Big Kid Adds (5/23/22)
While the NFBC Main Event garners most of the attention, there are a handful of leagues with even a larger entry fee ($2.5K to $15K). They get originally named “High Stakes Leagues” and this year there are nine of them. With so much money on the line, these fantasy managers are going to try to gain any advantage. Most of the time, these managers will be a week or two ahead of everyone else on their adds. Here are the players and some information on the ones added in five or more of these leagues.
Nolan Gorman (9): Gorman’s talent has been covered by every possible outlet and managers rostering him should not be a surprise. The one item I’m watching is how pitchers attack him. With the 34% K% in AAA, he had to have some huge holes in his swing. He’s only seen 44 pitches so far, a quarter of them have been changeups (18% SwStr% on changeups; 9% overall). One possible explanation is that he can’t hit lefties. He sat against one on Saturday. In AAA, he had a .655 OPS vs lefties and a 1.254 OPS versus righties. It worked out to a 41% K% against the lefties and 31% against righties. The strikeout danger zone is about 30%, though, so even his mark against righties isn’t exactly good. Also note that minor leaguers can’t be picked up in the NFBC until they appear in the majors unless they were drafted and subsequently cut so even these high stakes leagues go through the standard rookie frenzy we see in the Main Event when someone big is called up.
