8/11/23

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

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INJURIES/TRANSACTION NEWS

• Chris Sale due back today (will be limited)
• Garrett Whitlock due back Sunday
• Joe Musgrove not throwing until late-Aug.
• Logan O’Hoppe on rehab!
• Jonah Heim could be back next wk

3 UP, 3 DOWN

• UP: Yusei Kikuchi, Kenta Maeda, Ha-Seong Kim 김하성
• DOWN: Bryce Elder, Marcus Stroman, Teoscar Hernández

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The Time Management episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Scott Chu

Expert League Update

• Expert League Updates
• Players that worked out this season
• Players that busted this season

Strategy Section

• Time management
  • Bare minimum tasks
  • Important tasks
  • Nice to haves
• Important uses of time
  • Deep dives
    • Pre-season vs. in-season
  • Consuming fantasy content
  • Looking at standings, categories
  • Trading
• Ethics of competing towards the end

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Daily SP Chart archive

The chart includes their season performance, their opponent’s wOBA versus the pitcher’s handedness over the last 30 days, my general start/sit recommendation for 10-team, 12-team, and 15-team (or more) leagues, and then a note about them. Obviously, there are league sizes beyond those three so it’s essentially a shallow, medium, deep. If a pitcher only has an “x” in 15-team, it doesn’t mean there’s no potential use in 10s and 12s, but it’s basically a risky stream for those spots.

These are general recommendations, and your league situation will carry more weight whether you are protecting ratios or chasing counting numbers. This is for standard 5×5 roto leagues. The thresholds for H2H starts are generally lower, especially in points leagues so I thought there would be more value focusing on roto.

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American League

Guardians

• The team has not set any inning limits on their rookie starters, Tanner Bibee, Gavin Williams, and Logan Allen.

Here’s what Guardians president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti said on this:

“We don’t have a hard and fast limit on any of the guys. You look at each player individually, trying to understand where are they, how are they recovering between starts, are they showing signs of fatigue, are they maintaining their stuff? The good news on all of those guys so far is they’re still strong. We’ll continue to monitor that. When we can, we’ll give them extra days. But we’re hopeful they can continue to pitch and pitch effectively through the end of the season.”

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You had a decision to make recently, didn’t you? You had two starting outfielders in good matchups and you just didn’t know who to choose to start the game. It’s ok. It’s ok. It’s part of the fun. Those micro analyses that bring together all of your understandings of the game of baseball are a lot of fun. At this point in the season, maybe you’re on auto-pilot and you just choose the player who has the highest roster rate in your format because, well heck, everyone else is starting him.

Maybe you’re on the opposite end of the spectrum and you pay too much attention, focusing on minute details such as park factors, hitter/pitcher historical matchups, xwOBA, and more. Whichever style you have held recently, it’s likely that you make good and bad decisions. It’s part of the game. For all the predicting and analyzing we do, baseball is, fairly unpredictable. Let’s go through a few case studies so we can all get some practice. I’ll take two players who appeared at the same position (or position eligibility) and you decide which you would start. Then, we’ll go back and see what actually happened. Let’s get started.

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The 2023 version of the Bullpen Report includes five different sections, as well as the closer chart, which can be found at the bottom of the page.

We will always include a link to the full Closer Depth Chart at the bottom of the Bullpen Report each day. It’s also accessible from the RosterResource drop-down menu and from any RosterResource page. Please let us know what you think.

1. Notable Workloads: Primary closers or valuable members of a closer committee who have been deemed unavailable or likely unavailable for the current day due to recent workload.
2. Injury News
3. Outlier Saves: Explanation for a non-closer earning a save during the previous day.
4. Committee Clarity: Notes on a closer committee that clarify a pitcher’s standing in the group.
5. Losing A Grip: Struggling closers who could be on the hot seat.

The “RosterResource” link will take you to the corresponding team’s RosterResource depth chart, which will give you a better picture of the full bullpen and results of the previous six days (pitch count, save, hold, win, loss, blown save).

Click HERE to view the full Closer Depth Chart.

Read the rest of this entry »

Daily SP Chart archive

The chart includes their season performance, their opponent’s wOBA versus the pitcher’s handedness over the last 30 days, my general start/sit recommendation for 10-team, 12-team, and 15-team (or more) leagues, and then a note about them. Obviously, there are league sizes beyond those three so it’s essentially a shallow, medium, deep. If a pitcher only has an “x” in 15-team, it doesn’t mean there’s no potential use in 10s and 12s, but it’s basically a risky stream for those spots.

These are general recommendations, and your league situation will carry more weight whether you are protecting ratios or chasing counting numbers. This is for standard 5×5 roto leagues. The thresholds for H2H starts are generally lower, especially in points leagues so I thought there would be more value focusing on roto.

—

Read the rest of this entry »

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 four or more of these leagues. Read the rest of this entry »

Daily SP Chart archive

The chart includes their season performance, their opponent’s wOBA versus the pitcher’s handedness over the last 30 days, my general start/sit recommendation for 10-team, 12-team, and 15-team (or more) leagues, and then a note about them. Obviously, there are league sizes beyond those three so it’s essentially a shallow, medium, deep. If a pitcher only has an “x” in 15-team, it doesn’t mean there’s no potential use in 10s and 12s, but it’s basically a risky stream for those spots.

These are general recommendations, and your league situation will carry more weight whether you are protecting ratios or chasing counting numbers. This is for standard 5×5 roto leagues. The thresholds for H2H starts are generally lower, especially in points leagues so I thought there would be more value focusing on roto.

—

Read the rest of this entry »

The 2023 version of the Bullpen Report includes five different sections, as well as the closer chart, which can be found at the bottom of the page.

We will always include a link to the full Closer Depth Chart at the bottom of the Bullpen Report each day. It’s also accessible from the RosterResource drop-down menu and from any RosterResource page. Please let us know what you think.

1. Notable Workloads: Primary closers or valuable members of a closer committee who have been deemed unavailable or likely unavailable for the current day due to recent workload.
2. Injury News
3. Outlier Saves: Explanation for a non-closer earning a save during the previous day.
4. Committee Clarity: Notes on a closer committee that clarify a pitcher’s standing in the group.
5. Losing A Grip: Struggling closers who could be on the hot seat.

The “RosterResource” link will take you to the corresponding team’s RosterResource depth chart, which will give you a better picture of the full bullpen and results of the previous six days (pitch count, save, hold, win, loss, blown save).

Click HERE to view the full Closer Depth Chart.

Read the rest of this entry »