We can now say, with confidence and the backing of legal proceedings and pronouncements, that Ryan Braun did steroids. Those in yearly leagues have all said their curses dropped him — a good percentage of them won’t dip back into that well again, choosing to hold a grudge, or to just avoid the insecurity. But in keeper and dynasty leagues, the opportunity for arbitrage is here. Ryan Braun is available, and in a particularly desperate way in some of those leagues. But what will he look like without the juice?

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Jason Heyward is having a terrible year, I’m sure you noticed. What makes things harder on those that want to believe in positive regression from the star outfielder is that in some superficial ways, it looks like his other bad year, that one in 2011. Finding the differences between the two has implications both on Heyward’s rest-of-season prognosis, as well as the effort to pin-point his long-term upside.

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On Friday, Alfonso Soriano returned to the team he began his Major League career with, the New York Yankees, in exchange for cash and a pitching prospect. The knee-jerk reaction is probably that his fantasy value jumps given the perception we have of the Yankees offense of years past and the hitter’s haven their home park has played as. But is this true after diving into the relevant numbers? Let’s find out!

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At this point, we’ve run out of superlatives to describe the season Mike Trout put together last year. He had the best age-20 season in the history of baseball, and many considered him to be the AL MVP. Reflect on that for a moment. Many people argued Mike Trout was the best player in baseball last season. He was 20 years old. That’s not normal. We all got swept up in Puig-mania this summer and have basked in the glory of Matt Harvey, but we all witnessed something truly special in 2012.

Trout’s supremacy wasn’t limited to the WAR stat, though. In ESPN leagues, he was the number-one fantasy player in all of baseball — and he didn’t even play a big-league game until April 28. The young man essentially gave the entire league a month’s head start and still finished the season in the number-one slot.

Naturally, fantasy owners were left wondering if lightning could strike twice. Considering his price tag on draft day, would it be wise for owners to invest so heavily into a 21-year-old outfielder who may suffer from the dreaded sophomore slump? Opposing teams had ample time to make adjustments this offseason. Would he make the counter-adjustments and replicate his magical rookie season, or would he experience a dramatic year-two decline like Jason Heyward in 2011?

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Two things stand out while highlighting Jake Elmore as the American League outfielder this week. First, it should be noted that Elmore does not yet have outfield eligibility. That is in the works, as Elmore started in left field two days ago — and has four other appearances there — and the Houston Astros plan on keeping him in left field. He does already have shortstop eligibility in Yahoo! (just second base in CBS and ESPN) and given the difference in quantity as well as quality of middle infielders vs. outfielders, it would be wise to play Elmore as your MI even when he does gain OF eligibility.
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As we close in on the Major League trade deadline, non-contending teams are making moves to open up spots for their prospects. This is a blessing for deep league owners as finally there are more choices available to pick up besides fifth outfielders and the last man in the bullpen. Both the Astros and Cubs are looking toward the future and have recently introduced us to some new faces.

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My ideal set of rankings has input from both human and computer sources. In our rankings, we have one set of ranks that are built on projections, meaning that overall our rankings are 25% computer. That’s low for me. But I know that our other three human rankers also use the computer projections to varying degrees, so the number is probably closer to 50% computer, which I like.

But, ostensibly, we have one computer ranker. Jeff Zimmerman uses a proprietary mix of ZiPs and Steamer projections, and then takes the plate appearance projections from our depth charts. Every once in a while a player won’t be updated on the depth charts — human error — but if we stay vigilant, this mix should produce the best computer-generated rankings you can find. The addition of depth chart information can do a lot to undo the biggest flaw in projections: they don’t always know who has the job.

One remaining avenue to deal with with respect to the computer rankings is what to do with the missing plate appearances due to projected injury. Zimmerman has done a lot to advance the state of injury projections, and some of that is now built into the various projections he uses. We know that past DL stints predict future ones, for example. And that age is a heavy factor. But once those PAs and IPs are gone, they can be replaced through the waiver wire.

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After setting the world on fire this past April with a .283/.388/.566 line with five home runs, things have slowed down considerably for Coco Crisp in recent weeks. A quick glance of his batting average doesn’t tell the full story (just as one would expect with batting average) as he repeated his .283 average in May. His May was shortened due to a stint on the disabled list, but for the first eight weeks of his season Crisp looked like a different hitter.

For the first time since 2009 — when he received all of 209 plate appearances — Crisp’s first half walk rate is in double digits, currently at a healthy 11.6%. With already nine home runs on the season he already has more homers this year than in two of the previous three seasons. He’s also managed to trim his strikeout rate down to a tidy 10.6%, the 15th best mark in qualified baseball. In a somewhat recent podcast the present author stated that selling high on Crisp may be a good idea. The question hung in mind of the author and thus Crisp became a subject that required further delving in to.
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Two years removed from an MVP-caliber season and coming off an injury-shortened campaign in 2012, Jacoby Ellsbury was a popular value-pick for many fantasy owners in the fourth-or-fifth rounds. His average draft position was 43.7 this spring, which placed him ahead of guys like Yoenis Cespedes and Matt Holliday. He was expected to produce, so when he hit .241/.303/.335 in his first 44 games this season, many owners were understandably frustrated.

Since that arbitrary point of May 20, though, Ellsbury has been one of the top-producing fantasy outfielders in all of baseball, torching opposing pitchers with a .382/.446/.532 slash line. In fact, in the last 30 days, he’s been the fifth-best overall player in ESPN leagues. Only Chris Davis and his home run binge has prevented him from being the number one fantasy outfielder in the past 30 days.

Many owners are not necessarily wondering if this hot streak is legitimate. It’s ridiculous to expect Ellsbury to continue hitting at almost a .400 clip throughout the remainder of the year. Instead, some are beginning to wonder if this impressive stretch at the plate is an indicator that the 2011 version of Jacoby Ellsbury is lurking around the corner. Because that would be a game-changer and perhaps even a reason for owners to buy high.

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As a Seattle resident, I have the pleasure of attending a good number of Mariner’s games each year, mostly in the company of another founding member of ottoneu (owner of this team). A couple weeks back, we attended a game and marveled at the massive swings being taken by one Raul Ibanez, which led to one of us commenting, “It’s like he’s decided, ‘Screw it – I’m old and I am going to try to crush the ball, even if I can’t do anything else.”

It reminded me of the Jerry Seinfeld quip about old people backing out of their driveways: “I’m old and I’m coming back! I survived, let’s see if you can.”

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