Last week, I determine who the most overvalued pitchers were based on my projections and dollar values in comparison to their average draft positions on Mock Draft Central. Today I check in on the other side of the coin. Pitcher projections and rankings always have the most disagreement, so it is always interesting to see where my opinion diverges from the mock drafters and the various projection systems. I decided to include the 5 most undervalued pitchers that are still worth drafting (expected to generate a positive value) in a standard 12-team mixed league and projected to be worth more than just a couple of bucks. I also excluded the reliever turned starter group since I’ve talked enough about them and they aren’t 100% locks for a spot anyway.

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It has been a long time since the Twins needed a long-term option to close games, and it’s not a position they’re used to having to think about. In the 20 years between 1990 and 2009, the Twins had 17 seasons where a pitcher recorded 20 saves, of those, 13 were attributed to either Rick Aguilera or Joe Nathan. Unfortunately for the Twins, Aguilera retired in 2000 and Nathan hasn’t been a real option since he missed the 2010 season after tearing his UCL in spring training. As much as the Twins have had a few years to prepare for Nathan’s departure, there’s a substantial difference between patching a one-year hole and finding the team’s next stopper for the next 8-10 years.

When Nathan fled the Twin Cities to close where the “coyotes wail along the trail” (Deep in the heart of Texas), I speculated that the Twins would choose to use Glen Perkins at the end of games rather than going after someone on the free agent market. After all, Perkins was not only the Twins’ best relievers in 2011, he had the 11th highest WAR among all relievers, and one of the few members of the Twins’ pen that performed better than expected. Instead of entrusting Perkins with the closer’s job, the Twins chose to bring back one of 2011’s two closers, Matt Capps. Read the rest of this entry »

Seated quite comfortably on a bar stool at my favorite watering hole, I looked up at the television, and the vision was unmistakable. The green infield grass and the diamond it outlined – baseball is back and it felt like normalcy had finally returned to my life after slagging through the insufferable images of the sport where they kick things and constantly feign injury.

Yes indeed, Spring Training – everyone starts with the same number of wins and hope trumps reality. Optimism not only surrounds real-life clubs, but it also permeates us fantasy folk — and it’s almost a little impossible to try and eschew Spring results as we all look for information on who is going to help us claim our bragging rights in our respective leagues. Velocity, best shapers, worst shapers, all of this noise that we know probably doesn’t matter seeps into our consciousness despite efforts to the contrary.

Looking back at 2011, I can’t help but think I should have seen the writing on the wall. In the Spring, Mike Morse hit nine home runs and slugged .818. Asdrubal Cabrera hit .364/.400/.636. Alex Gordon hit .343/.459/.729 with six home runs and 23 RBI in just 70 at-bats. Ryan Roberts hit .509/.603/.660! On the flipside, Adam Dunn hit .224/.333/.448 with three home runs and 27 strikeouts over 67 at-bats. I should have seen it coming!

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Last week the San Diego Padres locked up Cameron Maybin, signing the 24-year-old to a five year contract extension. In less notable news, I traded for him in the staff Ottoneu league last week in exchange for Martin Prado. There was some debate as to who got the better end of the deal, which is why we’re bringing it to you, the reader. In the coming paragraphs, both myself and my trade partner, Ben Duronio, will explain our side of the trade. Feel free to openly ridicule both of us.

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Consensus Ranks: OF, C, 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, and RP and SP.

Tiered Ranks: C, 1B, 2B, SS, 3B, NL OF, AL SP, NL SP, Holds.

Introducing our revamped ranking process! In the interest of getting our rankings to you, our beloved readers, we will be pumping out the main consensus rankings as close to daily as possible for the next week and a half.

First up are the outfielders. Of particular note might be the rankings of Jason Heyward, Giancarlo Cruz Mike Stanton (and Jay Bruce!), Alex Gordon, Kendrys Morales and Marlon Byrd — for the divergence in our appraisals — as well as the rankings of Brennan Boesch, Logan Morrison, and Carl Crawford — for the convergence in our thinking.

Expect our positional correspondents to highlight players with unique ranks over the coming week. And then each of those positional experts will also be included in the next generation of our rankings. We’ll continue to update these rankings over the course of the season, as we always have.

Thanks to FantasyPros, you will be able to see our individual ranks as well as our consensus. Good luck this season.

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Back in November I discussed bargain shopping in Houston and how there are still a few hidden gems that would make for strong selections at the tail end of your draft.  Well, today, we’re going to look at another perennial cellar-dwelling team and see what kind of fantasy gold can be found.  Funny thing, though, is that these Royals — these, more often than not, punching bags of the AL — are looking pretty darn good lately and there’s going to be quite the battle to obtain a number of their players’ services in fantasy drafts this year.

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When Brennan Boesch got off to a great start in 2010, I was one of the many who pointed out why he was certainly due for a regression in the largest way, and you probably were too. On July 9 that season, Boesch was hitting .345/.402/.600 with 12 home runs, 48 RBI, and 34 R. He was extremely useful in fantasy over that stretch, but most who follow advanced stats knew that the performance was bound to decline.

His BABIP at that time was .390, which was the first sign that the season seemed inauthentic. On top of that, Boesch was coming off of a season at double-A in which he posted a .318 OBP and a 5.8% walk rate. He had also never appeared on Baseball America’s list of top-10 Tiger prospects. He slowed down significantly after that date, hitting .166/.237/.227 for the remainder of that year.
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Last season as an employee of Baseball Prospectus, I was invited to join a Scoresheet league called “Kings.” It was an AL/NL league comprised of 24 teams owned by some of the brightest baseball minds going today – your Jaffes, Passans, Swydans, and Laurilas of the world. As a relative newcomer to the ranks of elite baseball websites, I was permitted to join a team with John Erhardt, whom at the time had previously worked at BP.

Year one was a learning experience for me. We accidentally nabbed Danny Valencia in the second round of the dispersal draft — fortunately we’d pulled Jason Heyward in the first — and we ended up floundering to a 68-94 record, good for last in our division.

Come keeper time, I was faced with some tough decisions. For one, Erhardt would be departing our team, leaving me as the sole proprietor. To his credit, he was just blessed with his first child, so he certainly had more pressing issues at hand. Congratulations again, John. Nonetheless, we had decided last season was a bust pretty early on and sold off some good pieces — namely, J.J. Hardy — to make sure that we’d have some extra youth we could keep and maybe an extra pick or two.

The way keepers work in our Scoresheet league is this: anyone deemed a ‘prospect’ costs you a pick at the back of your draft. If you keep five prospects, you forfeit your last five picks. If you keep 10 big leaguers — the limit in this league — you will start drafting in round 11.

Coming off a bad season, I decided to only keep two big league players: Chris Sale and Heyward. This meant keeping prospects Drew Pomeranz, Deck McGuire, Joe Benson, Michael Choice, and Dellin Betances. It also meant cutting loose big leaguers Jhoulys Chacin, Derek Holland, Orlando Hudson, Andrew Bailey, Chris Perez, Coco Crisp, and a few others. Ideally I’d have kept Holland, but I was taking a chance that I’d be among the lowest in terms of keepers, and could lock in an early draft pick or two.

The strategy prevailed. As the draft kicked off last Friday evening, I was the only one picking in round three, and was able to nab Yu Darvish. Additionally, I had the first to pick in round four, and was able to pull Yoenis Cespedes. Quite a coup, at least in my view. Geoff Young of BP grabbed Nelson Cruz at pick three (second pick, round four), and I rounded out my third of the first four picks with Jose Altuve at the top of round five.

In round six, I grabbed Alexei Ramirez, and in subsequent rounds, I was able to pull Salvador Perez, Carlos Pena, Adam Dunn, Jordan Lyles, Crisp, and Valencia. (RE: Crisp and Valencia? Apparently I’m a glutton for punishment.)

So here’s how my roster currently sits:

C – Salvador Perez
1B – Carlos Pena
2B – Jose Altuve
3B – Danny Valencia
SS – Alexei Ramirez
LF – Coco Crisp
CF – Yoenis Cespedes
RF – Jason Heyward
DH – Adam Dunn

SP – Yu Darvish
SP – Chris Sale
SP – Drew Pomeranz
SP – Jordan Lyles

Prospects – Joe Benson, Michael Choice, Dellin Betances, Anthony Rendon, Josh Vitters, Deck McGuire

At the risk of giving away my strategy, I think I’m going to focus on a couple innings eaters — especially considering the relative youth and unpredictability of my rotation– a dynamic defender in the infield and outfield, and then start looking at bullpen and prospects.

It could just be the Kool-Aid talking, but I really like the lineup. I think I’ll probably go as follows:

1. Heyward RF
2. Crisp LF
3. Pena 1B
4. Dunn DH
5. Ramirez SS
6. Cespedes CF
7. Valencia 3B
8. Perez C
9. Altuve 2B

Obviously the lack of a true leadoff hitter hurts, so I’ll be counting on either Heyward, Crisp, or Altuve to fill that role for me. I like the power potential at 3-4, and I also tried to find at least passable defenders at most every position. As for the pitching staff, we’ll be very young, but there’s some good upside, and like I noted, if I add a couple innings-eaters, it could be pretty well rounded.

There are a veritable plethora of relievers in the pool right now, so I don’t think I’m going to wade into that group just yet.

Anyone else in a Scoresheet league? Have any tips or criticisms? Blast away!

A pitcher’s fantasy value is more than ERA, WHIP or K/9. Even if they have great values in rate stats, they are useless if they aren’t pitching. Today I am going to give the chances for certain starting pitchers to end up on the disabled list in 2012.

Last year, I determined a formula to get the percentage chance a pitcher will end up on the DL. Historically, any starter that pitched 120 innings in the previous season has a 41% chance of ending up on the DL. So of a team’s 5 starters, 2 will spend time on the DL on average.

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He is not going to strikeout many batters, he relies heavily on a sinkerball while the Tigers have assembled one of the worst infield defenses in recent memory, and Steamer projections have him at a 4.42 ERA this year. Even so, I still see reasons to believe that Doug Fister may duplicate last year’s performance.

The main reason for my support of Fister is how different his repertoire was last year compared to the previous year and a half of his Major League career.
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