Fantasy Baseball Advice

In the 2009 fantasy baseball rankings, we already went over 2009′s top 40 outfielders.  But like Jacques Cousteau once may have said to his underachieving son, “That’s not deep enough.”  There’s more outfielders to draft than there’s members of the Wu-Tang Clan, so we take it to the top 60 outfielders for 2009 fantasy baseball.  If you think there’s no value to be found this deep in the position, ask someone who owned Nate McLouth, Jacoby Ellsbury or Milton Bradley last year.  Anyway, here’s the top 60 outfielders for 2009 fantasy baseball:

41. Jayson Werth – This is the first tier.  This tier goes from here to Juan Pierre.  I call this tier, “Guys I like, but they have caveats.”  As for Werth, will he still be… *pinkie to mouth* Worthwhile?  He should be.  In Citizen’s Bank, Werth should be good for at least 17 HRs and he can chuck in 17 steals, as well.  The one caveat is he might hit .260.  2009 Projections:  95/17/70/.270/17

42. Coco Crisp – Well, hello, Mr. Cereal.  I already went over Coco Crisp for 2009 fantasy.  2009 Projections:  90/12/60/.280/25

43. Xavier Nady – 2008 was a career year.  Nady could go 25/90 in 2009.  He’s not hitting .300 again.  2009 Projections: 80/24/90/.275

44. Conor Jackson – His 2009 projections can be found at the top 20 1st basemen for 2009 post.

45. Fred Lewis – With the bunions behind him (no, “bunions behind him” is not a euphemism for hemorrhoids), he’s ready to be valuable in 2009.  2009 Projections:  95/12/50/.270/25

46. Andre Ethier – In the top 4o outfielders post, someone asked where was Ethier.  I said, “Ethier hit 7 home runs in August and .462 in September, two insane months that don’t look like they’re going to be easily repeated.”  And that’s me quoting me!  2009 Projections: 80/17/75/.290/5

47. Mark DeRosa – DeRosa’s projections are in the top 20 2nd basemen for 2009 post.

48. Justin Upton – He’s very young still, but check this out.  To get you further jazzed, he led the majors with the longest average home run at 417 feet, according to “The Bill James Handbook.”  2009 Projections: 70/20/70/.260/7 but there’s lots of upside from those numbers.

49. Nelson Cruz – Went over him in a fantasy sleeper post.  2009 Projections:  75/25/90/.270/10

50. Adam Jones – Could be a younger, slightly riskier Coco Crisp.  Speaking of Coco Crisp, someone has the munchies!  2009 Projections: 75/15/60/.275/12

51. Shin-Soo Choo – Let’s call him a less stoned, more Korean Adam Jones.   2009 Projections: 70/16/70/.280/11

52. Rick Ankiel – Not sure how the Cards outfield is going to shake out, but at some point, someone’s going to have to make room for Colby Rasmus.  2009 Projections:  70/22/85/.260

53. Denard Span – I not-so-secretly hope Span fails miserably for Gomez’s sake.  Unfortunately (or fortunately if you’re Span kin — I said, spanking — hehe), I think Span’s here to stay, even in the Twins overcrowded outfield.  His batting eye was impeccable last year.  2009 Projections:  90/8/60/.285/20

54. Juan Pierre – This is a new tier.  This tier goes from here to Taveras.  I call this tier, “SAGNOF.”  2009 Projections:  Steals

55. Willy Taveras – I have two words for you…. Actually, that was six words to get to the two words so eight words… Well, technically, now I’m up to twenty-one words.  Anyway, Dusty Baker, that was the original two words.  Baker’s going to bat Taveras lead-off and let him run like crazy.  He might just get 80 Steals and 60 Runs.  2009 Projections:  Lotsa steals.

56. Mike Cameron – This is a new tier.  This tier goes from here to Kubel.  I call this tier, “The Forgetten Vets.” If Mike Cameron and Adam Dunn were invited to a pinata party, we can guarantee one of two outcomes:  no candy or a whole lotta candy.  2009 Projections:  70/22/75/.245/18

57. Nick Swisher – Swisher’s 2009 projections can be found at the top 20 1st basemen for 2009 post.

58. Hideki Matsui – I almost put Eric Byrnes here, but he’s old and he relied on speed.  Matsui will prolly get 400 ABs this year and produce solid numbers for a deep league.  2009 Projections:  70/18/80/.285

59. Randy Winn – As is the case with this tier, these guys offer little upside.  Winn is the epitome of that.  2009 Projections:  80/12/60/.290/17

60. David DeJesus – You have Kelly Johnson and the dealer is showing David DeJesus.  That’s a push.  2009 Projections:  70/12/75/.290/12

61. Jason Kubel – I just couldn’t resist adding one more name.  Some people may look at Kubel and say yawnstipating, I look at him and I say not that far from Jermaine Dye’s numbers.  2009 Projections:  80/20/80/.280

After the top 60 outfielders for 2009 fantasy baseball, there’s a lot of names, but here’s two that stand out:

Jeff Francoeur – There’s certain guys you can grab late to look for upside-slash-a bounce back year, Frenchy ain’t one of them.  I wouldn’t draft him with your team.  2009 Projections:  65/18/70/.260

Elijah Dukes -  The location is the car.  The scene is Dukes and Milledge carpooling to work.  Did you bring quarters for the toll? I thought you got some when you bought that BK Broiler.  Those are MY quarters! Screech to the side of the road.  2009 Projections:  75/20/70/.265/15 (<–not as optimistic as you might think)

We’re at the 1/4 mark for the first season of Fantasy Razzball – a fantasy baseball game where you try to manage the worst team possible – and we’re on our way to probably the worst collective stat totals ever seen in a Yahoo! public league. With team batting averages as low as .238 and ERAs and ERAs as high as 5.36, it’s no wonder that Alan Trammell keeps bugging us for a chance to manage one of these teams (See 2003 Tigers team totals).

The top 4 are closely bunched but the leader at this point is….me. That’s right. My team sucks more than the rest. Look at me, ma. I’m king of the third world!

No doubt my 48 point offense (out of 60) has prospered at the expense of the real-life lineups that employ my top two picks (Willy Taveras, Michael Bourn). The two of them have combined for 277 ABs and managed 40 Runs, 3 HR (all Bourn), 12 RBI, 60 Ks, and a .206 AVG. Multiply that by two and you’ve got one AWFUL season. Message to Cecil Cooper and Clint Hurdle: Keep those guys at the top of your lineups. Don’t ruin a good thing…for me!

In 2nd place is our amateur entry from Josh the Non-Blogger – Team DFA (Designated For Assignment? Destined For Awfulness?). He’s overcome surprising starts by Scott Olsen, Edwin Jackson, and Ryan Ludwick with draftees like Franklin Morales (6.39 ERA over 25 IP yet only 2 HR?), Jose Castillo, and Brendan Harris (.248/33 Ks/2 HR/9 RBI) and smart pickups like the one-time apple of my eye Eugenio Velez and Tom “I’m Punto’s Backup” Tolbert.

In 3rd place is April league leader Cards In The Attic. Coincidence that his drop from 88 to 78 points started around the time that Pittsburgh dropped the anchor of his staff (and an anchor on their staff) Matt Morris? I blog to differ.

The 4th team of the top quartet is Roto Professor – who is so dedicated that he scouts Razztastic performances in the minor leagues. He’s smartly banking on the Giant offense (Ortmeier, Durham, Winn) but needs to find more AB machines like Kurt Suzuki and Jason Bartlett to avoid the minimum AB penalties (He’s currently about 320 AB off the pace of 5200 AB – the pro-rated stats definitely have an impact…e.g., goes from 20 to 25 HRs after applying 80 ABs of pro-rated 35 HRs.)

Other notes:

5th place Mop Up Duty’s team is looking good (bad?) relying on high AB/low performance middle infielders like Julio Lugo, Felipe Lopez, and David Eckstein. Also liked their recent preview on interleague play.

Biggest gainer in the last 20 days or so has to be the Fantasy Baseball Generals moving from 10th to 6th. Their ridiculous 3.17 ERA / 1.17 WHIP finally regressed (progressed?) to the mean with a move to 3.78 / 1.27. Keep up the bad pitching.

Blogmate Grey has fallen to 8th place. Ha ha…you don’t suck!

The team fielded by the blog formally known as GOTOS – now FantasyPhenoms – is suffering from a roster full of benchwarmers. Stop spending so much time on your fancy new blog and pick up some every day players. Their team’s 14 HR boosts to 31 HR because of the minimum-AB penalties. (BTW, here’s an interesting rank of pitchers they did – a little stat wonky but good.)

And in last place, our occasional contributor Lou and his Defunct Baseball Lab. Defunct indeed. I think you have to spend less time writing about great fantasy baseball players and start reading my Razzball Spotlights!

Our mad experiment of a fantasy baseball game has come to life! Thanks to all the bloggers (and one non-blogger) that participated in the draft. Click here for the league members as well as blogmate Grey’s review of the draft. Here are links to other league members’ posts:

RotoProfessor

Fantasy Baseball Generals

Greener on the Other Side

Drafting the worst team vs. the best team possible proved to be a much tougher undertaking than standard FLB but it also proved more rewarding and entertaining.

A quick recap of rules before I go into my roster and draft strategy. It’s a 10 team mixed league universe with the standard roster of C/1B/2B/SS/3B/5 OF/UTIL/9P with 5 bench slots. Weekly roster changes.

Hitting:

AB (High = 10 points), R (Low), HR (Low), RBI (Low), K (High), AVG (Low)

Any team ABs < 5200 receive prorated stats @ 550 ABs of .320 AVG/120 R/35 HR/120 RBI/50 K

Pitching:

IP (High = 10 points), L (High), HR allowed (High), ERA (High), WHIP (High), K (Low)

Maximum – 180 starts

My draft strategy was to focus on low HR/RBI players with 500+ AB potential in the first couple rounds with preference toward typically strong positions of 1B, 3B, and OF. This surplus of AB with low power could hopefully be cashed in by using 300 AB platoon types in tougher to fill positions like CI and 4th/5th OF as well as support a high K player or two with good power stats. I also wanted to draft several multi-position players so I had flexibility when my craptastic players got the benchings they deserved. For pitchers, I focused on low K rate starters who have some job security (say, 2nd to 4th starter).

Time will tell if this strategy works out but I was very successful at executing it. See below for the draft results. I snagged three light-hitting OFs in the first four rounds (Taveras, Bourn, Owens) that combined for 4 HRs in 2007! Taveras and Bourn look like they should go for 900+ ABs and Owens should be able to kick in at least 300. I was also able to get 2 SS Razzball legends in Adam Everett and Cristian Guzman who are set to be everyday anchors. Was able to get versatile Brendan Ryan (2B/SS/3B), Esteban German (2B/3B/OF), and Pablo Ozuna (3B/OF) at good value. Snagged two K machines in Jack Cust (41% of 2007 AB!) and Mike Cameron (160 last year). Cust is going to feel like a big swinging dick in my fantasy OF – probably the same way Jack Clark felt on the 1985 Cardinals.

I didn’t take a pitcher until the 9th round but feel like I’ve got a number of guys who’ll be good for 20+ awful starts including Kyle Kendrick, John Denks, and two of the terrible Mariner trio (Batista and Washburn – Silva went early).

Here are the draft results & rosters. (Click on the image for better resolution)

So what do you think? Which team do you like the least, ur, most?

For years, Juan Pierre has given teams a boost in steals, a decent average and little else. Well, there’s going to be a new Juan Pierre and his name is Michael Bourn. Or maybe Willy Taveras was the new Juan Pierre and Michael Bourn will be the new Willy Taveras, or Michael Bourn will be the new new Juan Pierre. Now that that is muddled appropriately, let’s look at the new new Juan Pierre.

Michael Bourn will presumably bat first for the Houston Astros. A great place for a prospect that Baseball America pointed out as having the “Best Strike Zone Discipline.” Okay, not exactly Best Newcomer at the AVN Awards, but strike zone discipline is not a bad thing to have for a leadoff man. I’m talking to you, Granderson.

What made Baseball America bestow Bourn with such an honor? He had a career Minor League OPS: .855 (.426 OBP). To go hand and hand with his strike zone discipline, he has demon-like speed. In Low-A he stole 57 bases in 63 attempts – a success rate of over ninety percent. BTW, those 57 bases were in only 106 games. In one and a half years at Double-A, he was 68 for 84. Triple-A, a tidy 15 for 16. Last year on the Phillies, Bourn was used primarily as a pinch runner and stole 18 of 19 bags. In 119 at-bats in the majors, he registered a .348 OBP. Oh, and Bourn hit six homers in Double-A. Juan Pierre doesn’t have six homers if you combine ‘05, ‘06 and ’07 or almost 2000 at-bats.

Also, in this great featherweight match, Michael Bourn is more than four and a half years younger than Juan Pierre. Now nowhere will you find me endorsing you draft a speed-only type like Bourn, but if you find yourself in need of a quick boost of steals, Bourn will be drafted probably ten rounds later than Juan Pierre in mixed leagues. For that kind of value, avoid Pierre and grab Bourn.