Well, well, well… the lockout is finally over and Opening Day is fast approaching. Unfortunately, this leaves us with a very short window to evaluate players, especially with free agents signing as we speak and some still looking for a new ballpark to call home. Now that we know when games will be starting it’s time to get ready for your draft. Hopefully, your league decided to wait to draft so we can see how things shake out in free agency and monitor spring training battles. With that in mind, it’s time to get into my thoughts on pitchers in points leagues and move into more specific players to target as we approach the start of the season.
Editor’s Note: Make sure to check out our Razzball Commenter Leagues and sign up for one, two, three, or more! They are free to play and the overall winner gets a Razzball gift basket. Play against your fellow commenters, lurkers, and Razzball writers! We have this league drafting at 10 PM ET TONIGHT<- Just click and you’re in!
By far one of the biggest differences between points leagues and categories leagues is the value of pitchers. Points are points and we don’t have any pesky ratios to worry about. Hitters and pitchers score points that count the same so you don’t even have to prioritize which category you need to beef up. That said, I am in agreement with Grey in that I prefer to get big bats early and then attack pitching in the middle rounds. There is a ton of value to found at starters in the mid to late rounds and even on the wire during the season. I’m a big believer in streaming because unless your league settings really punish pitchers, they will get positive points even in a poor start. Of course, pitchers can still put up a negative point outing but you can take advantage of Stream-o-nator to help you pick the best guys each day. This approach is definitely more of a grind than drafting the set it and forget it types but if you can play the wire the payoff is huge. Take a look at your league settings so you can max out your starts each week. Strikeouts are sexy but innings are king. Get guys who can get outs and you’ll be well on your way to a title.
Last season nine pitchers broke the 500 point mark: Shohei Ohtani, Walker Buehler, Max Scherzer, Zack Wheeler, Robbie Ray, Julio Urias, Kevin Gausman, Corbin Burnes and Gerrit Cole. Of that group, only Cole went in the first round although Buehler and Scherzer were off the board by the end of the second. So those guys were drafted in an appropriate spot relative to the value they provided this season but I would much rather have a guy like Wheeler in the late 80s than the top three. You could even have paired him with Ray, who went after pick 200. Urias was available around pick 100 followed by Gausman and then Burnes rounded out the top 10 with an ADP in the 50s. Basically, the top 10 pitchers came from all over the place draft-wise. This is by no means exclusive to pitchers but I would rather bet on finding value on the mound later in the draft. Personally, I like to target a pitcher in the 4th or 5th round. By that point, you’ve laid the foundation for your offense with some studs. If you’re feeling really frisky you can wait a couple more rounds, but I like to have at least one front-line starter.
So Grey was right and you shouldn’t draft a pitcher in the first round, but does that change for points leagues? We’ve just established that pitchers can score a ton of points, shouldn’t they deserve to be drafted highly? After all, only four hitters who weren’t named Shohei also joined the 500 club. That’s all well and good but I would much rather have the top bats than the top pitchers. So there you have some quick thoughts on pitchers, we’ll be back next week with more fantasy fun.
Happy drafting and as always drop a line here or on Twitter @deltaxi1842 with any questions or comments.
