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.

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Making bold predictions is one of my favorite activities in advance of an upcoming baseball season. It allows me — and the other writers partaking in the bold predictions series — to identify the bandwagons we’re on (or perhaps even driving). While now is the time of fluffy stories about players being in the best shape of their lives and poised for career years, not all is rainbows and butterflies. Below, you’ll find a few not so friendly bold predictions, too.

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I present to you my ten bold predictions for this upcoming season. I’ve placed these items in order of increasing boldness to give you some sense of how likely I think these things are to occur, in hopes that they’re more actionable. The items toward the top of the list are more likely to happen but perhaps not as bold… But I get pretty far out there by the end.

10. Gerardo Parra finishes the year as a top 25 OF. I feel as though this is cheating. Not bold enough. After all, he finished as the 3oth best OF last year (by my calculations). And yet, he’s being drafted as the 53rd OF this season. The issue here may be the projected platoon role he’s in. But is Ryan Raburn really going to take a lot of playing time from him? And with the possibility of Carlos Gonzalez being traded, there are other paths to a full-time role.

In the days of declining batting averages and diminishing stolen bases, a simple 12 HR, 12 SB, and .290 season (his Steamer projection) really adds up in value. Not to mention the move to Colorado offers hope for even more offense. It seems like Parra is being drafted as the former utility outfielder he was with Arizona. He wasn’t sexy. Nobody wanted him. Hopefully putting him in the top 25 crosses the bold threshold.

9. Jose Altuve finishes the year as a top five hitter. Is that bold? I’m not sure. He finished last year as the 13th highest earning hitter and is being drafted as the tenth hitter heading into 2016. Projecting him to outproduce all of Anthony Rizzo, Giancarlo Stanton, Nolan Arenado, Manny Machado, and Carlos Correa to reach the top five does feel bold-ish. One of my favorite facts about Altuve is that he’s still just 25 years old. I suspect that many believe him to be older than he is because he’s been around for nearly four and a half MLB seasons. Why can’t he have a little more growth in him? 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.

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I am a huge San Francisco Giants fan. However, if you have followed my work prior to joining Rotographs, you know I hate Gregor Blanco. I will explain further. Read the rest of this entry »

The Pod Projections are back! My projections are based on the methodology shared in my eBook Projecting X 2.0, and the process continues to evolve and improve.

Let’s rewind to spring training of 2015. It was one in which the hype became deafening for Taijuan Walker. He pitched 27 innings, allowing just two runs, for a microscopic 0.67 ERA. His underlying peripherals (ya know, the spring stats that might actually matter) were strong too, but it was most certainly that tiny ERA that took Walker from sleeper and breakout candidate into that risky territory in which he has to break out just to break even for his fantasy owners. So how were his new owners rewarded? With a luscious 4.56 ERA. Oops. His skills were excellent though and he managed to post a more respectable 3.69 SIERA. So is this the breakout year?

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I’ve been batting over .300 on bold predictions for a while, and I’ve also been getting crap for not being bold enough. So, in the honor of So So Def, I’ll stop slacking on my pimping, and I’ll turn it up.

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It’s time for another (and perhaps final) comparison between my Pod Projections and Steamer. Today we’ll look at another starting pitcher who I am significantly more bullish on by ERA than Steamer.

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3/14/16

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live!

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Strategy Section: John Smoltz on Pitching

• His amazing nickname before “Smoltzie” (3:05)
• Evolution of arsenal (4:05)
• Success of FB/SL guys (8:00)
• Slider manipulation & movement (10:30)
• Best way for FB/SL/CB guys to succeed w/out changeup (13:40)
• Did the slider or splitter tax your arm noticeably (16:00)
• Postseason pitching as a stress factor (18:00)
• The SP-RP-SP transition (19:25)
• Closer vs. Setup/Middle Relief warm-up patterns (21:33)
• Today’s Elite RPs as Potential SPs (24:10)
• Preparation Needed for SP-to-RP Switch (27:12)
• Command (28:50)
• More ideal: 1 Dominant Pitch or Diverse, Lesser Arsenal? (37:00)
• Two SPs on the Rise? (39:00)
• Nola v. Rodon (41:33)
• March Madness Tips [spoiler alert: take MSU!] (44:00)

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Keeper leagues are fun. But one of the hardest things to predict is rookie pitching performances because there are so damn many moving parts on a big league staff. Below are three arms that have very high ceilings but no clear path to a big league job this April. Still, their talents suggest they could be impact players for their respective clubs in 2016.

Jose Berrios, RHP, Twins: Minnesota is loaded with young bats but the club has yet to see the fruits of its (development) labor on the mound. That could change if Berrios impresses the coaching staff enough to break camp with the big league club. Just 21, the Puerto Rico native made 12 starts in Triple-A during the second half of the year. In total, he threw 166.1 innings — a fairly large number for a young arm so he could shoulder a respectable workload in his freshman year. Although he has a modest frame and solid control, Berrios should not be confused with a soft-tosser or command artist. He has a firm fastball and could be an impact player for the Twins in short order. ETA: May

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