Brian McCann is still recovering from right shoulder surgery and when he’ll be able to play is still up in the air. The early indication is he’ll miss a significant portion of April. Based on this news I moved him down seven spots from 12th to 19th. McCann really scares and I may drop him even lower. Geraild Laird is expected to be the Braves primary catcher with feel good story Evan Gattis serving as the backup.

Jason Motte will be out at least a week with a mild strain in his elbow. The last thing I want to hear with any pitcher is elbow problems because when there’s smoak (I literally typed “smoak” first instead of smoke) there’s fire. I originally had Motte as a top 5 closer, but I dropped him to 19th overall in my closer rankings. Mike Matheny, the Cardinals manager, said Mitchell Boggs will get the first opportunity at closing duties. If Motte misses a substantial amount of time Trevor Rosenthal, not Boggs, will end up becoming the closer.  Boggs walks too many hitters (7.1% walk rate) for his low strikeout rate (19.6%) so he’ll eventually blow too many games. When I have my NFBC 15-team draft on Tuesday I’ll target Rosenthal with my last two picks because if he becomes the closer, he could be a top 5 closer.