The Zen and Art of Fantasy Football: Rostering Framber Valdez – A Balance Between Frustration, and a Good Dose of “What’s Your Problem, Man?”

Zen Time:

This morning, in a discussion about “desire” in the context of Zen, a friend mentioned a piece of wisdom a teacher had given him many years ago: “Balance is a constant adjustment.”

I find myself pondering that simple sentence over and over in my mind. The balance is a continuous adjustment. That is, balance is not a state of ease as I would imagine it to be. Balance is not a state of being ready for anything and everything. If my friend’s teacher was right (and I suspect she probably was), balance is a never-ending process of adaptation. What makes us seem balanced, I think, is not the ease with which we deal with the world, but rather the ability with which we deal with any situation. Always understanding that any situation is possible, and preparing for emergencies it is possible it allows us to respond – not respond – to almost anything it happens.

As I think about what “balance” might mean in a Buddhist context, I can’t help but visualize the image of the dharma wheel, at least the version of the wheel that is common in the west.

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Like any religious symbol, the wheel of dharma (or, in Sanskrit, the dharmachakra) has become so popular and developed that the image often has no real meaning when we see it all the time in our daily lives. But when considered in the context of Buddhist – or, frankly, life – practice, the wheel gives us a visual reminder of the path to an uncentered life dukkha. Maybe, dukkha it is indeed the natural state of human beings, but the complete following of the Noble Eightfold Path, which unsurprisingly requires constant preparation and responses to all of life’s emergencies, can allow us to develop the tools to make decisions based on the right purpose, which leads to the right effort, which leads to … well, maybe you get the idea.

A simple statement from my friend this morning – “Balance is a constant adjustment.” – it’s a good reminder that even what seems easy in our lives, maybe especially what seems easy, is the result of work and training and focus and determination to keep striving for a better place.

How in the world does this work in fantasy baseball?

As life goes, so does fantasy baseball. In life, we face challenges, joys, and sorrows – big and small. In fact, “challenges, joys, and sorrows” may be the beginning of the word “life.” So it goes.

In dreams, on a fundamental level (I would hope, anyway), we will experience challenges, joys, and sorrows. Once we feel like we’re locked into successful strategies, they blow up in our face (a microcosm of my unreal season so far). When we feel that the game has beaten us, we find success in some way. If fantasy meets arrogance, a lesson in humility will soon be learned – at least by the wise. When fiction is met with resignation, like life, the process becomes a struggle, a painful humiliation in which we learn very little because we have little openness to solutions.

Balance, according to a wise friend, is a constant adjustment. I’ll work to keep that in mind as I test my teams this FAB Sunday, and I’ll try to use it to test my rosters to the best of my ability. Starting with a man who was incredibly frustrated to sign up this year – despite my confidence in writing it over and over again. As I said, pride quickly merges with humility.

Framber Valdez

I love Framber Valdez, the player – the man himself leaves me with some questions. In the last 10 months, he has made two questionable actions in baseball, and both actions were public and looked bad on him. One involved hitting his handler and he was clearly not apologetic at all. One involved hitting Trevor Story with a 4-seam fastball, a pitch, which Valdez had not yet thrown this season. Wow. It’s probably fair to say that Valdez, the man, could use some practice in his forms of balance.

But I enjoy the player – the old school mentality that Valdez brings as a striker. He doesn’t always have the stuff of an ace, but over the years, he has proven time and time again that he knows how to get results that an ace can get. But instead of hitting everyone to get those results, he finds ways to get hitters to get them out with ground ball after ground ball.

However, this year, his results were the reason why my team got off to a slow start. He was bad. I register him in many places. So, I wasn’t very good in many areas (well, to be fair, all my results are not due to Valdez, but he plays a role). With my friend’s message about balance and ongoing maintenance in mind, however, I decided to take a closer look at what was going on. Are you broke? Are you unlucky?

Valdez’s line this season has been enough to inspire a downward spiral: in 67.2 IP, he’s hurt his fantasy bosses with a 4.39 ERA (supported by a 4.34 xERA, 4.14 FIP, and 4.29 xFIP) and a 1.32 WHIP. His BB/9 is up to 3.33, not great at all. His K/9 dropped to 7.18, which isn’t great either. His K% made things look even worse, as he dropped to 18.3% from 23.3% last year, causing his K-BB% to drop from 14.8% last year to 9.8% in 2026. He is allowing the most contact this season in all aspects of his game: In the strike zone, he is allowing 5% more contact (2% vs. 5+2% (2% more than 5+2). 87%). His overall connection is up almost 5 points (80.4% compared to 2025’s 75.5%). Worst of all, out of the zone, hitters made contact 59.6% of the time compared to 49.9% in 2025. He doesn’t seem to be very successful at fooling hitters. And when he fails to keep them guessing, hitters put the ball in the air more often: His FB% rises from 22.8% to 33.8%, and his GB% drops by a corresponding amount, 47.6% compared to 2025’s 58.6%. Valdez thrives on keeping the ball down, so 10-11% conversions in both FB% and GB% are very bad signs.

But what is the problem? Since he can’t fool hitters, which leads to a lot of balls in the air and obviously can’t control hitters’ results, that suggests to me that we should look at his pitches themselves. Has he lost the ability to throw them?

After looking at the numbers below, my non-professional analysis (so take the necessary grains of salt) is this: his problem seems mechanical and very fixable. Check out these numbers:

**Valdez only threw the 4-seam 2x, one to hit Story and one to K.

There is almost no difference here. All his velos are consistent with last season.

**Valdez only threw the 4-seam 2x, one to hit Story and one to K.

The only worrisome Stuff+ number I see is his 4-seam, down to 70 points, 28-30 points below league average. But he only threw that pitch twice this season, and one of those was aimed directly at Story. Valdez knows it’s not his money, so he doesn’t use it. Stuff+ is actually not a rational number. As for Stuff+ in other areas, those numbers are pretty good, and his slider looks much improved.

**Valdez only threw the 4-seam 2x, one to hit Story and one to K.

Again, the only problem pitch seems to be the 4-seam, which is probably why he doesn’t throw it. But the pitch, stuff, and velo all look good, yet he’s using his sinker 3% more often this year and his curveball 4.6% less often this year. Is that a confidence thing? There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with the pitch itself.

Some of the answers to the mystery may come in circular form:

**Valdez only threw the 4-seam 2x, one to hit Story and one to K.

His throw rate is low, which I suspect is why hitters make more contact, and Valdez struggles to keep hitters off balance. I’m not a physicist, but I think that the rate of turning comes largely from the ability to commit and follow the movement of the pitch. If the pitcher doesn’t complete his swing, that can affect the velo, but we’ve seen that Valdez’s velo is in line with last year. So what gives?

One consistent number I could find that would explain his lack of spin is his arm angle – he has decreased arm angle on every pitch he uses regularly:

**Valdez only threw the 4-seam 2x, one to hit Story and one to K.

Is it that simple? Do you need to replace the vertical arm hole? I can’t say for sure what that answer is, but so far, it’s the most compelling information I’ve found. So what is my story? I suspect, true to this week’s topic, Valdez has lost his balance – physically and mentally. His body isn’t as focused, which I can at least think is due to a lack of self-confidence caused by being beaten so much. It’s a self-feeding cycle. Of course, I could be wrong, but at least this is data to work with.

If a guy who couldn’t pass the math in high school can see this change, I have to think the Tigers staff will fix it soon, if it happens to be a bugger. That makes me think I need to stick with Valdez on my teams, maybe even bench him for a few weeks while he’s rehabbed. Maybe all he needs is a little balance. And I just need a little patience.

Next week this time, I will be halfway around the world learning more about one of the origins of Zen, so my next article will be in two weeks. For now, luck in moderation, both in life and in sport.

Until then. – Hamley