The Conforto Inferno Is En Fuego

August 8, 2019 | Fantasy Baseball Daily Notes | 315 Comments

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Yesterday, Michael Conforto went 2-for-3, 3 runs, 3 RBIs and his 24th and 25th homer, and, like, his 43rd homer in the last month (9 homers since the break). Men, dudes, bros, youse, five lady readers, Goofusses and Gallants, Cousin Sweatpants, my peeps from another Easter basket! Conforto gets scorching hot for these month-long stretches that makes you think he could put it together for a whole year one of these days, um, years. He’s the third Met player in history with 100+ homers before the age of 27. The other two are Darryl Strawberry and David Wright. The three of them all stayed at a Howard Johnson in the offseason. HoJo puts on a team-building seminar on his back patio and provides snacks, and Lenny Dykstra works the valet. Conforto’s in-Confort-ible! *screams for 10 minutes* Okay. I’m back. If you look at Conforto’s peripherals he really is more this post-All-Star break hitter, and less the one that struggled for the previous six weeks prior to this. Hopefully, Conforto stays in-Conforto-ible for the rest of this year and into 2020. I can see it now! (Only another 18 months of bad 2020 puns.) Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Red Whitewashes The Brew

July 4, 2019 | Fantasy Baseball Daily Notes | 245 Comments

by: Grey

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Yesterday, Sonny Gray went 8 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 12 Ks, ERA at 3.59 vs. the Brewers. *unloads pockets, eggplant emjois fall to the ground* I’m gonna need all of those. “Sonny came home” hasn’t had such a pleasant ring since Shawn Colvin opened an Art of Shaving booth at a Lilith Fair that only did armpit hair massages, and each payment was followed by a very pleasant, cash register ring. A Sonny hasn’t shone this bright since the last climate change summit that was held in Hellsunki on Urth, which is a planet that looks just like this one, but is 13,000 miles away and is exactly Earth but 25 years in the future, and they have some weird spelling. “I just got back from Hellsunki, and boy are my arms tired, because we don’t have planes on Urth, we fly with our arms.” Sonny Gray’s peripherals are surprising in a good way — 10.3 K/9, 3.3 BB/9, 3.46 xFIP. For those not up on the hoo-de-ha, that xFIP would be about 12th in the league and the K/9 and walk rates would firmly put him in the top 20 starters overall. In other words, everyone who owned him last year died for the sins of his current year’s owners. In other other words, he’s throwing fire like pitchers in Hellsunki. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Rolling In The Deep: Help In the Nick Of Time

by: Laura Holt

Things can change in a hurry in baseball, and when they do, things can change even faster in fantasy baseball. Since last week, we’ve seen the horrific collision between Starling Marte and Erik Gonzalez, the Pirates promotion of shortstop Cole Tucker, and Tucker’s sudden fantasy relevance. He went from being a 2% owned player in CBS leagues, where he was probably only hanging around on keeper/dynasty league type rosters, to being a 30% owned player who has a legitimate shot to obtain at least some degree of mixed-league relevance this year. It’s just another reminder that, in leagues both deep and shallow, you need to stay on top of things and not let a potential asset to your roster get away. The players we’ll be looking at this week may not have the upside of a Cole Tucker type, but may be worth a look for those of us searching for help in AL-only, NL-only, and other very deep leagues.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Circle, Circle, Dot, Dot, Cody With Another Shot

April 19, 2019 | Fantasy Baseball Daily Notes | 510 Comments

by: Grey

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Due to the light schedule, let’s drill down on Cody Bellinger (2-for-4 and his 10th homer, hitting .432). If man love bothers you, perhaps you should shield your eyes. This could become naughty, and, yes, I need to remove my pants to write the rest of this. Cody is 2 1/2 home runs from being halfway to last year’s homer total. How does one hit a 1/2 of a home run? You hit it out of the park, then pimp with a bat flip so long you get tackled rounding 2nd. Right now, Bellinger’s HR/FB% is absurd. He’s not even hitting that many fly balls. It’s just everything he touches goes bim-bam-zoom to the moon. Can that continue, you ask with your doe eyes and soft lips. You drafted Goodrum on too many teams, because you sound drunk. Of course, it won’t continue. His launch angle last year, when he hit 25 homers, was 16 degrees. This year it’s 13. He is hitting the ball damn hard, though. He’s third in the majors with 96 MPH average exit velocity. I’d be shocked if he hits less than 35 homers, but I also don’t think he’s going to hit more than his career high of 39 homers, if his fly ball rate holds. His strikeout rate has absolutely cratered, in a good way, but, of course, when a guy is hitting well, he’s not striking out. He will go cold, turkey, and cold turkey on power at some point. It’s early, yadda-blabbity-bloo, so don’t panic sell. He’s now a legit top 15 bat vs. the top 40 one we thought he might be in the preseason. Now, I will put back on my linen Tommy Bahama pants and continue. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

2018 Spring Training Positional Battles: AL Central

March 13, 2018 | Fantasy Baseball Team Previews | 6 Comments

by: Son

For the upcoming season, Fangraphs has four teams projected for a run differential greater than 100. Three of those teams reside in the AL Central. Ha! For shits and giggles, the fourth team is the Miami Jeters. No wonder Chief Wahoo’s smile is so big. The division is straight forward so my only question regarding the AL Central is: why is the logo for the White Sox black? Wouldn’t white with black trim make more sense?

Please, blog, may I have some more?

2019 Chicago White Sox Minor League Preview

December 3, 2017 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 20 Comments

by: Geoff

Well look at us, we have the Braves, and now the White Sox systems done and it’s only December 3rd. I guess it’s all down hill from here, no? We’ve covered the top two systems, and the World Series ended just about a month ago. Damn, I’m going to have to hustle to make the rest of this series entertaining. Perhaps I should write in all caps all the time. Then again that might be difficult to read after awhile. Instead I’ll go about my business of bringing you my thoughts on as many minor league players as I can stomach. As for the White Sox they are the only team with three players in my top 20 prospects (Eloy Jimenez, Michael Kopech, and Luis Robert). However, the really interesting slant to that narrative is, none of them were in the system this time last year. No team, not the Braves nor the Padres, has done so much to restock their system. Not only do they have some close to the majors talent on both sides of the ball, they also have good depth, with no shortage of power-hitting. I went 17 deep today, but probably could have gone 25-30 if I wasn’t so lazy. The White Sox graduated Yoan Moncada and Lucas Giolito last year, with some players like Carson Fulmer just slipping under their limits. It’s an understatement to say the youth movement is on in the South Side. A looming Jose Abreu trade may fetch even more talent to a system already bursting at the seams. But for that news we wait and see. It’s the 2018 Chicago White Sox Top Prospects.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

2017 Minor League Preview: Milwaukee Brewers

January 4, 2017 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 126 Comments

by: Geoff

Johnny come latelys like the Yankees and White Sox may think they’re hip for acquiring prospects. But the Brewers have been doing it since before it was cool. Starting with the trade of Carlos Gomez, the Brewers have brought in a bounty of talented youngsters. In fact 8 of the 17 prospects discussed were acquired via trade. Including 4 of their top 5. So good work Doug Melvin and David Sterns, you guys are the prospect hoarding dynasty league owners of MLB. Truthfully, they’ve made a lot of good moves, and have a solid, and deep up and coming core. With good young players like Orlando Arcia, Jonathan Villar, and Keon Broxton already in Milwaukee, the revolution has started. There’s lots of fantasy gold to uncover in the Brewers system, so I went a little longer than usual. I’m sure you won’t mind. It’s the Top Milwaukee Brewers Prospects.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Mid-Season Top 100 Prospects for 2016 Fantasy Baseball

July 3, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 213 Comments

by: Geoff

Tell me this isn’t the most American thing you’ve ever heard. I sit mere miles from Cooperstown, NY, sipping an American made brew, working away on the final stretches of my Mid-Season Top 100 Prospects for Fantasy Baseball, while fireworks crackle overhead. The smell of beer and lawn clippings fill the air, and I just cooked some bacon on the barrel of my rifle. The last sentence was complete bullshizz, but the part before it is fairly accurate. I mean I’m not enough of a tool that I would sit in the yard with my laptop writing. But I am enough of a tool that I was formulating what I would type, once the pack of wild animals I affectionately call my children decide to finally retire to their beds for the evening. Well, the time has come and here I am writing to you, and you alone. Without anymore rambling incoherent non-sense, allow me to introduce the Top 100 Prospects Fantasy Baseball. This list is built with an eye to the future, in other words my goal is for this list to be more reflective of a pre-season 2017 list than the pre-season 2016 lists. I went bold, and I avoided the boring. Meaning I have no use for your Julio Urias’, your Lucas Giolito’s, A.J. Reed’s, Cody Reed’s and the like. You know those guys, they’re playing in the bigs, at this point they’re A. owned in your dynasty or B. owned in your redraft league so C. they’re owned. You thought I was going to say there’s no C right? What do I look like Grey? Nope I’m much taller and my facial hair is more Don Johnson than John Oates.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Mining the Numbers with Prospector Ralph: MiLB Leaders

June 26, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 96 Comments

by: Geoff

It’s easy to get lost in the scouting reports and tool grades from a million different resources. Buying too heavily into projection over production. I get caught up in it too, I Prospector Ralph am no scout. I’m one part Hemmingway, one part James Frey, blended heavily with an overly-enthusiastic approach to minor leaguers. In other words I’m a really, really fun minor league enthusiast. Saturday night at the Lifshitz house is like The Tunnel in its hey day. Let me tell you! (Queue the music, apply Timbos with the finest Polo swag) We have sleeping kids, lots of televised baseball, coffee, a baby named after a major leaguer learning to walk, then there’s a ruggedly handsome, but slightly dim witted looking gentleman typing away on his phone and laptop. Feverishly switching screens between gulps of java. That’s me and I’m combing through mounds of statistics and figuring out which ones I should report and which I should ignore. Why you ask? Well for this post where I look at 4-5+ of the minor league leaders in a handful of fantasy relevant categories. Most of it’s age based bias, if the leader is 28 in a particular category but number 3 is 21, I’m taking that young meat. Blah, blah, blah, blah, let’s get into it.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

RazzNasty League Update: Mentok The Mind Taker

May 1, 2016 | Our Leagues | 86 Comments

by: Geoff

There’s embarrassment and then there’s having to cover in detail a fantasy baseball league you’re nearly dead last in. So begins our first monthly update on the in house dynasty league “The RazzNasty”. For those of you that are new here, “The RazzNasty” is a Razzball founded dynasty league made up of Razzball writers, readers, commenters, and Methodists! It’s a 16 team roto with semi-weekly adds/drops via blind auction. We have 30 man MLB rosters and 10 man minor league rosters. Since we last updated you in early March there’s been a flurry of activity including trades, wire adds, a second commissioner switch, and a banana or two in the tailpipe. So yes it’s more or less high stakes Mario Kart.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

This Year’s Victor Robles: Up and Coming Fantasy Prospects for 2016

April 27, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 130 Comments

by: Geoff

One of the most common questions I encounter on a semi-weekly basis is “Ralph, who’s this year’s Victor Robles/Francis Martes/Cody Bellinger”. It’s a question that’s difficult to answer, but especially difficult to answer during Spring Training or the week following. Why? Well, it’s easy, we don’t have anything to base it off. No real games, no real at bats, no real stats. Unfortunately I have a day job, and Grey is yet to hand me a six figure salary to jet-set around the country to scout amateur and minor league baseball. Instead I’m paid in Helluva Good Cheese coupons and asked to scout little league games on a black and white TV with broken bunny ears. No matter because between games at the Taunton West Little League complex I have time to watch a few AAA and AA games a week while scouring through loads of leaderboards of all minor league levels. So through this deep data collection, I’ve developed the below list of players that are flashing promise, while simultaneously boosting their prospect status. Below are 20 or so names that have caught my interest in the early going.

Now that the intro is out of the way I’d like to acknowledge a personal milestone here on the baseball side of things, my 100th baseball post……Yeah! Thanks for reading all this drivel.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

2016 Minor League Preview: Texas Rangers

January 27, 2016 | Fantasy Baseball Prospects | 76 Comments

by: Mike

The Rangers have one of the deepest systems in the majors and it’s packed with upside for fantasy. Even after trading away three good prospects in the Cole Hamels deal, it’s still a beast. The appeal for our game is the type of player – toolsy, power bats, power arms…all good stuff. One of the pleasant surprises on the MLB roster was Delino Deshields, who the Rangers selected as a rule 5 pick from the Astros organization. If you’re like me, you threw Deshields on your farm for some depth and by the end of the season it was all like ‘whoa this is a solid player right here’ and then Grey’s writing a sleeper post on him and next thing you know he’s got an ADP in the teens. Grey is influential like that. Coincidentally, the Rangers also lost Odubel Herrera in the rule 5 draft to Philly, and that young man had a hell of a season too. Just goes to show that this whole prospect game isn’t always easy to peg, and you have to stay on your toes and roll with it. Back over to the Texas farm now, which features three top 50 fantasy prospects.

Please, blog, may I have some more?