10/18/17

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 18, the best baseball strategy game ever made – available NOW on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms! Go to ootpdevelopments.com to order now and save 10% with the code SLEEPER18!

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• @sporer
• @enosarris
• @jasoncollette
• @justinmasonfwfb – Producer

Open

• AL LCS Review
• NL LCS Review

Strategy Section

• Jason’s Lessons from ‘17

Events

• Baseball HQ’s First Pitch Forum at Arizona Fall League

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Last week I laid out my plans for combining prospect grades and “scoutable” traits to help project major league performance. Finally, I’m able to output projections with encouraging results. Just by using traits people can scout with their eyes, I created a set of projections which competes with Steamer projections. Additionally, it helps point to the traits people should look for in prospects.

Previously, I tried to use just the five traits prospects get graded on (Hit, Power, Speed, Field, and Arm) to come up with a player’s value. I found the Speed and Power grades useful but came to the following conclusion on the Hit grade:

Basically, the Hit tool is a useless component to determine hitter value as it’s currently being distributed.

The more I thought about the Hit tool, the more I concluded that it’s trying to evaluate too much information (examples of different Hit tool definitions).

For these projections, I matched up the traits hitters display with common stats. To start with, here are the core traits I decided to utilize:
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Alex Bregman came into the 2017 with rather large expectations, to the point where I opined that he might end up in the top five third basemen in Major League Baseball by year’s end in my bold predictions at the beginning of the year. As it turns out, that wasn’t too far-fetched an idea, as Bregman rode a strong second half toward finishing 7th at the position in WAR (3.8) and 7th in Off rating (17.7). With that in mind, it’s an exciting prospect to discuss what exactly the Houston Astros, as well as prospective fantasy owners, could expect from him moving forward.

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The 2017 ottoneu season has come and gone, so it’s time to take a look at the final power rankings of the season. Was overall scoring down compared to 2016? Where did your team/league end up in the rankings? Let’s find out!

You can find prior power rankings here: August,  July, June, May , April, 2016 Final

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At the beginning of January, I used my xK% equation to identify six starting pitchers with significant strikeout rate upside in 2017. Let’s see how these pitchers actually performed.

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Alas, we reach the final position to dive into for this year’s recap of Pod’s Picks & Pans. We finish with the starting pitchers, a group that always garners varying opinions. Let’s see how the players I was most bullish and bearish on versus the RotoGraphs consensus actually performed.

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The Astros have a talented, young team but the minor league system is starting to thin out now. With that said, there are still a few prospects with high ceilings, such as outfielder Kyle Tucker and pitcher Forrest Whitley.

The Graduate: Francis Martes, RHP: The Astros have a relatively young team but the club didn’t rely heavily on rookies in 2017. Derek Fisher led the first-year hitters with 166 plate appearances while Martes led the freshman pitchers with 54.1 innings — narrowly edging a more effective James Hoyt. Why focus on the former and not the latter? Hoyt has solid potential as a one-inning reliever but Martes has additional value as a guy that can go multiple innings out of the ‘pen or could eventually move back into the starting rotation. Just 21, he already flashes three potentially-plus offerings but it’s his lack of control and command that holds him back. Martes sits in the mid-90s with his heat but until he trims his walk rate (5.13 BB/9) he’ll be pitching in triple-A or mopping up games in the Majors.

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This time of year, I tend to look over leaderboards. My leaderboard perusing extends beyond MLB to the upper minors, NPB and KBO. It’s often a fruitless waste of time, but is it ever really a waste of time immersing yourself in something you enjoy (don’t answer that)? Sometimes players will stand out who I deem worthy of tracking in the offseason, and that’s the case with 26-year-old outfielder Oswaldo Arcia and Colin Moran. The former is well traveled and spent the entire 2017 season in the minors, and the latter is still rookie eligible and coming off of a career year with the stick. Read the rest of this entry »

Today we complete the hitter side of the 2017 Pod’s Picks & Pans with the outfielders. Let’s see how my rankings on the players I disagree with the RG consensus performed.

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10/13/17

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 18, the best baseball strategy game ever made – available NOW on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms! Go to ootpdevelopments.com to order now and save 10% with the code SLEEPER18!

Follow us on Twitter

• @sporer
• @enosarris
• @jasoncollette
• @justinmasonfwfb – Producer

Open

• AL LCS Preview
• NL LCS Preview

Read the rest of this entry »

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS