Yesterday, I unveiled my bold hitter league leaders, with the acknowledgement that these are a lot tougher to hit than the generic Bold Predictions. The pitching side of the ledger is a bit easier, but still difficult, of course. Given that there is more luck and factors outside the specific pitcher’s control involved that shape his surface results, it’s more conceivable that a non-favorite leads the league in a category.

In an effort to avoid double dipping and naming the same pitcher in two categories, there may have been a slightly better bold choice for a particular category. I opted to come up with different names in each. Also keep in mind that it is difficult to balance boldness with realistic. I eliminated many names that I didn’t think were bold, but maybe you do. I also eliminated names that have no real chance at leading in the category.

Read the rest of this entry »

• As expected, the Astros looked towards Luke Gregerson with their first save chance of the year and he rewarded the team with a clean save, throwing a perfect inning along with a strikeout against the Yankees. Ken Giles threw in the eighth allowing a solo shot to Didi Gregorious but otherwise looked effective, striking out two. Giles’ velocity (96.4 mph) was in line with last season and I would expect him and Gregerson to comprise a darn effective end of game tandem moving forward.

Read the rest of this entry »

• It seemed like a safe guess that Ken Giles would be closing games in Houston after the Astros gave up some real talent (Mark Appel, Vincent Velasquez and others) for him this offseason but A.J. Hinch announced that Luke Gregerson will be the closer to start the year. Baseball wise this might be a solid decision, especially if Giles can be used more freely in the seventh or eighth innings in higher leverage situations.  Gregerson is no slouch though, having saved 31 games in 36 tries last year with a 3.10/2.86/2.71 ERA/FIP/xFIP line. For what it’s worth, Hinch said that Gregerson will be the “primary closer”, which doesn’t suggest a committee but Giles could see save opportunities as well.

Read the rest of this entry »

• The Phillies have not named a closer yet, and it’s not as if they have an answer and are not telling anybody. For now, our chart lists David Hernandez as the closer despite giving up a home run to the Phillies future squad. One time closer favorite Andrew Bailey has been demoted to the minors, along with Ernesto Frieri. Hernandez has appeared in 5 games this spring, and has surrendered a run in two of them. Dalier Hinojosa is not out of the picture to close games, but has struggled this spring giving up three home runs 8.2 innings. I’d avoid this situation unless you are in the deepest of leagues. Hernandez very strong numbers in Arizona in 2011 and 2012, so that would take some serious optimism to think he could get back to those numbers.

Read the rest of this entry »

• Well it didn’t take long for us to have our first closer controversy in 2016 as John Gibbons announced that Roberto Osuna will be their closer on Opening Day. After trading Ben Revere for Drew Storen this offseason, it was assumed that Storen would be in the driver’s seat for the closing gig in Toronto but 2015 rookie sensation Roberto Osuna should take the job and run with it again. Adding insult to injury, after learning about his demotion from the closer’s chair, Storen allowed two runs in one inning of work yesterday. For those of you who had their drafts already, I’m sorry for your loss and you should try to convince the commissioner to hold the draft closer to Opening Day. For those of you who have not had their draft, please bump up Osuna’s value. While there is very stiff competition at the top of the relief rankings (these are a bit outdated and we hope to have an update soon), Osuna was darn impressive as a 20-year old and I could see him touching the top ten by the end of 2016.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ottoneu founder/creator Niv Shah once described Ottoneu as an economic system that just happens to be built for fantasy sports.  The entire platform is finely tuned to bring the stats, rules, and interface together to provide an excellent overall gameplay experience perfectly suited for baseball nerds.

Nerds often like math (which is why baseball nerds love sabermetrics), so let’s spend some time digging into some of the math behind the game of Ottoneu.  This will be a blend of benchmarks and strategy, but overall the goal here is to create a reference for Ottoneu owners looking to win their leagues.

Ottoneu Basics

Read the rest of this entry »

Remember fantasy baseball before the PITCHf/x era? I fondly recall arguments over player valuations. “I think” was the primary selling point, usually followed by an outlandish projection based purely in wishcasting. Stats were found on ESPN or Yahoo. In other words, they were unsophisticated. Maybe you were already reading a fledgling FanGraphs where you could peruse any number of articles about how Player X will regress from high/low BABIP. We’ve all come a long way.

Nowadays, I can’t imagine evaluating a pitcher without the help of PITCHf/x. When another site asked me to rate dynasty starting pitching prospects, I basically told them it was a waste of time. There are the guys we already know about, i.e. Julio Urias. Then there is a mountain of muck to throw against the wall. Some of it will stick. Without minor league PITCHf/x (and MLB translations), I lack the necessary tools to find the next Jacob deGrom.

There’s another issue, and it’s the primary purpose of this article – pitchers are not static talents. Command can change suddenly, new pitches may be discovered, or the next Carlos Carrasco might spontaneously figure out how to use his already excellent repertoire. Previously dominant sliders can lose their tilt or hitters might adjust to a predictable high fastball.

Read the rest of this entry »

When your leaguemates start paying too much for closers, there’s only one thing to do – queue up your closer sleepers. The following is quick analysis of my favorite closers-in-waiting. You can use these guys as elite sources for holds or handcuffs to unstable closers. Yesterday’s post covered the NL, today we move to the AL.

Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve started our annual Depth Chart Discussions, re-branded as Playing Time Battles for 2016. You can catch up on every team we’ve covered in the Playing Time Battles Summary post or following along using the Depth Chart Discussions tag.

I know what you’re thinking about the Miami Marlins rotation, you’re all “Jose Fernandez and IDGAF about the rest!”, but there’s a chance for some sneaky upside behind the undisputed ace and top-10 (at least… he’s 6th among SPs in NFBC draft data) arm in Fernandez. The Marlins got just 64.7 innings from their ace last year so they were unsurprisingly below average as a unit. They finished 18th in ERA and FIP, 27th in K-BB%, and 17th in WHIP. A full season of Fernandez will go a long way toward improving those numbers, so the guys you so callously discarded will be instrumental to any success the Marlins have in 2016.

The battles such as they are in the Miami rotation are at the backend, but let’s talk about their #2 starter first. Wei-Yin Chen come over on a 5-year, $80 million dollar deal and while he was a nerve-wracking pitcher to have on your roster as part of the Baltimore Orioles, his outlook greatly improves in the NL and Miami, specifically. As an Oriole, he posted a 3.72 ERA in 706.7 innings with 31+ starts in three of the four seasons. Chen doesn’t miss a ton of bats and has home run tendencies, but he doesn’t walk guys which helps minimize the longball damage.

Camden Yards exacerbated the home run issue, but the AL Beast ensured that homers were an issue everywhere (1.3 at home, 1.1 on the road). His new home park alone is a massive upgrade on that front. Yeah, I know they moved the fences in and lowered them, but they aren’t turning it into a bandbox by any stretch of the imagination:

The big change will be to the right of the home run sculpture where the distance from home plate is being reduced from 418 to 407 feet.

Camden Yards has a three-year factor of 128 for lefties, 107 for righties on homers per StatCorner. Marlins Park is at 70/77, respectively, so even a big change (which I doubt is forthcoming) would still make it a much better environment for Chen. And that says nothing of the rest of the division which only has one HR-friendly park (Philly) compared to the AL East which only has one HR-suppressing park and that’s Fenway which severely curbs lefty homers, but is still hitter-friendly in runs.

Read the rest of this entry »

When your leaguemates start paying too much for closers, there’s only one thing to do – queue up your closer sleepers. The following is quick analysis of my favorite closers-in-waiting. You can use these guys as elite sources for holds or handcuffs to unstable closers. We’ll do the NL today and the AL tomorrow.

Read the rest of this entry »