Top 100 Fantasy Prospects for 2012: Coming Soon
Like, next week.
Archive for Stock Watch
Plug-n-Play Candidates
Every week, every team gets a day off, usually on Monday or Thursday. On those days, it is nice for a fantasy owner to be able to put a player into a lineup that may add a few counting stats without hurting the team’s batting average. Zach Sanders coined these players: Plug-n-Play. These are players that have full-time jobs, but don’t have much power and don’t accumulate a ton of Runs and RBIs. Usually they hit lower in the lineup and their only fantasy attribute is batting average. I decided to look at some Plug-n-Play candidates for 2012.
ADP: Bottom Feeder Gems
Mock Draft Central’s ADP (Average Draft Position) is created by getting the ADP from the last 14 days worth of drafts. Here is a look at some players that are getting drafted too low, in my opinion, from Mock Draft Central’s most recent rankings.
Johnny Giavotella (Rank: 406, ADP 317, Drafted 4.5%)
Johnny looks to be in the running for a prime batting order position, second, in the Royals above average lineup. Last season Melky Cabrera had a top 40 fantasy year from this spot. Johnny will get a long look to see if he is the answer at 2B for the Royals or do the Royals need to find someone else to fill that position. Look for him to be a nice sleeper.
Hughes and Burnett: Stock Way Down
With the Yankees trading for Michael Pineda and signing Hiroki Kuroda this past weekend, the fantasy values of both A.J. Burnett and Phil Hughes took huge nose dives. While both did not even have decent 2011 seasons, they were looking to rebound in 2012. With the additional pitchers added, Hughes and Burnett should have little fantasy value to start the season.
CC Sabathia is entrenched as the ace of the staff. Ivan Nova should have one of the other spots in the rotation locked down. Pineda and Kuroda will have the final 2 spots since the Yankees inclined to show off their shiny new toys. Only one more spot is left to be filled. Even when one of the two wins the job, it will be just the 5th spot and likely skipped over a few times throughout the season. The other pitcher will probably be regulated to long relief. While both struggled last season, there are some positive signs for them this up coming season.
Kuroda Fantasy Value Drops With Yankee Signing
By signing with the Yankees, Hiroki Kuroda’s fantasy value took a huge hit. He has had a few good seasons with the Dodgers putting up numbers near 3.50 ERA, 7 K/9 and 2 BB/9 in the weaker league. The 37-year-old has not had much of a history of time on the disabled list, so he should be expected to throw the entire season.The Yankees get a good starter, but his overall fantasy stats will suffer for a few reasons. He will get a boost to his fantasy value from his teammates, but it will not be enough to offset the downside.
First, he is moving from the National League to the American League. There is probably not much difference in the leagues now in overall talent, but there is some. He will have to face a designated hitter every game instead of a pitcher, too. AL DH’s hit for a triple slash line of .266/.341/.430 while NL pitchers hit a staggering .142/.177/.184. He should expect to see his WHIP and ERA take a hit because of the DH. Besides the extra hits, DHs strikeout less than pitchers (18.1% vs. 32.5%) and walk more (9.7% vs 3.4%).
Other than the disadvantage of having to face a DH, most of the teams he will go against will be from the AL East because of the unbalanced schedule. On average in 2011, the other four teams in the AL East scored 4.7 R/G. In the NL West, Kuroda faced teams that averaged 4.05 R/G game. The competitive AL East could put a dent in his ERA. The dent will grow further by pitching his home games in New Yankee Stadium. It has a 108 batter’s park factor while Dodgers Stadium only has a batter’s park factor of 98. He should expect to see a 10% jump in run scored against him because of the new home park.
Not all is lost with the move to the Yankees. He will have the rest of the Yankee team to help him out. First, the Yankees are generally a good defensive team with with team UZR 20 points higher than the Dodgers in 2011. This will help limit some hits and runs. Second, the Yankee’s bullpen should give him enough support to keep any lead. Last season the Yankees’ bullpen had a 3.12 ERA while the Dodgers had an ERA of 3.92. Finally, the Yankees’ offense should be considered on of the league’s best by scoring 5.4 R/G. He will get good run support and a decent number of Wins.
In all, Kuroda should see a worse ERA and WHIP and some drop in strikeouts because of signing with the Yankees. He should see an increase in wins, but it will not be enough to offset the drop in the other three categories. Good move by the Yankees, bad move for Kuroda’s fantasy owners.
Danny Hultzen, Fernando Martinez, Andrew Brackman: Prospect Chatter
In this edition…
How a Japanese pitcher could push back the No. 2 pick’s ETA, why F-Mart landed in the right place and whether a former first-rounder has any hope in a new org.
Early ADP Undervalued AL SPs
January 12, 2012
A couple of weeks ago, and probably way too early, I couldn’t help myself from taking a peek over at the average draft position values at Mock Draft Central. I then identified a bunch of pitchers I thought were overvalued. This time I will look at the opposite side of the ledger and take a gander at who appears to be undervalued. I used the AL-Only league ADP values so I could look deeper into the pitcher pool.
Prime Lineup Position Battles: Royals and Reds
The higher the position a player is in a lineup, the better their fantasy stats will be at the end of the year. The player will get more PAs and therefore more opportunities for counting stats. Also, the team’s best players are grouped together at the top of the lineup and will create more RBI and Run chances. The key 5 spots for hitter to see a jump in their Runs and/or RBIs are the 1 to 5 spots. Today, I will look at 2 such battles on decent run scoring teams, the Royals and Reds.
Royals #2 Spot
Last season, Melky Cabrera thrived batting second for the Royals. He scored 102 times and had 87 RBIs on the league’s 10th highest scoring offense. This off season he was traded to the Giants, so the position has reopened for the Royals to fill.
Brad Peacock (again!), Ryan Flaherty and Addison Reed: Prospect Chatter
In this edition…
A second take on Brad Peacock, a first look at a couple of Ryans and another reason rookie Addison Reed could be the White Sox’s new closer.
Michael Taylor, Liam Hendriks and Simon Castro: Prospect Chatter
New year, new roles. That’s the 2012 outlook for a few prospects who are nearly big league-ready but now have to figure out where they stand in the wake of some recent transactions.
In this edition…
What the re-signing of Coco Crisp means for a former top prospect, why getting Jason Marquis is — gasp — a good move for the Twins and how the other side of the Carlos Quentin deal could play out.
