I have a firm belief that fantasy baseball players are the most knowledgable baseball fans.  The average fan only follows his team, and maybe the teams in his division.  He knows of the Yankees and Red Sox, and maybe some big names like Albert Pujols, but that is the extent of his knowledge.  Fantasy players not only follow every star on every team, we follow the prospects on every team, and all of the potential bullpen guys who could be in line for saves.  Who else, other than a St. Louis Cardinals fan, would know who Ryan Franklin was while Jason Isringhausen was blowingsaves?

It's clear that fantasy players are the ultimate fan, but how does the knowledge translate to managerial decisions?  For the most part, fantasy owners have a full evaluation of a player based on their numbers.  There are exceptions.  Some players who are good in real life hold no fantasy value, and some fantasy players are horrible in real life.  No one would argue that Hanley Ramirez was the best shortstop in real life.  He may have the best numbers, but his defense is horrible, and luckily it doesn't translate to fantasy.

There is a situation that affects a certain top pitching prospect and an average veteran returning from the DL.  This situation will probably result in the wrong move being made, even though our fantasy baseball common sense tells us that the move is wrong.  I am talking about the return of Doug Davis to Arizona, which will boot pitching prospect Max Scherzer from the rotation.

First of all, I have all the respect in the world for what Doug Davis has gone through.  There are things larger than sports, and battling cancer is one of them.  All respect aside, take out everything but the numbers in this case.

Player A:  3.62 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 7.83 K/9 ratio, 3.6 BB/9 ratio
Player B:  4.59 ERA, 1.55 WHIP, 6.89 K/9 ratio, 4.48 BB/9 ratio

Player A is Doug Davis in the 2004 and 2005 seasons.  His numbers look like what you would take from a number three starting pitcher.  Player B is also Doug Davis, in the 2006 and 2007 seasons.  Quite a drastic drop off.  His ERA went up almost a whole run, his WHIP went up 25 points, he strikes out one fewer batter every nine innings, and walks almost an extra batter every nine innings.  In short, the control that made him so good in 2004 and 2005 has disappeared the last two years.

Now let's introduce two more players:

Player A:  2.87 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, 11.05 K/9 ratio, 3.88 BB/9 ratio
Player B:  1.93 ERA, 0.83 WHIP, 13.50 K/9 ratio, 1.45 BB/9 ratio

Player A is Max Scherzer in the minors last season, pitching 106.2 innings between A, AA, and AAA ball.  You can see that the low WHIP and amazing strikeout totals is what gives him his hype.  Player B is also Max Scherzer in 37.1 innings between AAA and the majors this year.  While the sample size is very small in each case, you can't argue against the fact that Scherzer is the real deal.

Now let's assume the following for each player for the remainder of the year:

Davis:  4.59 ERA, 1.55 WHIP, 6.89 K/9 ratio, 4.48 BB/9 ratio
Scherzer:  3.14 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, 11.30 K/9 ratio, 3.14 BB/9 ratio

Over 180 innings pitched, Davis would allow 29 more runs, 53 more hits, 12 more walks, and strikeout 83 fewer batters.  This is assuming that Davis pitches the way he has the last two seasons, and Scherzer pitches slightly worse than he already has at the major league level this season.

When Davis returns in a week or two he will take over the starting job, while Scherzer will move back to the bullpen.  Looking at the fantasy numbers, common sense tells us that Scherzer is at worst the 4th best starter in the Diamondbacks rotation right now, with Randy Johnson and Doug Davis battling it out for the fifth spot.  This is just one case where fantasy players are smarter than the guys in charge of the real life teams.