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Brash. Bold. Brazen. Beguiling. None of these words actually apply to this game we call fantasy baseball. Except for beguiling, because that’s what Grey’s mustache does to your brain when he’s giving you a good chin wag about Fernando Tatis. Keep waggin’, Grey! Today, we’re getting ready for the fantasy baseballer (<---Grey's mom's word) season by looking at my bold predictions for pitcher performance in 2021. So, grab a Bold Canada Dry, set the radio to "Lo-Fi Hip Hop," and turn your Hue lights to purplish-yellow. We're about to get bold in here.

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There’s a fair chance that a bunch of you readers out there are sitting upon a dragon’s horde-sized pile of gold right now after the GameStop madness of the last week. So, in the spirit of taking something that people don’t consider valuable and hyping it to the moon, I’m bringing you my latest Deal or No Deal article on yet ANOTHER Seattle Mariners pitcher. Wait! Don’t unfollow us! Remember the good times when Randy Johnson and F-Her were your Mariners stars? Take that level of excitement and then tamp it down to “medium reggae” while you get ready to draft your star pitcher at pick 150: Marco Gonzales.

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Let me set the scene: it’s March 2020. Grey’s mustache is neat and trimmed, and he’s been wearing his sun hat 24/7. “At least take the hat off when you shower,” Cougs says, and Grey looks longingly out at the ocean. “The sea is the only shower I need!” he says, with dreams of visits to sushi restaurants dancing through his head. Justin Verlander is a top 10 pitcher. Steven Strasburg is healthy. Marcus Stroman is ready to pitch for the Mets. Nolan Arenado is playing for the Rockies. Nobody has heard of Randy Arozarena or him kidnapping anybody…just Miguel Sano kidnapping people.

10 months later, and Grey still hasn’t taken that sun hat off. “It’s like a mask for my brain,” he says, holding a can of Lysol at his side. Grey loads up his 2021 rankings and hoses his laptop screen down with Lysol. “GET RID OF THE BAD TAKES!” he shouts, pointing at German Marquez. But as he loads the site, he sees something so wonderful, he puts the Lysol down on his desk next to the Bartolo Colon bobblehead. He takes his sun hat off for the first time in a year, clutching it to his chest, tears streaming down his eyes. “It’s beautiful!” he says. “It’s RazzSlam SZN. There’s hope for 2021!” he shouts, only to be interrupted by his Twitter alarm alerting of another EverywhereBlair hype piece about a Seattle Mariners pitcher.

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Monday comes around, and what do you want to read about on your favorite fantasy sports blog? Of course! It’s a pitcher who finished in the 140s on the Razzball Player Rater last year. This player won a solid 2 games in 9 starts while sporting a 5.17 ERA and is projected for a 2021 season FIP around 4.30 by every major system. Whew! Is it just me that’s getting sweaty in here, or is it the side-effect of my genetically-modified coffee? Who’s ready to get hyped about the second starter on the Seattle Mariners, Yusei Kikuchi? You are!

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The New York Yankees signed two-time Cy Young award winner Corey Kluber to a one-year contract worth $11 million dollars this weekend. Immediately the fantasy sports sphere on Twitter — which is really more of a rounded mound of a shape — well, analysts went Klu-razy with the news. A big-time player on a big-time team! Hooray! Stonks up and let care fly to the wind! I’m looking through rankings from various sites on Kluber, and people are absolutely Ku-losing it (let’s see if I can get one more pun in before the jump!). Even Razzball’s 2021 Steamer Projections have Kluber as SP22 at this point in the pre-season. With some big time sites considering Kluber in the 30s for SP — in other words, your 3rd starter in a 12-team league — it’s absolutely worthwhile to see if the stats are Klean or Kluttered. Ha! Four of ’em!

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What is up everybody!? It’s the pre-season reunion here at Razzball, and we’re coming back strong as ever to deliver you the hottest takes, the slippery-est snakes, and a crap-ton of Grey’s quality bakes. What? The guy likes to bake! But for cereal, if Grey ever offers to send you bear claws, don’t take him up on it! The Chinese authorities have been all over me after Grey mailed me a package of ursine talons. ENYWHEY. I’ll repeat this again when we’ve moved from January Grey into March Grey, which is not to be confused with the Greymarch for all you Elder Scrolls fans: Yours truly has taken on an editorial role across the baseball and football sides of Razzball. What does that mean? It means my deadly red cursor of editorial prowess will grace these digital articles for the foreseeable future, which is pretty foggy right now admittedly. Thanks be to Grey and Rudy and Donkey Teeth for entrusting me with the “Schedule” button, and I hope to introduce you to some solid new writers while welcoming the familiar Razzball crew that you know and love and definitely wouldn’t want to see star in Bridgerton. While we collectively wait for the start of the 2021 MLB season, let’s gather for some pre-season hype pieces and get ready for drafts.

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What is up everybody!? Welcome to 2021, which in the Chinese Zodiac is actually the Year of the RazzSlam! Now, in case you were not feeling in the fantasy spirit last year due to [waves hands around], you might not know what the RazzSlam is. Is it some kind of senior omelet at Denny’s? Is it a finishing move for a WWE superstar? Some kind of rap battle? No, my confused friend! It’s the biggest Pros-vs-Joes fantasy baseball tournament in all this land!

Ray Butler of Prospects365 won the inaugural RazzSlam, and if you’re looking for your chance to compete against the best minds in the fantasy baseball industry (somehow they included me in there…), take a look at the rules below and sign up!

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Inspired by JKJ’s recent lament on the St. Louis Cardinals, combined with my First Year Player Drafts informed by The Prospect Itch and Hobbs, as well as noted scout John Sickels’ “Shadow Twins” series of articles, I wanted to reveal my own mourning process for my beloved tolerated local sports team, the Minnesota Twins. More than just an elegy to the Midwest Monsters that could have been, the Minnesota Twins stand as an example of a team that dynasty fantasy managers might want to avoid, and the reason is rooted in the “real world” dynamics of the Twins’ ownership and management over the past century.

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“I released it, he’s swinging, and as he’s making contact, I’m like, “Oh boy, this is gonna hit me, and so I turn… and it hit me, and it actually ricocheted off my head…my ears were ringing, so loud that it was hurting my eyes.

“When I hit the ground, I just went straight for my hat, and ripped my hat off, and I was bleeding. From the time I hit the ground, it was really…kinda crazy. I just had this, like, amazing peace about me. It was like God was saying ‘Hey, you’re OK.’ It’s like, ‘I got you.'”

Robbie Ray, Interview with YMI, published March 12, 2019

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Hey all! It’s Blair, your 2020 Top 100 starting pitcher ranker. Glad you came along for the ride! Your fantasy season is over now, and hopefully you won the championship, or you made a dent in your dynasty league, or you just managed to stay a bit saner in the depths of the pandemic that’s been clawing away at us for the past six months.

Let’s get the business side out of the way first: if you like what I did with [waves hands around] this series, hop on over to the subscription page and get an ad-free subscription to support me and Grey  and Lauren Holt and Coolwhip and MattTruss and JKJ and, and, and. If you’re not in a place to grab a subscription, then tell your friends about us, or share Razzball content on social media, or, well, just say thank you in the comments and I’ll give you a virtual high five.

Since there’s no longer traditional fantasy baseball going on right now, my weekly series at Razzball is more or less done until spring training. If you want my advice on DFS or dynasty leagues or whatever, feel free to ping me on Twitter, or leave a comment at the bottom of this page, or ask one of the many other talented writers here on Razzball what their opinion of your situation is. Otherwise, I’ll provide some updates on player profiles throughout the winter and I hope you keep coming around to check them out.

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I’m freshly back from The Hotties, which is the annual Razzball award ceremony for the “hottest taeks” in fantasy baseball. With the sharp-toothed piranhavirus in full swing, Grey called for a “Mask-erade” ball, but the Eventbrite invitation auto-corrected it to a “masquerade” ball. Everybody showed up with the wrong parts of their face covered. I thought Grey would be upset but he seemed to take everything in stride, saying that he had been waiting for this day since “Eyes Wide Shut” was released. Is that a movie or a novel or a contact delivery service? Anyway, Grey started giggle-whispering “Fidelio!” at everybody. Hey, Grey, I get it. Fidel Castro liked baseball. Let’s get with the times!

I did manage to record Grey’s speech to all the writers and Instagram models who attended. Here’s the transcript if you want to read it:

“I’ll get right to the point: I’m proud to announce a new partnership between Razzball and the San Diego Padres. 2021 will be known as STAN DIEGO around here, and all hot taeks will involve Padres players. The top 10 pitchers? Lamet, Davis, Clevinger, and Paddack [audible hissing from the crowd]. The top 10 hitters? Tatis, Machado, Grisham, and Myers. Trevor Rosenthal is a top 30 pick. You will all write sleeper articles on Joey Lucchesi, Adrian Morejon, and yes, Eric Hosmer. [pause while Grey dodges thrown masks] Fear not, for STAN DIEGO comes with perks! You will all get a free hot dog with a purchase of an annual pass to Sea World, and you’ll get a personal tour of the tiger enclosure at the San Diego Zoo. Now, writers, start hyping Jake Cronenworth!”

At that point, all the people Grey whispered “Fidelio” to disappeared into Grey’s private grotto, which he named “50 Shades of Play” because of the underwater mini-golf course he installed. Myself? I was left standing in the foyer with a mysterious note that only said, “MacKenzie Gore, 2021 hot taek.”

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Hard to believe, but my first season as a baseball analyst here at Razzball is almost at an end! For athletes, that means they’re leaving the bubble soon. Us fantasy writers? We’re all bubbled-up to protect from the dreaded Piranhavirus. Oh, you don’t know what that is? See, we’re so forward thinking here at Razzball, we’re already sequestered away for the next pandemic. You may be asking, “How does the Razzbubble work?” Well, future victims of piranhas, let me show you my notes from earlier this summer when I bubbled up.

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