Josh Hader

Please see our player page for Josh Hader to see projections for today, the next 7 days and rest of season as well as stats and gamelogs designed with the fantasy baseball player in mind.

Kerry Klug

Top 100 Keepers for 2021 Fantasy Baseball

February 24, 2021 | 2021 Fantasy Baseball, Fantasy Baseball Keepers | 71 Comments

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I feel like I say this every year around this time — but I LOVE keeper leagues. Especially all the crazy rules and context to them. “If you drafted him in the 13th round, he becomes a 10th round keeper next year, then a 4th round keeper the year after that, then a 1st the year after that. And if you keep him in the 1st you can’t keep anyone else with a 1st.” or “If you bought him for $5 his inflation becomes $18 in 2022. Then in 2023 he’ll be $31.43” or “You can’t keep anyone in the first 5 rounds, because one year Smitty somehow kept Miggy, A-Rod, Barry Bonds, Albert Pujols and Roy Halladay and broke the league.” And let me tell you — I love ALL of it. Your league’s crazy rules are what make it unique and interesting. Navigating this craziness is part of the fun. So these are just my rankings for your standard, vanilla 5×5 roto league. But my favorite part of this article — is always in the comments helping you guys breaking down your crazy keeper rules and making the best choices. So get down there and tell me your league’s crazy keeper system and how I can help you make your best decision! 

Please, blog, may I have some more?
Grey

Top 100 for 2021 Fantasy Baseball

February 12, 2021 | Fantasy Baseball Rankings | 186 Comments

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Hello, all you brave, courageous, adventure-seekers, you’ve found the wrong website. This is fantasy baseball, not fantasy role playing, unless it’s fantasy roll-playing and this is Stratomatic, but that’s still not right. Still, fantasy baseball. Good, now that we got rid of all those people wearing fedoras and shopping from the Indiana Jones collection at Eddie Bauer, we can get down to the bidness. The Auction value bidness? Not quite, but you can find all auction values in Rudy’s rankings — one example, 12-team mixed league auction values. This is a top 100 for 2021 fantasy baseball.

One word about this top 100 for 2021 fantasy baseball, before I give you another 5,000 words. I’m going to avoid repeating myself from the position rankings in the 2021 fantasy baseball rankings. If you want to know my in-depth feelings about a player, then you need to go to his positional page, i.e., the top 20 1st basemen for 2021 fantasy baseball, the top 20 outfielders for 2021 fantasy baseball, the top 20 Patterns In Queso That Look Like Messages From Another Planet for 2021– Okay, but I almost got you. This post is meant to give you an idea where guys from different positions are in relation to each other. Since this post is only the top 100, there’s more players where this came from. 458 more, to be very exact. Next up, there will be a top 500 that will go to 562. Then, after that, there will be a top 7,500 that will go to 8,602, then a top 25,000 that will go to 28,765, then a top 600,000 that will go to 892,121, until we end up with a top kajillion in April that will go to a kajillion and one. Or maybe I’ll stop at the top 500. Yeah, that makes sense. Not to get all biblical on you, but this is the gospel. Print it out and take it to Mt. Sinai and it will say, “Win your 2021 fantasy baseball league, young prematurely balding man.” Projections were done by me and a crack team of 100 monkeys fighting amongst themselves because there were only 99 typewriters. Somebody please buy Ling-Ling his own typewriter! Razzball Subscriptions are also now open. Early subscribers get Rudy’s War Room, and you can go ad-free for a $9.99, because ads suck. Anyway, here’s the top 100 for 2021 fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?
Kerry Klug

SAGNOF: Pre-Season Closer Rankings

February 3, 2021 | 2021 Fantasy Baseball, Closers, SAGNOF | 30 Comments

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SAGNOF has a new Daddy! Or I guess technically Step-Daddy — this will always be Grey’s baby. That’s right — this year I’ll be slipping into those SAGNOF slippers each week to tell you who will be doing the saving and who will be doing the stealing! 

“So like good guys and bad guys?” asks my wife as I explain to her what I’m writing about this year. 

*Sigh* “Yes…like good guys and bad guys…” I wept.

Let’s get this SAGNOF off to a great jump-off. Lo! Below are my top-30 closer rankings! 

Please, blog, may I have some more?
JKJ

2020 Waiver Wire All-Star Team

October 9, 2020 | 2020 Fantasy Baseball | 31 Comments

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What’s up, Razzballers? Hope playoff baseball is treating you well, and if you’re in any playoff pools like I am, hope they’re treating you well, as well!

Well. What a wild season of fantasy baseball we had, eh? I’m not a super high-stakes type of fantasy baller – I did two Yahoo public leagues mainly because drafts are so easy to join and get through quickly (I won both!), my home keeper auction league (which moved to roto for this year and I got 2nd after being two-time defending champ *sad emoji*), and then the RazzSlam. I got really lucky in the Slam, not suffering a lot of COVID-ness or injury. Finished second in my league and #46 overall. Not too shabby for my first industry league endeavor! Just want to thank Grey, Donkey and others, but mostly of all, you. You’ve made me feel so welcome. Hey, watch me make like a tree’s sap and get sappy!

Anywayyyyy, I bring up my own leagues because a large part of my success came down to waiver wire wizardry. Well, RazzSlam not so much (waivers are limited there), but my final rosters in the other three leagues looked a lot different from Opening Day. That’s always the case in fantasy sports, of course, but this year especially so in baseball.

I thought a fun exercise would be to go back and honor those who were league winners for a lot of you. What better way to honor real players than with fake All-Star selections?! I’m gonna take a standard lineup of C/1B/2B/3B/SS/OF/OF/OF/UT/UT/SP/SP/RP/RP/P/P/P/P and fill it with the best that the 2020 waiver wire had to offer. In most leagues, most of these guys were drafted late or not at all. Of course in deeper leagues maybe all of them were drafted at some point, but in standard 12-team leagues, almost all of these guys came off the wire.

Without further ado, let’s do it to it!

Please, blog, may I have some more?
Grey

The 12th Annual Razzballies

September 29, 2020 | Y to Z | 91 Comments

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Officially, this is the 11.5th Razzballie ceremony, and our first socially distanced one. *looks out at the cardboard cutout audience* I see some familiar faces out there. There’s the cutout that sells me car wax at Pep Boys. Good to see you! Figure you’d like some recycled jokes, since you’re all made of biodegradable material. *eerie silence* Okay, moving on. I’ll be your host for the ceremony after A-Rod backed out. Turns out he couldn’t host, he’s just a parasite! It’s all right he’s a no-show, you can’t spell ghosting without host. You also can’t spell hostage, but no one is forcing you to stay for the award show. You’re going to want to, though, because without these awards, you’ll have no idea who was the best and worst hitters and pitchers in this absurdly abbreviated year, and you’ll be left giving out your own awards and no one cares if your “Low sodium tomato soup in a sourdough bowl” won your “Whitest Lunch Of All-Time” award. Stop making up fake awards! Leave that to me. Anyway, here’s the year-end awards for the best and worst of fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?
Dan Pants

Damn Daniel Ponce de Leon

September 26, 2020 | 2020 Fantasy Baseball, Fantasy Baseball Daily Notes | 11 Comments

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Someone had his white Vans on! Daniel Ponce de Leon had another strong start Friday night pitching 6.1 innings allowing just three base runners (1 hit, 2 BB) and one run while striking out six for his first win of 2020. He had a no-hitter going through the first six innings until an Orlando Garcia home run, the only hit he surrendered, ruined his bid. Damn Daniel, 2016 called–they want their meme back. I touched on PDL (can I call him PDL? sounds like a bad light beer) last week and concluded he was too risky to touch, but his 3.15 ERA, 0.95 WHIP and 28/6 K/BB in September tell me something has definitely clicked. Considering he was rocking a 7+ ERA at the start of the month that gives you a sense of the strides he’s made in just a few short weeks. Perhaps he discovered the dot, dot, dot…fountain of youth? I’m sorry! I had to. Regardless the win was his first as a starting pitcher in 20 tries–that’s right 20! And yes, that is the record, albeit a fairly depressing record to hold. Maybe its these Brewers’ hitters, who he’s struck out 15 times this month to pad his 12.6 k/9 in 20 IP in September, or maybe it was finally getting the run support he needed (Cards scored zero runs for him in half his starts this year). More likely he started consistently locating his elevating fastball which allowed him to mix in breaking balls and keep opposing hitters off balance. Whatever it has been, his 4.96 ERA and 1.32 WHIP don’t tell the full story here. I’m going to choose to believe his 31.5 K% and .221 BABIP are more indicators of the pitcher DPdL is and he’s a player I’ll be keeping a very close eye on this postseason even if he’s just pitching in a middle relief role. So grab your white Vans and make sure they’re cleaner than the “WAP” radio edit because I’m telling you Daniel Ponce de Leon could be a a 2021 sleeper to watch!

Here’s what else I saw Friday night in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?
JKJ

Fantasy Baseball Waiver Targets: Week 6

August 30, 2020 | 2020 Fantasy Baseball | 8 Comments

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Hello, again. We’re officially into the second half of the 2020 fantasy baseball season. Where teams like the Tigers, Mariners, and Marlins are churning out league-winning type value guys and the Red Sox, Cubs, Yankees, and Mets disappoint for various reasons, be it performance or health or whatever. With double-headers stacking up like a good plate of pancakes, we’re seeing prospects squeeze into lineups and rotations and bullpens. Managers have to get creative, and that can wreak havoc in the fantasy realm. Or maybe it’s just managers tinkering more than they need to. All I want is my guy Garrett Hampson to hit leadoff every single day and steal a lot bases, Bud Black! That’s all I want, and it’s all you should want, too! All I want is Dominic Smith to head higher in the order, Luis Rojas!

Whatever. Anyway, let’s delve into the hotties I like (and actually a couple I don’t as much) heading into Week 6.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
Dan Pants

Jesse Winker Keeps Open Eye on Prize

August 15, 2020 | 2020 Fantasy Baseball, Fantasy Baseball Daily Notes | 18 Comments

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Jesse Winker had his open eye locked on the baseball Friday night as he extended his hot streak going 2-for-3 with two home runs and three RBI. It was the 26 year old outfielder’s first multi-homer game in ever. Winky’s now slashing an insane .365/.484/.712 with five jacks, eight RBI and a steal for good measure. But I’m not finished yet! Wink’s been hotter than Cardi B’s “WAP” video, batting .688 in the past five days and hitting all five of his homers in that stretch. To be fair, his .424 BABIP and .346 ISO aren’t exactly sustainable numbers, even by a Trout-Mookie frankenbaby (although that does sound adorable)–regardless, Jesse is a hot little potato right now. This is not completely out of nowhere either, as he flashed some pop with Cinnci last season, batting .269 with 16 bombs in 113 games. Are you intrigued yet? Because Jesse is still available in just about half of fantasy leagues! Where do I sign, you ask? And has this pen been sanitized? Well, unfortunately, like everything in 2020, Winker isn’t exactly a no thinker (err, brainer) of a pick up just yet. The Reds announced Friday that a PTBNL has tested positive for COVID-19 and Saturday’s game against the Pittsburgh Pirates has been postponed. That’s all the information available to me at the moment, but I assume if this turns into a Marlins/Cardinals situation, then adding Reds players right now (no matter how hot) is probably not pro stratz, bro. Whatever happens, I’ll always remember that five day stretch where Jesse Winker was the hottest man in baseball, and I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “wow he didn’t make a ‘Winker? I hardly know her!’ joke this whole time. But you’d be wrong. I actually did. It just wasn’t funny! Lol. Jokes aside, let’s hope the Reds can get back to playing baseball ASAP as possible.

Here’s what else I saw in fantasy baseball Friday night:

Please, blog, may I have some more?
B_Don

Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Scott White Stops By

July 21, 2020 | Razzball Podcast |

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Scott White, Sr. Writer for CBS Sports, talks with B_Don and Donkey Teeth about the shortened 2020 season. The guys ask Scott about his expectations for his Braves for both hitting and pitching. We ask Scott about his thoughts on Mike Trout as he comes in at 5 among his rankings.

The guys then move on to discuss the recent CBS roto auction. Scott criticizes DT and B_Don’s approach in the auction grabbing 3 top hitters in Ronald Acuña Jr. ($49), Cody Bellinger ($44), and Chrsitian Yelich ($56). The podcast hosts then explain their thinking toward the full stars and scrubs approach.

We move on to Scott’s team and how he planned his team prior to the auction. We get his take on Francisco Lindor and his possibilities of being traded, and his expectations for Mike Soroka.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
Brent

Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Schedule Breakdown, Award Winners, Fantasy Sleepers

July 7, 2020 | All Podcasts |

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Brent (@ExitVelo_BH), Jordan (@ExitVelo_JR), and Zach (@Braffz), breakdown the MLB 60 game schedule and what teams have the easiest path to the playoffs. The Twins, Padres, Indians, and White sox have a great chance to make the playoff and compete. The Angels, Athletics, and Rockies have some of the tougher schedules in the league. We discuss the underrated fantasy assets on teams that will compete. Can Wil Myers, Franmil Reyes, Luis Robert make impacts on their rosters? We discuss our award winners in a 60 game season. Can Josh Hader as a reliever get CY Young consideration? We all agree Josh Hader will be a very valuable asset in fantasy leagues. We talk about the future of the Exit Velocity Podcast and guests we will feature, highlighted by SP Streamer, Carter Capps, Adam Aizer, Chelsea Ladd, and Deegs. We also launched a new podcast store on Instagram (exitvelocitypc), which include shirts, mugs, koozies, wine glasses, and beer steins!

Please, blog, may I have some more?