Fantasy Baseball Today - 2023 Season Recap! League Leaders, Statistical Trends & Playoff Predictions! (10/3 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: October 3, 2023

The 2023 regular season is over! How did we do in our Fantasy leagues (2:51)? ... Who were the batting average leaders (11:42)? ... We have a special guest join us to hype up the Marlins (15:30)! ... What about the rest of the league leaders in hitting categories (22:52)? Stolen bases were way up, as expected. ... On the pitching side, ERA and WHIP went up but we had more reliable closers (32:49). ... News (39:44): Brandon Woodruff is out for the postseason with another shoulder injury. ... What league-wide statistical trends did we notice in 2023 (46:00)? ... We wrap up with our playoff predictions (56:16)! Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." 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 lead. Where fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. We did it. We made it.

The 2023 regular season is in the books. Welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today and welcome to the postseason. Today is Tuesday, October 3rd. I am Frank Stamfield joined by Scott White. Today on the show, we'll take a look back at how we did in all of our leagues. I actually took the time, counted all my leagues up. I played in 20 leagues this year. That sounds like a lot.

Maybe I need to cut a town a little bit for next year. 20 that you actually had to manage or were some of them best ball? You're not even counting the best ball with 20? One of them was best ball. Oh. 19 of them I had to set lineups for and probably about half of those I had to do fab for. So it all kind of when we say fab, you mean

waivers of any sort? Yep. So half of those, half of the 19 just didn't even have waivers that ran. No, those are draft and hold formats over at the NFBC where you just have to set your line up all year, but. Sure. So half of them were fairly low maintenance, you're saying. Yep,

yep. And that's how I like it. As little maintenance as as possible, but we'll talk all about that. We'll reveal the 2023 league leaders. We'll take a look at each of the major statistical categories. We'll take a look at some season-long trends and how they compare to years past.

And we'll wrap up, have some fun, make some playoff predictions here. I am the only person on this podcast where their favorite team did not make the playoffs. How about that? The Braves, the Marlins, the Diamondbacks, they all made the playoffs to Yankees. They did not.

Look at us, Scott. We're recording before midnight. This is weird. How's everything going, man? Fine. I'm hoping my voice holds. up for the entire podcast. I was, you know, I was starting to lose it last week and it got pretty bad over the weekend. It's a little better today, but maybe not after an hour of talking. We'll see.

We'll see, but hopefully, I might have to hit that mute button a little more and you'll say, Scott, you're muted. So we'll get to just a little preview of what you're in for here over the next hour or so. Well, I do. That should be fun. I do appreciate that you saved your illness for after the season, Scott. Once we were done with five podcasts per week, week. Now we're down to two. I think it's a little bit more manageable. I stockpiled vacation days and I stockpiled illness. So I'm ready to put it all out here in the fall. All right. Lilal, let's just jump in and talk about how we did in our league. Scott, congrats to you on sweeping both of our podcast league. That's a 12 to head head to

points league and a 16 team head to head categories league. How'd you do in all of your leagues combined, I guess? Well, Frank, I pulled off. the first ever podcast league sweep break out the brooms yes i'm in the the podcast listeners league

podcast for the people league winners club a club of one one them both in the same year and uh I was I think it was really uh the podcast for the people league

which is the 16 team head to head categories league remember I entered the second week of the championship game down three to seven. I won only three categories, lost seven in the first week. But the second week, I went 9-0-1. So pulled it out, didn't let him win a single category. We tied out in save slash holds, interestingly. It was a funny situation where we were kind of playing a game of chicken as all the games.

Remember, there weren't many games on Monday, so there were very few lineups spots that locked early and then a lot more locked on Tuesday. We were kind of watching what the other was doing in terms of how many starting pitchers he was starting, how many relief pitchers he started. The other guy ended up starting zero relief pitchers in the end. So I just went with one, Jose Alvarado. It turned out to be the wrong one.

There were no saves and holds for either of us all week. But that was the lone tie. So 901, I end up winning between the two weeks, 12 to, what, 12 to 10 and one. tie. So yeah, yeah, that was good. Those were my only two championships. So I came out looking great among the podcast listeners who participated, but maybe not so much everywhere else. Of course, that means I won zero roto leagues this year. I came the closest in the league specific formats, which I've been pretty consistently good at those in recent years. I think I've got a good system down for those very, those ones where you go very deep in the player bowl and the waiver

wire is almost non-existent. But ultimately, I finished either second or third in both the AL and the NL-only Roto leagues. And yeah, that was my best showing apart from the two podcast league victories. You know, I made the playoffs and a few more head-to-head leagues, but didn't come out ahead. I only had, how many was it? 11 traditional fantasy leagues, two more scorchy leagues, so 13 leagues that I was

managing in some former fashion and got two wins out of it. It was pretty normal, I would say average year I went two to four leagues. But I've mentioned a few times in recent weeks that I've been frustrated with the way I've performed overall in Rotar leagues, really since the beginning of 2021's, the last three years. And, you know, not that I won it every time before them, but. I'm finishing much lower in the standings than I used to. I used to consistently be top half of the league at least,

and I've had a lot more finishes in the bottom half of the league, and sometimes even as the bottom team or two. So that's what I'm looking to improve next year. Yeah, and I think that will be part of the conversation we can have on tomorrow's podcast about things we got right, things we got wrong, lessons learned from this past season, because I've had a tough time in the Roto leagues as well. So I think something needs to change with the process this offseason.

And who knows? Maybe we can help each other out, Scott, and try and figure out what's going wrong with that process. By the way, this is the second time in three years that you've won the For the People League, the 16 team head to head categories league. So you've had very strong showings since I've joined the podcast. I just want to point that out, Scott, that. Well, it might be because of me.

You know what changed when you joined the podcast. Prior to then, I had to share a team with Adam Azer. Oh, that. That might do it. That might do it. He was dragging me down. I don't know. I used to always joke that that was the league.

Heath set up with these oddball rules that just seemed like a massive troll job on me. Heath Cummings, of course, he used to be on the podcast and is now still on the fantasy football today podcast. So I really, I need to show Heath. I've made progress when in two of the last three years in that jerky league of his. Shout out to those who made it to the finals against you, by the way, in those podcast listener leagues. Kyle in the Points League and Chris and his son, Aubrey. I thought that was pretty awesome.

They were kind of playing together as a father-son tandem. They made it to the finals in the Four of the People League, and that's the league where they were kind of, you know, playing a little chess, a little lineup chicken with you, Scott. So fun job, good job by those who making it to the finals there against you. As I mentioned, I played in 20 leagues total this year, Scott, which ranged from all different types of formats. played four head-to-head points leagues,

one of those being the head-to-head, I mean the Scott White Dynasty League, which is a 24-team league, one head-to-categories, 13 roto leagues, one best ball, and one score sheet. This is the first year that I've ever played score sheet, sharing a team with Nando Defino,

and how did I know this would happen? Nando invited me on, he's like, yeah, we'll work together. And I'm pretty much just, I've set the lineup for the past like three months or whatever, but we made the playoffs. So I'm excited to see what happens. First year playing score sheet. That was pretty cool.

made the playoffs in all of my head-to-head leagues, including the championship in Taut Wars, which, you know, if everyone's kind of up-to-date, paying attention, I was going for that three-peat. And I lost, Scott. I lost to Greg Jewett. Congrats to him. Really great fantasy player.

Well-deserved for him. Carlos Ordone, how about this? You saw that stat line on Friday, Scott. I know you did. Minus 21 fantasy points. What the heck was that all about? Oh my goodness. Yeah, I just snotted all over the microphone.

I just couldn't say in case anybody's watching the video and wondering what happened. Okay. Yeah, no, that's crazy streaming of starting pitchers like that. It'll come back to bite you. Yeah. When you least need it. That seems to be what happened. I mean, you know, you kind of did that the previous two years, right, in the championship and it worked out.

Yeah, I mean, I had better pitching in years past, but, you know, people are probably asking, why the heck were you even starting Carlos Fordon? the truth was I kind of messed myself up because I didn't leave enough fab for the final waiver run and I couldn't pick anyone up. I only had like three moves to make and I had two other pitchers

who were shut down for the year. I needed a catcher. So I couldn't drop like my Andrew Abbots and Carlos Rodons. I wish I could have, but you know, I guess that's another lesson learned. Leave yourself a little bit more fab for later on in the season.

Twelve of the 20 leagues that I play in Scott were over on the NFBC that's the National Fantasy Baseball. Championship. For those who listen or watch, you've probably heard us reference the NFBC at some point in the past. They offer anywhere from low to very high stakes leagues.

We're talking like a $50 entry fee and at the high end like $10,000 entry fees. But I did win two of my 15 team Roto leagues over there. Came home with a decent return so I can't complain, you know, monetarily. But, you know, again, I wish I was a little bit more consistent across the board. One of those wins, by the way, I finished 25th out of 4,845 teams in their overall contest in the draft champions.

So that was pretty awesome. That was by far the best team that I drafted. I had Ronald Acuna, Ozzy Albies, Francisco Lindor, Jorge Soler, Ellie Dealer Cruz. And this is a 50-round draft that we did back in, I don't know, March. And I still had Ellie Dealer Cruz. So I was just kind of like stashing him back then. Blake Snell, Merrill Kelly, Brian Bayo. So that was far away my best team there.

Again, fun season, Scott. Overall, I'm disappointed in my performance, hold myself to a very high standard, and I'd like to win more than two out of 20 leagues. So just full transparency, I know some people ask, do you guys ever win in your leagues? Yeah, but at least for me, not as much as I wanted to this past season.

Shout out to everyone else who won their fantasy baseball championships. Love seeing all the screenshots and the interaction and the appreciation on Twitter, continue to send those over. And also feel free to leave us a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. You can leave a five-star review on Apple and let us know if we helped you win.

As I've mentioned many times, the bosses like that kind of stuff. So we would appreciate it. Scott, let's jump into the league leaders here and we'll just kind of run down the line. If you have any thoughts, I have kind of interesting stats about how many players did certain things

and compared to years past. We'll start with batting average. Luis Arise, 354 batting average. He won the National League batting title. The first player to win back-to-back batting titles in different leagues. So that's a pretty awesome stat for him. Yandi Diaz with a 330 batting average, he won the American League batting title just ahead of our guy,

Corey Seeger. And this past season, nine qualified hitters over a 300 batting average. Last year, we had 11. That seems kind of curious to me, Scott. The fact that batting average across the league went up this year, Babbitt went up with the shift restrictions, yet we only had nine batterers over 300, and last year we had 11.

Isn't that kind of weird? Seems kind of weird. Yeah. No, I agree. That's kind of weird. Not sure I have an explanation for it. It seems like maybe just a fluky thing, because home runs were up from last year too,

which would also help batting average quite a bit because you don't even have to rely on Babbitt for those to be hits. obviously they're out of play. Let me see, what did the final Babbip end up being? I'm not going to be able to find that quickly, I don't think. I have it for later on, but I think it wound up at 297. Yeah, 297. Okay, and that's compared to...

290 last year and 292 in 2021. Yeah, that's a big jump. That's like... Seven points, yeah. Yeah. That's curious that there weren't more 300 hitters. Unless there were, because you were just looking at qualifying batters, right? Unless there were fewer qualifying batters overall.

But I imagine it would be pretty similar. Perhaps. I wonder if I lower the thresholds. Maybe we just had more hitters kind of up in the middle of the 260s. You know what I'm saying? Like maybe we had more guys hitting 260 and 270 than we have had in years past, which again, overall, that would help for fantasy. And it does help the overall batting average.

But, you know, I looked at 280 as well. we had 23 hitters, qualified hitters, that hit hit hit hit hit hit, hit hit hit, uh, hit hit 280 or higher this year. There were 30 that did it last year. So again, that's kind of weird. I don't know. I'm going to like lower the thresholds and see maybe, again, we just had more in like the 260 or 270 range this past season.

The home run leader, my man, Scott, your man, Matt Olson. He came through. He won me that bet. 54 home runs this past season. Kyle Schwerber was second in the league with 47. Pete Alonzo had 46. So obviously the National League. had a great showing here,

Shohei Otani led the American League with 44 home runs, despite playing just 135 games and being shut down in the middle of September. So come on. Let's do better American League, I guess. If Aaron Judge didn't get hurt,

he obviously would have been up there too. I mean, it's pretty amazing that he finished with 37, you know, for as much time as he missed. He had 44, Scott, 44 home runs. No, I'm talking about, Aaron Judge. Oh, Aaron Judge, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. I thought you were talking about Otani. So Judge in the American League was behind only Otani, Adolice Garcia, who hit 39, and Luis Robert, who hit 38. Judge was fourth in the American League and home runs. And how many games did he get to? He got to 106. That's pretty darn impressive.

Yeah. A little more than two-thirds of the season. All right. Well, a quick, I have some other notes on home runs, but we do have a special guest, Scott. Something I didn't let you know what's happening. Are you ready? Oh, boy. Uh-oh. Are you ready? He is. And here we go. Chris Towers. Let's go. All right, that's enough of that. I let that go on for too long. I'm sorry.

Chris is here to celebrate the Marlins making the postseason. Help us take a look back at the 23 season over. all Chris, congrats, man. You are decked out. You got the Florida Marlins hat. You got the old school jersey. Everything. Let's go. Got everything but the new gear. Because I don't actually have any of the new gear except for the cool city connect. But yeah. Nobody wants the new gear. Marlins made the playoffs, guys. What, what a time to be alive. Who would who would have thought? Not me. That's for sure. I didn't see this coming. But it's been what a fun season for all of our teams, really.

Everybody had a great season on this podcast. Every single one of us, huh Chris? Nobody's team was a total disappointment that caused them months and months of agony. Oh, I mean, agony. Come on. You know, I'm the most pessimistic Yankee fan possible. So it didn't really surprise me, I guess. But I did lead the podcast by pointing out every other person's favorite team on this podcast made the playoffs, even the Welsh and the Diamondbacks too.

I mean, the Braves like, yeah, okay, they made the playoffs. We saw that coming. But Diamondbacks and Marlins, what a time to be alive. It's awesome stuff. I love it. There's a little more parody in baseball and obviously the extended postseason playoff picture. We've got teams that are fighting until the end. And it gives a little bit more opportunity.

So I'm all about it. I love it. If I'm looking at this right, then the Marlins and Diamondbacks are the only two playoff teams with a negative run differential for the year. I think the Marlins have the worst run differential for a playoff team ever. So the Diamondbacks are minus 15. The Marlins are minus 57. And that was even after they trounce the Braves in that three-game series in mid-September.

You'd think that would, they'd make up more ground in the run difference. Well, I think they lost a game to like the Mets 11 to 1 immediately after that. So kind of lost some ground there. Yeah. Yeah, what a dumb year. What a dumb year. The Marlins end up with the seventh best record in one-run games in major league history. Wow.

33 and 13. You can do the math on what that means for the games that weren't basically fluke wins. Team of Destiny, baby. I, for one, will be thrilled if we have a World Series winner who won 84 games. I mean, you know me. I'm always, almost always rooting for the funniest possible outcome. And the Marlins winning the World Series this year would be objectively the funniest possible outcome. And the fact that I'm rooting for them already has nothing to do with my thoughts on this.

Well, we've got two bites at the Apple with the D-BACs winning exactly 84 games as well. So either of those make it deep into the postseason. We can have some fun with that. Chris, are you sticking around? You want to hang out, talk a little baseball? I would love to. I would love to. I really would. And I'm going to make some appearances this offseason earlier than I normally do. But unfortunately, I do have a guest staying in my home who needs the guest bedroom. So I'm going to bow out semi gracefully. All right. Well, look, congrats to your Miami Marlins. Can you give us a World Series prediction before you leave? Marlins over who?

Marla's Blue Jays, why not? Yeah, you want my actual prediction? Yes. Sure. I think the Braves are far and away the best team in baseball. So I'm always going to pick the team that I think is the best team. And so that's the Braves, although, you know, they got some rotation questions of their own. The Dodgers have some rotation questions.

They're, you know, asking a clearly less. than 100% Clayton Kirshall to try to go deep into games. They've got to be, yeah, it's kind of, there's no like obvious favorite right now. So I'll go with the Braves, even with their rotation questions. And I'll just go with the chalk and, and say the Orioles. I don't really fully believe in their pitching staff, but as people who listen to this podcast now, didn't believe in their pitching staff in like May and June. and they just kind of kept doing it for the most part.

Whose pitching staff do you believe in? Because you just mentioned how you don't believe in the pitching for the three best teams record-wise. I mean, the twins, twins have legitimately very good pitching. It's just their offense isn't very good, which was not what we thought was going to happen coming into the season, especially with now their injuries. Is Royce Lewis going to be back for the playoffs? It sounds like, yes, he's going to play in game one.

Okay, that helps. But yeah, it's a fun field for the playoffs because there's no obvious favorite because every team is kind of flawed. There doesn't seem like one of those Astros teams where it's just like, oh, this team's going to run everyone over. Brewer's just lost Brandon Woodruff. There are a lot, a lot of question marks across the board with this playoff field, which, hey, as the guy rooting for, the 84 win minus 57 run differential team. Let's go. Hey, anything can happen, man. You get hot at the right time. You never know. Look, the Phillies made it last year as a wildcard team. So I think anything can happen, man. We'll see. Marlins have won two World Series as a wildcard.

We shall see. Just saying history doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme. Awesome stuff there, Chris. We appreciate your hopping in, buddy. All right, I'll see you guys. See later, man. All right. So Chris Towers must have something against this podcast because the last that you saw if you were watching part one of this live stream was that Chris came on to hype up the Miami Marlins excited for their postseason run and then what happens when he's leaving stream yard he clicks end stream instead of just leaving the studio so for those who saw the the night that Shoah O'Hanee went down with injury we had Chris come on and we had some breaking news the same thing happened and he just did that again

I don't know what's going on here Scott but there's like a a 3% chance that Chris actually hates me. Yeah, or he hates the podcast. He goes and leaves what in mid-August, never to return. He's, and then he comes back finally and he just wants to cancel the whole thing. So thanks a lot for that, Chris. Thanks a lot. So I don't know. I haven't decided yet if there's going to be two parts on YouTube or maybe I'm going to stitch them together. If you're listening on the audio side, then you have no idea what happened. And probably everything sounds perfectly fine to you. The last that we left off, Scott,

we were talking about league leaders, and we talked about the home runs leader, which was Matt Olson, and I wanted to mention, as you pointed out, there were more home runs this season. So in 2023, six players with 40 plus home runs,

including Marcelo Zuna. What a year for that guy. Awesome bounce back. 29 players with 30 plus home runs. Bobby Witt was one of them. He just missed out on 30-50. 49 steals for Bobby Witt. He got thrown.

out twice in the final weekend too. It would have been the fourth player to have a 30 home or 50 steel season ever. And we could have made reference to that all off season, draft prep season, and now we can't. It's very disappointing. That's right. But last year,

comparatively, we had four players with 40 plus home runs compared to six this past season. 23 with 30 plus home runs compared to 29, who did it just this past season, Scott. So there are more home runs available. but guess what that means?

You also need more home runs to compete in your fantasy baseball leagues. Wait, give those stats again this year versus last season? Six with 40 plus, 29 with 30 plus this year. Last year, four with 40 plus, 23 with 30 plus. Okay, so it was fewer last year,

which makes sense. I was hearing it backwards, I guess. Okay. Yeah, and Ozuna, so he had the final day of the season. A lot of brave starters were pulled early in the game, game, Ozuna had a two-homer four RBI game to get to exactly 40 homers in exactly 100 RBI was beautiful.

How about unexpected? Certainly for a guy who, gosh, as late as mid-season, he was still available in like a third of all league, something like that. Mm-hmm. I think I saw today that by the end of April, he was batting under 100 or somewhere around there. No, definitely. Remember that. It was, uh, yeah, it was pretty bad there for Marcel was doing a yeah. He was betting 0.085 by the end of April and then obviously went on a, an awesome tear after that. The Braves, by the way, the third team in major

league history to have three hitters with 40 plus home runs and 100 plus RBI on the same team. Matt Olson, Marcelo Zuna, Ronald Acuna. Speaking of a cune, so just from May 1st on, Marcelo Zuna hit 297. 274 overall, but 297 if you eliminate that first month, which tells you how much hitting 085 for a month can bring down your full season line, almost, what, 25 points? Yeah. League winner.

There's no other way to say it. And you know, it's crazy? He was actually dropped in my NL-only Labor League, and I had the same dollar bid in for him as I did. Oh man. The D-Banks outfielder that got called up that was okay for like two weeks. He replaced Jake McCarthy.

Dominic Canzon? No, not that guy. There was another one. Oh, Dominic Fletcher. Dother Dominic. Yeah. So I don't know if I would have got Ozuna, but I wound up getting Fletcher instead of Ozuna.

So great, good job by me. Run scored. The leader, Ronald de Kune, had 149 runs and 159 games. Just ridiculous stuff. Friday Freeman was second at 131. Matt Olson was third at 127. Mookie Betts was fourth at 126.

That's right. Braves, Dodgers, Braves, Dodgers. That's pretty much the MVP race right there. Not that is much of a race, I feel like, at this point. I noticed this today because I was putting together an article I write every year, things you miss once fantasy football season started, which mostly just focuses on September. Mookie Betts had a pretty awful September. he hit 244 with just one home run in September,

which is part of the reason why I think the MVP talk died down with him. Because remember, basically at the start of the month, I was saying, I don't know, if I was voting today, I think I'd give it to Betts over Acuna. And Betts did still finish with the highest war, baseball reference version, but it's close enough that I don't think it's going to matter. I think Ocuna is going to cruise to that.

Yeah, I would say so as well. This past season, we had 17 hitters with 100 plus run scored, including Gunner Henderson. That was actually pretty surprising to me. He had also 28 home runs. So, look, Corby and Carol was obviously far and away the best rookie this season. But, you know, Gunner Henderson,

he also had himself a fine year as well. Last year, we had 10 with 100 plus runs scored. So 10 compared to 17 this past season, which makes sense with overall offense being up around in the game of baseball this year. RBI leader, no surprise. Matt Olson, he had 139. Pete Alonza was the next closest with 118. And similarly to run scored, this year we had 18 with 100 plus RBI. Last year, 13 with 100 plus RBI, which again makes sense. Stolen bases, Ronald de Kunya. Once again, 73 steals.

Estuary Ruiz, much closer than I thought he wound up with 67, so six behind Ronald de Cunia, and then third was Corbyn Carroll with 54 steals. Scott, I don't know if you remember this, but before the season,

we had some bold predictions. One of my bold predictions, three players would steal 50 bases this year, including Estuary Ruiz, Corbyn Carole, and Trey Turner. So I was off by one player there. Oh, that's pretty good.

I mean, for a bold prediction. Yeah. That's, I know it's not technically a win, but it might as well be. And one of your bold predictions was that multiple players would steal 50 and one would steal 60. So do you one better? How about 70s, Scott? Yeah, undershot it.

And I kind of feel like I actually said it might actually be 70, but I could be remembering wrong. Yeah, it wouldn't surprise you. You're about to give more season-long stolen base stats? Oh, I've got a bunch, Scott. Here we go. Okay, go for it. This past season, we had 18 players with 30 plus steals.

51 with 20 or more steals. Last year, six with 30 or more. So one third of what we had this year, and 24 with 20 or more steals. Less than half of what we saw this past season. Yeah. I think we were all over that. Huge increase, completely landscape.

state altering fantasy baseball changed forever more and I kind of wonder if it could get even better next year like I didn't see a ton of box because of the uh you know that the two you're only able to attempt two pickoffs per plate appearance I didn't see a ton of box box would result if you try a third time if you throw them out fine but if not then it's a balk so I think everybody played it a little cautiously and I didn't see a lot of um runners daring pitchers to throw over twice so that the third time they could get a huge lead like I didn't see it play out and maybe it just became such a natural part of the process that there wasn't a lot of attention paid to it and it happened more often than I'm remembering but um you know I feel like I feel like as it becomes more

ingrained in the game as base runners learn to exploit it more. They will explode it more, if that makes sense. Yeah, I think that does. I think we could see more steals even more so next year. And I was quickly looking up to see the balk number in baseball this season. We had 208 box overall last year 122. So a definite increase. That's a huge increase. Yeah. Yeah. Which only adds to the offense again. It's like another player moving up a base. So just looking at league-wide stolen base totals for the entire league. Last year it was 2,486.

So basically 2,500. This year it was 3,503, so 3,500. Insane. Now, I remember MLB's own research showed that, with these rule changes, they thought we would get to an early 2000s level of stolen base output. That was what they were comparing it to. The year 2000 across the league, there were 2,900 steals. And 2001, it was only slightly more than that.

And I thought when MLB said that, I'm like, I think they might be underestimating. And I think it might go beyond early 2000s levels. and that seemed to be what happened. Yeah, 2001, it was 3,100 steals, again, versus 3,500 or thereabouts this year. Crazy. Do you know the last time there was 3,500 steals in a season before this?

No. 1987. Yeah. So. Very different era. Very different, indeed. There wasn't much power in that era. There was, wait, what year did you say specifically, 1980?

1987. I do think that was the year that randomly there were a lot of home runs. So I don't know, maybe it was pretty comparable to this year. All right, let's slide over to the pitching leaders from this past season. Wins, no surprise. Spencer Strider had 20 wins. He was your lone 20-game winner. Zach Gallen came in second here with 17 wins.

Last year, we also only had one 20-game winner, and he also came from the Braves. It was Kyle Wright with 21 wins. Last year, the ERA leader was Blake Snell, likely your NL-Sai-Young winner, finished with a 225 ERA. Garrett Cole led the American League side at 263. How about these numbers, Scott? Five qualified starting pitchers with an ERA under three this year. Last year, 19 with an ERA under three.

Nearly four times as many pitchers with an ERA under three last year. So it's just... Well, that's just another way to represent the glob, right? That's exactly right. Can have a good ERA. Round and round it goes where it stops. No one knows. Yeah.

I do think it's worth pointing out. You said 1987 was the last time we had 3,500 steals. Yep. 1987, there were four fewer teams. Wow. So they, wow, they really must have ran crazy back then. Yeah. Just worth pointing out.

You're comparing across the heroes like that. Yeah, that's definitely fair. The whip leader, Gary Cole, at 0.99. he was the only starting pitcher with a whip under one. Corbyn Burns led the National League at 107 and as I just mentioned only one starting pitcher

under a one whip. We had 10 at 1.10 or less. Last year 10 starting pitchers within a whip below 1.19 at 1.10 or less which again just goes to show you we just don't have that elite

level starting pitcher like as many elite level starting pitchers as did last season. The strikeouts leader was Spencer Strider with 281. Kevin Gossman was second, and he led the American League with 237. You know, oddly enough, ERA and WIP went up this year, and I think we expected that. Certainly WIP. And I do think, you know, the fact we had only one under an even one whip this year versus 10 last year, you know, I think that shows you that understandably with babbip rising across the league our standards for what a good whip is

are probably going to need to change too. And I was noticing this a couple weeks ago when I was pointing out how high Justin Steele's whip was relative to the average Siyang winner. Of course, now I don't think many people think Justin Steele is going to win the Siyang. But, you know, he was higher on the leaderboard than I thought when you just sort everybody by whip

because we have to look at whip and, you know, what was a good whip for 20 years is going to be harder to attain now. What I was going to say about the strikeouts, by the way, again, ERA and WIP going up, but there were also more strikeouts this year. So I thought that was interesting. We had 17 starting pitchers with 200 plus strikeouts this year, and we had just 11 with 200 plus strikeouts last year.

So while ERA and WIP kind of took a step back this year, we did have more strikeouts. Well, last year was weird in that the strikeout rate went down for the first time in decades. I wonder if it was because it was the first full season after the sticky substance ban. And maybe people were kind of figuring things out still. I don't know.

It has been speculated. Yeah. But it appears that it went back up this year. So that trend is. Well, it's not a trend. No, no, it is not. Let's talk about saves real quick. Emmanuel Class A led baseball with 44 saves.

He is the first reliever to lead baseball and saves in back-to-back seasons since Jim Johnson in 2012 and 2013. David Bednar and Camilo DeVal led the National League with 39 saves each. And something we spoke about a few times throughout the season, maybe not as much as we should have. But it seemed like there were more reliable bullpens this year, Scott, and it was easier to find saves than in years past. Maybe just more managers going with just one closer. But we had 12 relievers with 30 plus saves this year. There were 10 last year.

And 23 with 20 plus saves this year, only 18 last year. So I think a few more reliable bullpens, which is great for fantasy. Yes, it is. And it is curious the way managers kind of went away from that trend of the, you know, the closer committee, the having your best reliever using them in the highest leverage role, regardless of whether it's the ninth inning or not. We did see some of that still. But it wasn't as widespread as we had seen in previous years. and some of the managers who seemed most committed to it. Like, I mean, Kevin Cash had a true closer in Tampa Bay.

I understand Peter Fairbanks' safe total doesn't compare to some of the other closures across the league because he served a couple of aisle stents. But even when he was down, it was basically Jason Adam was the closer when he was when Pete Fairbanks was sidelines. So even Kevin Cash went with more traditional bullpen usage. and I don't know that we want to be too presumptive that that's going to continue heading into next year and oh, okay, we don't have to invest in saves, particularly in some of those deeper leagues where closers tend to go much earlier. Things could change just as abruptly and go back the other way, I think. But at least we know that this isn't like something that's going to get more. more and more pronounced every year

and maybe the true closers going extinct completely. That doesn't seem to be happening. Yeah, and I think the goal for me over the past couple of years has been, I'm never going to be the person to draft like one of the first three closers off the board because typically those guys might go too early for my liking. But I try to get one of those top seven or eight, you know,

just like that second tier of guys where you feel really good about their job security and the skills. And I usually like to get at least one of those guys. And then, you know, we'll take a few stabs as the draft goes on. But at least trying to get one of those locked down closers in each of my Roto or category league's draft. And I don't think that's going to change.

I think that's probably a staple in my strategy moving forward as well. Let's hit some news and notes here. And the big news from Monday. And Chris alluded to this earlier was that Brandon Woodruff will miss the wildcard series with a right shoulder capsular injury. and his availability for the rest of the playoffs is currently up in the air. And we know Woodruff is great when he pitches Scott,

but he was limited to just 11 starts this season with a similar shoulder injury earlier in the year. He turns 31 years old in February. And now I think this is something we seriously have to take into account when ranking him and projecting him for next season as well. Unfortunately, because he was one of the few relibles for the time he was healthy,

I thought Brandon Woodruff was a slam dunk to be a top 10 starting pitcher next year. But the fact this is a continuation of the injury that sidelined him for so long, you know, he seemed to be past it because he came back and was dominating. But now it's bad enough that he's probably going to have to sit out the whole postseason for it, which I don't know. Does that mean he has to go under the knife this off season? Even if he doesn't, how confident can we be that he's completely past it next spring?

You know, if he doesn't have surgery this offseason Woodruff, he comes back supposedly healthy next spring. He's probably still going to be drafted among the top 10. But that's dangerous. I don't know that I want to use my early round capital that way, even understanding how hard it is to find reliable pitching. Speaking of dangerous, I don't think he will go as early as someone like Brandon Woodruff, but Max Scherzer has been limited to flat ground work since throwing a,

light bulb pen session last Wednesday. He hasn't had a setback with the strain muscle in his shoulder, but he indicated he did not feel as good as he hoped when throwing off the bump. So perhaps Scherzer was ramping it up a little bit too quickly there and yeah he's gonna kind of slow it down a little bit. Carlos Correa said he's ready to go for the Wild Card Series against the Blue Jays. He's been out for the past two weeks with a flare-up of the plantar fasciitis in his left foot. Lewis, his teammate, who's been out since September 19th with a strained left hamstring,

is expected to return for game one of the wild card series on Tuesday against the Blue Jays. Luis Arise, who missed the final seven games with a sprained ankle, expects to be ready for game one against the Phillies. Jose Siri, who has a fracture in his hand, and Luke Rayleigh, who is dealing with a cervical strain, both took batting practice on Monday and hoped to be on the Ray's wild card roster as well. Some non-playoff news, Tim Anderson admitted he's willing to slide over to second base, if that will keep him in the starting lineup for whatever team he winds up on this offseason. Maybe he stays with the White Sox, but my early inkling is that probably not. I think we'll see Tim Anderson

in a new uniform for next season. And we know that Tim Anderson went on the IL early in the year with a knee sprain. And when asked about that, he recently said, quote, the body felt different each day after he returned, which could explain why he was so bad this season. I don't want to make excuses for the guy. He's been pretty damn bad over the past two years now and hurt often. But I know you speculate it's God,

and maybe we could see Tim Anderson with like a slight bounce back next year if he's healthy. Well, I mean, he hit in half season's time last year, he hit 301 with six homers 13 steals. I don't know that I call that that bad. But it was a down year, and we were drafting him later this year than years past, right? Yeah, and I kind of thought we were drafting him too early in previous years. So that was a necessary adjustment.

But, you know, a lot of the underlying data for Tim Anderson wasn't that different this year, even though the production was horrendous. And so I wondered if it was a situation where, yeah, he suffered that injury early on. at the time the stats look fine. They look like typical Tim Anderson stats. Tiny sample, granted, because it was in April, but still he was doing fine. Nobody had any concerns about him.

And he suffers that knee injury. Comes back and just is totally inept. And, you know, a lot of times we come to find out they were still struggling with that injury and just weren't willing to admit it or didn't want to use it in his excuse or whatever, but they come back the next season after an offseason of rest, and they're back to normal.

And I think given that the underlying data for Tim Anderson is, you know, not reflecting his decline, given the fact that he's still only 30, I think there's a pretty good chance of that. I'm not saying I'm going to make him like a centerpiece of my draft strategy next year, but as bad as the numbers are, Tim Anderson's probably going to go really late, even in Roto leagues that require an extra infielder. And I'll be, I'll be happy to take a shot on him at that point.

All right, the Mets have introduced David Stearns as their new president of baseball operations. And surprisingly to some, Buck Shawalter announced Sunday that he won't be returning as the Mets manager in 2024. On a similar note, Phil Nevin will not return as the Angels manager in 2024. and it's been a rough couple weeks in the baseball world as sadly Tim Wakefield passed away over the weekend. He was 57 years old. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends. And obviously Scott, like, we'll never forget that knuckleball. I mean, growing up, it was awesome to watch, even though many times it came against my New York Yankees.

A really cool moment on Sunday when George Kirby actually threw a knuckleball in his start as a tribute to Tim Wakefield. so, you know, it's, we've lost two names here in the baseball world the past couple weeks, and it's pretty unfortunate. Yes, it is. All right, let's take our final break when we return. We'll quickly run through some other season-long trends, and we'll make some playoff predictions here on Fantasy Baseball today. Welcome back in.

Let's take a look at some season-long trends from the 2023 baseball season. And as mentioned earlier, the Babbitt was up this year, nearly seven points compared to last year, which of course means the batting average was up. League-wide batting average, 248 compared to 243 last year, 244 back in 2021. The home run to fly ball ratio 12.7%. We had some question marks about that earlier in the season, Scott,

where it was up in March and April compared to last year, and we're like, well, this is troublesome because it's only going to go up as the weather gets warmer. And that's what it did. 12.7%. It was only 11.4% last year, 13.6% back in 2021, which, you know, we were still kind of playing with the juiced ball that year.

You know, not as juicy as like, you know, 2017 and 2018 and stuff like that. But this is kind of like splitting the difference. Like we didn't have a dead ball like last year, but we didn't have the juice ball from 2021. So somewhere in the middle. Yeah. I mean, 12.2 was very,

high for April, but then it was 12.4 in May, 12.1 in June, then 13.2 in July, 13.6 in August, back down to 12.8 in September. So it stayed as consistent month-to-month home-run to flyball rate as I can remember researching in the past. I haven't done extensive research, but I've gone back several years, and I don't remember it being so consistent for months-to-month the home-run to fly-ball rate, which makes me wonder if they did make an adjustment, a seasonal adjustment to the humidor settings. I haven't heard anything reported. I'm not trying to start a conspiracy theory or anything.

But last year when we saw those wide swings in production from April, it was just there was no offense at all. And then it became like normalized. We got a normal level of offense in the summer and it was just such a dramatic swing from month to month. And that was the first year where they had the widespread human. door use. And we thought, man, are we going to have to bake this in? Like Marcus Simeon's going to hit 122 every April and we're just going to have to warn everybody

not to worry about it. Well, fortunately, that didn't happen this year. But I can't help but wonder if it was by design. Yeah. I think there is a, I guess, a reasonable chance that that happened because, yeah, home runs and offensive production was much better early in the season this year, at least compared to 2022. There's no doubt about that. hitting by month in 2023. We were consistently between a 247 and a 250 batting average. The BABIP

was between 295 and 298 for each month of the year. Scott ran through some of the home run to fly ball rates. It spiked in July and August, which is expected. Again, that's the warmest weather of the season, and typically the ball does fly out a little bit better during those months of the year.

But never really got out of control. You know, 13.2% in July, 13.6% home. month to fly ball ratio in August. On the pitching side of things, got 4.33 ERA, the highest we've seen since the shortened season back in 2020. And if you want to look at a full-length season, it's the highest we've seen since 2019, which again, that was like peak juice ball when, you know, I think the league-wide

ERA was like 4.4 or something crazy like that. So the pitching environment much different this year compared to last year. 2022, the league-wide ERA, 397 with a 127 whip. This year, 433 and 132. And to my knowledge, there aren't really any rule changes coming in the offseason that should affect this. So as of now, again, like, we can't forecast like juice balls or anything changing in that regard. I think this is closer to what we should expect moving forward. a league-wide pitching landscape similar to what we got this year.

Yeah, hopefully things are going to settle down now. Hopefully. After so much discord in a lack of continuity the last few years, where we're making guesses as to what these widespread rule changes are going to mean. Or sometimes we don't even have the foreknowledge, really, and we're caught by surprise with it mid-season. and have to adjust on the fly. It's been very frustrating.

But I think things have settled into what MLB wants them to be, more or less. And so hopefully we can kind of just take 20, 23 numbers at face value. Now, that doesn't mean it's without its frustrations. Obviously, starting pitching was very frustrating this year. And it was mostly impacted at the high end. Even like during the height of the juice ball era, there were some dominant pitching performances. The BABIP increase seemed to impact the entire pitcher pool more than the juice ball era did. And so in the juice ball era, when I think it made sense to load up on ACEs early because the drop-off was steep afterward

and you were giving yourself the clearest advantage you could between the position. by targeting starting pitching early. I don't know that that's necessarily true now. I do think part of my issue in the Roto League's is that I didn't give myself enough pitching depth. Like I didn't draft enough pitchers from the glob. So I had to rely on too many subglob pitchers. But I still think most of the pitching pool is the glob. It's going to be hard to distinguish, okay, these are really high-end pitchers.

that are going to have, that are really going to set you apart in the pitching categories versus these are some starters who will at times look like aces, but at times get absolutely shelled and their final numbers will end up being mid-tier. I think it's going to be pretty hard to distinguish, like to draw exactly where that line is and say, okay, I want a couple of these pitchers that transcend the glob,

and then I'll build the rest of my pitching staff from the glob. I think the clearest way to distinguish is going to be strikeouts. But, you know, even among those pictures that we think of as slam dunk aces, their strikeout rates were down. I know that was true for Garrett Cole and Gorbman Burns and several others. Spencer Strider gets tons of strikeouts. We know that. But, yeah, I mean, that's, I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to tackle it next year,

but those are the kinds of things I'm thinking about right now with regard to pitching. Yeah, and that was my next question too. And again, I don't expect you to have an answer yet. The season literally just ended and we have so much time to kind of relax. Let's look back on this past season and really kind of dissect it and try and figure out what our pitching strategy is going to be moving forward. But some people have already asked me. I don't have an answer yet either.

I need to, you know, really sit down and think, all right, do I want to get, you know, two of those top 15, top 20 that we think are aces and then just kind of like live in the glob after that? And that's me just kind of spitballing. I don't know if that's my actual strategy yet, but. Yeah. I mean, that's, I know I said I haven't figured it out yet, but that's kind of what I'm thinking, especially in the deeper rotisserie leagues. But I want sort of the back end of whatever I think that. that group of pitchers is that transcends the glob. Unless I get Spencer Strider or Garrett Cole at like,

I'm sitting at the spot where it's obvious they need to be taken, I won't pass them up at that spot. But I do think there are, you know, a couple dozen hitters that are just such, they just do so much good for you in so many categories that if you, if you pass them up because okay i want to solve the pitching problem early you'll be playing catch up in the hitting categories the rest of the draft and i'd rather not do that i'd rather take my pitchers and like get as many good pitchers as i can once that group of hitters is off the table um and and the only like spencer strider and garicull are literally the only two i might break from

that four but i'm not going to reach for them i'm only going to do it if it's the appropriate point to take them that's that's kind of what i'm thinking so far So maybe I grab a couple, you know, like my 15th and 20th ranked starting pitch or something like that. Of course, it depends how deep the league is exactly where I'm drafting, but that's kind of what I'm thinking right now. And then hit pitching pretty heavily. Well, it kind of depends how the pitcher pool plays out too. Because I've said before there are certain pitchers within the glob, the glob being a group of like 60 pitchers after that first 20 or so. I don't want to be so selective within the glob because the entire idea behind the glob is these 60 are all pretty unpredictable and there's no reason to elevate one over the other.

But I have said I will single out pitchers in the glob who I think have a lot of upside, particularly with regard to missing bats. And so it's just kind of going to depend on is everyone else doing that too so that they end up being pushed up in the glob so that they're not. numbers 20 through 30 basically for everybody, in which case I will have to be selective within the glob. I mean, we kind of have to consider those pitchers not even part of the glob anymore because everybody's decided they're most likely to transcend the glob in the future. And so, you know, part of it is just waiting to see how things play out once everybody gets into drafting. All right. Well, let's wrap up here. Sky, we've got about five minutes left. Do some playoff predictions, have some fun here.

On the American League side of things, the Orioles finished as the number one seed with 101 wins. Good for them, man. Just awesome season. The Astros snuck ahead of the Rangers for the number two seed at 90 and 72, so both the Orioles and Astros will have a buy. As for the wild card round,

we'll have the number three seed, Minnesota Twins hosting the number six Toronto Blue Jays and the number four seed Tampa Bay Rays hosting the Texas Rangers. reminder that the wild card round is a best two out of three matchup and I'm putting you on the spot here Scotty who do you have winning each of those uh wild card matchups the blue jays twins and the rangers and rays i will i mean obviously could go either way best of three series could go either way oh yeah i'm going to say the blue jays upset the twins i think so too because you know

Gosman might single-handedly win game one for them. But I will say Reyes over Rangers. Yeah, we're in lockstep so far. I think Tampa Bay will get it done as well. I just don't think the Rangers have enough pitching. I know Jordan Montgomery has pitched really well, but between Glass now, Eflin, if they get to a third game, Aaron Savali, you know, the Ray's offense has been really good too. So I just think they're the more complete team right now.

On the National League side of things, your Atlanta Braves finished as the number one seed, the best record in all of baseball 1,04, and 58. The Dodgers snagged the number two seed 162. Both teams have a buy there

for the NL Wild Card, the number three Milwaukee Brewers hosting number six Arizona Diamondbacks and the number four Phillies hosting the number five Miami Marlins. Who do you have in those matchups, Scotty?

I do want to say real quick because I didn't know this until a couple days ago. The brackets don't reseed. Like R-E-S-E-D, they don't reseed. So if the six-seeded diamondbacks upset the fourth-seeded brewers, the Dodgers are the team playing the six-seeded diamondbacks because that's the way the bracket lines up, even though the Braves are the higher-seeded team,

they don't get to face the sixth seed. Braves are facing the winner of the fourth or fifth seed, no matter what happens. with a matchup between the third and sixth seat. So I found that interesting. Okay, so you were asking me, Brewers Diamondbacks? Yep. Boy, Fott starting game one.

Wow. Yes. That's unfortunate. I mean, Fott versus Corbett Burns. Like, Brewers better win that game, right? Yeah. I mean, if they don't, I assume Zach Allen's going to go in game two, right? So.

Yeah, I'm going to give it to the Brewers, the higher-seated team. Yeah. What about the Marlins and Phillies? I think the Phillies. I'm scared of facing the Phillies because of what happened last year, and I could see them going on a similar run this year with all the offense they have. So I wouldn't mind if the Marlins upset them, but I think it's going to be the Phillies.

I'm taking the two higher-seated teams in the NL Brewers and Phillies. The only upset I'm predicting in round one is, Blue Jays over twins. Yep, we're in lockstep, Scotty. I got all four of the same teams as you coming out of the wild card round. So we shall see what happens there. All right, last question. Who wins the World Series?

I'm not going to ask you every single round. So I guess we'll just go from there. Who you got, Scotty? Well, my preseason prediction was Braves over Mariners, which cannot happen. Same. I had the same exact prediction as you. Chris said Braves over Orioles. I don't know who I like from the AL.

I think the American League is wide open, Scott. Yeah. I really like, how boring would Braves versus Astros be again? Like, I'm obviously picking the Braves. They're not going to, they have the best record, they have the biggest run differential, and I want them to win.

So I'm obviously going to pick that. Over in the AL, I'm going to say the race. Ah, we have the same world series. Same world series, huh? Yep. Yeah, I think they're just so customizable that I think they can handle a lot of problems thrown their way. Plus, they did have the biggest run differential in the AL.

Rangers had the second biggest, by the way, even though the Orioles had the best record in the AL, they were tied for third best run differential. And the race were a distant first, 195, that's compared to 129 for the Orioles. Which isn't to say the Orioles couldn't do it. Right. Yeah, the only thing with the Orioles is obviously they're young, but they're kind of playing with House Money right now. So maybe they go on a run. Obviously, their whole season has been a run.

It's been awesome. I mean, Kyle Bradish and Grace and Rodriguez are looking like a pretty good one too at this point. Yeah, yeah, they have pitched tremendously, but like do those same guys show up in the playoffs? So I have some questions about that. The Astros, obviously they have the experience, but their pitching staff is kind of suspect. I mean, I could totally see the Astros getting back. Yeah. I think the only, really that Twins Blue J series,

I don't see the winner of that series advancing to the World Series, but any other team I think could do it. So, of course, now one of the twins are Blue Jets. Yeah, I mean, the one thing with the National League is, I do worry about the pitching staff for the Braves. Are these guys going to be healthy? Are they going to get more in? Are they going to get freedbacks?

So I worry a little bit about that. And look, if they run into the Phillies in round two and those guys are not 100%. I mean, yeah, I think anything can happen in that series. So, uh, yeah, frankly, I think one of the Phillies or Braves is going to come out of the National League. So, um, I feel pretty good about that. And, and yeah, I got Tampa Bay making it as well. I think overall the Braves probably win it all. And I don't sleep on the Dodgers.

They could do it. Especially what those young kids were doing in at the end of the season, those young pitcher, Sheehan and yeah, Bobby Miller and, uh, Ryan, um, Ryan, Pepio, my favorite of them. Brewers without Brandon Woodruff, I think that's a... If they had Woodruff, man, it's like, that three man of Woodruff,

Burns and Peralta, that would have been dangerous. Would have been very dangerous. But now that they don't, that's going to be tough for them to pull it off. All right, well, we shall see what happens. It starts here on Tuesday first game at 3 p.m. Eastern Time, so make sure to watch it and come hang out. Speaking of tomorrow, we'll be back here again tomorrow evening.

We'll have the Welsh on. He's going to go out and watch Ricky Teeteman in the Arizona Fall League. So we'll get an update right after his start and find out more about that. We'll also talk about lessons learned here from the 2023 season. We're going to wrap there.

For Scott, I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning in to Fantasy Baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. And we will be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye.