Power is typically the hardest to come by in free agent pools across the land, but Josh Willingham and Logan Morrison were likely undrafted in many shallower leagues (think 12-team and fewer mixed leagues), yet contributed solidly in the homer category. Let’s see what we might expect for 2012.

Josh Willingham

Jason Catania discussed him a bit yesterday, but I wanted to look a little more in-depth. Willingham is a free agent this off-season and has always hit in pitcher’s park. Of course, that hasn’t stopped him from posting a .214 career ISO, but it will still be interesting to see where he ends up. Willingham is an extreme fly ball hitter, which is what you love to see from a power guy, though it does hurt one’s BABIP, and resulting batting average. His HR/FB has jumped around between 11.3% in 2010 to a career high 17.5% this past season. It would probably be wise to assume a bit of decline in his FB% (maybe to the mid-40% mark, rather than high-40%), while his HR/FB dips as well, though his new home park may have some effect here.

The good news is that although those two factors would take a bite out of his home run total, his contact rate should improve from its career worst mark. As Jason mentioned, health is the key for Willingham, but if it cooperates, another season of mid-20 home run production to follow. And if all the stars align, he does have the skills to clear the 30-homer plateau for the first time.

Logan Morrison

After hitting just two home runs in all of 2010 (albeit in just 244 at-bats), Morrison surprised many by swatting 23 out of the park this season. But maybe we shouldn’t have been surprised. In early 2009, he fractured his right wrist, causing him to miss two months of action and he complained of continued soreness during spring training in 2010. This would help to explain the power outage. In 2007 in Single-A, he hit 24 homers in 453 at-bats with a .216 ISO, so the power skills had certainly been displayed before. That said, he needs to hit more fly balls to increase my confidence in the power being sustainable, and it is hard to believe he will come close to repeating an 18.1% HR/FB ratio.

He should absolutely see more at-bats next season, assuming he doesn’t miss another meet-and-greet or have a Twitter battle with new manager Ozzie Guillen. So although the rate of homers is sure to decrease, his increased playing time should ensure another season of 20+ homers. Factor in a .265 BABIP that should jump and you have a guy who may even yield a profit versus his draft day cost.

On Saturday, I took a look at the five pitchers whose ERAs were the most below their SIERA marks, which suggests that they may be overvalued in next year’s drafts. Today I will look at the opposite, the five pitchers whose ERAs were the most above their SIERA marks, which might lead to them being undervalued in drafts next season.

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The review of the 2011 season has just begun and it is time to look at one of my favorite all-encompassing numbers, the ERA-SIERA differential. The pitchers with the largest differences between the two are likely to over overvalued or undervalued in fantasy leagues next season, depending on which end of the list they fell on. Today I will look at those whose ERA was most below their SIERA marks, suggesting that these pitchers may be disappointments next year.

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Every year when the regular season ends, I breathe a sigh of relief. As much as I love baseball, it’s a long year and it feels great to finally relax and really take in everything that had just happened. And of course, as a fantasy player, I am already looking forward to what might happen next year. Ricky Romero is a name that is rather surprising to see on the AL ERA leaderboard. Let’s see what we should expect from him next season.

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In mid-March, I published an article espousing Braves starter Mike Minor as a good $1 option in your auction draft. I was a relatively big Minor fan and considered him an undervalued/sleeper breakout candidate. Then surprisingly, Brandon Beachy won the fifth spot in the rotation, something I thought Minor had pretty much already locked up. While Beachy ended up pitching very well and making the move look good, is Minor still worth watching?

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At the end of March, I posted a list of 20 predictions that I considered rather bold. On the Fantasy Baseball Roundtable Show, we have a segment called “Are you Crazy?” in which the lucky roundtabler of the night makes a bold prediction. To be considered not crazy, the prediction should be expected to have at least a 20% chance of actually happening. I generally used this baseline when coming up with these predictions, meaning that the hope is I get at least four of these predictions right. Now let’s see how I did.

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I have learned rather quickly that criticizing a player will get you a lot more angry comments than praising a player someone thinks isn’t very good. So with trepidation, I unveil my first Overvalued in 2012 pitcher, Ivan Nova.

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Raise your hand if you have ridden the Homer Bailey bandwagon at one time in your life, got burned by his continual disappointment and have sworn off ever drafting him again. That is what I expected, every virtual hand in the air. Bailey is that player who will probably have that breakout season just when the entire baseball and fantasy world has given up on him. But here he is again, finishing the season strong and giving us hope one last time. But is it just another tease?

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On Saturday, I looked at three starting pitchers with the potential to experience a K/9 surge in 2012. Today I will use the same methodology of comparing the pitcher’s SwStk% to his K/9 to look for those who may see a K/9 decline next season.

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As we near season’s end, it is time to start looking toward 2012 and to determine which players may see a performance spike, and therefore be a target in your fantasy drafts. As I have mentioned many times in the past, SwStk% is one of my favorite advanced metrics to analyze for pitchers. It correlates highly with a pitcher’s strikeout rate, and the relationship is intuitive to both stats freaks and stats haters alike. Here are three pitchers whose SwStk% suggest better strikeout rates could be in their futures.

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