For the 10th year, I had the honor of being part of the Tout Wars family of auctions and drafts this past Saturday morning. To ensure the safety and health of all members, we held our auction online for the third straight year. Here’s to hoping that we’re finally all back together in person in 2023! Last year, you might recall that I totally screwed up, making an error during a sudden bout of confusion because of the workaround we needed to create in the auction room to accommodate the “Swingman” role. Thankfully, I did not make such an error this time and I won’t have a stupid regret for the rest of the year!

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Welcome to the 2022 edition of the RotoGraphs Matchmaker Service! No, I cannot find you a date. However, we could hopefully facilitate the marriage of league owner with leagueless owner. If you are seeking an owner to fill your fantasy league or are the owner hoping to be seeked to join that unfilled league, this is your new home.

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The 2022 Pod Projections are now available and include over 550 player forecasts! As usual in my Pod Projection posts, I’ll dive into my projection methodology (detailed in Projecting X 2.0) by sharing my process on several hitters and pitchers.

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The 2022 Pod Projections are now available and include over 550 player forecasts! As usual in my Pod Projection posts, I’ll dive into my projection methodology (detailed in Projecting X 2.0) by sharing my process on several hitters and pitchers.

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Yesterday, I compared my starting pitcher ERA Pod Projections to Steamer and discussed what was driving the gap. Let’s now review the pitchers I’m projecting for a worse ERA than Steamer. Remember in yesterday’s article I mentioned that my ERA projections are lower in aggregate, so the gaps are much smaller here. The important part is the ERA relative to the projection set, so these are larger differences than the absolute gaps would indicate.

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After comparing my Pod Projections to Steamer for bother home runs and stolen bases, let’s now flip over to starting pitchers. This comparison is far easier, as it’s a ratio stat and therefore won’t need to be converted to the same PA scale. So let’s find out which starting pitchers I am forecasting for an ERA that is most below what Steamer is forecasting.

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Yesterday, I continued my Pod Projections vs Steamer battle by pitting our stolen base projections against each other, and identifying those I forecasted for a higher total. Let’s now review the players I am projecting for fewer steals per 650 PA than Steamer.

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Today, I continue my Pod Projections vs Steamer battle, this time moving along to stolen bases. Similarly to the way I compared our home run forecasts, I’m going to calculate a PA/SB rate first and then extrapolate that projection over 650 plate appearances so we’re only comparing stolen base projections and playing time forecasts don’t factor in. I’ll begin with the players I’m projecting for more stolen bases, or the upside guys.

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Yesterday, I began my annual Pod vs Steamer series by pitting my Pod Projections against Steamer in home run forecasts, highlighting those players I was more optimistic on. Rather than compare raw home run totals that are highly influenced by at-bat projections that may differ significantly, I put both projections on the same scale, 600 at-bats. That way we are comparing the home run skill forecasts with no influence from differences in playing time expectations.

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Every year, I pit my Pod Projections (now available!) against the Steamer projections in various categories. Today, I’m going to continue the annual smackdowns by calculating AB/HR rates and then extrapolating them over 600 at-bats. At that point, I’ll compare how many home runs each system is forecasting, given a 600 at-bat projection. I’ll start by sharing the names of hitters Pod is projecting for significantly more home runs than Steamer.

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