Last week on League Losers we covered the hitters who might be destined to ruin your teams, as well as covering why they don’t actually exist. At least, as singularities. Collect a whole set, however, and your roster will eventually collapse under the gravity of defeat.

Pitchers are a different bird, though, when it comes to ruination potential. You can, after all, just stop starting them when things go really wrong. But all sorts of variables will be pushing on when you’ll finally pull the pine trigger on someone you thought you could trust. And often by the time you do, the damage will have already been done.

Now then, we simply have no more time for preamble. In just a few hours I’ll be going under for foot surgery – and about 12 hours after that is something far more important: Read the rest of this entry »

Bad news, everyone – I come bearing ill tidings. Regardless of what you read, no matter how hyperbolic the verbiage, I’m afraid there is no such thing as a “league winner” in fantasy baseball. Not “rare” or “uncommon” – actually imaginary. Like, unicorns, imaginary. Read the rest of this entry »

Must. Reach. Finish line…So. Close. We’re almost done with our positional previews, having now covered catchers, first base, second base, third base, shortstop, outfielders, and relievers. We got started on the starters last week, checking it on the Top 50 options. But as we leave those tiers behind, the waters necessarily get choppier, with more categorical warts appearing as player quality (and reliability) begins to drop off. So, before we get to this latest Rankening*, let’s have a quick chat about how these ranks come to be and the wiggle room inherent. Read the rest of this entry »

Alright, alright – the official start of fantasy baseball has officially officialized, with the NFL kumite finally in our rearview mirror. We’ve now come to our final positional rankings, after first covering catchers, first base, second base, third base, shortstop, outfielders, and relievers. It’s time for starting pitchers – let’s have some fun. Read the rest of this entry »

From the shared draft boards of Twitter to the unruly outlaws in the Reddit commentsphere, closers seem to have gone scorched earth on the fantasy baseball landscape, turning us all into post-apocalyptic warriors fighting over a precious and disappearing resource. Saves remain concentrated at one end of the closer spectrum but are increasingly diffused amongst the rest of the population. All the while, the ADP tide rises. Chaos.

Cars on fire, people wandering the streets making nonsensical declarations like, “At that point, I felt like I just had to take Jose Leclerc at pick #92”, or “If Kyle Finnegan just takes another step forward, he’ll be a steal at pick #175”; Justin Mason was just spotted wandering the halls of FanGraphs with his head down, muttering over and over that he’s “totally fine with Doval and Lopez as my top-two, it’ll be okay…totally fine…totally fine, tot-…”. Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve now covered my ranks at catcher, first base, second base, third base, and shortstop, before making a stop in Splitsville last week. Let’s close our hitters out – time to hit that grass.

It’s not that the outfielders are shallow by talent but depending on your league and roster size, eventually, you’ll reach a cliff past which full-time players are few and far between. Full and part platoons start wreaking havoc on projecting final production, and while some part-timers will still end up with enough playing time to be fantasy-viable, trying to properly judge their value from week to week may be a fantasy headache some managers just may not want. Read the rest of this entry »

Wait a tick – this can’t be right. We’ve been trucking right along with our positional reviews, taking a twisted path around the horn, going from catcher, to first base, third base, shortstop, and second base, most recently. Clearly, it’s time for the outfielders, yeah?

Afraid not, mon freres. Heading into the positional review for outfielders, I already knew we’d be forced to dip into a ton of platoon talk, as swapping players in and out according to pitcher handedness continues to be a plague across the fantasy baseball landscape.

This pestilence seems most pervasive in the outfield, in regard to our fantasy teams, with the fear that this player, or that one, will suddenly be sitting versus this hand, or that one, leaving us to find another full-time option or scrambling on the wire from week to week to find someone to swap in for your boy because he’s facing a lefty in four of six games. Or, being forced to throw someone else back to the wire because they’re apparently only facing lefties now. Super annoying. Read the rest of this entry »

The New Year cometh (cameth?) and now so too does our last rankings stop on the infield. We’ve now seen in hindsight just how good we had it at catcher and first base, as shortstop is deep but gets shallow fast, and third base is mostly a pit of danger after the first eight guys, or so. Well, bad news, chuckles – second base is no picnic; unless you like yours with bears and half-eaten Jean Segura’s. Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve covered the slow foots at catcher and first base while seeing how cold the hot corner has gone. Let’s now speed things up and move over to shortstop, which is sneakily shallow. Just not in the way you’re thinking.

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I won’t mince words; it’s ugly in here. While more fantasy cream has risen to the top of third base, the middle class has been virtually decimated, sinking down into a muck where everyone seems to come standard equipped with all sorts of questions with answers that could sink their ultimate values. Playing time concerns, limited profiles, category sinks – once you hit the cliff, everything is in play.

And that cliff will sneak up on you. Read the rest of this entry »