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American League

Angels

• Before going on the IL, Vaughn Grissom (oblique) had been working on making more contact.

Vaughn Grissom, who has been filling in for Schanuel, also went 2-for-5 with a homer and three RBIs while Peraza, who started in place of Neto, went 2-for-5 with a double and two RBIs. Grissom noted the new approach that’s been working in recent weeks and said making more contact has been a huge key for the offense’s turnaround.

While his strikeout rate is down from 21% K% last year to 11% K% this year, the rate had grown back to 21% in June.

A deep league bench bat with his position eligibilities (1B, 2B, and possibly 3B) Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been a few weeks since we covered several rookie hitters. Rookies have been making a significant impact on the fantasy baseball landscape from a pitching and hitting standpoint. Several rookie hitters and pitchers have been starting in fantasy lineups instead of simply being stash candidates. These rookie hitters have name value, so they could be possible candidates to buy, sell, or hold based on their underlying metrics, skills, playing time, and peak projections. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome back to the Ottoneu Starting Pitching Planner. Based on the Roster Resource Probables Grid, I’ve organized every starter slated to start next week into four categories: start, maybe, risky, and sit for Ottoneu points leagues. The first and last category are pretty self-explanatory. Starters who fall into the “maybe” category are guys you could start if you need to keep up with the innings pitched pace in points leagues or need to hit your games started cap in head-to-head leagues; they’re good bets to turn in a decent start, but you shouldn’t automatically insert them into your lineup. If you’ve fallen behind on the innings pitched pace or you’re really starving for starts in a head-to-head matchup, you could turn to a “risky” starter or two.

I’ve also calculated a “Matchup Score” for each series using a straight combination of opponent’s home/away wOBA, opponent wOBA over the last 14 days, and the park factor for the ballpark the teams are playing in. It’s indexed so that 100 is average and anything above that is a favorable matchup and anything below is unfavorable. That matchup rating informs some of the sit/start recommendations I’m making, though the quality of the pitcher definitely takes precedence.

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With all of the preparation that goes into draft season, it’s easy to throw that all out of the window when you come into June and a guy is hitting .180 and has fallen far outside of the top-ranked players in the majors. 

This is especially true for managers in 10- and 12-team leagues. In these formats, the quality and depth of the waiver wire is never better than it is in April and into early May. 

Contrast that with the struggles and small sample size bloated ERAs and miniscule counting stats, and it is easy to see why so many of us contemplate dropping players we considered ourselves excited to draft just a few weeks before the season. 

In this article, I’ll look back at some of the hitters the industry liked heading into this season, noting their current roster rates and player rater values, and why you should consider buying back in while you still can. I’ll start with players who have already demonstrated some value of late and wrap up with blurbs on some names who could be next.

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• Daily SP Chart archive
• 2-Start podcast episode
• SP Rankings (last update: 6/5 | next: July)

Welcome to the Daily SP Chart, click here if you’re new to get an idea of what I’m doing with these rankings.

They’re working on a transformer here so the power is going out intermittently this morning.

• I didn’t realize ATH was in Vegas all week, so that Jump reco was misguided at best. Easy no-go there.
• Ben Brown has been pushed back to tomorrow.
• I’m never particularly excited to start Baz, but it’s hard to envision a better matchup
• Leiter/Imai are matchup recos, though they’ve been passable of late (mid-4.00s ERA in L30 for both) but Imai’s 1.17 WHIP is a good bit better than Leiter’s 1.27 in that same span.
• I know Sandy had an amazing 2-step last week, but this is a very difficult matchup so I don’t think he’s a must in 10s. His platoon split plays right into their strong lefty lineup, too. Not even sure you have to run this in 12s. I got burned for being proactive with him last week and actually skipped the 2-step. Of course, I put him back in this week to eat what will surely be a flameout. 🤣

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Some teams would call it an embarrassment of riches, but the rise of Emerson Hancock in the absence of Bryce Miller early in the season has left the Mariners in a bit of a bind from a roster construction point of view.

With not enough starts to go around for six starters, Jerry Dipoto, Dan Wilson, and company opted to piggyback Bryce Miller and Luis Castillo. While the results spoke for themselves, it certainly did not look great off the field.

Whether that be Castillo launching his glove and jacket into the benches of Sutter Health Stadium, or Miller himself, very uncharacteristically for a starting pitcher, giving his thoughts rather candidly on the situation.

“This setup is not very comfortable.”

He stated awkwardly, in his post-game interview in Sacramento, before reverting to the usual newspeak we have come to expect from MLB players.

For both Castillo and Miller, there is only one way to remove yourself from any ideas of future piggybacking: pitch so well they don’t remove you.

That is exactly what Miller (and Castillo to a lesser extent, to his credit) has done, so far, since Operation Piggyback began.

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You must be able to see it, Mr. Manager. You must know it by now. You can’t win. It’s pointless to keep fighting. Why, Mr. Manager? Why? Why do you persist?

Because you choose to. Because sifting through recently discarded hitters is your jam. Because the occasionally interesting platoon bat may just be set up for an interesting occasion. 

So, why do we persist? Because we all do. Why play fantasy baseball if not to savor the constant oneupsmanship. Oh yeah, pal o’ mine, you’re going to burn your FAAB on the hot young prospect? So what, I’ve got the entire Rockies lineup in Bing Bong Ballpark in Vegas this weekend. 

Beat that. 

In this article, I’ll use the Fangraphs Lab Baseball Sim tool to highlight some potential hitters to stream in this weekend’s juiciest matchups. And I’ll show you just how deep the rabbit hole goes and the extent of how you can use the Sim tool yourself. 

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• Daily SP Chart archive
• 2-Start podcast episode
• SP Rankings (last update: 6/5 | next: July)

Welcome to the Daily SP Chart, click here if you’re new to get an idea of what I’m doing with these rankings.

Justin Wrobleski is still running a tightrope with that 11% K-BB rate, but the ratios remain excellent and of course, being a Dodger puts him in line for a Win every time out as he’s racked up seven so far. Pittsburgh is much worse versus lefties with a 27% K rate that sits 2nd to only Colorado, but can Wrobo take advantage? He has just a 16% K rate, the 4th-lowest mark among qualified starters. He is spamming four-seamers this year with a 51% usage rate, 6th-highest in the game, and it’s down 2 mph to 93.9 mph. Last year he threw even more fastballs, but they were split among four-seamers (29%), sinkers (21%), and cutters (14%). The curve and changeup were show-me pitches last year and remain so this year.

You don’t get a 2.62 ERA with these skills without some “run-hot”. He’s 10th in BABIP (.243) and 1st in HR/FB (4%). Now just because someone is running well in those categories doesn’t mean it’s always pure dumb luck happening to them but there are certain thresholds where the combo of stats just can’t hold without something giving. In this case, I do think Wrobo’s ERA will be headed upward, I’m just not sure it starts tomorrow given Pittsburgh’s struggles with southpaws. I have him as a Team Streamer with only scary matchup in the near future. From here, he’s lined up for v. TBR, at MIN, and at ATH. The first two are bottom half wOBAs v. lefties but ATH is 5th overall and 1st at home. I’d strongly consider skipping that one.

• I’m still not totally sold on Zebby with his 1.5 HR9 but he has 4 QS in 5 starts. The fifth was a 7 ER Dud, though, and that’s my concern with him. It’s a wide range of outcomes, but enough good to start earning a little more trust.
• I had some interest in Dobbins at times last year with Boston and I’m happy to see him back starting after some strong extended RP outings.
• Feltner and Cabrera are going to burn me for even looking for upside in Coors. Maybe I’m overreacting to Wednesday’s 3-2 game. By the way, COL is going for the sweep! Feltner has been outright awesome of late with a pair of 6 IP gems since returning while Cabrera had a brutal return off the IL with 8 ER
• Montero could be making his last start for a bit with Skubal, Mize, and Verlander on the verge of returning.
• Pérez has bee a revelation for the Braves (3.02 ERA/1.06 WHIP) but this is a risky matchup with the sweet swinging White Sox on tap.
• Kelly’s full season stats stinks but his 4.18 ERA/1.14 WHIP over the L30 days are more indicative of who we can expect him to be going forward now that he appears fully healthy.
• Phillips is a pure matchup play if you want to take advantage of ARI. Don’t get enamored with the 2.08 ERA, the 1.36 WHIP will ensure that heads upward.

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In mid-April, I introduced my process of reviewing matchups and schedules in two- to three-week windows to identify outliers and potential short-term gains. The basic premise is that rest-of-season (ROS) analysis has high margins of error and that it is better to compartmentalize fantasy decision-making into short-term timeframes. We do not know who will get hurt and whether a specific team would be a good or bad matchup one month or two months from now. In that April article, the Chicago White Sox and New York Mets stood out as positive outliers. The White Sox crushed over the 3.5-week window, ranking fourth in runs and top three in isolated power and wRC+. The Mets were a huge letdown, though they were without offensive leader Juan Soto and other key hitters for parts of that stretch. Soon thereafter, Francisco Lindor joined the injury party.

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Hot Right Now (HRN) is a weekly Ottoneu feature focused on popular players currently being auctioned or players who you should think about auctioning in your Ottoneu leagues. Even if you don’t play Ottoneu, we’ll be highlighting players you should be looking at in deeper and keeper formats. In this feature, we will break down players into two sections:

1. Current Auctions: A closer look at players being auctioned at a high rate.
2. Hot Performers: Players with a high P/G or P/IP over the last 14 days who are also rostered in 80% of leagues or less.

The RotoGraphs Ottoneu team plans to run this feature weekly, updating fantasy managers on the biggest movers in Ottoneu leagues with an analysis of how these players could or could not help your roster.

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