In dynasty baseball, the June draft is must-watch television and the July 2 international signing day is fodder for a million clicks.
Months later, typically in February or March, dynasty leaguers select their favorite college, high school and international players in annual first-year player drafts. I have attempted to consider and rank this year’s player pool for your reading pleasure.
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by: Will Scharnagl
1. Don’t Prospect Hug.
We’ve all heard the term “prospect hugger” before. We’ve all likely played with prospect huggers before. Many of us have probably been prospect huggers before, but if you want to be a successful dynasty player, then you want to avoid prospect hugging. It’s important to note here that there is a difference between properly valuing your prospects and prospect hugging.
There’s nothing wrong with holding on to guys who you think are more valuable than what you’re being offered, but what I’m talking about is guys who will rarely move prospects, or even consider moving prospects, even when they get offers that are more than fair. As someone who writes almost exclusively about prospects, I understand how exciting the unknown can be, and I see the appeal in prospects, but it’s also important to be realistic and understand that a large percentage of prospects never really amount to anything. You should never value a prospect at what their ceiling is, but rather a fraction of their ceiling based on how far they are from the majors. This is especially true the more shallow a league is, as when there are fewer prospects rostered, there’s always going to be solid guys available to replace anyone you trade.
I saw a trade offer posted on twitter recently by @Prospects365 which was Sonny Gray and Matthew Liberatore for Kristian Robinson, and the Robinson side somehow got 40% of the vote. Personally, I would take the Gray side in any league, but what makes this even worse is that this was a league where only ~100 prospects are owned, meaning that there’s plenty of solid prospects available to replace Robinson with. To be completely honest, prospects should mostly be considered trade bait. When I play dynasty, I’m always looking to move prospects in 3-for-1 type deals for major leaguers, and then replacing those prospects with potential breakout guys who I can trade after they breakout, and it’s an endless cycle.
Please, blog, may I have some more?
by: Thomas Howland
Let’s face it. The baseball world is waiting on the Mookie Betts to the Dodgers trade to go through. While that may happen any moment, not everyone will have the opportunity to draft Mookie Betts. So we turn our attention to the definitely at this moment in time overlooked Nicholas Castellanos. He traded in the cavernous Comerica Park for the cozy confines of Wrigleyville and took off in the second half last year. What does a move to Cincinnati mean for him?
Please, blog, may I have some more?I regret to inform you, my fantasy friends, that even fake jedi get the flu. That’s right, Roto-Wan is coming to you today from a Sudafed laced haze that would make Jesse Pinkman proud. Stop interrupting me pink elephant, I’m trying to get a preamble together here. At any rate, we’ve reached the NL in our bullpen previews. Let’s kick it off with the very in flux NL East. My advice is to exercise even more caution with these names than we usually do.
AL East | AL Central | AL West
NL East | NL Central | NL West
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by: Rudy Gamble
It’s time for my first (and longest) post of the year. My LABR Mixed draft review.
As always, thanks to Steve Gardner at USA Today for the invite.
Last Year Recap (here’s my post-draft writeup)
Yet again, another competitive season (92 points) but outside the top two (6th place out of 15). The last 5 years I have scored between 87-102.5 points and finished between 3rd-7th.
This is not for lack of trying or being too conservative. Sometimes you barrel a ball only to end up with a double off the Green Monster vs a home run.
One year after basically throwing away a 4th round pick (Darvish 2018), I ended up getting absolutely nothing from my 2nd round pick (Stanton). Combine that with a 10th percentile bad outcome with my 5th round pick (Daniel Murphy) and it is a marvel I was in the top half of the standings. The rest of my early picks were solid to very good: deGrom (#1), Rendon (#3), Mondesi (#4), Robles (#6), Vazquez (#7). I hit big on two later picks with Austin Meadows (#14) and Christian Vazquez (#28). I do not recall any major in-season pickups but I imagine I did pretty well in that regard. I traded Mondesi for Hoskins once my SB lead was secure but Hoskins struggled. Traded Robles late for Bryce Harper which worked out okay.
Congrats to Steve Gardner on the win and Zach Steinhorn on the tough 2nd place finish (crazy last week).
Please, blog, may I have some more?As someone who lives in Colorado and considers the Rockies “My Team,” I’m ecstatic to get to write their team preview. With that said, I wouldn’t necessarily consider myself a fan because how the hell can anyone be a fan of the Rockies? It’s fun to watch these guys mash baseballs in Coors Field but it’s embarrassing to watch these pitchers crap the bed year after year. That’s simply the nature of playing in Coors Field every year and it makes for some weird baseball. That will surely be a major focus of this preview, so, let’s go ahead and get into it!
Please, blog, may I have some more?
by: Grey
From this post, life emerges. *toadstool morphs into frog, frog morphs into person, person types up this post* See! Darwinism at its most basic, and ‘basic’ like your girl who just wants a pumpkin spice latte and to play Candy Crush. It’s how basic is defined, yo. For these pitcher pairings, I’m going to be using our (my) 2020 fantasy baseball rankings. Notably, the top 20 starters for 2020 fantasy baseball, top 40 starters for 2020, top 60 starters for 2020, the top 80 starters for 2020 and top 100 starters. You can also just get Rudy’s downloadable War Room by signing up for the Razzball Subscriptions. Okay, formalities out of the way. *rolls up sleeves, makes farting noise with hand under armpit, rolls down sleeve* Let’s get busy! Now, what is a pitcher pairing? It’s your plan for putting together a fantasy staff. A course of action, of course — of acoursion, naturally. If you have A pitcher, which B, C, D, E and F pitcher goes with him? Which is different than ‘F this pitcher,’ that’s what you say by end of April about at least one of your starters. You should have six starters. The sixth starter is Pablo Lopez or take whoever you want. I suggest an upside pick. Mitch Keller comes to mind. Or Dustin May. Kevin Gausman also comes to mind. Chris Bassitt anyone? I’m going to assume you’re in a 12 team, 5×5 and some variation of 9 pitcher leagues like the Razzball Commenter Leagues, which begin signups on Monday. Put on your pants and look presentable! (NOTE: What you are about to read is massively confusing. If it were found scribbled in a notebook, the FBI would be watching me. If Ed Kemper stood up and read this at the next prison Meet N’ Greet, no one would blink an eye.) Anyway, here’s pitcher pairings for pitching staffs for 2020 fantasy baseball drafts:
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by: Son
Being a Razzball baseball content provider is tough. Grey writes up everyone and does it in a way that makes the gods nod their heads and say, “We done good. We done very good.” As I was combing Grey’s mustache, I brought this issue to his attention. He responded with, “My Son, I am but a man. A great man, but a man nonetheless. Oh, by the way, you missed a spot on my stache. Anyhoo, after you’re done combing my toe hairs, leave this establishment, head east, and look for the navy blue trash can with the words HERE painted in red. Inside you shall find your answer.” I did as Grey instructed. As I lifted the cover to the trash can, I was welcomed with a pungent, yet satisfying aroma. When I stuck my head into the trash can like an idiot, what I saw wasn’t so bad. It was Jake Odorizzi curled up with his knees holding up his chin, a phone in his right hand, and the browser showing his Fangraphs page. Why did the Odorizzi smell good and why was he smiling while curled up inside a trash can?
Please, blog, may I have some more?
by: Kerry Klug
I don’t really care about the Super Bowl too much this year. I’m a Giants fan so I’m just biding my time until they’re back in it in 2022. MARK MY WORDS! So instead I’ll do the next best thing — I’ll cover the Kansas City baseball team. Now I’m not going to be writing about Whit Merrifield, Adalberto Mondesi or Jorge Soler. Those are the 3 obvious names on this team and you can find articles about them on Razzball by people much smarter than myself. Just like when I get to the Angels — what am I supposed to write about Mike Trout? “He’s the best player in the game — draft him!” Duh — you should be so lucky. No, instead I’m going to focus some other lesser-known guys on this team who should be on your radar.
Please, blog, may I have some more? by: Grey
[brid autoplay=”true” video=”514546″ player=”10951″ title=”RZBL 2020 DraftKit DTNT 012920″]
Four score and seventeen-hundred rankings posts ago, my Fordfathers said, “Stop calling us Fordfathers, you idiot, it’s forefathers.” In order to form a more perfect fantasy baseball ranking system, we stopped ranking for fantasy baseball and simply said, “Eff it, let’s just let Grey rank 500 or so Mr. So-and-So’s.” Or, more succinctly, the top 500 for 2020 fantasy baseball. A few years ago, the top 500 was only a top 300 for fantasy baseball. Before that, it was 16 AD and I was drafting in one-person leagues because no one knew fantasy baseball or baseball. In a few years from now, this is going to be a top 10,000 and I’m going to be ranking Ronald Acuña Jr. Jr. Jr. Today, in this year, twenty after twenty, comes the top 500 for 2020 fantasy baseball. Or as I like to call it, “Did he really rank Mr. So-and-So before Mr. So-and-So Jr.?” If Mr. So-and-So Jr. would stop chasing pitches in the dirt, I might’ve ranked him in front of Mr. So-and-So. This post isn’t meant to send shockwaves through your system. The pipe cleaner that the doctor uses to get the clogged wax from your ears is meant for that. This is simply to give you an idea of where guys are ranked in relation to other positions, i.e., you know I like Ketel Marte better than Keston Hiura, according to the top 20 2nd basemen, but do I like Ketel Marte better than Starling Marte or anyone else in the Marte family? Okay, it’s not that simple. You should read the blurbs for all players, but this top 500 should give you an idea. You’ll notice after the top 200, positions start to get clumped together. I might be the only fantasy baseball ‘pert to tell you this, but it doesn’t matter where, say, Jurickson Profar is ranked vs. Sean Doolittle. If you need saves, Profar isn’t going to help you. He can be ranked 50 spots in front of Doolittle and it doesn’t matter. That’s why I have the 2020 fantasy baseball rankings broken down by positions. If you need a 1st baseman, where Evan White vs. Garrett Cooper matters, but where Evan White is ranked vs. Kevin Kiermaier really doesn’t matter. Also, there’s no comments about players, which you really should know prior to drafting. In other words, Alex Bregman might be in the 20’s overall, but am I drafting him? Well, you’d know if you read my top 20 for 2020 fantasy baseball. There’s also a top 100 for 2020 fantasy baseball to help you. Also, there’s Rudy’s War Room, which is downloadable, and it comes with Razzball Subscriptions. Anyway, here’s the top 500 for 2020 fantasy baseball:
Please, blog, may I have some more?
by: The Itch
First-Year Player Draft Rankings for 2020 Fantasy Baseball
In dynasty baseball, the June draft is must-watch television and the July 2 international signing day is fodder for a million clicks.
Months later, typically in February or March, dynasty leaguers select their favorite college, high school and international players in annual first-year player drafts. I have attempted to consider and rank this year’s player pool for your reading pleasure.
Please, blog, may I have some more?
by: Laura Holt
I’m usually not big on worrying too much about positional scarcity, but anyone who has competed in a variety of different fantasy baseball league formats knows that depth at a given position is one thing that can make a big difference in approaching a draft for a shallow league versus a deep one. The last couple of years, I’ve been making a concerted effort to draft with less concern about a player’s position, and more towards getting the best value possible with every draft pick or auction purchase, regardless of league size. But when approaching a draft this way, it’s even more important to know what your options are going to be at each position, which positions you can wait to fill later, and which players are actually worth reaching for if you do realize you’re running out of decent options at a given position. Getting to the point of today’s post, let’s take a look at some third basemen for 2020, with an emphasis on how I’ll be approaching the position in deeper leagues.
Please, blog, may I have some more?
