To start off, Jeff Sullivan wrote an awesome piece on Carlos Carrasco on the main site. If I could make a request, it is that you read the above link prior to reading this piece on Carrasco’s fantasy value.
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A future ace is often tough to identify. Sometimes it’s a #1 overall pick who makes his MLB debut a year after being drafted and turns in his first gem of a season in year three like David Price. But it is often a more circuitous route that maybe only involved a hint of potential ace-dom at the beginning, as with Max Scherzer.
The 11th overall pick from 2006 blitzed his way through the minors and debuted in 2008 with time split in between the rotation and bullpen. Most saw him eventually landing in the bullpen, but as a high impact closer-type. He ranked in the 2008 top 100 lists for Baseball America (#66) and Baseball Prospectus (#90), but he wasn’t even the top prospect on his team. That distinction belonged to Jarrod Parker.
Scherzer hasn’t seen the bullpen since that 2008 season – save a couple of postseason appearances, including an amazing one for the Tigers in 2013 – and has evolved from a promising, but flawed mid-rotation arm to dominant frontline stud. Now, armed with the contract to back his ace status, Scherzer moves from one loaded pitching staff to another, but this time he will be the focal point. Many believe the move back to the National League will increase his value substantially, but how much can he improve upon his last seasons: one a Cy Young effort and the other a near-match when you look at his FIP and component numbers?
Pundits and projection systems don’t always agree. When they do, it often signals some underlying truth. Everybody, human and computer, expects the Philadelphia Phillies to be bad this season. Really, the only debate is the degree of awful. Will they be merely bad or downright terrible? With the doom and gloom, it’s easy to forget the Phillies project to be among the best in baseball in one regard – relief pitching.
It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.
Looking for offense? Join the rest of Mets nation, whose hopes for a productive lineup rely largely on two aging corner outfielders and a glove-heavy center fielder. That said, all of the three options here have clear full-time jobs — well, heh, assuming they stay healthy — and they all have the potential to contribute in standard mixed leagues, even if they probably shouldn’t be drafted with such expectations.
First, a quick word about Citi Field. Last year, the park favored pitchers slightly overall, though it was found to increase home runs a tad, particularly for right-handed hitters. We’ll see how the Mets’ decision to move in the fences, yet again, bodes for offense, but suffice to say, the ballpark shouldn’t be viewed as a major impediment to run production.
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At the end of October, I asked a very serious, important question — Is There Any Hope For Mike Moustakas? I was quite negative, which is something that is hard not to come away feeling when staring at Mike Moustakas‘ statistical record. But then upon typing yesterday’s ESPN Home Run Tracker Analysis: The Upsiders and finding his name appear, I discovered a positive, and then another one and then another one. Behold, reasons for optimism! These new discoveries are tempting me to up my Moustakas forecast in my 2015 Pod Projections (available now!).
• Troy Tulowitzki has been dealing with a labrum tear since 2008 in which he finally had surgery for at the end of 2014.
But for years, Tulowitzki and the Rockies knew that his hip labrum was damaged. The area has been a problem since he suffered a torn left quadriceps tendon early in 2008. He had surgery to remove scar tissue from the left groin area in 2012, but he hoped to continue to play through the underlying labrum damage.
Did the surgery finally put an end to the problems?
Not even Tulowitzki knows.
“It’s been a battle for me, no doubt,” Tulowitzki said. “I do everything I possibly can to prepare for the season and make myself healthy. Hopefully, all these things are past me. I can move on and go out there and play 140, 160, however many games it is, I love to do that. I have every intention to. We’ll see how it goes.”
I guess we can finally see if he can stay healthy for an entire season.
Contributing to RotoGraphs’ Bullpen Reports last year brought me much joy: opening infinite Brooks Baseball player cards for sabermetric outcomes and watching glorious GIFs. Oh, Marcus Stroman’s Two-Seamer:
GIF: Marcus Stroman’s Two-Seam Fastball from last week’s outing. It may be our favorite of the year – http://t.co/vyJM8ltUir
— Pitcher List (@ThePitcherList) August 31, 2014
Mmm.
My last Bullpen Report from October looked at possible closers through outcomes and presented BABIP differentials (actual BABIP versus expected BABIP using Inside Edge data).
The Astros outfield is going to look quite a bit different than it did in 2014. The only Astro outfielder to top 500 plate appearances last year was Dexter Fowler who is now a Cubbie. The only other Astro outfielder to top 400 PA was Robbie Grossman who figures to see significantly less playing time with the Astros acquiring Colby Rasmus and Evan Gattis. But any discussion of the Astros outfield has to start with one man, George Springer. Read the rest of this entry »
What I have in mind today is a review of everything I’ve done between the end of arbitration and last Saturday’s keeper deadline. I’ll begin with my 31 player roster entering the draft and include each trade that was made along the way. We can use the comments today for two purposes. Those who want to crow about their own accomplishments can do so. Others who have questions or concerns about why I did certain things should ask away. While there is an essence of humblebrag in this post, my purpose is to teach through example.
With the cut deadline behind us, now is the time to start prepping for your auctions. One thing to do is identify your targets, but another is to suss out the competition. Who has cash to spend? How much? Who is building a new roster and who is filling just a couple holes?
I started by taking a broad look at my three leagues to see how much cash was kept and I was intrigued to see how different the three auctions are set to play out.