Archive for Projections

In 2019, I participated in AL LABR and struggled to stay out of the cellar. Coming out of the auction, I thought I would accumulate too many stolen bases but could trade one of Mallex Smith or Dee Strange-Gordon. I ran into the simple problem, they played themselves out of their jobs. From that point forward, I told myself “I will no longer rely on sh##ty baseball players”. Talent declines during a draft, but I don’t want a core piece of any team demoted to the bench or the minors. I’m going to examine a few hitters drafted in the first 10 rounds and fall into this playing time trap.

Looking back at Smith and Gordon, I should have had an inkling that they’d disappoint. Going into the season, Steamer projected Smith for a .695 OPS and Gordon for a .664. For the 2020 edition of The Process (after the fact research), I researched the production level needed to keep a hitter in a lineup. Depending on the player’s defensive ability and position, the average production level that gets a hitter demoted is between .600 OPS and .650 OPS with the average being around .635 OPS. The following chart shows the chances a player’s in-season OPS may drop to knowing their projected OPS.
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The Starting Pitcher Episode (Part I) of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Paul Sporer

Strategy Section

• How many pitchers will throw 200 innings in 2021?
• Pitcher ramp up from the 2020 short season.
• Pitchers returning from injury (Chris Sale / Noah Syndergaard / Luis Severino)
  • How do you project innings for 2021?
  • How do you assess their fantasy value?
  • What leagues are these players more (or less) valuable?
• Super Elite Pitchers (Jacob deGrom / Gerrit Cole / Shane Bieber)
  • How far should the trio be pushed up in drafts?
  • Which hitters should be drafted ahead of the super elite starters?
    • Does the format make a difference?
• Pitching Strategy in 2021 – Snake Drafts vs. Auctions

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1/15/21

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live. Support the show by subscribing to Fangraphs! With a standard $20 membership, you help maintain and improve our database of stats and graphs as well as our staff of 8 full-time employees and over 50 contributors. The premium ad-free membership at $50 year supports site growth and also includes faster load speeds and better site performance. You can also support monthly for just $3.

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• @sporer – Host/Producer

2021 STEAMER GEMS

• Franmil Reyes (2:43)
• Jesse Winker (7:22)
• Brandon Nimmo (13:36)
• Alejandro Kirk (18:35)

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I’m continuing my attention on fringe starters. They are the starters who once the season starts, managers are going to have to make a quick decision on adding or dropping. These pitchers will be in play all season. I’m using NFBC’s ADP and starting at the bottom and selecting any starter drafted by half the teams. Here is an evaluation of eight more starters (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8).

#523 Bryse Wilson

I’m a little surprised Wilson is being drafted this high (i.e. at all). In 42 career innings over three seasons, he has a 5.91 ERA supported by a 5.3 BB/9. He has been unplayable. I could just go through the plethora of negatives, but instead, I’ll state the few positives (career numbers).

1. He was decent in AAA in 2019 with a 3.42 ERA and 1.21 WHIP over 121 innings.
2. A 94-mph four-seamer with a 10% SwStr% and a popup inducing 32% GB%.
3. A 93-mph sinker with a 11% SwStr% and 73% GB%.
4. And what looks like an average changeup (12% SwStr%).

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Although the year just flipped to 2021, it’s already Pod Projections time! The 2021 forecasts are not available yet, and it’s looking likely that I’ll have more time to finish them once again, just like last year. So consider this an early preview to whet your appetite, for a hopefully longer season than in 2020, even if we don’t return to a 162 game schedule. As usual, I’ll dive into my projection methodology (detailed in Projecting X 2.0) by sharing my process on several hitters and pitchers.

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I’m continuing my attention on fringe starters. They are the starters who once the season starts, managers are going to have to make a quick decision on adding or dropping. These pitchers will be in play all season. I’m using NFBC’s ADP and starting at the bottom and selecting any starter drafted by half the teams. Here is an evaluation of the six more starters (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6).

#596 Jaime Barria

Barria is a steady below-average MLB starter who should be streamed in half his starts. Here is what  is known about him.

• His 7.5 K/9 wasn’t ideal, it was at least paired with a 2.5 BB/9.
• His fastball velocity increased just a bit (91.7 mph to 92.1 mph).
• He’s flyball prone (34% GB%) so he could give up a decent number of home runs (1.6 HR/9 on his career).
• He’s got an average four-seamer (8% SwStr%) and slider (14% SwStt) and an ineffective sinker (3% SwStr%) and changeup (9% SwStr%). He needs to ditch or improve the last two (22% usage).

The same upside exists with him with just about every other pitcher. Throw harder. Improve or add a pitch. Ideal pitch mix. Until he shows an improvement, just stream him against weaker opponents.
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Many thanks to Derek Carty of RotoGrinders for his assistance on this article, and for his player notes on a few 2020 player projections.

In my previous article, 2020 Projection Systems Comparison – A Game Theory Approach, I compared several excellent projection systems in terms of fantasy baseball profitability for 2020. It was not the typical statistical comparison, rather – I used a game theory approach. This was the third such annual article that I had put forth in evaluating projection systems.

Earlier this year, Derek Carty unveiled a new version of his already excellent THE BAT projection system. The new system is called, THE BAT X. The major innovation of THE BAT X is that it incorporates Statcast data into the fold. You can read more about THE BAT X works in Carty’s introductory article found here on the pages of FanGraphs.

I have typically evaluated THE BAT within my 2020 Projections comparison. With this season (despite the short duration) as the inaugural run of THE BAT X – Derek asked me to take a deeper look into how his new projection system had performed. To do this, I went back and revisited the same game theory methodology applied to THE BAT X. The initial results look very promising for the young system.

In this article, I will go through what had changed between THE BAT and THE BAT X as far as the game theory simulations. For a few of the largest and most impactful player performance differences, I will also include some analysis from Derek Carty himself as to why THE BAT X made those adjustments. Read the rest of this entry »

I started diving into the dividing out the effects of injuries limited ramp time for the short season and didn’t get far. Some league-wide rates didn’t add up. Hitters who head to the IL are outperforming the healthy population.

Note: This analysis is math-heavy. I summarized my findings and questions at the end.

To start with, here are the league-wide OPS values for all nonpitchers as I compare the first month as players might have been ramping up.
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Introduction

Back in 2018, I introduced a game theory approach for comparing baseball projection systems. Proudly, the article was nominated for Baseball Article of the Year by the Fantasy Sports Writers Association (FSWA). The game theory methodology is now back for its third straight year.

This approach is not the standard projections comparison analysis that most others embark on. The typical comparison makes use of some type of statistical measure. The standard analysis involves calculating least square errors, performing chi-squared tests, or perhaps even hypothesis testing. My method does not use any of these capable methods.

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Introduction

On June 23, Commissioner of Baseball Robert D. Manfred, Jr. announced that Major League Baseball would begin its 2020 regular season on July 23^rd. It submitted a 60-game regular season schedule for review by the MLB Players Association. The proposed schedule featured divisional play, with the remaining games being played against their opposite league’s corresponding geographical division.

That 60-game proposal came to fruition. It was an unusual season to say the least. The St. Louis Cardinals did not play a game from July 30^th through August 14^th. Doubleheader games were all seven innings each, and extra innings started with a runner on 2^nd base. The designated hitter was in effect for the National League, and so on, and so forth. In the end, the season came and went, and the Los Angeles Dodgers were crowned as champions of the Fall Classic.

Now we are squarely in the midst of the baseball offseason. Most fantasy baseball players are on holiday from their annual game, eagerly awaiting one of the most important ingredients to their annual draft preparation …

Projections.

For many (including myself), player projections are the backbone that form the strategies and planning for the upcoming fantasy baseball season. Understanding how player statistics are forecasted for the coming season is the essential part of fantasy preparation.

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