Market Watch: Let’s Run It Back
The second installment of my new series tracking the NFBC average draft position market will be formatted a little differently and you can let me know which works best. I will still highlight the biggest riser and faller, but then I’ll go position-by-position for a takeaway or two. Let’s see how that works compared to last week’s. Comment below on your preferred method.
Previous Editions:
BIGGEST RISER: Neftali Feliz – +20 spots to pick 307
For the second straight week, the assumed Brewers closer is the big mover up the board. It’s not impossible to see why. His velocity returned last year, surging back to 96 MPH on average, and so did his strikeout (28%) and swinging strike (14%) rates – the latter being a career-best. The home run rate (1.7 HR/9) is worrisome, but a sky-high 19% HR/FB seems unlikely to repeat, even for a flyball pitcher like Feliz. Even with back-to-back big surges up the board, he’s still just 33rd reliever off the board so he’s likely to keep moving up. I suspect he’ll land somewhere in the mid-20s which is still cheap enough to invest, even with his flaws.