Justin is running his annual Too Early Mocks and the wonderful Smada has once again compiled the average draft data for our perusal.

The Top 3 SPs: Jacob deGrom, Shane Bieber, Gerrit Cole – deGrom went 1 in one league and Cole went 4 in another, but otherwise they averaged 7.7, 9.2, and 10.3, respectively. It’s not that I’m against the hitters going top 6 (Betts, Acuña, Tatis, Trout, Soto, and Turner), but I don’t understand how the mega aces aren’t more often in the top 3. I feel like the community at large is pushing pitching up (and not just the NFBC ecosystem), but the best of the best still don’t go high enough as far as I’m concerned.

Dinelson Lamet 53.7 ADP – He was unquestionably excellent as he flipped his pitch mix to throw the slider 53% of the time and his fastball was the best we’ve ever seen it, but he’s still at best a two-pitch guy and ended the season with a biceps injury that cost him the playoffs. That said, his slot as the 19th starter off the board matches where I put him in my initial rankings. Short of developing a third pitch, my biggest questions are whether or not the fastball can remain a plus offering and if he can continue to keep the ball in the yard – those are no doubt related as the fastball improvements played a big role his 8% HR/FB rate.

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Introduction

The key to succeeding in fantasy baseball:

Maximize the value of your accumulated roster.

At the start of a draft, each fantasy owner is handed a set of draft picks. Each owner receives a 1^st round selection, a 2^nd round selection, a 3^rd round selection, and so on. If your league chooses to hold an auction rather than a more traditional serpentine draft – each team is handed $260 at the auction start. Players are then purchased throughout the auction with the use of these finite funds.

The key to gainfully drafting is not to draft a 3^rd round player in the 3^rd round, or a 9^th round player in the 9^th round, etc. The key is to draft a 3^rd round player in the 10^th round, and a 9^th round player in the 20^th round.

In an auction, if you purchase every player at his projected value, you will have paid $260 of auction dollars for $260 of value. What you will have is an average team. You won’t finish last, but you won’t finish first. Instead, with your $260 – you need to buy some $290 or $300 or $310+ of total value.

The key is to make a “profit” on as many roster spots as you can. The goal is to purchase players at bargain prices.

I have asked this question before – but it is worth asking every now and again. Suppose that you competed in an NFBC fantasy baseball auction back in July this season.

Which player was the better purchase?

Bryce Harper (OF, PHI)

OR

Andrew McCutchen (OF, PHI)

Before opining on the better Philly outfield purchase of 2020, let’s take a look at their final 2020 stat lines:

On the surface, it seems like a pretty obvious answer. Harper had more HR, SB, R and a better batting average than McCutchen. He had just one fewer RBI.

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10/07/20

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live. Support the show by subscribing to Fangraphs! With a standard $20 membership, you help maintain and improve our database of stats and graphs as well as our staff of 8 full-time employees and over 50 contributors. The premium ad-free membership at $50 year supports site growth and also includes faster load speeds and better site performance. You can also support monthly for just $3.

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• @sporer – Host
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NOTABLE TRANSACTIONS/INJURIES/RUMORS

• LDS Playoffs

TOO EARLY MOCKS

First Round review

• Surprise at the Top?
• Mookie Betts 1st 6 times
• Other 1s: Fernando Tatis Jr., Ronald Acuña, Jacob deGrom
• No Mike Trout & he’s only 2 in 2 drafts
• 5 OF, 4 SS, 3 SP, 2 1B (one w/OF), 1 3B
• Biggest 1st rd split: Freddie Freeman peak 6, low 21

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Every year I run mock drafts at the end (or right before the end) of the regular season. The idea is to get some gut reactions of the industry on where players are likely to be taken in early drafts for the following year.

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The playoffs are a great time for all of us to collectively watch the best the game has to offer and when they have major performances, it can stick with us. Those memorable moments are fun, but they can result in a Playoff Tax for us as the fantasy draft table the following year. This isn’t inherently bad as there are plenty of times when these showcases make us look deeper into a player and realize he’s someone we want on our team.

I remember seeing the exact moment that Walker Buehler skyrocketed up draft boards in October 2018:

The playoff fantasy tax will have Walker Buehler regularly going among the top 10 SPs in fantasy drafts next year.

— Paul Sporer (@sporer) October 27, 2018

He ended up going 12th among starters in Main Event drafts, so I was pretty close.

American League version

Here’s one player from each National League team who could make a big move with a strong October performance (ranging from studs to low/mid-tier options for deeper leagues):

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The 2020 MLB regular season has now concluded. In most years, this introductory sentence would be a simple fact. One ordinarily would not pay much attention to such an evident truth. However, in 2020, the consequence of baseball completing the year without a major full stop is a sparkling achievement.

Yes, the Marlins and Cardinals did not play for the course of about a week due to team COVID infections. Yes, there were more make-up doubleheaders played in 2020 than in any season during my lifetime. Yes, there were a few teams that made the playoffs despite a losing record. Yes, the league-wide batting average of .245 was the 6^th lowest full-season mark since 1900.

But baseball made it through, and now embarks on their expanded playoffs journey.

As such, it is now time to check back on how we fared in the fantasy season. For me personally, it was a rather positive one. I did not finish below 6^th place in any league that I played in this year. Amazingly, I was crowned as the 2020 Tout Wars Head to Head League Champion, my very first expert league title. 2020 showed that the ATC projections work well, even in smaller sample sizes.

In today’s article, I will recap my 2020 bold predictions. To remind the reader, the goal at the outset was to predict 70^th to 90^th percentile events (10% to 30% likely occurrences). I don’t expect to get the majority of these correct. If I wanted to achieve a higher success rate, I would simply have predicted that Jacob deGrom would win the Cy Young award, and the like.

Now let’s recap! Read the rest of this entry »

Opening day is finally here!

In 2020, we had two distinct draft seasons – both in February/March as well as in June/July. Some fantasy teams of mine were drafted four or five months ago, while others were assembled just this past weekend. We typically spend all winter longing for the time when our fantasy teams finally start accumulating statistics. This year, due to the tragic global pandemic of COVID-19, we had to wait even longer. We are now finally here. Tonight the standings go live!

I am well aware that there is still much suffering in the U.S. and in the rest of the world from the disease. I do not mean to make light of the world’s situation by any means in my enthusiasm for baseball’s return. At the same time, watching our nation’s pastime played day in and day out, may aid the morale of the country. Although there will be many challenges, I am hopeful that the MLB will be able to start and finish the abbreviated 2020 season without major hiccups.

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On recent episodes of The Sleeper & The Bust, Justin and I picked pitching and hitting league leaders for the upcoming season, highlighting a main pick and then someone to keep an eye on. I wanted to take it a step further and pick some guys who could lead the league in the 5×5 categories going pick-200 or later. Here are the pitchers and today we’ll cover hitters.

BATTING AVERAGE

Jesse Winker, CIN | Pick 345

A career .285 hitter, Winker dipped down to .269 last year when his BABIP was at a career-low .286, but he was at .332 from 2017-18 and hit a cool .299 in 471 PA. He has the talent to push a mid-.300s AVG in a short sample, especially if he’s protected a bit against lefties (.176 career AVG), though not too much or else he won’t qualify for the batting title. I don’t really understand Winker’s ADP. Even acknowledging his poor defense and inability to hit lefties, he’s better than pick 345 with a career 122 wRC+ as part of a fantastic lineup.

Also consider: Howie Kendrick (254) – Not a terribly daring secondary pick as he ripped a cool .344 last year which would’ve led the league and now the NL DH ensures a full-time role for the excellent hitter.

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07/16/20

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live. Support the show by subscribing to Fangraphs! With a standard $20 membership, you help maintain and improve our database of stats and graphs as well as our staff of 8 full-time employees and over 50 contributors. The premium ad-free membership at $50 year supports site growth and also includes faster load speeds and better site performance. You can also support monthly for just $3.

Follow us on Twitter

• @sporer – Host
• @justinmasonfwfb – Co-Host/Producer

NOTABLE TRANSACTIONS/INJURIES/RUMORS

• Yasiel Puig to ATL
• Jacob deGrom back MRI comes back fine
• Byron Buxton sprained foot, says he’ll be ready
• Julio Rodriguez hairline fracture in wrist
• Nick Solak holding down LF w/Calhoun out (Grade 1 hip flexor strain)
• Isiah Kiner-Falefa has edge for 3B role

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Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

On recent episodes of The Sleeper & The Bust, Justin and I picked pitching and hitting league leaders for the upcoming season, highlighting a main pick and then someone to keep an eye on. I wanted to take it a step further and pick some guys who could lead the league in the 5×5 categories going pick-200 or later. We will start with pitchers.

WINS

Luke Weaver, ARI | Pick 201

Just under the wire with this pick which of course means that sometimes Weaver goes before 200, but I still wanted to highlight him as someone to target in this area of the draft. I’ve been on the Diamondbacks all offseason as a contender with a strong lineup, good rotation, and capable bullpen arms (with some upside candidates who could make it even better). Wins are going to be flukier than ever so with something like this I’m really looking for a pitcher I like on a quality team.

Also consider: Anthony DeSclafani (245), either Ryan Yarbrough (223) or Yonny Chirinos (276) if they got an opener with regularity

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