In my most recent article, I estimated that a typical power hitter should lose 7.6 RBI over the course of a season if he bats second in the order compared to if he bats fourth. From a narrow perspective, that’s bad news for fantasy owners. But typical fantasy formats deal with more than just RBI, and runs scored in particular seem to have an inverse relationship with RBI where, as a hitter moves toward the front of the order, his runs should increase to offset some or all of his RBI loss. The question is which influence is bigger.

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My review of a recent Ottoneu dynasty prospect draft continues today with highlights from rounds 10 – 12.

Dynasty Prospect Draft Review: Rounds 1 – 3

Dynasty Prospect Draft Review: Rounds 4 – 6

Dynasty Prospect Draft Review: Rounds 7 – 9

This draft should help you “discover” a few prospect names to keep an eye on going forward.  If you have specific questions about players or the thought process of why they were selected, fire away in the comments section, as I’ve asked each owner in the league to be on standby to provide feedback as we review the rounds.

Before I review my own thoughts on the draft, you should know this Ottoneu league uses the “FanGraphs Points” scoring system based on linear weights, so offense is heavily slanted towards wOBA skills (and speed is almost a non-factor).  We also somewhat arbitrarily removed the Top 12 overall offensive prospects to save them for the standard 40-man auction next spring.  Otherwise, any minor league player without one (1) MLB PA or IP is eligible to be drafted. You can read more about the custom rules of this dynasty league here, and follow along with the draft here.

A few of the prospects below are also featured on the 2018 Top 100 Fantasy Prospects list.

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I received some really interesting comments on my previous article on RBI luck, and that has steered me toward several new avenues of related research. Commenter Bill identified that several of the unlucky batters who had fewer RBI on home runs than I expected batted second in the order. Intuitively, it makes a lot of sense for batting order to influence a player’s opportunities for RBI, but that issue can be a bit difficult to disentangle from the quality of the offense he is a part of. Still, I think it is possible, and I’ve made an attempt to do so with a model that chains some league average rates to a hypothetical power hitter’s expected batting outcomes.

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Happy Game 7 Day!

About a year ago I released my (2017) Top 50 Fantasy Prospect rankings using the Prospect Scorecard to weight a variety of important variables in the context of fantasy baseball.  Today I’m publishing an (early) expanded list of the Top 100 Fantasy Prospects for 2018 for both Ottoneu’s FanGraphs Points leagues (where wOBA is a key measure on offense) and Roto leagues (5 x 5).

A few quick notes before we begin:

• Since “Cost” is league-dependent (auction salary, keeper round, etc.), I’ve ignored it here for simplicity by keeping it constant for every prospect listed. Feel free to use the Scorecard to make changes that reflect true player costs for your league, which will impact these rankings.
• These rankings below are intended to represent the 100 most valuable prospects for fantasy leagues (depending on scoring format).
• It’s quite possible I’m missing an obvious player that should be ranked, so let me know in the comments.  We can discuss the specific rationale for player rankings in the comments, too.  Player ages are current ages.
• For a lot more prospect resources, check out the Ottoneu community.

Here are the (early) 2018 Top 100 prospects for the linear-weights-based FanGraphs Points scoring format (a good proxy for those in OBP leagues):

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Last year I interviewed Brent Daily, winner of the 2016 Ottoneu Champions league.  This year I’ve done the same by  interviewing Keith Smith, who led his Harrisburg Mayflies to a dominant victory in 2017.

Q: Well done on a big victory in 2017.  How long have you been playing fantasy baseball?

I started playing in the late 80’s. I forget the exact year but I remember Carney Lansford dominating. Stepped away for a number of years but got hooked again when a friend introduced me to Ottoneu.

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Justin Vibber has released his final 2017 dollar values by player.  I’ve captured Ottoneu average player salaries as of the end of the season (prior to inflation and arbitration).  Let’s combine the two to determine which hitters were the best bargains of 2017, and take a quick look at what might be in the crystal ball for 2018.

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This being FanGraphs, I don’t spend a ton of time thinking about RBI and runs. Both of those stats are contextual in nature and say less about a player’s quality of performance than many of this site’s context-neutral metrics, such as wOBA and WAR. But I still play in a number of roto leagues where RBI and runs are categories, and just because they mean less in real life doesn’t mean I can’t put some analytical thought into how players accumulated them.

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Sunday, October 15th is a significant signpost for the fantasy baseball off-season as it marks the beginning of Ottoneu arbitration, the 30 day process that helps leagues maintain competitive, economic balance. Ottoneu offers a ton of great features in its standard platform, but there are few more intimidating to a brand new owner than this annual salary-sharing arbitration event. Here is a summary of the more popular “allocation” option:

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Recently I reviewed the results of the first few rounds of a new dynasty league prospect draft.  The review continues today with a quick look at some key selections in rounds 7 – 9.

Dynasty Prospect Draft Review: Rounds 1 – 3

Dynasty Prospect Draft Review: Rounds 4 – 6

This draft should help you “discover” a few names to keep an eye on going forward.  If you have specific questions about players or the thought process of why they were selected, fire away in the comments section, as I’ve asked each owner in the league to be on standby to provide feedback as we review the rounds.

Before I review my own thoughts on the draft, you should know this Ottoneu league uses the “FanGraphs Points” scoring system based on linear weights, so offense is heavily slanted towards wOBA skills (and speed is almost a non-factor).  We also somewhat arbitrarily removed the Top 12 overall offensive prospects to save them for the standard 40-man auction next spring.  Otherwise, any minor league player without one (1) MLB PA or IP is eligible to be drafted.  You can read more about the custom rules of this dynasty league here, and follow along with the draft here.

Many of the prospects below are also featured on the 2018 Top 100 Fantasy Prospects list.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’m not sure I have this whole bold predictions thing figured out. As has been the case for me in the past, several of my predictions this season produced useful fantasy advice. In particular, avoiding Jake Arrieta and drafting Jose Berrios, Dylan Bundy, Ender Inciarte, and Luke Weaver would have helped your team. But that was not enough to make any of my predictions actually correct.

Previous bold predictions reviews: 2016, 2015, 2014

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