he expects to make his next start so you should not downgrade him on your rankings if you are about to be drafting.

Blue Jays' slugger Jose Bautista was a scratch from Wednesday's game with tightness in his quadriceps. Again, this is just a case of some early Spring tightness and nothing that should make you freak out. If this were the regular season, Bautista wouldn't be missing any time, and he should be playing by the weekend at the latest.  I can nearly guarantee that Bautista isn't going to hit 50 plus home runs again and likely will be over valued, but if you like Bautista, this news should not affect his draft status.

Jason Heyward left Wednesday's game with tightness in his left groin after just two at bats in the game. Heyward has been dealing with the soreness and it flared up on him in the first inning, he remained in the game until the third but came out for precautionary reasons. Heyward will definitely miss Thursday's game as well. He is off to another great start early in the year, so it is good that Heyward will likely give his body a few days rest so he doesn't deal with the same injury concerns in his second year.  I think if he can stay healthy, Heyward will have a monster year.

And the Cubs pick up right where they left off as another dugout skirmish happened after an inning filled with errors, hits and long balls. The Cubs made two glaring errors in the field and Carlos Silva allowed two home runs, after which he got into it with Aramis Ramirez.  This might not have much of a fantasy impact, but you can already see Chicago starting to spiral down the same path. Imagine if Carlos Zambrano had been on the mound!

Atlanta's closing hopeful Craig Kimbrel bounced back in his second trip to the mound this spring after a rough first time out. Kimbrel pitched one scoreless inning, allowing just one hit, but he didn't strike out a batter. You want to see him get the strikeouts up, but the fact that he didn't get tattooed again in his second outing is encouraging.  I still like Kimbrel to close over Johnny Venters and rack up a great number of whiffs. 

I will continue to warn about Dan Haren, because he is clearly not the pitcher he once was. He had what was the worst season of his career in 2010, and his first start of Spring 2011 didn't bring about much optimism. Haren got creamed by the Rangers to the tune of three earned runs over two innings. He did strikeout two, as he is a good strikeout pitcher. But I think he is severely overvalued in drafts. Haren is a number three starter at best, but often gets taken much higher. I predict Haren will be a .500 pitcher with a 4.00 ERA and 185 strikeouts.

One of Jeff Mans' sleepers on Fantasy Alarm, Aaron Harang got his spring off to a very nice start as the new Padre acquisition pitched two shutout innings against the Rockies and threw just 23 pitches. He didn't strike anyone out, but it is encouraging that a guy who has been so bad for the past two years at least got off to a solid start. Don't look for Harang to win 18 games and lead you to fantasy glory, but he will be a nice late addition to your fantasy rotation and should strikeout at least 150 batters.

Two young, power-hitting first base prospects both hit their first home runs of the spring as they try to win their respective jobs. The Royals Kila Ka'aihue seems to have a first base/DH role sewn up with the Royals so he should get a good number of at-bats, but he is still going to need to have a solid spring. A three-run shot in the eighth inning was his only hit of the game and he is batting just .222 for the spring, but perhaps this will get him going. 

Juan Miranda in Arizona has to deal with Brandon Allen and Russell Branyan in the desert, but he connected on a two-run bomb that got his team on the board. He offers great power potential and I think right now he has the inside track to the first base job in Arizona.  Think of Miranda towards the end of your drafts and you could have a great sleeper on your hands.

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