Last year, Anthony Rendon bounced back quite nicely from an injury-shortened, disappointing 2015 campaign. He raked in 2014, and 2016 was merely a return to form. The quartet at the top of the hot corner is clear as day, but after that, there’s plenty of room for debate as how the next tier should be ranked. According to the NFBC’s ADP data, Kyle Seager (66.70), Matt Carpenter (71.74), Todd Frazier (74.02), Adrian Beltre (83.70), Rendon (91.72) and Alex Bregman (92.13) round out the top-10 at third base, and Jose Ramirez adds 11th third basemen to the top-100 picks checking in with an ADP of 95.43.

Rendon is the ninth ranked third baseman in terms of ADP at NFBC, and over at Fantasy Pros, he checks in 11th in expert consensus ranking (Jonathan Villar is third base eligible for Fantasy Pros ranking purposes). I’m a believer in Rendon posting a top-10 fantasy line at the hot corner in 2017, and at their respective ADPs, he stands out as my target at third base if I don’t end up with one of the Big Four — or if I end up with Manny Machado or Kris Bryant and opt to use the former at shortstop and take advantage of the latter’s outfield eligibility. Read the rest of this entry »

Earlier this week, I discussed my latest plan for my holds league. Since chasing both saves and holds usually comes at the expense of hitting categories, I’m going to focus on holds early in the season then pivot to saves around the mid-way point. The most efficient way to accomplish this is to draft setup men who will eventually matriculate to closer. Preferably cheap setup men (unlike Nate Jones).

To that end, volatile bullpens are my friend. But it’s not enough to say “that bullpen is unsteady.” The Padres have a shaky bullpen with as many as four relievers competing for the closer job. However, how many save and hold opportunities do you expect that rotation and offense to produce? Not many. Those starters might be historically bad…

So we want a synthesis between opportunities and bullpen volatility. Here is a division-by-division review of the teams I’ll be monitoring closely.

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Rangers sign Mike Napoli

Signing with the Rangers boosted Napoli’s fantasy value. If healthy, he’ll accumulate a full season of PA at first or DH.  He’s going to be in a good offensive park with good hitters around him. He just needs to keep up the gains he showed last season.

In 2016, Napoli went pull and flyball crazy on the way to posting his highest single-season home run total (34). His power may regress some, but if he comes to bat 600 times 30 home runs are reachable. He’s never going to have a decent batting average because of his lack of speed, high flyball nature, and near 30% strikeout rate.

The big losers with this signing are Jurickson Profar, Joey Gallo, Ryan Rua, and Josh Hamilton who are all competing for the DH spot. Playing time looks to be at a premium among them. Of the four, I have always liked Profar’s talent but he needs to play to be productive. I hope he gets a chance sometime.

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2/9/17

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

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 Leading Off: Question of the Day (3:30)

• How psyched are you about the ghostrunner on second idea?

Notable Transactions/Rumors/Articles/Game Play

• Jason Hammel to KC (10:00)
• Homer Bailey has bone spurs, down 4-6 wks (20:55)
• Mike Napoli to TEX (28:45)
• Chris Carter to NYY
• Byung-Ho Park outrighted

Strategy Section: Team-by-Team Breakdowns

• Louis Cardinals (42:30)
  • Best rebound candidate: Wainwright, Wacha, or Lynn? (48:30)
  • Why is Alex Reyes the 31st SP off the board?
  • Is there hope for a Kolten Wong breakout? (56:18)
  • Who plays more: Jhonny Peralta or Jedd Gyorko? (58:10)
  • Favorite Targets: Dexter Fowler
  • Stayaways: Yadier Molina
  • Off-the-Radar: Michael Wacha & Luke Weaver
  • Impact Prospects? Harrison Bader, Carson Kelly

Read the rest of this entry »

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My Tout Wars prep continues. I have already examined the league’s historical aspects which I have used to create initial auction values and a draft outline. With the initial projections out of the way, I am refining them. One step in this process is to find the replacement level player and adjust players who will miss time accordingly.

The concept behind the replacement level player is fairly simple. If a good player is expected to miss significant time, his fantasy value is based on just the games he is expected to play. For the games he misses, some lesser player (replacement level player) will fill. The better player’s total value will be both his and the replacement player’s contribution.

For example, I don’t expect Yoan Moncada to get called any earlier than the Super Two deadline around June 1st. For the months he’s in the minors, a less talent replacement level player will be subbing in for him. The same idea works with pitchers. Tyson Ross is expected to miss at least a couple of months so a replacement is needed until he gets healthy.

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xStats seems to excel at identifying changes in small sample sizes, which might make it ideal in season tool for fantasy players, since it can rapidly adapt to a player’s changing profile. When you start looking at players with larger samples, other projection systems like Steamer or ZiPS exceed the predictive value of xStats. This is a weakness I hope to address in the future, through a combination of more data and refined algorithms. In the meantime, projecting players with little major league experience is a valuable trait. In the past few weeks I have written articles about Trea Turner and Gary Sanchez. Sanchez is particularly interesting due to his ridiculously over the top power numbers, and I think the method I came up for adapting his batted ball numbers to a more realistic projection is reasonable (feel free to tell me if you disagree). This week I’m casting a wider net and looking at a larger group of young players.

For the purposes here, I’m looking at players under the age of 26 who have at least 300 plate appearances in my records (and my records doesn’t necessarily line up with MLB records, due to various measurement and reporting errors). This isn’t an exhaustive list, moreso focusing on players who likely have some fantasy value. Read the rest of this entry »

I know that clown PUNKxsutawney Phil – that’s right, I’m swinging on a groundhog – saw his shadow which allegedly yields six more weeks of winter (the dumbest season), but we shan’t be deterred by that as baseball season is here. Well, fantasy baseball prep season is here which is just as good. We are less than a week away from pitchers and catchers reporting around the league which officially kicks things off in earnest and before you know it, you’ll be in your draft room making the big decisions that will shape your season.

Here are a few tips to remember as you prepare and then enter your draft:

YOU CAN’T WIN OR LOSE YOUR DRAFT IN THE FIRST ROUND

I fully understand the excitement of the draft order reveal and subsequent first round. I’m not here to say that the first round flat out doesn’t matter, but it doesn’t matter as much as we like to think. The top 15 players at the end of the season are never the top 15 drafted that March, not even close.

Read the rest of this entry »

At the MLB owners meetings earlier this week, the competition committee agreed on a motion to raise the bottom of the strike zone from the hollow below the knee cap to the top of the hitter’s knees. That change isn’t a done deal for 2017—or at all—but it is an interesting idea for an attempt to cut down increasing strikeout totals in baseball. The ESPN Stats and Info tweet in that previous link shows the marked increase of called strikes in the lower third of the zone in recent seasons, a trend no doubt influenced by teams’ recent dedication to pitch-framing catchers.

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Finally, after unmasking the newest version of xBABIP that accounts for shifts, it’s time to get to the names…you know, the kind of list you could actually use for your fantasy leagues this year! So let’s identify and discuss the fantasy relevant hitters whose xBABIP marks were significantly above their actual BABIP marks. These ten hitters should enjoy a BABIP rebound in 2017, assuming their BABIP-related skills remain stable.

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My fellow RotoGraph writers and I have started compiling our preseason position rankings. My initial rankings are projection based and then I adjust them as I see fit. I found several rankings/projections where the industry and I disagree. I am going to dig into three of those players today with more to come.

Freddie Freeman: Disputed Projection

Tenth? Really? I didn’t expect Freeman that low. Depth Chart based SGP values place him out as the tenth first baseman. At NFBC, he is the 6th first baseman which is near my gut based ranking. Additionally, he just went 24th overall in MLB.com’s Fantasy411 slow industry draft.

I am fine with the six players ahead of him (Goldy, Rizzo, Cabrera, Votto, E5, and Bryant). Then my gut disagrees and I am pretty sure some of our readers will also.

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