Yesterday, I examined the American League lineups. Today it’s the National League’s turn.

Braves

• Their lineup has been consistent with Nick Markakis hitting cleanup and Preston Tucker batting 5th. I sort of wrote Tucker off coming into the season and need to re-evaluate him and his .467 BABIP.

Brewers

• A major platoon has been used so far with Eric Thames facing righties and Domingo Santana going against lefties. Otherwise, it’s tough to find any reasoning behind some of the changes.
• I’m a little worried about Orlando Arcia’s stolen base chances as he’s getting slotted into the 8th spot in front of the pitcher.

Cardinals Read the rest of this entry »

One of the great things about Ottoneu is the high level of engagement by the growing community of owners.  Few topics get the masses talking more than crowd-sourcing feedback on recent league trades, so today I want to highlight a few of the more interesting trades I’ve seen recently to get a pulse on how some player values are already shifting early this season.

As a quick reminder, Ottoneu is a keeper system by design that shifts the balance just short of traditional dynasty leagues, and offers a variety of scoring systems (including H2H this year).

Few players have seen their value shift as wildly as Shohei Ohtani over the past few weeks.  What he’s managed to do to start the season with both the bat (1.286 OPS) and off the mound (97.8 mph fastball) has at least verified that he’s as talented as the world thought he was, but the fact that he now looks less raw than he did just a few weeks ago in spring training tells you everything you need to know about the upward trajectory of his value in fantasy baseball leagues.  If you don’t happen to own Ohtani already, he’s going to be one of the hardest players in the game to acquire over the next 30 days.  He’s young, exciting, and just for the cool factor of clicking between batting and pitching stats on his FanGraphs page makes him the hottest commodity in the game right now, especially if you have the flexibility of slotting him into your daily lineup or your rotation like Ottoneu provides.

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After a relatively calm first week for closers, the fantasy world got rocked on Thursday night. While the pitching the ninth inning of the Brewers’ series opener against the Cubs at Miller Park — a game that was firmly in the grasp of the visiting team — Corey Knebel hopped uncomfortably after making his second pitch to Tommy La Stella, then quickly fell to the mound. Knebel sustained an injury to his left hamstring, and according to multiple reports, he will undergo an MRI on Friday to determine the exact nature and severity of the issue.
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Let’s all give a round of applause to the Roto Riteup!

The fans in Philly were NOT happy when Gabe Kapler came to take out Nick Pivetta after 97 pitches.

There’s two down in the sixth after 5.2 innings of scoreless baseball. pic.twitter.com/yAsYHaJe2w

— NBC Sports Philadelphia (@NBCSPhilly) April 5, 2018

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We have these arms every year. The pitchers surprising us in the first week of the season who we maybe heard once or twice among the sea of information during the preseason but never really considered as a possible candidate for our opening day rosters. Who is this guy? Is he worth the add? Can he do this again? What do I do?!

Tyler Mahle is just that for plenty of owners after dazzling with a 6.0 IP, 0 ER, 1 Hit, 2 BBs, 7 Ks outing on Monday afternoon, even becoming an add in some 12-team leagues. It’s not easy to dominate a Cubs lineup, even if they set a record for team strikeouts over the opening weekend, and with Mahle becoming an intriguing enigma, I wanted to take a closer look.

Here’s what I saw from Tyler Mahle in his 2018 debut:

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4/5/18

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 19, 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 SLEEPER19!

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Top 100 Minor League Names by Cespedes BBQ

Notable Transactions/Rumors/Articles

• Michael Conforto back & leading off (3:50)
• Eduardo Rodriguez could debut Sunday (11:06)
• Christian Yelich left with oblique on Wed. (13:38)

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I find the season’s first few weeks tough to analyze since no stats besides velocity are even close to being significant. Instead, I will look through the first week’s lineups for hitters whose value may be changing depending on preseason expectations.

Angels

• Mike Scioscia has a lineup and he’s sticking to it unless Shohei Ohtani is the DH.
• Of note, Zack Cozart’s leading off and Kole Calhoun is batting 5th.
• The only question will be Kinsler slot once he comes off the DL. Albert Pujols should be the one dropping out of the cleanup spot but I bet it’s Cozart because, you know, veteran presence.

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Even if you don’t own a turntable, it’s time to shop for some 33s.

Each Thursday, I’ll be recommending hitters to pick up who are owned in 33 percent of leagues or fewer on CBSSports.com and Fantrax. I’ve chosen to use these sites’ ownership rates as a guide, as they tend to be higher than those on ESPN or Yahoo. If I were to use the latter two sites as a guide for identifying players who are available in at least two-thirds of leagues, in reality, some of those players would be unavailable to many owners who play on CBS and Fantrax.
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I watched the Phillies and Mets play on Facebook Live yesterday. It was great. No joke.

AGENDA

1. TDG Invitational
2. Weather Reports
3. Pitchers to Use and Abuse
4. SaberSim Says…
5. Sho-Heave-Ho 2

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It’s still way too early to be analyzing anything. Heck, after Tuesday’s games, the league leader in plate appearances sits at just 33! That said, batted ball type distribution does stabilize relatively quickly, compared to other metrics. So even though we’re still not even halfway toward our 80 balls in play stabilization point, it’s worth checking in on batter fly ball rates. Perhaps we’ll get an early indication of which hitters have joined the fly ball revolution and are poised for a home run surge.

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