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

Guest: Randy Dobnak, Starting Pitcher on the Minnesota Twins

Interview

• The current offseason
• The affect of COVID on minor league players
• Innings limits in 2021
• Innings per start trends
• Players & Social Media
• The impact of fans
• Pitching coaches

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1/7/20

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
• @justinmasonfwfb – Co-Host/Producer

NOTABLE TRANSACTIONS/INJURIES/RUMORS

• Francisco Lindor traded to NYM (41:25)

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The market premium episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Tristan Cockcroft of ESPN

Strategy Section

• How to use and adjust projections
  • What are the key adjustments that are most often made?
  • When should you diverge from projections?
  • How to adjust player rankings.
  • How to stress test playing time.

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1/5/20

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
• @justinmasonfwfb – Co-Host/Producer

2021 OUTFIELD, PT. 3

• Prospect OFs: Dylan Carlson 139, Ryan Mountcastle 142, Daulton Varsho 155
• Better Bay Area Buy: Mike Yastrzemski 141, Ramon Laureano 142
• Power Studs: Jorge Soler 143, Joey Gallo 167
• These 3 Are Unrelated: Anthony Santander 155, Michael Brantley 159, Ian Happ 160
• Speedsters: Victor Robles 160, Victor Reyes 187, Leody Taveras 19

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American League

Angels

• Signs continue to point to Jared Walsh being the full-time first baseman.

Albert Pujols is entering the final season of his 10-year contract signed before the 2011 season, but he’s likely to spend it in a backup role. Jared Walsh had a breakout rookie season in 2020, batting .293/.324/.646 with nine homers and 26 RBIs in 32 games. He will head into Spring Training as the favorite to be the club’s regular first baseman, but he’ll have to earn the job, especially considering the small sample size in 2020. But Walsh appears likely to be the regular at first base with Pujols serving as a backup and occasional DH when Ohtani isn’t available. Matt Thaiss could also see some action at the position, but Walsh has moved ahead of Thaiss on the organization’s depth chart.

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12/29/20

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
• @jasoncollette – Jason Collette

NOTABLE TRANSACTIONS/INJURIES/RUMORS

• José Ureña to DET (1:55)
• Kohei Arihara to TEX (6:18)
• Josh Bell to WAS (11:14)
  • Joe Musgrove next out of PIT?
  • Gregory Polanco broken wrist

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With news of the Blake Snell trade to San Diego (covered here and here by our fine folks at FG and Podhorzer will have a fantasy piece out Tuesday), there is a lot of chatter about his workload now that he’s out of Tampa Bay. This isn’t a particularly new issue – he didn’t complete six innings once in the regular season – but it all came to a head in Game 6 of the World Series when Snell was removed after 5 1/3 brilliant innings, allowing just a run on two hits with nine strikeouts and zero walks in 73 pitches.

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In 2019, former Pirates first baseman Josh Bell enjoyed a breakout season. His wOBA spiked from the high .330 range to .378, while his ISO settled just below .300, thanks to a HR/FB rate that surged above 20% for the first time. Unfortunately, he failed to effectively follow up that performance during this year’s shortened season, as his overall power plummeted (even though his HR/FB rate held onto the majority of its 2019 gains), while his strikeout rate skyrocketed well above 20% for the first time. Given his poor defense, all it took was a poor 223 plate appearances at the plate for the Pirates to jettison him, as he now lands in Washington to take over first base duties for the Nationals. Let’s check the park factors to see how the park switch might affect his results.

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Jayson Stark asked several people in MLB about when next season will start and most think it will be delayed.

But in 2021, owners appear ready to dig in. If they can’t open ticket offices and play baseball games in front of real human beings who purchase real tickets, they’re likely to push to delay the season until they can.

“The belief is, we can’t have games without fans anymore,” said one NL club official. “And we understand that in certain parts of the country, it’s going to be impossible to have fans in April.”

So if it’s impossible to have fans in April, they’d prefer to wait until May. If it’s impossible to have fans in May, they’d prefer to wait until June. But even if they’re wrong and fans are permitted as soon as early April, their question is: How many fans?

First, don’t get too excited about any preset fantasy draft dates. There is a good chance the start of the season will be pushed back so everyone in a draft must know that possibility.

Second, players may have to go through the ramp-up and down and back up procedure again. The season could be a huge mess again with delays and an unknown start date.
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