The reliever landscape has faced some of the biggest changes in recent years as many teams have gone away from anointing a single guy to be their closer, instead embracing committees where they trust a number of relievers to close the game out in the 9th. The committee strategy often includes putting their best guy in a fireman role meaning he could come in for any sticky situation from about the 6th inning on. This is undoubtedly a smart way to run a bullpen from a “real life” standpoint, but it can be rough on us fantasy folks where Saves remain a prominent category.
It was a weak year overall for first basemen in 2024. We now head into the 2025 season with a clean slate and fresh optimism that this year’s crop will return more value, and perhaps include a number of young breakouts and veteran rebounds. There isn’t as much category selection needed this year, as just two hitters on this list are projected to earn positive value from stolen bases. So that means we’re back to rostering mashers who need to make a good dent in your home run total goal as you fill out your team.
Today’s Discussion
It’s the final rankings update for the 2025 season! Given the rash of injuries over the last week, I’m almost afraid to set these in stone, knowing there are still a couple of more days until the stateside Opening Day.
This week, the man whose face adorns the top of this post, Vinnie Pasquantino, left Saturday’s game with a hamstring strain. As I type this, there hasn’t been an update on his condition and how severe the strain is considered. I felt obligated to drop him in the rankings, but it’s impossible to know where he should ultimately be ranked without an idea of how much time he might miss, if any. At least he doesn’t rely on the running game to drive his fantasy value, so we shouldn’t expect the injury to affect his performance when he returns.
The other two rankings changes I made were more about a better understanding of the new Rays home park, rather than any underlying change in expected skills or playing time for the hitters upgraded. The Rays are playing their home games at George M. Steinbrenner Field, a minor league ballpark with dimensions that mimic Yankee Stadium. The park switch should be a boon for left-handers, who go from a park with an 88 left-handed home run factor to a 119. That’s a massive bump! Letting that really sink in motivated me to upgrade two left-handed Rays on these rankings, as I’m not sure whether the projections are accounting for the park factor changes.
Tonight, I will be drafting my second $1600 NFBC Auction Championship team. This is a 15-team, 5×5 Roto league with an overall prize pool. You can see the live draft board here.
Tonight, I will be drafting my first $1600 NFBC Auction Championship team. This is a 15-team, 5×5 Roto league with an overall prize pool. You can see the live draft board here.
Below are the latest playing time changes for position players since last Tuesday. We’ve mostly just got some Gavin Sheets– and Alex Verdugo-related shuffling for the Padres and Braves, respectively.
Position Player Projected PA Changes, 3/18 to 3/21
There’s an interesting smell coming from the kitchen of pre-season 2025 third-base ranks. Some may notice notes of “changing of the guard”, and others may sense stable notes of “nostalgia”. Only the most sensitive whiffers may be able to decipher the sweet from the bitter. If you’re unwilling to take a chance and try something new, you may need to draft at the top and order right away. If you see something in a player profile that you think so clearly indicates a step forward, you can wait for the orders to go around the table. There’s a decent amount of veteran, safe talent at the top and a tremendous amount of upside risk in the middle. The bottom? The bottom seems like a scary place to dine, but then again, perhaps the table will be jealous when the meals come out and you begin to feast.
Three nights before the first game of the 2025 MLB season in Tokyo, the Cubs played the Angels in a Spring Breakout game in Arizona. Those in attendance got to see Angels top pitching prospect Caden Dana struggle to make it out of the first inning, Cubs outfield hopeful Kevin Alcántara slug a home run, and 21-year-old catcher Moises Ballesteros leg out a double. Matt Shaw was not there.
We are live more than a month earlier than last year which helps those diehards drafting through the winter while the living, breathing document aspect of them allows us to keep these relevant all the way through draft season in March. The Hot Stove is positively blazing which has brought about several updates before even going live. Chief among them being a pair of premium lefties joining the AL East.
The updates will come regularly as I fill in the profiles over the coming weeks while also reacting to the news as it happens. We still have an ace who needs to be signed, plenty of trade rumors already in play, and the inevitable out of nowhere trades that we will get at some point this offseason. Feel free to leave comments about guys who don’t yet have a profile, but just know that one is coming. I intend to write up all 200 before we reach Spring Training.
First update is finally here in early-January and they will be much more frequent now that we’re out of the holiday season!
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My body decided to get a nastyyyy flu at quite literally the worst time of the year. I’m finally starting to feel a bit better today so those more frequent updates I promised last time will actually start coming through consistently.
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OK, I reworked the ranking quite a bit instead of just going 1-200+ within each tier. A lot of y’all had been asking for that after the first release, so there you go. I still have lots of profiles coming so stay tuned for those!
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Profiles will continue to flow as we approach March. As I dive deeper on pitchers, rankings will continue to shift. I obviously don’t want to be making sweeping changes to the them in mid-and-late March so y’all can have confidence in them as your drafts come up so I expect the massive swings to slow down after the next couple of updates. I’ve been battle-testing my rankings with multiple drafts recently and that’s been a key driver behind a lot of movement. I had my TARF draft last Sunday (board can be found here, I’m team 4) which is part of the EARTH set of drafts as well as the LABR mixed draft (board) this past Tuesday and both were eye-opening in terms of where I sit with a lot of pitchers.
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More rankings movement, more profiles and unfortunately more injuries. We’re at that time of the year when the injuries will start rolling in with way more frequency than any of us want.
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Mid-March, we are in the thick of it now! Good bit of movement again today as things really start to develop with Main Events starting over at the NFBC. We’ll be through the Top 100 profiles w/the next update, but if you have questions about anyone without a profile yet, please don’t hesitate to drop a comment.
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Another big update here on March 20th because the injuries just won’t stop! Last massive draft weekend before the season starts and then one more draft weekend for those who go right after the season gets going. I’ve battle tested these rankings in several drafts so I made some big moves based on guys I kept passing over at their current ranking and others I’ve been zipping up my board.
