Archive for Projections

The Reds are a playoff team with a pretty good outfield, but one man is lurking in the background, preparing to steal all your bags, and possibly your heart. The Reds have some decisions to make this offseason, and one question facing them is “what the heck do we do with Billy Hamilton?” In celebration of Hamilton’s spectacular and otherworldly speed, the present offer sought to present some possible outcomes to the most handsome reader.

What you will find below is a possible fantasy line for Hamilton, listed in the following format: AB/HR/R/RBI/SB/AVG. After each line is presented for your viewing pleasure, two numbers follow. The first is the value of that fantasy line in standard mixed leagues, and the second is the value of such a line in NL-only leagues, both of which are calculated by the intrepid author’s own special spreadsheet derived from 2013 Steamer player environment. While fantasy drafts deal in whole dollars, cents are presented to show the differences before rounding.

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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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Brooklyn, New York — Toss the hype aside. LJ Mazzilli has quietly, steadily put together an excellent professional debut season.

After the Mets drafted him out of UConn in the fourth round, the son of former Met Lee Mazzilli, was rushed into the spotlight of a media blitz.

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Chris Davis owners are experiencing an unexpected surprise this season. Instead of a possible corner infield or injury replacement, they have one of the top players in the league for pennies on the dollar. On the other end of the spectrum is B.J. Upton who Ron Shandler picked to have “40/40 upside”, but is in the discussion has the worst everyday player in the majors. Going into the 2013 season, Davis and Upton were projected to have similar production because of a uncertain skill set and the similarities ended then.

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When the Wil Myers hype train started, he had no flaws. He walked almost as much as he struck out, he struck out less than the league average, and though he wasn’t a catcher any more, he looked athletic in the outfield, and his power was to drool for. That was probably 2010. Since, he’s been traded, and a possible flaw has emerged — his strikeout rate has increased steadily as he’s advanced. That’s not great news, but with him up today, it’s worth trying to ask the numbers what might be in store for Myers.

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Back when we launched FG+ earlier this year, I included a table that put dollar values on players for year one and future year ottoneu leagues. Since then, I have mentioned a few times that I wanted to refresh those values with new projections.

Well, I have auctions coming up the next two weekends and finally got my act together to get my spreadsheets in shape; today, I release them into the wild!

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As a FanGraphs reader, you are no doubt familiar with the many projection systems we display statistical lines from on the player pages of the site. These are fantastic models and I have mentioned many times how big a fan of the Steamer pitcher forecasts I am. Unfortunately, it is thought that these systems only have around a 70% accuracy rate, which may or may not seem high to you. The belief is that any additional factors added to the computer models will barely move the needle, so hope for an 80%+ success rate should probably be given up. That said, there are many reasons why these models cannot become better at projecting players, and it doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that we are dealing with human beings and no matter how much data we have, sometimes that .001% event happens. Projection systems have weaknesses and they are pretty easy to identify. Let’s discuss them, shall we?

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It’s been over a week since I shared my last Pod Projection, so let’s get back on the saddle. Easily tallying the second highest number of votes was Max Scherzer. Clearly, Scherzer set your heart aflutter when he posted that 2.69 ERA in the second half. Funny, it was just the luck pendulum swinging the other way, rather than any change in skills, as his xFIP was very similar in each half. On to the projection we go.

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Your voices have been heard. Tallying six big votes for the next pitcher to be Pod Projected was 2012 breakout starting pitcher, Jeff Samardzija. I owned him in all of my leagues last year after scooping him up post-draft during spring training and I know how to spell his name without looking it up! Impressive feat, I know. So what will the “Shark” do for an encore?

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Last Thursday, fellow RotoGrapher Chris Cwik tried to make sense of Justin Ruggiano’s half a season breakout performance last year. Chris primarily focused on historical comparables and concluded that it is unlikely that Ruggiano will continue to enjoy above average offensive performance. Looking at historical comparables is a good idea and tells us that Ruggiano is indeed facing long odds. However, I want to take that analysis one step further and dive into Ruggiano’s specific skill set to determine whether he’ll experience a better fate than the majority of the group in Chris’ sample.

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