As you know, it’s mock draft season. It’s a time to be friendly with our fantasy drafts. Often, we’ll openly discuss how we view certain players or why we’re building a fake roster in a specific way. That extends to congratulating others on “good” picks. Avisail Garcia is one player who always garners a pat on the back. If you can’t tell, I don’t understand the love. I’d like to. I’m open to hearing explanations.

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It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

The White Sox had an aggressive offseason, adding plenty of fantasy-relevant talent to an interesting core. Two-thirds of their outfield was already drawing attention as mid-round guys with breakout potential. They added another mid-rounder – though he is of the established variety – this offseason making their starting outfield one of the more alluring fantasy units in the game.

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It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

Maybe Boston’s treating their outfield like most teams treat their starting rotation — their depth is astounding. They could fill the outfield twice over with players that could be above average given the time. The trick then, for us, is to try our best to figure out which ones will play the most. There might not be a lock in the crowd, but there’s a lot of talent.

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It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

Looking for offense? Join the rest of Mets nation, whose hopes for a productive lineup rely largely on two aging corner outfielders and a glove-heavy center fielder. That said, all of the three options here have clear full-time jobs — well, heh, assuming they stay healthy — and they all have the potential to contribute in standard mixed leagues, even if they probably shouldn’t be drafted with such expectations.

First, a quick word about Citi Field. Last year, the park favored pitchers slightly overall, though it was found to increase home runs a tad, particularly for right-handed hitters. We’ll see how the Mets’ decision to move in the fences, yet again, bodes for offense, but suffice to say, the ballpark shouldn’t be viewed as a major impediment to run production.
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It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

The Miami Marlins are known for roster turnover, but they’ll return their entire starting outfield for the 2015 season. Those starters range from 23 to 25 years old, and they possess the tools to be fantastic fantasy assets. The Fish traded away a few outfield prospects who might have served as valuable depth. Instead, they’ll depend on one old guy to back up three positions. It mostly worked for them last season with Reed Johnson.

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It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

With their recent dedication to platoons and positional flexibility, the Rays have never really been easy to recognize in the outfield. But that is especially true entering 2015. Understated sometimes-outfield star Ben Zobrist is now in Oakland. Elite prospect Wil Myers is in San Diego. Matt Joyce is in Los Angeles. What’s left in Tampa is a collection of young outfielders who are likely more valuable in real life than in fantasy. However, one of those players offers a bit more fantasy value than you might expect.
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It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

The Toronto Blue Jays held on to just one outfield starter from last year’s opening day lineup, but when that person is Jose Bautista, the Jays still have some outfield production. The park plays up power — especially right-handed power — however outside of Bautista, don’t count on too many home runs. Rather than the long ball, expect speed from the Jays mostly new outfield.
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The Steroids Era has passed, and with that comes a return to the laws of physicality: when you approach your mid-to-late 30s, your athletic productivity takes a sharp downturn. Need any proof? Last year, just 13 players in their age-37 season or above notched 200 or more plate appearances. Among them were the now-retired Derek Jeter, Paul Konerko and Alfonso Soriano, as well as part-time players like Reed Johnson, Jose Molina and Ichiro Suzuki. Of this bunch, only two — David Ortiz and Torii Hunter — posted positive WAR figures and were above average offensively.

Assuming for the moment that some Faustian agreement doesn’t produce a Joe Boyd-like debut this year, here are five players, 37 years and older, who could snag enough playing time to surface on the radars of standard leagues this year — unless, of course, Father Time catches up with them first.
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Yesterday, the Astros continued to alter their outfield, this time by signing Colby Rasmus to a one-year contract. I’m sure glad I’m not overseeing the Astros depth chart, because it has seemingly changed every day. Rasmus suddenly becomes the team’s starting center fielder, with the collection of Jake Marisnick, Robbie Grossman and Alex Presley likely fighting for reserve roles. Let’s begin with the park factors to determine whether this impacts Rasmus’ fantasy value at all.

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You can follow along as we mock, but you’ll see us highlighting specific picks and rounds over the next couple of weeks too. Multiple times in the draft, I found that there were back-to-back outfield picks that were interesting. Matt Kemp and George Springer. Michael Brantley and Justin Upton. Yasiel Puig and Carlos Gomez.

In the third round, after picking up Miguel Cabrera and Anthony Rizzo with my first two picks, I found myself in just such a predicament. I wanted an outfielder, and Michael Brantley and Ryan Braun were clearly the best of the remaining. Given their respective ages, histories, name values, and draft positions, I found that juxtaposition interesting and worth investigating.

Would you rather have Brantley or Braun?

Full disclosure. I have not yet done my own rankings, since I’m deep into editing FanGraphs Plus, so I’m winging this mock. Once I investigate, I may decide I made the wrong decision. So it goes.

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