I’m attempting something new with this year’s top 100 keepers article. It’s something I’ve always thought about doing but never had the time or brainpower to figure out. I want to try to objectively (impossible) rank each player on how many projected categories they provide for your team. 

I broke each standard 5×5 category down into five statistical outcome ranges. Take runs for example.

 

Points 0 .25 .5 .75 1
Runs Under 54 55-69 70-84 85-99 Over 100
HRs Under 16 17-23 24-30 31-37 Over 38
RBI Under 54 55-69 70-84 85-99 Over 100
SBs Under 8 9-13 14-18 19-23 Over 23
AVG Under .254 .255-.269 .270-.284 .285-.299 Over .300
W Under 7 8-10 11-13 14-16 Over 17
K Under 159 160-184 185-209 210-234 Over 235
ERA Over 4.45 3.96 – 4.44 3.46-3.95 2.96-3.45 Under 2.95
WHIP Over 1.33 1.24-1.32 1.15-1.23 1.06-1.14 Under 1.05
SV Under 11 12-17 18-23 24-30 Over 30

 

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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See all of today’s starting lineups

# MLB Starting Lineups For Sun 8/3
ARI | ATH | BAL | BOS | CHC | CHW | CLE | COL | DET | HOU | KC | LAA | LAD | MIA | MIL | MIN | NYM | NYY | PHI | PIT | SD | SEA | SF | STL | TB | TEX | TOR | WSH | ATL | CIN | OAK

I fulfilled my quota for young, exciting players when I wrote about Keston Hiura last week. Now back to our regularly scheduled program of boring, undervalued players. I liken it to walking into a Baskin Robbins. Ooooohh, 31 flavors. There’s mint chocolate chip, rainbow sherbert, jamoca almond fudge, and cotton candy with their fancy names, colorful skin, and sweet taste. The scooper behind the counter has to dig his/her arm way down into the bucket to mine the deliciousness due to their popularity. But, but, but…..let’s not forget about the vanilla, very berry strawberry, and old fashioned butter pecan. They are boring compared to their more high-profiled brethren, but they get the job done. Which brings me to Jonathan Schoop of the Detroit Tigers. He doesn’t steal a lot of bases or hit for a high average, but he could club 25-30 home runs and is being drafted as the 321st player on average in NFBC drafts from February 1, 2020 to March 2nd, 2020. Scoop Schoop?

 

The 2020 Razzball Commenter Leagues are now open! Free to join!

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The RazzSlam fan lottery odds were slimmer than Grey Albright on his twenty day juice cleanse. Please eat some food already, Grey! Anyway, hundreds of fans signed up for the 54 precious spots to compete against 162 of the top fantasy baseball industry analysts in all the land. Those spots have been filled and the 18 inaugural RazzSlam drafts are now underway. But if you didn’t get lucky in the lottery, don’t fret, there’s still time to get lucky in your mom’s basement. The 2021 RazzSlam Qualifier is now open for business. Here’s everything you need to know about the qualifier (or you can just blindly sign up for FREE thru this RazzSlam Qualifier link):

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Hey, how’s everyone doing? Enjoying your preseason? That’s nice. Have you see Parasite? It was great–*intern whispers in my ear* Yeah, I will talk about DJ LeMahieu and why he’s overrated. It’s so obvious, though, I thought I’d take this opportunity to check in on people. You know, give the impression I care about other people. What’s that? They can read this? Ohhhh…So, DJ LeMahieu just had a better season than any dream an acne-faced, 12-year-old DJ LeMahieu ever imagined while he was launching imaginary home runs in the back of the Party City his family ran. His father, Noisemaker LeMahieu, speaks to a customer, “Do you need a DJ for your party?” DJ overhearing, “Dad, I don’t want to go to anymore parties.” Noisemaker turns to his wife, “Piñata, straighten your son out, or I will.” Piñata, “¡Dios mio!” Then DJ would run into the parking lot, crying. After he composed himself, he would mimic the crowd noise of Yankee Stadium, and imitated Bob Sheppard announcing him to the plate. Or so the 30-for-30 that I’ve imagined has told me, i.e., DJ LeMahieu’s wildest dreams <are less than or equal to> His 2019 season. For s’s and g’s, I’m going to tell you his last three seasons stats, two of which were in Coors:  95/8/64/.310/6; 90/15/62/.276/6; 109/26/102/.327/5. Yo, am I the only one cackling? Giancarlo didn’t miss all of last year; he peed in the same fountain as DJ LeMahieu and, magically, they inhabited each other’s bodies. So, what can we expect from DJ LeMahieu for 2020 fantasy baseball and what makes him overrated?

Please, blog, may I have some more?

With that said, I began with ATC projections, which amalgamate the best from other projection systems. I then altered the projections based on my own assumptions about playing time and the five traditional hitting categories. For instance, I accounted for barrel rate by using hitters’ 2019 predicted home runs–which are home run totals I derived based on barrel rate, among other inputs–and projecting out my own 2020 home run totals.

Finally, I performed my own mock 12 team draft to derive player values based on z-scores from my projections. You can read more about that process in my friend Alexander Chase’s excellent article. A z-score shows the relationship to the mean of a group of values, measured in terms of standard deviations—degrees of spread—from the mean. Where a z-score is 0, the value is equivalent to the mean in the sample. Where a z-score is 1.0, the value is one standard deviation greater than the mean.

Z-scores are useful because, in a vacuum, 15 HRs and 15 SBs are meaningless. They are only telling in relation to one another. For instance, if the mean for the sample of players’ SBs is 9 and the mean for their HRs is 25, then those 15 SBs are worth a lot more than those 15 HRs. Z-scores reflect those relative values.

And with my process out of the way, I won’t bury the lede any longer.

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Razzball Commenter League drafts are off and running!  Don’t let the chance to play with your favorite writers and commenters in free leagues for an overall top prize pass you by!  We’ve only had a handful of drafts so far, but next week we’ll really be able to dive into early RCL ADP and over-analyze to our hearts content.  As for now though, go sign up for a league drafting in the next week or so and contribute to our data pool. It’s so easy to sign-up, it’s really just one click!  Use it as a mock draft that is actually useful. We will be drafting the Writer’s League this week and 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.

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We made it folks. On Sunday, the news flashed a Chicago forecast without a temperature below 40 degrees on it. March brings warmer air, a clock change, a celebration with green, the anniversary of millions of vasectomies, and opening day baseball. With that last one in mind, I released my top 100 starting pitcher rankings. Rankings bring out a special brand of emotions among fantasy baseball addicts. I’m here to explain as many of my disputed rankings as possible before opening day. I am nothing if not transparent. I’ve detailed six pitchers below that I am significantly higher, or lower, than the market on. In addition, I have linked to every article with a blurb about pitchers in the top 100 that I have written and paraphrased my commentary from a Reddit thread. In the weeks leading up to opening day I will release my top 10 pitching values to complete the finding aces series, a revised version of the top 100, and further commentary on major discrepancies. Feel free to let me know where you would like to see more detailed analysis. I owe a few frequent commenters player blurbs and I haven’t forgotten, just give me a couple of weeks, looking at you Magoo.

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You might remember ten years ago I drafted in the live LABR NL-Only auction. Okay, you don’t remember, but I do, so you’ll have to take my word for it. It was the first major league I was in. I was sailing on the wind of doves. I thought my feces smelled like Reese’s Pieces. I even joined the Local 564, a railway union, thinking LABR had something to do with that. Ah, the memories…they sure were fleeting! I was booted from the league after one year. Why? I’m not sure, but my money’s on I insulted someone. Well, ya boi’s back and he’s learned his lesson! Though, someone drafted Rhys Hoskins for $28 and I was cackling about that for a good 45 minutes. Yo, just send Rhys flowers and a ball in the dirt for him to swing through; he might respond quicker. For those of you not in the know, this is a 5×5 league with average. (If you want a shallower league, play against me and hundreds others for prizes –> Razzball Commenter Leagues.) Anyway, here’s my LABR 12-team, NL-Only draft recap:

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Oh man, the crack of the bat and the sound of the ball hitting leather. It’s seamhead heaven, boys of summer katnip, and time to put away the hot stove (well almost). Spring training baseball has just started. Beer is flowing from Florida to Arizona and lazy afternoons at the ballpark are in vogue.

As such, Razzball’s 2020 inaugural Top 100 Hitters is here to inform, entertain, and track your favorite sluggers, five category studs and perhaps underappreciated gems. We have to start somewhere, so here are the rules for this first list: They’re geared towards 5×5 roto leagues. “Last” is tracking where the hitters were in the last Top 100 of September of 2019. “Change” is a change from that last 2019 ranking.

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Draft season is getting into full swing. Unless things break right for you early you’re likely to find your team a little light in the steals department. Take a stab at some of these cheaper players to boost your speed.

The 2020 Razzball Commenter Leagues are now open! Free to join!

Usual Suspects

  • Jarrod Dyson – Dyson probably has the most guaranteed playing time coming into the season. Injuries tend to cut into his ABs but when he’s in the lineup he’s running.
  • Delino DeShields Jr. – We’ve all been there with Delino. He’s cheap and has 50 steal speed if he could only play everyday and avoid the litany of injuries that tend to derail his season.
  • Dee Gordon – I’m actually interested in Gordon as a speed dart. He’s been around a while but is a seemingly young 31. The wheels aren’t what they used to be and will likely degrade as the season goes. Still, there’s plenty of scenarios that see him leading off in Seattle.
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One of my favorite traditions as a young fan was Peter Gammons profiling each team’s spring training focus points. 

I loved the spittle and shake of his voice, the depth of his details, and especially how he always shot the segments in front of people playing catch, gloves popping symphonically as Gammons explained how critical first overall expansion draft pick Travis Lee would be to the long-term fate of the Arizona Diamondbacks. 

It’s in that spirit that I begin our next prospect series—one that works in concert with Razzball’s Gammonsian team previews and one that involves a few nods to some non-prospects. Graduating from eligibility requirements doesn’t mean you’re a known quantity, nor that you’ve graduated to an everyday opportunity. Yesterday’s failed prospects are often tomorrow’s sleepers, so let’s take a lap around the division looking for some fantasy profit. 

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“If you work for a living, why do you kill yourself working?”

Austin Riley came up last year as a 22-year-old. During his first few weeks of play, it was the best of times showered in gold. In his first 18 games, Riley hit 9 HRs with 25 RBIs and a .324/.368/.732 slash line. The world was his oyster (or plant-based soy oyster substitute if you’re a vegan). It looked like he was a world-beater. But a problem simmered under the surface. A 30% K-rate and 5% walk-rate to go along with a .378 BABIP well above his minor league career mark of .293. He always had some swing and miss in his game, but in the minors, it was a serviceable 25.3% that improved over time.

The hurdles of the known and the unknown are the everpresent challenges for rookies that reach the Show. Adjustments are the name of the game. You anti up your hand, then the league calls it. Now it’s back to you to raise it. That’s where we find our hero now, holding the cards in need of a response. You see, in this world there’s two kinds of people, my friend: those with loaded guns and those who dig. You dig? You are going to show me a table, aren’t you? Yes, I am.

 

The 2020 Razzball Commenter Leagues are now open! Free to join!

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