Welcome to the kickoff of our 2017 rankings. We’re going position by position this week and next with our initial roll out of rankings. We will update these in March based on Spring Training activity and injuries.

We’re using Yahoo! eligibility requirements which is 5 starts or 10 appearances. These rankings assume the standard 5×5 categories and a re-draft league. If we forgot someone, please let us know in the comments and we’ll make sure he’s added for the updates. If you have questions for a specific ranker on something he did, let us know in the comments. We can also be reached via Twitter:

• Paul Sporer
• Jeff Zimmerman
• Mike Podhorzer
• Brad Johnson
• Justin Mason
• Al Melchior

There will be differences, sharp differences, within the rankings. The rankers have different philosophies when it comes to ranking, some of which you’re no doubt familiar with through previous iterations. Of course the idea that we’d all think the same would be silly because then what would be the point of including multiple rankers?! Think someone should be higher or lower? Make a case. Let us know why you think that. The chart is sortable.

If a ranker didn’t rank someone that the others did, he was given that ranker’s last rank +1.

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Today we are kicking off our series on ottoneu FanGraphs points league rankings. This year the rankings will include values from myself, Joe Douglas, and Chad Young. We are presenting our individual dollar values, the average of all three individuals, plus the ranking of that average. In addition the tables below include ottoneu eligibility (5 games started/10 games played in the prior year). Players are ranked at their most valuable position, and the hierarchy we are using is C/SS/2B/3B/OF/1B (with 3B and OF being a coin toss in terms of replacement level, we chose to include 3B/OF eligibles at 3B).

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So far in my Tout Wars preparation series, I’ve documented the league’s draft tendencies and the stats needed to win. Today, I’ll create the framework for player pricing. Along the way, I will show how there is no position scarcity except with catcher. At least for this league

Completing this step brings the preparation is laborious, but necessary. Once it’s done, I can spend most of my time evaluating players and their projected playing time.

For evaluating players, I utilize the Standings Gain Points (SGP) method. I previously outlined the procedure and it‘s the same method Larry Schechter recommends in his book, Winning Fantasy Baseball. Normally, this procedure is fairly straight forward since I’ve historically used three-year average values. Last year’s offensive explosion complicates the math. With more offense available, home runs, Runs, and RBIs become less important. Predicting 2017’s run scoring environment is impossible so I won’t for now. I feel I need to use a weighted average system with 2016 getting the most weight but I am just not sure how much to weight them. To get the process started, I will use the average standings from 2014 to 2016 for this work.

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Just yesterday, I mentioned I was happy to get Michael Pineda in the 19th round in Lindy’s mock draft. I am not a believer he can quit getting hit around so hard and therefore lower his ERA near his FIP. I do though want the pitcher with a +9 K/9 and a walk rate under 3 BB/9.

Using NFBC average draft position data, Pineda’s is getting picked as the 230th player off the board but he has gone as early as 184th. A spread of 46 picks is about three to four rounds depending on league size. I created a simple spreadsheet to help an owner know the chances a player is still available at each of their picks thereby knowing when to wait on a player or immediately pick them up.

Merging an owner’s personal projections and the current ADP is probably one of the most important processes in a preparing for a draft. It takes some time (which I understand not everyone has) but it can give an owner a nice leg up on competition. These owners understand when they can get 5th round values in the 12th round.

In past articles, I demonstrated how to go through each round and use ADP to see which players may or may not be available. I would sort of gamble on when a player may go using the earliest and average pick. By setting up a spreadsheet to calculate the normal distribution using the draft pick data from NFBC.

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I have been playing in dynasty and keeper leagues as long as I have been playing fantasy baseball. There is something satisfying about being able to attempt to build long term contending teams and scour the wire for future talent. I also find that they stay the most active from the beginning to end of a season and in the off season. For a fantasy junkie like me, that is a fix I often need. However, there is a dark side to leagues like this…

*Cues the gloomy music* Read the rest of this entry »

As we close out 2016, we’re nearing that point in time where we look forward to what the future holds and then solidify commitments about changes we plan to make.  From a fantasy perspective, there are few things to look forward to more than the annual Ottoneu auction, so whether you’re anxiously anticipating your very first or are committed to improving upon your second or tenth, preparation is everything.  As in life, you rarely get the chance to make a second first impression, so recovering from a poor draft can be a challenge that plagues you all season long.  

I covered the mechanics (many of which have since been upgraded) of the Ottoneu auction last year here.  We’re still roughly one month from the keeper deadline (1/31), but today I want to offer some practical suggestions (especially for those new to the game) for how to begin preparing for your auction draft.  If you’re thinking about playing Ottoneu for the first time in 2017, leagues are forming daily here and here.

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Actually Read This Intro

Today I have a weird thought experiment. You’ll need to pay attention for a moment. Back at the start of November, I secretly began my Way Too Early Rankings with a post about relievers. This article. As I was about to schedule it, friend Eno requested me to post my rankings in order (i.e. C, 1B, etc.), and kindly furnish End of Season rankings first. So this article was mothballed for two months.

What follows is that same article, unedited. I have provided commentary to my commentary in italics. The lesson is pretty simple – relief pitchers can experience rapid shifts in value. Now, let’s return to two months ago…

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Thus the series is concluded. Setting the reliever replacement level in the FanGraphs auction calculator is tricky. I did my best. You may think the values smell fishy, in which case you’re free to tinker with them. The top names certainly look correct, but it’s a bit jarring to see players like Kelvin Herrera and Dellin Betances score so poorly. Maybe that’s just a reflection of me and my biases. I expect Herrera and Betances to tally $8 even without earning saves.

In case you’re just tuning into this series for the first time, I recommend going back in time and starting from the beginning. Luckily, you won’t need a time machine. The post on catchers has notes on important methodological changes. You can also go straight into the calculator to tweak values for your league.

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Jon Gray.  Alex Bregman.  Michael Fulmer.  Edwin Diaz.  Yoan Moncada.  Willson Contreras.  Josh Bell.  Blake Snell.

The young players listed above are hot commodities right now in keeper leagues like Ottoneu. These players are the building blocks of hope for many eager fantasy owners looking to turn the corner from rebuilding to contention over the next season or two.  Each of these players were also well outside the top 50 prospects listed in Chris Mitchell’s KATOH Top 100 prospect ranking posted almost oneyear ago.

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With the calendar turned to December, the “Way Too” portion of the title feels  incorrect. Still, we have a series to finish so let’s get down to business. This is the seventh of eight volumes in the Way Too Early Rankings collection. Pre-Order the complete edition now – it makes a great stocking stuffer! You can find outfielders and links to the rest by following a link.

As a reminder, these rankings represent my first reactions rather than a truly rigorous approach. I’ve used an absolutely objective technique called mental math to compile the lists. I’m assuming a standard 5×5 format.

The purpose of this exercise is two-fold: to get an early start on 2017 rankings and to crowdsource missing or misranked players. That’s where you come in. Let your thoughts and feelings be known in the comments. As we’ve done in previous editions, we’ll break this into digestible chunks.

Starting pitcher is the deepest and most difficult position to rank. I’ll be focusing written analysis on the players who most interest me. There’s a very high likelihood some players have slipped through the cracks. I think we’ll have a lot to talk about in the comments.

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