A year ago, I developed a regression equation to estimate what a pitcher’s strikeout rate (K%) should be. That formula used a trio of strike type rates found at Baseball Reference, including a pitcher’s looking, swinging and foul strike percentages. While the original formula was a strong estimator, I have since tweaked it slightly.
There’s nothing I love more than a cliche for the title of a post.
Today I want to take a look at a few of the players who have seen some of the biggest drops in ownership percentage on ESPN.com so far this season. Because we’ve only played a few games this year, determining whether I think these guys should be snatched off the wire comes down to whether I liked them in the preseason. I put hundreds of hours into preseason prep work, so I might as well milk it for all it’s worth while I can.
Dillon Gee — 7-Day % Change: -27.6%
There was a point where four of the five most recent articles that showed up on Gee’s player page were written by yours truly. I loved what he did in 2012 when he saw a big spike in swinging strike rate which pushed his strikeout rate comfortably above league average. He also had a solid ground ball rate just over 50%, and he limited walks. But his ERA was north of 4.00 thanks to a strand rate that was in the lowest quantile among pitchers with at least as many innings as Gee. I was all over the guy with solid strikeout, walk and groundball rates going into 2013.
Gee delivered in a way with a 3.62 ERA last year. But he didn’t do it like I wanted him to. His swinging strike rate and strikeout rate fell back below league average to where they had been prior to 2012. His groundball rate also fell significantly as well, but his walk rate did hold. The main reason he was able to post a sub-4.00 ERA was a reversal of strand rate fortune. His strand rate went from 68.9% to 77.9%. To repeat his 2013 ERA he’ll either have to regain the above average strikeout and groundball rates or get lucky again. The good rates of 2012 seem to be the exception and not the rule, and you can’t own a guy banking on strand rate. Leave him on the wire, and use him as a streamer if the right matchup comes along. Read the rest of this entry »
Yesterday, I analyzed the five players most added in CBS leagues. Was the juice worth the squeeze? For the most part, no. Are fantasy owners also dropping players too hastily? It follows that if fantasy owners love to chase the hot player du jour, they also get too trigger happy when jettisoning players from their rosters. Let’s discuss the five most dropped non-injured players in CBS leagues. Are fantasy owners justified for their decisions and if these players are now available in your league, should you pounce?
While we’re generally quick to throw out early-season performance as a matter of small sample size, doing so universally risks throwing the baby out with the bath water, to shoehorn an expression into a place it doesn’t really fit.
While small samples generally aren’t very predictive or revealing of true talent – the quickest metric to stabilize is strikeout rate, which requires about 60 plate appearances to cross the 70 percent reliability threshold – they do matter. An 0-for-20 stretch can doom a player, a 12-for-20 stretch earn him a great deal of leash with a manager. Small sample sizes have meaning for many players.
A week into the season, a handful of players are seeing far more playing time than was expected. How they are performing in these small samples could very well determine the fate of the rest of their seasons.
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The CBS Sports league site has a Roster Trends section that is always interesting. I use it for the Deep League Waiver Wire column as it displays the ownership percentage of a select group of players. In addition, it provides a list of the most added and dropped players, comparing the current week’s ownership percentage to the next week. These lists provide a snapshot of what other fantasy owners are doing and could offer ideas for player pickups. So let’s take a gander at who is being added in leagues and determine whether fantasy owners have the right idea.
OK, so not really. In fact, if you don’t know Brad Ausmus personally, then he probably doesn’t even know you have a fantasy team, let alone care about it. But the headline is a good attention-grabber and you all know how I love to lure you in with the headline. But while we all know that real-life managers don’t make their decisions based on how they’re going to impact the fantasy world, some times it feels like that when you own a player or two on that team and you don’t agree with a decision…or potential decision as the case may be here. I’m talking about the idea of Ian Kinsler batting leadoff for Detroit this year while Austin Jackson is moved down to the five-hole, or possibly even lower. Kinsler? Really? Read the rest of this entry »
The real baseball aspect of the trade which sent Prince Fielder to Texas and Ian Kinsler to Detroit has been covered in detail here at FanGraphs. I will give a look at how the trade affects the fantasy value of the players affected.
Winners
Jurickson Profar, Ian Kinsler and Elvis Andrus playing time– The three-head Texas infield monster needed to be broken up. Many people thought Kinsler would have been traded or moved to the outfield last off-season. Kinsler and Andrus now don’t have to have give up atbats to Profar. Basically, the trio would be splitting up about 1350 PA three ways (450 PA each if evenly divided). Now each hitter can hope to have over 600 each if they remain healthy. Kinsler may see a small production drop because of the new home park (92 vs 101 RHH HR PF) not being as kind to right-handed hitters, but it will be off set by the increase in plate appearances.
It’s hard to believe that there’s only about a week and a half left of the 2013 regular season. Many of you are likely scrambling for wins and strikeouts at the expense of potential destruction to your ratios. As usual, there are a whole bunch of new or returning starters in the American League that may be sitting in your free agent pool. The question becomes: do I pick up the pitcher or not?
Adam Dunn’s batting average has never been considered great, but it has taken a nose dive over the past few seasons. More and more teams have been using a extreme shift on the left-handed hitter. Dunn has now decided to implement his own shift beating swing adjustment. The change has his batting average up, but at the cost of some home run power.
The 33-year-old has hit at or below the league average AVG over his career.
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.
