Yesterday, the Justin Mason posted the ADP from four of the slowest drafts containing industry experts and myself. One thought I had after a handful of rounds was the lack pitching available and how the good were the available hitters. I decided to go back and examine draft results from last year and these draft to see if pitching was being taken early. While it wasn’t, some other information could be extracted.
This is the second installment of my Unlikely Pairs series. Last week I looked at Mike Trout and Freddie Freeman and their elite offensive production. This week we’ll be aiming a little lower in the draft, and maybe it will be more controversial.
These two players are on opposite ends of the career spectrum. Santana, 25 years old, just put up great numbers in his first full season in the majors. Domingo Santana is a bit of a late bloomer, having spent full seasons in both AA and AAA, both with the Astros, prior to advancing. His AA season was particularly mediocre, as he suffered deep drops in both walk rate and batting average. The following season, age 22 in AAA, his walk rate and batting average both bounced back, but he was only given a total of 18 major league plate appearances. In mid 2015, still in AAA, he was traded to the Brewers as part of the Carlos Gomez/Mike Fiers trade. In 2016, Santana injured his elbow and missed most of the season. So, 2017 was his first real chance in the majors, and he certainly ran with it, hitting 30 homers, stealing 15 bases, and achieving 126 wRC+.
Meanwhile, Shin Soo Choo, 35 years old, enjoyed a bounce back year after an injury plagued 2016 campaign. Choo established himself as a solid and reliable player in 2008, and put up consistent 20 HR, 80 R, 60 RBI seasons from 2008 through 2015 with two exceptions. Read the rest of this entry »
Filled in for Eno, thanks for coming out!
| 11:53 |
: Hola, everyone! Eno’s at his gall bladder appointment. I had to have mine removed a couple years ago and he seems to be going through the same thing, so we’ll see what’s what after this appt. |
| 11:54 |
: What on earth are the Yankees thinking? Georgia Roddy is the best man for the job. |
| 11:54 |
: This is REALLY shocking that he’s out. There were grumblings on Twitter last night, but I wasn’t sure if it was sourced or not |
| 11:54 |
: JOOOEEEEEEE!!!!!! |
| 11:54 |
: Very surprising |
| 11:55 |
: Josh Fields was definitely the right choice, right? |
Many of my goals for the offseason, as far as the third base position is concerned, relate to an evaluation of the standing of several players and their roles within their current situation on their current teams. Examining the standing within their organization, perhaps somewhat obviously, should lead us to some insight surrounding their value from a fantasy standpoint. And what better place to start than with the player that has become my personal special boy, of sorts (really in every way possible), in Jake Lamb.
For the last three years I have run an industry mock draft during the month of September. It has been a fun exercise that suits two purposes.
This year I decided to turn it up a notch. I started four separate mock drafts including 57 different analysts. Here are the mock draft (you can click the title of the of each table to go to each mock) and analysts involved: Read the rest of this entry »
Last year I interviewed Brent Daily, winner of the 2016 Ottoneu Champions league. This year I’ve done the same by interviewing Keith Smith, who led his Harrisburg Mayflies to a dominant victory in 2017.
Q: Well done on a big victory in 2017. How long have you been playing fantasy baseball?
I started playing in the late 80’s. I forget the exact year but I remember Carney Lansford dominating. Stepped away for a number of years but got hooked again when a friend introduced me to Ottoneu.
Andrew Cashner did not get much respect from fantasy owners this season. Given that he finished with the highest contact rate and lowest swinging strike rate for any qualified starting pitcher, it may look like he was undeserving of widespread ownership. Cashner’s 12.2 percent strikeout rate was lower than all qualifiers, except for Ty Blach, and that paucity of Ks usually doesn’t bode well for one’s fantasy value. Not only does it put an owner behind in the strikeout category, but K-rates inversely correlate with ERA.
Run prevention was not a problem for Cashner, as he ranked 15th among qualifiers with a 3.40 ERA. On the basis of that, along with 11 wins, a 1.32 WHIP and just 86 strikeouts, Cashner was a top-70 starter, both in Roto value (per ESPN’s Player Rater) and in CBS fantasy points. That may not sound like a big deal — okay, it’s not a big deal — but it does mean that Cashner was more valuable than several more popular starters. For example, the 31-year-old outearned Tanner Roark, John Lackey and Sean Manaea in Roto value and amassed more CBS fantasy points than Taijuan Walker.
Read the rest of this entry »
Here is a look at some of the performance data for each team based on tonight’s matchup: Dallas Keuchel v. Clayton Kershaw. Links to the data where available.
The Dodgers v. Dallas Keuchel
Last offseason, I created an individual pitch metric, pERA, which gives each pitch an ERA and prospect grade based on its ground ball nature and swing-and-miss capability. With the 2017 season over, I’ve compiled the final 2017 values. This year, I’ve added in exit velocity (EV) grades for each pitch.
The process I used for creating pERA is in the article linked above but here is a quick rundown.
10/23/17
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