Yes, we are going back to the Hot Right Now well, before we get to our first Cold Right Now. What can I say, it is still early even for us writers, and we are getting our rotation into shape.

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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. 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. To start the season, I’ll be relying on projected team wOBA until there’s sufficient in-season data to start calculating these matchup ratings. I should also note that the two new minor league stadiums that the Athletics and Rays are playing in this year currently have neutral park factors in my calculations, though both should play like hitters parks.

First, a reminder that the first week of Ottoneu head-to-head leagues ends on March 30, which means you have one weekend to hit your games started cap. That means you’ve got a very short window to figure out which starters to use over the next four days, and you may want to use some of the riskier pitchers on your roster just to hit the cap. The table below has my sit/start recommendations for the weekend and then there’s a second table below for the first normal week.

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A few general schedule notes:

• These first few weeks of the season have some awkward off days to give teams a buffer for any early season rainouts. That, combined with some still unsettled rosters, means you should definitely pay attention to the announced starters for each game, make note of any rotation shuffling, and have a backup plan just in case one of your starters misses a start.
• The Mariners have an extremely easy schedule to start the season, hosting the A’s and Tigers before heading to San Francisco next weekend. All of their starters are usually must starts, but even with George Kirby on the IL to start the season, giving Emerson Hancock some consideration might be worthwhile if you need a two-start pitcher next week.
• No team has three tough matchups during this first week and a half, but the Dodgers and Marlins have a pair of them next week. Los Angeles hosts the Braves before heading to Philadelphia while Miami hosts the Mets before traveling to Atlanta.

Welcome to another season of Ottoneu Hot (and Cold, but not today) Right Now! I hope you are all excited for this! And if you are not – let me know what would be more useful. We are here to serve.

As with last year, Hot Right Now will cover players being added or auctioned, as well as players performing at a high level. We are always tweaking the format, so please provide feedback!

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Sometimes you have to shake things up, especially when you find yourself rostering four “1B only” players. I updated my trade block and hoped someone out there needed help at the position. “Ding!” went my laptop from across the room a few minutes later, indicating I’d received an email. It had an extra sharp sound to it like it had come straight from Ottoneu’s automated system with intent.

hey, i’d be interested in Vientos. Let me know what you’re looking for or if you see a fit.

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Chad unleashed his Ottoneu-focused bold predictions on us yesterday, now I’ll take a crack at it. I’ve got five pitcher predictions and five hitter predictions; hopefully they’ll be of some use to you as the season starts up. Alongside the predictions, I’ve also included some draft data from the current offseason to get a better sense of how these players are being valued by the Ottoneu community right now.

1. Cristopher Sánchez is a top-10 SP (by P/IP among pitchers w/ 100+ IP)
Ottoneu Average Salary: $8.2
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $12.9

We’ve all seen the hype surrounding Sánchez this spring: he’s throwing harder and has added a cutter to his pitch mix to help him combat right-handed batters. Last year, he compiled 910 points across 181.2 innings, a 5.01 P/IP rate, but his current Depth Charts projection has him pinned at around 4.71 P/IP in 2025. His per inning performance in 2024 ranked 28th among pitchers with at least 100 IP last year, and his total points ranked 13th. His current draft price has him valued somewhere around the 40th starting pitcher and his overall average salary well below that mark (thanks to those lucky enough to roster him as a keeper with plenty of surplus value).

To break into the top-10, he’d have to add about a half point per inning and seriously outperform his projections. He’s already got a solid foundation with an elite groundball rate and corresponding low home run totals, he just needs to add strikeouts to his profile. He shouldn’t have trouble finding those punchouts with his increased velocity and new cutter.

2. Reese Olson is a top-25 SP (by P/IP among pitchers w/ 100+ IP)
Ottoneu Average Salary: $6.6
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $6.8

Would you believe that Olson slightly outperformed Sánchez on a rate basis last year with 5.1 P/IP? A shoulder injury cut his season short but he was fantastic while he was on the mound. His current draft price has him valued around the 65th starting pitcher and I’m sure the shoulder issues are a warning sign many can’t ignore.

What I like about Olson is that he has two absolutely killer secondary weapons in his slider and changeup that both return whiff rates north of 40% and also sports a curveball that isn’t far behind at 30%. Sure, his fastballs aren’t that great, but he’s throwing both his four-seamer and sinker about a tick harder this spring — surely a good sign for the health of his shoulder. If he stays healthy, leans on his secondary offerings, and maybe improves his fastballs, good things should be in store for him.

3. Eduardo Rodriguez is a top-50 SP (by P/IP among pitchers w/ 100+ IP)
Ottoneu Average Salary: $3.0
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $1.8

With an average draft price of just over a dollar and a roster% of just 54.8%, Eduardo Rodriguez is essentially an afterthought right now. He’s never really been an outstanding contributor in Ottoneu, but he’s only a year removed from posting a 4.9 P/IP season across 152.2 innings in 2023. Injuries absolutely wrecked his season last year but it seems like he’s fully healthy this spring. He’s struck out nearly 40% of the batter’s he’s faced and hasn’t allowed a run in Cactus League play and his velocity is even up slightly. He might not win you any leagues, but the potential for solid contributions at his current price is too good to pass up.

4. Max Meyer scores the most total points among Marlins starting pitchers
Ottoneu Average Salary: $3.6
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $3.3

Originally, this bold prediction included Ryan Weathers, but he just injured his elbow and will likely be out for a few months of the season. Womp womp.

I’m sure you’ve heard but Meyer has completely revamped his pitch arsenal this spring; he’s added a sinker and sweeper to his repertoire and his fastball is now sitting at 96 mph. He’s always had a high prospect pedigree but that mostly was thanks to his outstanding slider. This is the first time as a professional he’s had a fully realized repertoire to work with.

The other unspoken aspect to this bold prediction is the status of Sandy Alcantara. For this prediction to work out in my favor, I’m assuming Alcantara is traded this summer and that Meyers continues to pitch well for Miami throughout the entire season.

5. David Festa scores the second most total points among Twins starting pitchers
Ottoneu Average Salary: $3.6
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $2.7

I already wrote about Festa as an undervalued draft target a few weeks ago and my position hasn’t changed even though he’s been optioned to Triple-A to start the season. I wrote, “An ugly 4.90 ERA hid the fact that he posted a very good 3.76 FIP across his first 13 starts in the big leagues last year and all the projection systems think he should come close to replicating those peripherals again this year. He’s added a sinker to his pitch mix this spring and has continued to flash the swing-and-miss stuff that earned him the callup last season.”

I hedged my bold prediction a little by allowing one of Pablo López, Joe Ryan, or Bailey Ober to outscore Festa. His talent will outshine whatever the Twins are going to get from Chris Paddack or Simeon Woods Richardson and that’ll get him back to the majors pretty quickly. Taking Ryan’s injury questions into account and the slide backwards we saw from López in 2024, I’m betting Festa will emerge as the next great starter in Minnesota.

6. Brent Rooker is a top-3 OF (by P/G among batters w/ 300+ PA)
Ottoneu Average Salary: $12.1
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $24.3

The first thing that has to happen for this prediction to come true is that Rooker needs to establish OF eligibility. After signing his big five-year extension this offseason and now more than a year removed from his forearm injury, I think the A’s will give him enough time in the outfield to remove his util-only status.

From there, it’s just a matter of him continuing to crush the ball in a minor league ballpark without the oppressive marine layer hampering his batted ball quality. There are 18 outfielders being valued ahead of him — his positional limitations surely have something to do with that — but just five outfielders outscored him on a rate basis last year. He’ll need to leapfrog some absolute superstars in Yordan Alvarez and Kyle Tucker for this prediction to come true. I think his continued improvement at the plate combined with his now favorable home ballpark will give him the boost he needs to sit right behind Aaron Judge and Juan Soto at the position.

7. Anthony Volpe is a top-12 SS (by P/G among batters w/ 300+ PA)
Ottoneu Average Salary: $9.6
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $8.9

I’m confident in saying that Volpe is a better real life player than he is a fantasy baseball player, and I’m not actually sold that he’s a good real life player to begin with. The first two seasons of his big league career have been rocky to say the least. A much ballyhooed swing change last year amounted to four added points of wRC+ and a much lower barrel rate than what he accomplished in his rookie campaign. His current draft price has him valued around the 18th shortstop.

When looking at players with significant increases in bat speed this spring, Volpe’s name stands out above the rest. He’s added three ticks to his average exit velocity, more than half the balls he’s put in play have been hard hit, and while that contact hasn’t translated to hits or production, there’s very clearly something cooking underneath the hood. More importantly, 50% of the contact he’s made this spring has gone to his pull side. Swinging hard and pulling the ball in the air is generally a recipe for damage; let’s hope this new approach carries over to the regular season.

8. Maikel Garcia is a top-15 2B (by P/G among batters w/ 300+ PA)
Ottoneu Average Salary: $3.9
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $2.9

In 2023, Garcia posted a .344 BABIP to fuel a .299 wOBA which translated to 4.1 P/G. Last year, his BABIP cratered to .268 despite no meaningful change in his underlying batted ball metrics, and his wOBA fell to .270 and just 3.4 P/G. He hits the ball too hard and runs too well to run a BABIP that low, plus he improved his strikeout rate by six points and hit for a little more power and still couldn’t shake that bad batted ball luck. I’m betting on those improvements carrying over while also enjoying a BABIP rebound leading to a true breakout season.

9. Miguel Vargas scores the most total points among White Sox hitters
Ottoneu Average Salary: $1.6
Ottoneu Average Draft Price: $1.5

This bold prediction might come true simply by process of elimination. The White Sox are going to give Vargas every chance to succeed because he could be a core piece of their rebuild and who’s going to out hit him in their lineup? Luis Robert Jr., the oft injured star who might be traded away this summer? Andrew Benintendi, the light-hitting former star whose reputation far exceeds his actual production? Certainly not Andrew Vaughn, the former college star who hasn’t really put it all together in the big leagues yet. Vargas has really struggled himself — his career batting average across nearly 600 plate appearances is just .175 — but he’s tearing up spring training and has a wide open opportunity to prove he can stick in the big leagues.

10. Neither Roman Anthony or Kristian Campbell will be starting-caliber options at their respective positions in 2025

For the sake of the prediction, let’s say starting-caliber in Ottoneu is 4.5 P/G; that’s the 15th best 2B and the 45th best OF based on last year’s stats. But really, this prediction all comes down to opportunity. Both Anthony and Campbell are expected to be key contributors for the Red Sox sooner rather than later, but I think neither will be able to break onto the major league roster in a meaningful way this year. Campbell had an opportunity to make the Opening Day roster but fumbled it this spring and Marcelo Mayer might just be ahead of him in the pecking order now, and both those prospects are behind David Hamilton and possibly even Alex Bregman on the 2B depth chart.

Anthony has a little clearer path to playing time, especially if Ceddanne Rafaela struggles, but the Red Sox will need to fit Masataka Yoshida into the outfield picture if Rafael Devers is taking most of the at-bats at designated hitter. The addition of Bregman really mucked up the playing time opportunity for both of these top prospects. If they get a long run of playing time in 2025, things will have gone very poorly for the rest of Boston’s major league roster.

With the season nearly upon us (I refuse to count the Japan Series), it’s time for Bold Predictions. My goal here is for my predictions to be legimately bold – which means my end of season recap will be a bit depressing – but directionally useful – which means you can hopefully use these bold predictions to buy (or sell) on players and strengthen your teams.

As always, my bold predictions will be Ottoneu-focused.

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Every year, before the season starts, I go through my rosters and see who I roster most (and poke around at players I wish I rostered more). And every year I learn something about my fantasy baseball management from the exercise. So every year, I end up deciding to share those results with you.

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When preparing for a draft or auction, it is pretty typical to determine what positions you feel best about the deep options and therefore don’t have to spend big resources upfront. Love a bunch of shortstops you can get after pick 200/for less than $5? Then you don’t need to break the bank for Francisco Lindor.

In keeper auctions, that depth can shift unexpectedly (as we discussed earlier this week), so you need to now only know what positions are deep but what positions are deep among players actually available. But there is another factor that impacts position depth: what other teams need.

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Sunday morning, at 7 am (which felt like 6 after springing forward), I sat down at my computer, started the auction for Ottoneu league 1199 and immediately dropped $88 on Juan Soto. Spending $88 on one player isn’t something I would typically do and (as much as I would like to) I can’t blame the early hour. When prepping for the draft a couple of days earlier, I had put $90 as a target price for Soto…and then upped it to $95. $88 wasn’t me panicking, sleep-bidding, or just going all out to get my guy – it was very much the plan. And it’s all because OF has become so deep that it’s shallow.

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Google’s AI Overview on the search “what is inflation” (proper grammar not necessary) is:

Inflation is when prices of goods and services increase over time. It’s a broad measure of how much more expensive things are becoming.

In Anthony Clark’s Economics Through Everday Life, he writes:

The presence of inflation simply means that prices on average are rising.

This time last year, Chad Young wrote:

Inflation is simply the increase or decrease in average player price you can expect as a result of the relationship between amount of money spent on keepers and the amount of value those keepers represent.

Let’s use a few of the FanGraphs Staff II keepers as examples of how this all plays out to cause inflation in Ottoneu fantasy baseball. Read the rest of this entry »