Guess what’s back. Back again. OK, so we probably aren’t quite nightly yet (although we should hit the wire a handful more times before opening day). And the closer grid may need some tweaking as final roster cuts get made. This is our spring training. But, hey, at least there’s something to read at midnight again.

First goal is to get a semi-functional grid out tonight. Don’t worry, iterations to come. As for some notes and notes…

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3/28/16

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live!

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Notable Transactions/Rumors/Articles

• Matt Harvey scratched, OD in doubt (4:00)
• Lonnie Chisenhall to DL [forearm] (6:17)
• Nate Karns & Vincent Velasquez win 5th starter roles (9:30)
• Tyler White makes Astros OD roster (17:45)

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• Injury information is being reported more frequently, but with fewer details. Make sure you check the spreadsheet at the bottom for the latest details as I wasn’t able to write a blurb on every player. If you want more information, click on the “Source with Link” date for the player’s latest article.

• Ryan Braun and David Wright look to be couple headaches for their owners in leagues with Weekly lineups. It has been reported each will not be playing full time and take days off when needed. The playing time in weekly leagues may drive an owner nuts. They may drive owners in daily lineup leagues also nuts, but, at least, those owners can move them out of the lineup if they aren’t playing. They may be bought on the cheap a month or two into the season when their owners are tired of dealing with them.

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Starting pitching used to be the calling card of the Tigers with Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer, Doug Fister, Anibal Sanchez, and Rick Porcello giving them one of the most potent quintets in the game. Fister was traded to the Nationals with Drew Smyly next in line, but then they upgraded him to David Price for the 2014 stretch run. Then Scherzer went to the Nationals, Porcello was traded to the Red Sox, Verlander fell on hard times, and Sanchez’s health went south again and all of a sudden it was Price & pray in 2015. Instead of running out the rest of his final year, they traded him to the Blue Jays last year and sealed a last-place finish in the AL Central, their worst finish since 2008.

The Price trade helped the Tigers retool instead of rebuild thanks to the acquisitions of Daniel Norris and Matt Boyd. Meanwhile, Verlander got his groove back (2.27 ERA in final 99.3 IP), and the Nationals once again figured prominently in Detroit’s pitching plans – this time with an acquisition from them as Jordan Zimmermann inked a 5-year, $110-million dollar deal this offseason. Verlander and Zimmermann are locked in as the workhorses atop the rotation and the Tigers will need 400+ innings from them to compete this year. Sanchez got a late start in Spring Training due to triceps inflammation, but after one solid start, there is already talk of him pitching game two in Miami to open the season. So the top three spots are set (as long as Sanchez stays upright, at least).

That leaves four candidates for the remaining two spots – Norris, Boyd, Shane Greene, and the less-heralded offseason signing: Mike Pelfrey (2 yrs, $16-mil). Pelfrey has the four-spot, but I still can’t muster a case to draft him and his 13% career strikeout rate. He has looked good in Spring Training (and not just the numbers, but I saw him pitch well on my TV), but it’s still a no. Let’s focus on the fifth-starter candidates.

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When it comes to fantasy baseball, not all prospects are created equally. In keeper leagues and dynasty leagues it’s important to have strategies around your prospects; you don’t want to just randomly grab a Top 10 or 20 prospect and hope for the best.

Along with skill, knowing a player’s ETA is key. Is the player advanced enough to help in 2016… or is he headed for a 2019 debut? Toronto’s Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is a talented dude but he’s not likely to visit the Great White North until 2020. Chicago (AL) drafted Carson Fulmer in 2015 with the eighth overall pick but he’s considered advanced enough to perhaps help the club in ’17. And then there’s Colorado’s Trevor Story, who is likely to turn the Jose Reyes soap opera and a strong spring into a ’16 starting gig.

As a result, your strategy around acquiring prospects should vary. If you’re grabbing a guy earmarked to help in 2017 or later, you should look at them like a stock — an investment that you hope to see increase in value before you cash out (either by adding to your active roster or by trading for an opportunity to win sooner). You also have to consider if you’re truly committed to a long-range prospect and willing to commit a roster spot to someone who may not help for three or four years — if at all. Prospects with a ’16 or ’17 should be viewed as players that can be valuable (albeit potentially inconsistent) contributors to the current makeup of your roster at a reasonable cost.

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It’s difficult to find a position with more intrigue across the baseball landscape than that of third base. This is especially true from a fantasy perspective. Not only do you have the mix of youth, many of which have already been tagged with the elite label, but there’s a ton of versatility going on here from top to bottom. As such, that makes it one of the deepest positions in fantasy. While not all players that make their way onto these rankings will man third on Opening Day, they’ll at least maintain eligibility to do so for fantasy squads.

Preseason rankings tend to be quite a bit more arbitrary than they are throughout the remainder of the season. Past performance is the only indicator to go off of, with OBP serving as a main focal point in these initial rankings, and other whimsical reasoning having the potential to make its way into the rankings as well before regular season play begins. And as deep as the position is, at least to start the year, tiered rankings allow us to break this up a little bit and separate the elite from the fringe types that’ll log time at third. Given that these are our initial rankings for the 2016 season, we’ll just give it to you as straightforward as possible.

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As you may have guessed, the following is a list of five players who deserve to be monitored. In most cases, you probably won’t want to draft or rush to the wire for these guys. Just keep an eye on their stock.

Juan Nicasio – SP/RP

Chances are, you’ve heard some buzz about Nicasio this spring. What he’s done is pretty buzz worthy – 15 innings, 10 hits, five walks, and 24 strikeouts. Nicasio returned to major league relevance last summer. He pitched out of the Dodgers bullpen, averaging 95 mph with his fastball and also using an average slider. Over his career, he’s mostly been a fastball-slider guy with a few changeups and sinkers mixed in for variety.

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I don’t know if y’all are familiar with Tanner Bell. He recently joined the RotoGraphs staff and has wasted no time churning out quality post after quality post. He performs analysis, but he also offers technical advice regarding the “offline” components of fantasy baseball such as building cheat sheets in Microsoft Excel. It’s good stuff, even for people who consider themselves proficient in Excel — I do and, alas, it never occurred to me to conditionally format my draft prep workbook to strike out players already drafted.

Similarly, it seems Tanner recently experienced an epiphany (or two) of his own in regard to player projections and valuations. I mentioned to him I wanted to respond, so to speak, to his post, not as a criticism but as an expansion. A validation, I guess.

Also, rarely, if ever, do we engage in back-and-forth call-and-response posts. I don’t intend for this to be one of those. It’s just that Tanner inspired me, but I have some thoughts of my own to add.

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You’re not sick of reading about my Picks and Pans yet, right? Of course not, you love them! We’re winding down the series and today we move along to the starting pitchers. As you no doubt have argued in the comments, my valuations take innings into consideration. It has to. We’re valuing the player’s contributions to our team. This is from a strict dollar value perspective. This is different than where I might suggest drafting the player in a snake draft, as I’d be more willing to take a lower ranked pitcher projected for better ratios than a higher ranked one with worse ratios, but more innings.

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Starting today, the Roto Riteup is back on a daily basis!

On the agenda:
1. James Paxton vs Nate Karns, redux
2. Hyun Soo Kim on the chopping block
3. Shane Green: Tigers’ fifth starter
4. Some banged up catchers

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