The NFBC & Outfielder Episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Matt Modica

Strategy Section

• NFBC
  • Differences between NFBC (High stakes) vs. Home Leagues
  • Standalone Leagues vs. Leagues with an Overall Prize
  • NFBC Specific Rules
    • Limited Bench
    • No Injured List
    • No Trading
    • Semi-Weekly Lineups for Hitters
  • Are Multi-Position Eligible players more valuable?
  • Pitching is greatly pushed up in NFBC leagues
    • Is it warranted?
    • Should you follow the crowd, or alter your strategy to zag?
    • Should a super elite pitcher (deGrom/Cole) be taken #1 overall?
  • NFBC Draft Planning
  • KDS

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Last week, I used my xHR/FB v4.0 equation to share the names of the hitters who either enjoyed a HR/FB rate surge from 2019 or posted a surprise mark in 2020 after not playing in 2019. The wrinkle is that these players all posted xHR/FB rates that validated the HR/FB rate spikes. Today, let’s discuss hitters on the opposite end of the spectrum — those that suffered a surprise decline in HR/FB rate that was confirmed as a legit falloff by xHR/FB rate.

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Now that we’re through understanding the xHR/FB v4.0 equations and its components, let’s finally use it to evaluate past performance and help forecast 2021 performance. Today, I’ll share a list of names who enjoyed a breakout HR/FB rate in 2020 and their xHR/FB rate validated that surge (including surprising marks from players who didn’t play in 2019). Over small samples, luck plays a greater role, so knowing which spikes were real, based on the underlying skills displayed, is more important than ever when looking toward 2021.

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*The 2021 Pod Projections are now available!*

Last week, I unveiled my newest xHR/FB rate equation, v4.0. Since, I have been diving into each of the components to better understand the context, what’s good, and what’s bad. Yesterday, we had some Barrel FB% fun, so today, let’s move along to Barrel LD%. While I’ve used Barrel FB% often in the past, I have never used Barrel LD%. It’s a good thing I investigated the metric, because it actually correlates slightly better year-to-year than Barrel FB%, though it correlates with HR/FB rate a bit less so.

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*The 2021 Pod Projections are now available!*

Last week, I unveiled my newest xHR/FB rate equation, v4.0. Since, I have been diving into each of the components to better understand the context, what’s good, and what’s bad. Today, let’s move along to Barrel FB%. Barrels is my most favorite metric developed by the Statcast crew because it combines exit velocity (EV) with launch angle (LA). All I need to know is whether a ball was classified as a barrel or not and I will know whether there’s a good chance it went for a homer or stayed in the park. The rate is a percentage of those batted balls with the optimal combination of EV and LA, and it is far superior than just looking at average exit velocity and launch angle.

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Every season, I hope a superstar joins the Rockies, or one of their better hitters gets shipped out or signs elsewhere. It simply hasn’t happened very often, but it’s fun to see how the most unique park effects in baseball influences or has influenced the hitter’s results. We now get another chance to learn about the Coors Effect. This time with Nolan Arenado, who was just traded to the Cardinals. The challenge here is that Arenado played through a shoulder injury that ultimately resulted in an injured list stay. We don’t know exactly how long it affected him and can’t possibly quantify its exact effects. So if he improves significantly from last year’s .308 wOBA (and he certainly should), how many are going to conveniently ignore his health and claim the Coors Effect is a myth? Anywho, it’s something to remember, so let’s now compare the park factors for each park and how Arenado’s projection should be affected.

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Jeff wrote a great piece earlier today on bad hitters who go early in drafts. These are often speedsters who can be huge pieces to a fantasy lineup or find themselves out of a job six weeks into the season. I figured I would do a quick follow up on the other ends of the spectrum and identify 10 players going later (150+ ADP) with OPS totals at .800 or better.

Only one of these guys will do anything for your SB count, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be drafted with Jeff’s speedsters to offset their OPS struggles.

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On Friday, it was reported that Eddie Rosario, career Minnesota Twin, had signed a one-year contract with the division rival Indians. Is there a strong perception about either of these parks and their affects on offense? I don’t think so, unless you’re super familiar with park factors. However, just because it’s more difficult to guess off the top of our head like Yankee Stadium’s home run boosting power, doesn’t mean there’s no change in factors. So let’s consult them and see how Rosario’s offense might be affected.

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Today, I finish reviewing my hitter Pod Projections versus Steamer projections comparisons, ending with the stolen base downside guys. These are the hitters who I forecasted a significantly higher PA/SB rate than Steamer. Let’s see how they ended up performing.

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Calling someone a flop in two-month season requires some serious caveats, air quotes around “flop”, or both. That doesn’t mean there weren’t several disappointing players that deserve a deeper look to see what’s going on. We will investigate some of them today and if you find this exercise worthwhile, we can make it a series!

• Part 1
• Part 2

Miguel Sanó | MIN – 1B – 99 wRC+

Sano wasn’t exactly a complete dud for his teams in 2020, essentially amounting a league average bat, but the expectations were a good bit higher as he was coming off a 137 wRC+ in 2019 and 121 career mark through 2019 (2051). His 13 HRs put him among the top 30 in baseball and was tied for the 8th highest total. They saved his season in the wake of a .204 AVG and 44% K rate. The AVG was only his second worst (.199 in 2018), but the strikeout (44%) and walk (9%) rates were career worsts.

His raw power still delivered a rosy StatCast profile, sitting in the 99-100th percentile in Barrel, HardHit%, and Exit Velocity. We have seen runs like this before, the difference now is that it’s a “season”. This feels more like the ebbs and flows of this profile. His ADP of 192 since the New Year is more than fair. It both leaves plenty of room for upside and affords you enough rounds before you have to pick him to insulate yourself from his batting average issues should you want to take on the power infusion. The downside and health issues are covered within this draft price. Buy.

Josh Bell | WAS – 1B – 77 wRC+

On the heels of an excellent 2019 breakout, expectations were high for Bell going into 2020. He didn’t just regress back to 2018, he fell apart with a .669 OPS, 27% K rate, and 10% BB rate in 223 PA – all of which stand as single season worsts for Bell, but there is no way I’m weighing anyone’s 2020 as a truly full season. Even in his 2019 breakout he had a stretch that wasn’t too far off his entire 2020. From July 6th to August 27th, he posted a .688 OPS in 170 PA, though his 21% K and 14% BB rates were much more in line with his career marks (19% and 11%, respectively).

Bell has moved up 20 picks since his trade to Washington, currently sitting at pick 163. That’s still ahead of Sano, Rhys Hoskins (173), Christian Walker (197), and Jared Walsh (199) – all of whom I prefer over Bell. As such, I’m just passing on him here. I don’t put a return to 2019 levels out of the realm of possibilities, but it’s a low probability play with some combination of 2018-19 looking more likely which would yield a .260s AVG with a mid-20s HR count, and a strong chance to be north of 80 in both R and RBI. That is a pretty solid projection, but I just prefer the potential power output from the other four, especially with them all being cheaper.

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What do you think? Are you buying back in on these two? What is your general plan at 1B?