It’s once again time for a macro level view of the ottoneu landscape, and as of the end of July the teams involved in championship races are well known. Let’s take a look at the top performing teams and leagues:

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Are hitters consciously deciding to hit more balls in the air, now that more data is available? I don’t know. There is certainly evidence that more players have hit the ball in the air over the past 2 years. Maybe it’s the ball. Maybe it’s the availability of StatCast, though teams have had more batted ball data than what is publicly available for some time. Would more widely available data be all that was needed in order for a player to see the merits of hitting the ball in the air?

I’m skeptical. Perhaps, hitters have always known that hitting the ball in the air is valuable, but now we have a standardized way of articulating these changes? These are just a couple of questions that sift through my head as we sort our way through changes in league wide batted ball tendencies over the past 2 years.

We know that expected production based on qualify of contact changes as we change launch angles and increase exit velocities, with the least valuable batted balls being those hit under 0 degrees and over 39 degrees. Balls in play fall into these buckets nearly 50% of the time.

Given this, I was curious if players increasing their launch angle are, on average, increasing their expected production. Much could be said about Yonder Alonso deciding to hit more fly balls. It’s worked out well for him, but there’s some survivor bias involved here. We remember Alonso because he has succeeded. Has everyone who has added more lift to their swing seen similar improvements? Read the rest of this entry »

Just like last Sunday, another meltdown for the Angels ‘pen was the highlight of the day. With a four-run lead and two outs in the eighth, Blake Parker allowed a single to Jed Lowrie, a home run to Khris Davis, and a double to Ryon Healy. With the lead down to two, he was pulled in favor of Bud Norris, who surrendered a run-scoring single to Chad Pinder (the run was charged to Parker), a double to Matt Chapman that put the tying run on third and the go-ahead run on second, and finally he allowed a two-run single to Bruce Maxwell that gave Oakland an 11-10 lead. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to another installment of the ottoneu prospect report, where I highlight the top performances in the minor leagues (limited to players in their organization’s top 15 prospects) year to date, and over the past month.

The trade deadline has passed, and with it has come the promotions of top prospects such as Rafael Devers and Amed Rosario, but there are still prospects knocking on the door of a call up. In addition, some of these players are a bit further out (A/A+), but represent some high ceilings prospects that could be the next big marketable prospects going into 2018. Read the rest of this entry »

Last year around this time I took a look at the Steamer600 Update projections to try to identify potential keepers that were currently undervalued or overlooked. As a refresher, the Steamer600 Update projections represent the current Steamer rest of season projections, but scaled to 600 PA/200 IP (SP)/ 65 IP (RP) for all players. I like to look at these projections periodically to get a sense of how Steamer is estimating true talent level regardless of playing time (due to injury, a bench role, or being in the minor leagues). I have taken those Steamer600 Update projections and applied ottoneu FGPTs scoring to find some interesting potential keepers.

Before I go any further, I thought it would make sense to highlight a few of the names I mentioned in last year’s article(these are the hits, there were many misses as well):

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Another month gone by in the ottoneu season, another edition of this article highlighting how desperate teams are for pitching. Seven out of the ten most added players in the last week are pitchers, though things are more even when looking at the most added players over the past month.

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‘Tis the season for reviewing bold predictions, let’s check in and see if my second year of predictions is going any better than my first did (1 for 10):

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A few weeks ago, I took an initial (and someone rudimentary) dive into tying Statcast data to Ottoneu. Specifically, looking at the Fangraphs Points (FGpts) format. Like in real baseball, when the ball leaves the bat with a higher exit velocity, it is more likely to produce more favorable results. This was to be expected. The way the scoring settings for FGpts was developed was through linear weights, so it would make sense that the distribution of points per batted ball ties closely to reality. Today, I am going to look at the batted balls hit though the all star break (actually, just before the break as I pulled this July 6th) and examine the expected points per ball in play on specific batted ball types. Let’s get started.

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With the All-Star break upon us, I wanted to take some time to notice several players who are putting up seasons worth your attention across Ottoneu. I guess we should probably consider what we mean by “worth attention.” Certainly many players are having great seasons. Chris Sale is pitching at career bests, Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger have combined for 53 HRs, Justin Turner is walking more than he strikes out, and Jose Ramirez has picked up 2B eligibility when producing a career high ISO. None of these players will be included… Wait, what? I thought you said this was an All-Star team?

A couple key points that drive the Ottoneu format. First, it is an economic game with a defined budget. Second, players get kept year to year. For this reason, and because others can/have spilled virtual ink over the players listed above, I will exclude them. A couple additional stipulations in filling out this roster Read the rest of this entry »

We have now reached the halfway point in the ottoneu season, and at this point if your team isn’t squarely in the top four or five in your league you are in some trouble. To me the end of June is a watershed moment where teams are no longer just benefiting from a hot start or suffering from under performance, but rather the standings represent the realistic groupings of contenders, also-rans, and bottom dwellers.

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