Fantasy Baseball Today - 03/20: Draft Strategies, and Baseball is Back! (Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 20, 2019

Dee Gordon stole a base, Domingo Santana hit a grand slam and Matt Chapman looks healthy, so you know we're excited to start today's show! We give some thoughts on OAK-SEA before discussing key takeaways from yesterday's 12-team H2H Points mock draft (9:05). We cover how to draft RPs, when some trendy rookie SPs are being drafted (15:48) what to do when your SP strategy gets thrown off (17:48) and how league size changes the way you draft (23:43) ... News and notes (26:00) as we cover the Yu Darvish injury, the Mike Trout contract, the MIL bullpen and more. Plus Fantasy Regulators Part One (33:15) ... Reviewing our draft strategies for H2H Points (36:30), H2H categories (43:10) and Roto leagues (49:10). Then stay tuned for Fantasy Regulators Part Two! ... Your emails at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Now here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris. It is Thursday, March 20th, everybody. Welcome to Fantasy Baseball today. What a glorious day.

We have baseball. Live right now, in fact, we are watching the eighth inning of the Mariners and the A's. You already know how it turned out. Heath, I am preparing myself for a nice Hunter Strickland save opportunity. Isn't it great to have baseball back on the unofficial opening day of the season? And not just baseball, but so many dongs. Home runs all over the place. It was a fantastic start to the season.

I told you before the show, I woke up this morning. I did not wake up for the game, but I woke up this morning, took a shower, checked Twitter, had about 15 notifications of people excited about Domingo Santana's Grand slam. I'm excited to get excited at him. I don't blame you. You should be excited. Did you see the Grand Slam? I have not seen it yet. I'm sure you have something derogatory to say about it. Take a look at the Grand Slam and you won't be quite as excited. It was an opposite field shot in quotes. Those of you watching on a video can see the quotes. Those of you not can't see them, but they happened. Look, one thing, it's a very hitter-friendly ballpark. It's making me

consider starting, well, I don't have them, but recommending you say Kikki Tucci tomorrow. I don't know if it's such a good idea. The ball flies and the dimensions are small, especially on right and left field. This was kind of like a Yankee Stadium grand slam for Domingo Santana. You know, there's another development in this game that to me is much more exciting, Heath. Can you guess? I bet you can. What it is? The D. Gordon stole a base. Yeah.

He didn't actually run that fast. The catcher did a really bad job. He had a big lead off. They weren't even holding him on. I wouldn't get too excited. The bases are closer over there. Right. It wasn't that big a deal. That by, I actually didn't see it. I'm sure it was glorious.

Nobody tweeted about it. But he let off and he stole a base. Of course he let off. Malick Smith isn't there. That's true. But he let off. So that's great news. Anything else from this game?

Today we're going to talk a lot about strategies, by the way. I plugged Heath's strategy column yesterday. We did a 12 team ahead-to-head mock draft Points League mock draft yesterday, and we are currently doing a 14 team Points League mock draft, so I have a lot to say about these drafts. It's a slow, untimed draft that Heath and I are in. Anything else about Mariners A's? It is 9-7 Mariners in the 8th, so I do expect to see Strickland

in the ninth inning. But anything else? Really rough start to this game for Marco Gonzalez. I think he got three runs in the first three innings, but he settled down nicely, did get the quality start, likely going to get the win, assuming Hunter Strickland doesn't mess things up. He was one of Chris's favorite sleepers, I think Scott's two. So tough start to the season, but he settled down nicely.

Yeah, he gave up four runs, but only three earned. So he will get that quality start. And, yes, he's in line for the win. So that is excellent. And he's not a strikeout guy, but he's a great control guy, great ground ball pitcher. And, yeah, someone you can take late. Marco Gonzalez, I don't know how late, but. but late.

And Matt Chapman homered. And he doubled. And he made a great play on a D. Gordon Bunt at third base, and he's an amazing field. We probably need to just accept that he's over the injury. That's what I was going to say. And now, I mean, how early would you take Matt Chapman, a healthy Matt Chapman who had a 962 OPS in the second half, kind of look like a second half breakout? I mean, I think you could start considering him around 10. Okay.

Round 9, maybe, if you really wanted him. But I think he's going to go in that 10, 11, 12 range. And if you take him in round 10, you're going to get him most times. I assume you take him over Josh Donaldson. I would take him over Josh Donaldson. And one guy who's going well ahead of him, I'd definitely take him over is Miguel Andeyore. Yeah, I agree. And I would take him over, Donaldson.

I don't see why not, but would you take him over Justin Turner? I would not take him over Justin Turner. I definitely would not take him over Travis Shaw. Would you recommend starting you say Kikuchi tomorrow? I think I am. I don't, like he's pitched in small ballparks in Japan for a while now, so he should be used to it. Not against the A's. They can crush it.

The A's have a pretty good lineup. The Mariners have a pretty good lineup. Well, that doesn't matter for Kikuchi, does it? Yeah, it does. I'm going to win. Okay. Okay. All right. So what else? Eichiro started in right field. Mitch Hanager was in center, D.Ngo Santana, and left. J. Bruce was at first base, Edwin Encarnacio and D.H'd. Then in the fourth inning, Dan Vogelbach replaced Eichero, and he played first base, and Jay Bruce moved to right field. And now I'm starting to think, this will be my final thought. I'm starting to think Jay Bruce should be drafted in five outfield or leagues. What do you think? In fact, I definitely think he should be drafted in five outfielder leagues. Well, it's whether he should, he should definitely, we've always said that he should be drafted in the reserve rounds.

It's whether he should be drafted in the first 270 picks. I think he's really borderline there. I've got him right around that spot in drafts right now. So I don't dislike it. I don't know that there's a ton of upside. And I do worry that at some point in the season, he's not playing against lefties either. Where is everyone else, Heath? Why is it just me and you today?

Well, I don't want to speak for anyone else. I could make some jokes about it. Sure, please. It's probably not okay. I think Scott's not here on Wednesdays. That's a normal thing. That is. And Chris isn't here once a week, and it just happened to be Wednesday this week.

Yeah, we're starting early. You know, it's tough. It is tough. I set my alarm for 5.30, by the way, to watch the game, and I woke up at 6.30 and missed a lot of the action. but bright and early. Here we are with the first time to actually break down baseball and it's really fun. Also, we are going to have a special guest on later.

Warren G and Nate Dogger's swinging by to do some regulating. So get excited for that. You're doing it way too early, man. Fantasy Baseball at cbsi.com is the email address. Couple things to promote. A few things to promote. All right. We got a lot of other podcasts.

You want to see all of our other podcasts. CBSports.com slash podcast. Singular. Right now, you need to be listening to the Ion College Basketball podcast. Yesterday, it was a top 15 sports podcasts in iTunes, and it is great, and they will help you with your brackets. Another way to get help with your brackets is on Sportsline.com. Use the promo code Vegas to sign up. Your first month is only $1 with the promo code Vegas.

Go to sportsline.com. It's gambling, it's picks, it's fantasy. It's great for brackets. and Sportsline.com slash promo code Vegas. CBS Sports HQ. Watch all of your tournament, as I say, coverage on CBS Sports HQ,

all for free on the CBS Sports app. I have it on my Roku, so any connected device that you have, download the CBS Sports app and watch HQ. And to watch the games during March Madness, you want March Madness Live. NCAA March Madness Live. That's where you can get direct streaming access

to every tournament game. March Madness Live. Madness Live is available across 17 streaming platforms. One of the coolest features now is something called Fast Break. It covers the entire first weekend. So when multiple games are being played, fast break provides live whip around coverage. The option to switch from game to game for live lookins. Quick turnaround highlights.

Real-time analysis, social reaction and commentary for all games, all in one place. We've been getting you ready for this stretch all year long, so you really don't want to miss a second of the action. Download NCA March Madness Live now on your streaming device. It's a lot of fun, Heath. It starts tomorrow morning, tomorrow afternoon. I love it. I love March Madness.

Are you going to pick Duke to win it all? I already picked North Carolina to win it all over Duke. North Carolina. That's interesting. I did see a tweet that Duke would be the worst three-point shooting team ever to win the championship. Did you see that? Yeah, you can do that when you have Zion. By the way, for the number one pick, I think I said this on the football podcast,

but I am Team RJ Barrett over Zion. That's absurd. No, it's not. That's absolutely absurd. He is not even on the same planet as Zion. I think a lot of people are going to agree with you. So I have a lot to get off my chest about fantasy drafts. Yeah, I feel like I have some wisdom that I took away from the two drafts that we did yesterday.

The 12-team points league that we completed, mock draft, and the 14-team points league that we are doing now. It's a little point specific, so we won't linger on it for all of you categories and roto players. but I think there are, you know, universal takeaways. First of all, Heath, I don't know why Nolan Aeronado is falling to like seven, but to me he should be fourth in points leagues. I could see him being sixth, but he's so safe and he's so good. So I was very happy to get Nolan Aeronado ninth in the 14th team league, and I think sixth or seventh in the 12th team league that we did.

And you got Jose Ramirez fifth in the points league. Jose Ramirez is so good and so safe in points leagues. His plate discipline is great. If he loses some home runs, they'll probably just turn into doubles, so he had more than 50 of them two years ago. Don't take Trey Turner ahead of Ramirez and Aronado in points leagues. Agreed? 100%.

Yeah, people are just really trying to get – and in a 14-team league, I guess it's a little bit more understandable because you never have a chance at getting the guy you're looking at in the next round. and so you just get your guy. But the path to Trey Turner being better than both Jose Ramirez and Nolan Aronado in points, that's tough. Yeah, it could happen, but there's just no need to take that risk. And you might be able to get Machado the next round, or Correa in round four at shortstop. I'm happy to take Correa in round three.

Early round three, though? 14-team league, yes. Okay, 14-team, yeah. That's kind of who I'm talking about, the first-stop. person who takes Trey Turner like third overall, fourth overall in a points league, you know, Correy in round three. You know, I was, I was tweeting about this yesterday. I don't think you have to worry about, oh, no, I missed Trey Turner.

What second or third round shortstop am I going to take? Paul DeYoung is there in the 15th round. In a Roto league. In a points league. I don't love him in a points league. I understand if you don't love him, but the value of him relative to shortstop as opposed to the first baseman's second baseman, third baseman that you're looking at, I think he's one of the best values out there.

And I'd rather have Corey Seeger in like the sixth or seventh round than Trey Turner in the first round in a points league. You can take Corey Cesar. There's no reason to force shortstop. In the 12th league that we did, I got Trey Turner like 16th or something, like 17th. It was weird. His ADP, I wrote yesterday the best ADP values on CBS, ESPN, and Yahoo.

Tray Turner's ADP and CBS Points League is 28th overall. Oh my God. He's so good. Even in Points Leagues, he's great. I mean, the way he performed in 2016 and 17, you're talking about a top 10, maybe top five hitter in Points Leaks. Forget about just being a Steel Specialist. He is great.

I don't think he should go ahead of Vermeer as an Aeronado, but I think he's a back end of the first round pick in Points Leaks, Trey Turner. You agree? Yeah. Yeah, I actually like him better at the start of the second. But I pushed the pitchers up just a little bit. Fair.

Okay, here's another takeaway. I am feeling better now, certainly, than when we previewed the position, when we did the position previews about relief pitcher, specifically in a points league. Because there are... Yeah, go ahead, go ahead. Why were you ever feeling bad about relief pitchers in a points league? When we did the relief, go back and listen to the relief pitcher podcast, I told you this position is totally dependent on the format you're playing in.

It's terribly thin and very worrisome to find saves in a Categories league. But in a points league, there are so many sparps and teams only have to have two of them. There is no reason to rush after closers at all in a points league. Okay, but in a 12-team points league where you're starting two relief pitchers, it's a very common format on CBS Sports Leagues. There's 30 of them easily. Okay, but some of them are really bad. like Drew Steckenrider should not be in your under roster.

No, I didn't mean 30 closers. It's not close to 30 closers, but there's five or six sparts. Okay, when we did the preview, Carlos Martinez was the number one spark, I believe. Right. He's off the board. I mean, you could take a late around fire on him, but he's off the board. Because Matt Strom's there now. Yeah, that's a little, he's worth drafting for sure.

And he went like 170th, which was somewhat early. But, okay, my point is, since we did that preview, I feel better. I feel better about Corey Canable, except now there's a report that they're talking to Kimbrel. But Canable looks like the guy, because Jeremy Jeffers is going to start the season on the IL. I feel better about Jordan Hicks winning the job, although I believe he's had some control problems. So there are always butts, but I feel better about Hicks. I guess I should feel better about Matt Barnes. I don't see how he doesn't start the season as the closer.

So that's a little bit of clarity there. I think Hunter Strickland, for whatever reason, he's still available in this 12-team points league. We're not playing it out, but he did not get drafted. Will Smith did not get drafted. Cody Allen was drafted in the last round as Scott White's third relief pitcher. Erodos Viscayano didn't get drafted. And A.J. Minter's hurt right now. So, you know, there's plenty to go around.

I think you can wait at that position when you include the Sparps. And as he said, much, much different in a Categories League or Roto League, where you can't start Tyler Glass now and Kenta Maeda and Brandon Woodruff, etc. in your RP spot. Okay, so that was my first one. Will Smith, Heath, we don't, I don't know that we've spoken Will Smith's name since the RP preview, but I just want to remind everyone, he had a 255 ERA,

and that was with allowing four runs in his final appearance of the season. It was 190 going into that. He struck out 71 batters to 15 walks and 53 innings and had a 0.98 whip. Do you really think Will Smith is not going to close for the Giants, or is he underrated right now? I think he's probably underrated. The problem is with the Giants, because they've basically come out and said at the beginning of the spring they were going to have a competition. I've not seen anything where they've declared a winner.

They kind of gave some indications. They'd like to give Mark Melanson a really long look at getting that job back. And Malanson does have a much longer history of being a closer than Will Smith does. So it's not a concern about Will Smith's skill set at all. it's just a concern about whether he's getting 90% of the saves, 50% of the saves, or 20% of the saves. Okay, rookie starting pitchers that are the trendy guys we've been talking about. They went much earlier than average draft position, so be prepared for that. Chris Paddock went 156th overall, Jesus Lazzardo 166 overall,

and Matt Strom, who is RP eligible 175th overall. So between 156 and 175, Paddock, Lazzardo, and Strom came off the board. And what did you think about that, Heath? Well, it didn't work out well, and we're going to talk more about my strategy for this draft and other drafts in a little bit, but it didn't really help my strategy at all.

There were two different runs of upside pitchers that really kind of put me in a bind. I still love my team, but I don't love it quite as much as I could. It almost worked out exactly like I planned. Yeah, my start, that was the, well, the next thing I was going to talk about as Ryan McMahon and Garrett Hampson, but then I'll talk about starting pitcher.

In a shallower league, Heath, where, let's see, we had 21 times 12, so what is that, however many picks that is. I used to be much better at math. 210 plus 42, 252 picks? No, 54 picks, 254? Please, I hope that's right. You know, it's easy to forget about guys like Ryan McMahon who might go, you know, more in deeper drafts.

But you should always take upside. And Heath, you took McMahon 216th overall the last pick of round 18. Yeah, and in a points league, I kind of feel like Ryan McMahon should go ahead of Garrett Samson. Garrett Hampson. He's not Garrett Samson. He's not that powerful. 252 picks, by the way. How come, why would you, why the difference between points in Rodo?

Because it steals? Well, the steals are still worth points, but they are more valuable in that format. right now it feels like Ryan McMahon is the team's second baseman and Garrett Hampson is the utility guy. Now that could change throughout the year, but I would right now project Ryan McMahon for more plate appearances than Garrett Hampson. And now I want to talk about starting pitcher strategy as I basically have figured out my starting pitcher strategy. Okay, I want to get one ace. That's a little bit harder now without Severino in that mix and without Clayton Kershaw. I don't think you can really value him as a top 12 guy.

So it's more difficult. And sometimes they go earlier than anticipated. So Heath, my strategy, if I don't get an ace, then becomes Strasbourg-Paxston with back-to-back picks. That is, like, I love it. Major upside for both of them, in my opinion. Obviously health concerns, but I'm willing to roll the dice if I can get three great, in a points league, let's say three great hitters, maybe in a rhodo league, four great hitters before I take Paxton or Strasbourg. and Paxson, maybe.

Of course, Paxon went one pick before me, so I did take Strasbourg, and then Paxon went one pick before I was up to go. So then, Heath, my strategy, if I can't get Strasbourg and Paxon, becomes one of those two and Tyone. I like Tyone a lot. But at my next pick, he wasn't available.

So he was available. Paxon went, and then I could have taken Tio, but that felt like a reach in round five. So I'll take him in round six. No, he was off the board. So was Jose Barrio, so was Armand. Marquez. So, what did I even do after that? So then, then I turned to U. Darvish as my, I think my third pitcher. No, no, my second pitcher. So U. Darvish, I took in round seven. I reached for him,

because you know, I like him a lot. But now I'm worried about the blister, Heath. So things are, things went haywire for me with starting pitcher, but I think there are still enough, especially in this format, is a little bit shallow, where you can make a good staff load up on hitters, have like an elite elite lineup, then you can basically forget about hitters for like five or six rounds, just take pitchers, and still pull it off. So I know my

pitching staff isn't what I wanted it to be. Strasberg's my number one. U. Darvich is my number two. I did draft Luis Severino. I have Tyler Skaggs. Let's see the rest of it here. Bumgarner I took. I'm glad you don't have any injury concerns in that pitching stuff. Yeah, I do, but you know what? You're probably going to get

200 innings out of all of them. Well, the Darvish blister thing kind of screwed things up, but that was after we drafted. But Strasbourg, Darvish, Bumgarner, Severino, Skaggs, Sonny Gray, Andrew Hini, Vince Velasquez on my bench. I have a lead hitting. There's no question about that because I waited so long on pitching. I think I could pull this off. I think I can pull it off. Oh, I've been talking about this sort of strategy for a couple of months, so I think it definitely works.

I don't know that you necessarily took the pitchers that I would want in that range. I have pretty much decided into points league, especially if I pick in the top three or four picks, that my ideal strategy is to get one of that Betts, Trout, Jose Ramirez, Altuvae, and Otto group, and then take two of my top eight pitchers at the two-three turn. And that's what I did. And then I don't feel like I need to take another pitcher until round 10.

The problem was there was a run on almost all the pictures I wanted in round 10 before I got to pick again. Who are some of those pitchers that you wanted that you did not get? Shane Bieber is obviously number one with a bullet. I missed out on Nick Povetta. I missed out on Charlie Morton. I missed out on Robbie Ray. Those guys all kind of went right before me.

And then two rounds later or two and a half rounds later, I missed out on Jesus Lazardo by two picks. So who filled out your pitching staff? I did still get Kintamaieta as, and one thing I've kind of come around on, especially in a points league, is taking one closer, which I took Canabel, I think, in the ninth round. And then a couple of sparps later in the draft.

I took Kenta Maida and Brad Keller. And I think there will be a lot of weeks where I feel perfectly fine starting my Ada as my third starter. And having Keller in there as a very good spark. Not necessarily somebody you want to have as one of your top five starting pitchers, though. I also have Rich Hill, Zach Godley, Sean Newcomb, Marcus Stroman, and Josh James. Yeah, I mean, it's not a great step. But I have Blake Snell and Aranola at the top. Right.

So I... So I... So which is a better pitching staff? Heats or Adams? Oh, it's definitely mine. Dog or Frog? Blake Snell and Aranola with Rich Hill,

Zach Godley, Sean Newcomb, and then Stroman, Josh James, Brad Keller, Kenta Maeda. Or Strasberg, Darvish,

And it gets easier to... I wish Darvis were healthy. Strasbourg, Darvish, Bumgarner, Severino, Skaggs, Sunny Gray, and Trujini, Vince Velasquez. That's probably yours. My hitting's better. So, but that's the thing. Like, I would have...

I doubt your hitting's better. Oh, my hitting's better. Are you kidding me? My hitting's better. Aeronado Turner with my first two... My hitting's better. So I would have taken a pitcher maybe in round two, but Trey Turner was there.

So I couldn't pass that up. And then, you know, more likely, I would have taken a pitcher in round three. This is the last point I wanted to make about this, Heath. I could have taken my ace in round three. There was Noah Cindergarde. And the more and more I've thought about it, Heath, I just don't see that much of a difference between Cindergarde and Strasbourg. Cindergarde's better. If they both pitch the same amount of innings, I'm pretty sure Cindergarde would do better. But not that much better. So I took Rizzo and I waited. Cindergars less likely to get injured, too, in my opinion.

Yeah. So I took Rizzo and. of Cinderguard, he's great in points leagues. Plate discipline's amazing. Safe player. I think he bounces back as a good year. That's my third round pick. And then I took Strasbourg in round four. And I was fine with that.

And then to compare it to the 14 team league, whereas I took Aeronado in round one in the 12th team league, and then I couldn't pass up Trey Turner in round two of the 12 team league. I also took Aeronado ninth overall in the 14 team league. And then in round two, Manny Machado, Aaron Judge, Ronald Ocuna, all were there. Those are great picks. I would have been happy with any of them.

But I knew I wasn't going to get an ace in round three. No chance of a 14-team league where I had, I guess that would be the 37th pick. No chance. So I took Trevor Bauer. I took Bauer over Machado and Judge. I wouldn't do that in a 12-team league. I did do that in a 14-team league. And that is something I recommend.

I've played in these 14-team points leagues for like seven years now, and my best teams always have strong pitching because it's just not that easy to find it necessarily throughout the year. So that's why I prioritize the ace over hitters that in a shallower league I would go with the hitters in the deeper league I went with the starting pitcher. And you choosing Bauer probably led to me taking a pitcher in the second round because I wouldn't have necessarily taken Bauer over Judge there. I passed on Judge as well. But you took Bauer over Blake Snell, so it was pretty easy for me to just take Snell. Yeah, and that's a toss up to me. I do the team with Jamie Eisenberg and he favored Bauer over Snell, so I had no problem with it.

We're going to get to a lot more of Heath's draft strategies. I wanted to update the Twitter poll as I believe Hunter Strickland closed it out. No, not yet. Two down to Matt Chapman. Okay. The Twitter poll, do dog and frog rhyme? Last I checked, it was like 88% said yes. With over 3,000 votes.

It's a large sample size. Okay, so where are we here? 37% yet 30,775 votes, 87% say yeah. Is this my worst take ever? I don't know. You know, I have a threat of those on Twitter of all the worst things that you've said on the podcast. Maybe we should do, by next year, we'll probably have enough of them to where we could do like a March Madness-style bracket of Adam's worst take to determine what is the worst take you've ever had? It might be this one.

It might be this one. But I still think you all are saying the word frog wrong. News and notes. Heath Mike Trout will sign a 12-year $430 million extension, and he still takes mokey bets over Mike Trout. But what do you think about him in long-term Keeper League's Dynasty Leagues? He's the best player in baseball. I don't know there's much real fantasy analysis.

here. I would expect him to keep being the best player in baseball. He has such a wide range of skills that even if age starts to impact one of them, I still think he's going to be awesome. So he's fantastic. At one point do you think he stopped running?

30? What is he, 26 now? I only picked that because it's a round number. He's 27. 27. Okay. Michael Fulmer likely needs Tommy John surgery. Houston's signed relief pitcher Ryan Presley to a two-year, $17.5 million.

deal. He was among a small group of relief pitchers with no starts that did not make one start and struck out 100 more batters. They were Josh Hater, 143, Edwin Diaz, 124 strikeouts, Delin Batanzas, 115, Adamadovino 112, Brad Hand 106, Ryan Presley 101, and Blake Trinen 100. I've taken Presley in a couple of categories drafts. The difference between him once he got to Houston last year, and we know what they do to pitchers. He was he was hateresque. Yeah, he was terrific. And Milwaukee is talking to Craig Kimbrel, according to the athletic.

He's going to sign soon and it's going to screw things up. And I hope it's not the Brewers. But we'll see. Jeremy Jeffers will begin the season on IL. The IL. It's not IR. It's the IL. Houston signed Alex Breggman to a five-year extension, $100 million. Brad Peacock, this is somebody that I sort of forgot about in the Points League draft yesterday.

And I don't care points or roto. I am excited about Brad Peacock, Keith. He's still the favorite, A.J. Hinch said it yesterday. And he was amazing. As a starting pitcher, I think he was great. In 2017, he had a 32ER and a 122 whip with 135 strikeouts in 111 and two-thirds innings. and in his last nine starts of 2017 and then continuing,

I know last 12 starts, and then continuing as a reliever last year, Brad Peacock really cut down on the walks. So, I mean, I just see a ton of potential here. And he went, and I said, oh, I wish I had Brad Peacock in my cue, and I can tell you where he went. But I think he's, I think it's huge,

I mean, I'm over the moon. I might have to change from you, Darvish, to Brad Peacock with my player I love. Yeah, I mean, there's a little bit of concern that he's not likely to make 30 starts. He's probably going to be in the rotation for half the year. There's a little bit of concern that he's probably not going to pitch more than five and a third most starts. You won't see hardly any quality starts from Peacock.

But he is phenomenal when he's out there, and I still think he's a good value. So I don't mean that to poo-poo your pick. It's just I wouldn't want to get too excited and start thinking, man, this guy should be taking a single-digit round or something. No, I wouldn't do that. Okay, and then you Darvish. He left with a blister, and what do you make of it? He doesn't sound concerned about it. It sounds like the last time he had a blister like this.

He didn't even miss his next start. So, listen, it really depends. Darvish was in one of my favorite picks yesterday. I think it was on ESPN, where he's going 156. seventh overall. But, so I wouldn't worry about the blister at that cost, or at a 12th round cost or at an 11th round cost. If you're taking them in a seventh round of a 12-team league, then I'd be a little nervous. You know, look, I agree that taking him in the seventh round of a 12-team league was felt early.

But at the same time, at some point, you have to ignore average draft position and get your guy. And pitchers just went kind of early in this draft. So, I mean, we could talk about the guys that I took Darvish over. I don't think it was anything crazy. Like, he went after the Tyone, Brrios, Zach Wheeler, Armand Marquez. They were all off the board. So here are the pitchers that went after you Darvish. Tanaka, Chris Archer, Luis Severino to me again.

Madison Bumgarner to me again. Wow. See, this is what I'm talking about. Nobody was taking pictures at this point. I had filled up my lineup, basically. Everybody's taking hitters, and I'm just taking all these pitchers. And then Tyler Glass now, Shane Bieber. I understand that seventh round feels early, but when you look at the names that went after U.

Darvish, there's nobody that strikes me as, oh, he definitely should have gone ahead of U. Darvish. Maybe not definitely. I mean, I think every name you've said so far I'd rather have than U. Darvish. But I just, I do agree. And you kind of did the opposite. opposite before the U-Darvish pick and illustrated it, worrying about getting guys one round later can cost you everybody you want.

That's true. But when you're taking a guy five or six rounds ahead of his ADP, then you're probably costing yourself some value. I think you should take an Archer there. Yeah, you know, I'm not going to do that. Severino next and then taking Darvish. I suppose. I didn't want Chris Archer to be my number two starting pitcher. I may have considered him as my number three,

but he went one pick before I took my number three starting pitcher. But I think, yeah, I just, you know I like Darbush better than Archer, but. Okay. Yeah. Okay, Heath. So, we have a lot to get to. I do want to talk more about Heath strategies for three different formats, head-to-head categories, Roto, and head-to-head points leagues.

We also are going to do some regulating, and we're going to read some emails. It can be a fun second half of the. show will be right back after this. Heath, you ready to do some regulating? 100% yes. All right. I actually have an email for regulators. Oh, you do?

What do you mean? I have an email for the regulator segment. That's my job to get the emails for the regulator segment. Oh, I didn't realize this was that you had a firm grip on this and then we only have the emails used like it. I had a very interesting one about price payouts. All right. Go for it. The most equitable way to do that.

Go for it. Regulate, go ahead. This guy is in a 14-team points league, and it sounds like they are all playing for 50 units per person. And the current prize payout is 500 units for first place, 150 for second place, and then 50 for the third-place game, which I'm not really a big fan of third-place games, but whatever. And he had suggested to his commissioner that they make the regular season. season winner, a $50 unit winner. So the person that was the best team for four months of the season got their investment back. Commissioner never responded to his email or even acknowledged it, and he was wondering what his next step should be.

When did this hero that you speak of who champions for the regular season league winner, when did this hero make the suggestion to the commissioner? How did he do it? He sent an email and replied to the entire league before the draft started. Are you sure? Yes, 100% before the draft started. He actually, it looks like the draft started yesterday morning, and he does have receipts on the date of the email was sent, yes. Okay, so Heath is talking about me.

I am the commissioner of this league. You know what? I think it's a fine idea. I will grant it. Heath, consider this. to have been regulated. You are correct. I didn't see the email.

That's why I ignored it. My apologies. Thank you for calling me out, though. That was wonderful. Here's Kenny from York, Pennsylvania. Regulate this. My sister's boyfriend has been playing in our fantasy baseball and football leagues for the past two years. And this morning, my sister called me to say that he packed up his stuff and he left her.

Obviously, I want to kick this bum out to defend my sister's honor. At the same time, this breakup is so new, and I'm afraid they're going to get back together, and it will be awkward that I impulsively threw him out of the league. I only got 10 days until the draft, and full disclosure, Heath, he only has three days until the draft now. This email's a week old, and I'm not sure whether to try to find another player. Any thoughts would be appreciated. I guess, Kenny, at this point, I mean, it's been a week since you sent the email, and I understand the trouble you go through, and Adam doesn't respond to your emails in a timely fashion.

It depends on whether the guy has reached out. If he's reached out to you to say he's definitely playing in the league, then I'd probably just let him stay in the league because that sounds like maybe he's not quite done with this situation. If he left your sister and he's never sent you any message about the league or said anything about the draft, then I'm probably replacing him. Okay. Well, that's good. I mean, that's a tough spot.

I would get him out of the league for, Without a question. All right, so thank you for that regulator segment, Heath. You threw me off there. But we have more later, hopefully. Now, Heath's draft strategies, great story on CBSports.com. Check it out. What do you want to share?

What format do you want to start with? I mean, we could basically knock out points right now because we have spoken so much about it. I gave my strategy. I'd like to get an ace. If not, then it's Strasbourg and Paxton. If not Strasbourg and Paxon, then it's one of those guys in Tyone. If not that, then I'm kind of scrambling a little bit. One thing I did notice, 12 team head-to-head points, League Heath, 21 rounds, 21-man roster.

It still feels pretty shallow, and I'm really not opposed to just going best player available. And I would do that in a 10-team league, I think. I just feel like you can make it work, you know? As long as you're active on waivers, just go best player available. And that's the point that I wanted to make at the start of this is I'm going to do that. And this draft was a good example. I started off. I thought, you know, I just wrote this piece,

and I wrote it about, for points leagues at least, if you have a pick early in the first round to start the draft. And I had the number one pick in this draft. So I just tried to implement the strategy. And this draft's a pretty good example of how it can go and how it can go wrong. I took mooky bets with the first pick, and then I took Snell and Nola at the two three turns. So I've got two aces.

I don't need to worry about pitcher. I did, though, worry a little bit about catcher. The ideal plan would be that J.T. Raimuto's there at the end of the fourth round. He's often not, and he often goes just before that pick. I'm perfectly fine, though, taking Gary Sanchez, because he's not going to be there the next time you pick, and you're going to be a lot worse at catcher if you don't have him. So I took Gary Sanchez, and what I said in the piece was the other position that does feel a little bit thin is first base. and there are three first basemen that I think are fine in that range of the draft,

and I'm pretty okay with just taking whoever's left out of Matt Carpenter, Joey Votto, Jose I Brio. I took Carpenter. So I started the team off with Betts, Sanchez, and Carpenter as my hitters, and Snell and Nola. Round 7 and 8 is generally a place where I'm going to look for Travis Shaw, and then I'm going to take a lot of outfielders in that range as well, because Mitch Hanigur, Michael Brantley, Eloi Jimenez,

three of my favorite outfield values. You can usually get them in the sixth, seventh, or sometimes eighth and ninth range. Oh, you know what? I'm so glad you brought that up, because that is the best spot for outfield. I know we've said it a lot, but what were the three names you gave?

Hanager, Brantley. And Eloy. And Eloy. And then Pueg is trendy there. I don't know where he goes, depends on the draft. Pueg and Conforto and who was the other? one that I love, and David Dahl.

David Dahl. I will not fill up outfield before I get to that spot. I love to get one high-end outfielder, but I'll take two of the six that Heath just mentioned. I think it's amazing. And I think Aaron Hicks is falling way too far

because he might miss a week, especially in a points league where he's going to lead off for the Yankees and has great play with discipline. The outfield value is just too good to load up early in your draft. Keep going. I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I'm so glad you said.

So I did finish my out, I had my three outfielders by the end of the end of, round eight when I took I Elohimenez. Okay. But you know when you take Elohimenez, you need a fourth outfieler. But it was like seven and eight, right? I mean, it was Yes, seven and eight. Right. Okay. Because I started off with Mookie. I did take Corey Canable at the start of

round nine. I was hoping to get Brad Hand there, but he went just a couple of picks before me. I'd like to take one of those top ten closers in the first ten picks. And I didn't really feel like, I mean, the start of round nine, I was 24 picks away from my next pick. I didn't think there was probably another good closer getting back to me. Where things went wrong, because my plan and my perfect draft strategy is round 10, 11, 12, and I've been able to do this all preseason. I just couldn't in this draft. I want to take three of that group of Shane Bieber, U. Darvish, Kenta Maeda, Luis Castillo, John Gray, Nick Pavetta.

I want three of those guys right in a row, and they all went earlier than I expected. I did get Maida, I didn't get any of the rest of them. And then the other strange thing that happened was we get to the end of round 10, pick 120 overall, and Marcelo Zuna was still there. I didn't plan on taking Marcel O'Zuna there. I didn't plan on taking another outfielder, but I couldn't pass on that value. Yeah, I find that I find a guy that I really don't like that much is Justin Upton, but I find that he's going to be out, like Aaron Hicks, not very long.

I find that he is falling way too far, and I've been taking Justin Upton. So, yeah, I mean, if great value falls to you, then just take it. And then shallower form that's draft upside. The one position I haven't addressed it all yet that I do address in the piece is shortstop. And they're may, like, I'm not opposed to taking some of those elite short stops early. But if you get into a situation where you didn't get any of them, I absolutely love Paul DeYoung in the 13th round.

Somebody made reference to the difference between Glaber Torres and Paul DeYoung on yesterday's podcast. I went and looked up their projections on most of the major projection sites, ATC, steamer, the bat. They're very, very similar. They've got like a hundred spots difference in their ADP. So, okay, I know you've been a Paul de young guy, and I get it. I get it more in Rodo because the plate discipline drags him down a little bit. He had 36 walks to 123 strikeouts. It's just hard to be a standout and points with that. Well, you're not drafting a standout

in the 13th round. I understand. Yeah. So I'll just finish up. We should move on from points because we've talked so much about it, but I agree, Heath, that I, you know, catcher's important to me. It doesn't have to be Sanchez-Aremuto, but I did take Yaddi or Molina because

now that Salvador Perez is out, there's like eight catchers that I trust. And one of them is Danny Jansen, and I don't really fully trust him. It's a bit of a leap of faith. But he does have great play discipline. It's good in points leagues. So catcher's important, and you don't have to take, if you want to take Ramos or Molina or somebody like that, you don't have to go that early. But it's nice to get a top seven catcher, in my opinion.

I would like to get one relief pitcher that I'm very comfortable with, but I'm fine waiting a long time for my second. And okay, and there we go. So I think that's basically how we're approaching points leagues. That's good stuff. Let's do head-to-head categories now. So I have been playing for about four years in a Yahoo League, which, by the way, we are moving to CBS because I convinced the commissioner, hey, let's move it to CBS. And what did he say?

Oh, this is great because I can make a custom category, which is seven by seven and we're doing like strikeouts minus walks per nine or something weird like that. I don't know. I don't really like it, but you can do it on CBS. You can do a lot of cool things on CBS. CBSports.com slash FBT to sign up. So in this Headhead Categories League, it is two starters, two or three relievers, and then like two or three pitcher spots. I don't remember exactly.

I want four closers. Easier in years past than now, but I anticipate that I will have four guys that I think will get saves. One of them might be like a David Robertson who might get every save. I definitely see Hunter Strickland being on that list because I love his value. But I'll probably have one top seven closer or something like that. hopefully a top 15 closer as well, and then like Robertson and Viscayne, it was something like that. But this is a daily lineup, too.

So I love to be able to win saves and then just kind of shuffle in my starting pitchers based on matchups in the daily lineup format. But I wouldn't say I punt starting pitcher. I do like to have good starting pitching. It doesn't have to be as good as it is in a points league where you have to start five starting pitchers and two relievers. but I'm not punting starting pitching.

I would still like to get an ace. That is how I take a look at my pitching staff. It's mostly normal except four closers, is what I'd say. And I don't draft a middle reliever, but typically, but throughout the year, I can go to the waiver wire and get some with ERA help with some middle relievers. And then as far as hitting goes, you know, mine's a 7 by 7 league. The more categories there are, the less I care about. about steals. So that's very important. It's five by five, then yeah, I'm going to have to care

about steals more. Seven by seven, I don't really care. I'm not going to draft Billy Hamilton, most likely, because, you know, whatever, I'll punt steals. I'd rather him not kill me in every other category. Heath, you're very good at head-to-head categories leagues. Take it away. Yeah, I like to take care of the steals early. And I mostly play in five-by-five leagues, so I do think it's important. And it's pretty easy when you're taking those steals guys early in the draft to get a good head start in both steals. and batting average. I'd love to start my draft off in the middle of the draft

with either Jose Altuve or Trey Turner. A guy I find myself taking a lot in the second round is Freddie Freeman, and he gives you a little bit of power, but he also keeps the batting average up. In the third and fourth, I don't have a lot of difference between categories and points. I'd still like to get one of Real Muto or Sanchez in the fourth or fifth round.

I'd still like to get that first base taken care of, but if I've got Freeman, I don't have to worry about that. I am more likely in this format to take a shot on Adalberto Mondesie because I think upside matters just a little bit more in this format. And Mondesie could be absolutely amazing in Categories leagues, and it won't be that hard to replace him with the smaller lineups. So you get the benefit of him in a Categories league, but also don't have the risk of the deeper rosters in a standard CBS

Roto League. Right. I am more likely to take two closers in the first eight rounds. They generally go off the board much, much quicker in this format. I'd be thrilled if in the seventh and eighth round I could get Roberto O'Zuna and Brad Hand. I think that's a good accommodation to start with. And then you've got some guys in, because I think with this approach, if you're starting with, let's say, Turner Freeman and Whitmeryfield, or Turner Freeman and Mardi, or Turner Freeman and Mondesie, You're a little bit behind on power.

Gary Sanchez could help with that in the fourth round. But there are some guys in that round 9-10 range, Joey Gallo, Matt Olson, Matt Chapman, who might hurt you in batting average. But you've got a huge head start on that already. So I'm focusing on those guys in this range. Wild Wild West Leagues, Heath, where it's just like seven or eight pitcher spots

and five-by-five categories. What do you do there? have to have any starters if you don't want to. You don't have to have any relievers if you don't want to. I think that league more than any other is going to be determined by what everybody does. Generally speaking, I lean towards I want to have four or five relievers, maybe six relievers and just take a couple of upside starters later in the draft. But we've had years in the Four People podcast league where relievers just start flying off the board in the fourth round and they don't stop. And I think then you have to realize that this approach doesn't make any sense.

since everyone's trying to do it. Right. And you start stockpiling starters. I, in a league like you're talking about, though, where you have to have two starting pitchers, I want guys in the double-digit rounds like Shane Bieber, Jesus Lazzardo, Rich Hill,

guys that there are some questions about, or maybe there's some questions about their innings, but when they're starting, they're going to be awesome, at least I think. Yeah, I support having a balanced pitching staff with some high-end guys. I think weekly versus daily really changes things. You know, because you can go to the waiver wire

and pick somebody up in the middle of a week and start him. It takes some pressure off. But as long as I get four closers or four guys that I think are going to get saves, I feel pretty good about it. That's, you know what? I just don't think that it's so easy to sum up the head-to-head category strategy

because there are so many different formats within the format. Well, and there are more strategies for, this formats than any other. It's why it's my favorite format, because there are so many different ways you can approach it. And I am all four. You should go in with a plan that this is the way that I want to do things,

and you should be ready by round four to say that's not going to work. I'm going to have to go a different direction. And as we pivot to just standard roto, let's say 5 by 5-5 roto, it's fine to punt categories in a head-to-head categories league. I don't think you want to punt a lot, but you can punt, like, you

could go RP heavy and punt wins and strikeouts, but figure you're going to win saves, whip and ERA most weeks. You can't do that in a Roto league, in my opinion. What do you think? Can you punt categories in a standard Roto league, five by five? In a five by five, you can,

and there have been people that have won leagues doing that, but I don't suggest it. I think the degree of difficulty is much, much higher if you decide you're going to punt saves or steals. It's possible. I'm more likely to, not really punt a category, but recognize that I'm going to start off behind in a category.

And then sometimes, a lot of times, like last year, it's wins and the strikeouts. And then just try to start picking people off in the second half. The bad thing about a standard Roto League is generally by the time you get to June, you've got at least three teams that don't have much of a chance.

And at the time you get to August, you've probably got six teams that don't have much of a chance. And a lot of those guys don't keep trying very hard. And that does make it easier to make up ground in a category when maybe they're not accumulating very many statistics in that category. Now, when we talk about roto leagues, they are typically deeper than points leagues and the categories leagues, right? They're usually, I guess on CBS, they're usually two catchers, you know.

Five outfielders. A lot of them, a lot of them are 15 teams on other sites. 15 team road leagues, exactly. So you do have to understand. your league depth and you have to understand what's going to be available on waivers and you have to understand position scarcity it's not as easy as just take best player available uh i mean you could you could i'm not saying you can't but it's but it's there's more thought to it great the great debate and i i touched on this in the piece is whether okay it's much deeper rosters it replacement

cost is much lower so i don't want to take risks on players that might just be terrible because i to have some of those boring guys. And there's some very smart people that think the boring hitters are the most undervalued in Roto just because of that fact. I look at it a little bit different. And it's probably because most of our Roto leagues aren't really for anything but pride. Nobody talks about finishing second or third in our leagues. I know there are some where maybe prize money goes to first second or third.

That might change my approach. But the only thing we're playing for is winning the league. It's so much different than a head-to-head categories or head-to-head points league because at the end of August in those leagues, you just have to be in the top half of the league, and now you've got to win three in a row, and you're the champion. In a roto league, you've got to beat 11 teams.

You're right, you're right. And I sort of was a little skeptical of your strategy last year, but it really worked out. And as I mentioned on the auction show that we did, I'm specifically talking about our auction roto league. Heath had basically every single one of his most expensive players hit. I mean, and they hit big. So that was great for Heath.

But yeah, he went with a high upside approach, and it worked, and he destroyed the league. Yeah, you do need some boring players. That's true. You can't just take risks, but, well, maybe Heath disagreed. There's a balance. Okay, it's not like your whole roster should be boring. You definitely want some upside guys, but don't be afraid to take Adam. I'm just not.

Yeah, I'm not interested in the Rick Porcello's. of the world in Roto. I agree. That's basically what it comes down to. Okay. You never really like Rick Pursle that much, though. And, yeah, our standard Roto leagues have more hitter spots than pitcher spots. And proportionally, like, they're more hitter heavy than the points leagues and the categories league.

So hitting really does become a bigger priority in the early rounds. And, you know, you could still say I want one ace. Or I want two top 20 pitchers, but fortunately you can usually get them later in those drafts. All right. If you need more help, consult the story on the website. And let's do some emails to end the show, Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. It's your last day to join the Bracket Challenge, everybody. So if you need a link to it, please email me or just follow me on Twitter at Adam Azer, A-I-Z-E-R.

And Heath, before we read some fantasy baseball emails, Let's regulate. Max Powers from the Bayou City. Max Power is what Homer renamed himself in a Simpsons episode. I am in need of your wisdom, gentlemen. Our league has a constitution that we have all agreed upon. One rule is that if you fail to submit a proper lineup weekly, you will be docked auction dollars in next season's draft.

Well, one member violated this rule late in the season. he failed to submit a lineup, and his 12-0-0 loss impacted our playoff race. The worst thing is, this owner made numerous trades during the week. His excuse was he was very busy and had no time. Our commission is refusing to punish him, and the offender is acting like a five-year-old child anytime someone brings up the auction dollar sanction. He threatens to quit if he is fined even one draft dollar. Help me, regulators, you are my only hope.

Please help my commission named Evan grow a spine and punish the offender. Evan, you're probably not going to grow a spine. Let's face it. This guy is in your league. His name is Max Powers. How is he not the commissioner of your league? He has the Max Powers. And he has the right idea here.

If you have a rule in your constitution and you don't enforce it, it's kind of like when you set a clock in a draft and it's four hours long and people time out and then you say, oh, it's okay. We'll go back and redo the pick for you. you because you weren't paying attention for four hours. Another reference. No one has any motivation to follow those rules in the future because they know

there's no teeth behind them. If this guy wants to quit because he's going to be fined per the rules, don't let him. Kick him out of the league. Thank you for referencing another commissioner decision I made. I'm sorry I didn't want the guy's first round pick to be an odd. This is actually kind of a funny story.

Sixth pick in our 14 team league. It's basically on time, but you get a three hour o'clock. Now this guy works with us. This is an office league. And he's very, very busy, Heath. He was in meetings all day. So he auto-drafted Justin Verlander with the six pick in the draft. So I paused the draft, and I reached out to him. I said, hey, you just auto-drafted Justin Verlander. I don't want you to have to auto-draft your first pick.

He says, okay, I'll go back in now. I'll go into the draft room now. I back out the pick. He takes about a minute. He drafts Justin Verlander. After all that... The funny thing is, the person that co-owns your... team with you went over when there was 10 minutes left on the clock just to make sure that he wasn't caught in something. And this person was just sitting at their desk. Oh, I didn't know that. That's new information to be. So, let's, okay, we're done with regulators for today.

Let's read some emails to finish the show we have about three minutes left, Heath. This is from Christopher. I'm surprised that Ryan O'Hern is not higher in your rankings. Is Ryan O'Hern, Royal's first baseman, a top 300 player? he's a borderline top 300 player and right christopher's email was much better than what you gave a credit for he was basically comparing him to luke voight and why do you love luke voight and not feel the same way about ryan o'hearn and if you look at what they did last year it does not make any sense at all that luke voight gets taken in the first 200 picks of a draft and ryan herne goes

undrafted i just think that the case is probably more that luke voight shouldn't be drafted as high as he is than that Ryan and O'Hern should be drafted. They're both very good reserve round picks in a Roto League. By the way, we still don't know what's going to happen with the Yankees' first base situation. They're both probably going to make the roster because of Hicks' injury, and then we'll go from there. But they're both having amazing springs. It's very frustrating.

From Dennis, this is a final. Okay, do you want to give final thoughts on Alberto Mondesie? If you don't draft Mondesie because you're worried about how bad he could be. than you're playing scared. That's okay. Some people play scared. That's fine. We got accused of playing scared in the past.

I support playing a little bit scared. He has legitimate top 12 upside in Roto and probably top 25 upside in points leagues. He could also, it's conceivable that he could be bad enough that he doesn't have a job. It's an extremely wide range of possibilities. But what he showed last year in the second half, if he gives you 75% of that over a full season,

you're going to feel stupid for not drafting it. In a points league, his plate discipline is really bad and it will hurt him. That's an important thing. Walk to strikeout ratio, very important in points leagues. So I have seen the question several times. Why is Scott so much lower on Mondesi in points leagues? It's because of plate discipline. Austin from Santa Barbara, dear frog, dog, pog and log.

See the difference there. I'm interested in Chris's story about drafting all the Dodgers, but I'm concerned that if some of the starters moved to the bullpen to save their innings, rather than a Phantom IL stint, how would that change? You're then wasting two roster spots on middle relievers. So do you think that some guys are going to go to the bullpen instead of being put on the injured list? Oh, certainly.

I would expect that Kenta Maida at some point is going to get very close to the number of innings he needs for the Dodgers to pay him the contract they agreed upon, and they're going to send him to the bullpen to make sure that doesn't happen. But at that point, you can probably just drop Kenta Maida. Yeah, yeah, I think that's the way to say it. If the Rias gets sent to the bullpen, then just you drop them.

Now, if your Rias gets sent to the bullpen at the beginning of the year, and they say he's going to be the long man and make starts soon, I'm going to hold on to him. Right, right, right. Sorry, thank you for clarifying. This is from Justin. Dear Marty, Patrick, Ed, and Roberto. Marty, Patrick, Ed, and Roberto. I don't know.

12 team head-to-head league. We can keep four people for up to three. Three years. Should I take Juan Soto or Vladimir Guerrero? I'm inclined to go Soto. I'm inclined to go. Listen, Soto last year, just the pace he gave you from the time that he came up, and that included a few games where he was a pinch hitter before he actually got into the actual starting lineup.

He was a top 20 hitter overall. I don't think we saw the best of him. He's going to be ready on opening day, and he's going to play a game. full season. Vlad is definitely not going to be ready opening day. We're kind of now hopeful that we see him in May and if they're going to keep him down till May there's a chance

you could just get to the Super 2 deadline and keep him there. So I'd go Soto. I do think that Vlad has more upside over the next three years, but I don't know that the next two years he'll catch up to what you're going to lose this year. All right, we are

out of here. Thank you very much to all of our listeners who needed regulation who sent in emails who joined our bracket challenge. Good luck to you, everybody. We got another game at 5.30 in the morning, so I'm going to get to sleep in a few hours so I can wake up for it. Heath Cummings, thank you so much. I'm Adam Azer, and we will talk to you tomorrow on Fantasy Baseball today.