Archive for Yan Gomes

As I so often do, I ran some numbers through the z-score method yesterday. I ran each player’s 2015 numbers through as well as the Steamer rest-of-season projections and compared the results. Given the cumulative nature of fantasy production, I looked at each player’s production, actual and projected, on a per plate appearance basis to get an idea about who the projection system thinks is going to bounce back in the second half. Read the rest of this entry »

Here is Travis d’Arnaud before he was sent down on June 8th: .180/.271/.273/.241 (BA/OBP/SLG/wOBA).

Here is TDA after his return: .269/.315/.481/.346. He also tore it up (again) at Triple-A.

Here is TDA from August fifth onward: .280/.335/.510/.369. Yan Gomes, FYI, went .278/.313/.472/.340 albeit for the season.

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Congratulations to fantasy baseball players who drafted Yan Gomes in 2014. He’s batted .285/.321/.472, with 17 home runs, in 452 plate appearances. He’s been a top-five catcher-eligible commodity in standard mixed leagues. That’s not bad for the 12^th one of those drafted, on average, across the most well-known places to play, according to FantasyPros. The owners who landed him at Yahoo! or ESPN, where he was several spots lower on that list, if he was even drafted, feel a little extra special. Unless they play in 1-C leagues.

I’m not one of those people. I didn’t avoid him, but I didn’t target him, either, and aiming for Gomes appears to have been a smart move. Because of that, I kind of want to know what I was missing, and why.

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Using Razzball’s early 2014 auction values, the Cleveland infield comes in a tie for tenth for the most valuable fantasy infield. Four of their infielders are easily fantasy relevant, and they have a fifth that makes for an interesting late sleeper option at his position.

Jason Kipnis is responsible for about half of the fantasy dollars projected to be spent on Indian infielders ($26). Kipnis was the second most valuable second baseman last year according to both Zach Sanders’ end of season valuations and ESPN’s player rater. Sanders’ values had him as the 37th most valuable player overall, and he was 20th overall on the player rater. In his second full season, he stole 30+ bases again and had the exact same run total (86). He hit a few more home runs (17 from 14) and upped his RBI total (84 from 76). But the biggest improvement came in his batting average, which jumped from .257 to .284.

The thing that jumps off the page when considering Kipnis’ improved batting average is that it was accompanied by a 50+ point spike in BABIP (.345 from .291). But thanks to a BABIP-friendly batted ball profile led by a top 20 line drive rate (24.7%), Kipnis’ xBABIP was .352 last year. Automatically assuming Kipnis’ batting average will regress because of a high BABIP is a mistake. He has a career line drive rate of 23.5% and a career xBABIP of .341. A little bit of line drive and BABIP regression may be in order, but it should only result in a slightly lower average.

Another reason to potentially fear batting average regression is the rise in Kipnis’ strikeout rate (21.7% from 16.2%). The main culprits were a 6.3% drop in O-Contact% and being a bit too selective with the fourth lowest swing percentage and a 1.6% drop in his Z-Swing%. More strikeouts tend to make you think the batting average should drop, but the batted ball profile seems to be more determinant of batting average. Below is a list I somewhat arbitrarily created of the hitters with a batted ball profile most similar to Kipnis’ last year. As you can see, all but one of the six players listed had a healthy line drive rate, and Kipnis had the lowest batting average of that subset. The one guy on the list with a bad line drive rate had an ugly batting average. Read the rest of this entry »

Episode 90

The latest episode of The Sleeper and the Bust is now live! Jason Collette joins Eno Sarris to preview the San Francisco Giants and the Cleveland Indians.

As usual, don’t hesitate to tweet us any fantasy questions you have that we may answer on our next episode.

You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes or via the feed.

Thanks to Ian Miller aka Teen Archer, for the new intro music

Approximately 77 min of joyous analysis.

FSTA draft results mentioned several times in the show

Joe Mauer just hit the 7-day concussion DL, joining the likes of Alex Avila, John Jaso, Miguel Montero, and even Carlos Corporan as the list of injured catchers grows in seemingly exponential fashion. With a little more than a month to go in roto league and the playoffs coming in head to head play, you’re going to need to start filling in the blanks on your roster in order to press ahead and try to win your league. There’s probably not a whole heck of a lot left sitting on your waiver wire and what’s there probably doesn’t conjure up images of champagne corks popping and ticker-tape parades. But you need to make a move. You can’t go without a catcher even though the improvement you get might not be all that much. But at this point in time, something is better than nothing, so here are a few names to consider… Read the rest of this entry »

Back in early April, we took a look at a few catcher prospects that you should have had on your radar, both as long-term keeper prospects and potential 2012 call-ups in case something went awry on the major league level.  We’re a little more than a month past that first look and while none of them have set foot in the big leagues just yet, different aspects of their situations have changed and a re-visit seemed like a good idea.  Are they any closer to a shot in the majors, and if so, how long before we see them? Read the rest of this entry »