See all of today’s starting lineups
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I have waited a very long time to say this, Happy Opening Day! Now, with that out of the way, let's get down to business. Your H2H league has drafted, we have an 11-day Week 1 (in most formats), and I am here to help you tighten up those categorical needs to help you win every week. In this weekly segment, I am going to give you some players that can help you win your categories. Contrary to ROTO, you need to strike while the iron is hot on a week-by-week basis! While I would love to help you out in your 6-team 15x15 with caught stealing and crotch grabs, I am simply going to look at Runs, RBI, HR, Wins, and Saves. The Ratios will get some love here and there! Without further ado, let's get started!
You’re traveling through another dimension -- a dimension not only of coaching decisions and slow catchers but of plate appearances. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of your lineup slots. That’s a signpost up ahead: your next stop: the stolen base zone!
Not too long ago on this very site, I wrote an article about which catchers had the slowest pop times and worst caught stealing percentages.
Even less long ago I wrote about which team managers allowed their players to attempt the most stolen bases.
Now comes my honors thesis at the Grey Albright School for Fools: which players each week are on a team run by a manager who likes to steal bases AND are facing a catcher who isn’t great at throwing out runners!
DraftKings Sportsbook has recently released a ton of awesome future bets. They have all the classic ones like odds on the World Series champion, AL/NL pennant odds, and odds on the Divisional Champion. You can also get wagers on the over/under win totals and the likelihood of teams making the playoffs. For players, you can bet on all the major awards such as MVP, Cy Young, and Rookie of the Year.
However, some of the most fun bets are the head-to-head future odds for players and teams. Currently, DraftKings is offering wagers on which player will hit more home runs and which team will have more wins in the regular season. These are some fun wagers that you can make some big bucks on.
My final final final final draft of the year. Believe it was four finals, might've been five finals. Finally, the final final, as we extend our arms and coax into the 2021 fantasy baseball season. HalleBerrylujah, we've made it. Since this is my fourth or fifth final final draft of the season, I decided to throw everything to do with ADP out the window.
I mentioned at one point in the draft, I wonder what a draft would look like if all players were simply listed alphabetically rather than by ADP, or some arbitrary ranking by someone I don't trust. It would likely mean at least one person would autodraft Andrew Abbott, but besides that I think it would change the entire draft landscape. Whether people want to believe it or not, they are influenced by the in-draft rankings. When it says a player is the next hitter or pitcher off the board, they don't sit there for very long. Well, except for Sixto Sanchez in our league who went in the last round to Coolwhip. When you ignore ADP, it feels. Dot dot dot. Freeing. The most YOLO of drafts incoming. Anyway, here's my RCL draft recap, 12-team mixed league:
So it's the last of the last week of Spring Training, what could possibly go wrong? This weekend of a slew of injuries and demotions went down across the league. And perhaps hit hardest was the outfield. It wasn't just a middling outfielder or lower-tier guy that was struck down, but Superman himself Eloy Jimenez in one of the premier offenses for this season, and World Series hopeful White Sox, whose massive chest was torn asunder while trying to fly. The shining white knight became as Icarus with his wings burnt up for flying too close to the sun (or wall in this case). The folly of man triumphs over his dreams once again, no? The sweet lullaby of babies rocking ends with a tumble from the heights of Mt. Olympus to the pit of Hades. On that happy note, hopefully, this report doesn't find you circling the drain in the Well of Souls... let's begin!
Welcome to the first non-ranking podcast in what seems like two years. Phew, am I glad to be done with that. In celebration Mr. Albright and I cover actual up to date news and hammer home a few points before the season starts. We talk closers, we talk demotions, and we talk some sleepers breaking camp with the big club. It's a bento box of baseball goodness. Get excited the boys are back!
Hey friends, can you believe it? It’s our last deep-league dive before the season starts. I don’t know about you, but I still have a couple drafts left – and after another long off-season, the last thing I want to do is miss any late injuries or spring training position battle surprise outcomes as I’m trying to get all of my rosters together this week. So, let’s press on and take one more look at a handful of players whose stock has risen at least a little bit of late, to the point where they may now be more prominently on the radar for those of us in NL-only, AL-only, and other deep leagues.
We’re winding down on draft season now, with official games starting on Thursday. I am giddy for baseball after being pretty “meh” on the whole thing last year. This is the last Tuesday without baseball for some time (I hope!) and I’m here for it. We’re sitting at 46 Razzball Commenter Leagues right now (less than last year, but draft SZN is about two months shorter too) and all but four of those have drafted as of this writing. ECFBL, one of our longest running legacy leagues, is drafting late Wednesday night. Nothing like waiting until the last moment. If you didn’t get in on the fun, well, there’s always next year, don’t procrastinate so much next season! Speaking of fun, I had fun going over the ADP data by taking a look at the ADPs of all Grey’s Sleepers. Even though the ADP Sheet is Razzball-centric, it can still give you some interesting tidbits of information. So, let’s do some last second cramming for those final drafts and see what we can see.
I'm a big fan of the everyman. I consider myself the everyman. I'm every man's everyman. A pioneer of normcore. Track pants and a blinking light on my car's dashboard that either means my seatbelt isn't on or I need oil. That is me. What better way to elevate the Everyman Culture, than to take part in a tourney where no one is smarter than anyone else. Enter the RazzSlam, a Best Ball tourney. Every everyman likely knows what a Best Ball league is, but, if you don’t, it’s when you draft a team and the computer manages it for you by choosing who are your best players, and you get those stats. It’s basically one fantasy league removed from the robots taking over and killing us all. Well, the last laugh is on you robots, there’s a virus beating you to the punch! Kinda love that Razzball is putting on a tourney (hosted by NFBC -- thank you!) that no one really has any clue how to strategize against. A true everyman experience. Oh, I'm sure there's a few people who think they know the best strategy for, uh, Best Ball, and a few of them might be right, but there's an under 1% chance they know why they're right, and it isn't just luck. In some ways, Best Ball leagues are a lot like Best Ball strategies. Throw a ton of them out there and a few good ones will rise to the top through sheer force of players' performances and nothing you're actually doing. That's the fun. Anyway, here’s my RazzSlam, a 42-round, Best Ball 12 team draft recap:
I walked down a dark hallway of Razzball Headquarters, some corner I had never been before. The walls were the color of aquarium gravel. I squinted in the dim light to verify that I had the correct office. I knocked on the door and peeked my head inside, seeing the Fantasy Master Lothario himself, Grey Albright, sitting in an office chair behind of a well-built desk. The image of Don Draper in a sweater-vest.
"Everywhere!" he said, wringing his hands excitedly. He put his hand out for a shake. I reached for it, but he pulled his arm back as if almost touching a hot stove. "Nah-ah!" he smiled and wagged his finger. "Not in the time of Covid!"
Nearly five years ago I went live with a post entitled Nostradumba** which was a piece of software I developed to help make fantasy baseball predictions. At first it was a disaster, recommending I draft Reggie Jackson and other inactive players. Realizing that wasn't going to cut the mustard, I made a few tweaks that seemed to get the system running more smoothly, enabling me to make some less ridiculous dart throws. Earlier this year I cleared out one of my MacBook Pros so that my daughter could use it for remote 2nd grade. The school gave them all sh!tty Chromebooks that might have been less powerful than George Michael's Sports Machine. While getting the MacBook setup, I found Nostraduma** and decided to bring it back to life. Here's what it had to say.
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