Robbie Ray’s latest eight strikeout, five runs allowed effort, has continued what has become a baffling season from a results perspective. His 4.66 ERA is obviously poor and ranks 13th worst among all qualified Major League starters. But he has still attracted interest from fantasy owners thanks to a plethora of strikeouts. Let’s take a look at where he ranks in a variety of metrics among 78 qualified starters to get a better idea of just how bizarre his performance has truly been.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’m finally back from my two week Slovenia/Croatia jaunt (feel free to discuss the wonders of either of those countries in the comments) and what else does one write about when not totally in the loop? More home run surprises, of course! I continue to be in shock at some of the home run total, so let’s discuss more of them.

Read the rest of this entry »

On Wednesday I lamented about how my year-long infatuation with prospect Nick Williams blinded me from seeing offensive value in other places that would likely have put my team in a better position during a rebuild.  Today I’ll take the same approach, focusing on the pitching side, and will use Jose Berrios as my prospect scapegoat.  Like Williams, I’ve owned Berrios since well before the 2016 season began, and invested fully into the scouting reports of a potential #2 starting pitcher. Better yet, I was convinced Berrios was more “polished” than most prospect pitchers, and that his strong command would quickly smooth out the inevitably bumpy transition through MLB lineups. Fast forward now to mid-September and Berrios has a 9.27 ERA in 44 IP, which includes 28 BB’s and 2.0 HR/9.  And yet, I still own him…

Using Ottoneu ownership and average salary data as of September, I limited my filter to all players currently owned for $3 or less, and then hand-selected a few pitchers who (using FIP and P/IP as quick standards for YTD value) appear to have enough future value to be at least as interesting as Jose Berrios once was to me so long (not really) ago.

Read the rest of this entry »

Last Friday, September 9, baseball saw its 4,910th home run of the season hit, passing the total number hit in all of 2015. If you’re reading this, then you’ve probably known about the spike in home run rates since mid-2015 for a while now. I started to pay close attention to the trend when I read the first of Rob Arthur’s and Ben Lindbergh’s articles on FiveThirtyEight (one, two, and three) that posited that a juiced baseball could be responsible for the change. That was more than five months ago, and the trend has not slowed down since then.

In fantasy, the increase in power is particularly important because it undermines the value of hitters whose elite home run totals no longer stand out to the same extent. With still almost three weeks left in the season, 91 hitters have already reached 20 or more home runs. That’s the most players at that benchmark in a season since 2008. If this power surge continues, then the Khris Davises and Chris Carters of the world will lose a lot of value. Why reach for them when Brad Miller has 28 home runs and Marcus Semien has 24 home runs? Suddenly, speed is the scarce resource.

Read the rest of this entry »

I didn’t grow up a fan of baseball. I was born and raised in Washington DC; an area that was devoid of a professional team until after I moved away. However, just like many kids, I played it growing up, but because I didn’t watch much of it growing up, I didn’t know about many of baseball’s unwritten rules until later in life. Read the rest of this entry »

I have owned Nick Williams in a very competitive Ottoneu league since mid-January.  Effective today, I am cutting bait on Nick Williams.

Actually, Nick Williams is really just a proxy for all those glossy prospects we fall in love with. Exiting the 2015 season, I was coming off a championship but knew I’d be staring headfirst at a very difficult rebuild.  So, entering the spring of 2016 I did exactly what I usually advise new fantasy owners to avoid: stock up on a bunch of prospects and let hope fill in the strategic gaps.

Read the rest of this entry »

While his ERA only dropped marginally from 2014, last year Chris Archer vaulted into the elite, thanks to pumping up his slider usage, which dramatically boosted his strikeout rate. Unfortunately, the 2016 season did not begin the way he, or his owners, imagined it would. He ended the month of June with an ugly 4.76 ERA, his control had deteriorated, and he was giving up homers like never before. So how did he cure his issues? By throwing even more sliders, of course. Let’s break down his season into two parts, which seem to correlate with the time he further upped his slider usage.

Read the rest of this entry »

The star of yesterday’s Rays-Red Sox day game was Hanley Ramirez, whose fifth-inning grand slam erased a three-run deficit en route to an 8-6 victory for the Red Sox. Batting ninth in the order, Jackie Bradley was out of the spotlight, but his performance was likely more important to the team’s playoff aspirations given his recent struggles and history of streakiness. Bradley was on third base for Ramirez’s grand slam following a leadoff hit in the fifth inning. He added his own home run to extend the team’s lead to 6-4 in the sixth inning. And he added the team’s final run with a double to right field in the eighth inning. It was Bradley’s first three-hit game since July.

Read the rest of this entry »

Once again, I present to you my monthly update of the AL Outfield Tiers. As always, these are my rest of the season ranks for the position. There is a month to in the regular season and as the clock runs out for the regular season it becomes harder and harder to do these ranks. Value at this point depends on what you need in your league. A player like Jarrod Dyson may not be as valuable as Ian Desmond all things being equal, but if you are searching for speed then he may be to you. So, keeping this in mind I have done my best to give ranks that best reflect my value while giving a boost within tiers to players like Dyson that may offer elite production in singular categories for those needing to make up last minute points in roto formats. Read the rest of this entry »

With only about a month left in the season, it’s probably much easier to make up ground in the counting stats than in the ratios. So let’s see what hidden gems get unearthed today.

Read the rest of this entry »