If you don't sing Alec Bohm to Spoon's You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb, you are a better person than me. If you sing Alec Bohm's name to The Gap Band's You Dropped A Bomb On Me, you are a much worse person than me. If you sing Alec Bohm to B.O.B. (Bombs over Baghdad), then we're roughly the same person. Okay, now that we got those comparisons out of the way, let's talk turkey. Much like the turkey that Phillies fans will throw at Alec Bohm if he fails to live up to his prospect hype. I'm not going to recount here the 1200 words that Prospector Hobbs wrote about Alec Bohm in this Blind Resume Challenge. It's worth reading, if for no other reason than to see how well Hobbs wrote while wearing a blindfold. By the by, what kind of luck are we having that we add another prospect writer, because demand was at its peak in early 2020, and now we're living through a pandemic and demand is at its nadir? If not for any luck, we'd have no luck. Wait, I said that wrong. A second prospect writer adds some perspective, and I think that helps, especially here, since I don't think Prospect Itch and Prospector Hobbs necessarily love Bohm equally. If I may infer from digital words posted on Razzball, Hobbs seems to like Bohm better than Itch. Perhaps the major drawback for Itch and why he ranked him fairly low on his top 75 prospects for 2020 fantasy baseball was Bohm's lack of glove, and, with no DH in the National League, it hinders him. Did someone say NL DH? Well, now we are talking! (Also, JKJ went over some thoughts about Alec Bohm in his Universal DH: NL East edition. Am I the last one in the world to talk about him? I dropped a Bohm on me, baby...) So, what can we expect from Alec Bohm for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Monthly Archives: May 2020
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Is this the first time a woman had been on this show? Grey is this true? What's going on here... Anyway, Ellen Adair! You know her, you love her, she's on all your favorite shows (Homeland, Billions, and The Sinner), and she's as big a baseball fan as you'll meet. We talk movies, her work, and her new and very fun Podcast "Take Me In To The Ballgame". Where Ellen and her husband discuss the best baseball movies of all-time. Now, you know what this means. We talked Rocky movies for 20 minutes. Why does this have to do with baseball... nothing. But it's Grey, he never stays on topic. It's his superpower.
Check it out, it's the latest non-baseball related baseball podcast from your favorite idiots.
Spring Training Battles: Orioles Outfield
May 19, 2020 | 2020 Fantasy Baseball | 8 Commentsby: Thomas Howland
Rumors abound that the 2020 MLB season will begin sometime soon in some shape or form. And boy do we need real games, so much so that ESPN is showing our brethren in Korea live in the early AM hours. On the bad side, Blake Snell speaking out can go from praised to vilified in moments. On the good, spring is about hope, and hope right now springs eternal, especially in places like Baltimore. The Orioles are among many teams that can figure in a shortened season with a potentially expanded playoffs 'Why not us?'. They were dealt a blow with the Trey Mancini news. Ryan Mountcastle has the best chance to fill Mancini's shoes in the lineup, but he's at first base. So who is left to fill his shoes in the outfield?
Allow me to demonstrate my feelings on Aristides Aquino over the last 12 months:
"Meh, he's got some swing and miss tendencies, but I guess you can pick him up if your league is deep enough."
"Wow, Tuffy Rhodes ain't got nothing on this guy."
"Yes, absolutely pick him up!"
"Oh em gee, Aristides Aquino is the greatest GOAT of all-time. I will now call him The GGOATOAT!"
"I want The GGOATOAT to have my babies."
"Will I have baby GOATs with The GGOATOAT or Baby GGOATOATs?"
"Hmm...The GGOATOAT is starting to swing and miss a lot again. That could be a little bit of a concern."
The preceding was the tides of my thoughts in only two months of his playing time. Then, this offseason:
"The GGOATOAT is going to be way overpriced, but I still do like him."
"Wow, he's not overpriced at all, I wonder if he's worth a sleeper post?"
"Wait a second, he still has a starting job, right? I mean, this Shogo Akiyama signing won't kill that, right? Right?! Answer me, Internal Monologue!"
"They signed The Greek God of Hard Contact?" Extremely worried, "Um, can Nick Castellanos play shortstop?"
"Sorry, Cinderfellas and five Cinderellas, I'm dropping Aristides Aquino way down in my rankings since he will never play in that crowded outfield."
"DID SOMEONE SAY UNIVERSAL DH?!" So, what can we expect from Aristides Aquino for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
Points Leagues, What’s The Point?
May 18, 2020 | 2020 Fantasy Baseball, Fantasy Baseball Points Leagues | 4 Commentsby: malamoney
Hello? Are any of you still out there? Blink once if you can hear me. Blink twice if you need help. Blink three times if you want to blink three times. I had finally worked my reader count up from nine to fifteen (my math's a little rusty these days but me thinks that's about a 67 percent increase) and then this whole COVID-19 has to come along and derail my momentum. I had broken double digits and was on my way to twenty. Once I got to 19 I was going to call that group the MALAMONEY-19. This virus has certainly stolen my thunder. It has also stolen one of my favorite past times. Fantasy baseball. Not to be insensitive as I know this POS-19 has taken much more from people, but man do I miss the daily monotony of fun we call fantasy baseball. I'm really glad I busted my ass back in the first week of March to get my spreadsheet done. I'm sure it's helped about as many of you as the virus has. At least it's done, right? Or is it? If and when baseball returns I am clearly going to have to make some modifications. Playing time and projections are obviously going to be altered. I guess I'll cross that bridge when we get there.
Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Rays Baseball with Yancy Eaton
May 18, 2020 | All Podcasts | 5 Commentsby: Brent
Yancy Eaton (@YancyEaton), joins the show to talk Rays baseball and gives us his thoughts on what's happening around the league. We look into the Rays lineup, lethal rotation, and bullpen. Can Blake Snell put it all together to be a top 5 pitcher in the league? Will Nick Anderson get the majority of save opportunities in Tampa? Can Willy Adames hold on to the starting job when Wander Franco arrives? We answer these questions and more. We have some rapid fire questions towards the end of the podcast for Yancy as well.
So, I didn't expect much from this Patreon podcast, but, honestly, waking up Lenny Dykstra mid-nap to hear him say Ron Darling sucks d**k, well...I have to be honest here, this podcast is in the pantheon of nonsense. So, we get Lenny Dykstra on the show, for, I don't know, maybe 15 minutes. He's in the middle of napping-slash-having sex and he's also very, very angry with Ron Darling, but, other than that, it was a totally normal conversation where I say 1993 Phillies players names and Lenny says whether or not they did drugs with him. Ya know, standard stuff.
You see a girl across the bar.
She’s gorgeous.
An angel.
Maybe.
It’s dark.
Tough to see real well.
But one thing you can say for sure is there’s a human sitting across the bar in this post-rona scenario.
You’re eager to move a little closer, maybe buy a couple drinks. And who knows? Might be the start of something long term.
You can feel the competition looming. Lotta hungry eyes in the house. Can’t sit around much longer. Have to move in before you’re certain.
What I’ve just described is the free agent pitching pool in most dynasty leagues. It’s also the general pitching landscape between spots 150 and 200–this week’s focus point. The situation can seem dire most nights, but people get picked up all the time, and some turn out to be great finds.
A couple of weeks ago, I took a look at hitters who are being priced cheaper in 2020 than their 2019 stats would dictate. This week, it's time to assess Starters using the same approach.
Recency bias suggests that 2019 performance weighs most heavily in our minds when making 2020 decisions. That certainly plays out in many scenarios, but there are other players who's 2020 price is discounted compared to what just happened. I'm guessing that's mostly due to the prevalence of projection systems in player valuation. A good projection system should absolutely be the baseline for your 2020 valuations. But as we know, these systems are slow to pick up on skill changes. Three year weighted averages & regression to the mean helps the systems get the most players right; but it also means they systematically devalue 2019 stats. The goal of this post is to look at what just happened (2019 performance) and find places where the market (ADP) isn't pricing in those stats.
Hello, again. Time to wrap this baby on up with the NL East. I don't know what else to write here that I haven't in the other two pieces. Check out the NL West Edition and the NL Central Edition if you haven't already.
Just made myself another old fashioned, the wife is reading, and the kiddo is asleep. Let's do it to it.
Atlanta Braves
Probably not gonna surprise anyone with this pick: Austin Riley. Riley was having himself a very nice spring, but so was Johan Camargo, his competition at third. Now the DH solves all that - let the slugging prospect, well, slug. Camargo is the better glove, so there you go. Riley showed glimpses of serious power last season, bashing 18 homers in only 80 games. My lazy and mathematically-challenged brain would double that to 36 HR in 160 games just to give a very rough idea of what we're looking at. Of course, that's not sound fantasy advice nor very accurate given those were his first 80 games ever in the majors. We gotta look deeper. Deep dives are king! I'm no expert delver, but let's give this a shot anyway. He slashed .226/.279/.471 with Atlanta, but hit for a much better average all through the minors. I know that's not very telling, but I like to at least see if someone has shown ability to hit for average somewhere, sometime. The power last season was nuts - 127 games total and 33 homers. Looking at just his AAA numbers, in 2018 he hit 12 HR in 324 PAs, but launched 15 HR in just 194 PAs last year. Then came up to the bigs and hit 18 more. That's quite the progression in just a year's time. His isolated power was .182 in AAA in 2018, which is pretty solid (.200 is the baseline for "great" according to FanGraphs, though it fluctuates a little relative to league averages in a given year). Anyway, his ISO spiked to .333 in 2019, which is off-the-charts good. Yes, we're judging these numbers off fewer PAs than FanGraphs recommends, but whatever. You can see the power is there. Riley did his best Aristides Aquino when getting the call last season, slashing .324/.368/.732 with nine homers and 25 RBI in his first 18 games. Buuut in his final 62 games, he had almost the exact same production (nine HR, 24 RBI) and a yucky, yucky slash (.192/.249/.379). The 2019 AAA Riley struck out 20.1% of the time (his best anywhere) and walked 10.3% of the time; but alas, 2019 MLB Riley struck out 36.4% of the time and walked only 5.4% of the time. He still managed a .245 ISO in the majors, which is very damn good, but the rest of his offensive metrics definitely took a nose dive as the year went on. The batted ball metrics are great: 13.7% barrel rate, 44.6% hard-hit rate, and a 20.6-degree launch angle. Riley had 7.7% barrels per plate appearance, which would be top 50 in the league if he qualified. Better than Ketel Marte, Rafael Devers, Gleyber Torres, Max Muncy, and like a ton others, of course. Those are just some big fantasy studs that stood out. I think you all get the picture. Riley has the chops to be a fantasy force as is, but he's got improvements he needs to make. If a pitch is in the zone, dude swings like every time (okay, 80.5%) but also chased almost 38% of the time. If he can keep barreling balls and show some more patience, then whoa nelly. They've got Ronald Acuna Jr., Ozzie Albies, Freddie Freeman, Marcell Ozuna, and now this guy?!
Did one of you em-effers say something bad about Austin Riley and/or good about Johan Camargo? Because if you did, you're gonna have to answer to Bazooka and Cannon, which is what I call my biceps, as I point to them in a mirror, while wearing a burlap sack filled with limes, because if anything can kill Corona, it's limes. I'm a genius! You know how hard players are gonna push back on a universal DH? Imagine a feather pushing against Paul Donald Wight II aka Big Show. Unless I'm misunderstanding what a Universal DH is. "A Universal DH sounds amazing! I always loved The Mummy franchise! Can Brendan Fraser be the DH for the Marlins?" That's me misunderstanding a Universal DH. Why I say there will be no pushback on a Universal DH is because it means one more hitter getting stats, which is good for contracts. It's an unmitigated win for players. With a universal (still playing with capping it every time or only sometimes; feels like it should be capped, because it's such a big thing) DH (talk about a parenthetical interrupting the flow of a sentence, huh?), Austin Riley has to be at least near the top of the list of guys getting extra at-bats. Praise be, it's gonna rain sexy time in Hot Atlanta! Or will it...Let's take this sucker to 'graph numero dos...So, what can we expect from Austin Riley in 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him a great dart throw?
College Baseball Underclassmen Prospects: Part One
May 14, 2020 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 6 Commentsby: Hobbs
Over the past two months, I have immersed myself in the college baseball ranks and provided in-depth analysis in regard to which players to target in dynasty formats. As it relates to the priorities of my life, I refer to this project as the "Immersion Diversion," in which I neglect all other areas of my life for researching college prospects. This began with my top 10 college prospects, which then grew into a top 25 before culminating into my top 100 overall. Then, I was slammed with arguably the largest hazing scandal Razzball has ever seen, as some questioned in the comments why I failed to address the underclassmen in these lists. Was it solely due to an underlying hatred for the newcomers?
At the time, my response was two-fold: 1) the upperclassmen have added value due to the fact they will be attainable via first-year player drafts next off-season and 2) only those eligible for the 2020 MLB Draft come with complete and updated scouting grades. Not only do these scouting tools help us predict future MLB production, but they shed light on where players will be drafted, and where specifically a player is drafted goes a long way in determining said player's perceived value in deeper formats. What I'm saying is that no first-year player fantasy drafts have 10th round talents being selected. At least they shouldn't. Draft position influences hype, which influences who you and your league-mates target post-draft and beyond.
Still, this posed an intriguing dilemma. What about open world leagues, where everyone in the college circuit is readily available at present? In those cases, would I recommend Asa Lacy (2020 class) or Kumar Rocker ('21)? Would I advise anyone to pass on LSU's Daniel Cabrera ('20) for Colton Cowser ('21) of Sam Houston State? Over the next several weeks, I will begin revealing college underclassmen not yet eligible for the MLB Draft who I recommend deep-leaguers begin targeting NOW, beginning with five names this week to put on your radar.
