(10/9: Thanks to everyone for the additions.)

One player class I target for potential bargains are hitters who played through injuries. These injuries drag down a player’s production as they and their team struggle with the tradeoff of a regular player at 80% or a replacement at 100%. With the season just ending and drafts months away, I want to create a draft season reference list while people still remember parts of the 2017 season.

A few years back, I examined the negative effects of playing through injuries, mainly power. In the following season, those effects are gone for hitters.

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After squeaking out the top finish in the inaugural 2016 Tout Wars Head-to-Head league, I moved to the 15-team mixed auction league. It was an interesting season and here are some of my “highlights”.

• To the frustration of auctioneer, RotoWire’s Jeff Erickson, I was just pulling names out of the air during the end game. The room lost its lighting (the sun) and my paper draft list was useless.
• Buster Posey and Chris Davis were my most expensive hitters ($57 combined). I’m pretty sure I got no more than $15 of value out them.
• On the pitching side, I spent $26 combined on Rick Porcello and Danny Duffy as my #2 and #3 starters. I may have been lucky to get positive value from them.
• Additionally, I found it necessary to roster Adam Wainwright, Shelby Miller, and Rubby de la Rosa on auction day.
• For my first waiver wire splash, I spent over a quarter of my FAAB on the recently anointed Nationals closer Blake Treinen. And release him a few weeks later once he lost his job.
• Got ravaged by injuries. In late May, I sent four players to the DL in one week.
• Around mid-season, I traded my Elvis Andrus for Nomar Mazara because I need some more power. In the season’s second half, Mazara hit one fewer home run, had 14 fewer R+RBI, five fewer stolen bases, and an on-base percentage 16 points less.
• Right after the Andrus trade, I lost my other stolen base threats, Kevin Kiermaier and Eduardo Nunez, to the disabled list.
• Picked up Zach Davies and Mike Clevinger off waivers and just let them go waiting for Rick Porcello to catch fire.
• Spent over 10% of my FAAB and Matt Chapman, watched him struggle on my team, and then released him. He hit 14 home runs in the season’s second half.

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It’s that time when I go back through and see how my preseason BOLD predictions held up. Usually, this process is humbling but after I reviewed them mid-season, I knew I may be in for a career year.

Note: For all the rankings, I used ESPN.com’s Player Rater.

BOLD prediction #1: Trea Turner will perform 20 spots worse than his ADP suggests.

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It’s the season’s end. Good luck to everyone and hopefully I can help a few teams win their titles. Now, if there ever was a time to second guess me, it’s this weekend. Teams are limiting their pitcher innings and changing starters, especially the playoff-bound teams. Do a bit of fact checking before picking anyone up.

Note: All players have a 10% or less Yahoo! ownership.

Saturday

Luke Sims (5% owned) at Marlins (Odrisamer Despaigne)

If you’re streaming just for Wins, Sims is a perfectly decent option. He’s pitching good enough to squeak out a Win, especially against a beatable Miami team. His strikeouts are reasonable at ~7 K/9. His ERA and WHIP are likely to be high but it’s just one game.

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The great, powerful, and unbelievably handsome Justin of Friends With Fantasy Benefits (and of course, RotoGraphs) is hosting four early mock drafts. I am participating in one of them.

All 4 #2EarlyMock drafts are running! https://t.co/F8MVltwVHThttps://t.co/voN0u0qhxohttps://t.co/Zs0dRbc3ZQhttps://t.co/b4kc4XbBk5

— Justin Mason (@JustinMasonFWFB) September 21, 2017

In each draft, the following four pitchers went first without exception.

Last season in NFBC drafts, these four were included with the first six pitchers drafted on average. While Kershaw and Scherzer were 1st and 2nd in each draft, Madison Bumgarner and Noah Syndergaard were taken, on average, before Chris Sale and Corey Kluber. Both Bumgarner (bruised ribs, strained shoulder) and Syndergaard (torn lat muscle) missed most of the 2017 season. Because of their current injuries and unknown future health, their ADP has fallen in these four mocks.

The trepidation about owning them is understandable but owners still need to value the pair. It’s not going to be easy.

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Tuesday’s lowly owned starters are a sad lot. Some decent arms have their ownership up like Daniel Mengden and Tyler Anderson. It’s like “Aces and Duds” today.

Just eyeballing some names, I may hold off and use some the guys going Wednesday (e.g. Andriese, Ynoa, Leiter)

Rafael Montero (3% owned) vs Atlanta (R.A. Dickey)

Montero is a perfectly good option for a team needing just strikeouts and Wins and doesn’t care about their ERA and WHIP. The game against Atlanta is winnable and Montero is averaging 8.6 K/9 as a starter. His value gets destroyed by the 5.0 BB/9 and the problem it causes to WHIP and ERA.
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Quite a few aces (and Matt Harvey) are throwing on Saturday so owners may not have many open slots but here are some lowly owned starters. While I normally limit my ownership rate to 10%, I bumped it up to increase the options.

Henderson Alvarez (1% owned) vs Braves (Julio Teheran)

Starting Alvarez is like playing Russian roulette with five chambers filled. It may kind of possibly end up good, but likely not. The basic issue is that it’s about impossible to have a feel for his talent level with spotty starts since coming back from shoulder surgery. Instead of trying to make sense of the rehab starts, I will let Steamer and Zips do the work. They put him with a near 5.00 ERA and 5.5 K/9. If those stats along with a possible Win, if he can make it five innings, against Teheran and the Braves are usable, start him.

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Continuing my Quick Looks series, today looks at a pair of NL East arm…

Mark Leiter

It’s like the 26-year-old righty didn’t exist before this season. I like to look at previous reports on popup guys to see what has changed. I was able to find one report on him at 2080baseball.com.

“A senior sign out of New Jersey Institute of Technology, he certainly got on some radars when he posted a 20-strikeout game his senior year before being drafted by his favorite hometown team, the Phillies. He doesn’t have pure “stuff” – his fastball barely touches 90 – but he’s a smart pitcher who works with what he has and has posted a 3.37 career ERA in 95 games, 69 of them starts, over 445 2/3 innings. He underwent shoulder surgery prior to the 2016 season but enjoyed a strong campaign that summer and now gets his call-up just a few games into his Triple-A debut.”

It’s not exciting but it’s at least a starting point. Now to move onto the starts I watched. There are no good camera angles for any of his starts. The best was against the Mets (9/4) when he lasted just three innings (video from it). Also, I watch his last start at home (9/15) against Oakland to see if anything changed.

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The march towards inning caps and strikeout titles continues with today’s lowly owned pitchers (<10% in Yahoo! leagues)

Gabriel Ynoa (0% owned) vs. Rays (Matt Andriese)

I spent way too much time analyzing Ynoa (I’ve decided to do a Quick Look on him and Leiter tomorrow). He’s shown some major-league talent and may just be one pitch from being a top-50 starting pitcher.

The 24-year-old throws a 4-seamer, sinker,  and a slider. He throws his slider (35%) more than either fastball (28% for each) to help his strikeout numbers. This season, he has allowed an above average rate of flyballs (32% GB%) but maintained a respectable 1.1 HR/9. His 7.6 K/9 is reasonable, especially paired up with a 1.9 BB/9. Both values are in line with his recent minor-league performance. Signs point to a potential sleeper but I have my doubts about a pitcher’s upside with only one breaking pitch.

I would gladly start him this game against Tampa who leads the majors in striking out. My only reservation is if he gives up too many home runs in Camden Yards and runs up his ERA.

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Our series on low ownership starters continues with those pitchers owned in less than 10% of Yahoo! leagues who are expected to throw Tuesday.

Travis Wood (1% at Yahoo) vs Diamondbacks (Zack Godley)

I put the minimum strikeout rate needed for streaming consideration at 6.5 K/9. Wood just meets the benchmark but that’s it for his positive traits. His BB/9 is a 4.2. He has a 6.80 ERA. His ERA estimators are near 5.50. He’s facing Zack Godley and Diamondbacks, so the Win chances are slim. Probably look elsewhere.

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