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Sometimes you write a fantasy baseball overrated post and think, “Grey, you’re like Coolio but instead of Medusa braids, you got brains and such.”  Other times, you think, “You’re a Foolio who can’t even think of something to go with brains.  ‘And such?’  How about ‘dumb much?'”  With this Elvis Andrus overrated post, I legit don’t know if I’m being smart or stupid.  It feels smart, but maybe it’s a blindspot and I’m just being dumb.  It’s definitely not reassuring that I don’t know if I’m being smart or stupid by calling Elvis Andrus overrated.  Jerry Lee Lewis would definitely think it was smart, and might add in Elvis was also bloated.  “That Memphis porker grabbed my spotlight with his peanut butter-stained fingers and loosey-goosey hips.”  That was Jerry Lee Lewis at the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame.  By the by, Jerry Lee Lewis is alive, and only 82 years old.  That is news to everyone.  Never the hoo, I’ve never seen a career year that I couldn’t squash and Andrus’s previous year is no different.  Anyway, why is Elvis Andrus overrated for 2018 fantasy baseball?

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Yup, I’m going for the stars of schmohawks this year.  What fun is it pussyfooting around saying some guys are overrated whom no one is drafting?  By the by, there’s millennials right now squinting at my use of pussyfooting, thinking, “That’s not a very woke word.  Can’t we make that word more cisgender, non-binary?  How about codpiecefooting?  Ken Doll’s groinfooting? An innie-on-the-no-no-touch-area-footing?”  However you want to get to that word is on you.  Or is it “howmever?”  Never the hoo!  Carlos Correa is the latest guy to get clowned and frowned on.  To get the sour candy face.  To get the head nod, then when I pass them, I fart.  All that’s left to draft in the first two rounds is Mike Trout and Jose Altuve.  Mea culpa, my Latin friends.  Ain’t how I drew it up originally, but the more I dug into the numbers it was where I ended up and…*bangs phone*  Why did Waze take me down a dead end?!  So, what can we expect from Carlos Correa for 2018 fantasy baseball and what makes him overrated?

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*karate chops the air* HiiiiiiiiiiYA!  Chopping down overrated players with the quickness and I’ve set my sights on Tommy Pham.  Speaking of karate, you have to bow if your opponent bows, right?  So, I’d be a World Karate Champion by bowing non-stop with a sneak attack worked in.  They’d call me, Bowing Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and I’d be fierce.  *wavy lines signaling dream sequence*  I bow, opponent bows, I bow again and opponent knocks me out with one kick.  *wavy lines signaling end of dream sequence*  Damn, I can’t even make myself a karate champion in my dreams.  You know what?  I don’t need kay-ROT-té!  I have fantasy baseball!  However, what I don’t have on my fantasy baseball teams this year is Tommy Pham.  “Land mine, right ahead!”  That’s the remake of the Titanic after a nuclear holocaust and someone and someone accidentally merges the Titanic wiki page with Princess Di’s.  By the way, imagine watching Survivor after a nuclear war.  “Um, yeah, so they’re starving, so what?  So am I!”  Am I the only excited for the new season of Survivor?  Prolly, unless a time traveler from 2002 is reading this.  Any hoo!  I didn’t think I was gonna have to write this post, but I see some very smart fantasy baseball people being trip-wired by Pham, so I need to lift the haze.  Illuminate the love story in the genre-bending, The Crying Game, and make the world less Phambiguous.  Ignite a roadside flare in your brain.  So, what can we expect from Tommy Pham for 2018 fantasy baseball and what makes him overrated?

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I know the consensus opinion of the worldwide web aka internet aka 4chan aka Russian bots on Twitter.  Saying Aaron Judge is overrated is not going to be a popular opinion.  I may as well go to a Kiwanis club on vet night and tell them they fought in The Great War so we could now have Lady Doritos, then tell them I refuse to eat Lady Doritos until we have non-binary Doritos.  “This Spicy Not-Ya-Sex chip is delicious.”  That’s me eating non-binary Doritos.   On the bright side, finally, we can do a baby reveal party with Doritos.  That would be as popular as calling Aaron Judge overrated.  Walking into a Korean spa and telling the owners I was there to check for hidden cameras would be greeted more enthusiastically.  Standing behind the counter at Chipotle, announcing there’s no more avocados, would be greeted more warmly.  Saying Aaron Judge is overrated is a real pickle.  However, for Christmas, I got a sous vide machine and I’ve made pickles every weekend for the last six weeks, so I drink up your pickle!  I drink it up!  Wow, that sounds very wrong.  Keeping with the recurring theme that wasn’t recurring until right now, Aaron Judge is butter pickles.  Could be sweet, but I don’t like sweet pickles.  I like them shizzes sour.  Then again, I’m sour on Judge, so I should be all right with him; I’m not, though.  So, why is Aaron Judge overrated and what can we expect from him for 2018 fantasy baseball?

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So the title is a bit of a superlative.  What was I gonna say, “The Mostly Kinda Good Fantasy Baseball Team?”  You’ll get over your scoffing; I have faith in you.  This is the best 2018 fantasy baseball team that I can put together when drafting from my top 100 for 2018 fantasy baseball and top 500 for 2018 fantasy baseball.  Honestly, I could draft another 25 teams from those lists, and they’d all be different, but equally terrific… Well, one of the twenty-five would only be sorta terrific, but it would be really hard to tell which one that is.  If I took Cody Bellinger in the 2nd round, everything after would change.  If I took Arenado in the 1st round, everything after would change.  I’ve previously gone over my 2018 fantasy baseball draft prep for the first few rounds and pitchers pairings.  For this exercise, I’m taking Mike Trout first, because, well, I have him first overall.  Until pick 100, I’m taking one guy somewhere in every fifteen picks.  It would be nice if I was in a league where someone drafted Scherzer and Kershaw in the first two rounds and I was able to take Freddie Freeman in the 2nd round (which is very likely), but since Trout and him are in my first 14 picks, according to the rules I’ve set up for myself, I can’t take them both.  Then, as we all know, once you get into the 100s, there’s wide gaps between ADP and where players are actually taken.  People tend to look at team need over value.  So for this exercise, once I get to pick #101, I’m going to pick two players every twenty picks.  Finally, because there is so much latitude in the last 300, I gave myself free reign to fill up my team.  Throughout the draft, I also gave myself the ability to reach to a lower draft pick, but not reach forward.  Or reach around, if you’re feeling frisky.  It should still be my ideal team… Or not.  Let’s see, shall we?  Bee tee dubya, this team is 5×5, one catcher, 5 OFs, MI, CI, 1 UT, 9 P, 3 bench, just like the Razzball Commenter Leagues (go sign up).  Anyway, here’s the best 2018 fantasy baseball team:

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Here’s a post that’s gonna make you wanna slap ya mama and tell her Don Magic Juan sends his best.  The other day I told you how to draft your pitchers for 2018 fantasy baseball.  I laid it out to you nice and simple (if you have a degree in “What The Hell Is Grey Talking About?” Not a PhD, mind you.  Just a BS.)  Today, we forget all that jabberwocky on the who-ha and get down to business old school-style (which means if you don’t comprehend, I will hit you over the head with a baseball bat signed by Joe Clark.)  What I’m hoping to lay out to you is who do you draft 2nd if you’ve drafted so and so first.  I think it might be helpful to go through pairings for your 5 outfielders, all your middle and corner infielders too.  I’m not sure I’ll have the time or patience to do them.  We’ll see!  Or not.  Your choice.  (Actually, my choice.)  For easy reference, the royal we will be using the top 10 for 2018 fantasy baseball and the top 20 for 2018 fantasy baseball and the beginning of the top 100 for 2018 fantasy baseball.  I’m going to assume you’re in a 12 team, 5×5, MI, CI, 5 OF, 1 Utility, 1 Catcher league, similar to our Razzball Commenter Leagues. (Sign up for multiple leagues, and beat the heck out of your frenemies and random strangers!)  Anyway, here’s some pairings for the first two rounds of 2018 fantasy baseball drafts:

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Just finished my first draft if you’re reading this as I type it, and other than one shirtless man in yellow sweatpants standing behind me in this internet cafe, I don’t think anyone’s reading this as I type it.  Unless, of course, there’s micronauts living inside my brain watching as my inner monologue is sending info to my fingers.  Gadzooks, I got micronauts in my brain!  I wonder if these micronauts made me draft eight Twins and White Sox players.  I need to delve deeper into this subject.  Maybe I will in my pastel journal that is covered in Giancarlo’s picture from ESPN’s nude magazine.  So, I took on the monsters of the industry in an AL Only league that was hosted by Scott White of CBS and I came away with a team that is more imbalanced than Amanda Bynes.  This league is deep so hold onto ye old hat.  (If you want a shallower league, play against me and hundreds of your closest buddies in the Razzball Commenter Leagues.  Or closet buddies, if you’re reading fast and/or experimenting.)  Anyway, here’s my 12-team AL-Only team and some thoughts:

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“I’ll always remember 2018 as the year baseball’s free agents didn’t sign until February,” which is exactly what someone says after listing 3,500 things they’ll remember about 2018 before when baseball free agents signed.  J.D. Martinez finally signed in Boston for $110 million, after being previously offered $150 million, $105 million, $141 million, $15 million (this one was just to see if he was paying attention) and $300 million.  J.D. Martinez didn’t negotiate a contract, he was picking suitcases on Deal of No Deal.  “Howie, I’m going to take the #4 suitcase and give back the $150 million suitcase.”  *three days later*  “Well, that sucked.”  Yeah, I’m not sure what J.D. was doing.  His name is definitely not Just Deal, because he dragged his heels for three weeks and seemed to lose a lot of money, and bargaining ability.  Any hoo!  In the top 20 for 2018 fantasy baseball, here’s what I said, “Here’s what I would’ve said, had Martinez signed somewhere, “Sure, going to Chase Field for half a season in a walk year is like having some half-baked rhymes and getting to work with Dr. Dre.  You can throw out there a line like, “You think I’m being a cock with my rhyme, but I think chickens keep the thyme,” and that shizz goes triple-platinum even though no one but seventeen hipsters in Brooklyn buy albums anymore.  What do call a millennial that says ‘Bedford-Thighvethant?’  A lispster.  Take it, Highlights, it’s yours.  Being in Chase for half a season in his walk year was like being a nobody-nothing who is working an assistant job cleaning out potted plants that Weinstein just irrigated, then finding out you have a high count of midichlorians in your blood and you’re mothereffin’ Frank Skywalker, Luke’s other kid.  And you’re not Frank Skywalker like Frank Stallone, but you have some real qualities to add to the mythology.  That’s J.D.’s last year.  However (Grey’s turning the ship around?), J.D.’s able to hit wherever he’s played.  His home/away splits in his career are better at home, but everyone’s are.  It’s just easier to hit at home because you’re sleeping in your house, you don’t need to travel, you don’t have to tell the hotel’s front desk to please tell Archie Bradley’s room to be quiet.  Road scholars are rare, and are a little weird anyway.  Only thing stopping Just Dong, and what has also stopped him in the past is his health.  Other than subtracting 75 ABs from the bottom line, there’s not much we can do with that, i.e., I love J.D. but there’s injury risk.'”  And that’s me quoting hypothetical me!  As I said in the above blurb, Just Dong is who he is, and Fenway’s gonna be a lovely place for him to just, uh, dong.  With the signing of Just Dong, Hanley’s going to play 1st base, which means it will take one throw into the first base line for Hanley to lose his arm, and I lowered him in my top 20 1st basemen for 2018 fantasy baseball.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw this spring training for 2018 fantasy baseball:

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It’s the Winter Meetings, Part 2:  This Time Free Agents Are Really Signing.  Starring as Eric Hosmer is Turtle!

Starring as Wil Myers is your goofy friend from high school who now works for Enterprise Rent-A-Car:

Trailer Voice, “What if all of MLB’s owners weren’t in collusion….But just the rich teams!”  In the last few days, the Padres, Twins and Rays got some deals done, which is kinda like shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic.  Some ‘perts will likely move Hosmer down in their rankings, but I always assumed Hosmer would be a Padre, and ranked and projected him as one in my top 20 1st basemen for 2018 fantasy baseball.  There, I said, “Here’s what I will say when Hosmer signs, “I made the case last year that Hosmer was Joey Votto Jr.  I called him Kangaroo Embryo.  I just thought of a kangaroo wearing a Kangol, but I’ve never thought about an alligator wearing an Izod shirt, I’ll have to discuss this with my shrink.  At one point, Wil Myers said he’d move to the outfield for Eric Hosmer to come to the Padres, and I thought to myself, “If I were Hosmer, I’d tell Myers to please not do me any favors.”  San Diego is like the Trojan Horse of cities (for baseball and just visiting).  It’s like this, “Oh, man, San Diego is gorgeous.  What’s this, 77 degrees every day?  I can get used to this!”  Five minutes later, “I am bored out of mind.”  Five minutes after, “Damn, can we get out of here?”  Ten minutes after that, “If I see one more white person in flip-flops I’m going to readily embrace going to Tijuana.”  Any hoo!  Hosmer isn’t exactly a home run hitter.  His fly balls were goofy low last year for a guy with 25 homers.  He was the third lowest for fly balls (22.2%), fourth highest ground balls and the 29th lowest for Hard Contact.  He does hit a decent amount of line drives, and feels like a 23-26 homer guy with a few more fly balls.  He might be Kangaroo Embryo this year, but to emulate Joey Votto Jr. he’s going to need to elevate the ball more.”  And that’s me quoting future me!”  And that’s me quoting me quoting future me!  Anyway, here’s what else I saw in spring training for 2018 fantasy baseball:

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The Fantasy Baseball War Room is back!  I’m not saying the Fantasy Baseball War Room is back, as in, is a butt.  So, if Sir Mix-A-Lot is reading, I’m truly sorry for the confusion.  Our Fantasy Baseball War Room is one part draft tool, one part fantasy team evaluator, one part fantasy junkie’s s’s and g’s tool, one part holy, two parts smokes, three parts… How many parts is that so far?  Cause it’s only really seven parts total.  I think there’s one part kill-your-day-with-this-war-room-thing-a-maboob-as-a-pinwheel-spins in there too.  Essentially, this helps you practice building a fantasy baseball team.

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As the big market maxim goes, if you can’t draft ’em, sign ’em.  The Cubs have struggled to produce major league-ready pitching, and rather than rely on a solid, if unspectacular pitching staff, they signed Yu Darvish for a shizzton of money, though likely his going rate.  Speaking of which, have you heard all the whispers of collusion?  This one doesn’t involve Russians, unless Scott Boras has Russian ancestry.  Have to check 23 and Me for that.  This offseason seems to be dropping breadcrumbs towards a work stoppage in 2021.  Hopefully, I’m wrong.  However, when teams are making hundreds of millions of dollars, then refusing to pay free agents things start to look suspicious.  Not to mention, Derek Jeter seems to have shorted Marlins stock.  When you sell off the whole team to make $60 million in revenue sharing, eyebrows are raised.  Unfortunately, for Jeter, it wasn’t his eyebrows, because his forehead seems to be losing hair by the day, and he could use some raised eyebrows to cover that shiny dome.  Any hoo!  As I said in the top 20 starters for 2018 fantasy baseball, “Yu signed with the Cubs for $126 million.  If you just had Siri read that off to you, stop celebrating, and get off the phone with the Lambo dealer.  It’s not you you, it’s Yu Darvish.  Not saying this is everything, but I just looked at the park factors for Wrigley vs. Dodger Stadium.  I mean, I knew they were grossly in favor of Dodger Stadium for pitchers, but I just wanted to confirm.  And, what do you know, I confirmed it.  Darvish had a 3.44 ERA in Los Angeles in 49 2/3 IP, and, while Wrigley won’t be as gentle, it won’t be any worse than Arlington, where he played previously with success.  He feels like a richer Archer.  Call him, Robin Hood: Prince of Ks.”  And that’s me quoting me!  I also updated Darvish in the top 100 for 2018 fantasy baseball, the top 500 for 2018 fantasy baseball and the pitchers’ pairings.  Finally, Rudy updated his fantasy baseball rankings and Darvish moved up about 30 spots.  That reminds me of the DJ Khaled song produced for the Huffington Post called, Clickbait Drop.  I upped Darvish’s projections, and moved him into a more favorable tier, realizing I had been too harsh on him previously.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw this offseason for 2018 fantasy baseball:

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My esteemed colleagues at Yahoo have put out their 2018 fantasy baseball rankings.  I think I’m using the word colleague incorrectly.  Does colleague mean someone you’re in a league with?  Yes?  No?  Okay, let’s move on.  I might be using esteemed wrong too.  Know what?  We’re moving on!  The Yahoo 2018 fantasy baseball rankings are out; I’m sure about that after consulting with my hair stylist, Jeffrey, at SuperCuts.  I said to Jeffrey (don’t shorten it), “Do I have dandruff, Jeffrey?”  Jeffrey, digging through my full, lustrous mane, “Why do you think this horrible thing, Mr. Grey?”  I replied, “I saw how low Yahoo ranked Cody Bellinger and I began to demonically scratch my head.”  After a three-hour explanation of who Cody Bellinger was, what fantasy baseball is and the ins and outs of Yahoo fantasy baseball, Jeffrey responded, “That is not dandruff, Mr. Grey.  I shaved my hair and donated it to a sculpture at Miami’s Art Basel, and that Cody Bellinger ranking makes me scratch my head too.”  Thrilled I didn’t have a disease of the dry scalp, I was still left puzzled by some of Yahoo’s rankings.  So, I figured be a Pisces and jam.  For this post, I will be looking at the consensus Yahoo 2018 fantasy baseball rankings vs. my own 2018 fantasy baseball rankings.

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