Last season around this time I wrote an article showcasing a recipe that would help select starting pitching in drafts. I queried the heck out of a dataset containing 2022 end-of-season pitcher data and 2023 projected data, slicing and splicing the list down to an interesting group of pitchers, each having done or expected to do the following:

• A SwStr% in 2022 of at least 11%. (2022 MLB SP average – 10.7%)
• A K/9 projection (steamer) of eight or better. (2022 MLB SP average – 8.18)
• Positive pVals (Pitch Info) on at least two pitches in 2022.
• An ADP greater than 100.

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Introduction

In 2018, I introduced a game theory approach for comparing baseball projection systems. Proudly, the original article was nominated for Baseball Article of the Year by the Fantasy Sports Writers Association (FSWA). Today, I am proud to release the same in-depth research for the sixth consecutive year!

This is not a typical statistical analysis. There won’t be any Chi-squared tests, nor will I calculate Type I or Type II errors. Forget about mean squared errors or any hypothesis testing.

My methodology does not incorporate a statistical model. Instead, it looks to determine the profitability potential of each projection system by simulating what would have happened in a fantasy auction draft. It games the projections.

What do I mean by this?

Let’s think about what happens in a real fantasy [pun intended] baseball draft auction.

Suppose that Jared Cross himself (or anyone exclusively using the Steamer projections) walks into a rotisserie auction prior to the 2023 baseball season. Let’s say that Jared decides to participate in an NFBC auction league. Mr. Cross would take his projections and run a valuation method through them to obtain auction prices. He would generate a list that looked something like this …

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The Auction Strategy episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Jeff Erickson

Strategy Section – Auction Strategy

• General Auction Strategy
  • Rules to live by
  • Differences to snake drafts
  • Online vs. in-person auctions
  • Time of day
  • Other players’ tendancies
  • Looking around at the auction table
  • Most important items to keep track of during an auction
• Nomination Strategy
  • Have a purpose
  • Reasons for nominating who you are most interested in buying
  • Plan A / Plan B nomination
• Market Values
  • Assessing the market
  • AAVs / ADP$
  • Hotspots
• What to pay for players
  • Strike Prices
  • Paying more for players who fit your team’s build
• Money plan
  • Hitter / Pitcher % Split
  • Stars & Scrubs vs. Spread the Risk
  • Unorthodox strategies
• Money management
  • Pacing yourself in the auction
  • Buying out of “the break”
• In-draft adjustments
  • Tracking scarcities
  • Tracking inflation
• Bidding
  • General procedure
  • Starting bid
  • +2 bids
  • Bidding often
  • Timing of bids
  • Price enforcing
• Other tidbits
  • Pay attention to the other bids
  • Clogging the DH spot
  • Shohei Ohtani is still pitcher eligible
  • Need to get bargains

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Let’s start looking toward 2024 and dive into the projections that are now all available on individual player pages and on the 2024 Pre-Season Projections page. It’s pretty clear that the projection systems are all pretty darn similar, or you would see far more variation between forecasts for individual players. That doesn’t mean they are identical, of course, with some regressing certain metrics more aggressively, or perhaps using Statcast metrics more than others. I don’t know all the ins and outs to compare, so instead, we’ll just focus on the players that THE BAT X and Steamer disagree on most.

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The Starting Pitcher Preview (Part I) episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Nick Pollack

What’s new at PitcherList?

• PLV 2.0

Strategy Section

• Pitch arsenal
  • Is it better to have one elite pitch, or a few good pitches?
  • Pitch mix changes
    • Blind spot of projections?
    • How to know when a pitcher will be more successful?
    • What to make of a pitcher throwing a new pitch?
• Should we trust certain teams / organizations to improve pitchers?
  • Ryan Pepiot

Starting Pitchers

• General player pool observations
• 12-team vs. 15-team leagues
• Which is more important – securing ratios or strikeouts?
• Should you chase wins?
• How much of a discount do you need for an injury concern pitcher?

ATC Undervalued Players

• Starting Pitchers
  • Framber Valdez
  • Logan Webb
    • How to throw a screwball
  • Max Fried
    • Partial tear vs. full tear
    • Yoshinobu Yamamoto innings
  • Zach Eflin
    • Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week
  • Tanner Bibee
  • Justin Steele
  • Shane Bieber
  • Chris Bassitt

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The Middle Infield Preview episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Sara Sanchez

Strategy Section

• Risk
  • Should you minimize risk early on in drafts?
  • Should you increase risk late?
  • At what point in the draft do you worry less about risk?
  • How does league size / depth affect your risk propensity?
• The value of player consistency
  • Head to Head formats
• Pitchers with injury issues
  • Why do projections seem to overstate innings for risky starters?
  • Should you avoid injury risk pitchers all together?
  • Should you worry about your team’s aggregation of risky pitching?

Middle Infield

• General player pool observations
• Positing scarcity no longer exists
• Which price points to play at in 2024?
• What statistics should you get from the MI?
• Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week

ATC Undervalued Players

• Middle Infielders
  • Bo Bichette
  • Nico Hoerner
  • Gleyber Torres
  • Xander Bogaerts
  • Willy Adames
  • Nolan Gorman
  • Jeremy Pena
  • Vaughn Grissom
  • Jeff McNeil
  • Jorge Polanco
  • J.P. Crawford

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The Outfield Part II Preview episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Ray Murphy

First Pitch Florida

Strategy Section

• Projections
  • The basics of what goes into generating player projections
  • How should you use projections?
  • Blind spots of projections
    • What does the human eye do better than the computer?
• Pricing Players
  • SGP vs. Z-Scores vs. PVM
• Outfield Player Pool
  • General observations
  • Are there specific stats that you need to get from the OF position?

ATC Undervalued Players

• Outfielders
  • Masataka Yoshida
  • Brandon Nimmo
  • Cedric Mullins
  • Riley Greene
  • Taylor Ward
  • Bryan De La Cruz
  • Jung Hoo Lee 이정후
    • Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week
  • Austin Hays
  • Sal Frelick

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The Outfield Part I & Utility Only Preview episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Brian Entrekin

Strategy Section

• Snake Draft Strategy
  • General KDS Strategy
  • This year’s KDS Strategy
  • Mapping stats & positions in future rounds
• Outfield Player Pool
  • General observations
  • 3 OF vs 5 OF leagues
  • OF Stars & Scrubs approach?
  • OF Waiver wire viaiblity
• Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week
• Are platoon players viable to roster?
  • In which formats?
• Designated Hitter / Utility Only Players
  • Is it worth it to “clog” up your utlilty spot with a utility only player?

ATC Undervalued Players

• Outfielders
  • Yordan Alvarez
  • Michael Harris II
  • Nolan Jones
  • Bryan Reynolds
  • Kyle Schwarber
  • Nick Castellanos
  • George Springer
  • Teoscar Hernandez
  • Anthony Santander
• Utility Only
  • Eloy Jimenez

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The Catcher Preview episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Justin Mason

Strategy Section

• Catcher player pool observations
• Are catchers less valuable this year?
• 1-Catcher vs. 2-Catcher leagues
• Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week
• Can you effectively stream catchers?
• Can you / should you draft a catching pair from a single MLB team?
• Catchers who might recieve extra playing time as the designated hitter

ATC Undervalued Players

• Catchers
  • Salvador Perez
    • Will Sal Perez be a Hall of Fame catcher?
  • Willson Contreras
  • Keibert Ruiz
  • Jonah Heim
  • Logan O’Hoppe
  • Shea Langeliers

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The 1st & 2nd Rounds episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Frank Stampfl

Strategy Section

• Fantasy baseball resources
• Looking back at last year’s fantasy teams
  • Learning year over year
• Do not draft lists?
• Risk adjusting player prices
• Limiting aggregate risk on a fantasy roster
• Year over year consistency
• Drafting inexperienced players in early rounds
  • Elly De La Cruz
  • Corbin Carroll

Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week

1st & 2nd Rounds

• What should you accomplish in your first 2 picks?
  • Draft certain stats or a certain type of player?
• Do you need to draft an ace starting pitcher in the first 2 rounds?
  • When should you draft Spencer Strider?
• Overvalued players in the first 2 rounds
• Undervalued players in the first 2 rounds
• Other players who should be drafted in the first 2 rounds
• Ronald Acuna Jr. is #1
  • This year’s KDS should universally start with #1
  • Who to draft at #2?

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