Archive for midseason

If March is bold prediction season and October is bold prediction review season, then somewhere in between is bold prediction check-in season.

As always: you don’t care about this introduction, just the midway results. But, also, as always: I try to use bold predictions as an exercise in using hard data (and a little bit of blind faith) to make actionable recommendations for leveraging market inefficiencies to your advantage. While it’s fun to predict Christian Yelich might hit 60 home runs (he might!!!), it doesn’t change your opinion about him very much, whereas a bold prediction about, say, my little king Jeff McNeil might have encouraged you to draft him ahead of his lowly average draft position (ADP) of 298th overall (34th among second basemen), per National Fantasy Baseball Championship (NFBC).

Unlike past seasons, I actually remember some of the bold predictions I made, which makes me excited to review them. At the end of each prediction, I’ll assess the percentage probability of it hitting come October. Let’s dig in.

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Bold predictions are inherently jovial, whimsical, outlandish, possibly even blasphemous. You know you probably weren’t bold enough if you got too many correct, and you probably were too bold if you got too many incorrect. Mine typically follow suit. I don’t expect to get every prediction correct by the numbers, but I do hope each prediction is correct in spirit. My “spiritual” success in this regard, I’ve noticed, typically reflects upon how well my teams performed in a given season. Accordingly, I take my predictions seriously, and I sincerely use them as a collective barometer for how I had gauged value plays in the preseason.

I don’t remember any of my predictions, really, and I’m revisiting them in real time with you. My teams are doing well this year — 1st, 2nd, and 3rd in my three home leagues (humblebrag) (no expert or high-stakes leagues this year) — but I have a feeling my predictions have not stood the test of time. Again, this is to be expected. But, again-again, I’m not sure they’ve held up spiritually, either.

Here goes:

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As part of some midseason RotoGraphs shenanigans organized by Brad Johnson, the Birchwood Brothers (aka Michael and Dan Smirlock) invited me into the Birchwood Derby, a midseason re-draft league. A post-draft recap seems appropriate, mostly because this was my first midseason re-draft ever.

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