Top 200 Prospects for 2020 Fantasy Baseball

Thanks, Silent Heat!

Some of it was Vaughn’s consistency as the man to attack in that lineup for three years, some of it was the risk of catcher, some of it was the incredible on base skills across three years, some was landing spot as CHW is looking monstrous in the near future,

but I can definitely see the case for Adley and did have him neck and neck with Vaughn at times. Even though catchers get faded heavily in most my leagues, especially prospect catchers, they’re incredibly valuable if actualized.

Still, their peaks are brief and sporadic, and first base is looking pretty barren in its own right.

Hi Heathcliff,

For one thing, and maybe this will sound ridiculous, I’ve made a small fortune prospecting baseball cards over the past decade.

I started by purchasing Mike Trout Bowman Chrome autos at $75 when he was in AA and selling them for $500 a little while later. (The base auto sells for about $5,000 today). I had no idea this world existed and went a little crazy with it, was even buying from two distributors wholesale, prospecting whole lists of sets. Like in 2018 Bowman Draft (released in November). The guys I wanted who didn’t have their first chrome autos were Kristian Robinson and Yordan Alvarez. Both have seen their eBay sales prices skyrocket since then.

Back in the day, I bought a huge Aaron Judge collection when the prospect world had convinced everyone he struck out too much.

Bought a little mountain of Mondesis on the cheap when everyone had dismissed him.

Bought Fernando Tatis Jr. Chrome Rookies at $10 a pop. They go for $500 all day today. Bought several of Jose Fernandez’s first base chrome auto for 15 and a gold at 50. Sold before tragedy struck, which makes me think . . .

I’m sure I missed plenty, but my biggest miss was Oscar Taveras. Had more than a grand in him. Best barrel control I’ve seen on a minor league field. Saw him take five swings and pick up five hits in a AAA game.

Anyway, I’m no Johnny come lately. I’ve poured my own money, work and time into this arena at a level that’s frankly ridiculous, but it’s brought me a lot of money, and that’s just in cards, which follow fantasy, not the other way around. Got my first fantasy writing gig 16 years ago, Been playing keepers for 22 years. Dynasty just the last few, but our keeper league auction was always a little dynasty, so the transition has been smooth and fun.

Anyway I don’t mind coloring outside the lines. That’s where the profit is. That’s why the list looks different.

I have articulated at various points in my time at Razzball about the general direction of the dynasty game RE the value of speed, and how the combination of speed and hit tool seems incredibly undervalued to me, given everyone’s easy access to power in the juiced ball launch angle era, and the chance that speed and hit tool guys add power as they age into muscle and experience.

My list is meant to reflect the comparative lack of value most pitching prospects have in dynasty leagues. If you’ve played dynasty and tried to shop them, some owners have just requested bats or shut down the idea of paying apparent prospect market value for a Liberatore or a McKay in some other way.

Man, it feels wild but I don’t see who you can swap out . . .

any chance of a consolidation play?

or would you rather just toss em back than strengthen another team . . . ?

Hey BravesUK,

WELCOME TO THE FOREVER-FUN ZONE!!!

By which I mean dynasty is my favorite format, and I hope you like it!

Can you add minor league free agents during the season?

Even with 14 and 35, you should be able to mine some solid talent.

I suspect you’ll get more than 1/4 . . . might even get someone off the 50 in all five rounds . . . dynasty is very wild west in general but maybe nowhere moreso than the FYPD.

In terms of balance, it does help to have a lot of differently shaped pieces because you never know who you’ll be trading with and what they’ll want.

I generally value proximity and production more than the crowd because that dictates near-term opportunity, and even in rebuild, it’s great to pick up a player from AAA and have them in your lineup a few weeks later . . . it’s also how you land the Whit Merrifields, Nelson Cruzes, Jon Bertis, Trent Grishams, David Ortizes, Matt Olson and on and on and on.

Or even guys who fall into opportunity like Mike Tauchman and Gio Urshella. I suspect both would’ve been available in this sized league last year. Even Frankie Montas might’ve been out there.

No need to go all kids to chase upside, is all I’m saying. It’s important to follow that market and invest there, especially with a minors that deep. That factor probably increases the value of players who are far away.

Anyway, fun question, and that’s one of the keys to dynasty in general–moreso than a redraft in my opinion–acquire players you believe in or want to watch and try to have as much fun with it as possible . . . while winning of course.

Thanks, Jolt In Flow!

And well said: the Dominguez hype train has morphed into a rocket and has already exited earth’s atmosphere.

The split is more about him getting this crazy love than anything negative about Puason.

And if you’re searching all the typical spots like google and youtube and following a variety of prospect twitter accounts, we’re probably getting the same video. Just not much available on the J2 guys until they’ve been stateside for a while, usually.

But this is an excellent question. Might start a long-term project cataloging video sources . . . Baseball America and Fangraphs have been killing it for a while and ProspectsLive has been an amazing addition to the prospecting universe, but there are some solid Twitterers, too. Need to dig a bit.