We all have different conceptions of what is/isn’t gross. I hate mayonnaise. It’s the most disgusting thing and the mere sight of it makes me want to puke. Mustard too. I can deal with ketchup, but sometimes it makes me gag as well. I know, I’m a freaking weirdo. I don’t care. I don’t care. Grossness is triggered by any of the senses. Some can’t stand the sight of toe jam, while others cringe at the sound of nails scraping a blackboard. Smell can make one float in the air like Pepe Le Pew or barf like Stewie Griffin. I traveled to Hong Kong many years ago with my wife and one day she brought a bag of durian into the hotel room. Once she opened the bag, the smell. The god-awful smell permeated the entire room. It was straight-up chemical warfare. I keeled over into a fetal position, put a pillow over my head, and held my breath. I would rather die than smell another whiff of that fruit. Then my wife kicked my balls and inserted a piece of durian into my mouth. O. M. G. Heaven. Bliss. Which brings me to Robbie Grossman of the Detroit Tigers. He looks like shit and probably smells like shit after playing nine innings, but is there some savory sweetness for fantasy that can induce a chef’s kiss?

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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See all of today’s starting lineups

# MLB Starting Lineups For Wed 8/6
ARI | ATH | ATL | BAL | BOS | CHC | CHW | CIN | CLE | COL | DET | HOU | KC | LAA | LAD | MIA | MIL | MIN | NYM | NYY | PHI | PIT | SD | SEA | SF | STL | TB | TEX | TOR | WSH | OAK

When I decided to name this piece the RP Thrift Shop I couldn’t get the Macklemore jam by the same name out of my head. So here I sit, wearing a fake mink coat, shaving the sides of my head. Like Mack I’m not looking to spend $50 on a t-shirt. I’ll take the 99 cent stuff that smells like R-Kelly’s sheets. Thus, the framework is laid. Let’s talk relievers. Maybe Ryan Lewis will drop a bomb chorus for us.

 

The Gucci shirt: Edwin Diaz

If you just look at Diaz’s 2020 surface numbers when you’re in the draft room you might click his name when it’s your pick. What those numbers leave out is how the Mets protected him from his Molotov throwing self for an entire month of a two-month season. Sounds exactly like someone you want to invest a top 100 pick on.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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‘Member the days when I told you that you needed a top 1st basemen and you shouldn’t look for sleepers at this position? Don’t remember? Prolly for best, leave more room in your brain to remember an excuse for why you didn’t exercise. Previously, I’d tell you to go to my top 20 1st basemen for 2021 fantasy baseball (not clickbait at all) and draft some top guys and stop fooling around with sleepers at this position. Of course, I’m malleable like Gumby and this year we need to look for sleepers at 1st base *ducks head*.  Whoa, someone threw a wrench into this! Fine, Pete Alonso and Matt Olson get my nethers ablaze, but 1st basemen dry up quick. As with other positions like the catchers to target (again, not clickbait), these are 1st basemen that are being drafted late. For the 1st basemen, I’m going with an ADP of 150 or later to be included in this post. Anyway, here’s some 1st basemen to target for 2021 fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Razzball Commenter League drafts are going off in full force!  It’s officially DRAFT SZN.  Don’t let the chance to play with your favorite writers and commenters in free leagues for an overall top prize pass you by!  Almost every spot is taken in our first round of drafts, but we’ve added more!  Based on comments from you all we’ve added another draft for our European friends and a few more money leagues.  With the drafting of leagues comes the return of the RCL ADP spreadsheet!  Now we can really dive into the data and over-analyze to our hearts content.  From the spreadsheet you can see all the RCL ADP data, the ADP over time as well as a breakdown of round 1 data.  Ronald Acuna is dominating the number one draft pick so far (10 of 11 leagues) and 15 different players have made a first round appearance.  Granted, we only have 11 leagues worth of data to comb through, but it’s a start.  Go sign up for a league drafting in the next couple weeks and contribute to our data pool.  The more data, the better I always say.  It’s so easy to sign-up, it’s really just one click!  Use it as a mock draft that is actually useful.  We drafted the Writer’s League this weekend and will be covering it in the coming weeks.  Today, we’ll be going over how to approach your pitching in the RCL format, hopefully to get you prepped for the first draft of the year.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

If you were here last week for Your Favorite Rookie Sleeper’s Favorite Rookie Sleepers Volume 1you might remember we were scheduled to discuss Tyrone Taylor today. A huge part of my fascination with Taylor came down to Lorenzo Cain being old and injured. I’ll be surprised at this point if Cain ever returns to his previous life as an everyday centerfielder. With Milwaukee’s signing of Jackie Bradley Jr., Cain became an extra piece. I know the Brewers front office initially said he’d remain the centerfielder with JBJ sliding over to right, but that was before Cain attempted to resume playing baseball, which did not go well. He’s laid up with leg troubles, probably needs a cane to walk, so there’s still glimmer enough for Taylor to break camp with the big club. Still, he’s less appealing to me today than he was last week. Jackie Bradley Jr. is a very good big leaguer in a great place to have his career year  thanks to a very kind park for left handed hitters and less-than-exceptional slate of pitchers in the NL Central. 

I still like Tyrone Taylor as a player and think he could break through in a big way next season when Cain and Avisail Garcia aren’t around, for what it’s worth. In hindsight, I should not have declared my next three sleepers that far out anyway. A week in Spring Training during the heart of Draft Season is worth at least a month of the off-season calendar, and I’d never pick three players I’ll be talking about a month from now, I think. I’m often a mystery to myself, truth be told, so let’s push forward and find out who’ll get the feature-piece treatment this week. 

Please, blog, may I have some more?

And the men who hold high places

Must be the ones who start

To mold a new reality

Closer to the heart

 

What? You didn’t know that Toronto-based prog rock band Rush were huge roto baseball fans? That song was released in 1977 — the same year the Toronto Blue Jays played their inaugural season. It’s actually about their love for under-appreciated closer Pete Vuckovich who saved 8 games for the blue birds that year. A lot of us have that same love for certain closers and when it comes to draft time we think with our hearts rather than our heads. 

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Here, friend, are some catchers that I will be targeting at my 2021 fantasy drafts after the top options are gone. I’m not going to get into the strategy of punting catchers. Been there, half-drunkenly wrote that during the Ottoman Empire. Applies to oranges, it still applies. Click on the player’s name where applicable to read more and see their 2021 projections and blurbs I wrote for them. This is a (legal-in-most-countries) supplement to the top 20 catchers of 2021 fantasy baseball. Now, guys and five girl readers, I am not saying avoid catchers like Yasmani Grandal if they fall, but, to get on this list, a catcher needs to be drafted later than 200 overall, and, to preemptively answer at least seven comments, yes, I will go around the entire infield, outfield and pitchers to target very late. Anyway, here’s some catchers to target for 2021 fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

THE INVITATION CAME ON 8 FEBRUARY in a gilded envelope, printed with the finest inks of the Far East, on the heaviest parchment I’d ever felt. One knew, simply by sight, that the contents of the envelope were destined to change the life of the man– or woman– to whom it was addressed.

It came from a man named “Donkey Teeth”… I assume this is a man, as sure as I am that the post was not, in fact, sent by the sentient protrusions from the alveolar of an ass. This Mr. D. Teeth was inviting all recipients of the missive to something called a RazzSlam.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Part two of our dramatic two part series on the Top 100 Outfielders for 2021 Fantasy Baseball comes to it’s conclusion this week. Will Grey join the two great kingdoms into one fabulous list? Will we spend 40 minutes discussing Jarred Kelenic? Will we talk about Dylan Carlson? Will the name DJ Stewart be uttered? I’m not telling you’re just going to have to listen as Grey and I drop a gem on em’ like P-Dolo and Havoc. It’s the latest episode of the Razzball Baseball Podcast!

Please, blog, may I have some more?

I was sitting at my desk when a great sadness washed over me. I could feel it in the air. It was like a million voices suddenly cried out and were then silenced by roster regret. It was the Frambering. Framber’s glove got fingered and said finger got smashed by a Lindor grounder. And now, Framber has us scrambled and scrambling to find a replacement for his potential production. Well, Houston did the same, and lucky for them (and now us) instead of leaving your rotation scrambled you get to order it Odorizzi. Jake Odorizzi to be exact. The Astros signed him to a 2-year $30M deal with a 3rd-year option. Good things do come to those who wait, says Jake’s agent.

Now I’m sure you are asking yourself, didn’t Coolwhip write about this guy before? Yes, I did. Early in the 2019 season, I broke down the good start of the season Jake was having HERE and projected him to be a top 30 pitcher by year’s end. And he was. I asked Grey if I could just repost the article when he cackled in my face and said no, followed by more cackling. Okayyyyy, Jake the Snake sequel here we come.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Greetings readers, I want to start today by thanking and wishing good luck to all of the participants who drafted with me in my RCL Sunday night.  I was kept on my toes throughout the draft, as everyone was clearly prepared and ready to apply all they’ve learned at Razzball and in life to conquer what was (lovingly, I’m sure) referred to in our chat as the “Take Down Laura Holt League.”  To those of you who have RCL drafts upcoming and are new to the format, you’ll soon learn what the rest of us have discovered: dollar for dollar (yes, I know most of the leagues are free) it’s about the most fun and challenging format (no) money can buy.

Now, to the business at hand:  it’s time to continue our way around the diamond to the hot corner, where we’ll take a look at some late-round third basemen that may be of particular interest to those of us in NL-only, AL-only, and other deep leagues.  This week, we’ll keep a true deep-league vibe going by looking only at guys who are currently outside the top 20 third basemen being selected, according to current NFBC ADP.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

That’s a text message from Gerrit Cole to Brian “Bubba” Hawkins trying to procure some spin-inducing substance. That text message is being used in a court filing against the MLB, as Bubba claims he’s being used as a scapegoat. There’s only so many institutions that could be under fire from someone named Bubba. In the last ten years, the name Bubba only shows up three times in the U.S. court system: Bubba vs. Lowe’s for faulty outdoor furniture; Bubba vs. Pfizer as a manufacturer and distributor of trucker speed; Bubba vs. Bubblicious gum for not being at all Bubba-approved. That last case got thrown out. Okay, I kid, about the latter of this nonsense, but that really is a text from Gerrit Cole and he’s named in Bubba Hawkins’s court filing. Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, and just about every Angels’ pitcher of the last decade-plus are also named. It’s not just a Gerrit Cole issue. It’s a league issue.

Please, blog, may I have some more?