Fantasy Baseball Today - 2024 First & Third Base Tiers! Strategy, ADP & Players to Target (1/22 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: January 22, 2024

How should somebody use tiers in Fantasy Baseball (2:55)? ... After a strong finish, Bryce Harper is back in the first-round tier (9:07). ... Does Vlad Jr. deserve to be in the also elite tier (12:12)? ... Is Paul Goldschmidt slowing down (15:12)? ... Should Christian Walker be in a higher tier (19:20)? ... Let's take a look at the rest of first base tiers (26:06). ... News (34:13): Robert Stephenson signed a three-year deal with the Angels. ... Jose Ramirez is the lone name in the first-round tier (45:14). ... Does Gunnar Henderson deserve to be in the also elite tier (48:05)? ... Should Manny Machado and Ha-seong Kim be in the same tier (51:50)? ... Any concern over Noelvi Marte's playing time (55:55)? ... We wrap up with the rest of the third base tiers (1:00:18). To display your continued support of the show, please vote Fantasy Baseball Today in the Sports Podcast Awards in the "Best Baseball Podcast" Category https://www.sportspodcastgroup.com/sports_category/best-baseball-podcast/ 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.  Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday 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/ 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. We're fantasy! Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. You want positional tears? Scott Whitehast.

Welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today. Frank and Scott here on Monday, January 22nd. And today on the show, we're breaking down first base and third base tiers, which are live on the site, CBSports.com slash fantasy slash baseball. And if you'd like to follow along, obviously you can pull those up at your convenience. Plus we have some news from the weekend,

reliever Robert Stevenson, signed with the Angels, and we have some other interesting tidbits. Scott, I always kick off Tears Week with some variation of this question. But what is the point of tiers in fantasy baseball and how should people use them in their draft or auction?

Well, the point of tiers is to ensure that you're maximizing the return of every draft pick you make. And the way this is accomplished is by combining those portions of the rankings where you're really just kind of parsing player value. There aren't huge distinctions between the players. They're all more or less just as value.

as one another. And I do this within positions itself. I mean, I suppose there are other ways you can tear it independently of positions. I've tried doing tiers according to skills before you could just take an overall rankings and try to tear it that way. But I think it's most effective to do it positionally because when you do that, as the draft is progressing, you can know with a fair amount of confidence what is the most urgent position to draft. It's the one whose active tier is closest to depletion.

You know, if you've got six players left in the active third base tier and two players left in the active outfielder tier, probably should draft an outfielder because there's a good chance one of those six third basemen that are more or less equivalent according to the tiers is going to make it back to you. So that's the basic idea. And I'm a big believer in it. Some years I find it more useful than others. I will say that the infield positions are by and large so strong this year that it might not be as useful this year as it has been in other years. But it's still a handy tool to have at your disposal during a draft just to make sure, you know, just to keep yourself honest to make sure you're not reaching unnecessarily. at a position. And how do you actually put them into use while drafting? Scott? Like, do you have

your rankings up somewhere like on an Excel sheet and they're kind of like marked off by tiers and you're like crossing names off? Or is it just like, you've done this so much that you just kind of have an idea of what the tiers are? Oh no. I actually, so if you go to the site right now, there's there's an individual article for each position. Relief pitcher tiers 1.0, third base tiers 1.0. And if you, if you go and in, into one of those articles, you'll see the players listed according to my rankings, but then divide it into tiers. I give the tiers

different names. Like I'm looking at relief pitcher now, there's the elite, which includes Devin Williams, Josh Hader, Edwin Diaz. Then there's the near elite, which includes like nine different names. And as the draft is playing out, so I have a, like a word document with all the positions combined,

just catcher, catcher tiers, first base tiers, you know, get them all on one page, basically. I bring that page with me to a draft, and I cross off names as the draft is going. And that way I can see very clearly how many is left at each, in the active tier at each position side by side. I feel like for years, I mean, we're not the only ones. Like, obviously this has been out there for quite some time.

But when doing an auction or a salary cap draft, I think people kind of have this idea of clear endings of tiers, right? Let's just say, for example, we're going to talk about the first rounders in your first base tiers. Freddie Freeman, Matt Olson, Bryce Harper. Say the first two have already been drafted in an auction or a salary cap draft. There's a chance that the final name in that tier could go for more than the others because people realize it's the end of that tier. And it's things that I've noticed in the past as well.

I would say just as a word of advice, if you like a player in that tier, I would say either nominate that player a little bit earlier or if someone else nominates them, maybe try and get in on the bidding. So it's not like you're bidding on the final player in that tier, if it makes sense. Yeah, I mean, I certainly understand what you're talking about. And, you know, it is worth reminding everyone that not everybody's tiers are going to be broken down the same way. So what you might think is the last player in the current,

tier at third base. You know, another person might see three other players in that tier. And so it's the lack of consensus there doesn't always make it crystal clear what you should do. I've noticed too in an auction scenario like you're talking about, I will think, okay, there are two players left in a tier. I need to go for the second to last one because I know that last one's going to be more. But then it's like everybody thinks the same.

You know, we kind of like outsmart each other that way. And then it's actually the last player in the tier that goes for a lot less. And we each tried to outdo each other for the second to last player thinking the last player would go for too much. So it's, you know, every auction plays out differently. Every salary cap draft plays out differently. And that's why all of the advice for that format in particular, they're more guidelines. than rules, I would say, because no two ever play out the same way. You are absolutely right, Scott, and I've had people ask,

how much should I bid on this player? What's this player's value in an auction or a salary cap draft? And obviously, we can give you an idea. We could say, all right, well, we have this player listed for this amount of dollars on the website. You know, that should be whatever. That's the foundation. But, man, like, drafts, those formats are so different from, like, each draft to the next that it's really more of, like, a range of what you'd be willing to pay.

pay on a player, but we'll save that for another day. I mean, we could do like a whole strategy podcast on just auctions and salary cap drafts, which I think would be pretty useful. Let's get into first base tiers. As I mentioned, the first tier includes the first rounders. And that has Freddie Freeman, Matt Olson, and Bryce Harper as part of this mix. No surprise, Freddie Freeman, one of the most consistent players over the past decade. Honestly, Matt Olson coming off a huge breakout season with over-freyfrey.

50 home runs. Bryce Harper is maybe a name that might surprise some. He got off to a slow start in his return from elbow surgery, but he flipped a switch over the final two months. Got looked a lot like Bryce Harper during that span. 299 batting average, 16 homers, OPS over 1,000, awesome quality of contact. And that leads me to believe Bryce Harper is probably going to be just fine and that's why he's part of this year. Yeah, I agree. The way he turned on the power after a couple months into his recovery. Obviously, the quickest return

from Tommy John's surgery ever. It stood to reason there would be some negative effects from that for making it back so soon. And during the postseason,

especially during that series against the Braves, Bryce Harper just seemed like he could hit a home run any time he wanted. Of course, a two-time league MVP. So he has a first-round

track record, first-round pedigree and fantasy. And so, yeah, I thought it was more appropriate to tear him with Freddie Freeman and Matt Olson than with what follows at the first base position. You'll notice also,

if you're a long-time follower of my tiers, I've kind of renamed them a little bit. I did notice that. Yeah. I mean, they've been around for they've been around as long as I've been writing about fantasy baseball, so over 15 years. I actually think,

and there's no way to go back and prove this, but I'm pretty sure I popular popularize the concept of tears within the fantasy industry because when I started, nobody was writing about him and now they're like just a mainstay. It's funny because Dave Richard and I had an argument about this recently. He thought he did. And I said, no, I wrote about him in 2008, my first year writing about baseball for CBS. So he went back and looked and he was like, yeah, I wrote about him in 2008, too, just later in the year because it was football season instead of baseball season. So we kind of rubbed off on each other that way, I guess.

But yeah, they've been around for a long time. A lot of places just do tier one, tier two, tier three. I like to be a little more descriptive in my tier titles. And so as I've talked about throughout the off season, there are in my mind, I think it's 17 first round caliber hitters, obviously more than it can fit in a first round. But I want to distinguish those hitters. from other really good hitters who don't fit in that first round tier. So I've named a tier at each position, the first rounders, to really distinguish them from what might be deemed as a larger tier of just elites. The also elite tier, this is the one that follows the first rounders,

and it includes just two names, Pete Alonzo and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. And I think some people might argue, Scott, that Vlad doesn't deserve to be in this tier. If you look at his OPS by year, something we've done a lot already this offseason. 772, 791, 1002, 818, and 788. So very clearly, one of those is not like the other. And that was Vlad's near MVP season in 2021, where he hit 311 with 48 home runs, finishes the top player in fantasy baseball. it also happens that that season was kind of a weird one for the Blue Jays

where they played the majority of their games in minor league ballparks, both of which were extremely hitter-friendly. So I don't know if that's the exact reason. Feels like these renovations that they've made in Rogers Center have kind of suppressed offense and power so far. It's, you know, it's only been that way for one season so far. But what would you say, Scott, to the naysayers of Vlad Jr. being in this tier? Well, first of all, I'd say this is why I was saying that not everybody's tiers are going to look the same, because I can understand somebody leaving Vladimir Guerrero out of this also elite tier with Pete Alonzo.

But I will point out, Vladimir Guerrero last year was the fourth biggest underachiever by expected batting average and the 12th biggest underachiever by expected slug. He was a stud according to the stat cast data, which wasn't necessary. I mean, he was good by the stat cast data in 2022, but it was much better in 2023. 2020, looked a lot more like 2021 than it did 2022. And the guy hasn't turned 25 yet. He'll be 25 by opening day. But he's like just now entering his prime. He already has a year where he was the best player in fantasy and all the underlying

data looks amazing. And I think in the long run, we're going to think of Vladimir Guerrero as a first-round type hitter in fantasy. And so I actually see it as something of a by-low opportunity right now. He's falling well into round three in even in some 15 team drafts, much less 12-teamers. So I want to give myself an opportunity to draft him. And if I tear him lower than this, first of all, I think it's underestimating. He's upside. And second of all, I'm going to, I'm going to kind of like box myself out from drafting him

by putting him in a tier with lower caliber first baseman and with the higher caliber first baseman. So it's kind of a, there's a certain element of gaming your tiers for your tastes, which of course you don't want to do too much because then it undermines the purpose. But if you're being honest in your assessment of players, then I think it's, I think it's fine. All right. Let's move on to the next tier. is the near elite, which features, again, just two names here. Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt.

Cody Bellinger also has outfield eligibility, remains a free agent. He's part of that big group of four, the Scott Boris free agents, which typically Scott Boris players do take a little bit longer to sign, and that's where we're at with Cody Bellinger, unfortunately. Paul Goldschmidt, Scott, had a bit of a down year. 8-10 OPS was his lowest since his rookie season, but the stat cast numbers are still really strong. 91.3 average exit velocity.

Expected numbers look pretty solid. They were actually better than his 2022 season. And, you know, I've noticed some videos of him working out at driveline baseball this offseason and obviously driveline. They do really good work with pitchers, but, you know, they've done great work with hitters the past couple of years as well.

I can only see it being a positive. Paul Goldschmidt also entering a contract year. So I know he's older, but I kind of like it. It's like a bounce back opportunity for him. So this is why I'll point out why I didn't want to tear Vladimir Guerrero, though, because if I'm tearing him with Bellinger and Goldschmidt, there's not any league where he's going to go after Bellinger or Goldschmidt.

So I'm just not drafting Guerrero, right? I already said that, but I just wanted to reemphasize the point. Goldschmidt's actually one of my bus picks for this year. I know. Spoiler alert. It's not out yet. It'll be up. It'll be up by the time most of you are listening to this point.

probably. But if I could get into that a little bit, I will say the most obvious reason, of course, is that he's 36. But so he slowed down quite a bit in the second half. Okay, yes, I got to have the year Goldschmidt hit 246 with a 763 OPS. The most alarming thing to me, though, I think the clearest indicator of Paul Goldschmidt beginning to show his age

is what he was doing on fastballs specifically. So, first of all, I'll point out the numbers way down in the second half, the exit velocities way down in the second half. For the season, I don't even have to break this down first half, second half. For the season against fastballs, Paul Goldschmidt, who is a career 307 hitter, with a 995 OPS against fastball. It's easiest pitch to hit, straightest pitch.

You know, usually players have their best numbers against fastball. Goldschmidt, no exception. 307, 995 for his career. This past year, he hit 238 with a 797 OPS. When players get older, it's not uncommon to see the fastball no longer become, them no longer have their best numbers against the fastball because they're, you know, the bat's slowing down a little bit. They're having a harder time catching up with that heat.

And given that second half drop-off corresponds with, you know, it happened in the year where he has these terrible numbers against the fastball and it's when he's 36, I don't know. Father time is undefeated. It may be, we may be getting a whiff of him here for Goldschmidt. And so I'm not. saying I want to draft him I actually think that his ADP is a little lower than I have him but if you are going to draft Goldschmidt you have to understand the risks

here that you know a player his age shows signs of decline like that you can't just dismiss it as random noise obviously Paul Goldschmidt's ADP so far this offseason is 78 over at the NFBC so yeah I would say that's a little bit later than I would expect definitely some fair concerns there. I know some people brought up last offseason Jose Ibrahim, his numbers trending down against fastballs and then we all saw what Jose Abraeu did last year, so perhaps they were onto something

and perhaps you are onto something as well, Scott, regarding Paul Gulchman. The next best things tier includes Christian Walker, Tristan Kassis, Spencer Steer, Spencer Torkelson, Yandy Diaz, Vinnie Pasquantino, Josh Naylor, and Christian Encarnacionacion Strand, who we will point out is one tier lower in a points league. Why is that? Well, the plate discipline, not so great for Encarnazion Strand,

5.8% walk rate with a 28.6% strikeout rate, and maybe some playing time risk. Obviously, you do want a lot of volume, a lot of plate appearances in points leagues as well. This is where things kind of open up, Scott. We see a good amount of names here in the next best things tier, and it looks like it's here I won't mind shopping in. if I do miss out on some of the early round first baseman.

One that I wanted to ask about, did you consider Christian Walker being in the previous tier, back-to-back seasons with 33 plus home runs, 94 plus RBI, also kind of getting up there in age? I could understand the argument, but personally, no. I'm much more excited about the prospect of drafting a Tristan Kossis or of any Pasquantino than I am a Christian Walker,

and I would hate to tear them in such a way that I'm going to block myself out from doing that. Like I'm going to fill up the spot with Walker, who I'm less excited about drafting. I think I would actually be more likely to drop Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt into this tier and make it even larger. Given that I have concerns about both of them.

I just laid out my bus case for Paul Goldschmidt. Also, spoiler, Cody Bellinger's, among my bust picks for 2024. So I don't know how motivated I am to actually draft from that. two-player near elite tier of Bellinger and Goldschmidt, given that there are such exciting upside plays here in the next best things. You know, there are concerns, obviously.

I think it's, I think, for example, the possibility of Tristan Koss is continuing to sit against lefties is why I'm leaving that tier distinction for now. Spencer Torkelson, he's got a, a home park that really suppresses his power production. I mean, he still hit, what, 30 home runs last year? So he was still able to hit for power, but two-thirds of those home runs were on the road,

and his home venue isn't changing. So it limits Spencer Torkelson's upside. Yandi Diaz, who's in this tier, coming off a career year at an advanced age, and not a lot of power for a first basement. And he plays for the Rays who like to mix things up, don't tend to stick with the same lineup day after day. So there are a lot of reasons to think maybe Yandi Diaz won't live up to expectations.

Vinie Pasquantino, the final numbers didn't look that great. No, I think it's because he was playing with the bad shoulder for a while because through mid-May his numbers looked exactly what we expected them to. But maybe that's not the case or maybe just the fact he's coming off shoulder surgery. Vinny Pasquantino is not going to look quite right next year. So that's why there is this distinction between them and the Bellinger's engulfemits of the world. Even though I see downside risk for Bellinger and Goldschmidt, I think their realistic floor

is still probably higher than a realistic floor for Vini Pasquantino. But in terms of ceiling and likelihood of reaching that ceiling, I feel like those tiers are pretty close. Yeah, and based on this tiers approach, Scott, I would nearly guarantee that you will not have a single share of Christian Walker this offseason because his ADP is 87.9 and Vinnie Pass Quantino is right around pick 170. So based on the tiers approach, no reason to reach up on Christian Walker when you can go ahead and get Vinie Pass Quantino almost 100 picks later based on early ADP. Let's take our first break. When we return, we'll wrap up the rest of first. Base Baseball today. Welcome back in. We'll pick things back up with first base tiers and we're up to the fallback options which includes

Reese Hoskins, also a free agent coming off of a torn ACL all but confirmed he will not be back with the Philadelphia Phillies. Where will he play? We have no idea. Jamer Candelario who is now with the Cincinnati Reds, Alec Boehm, Ryan Mountcastle, Nate Lowe, and Esauk-Sach parades. Scott Are we at the point in the first base tiers? Well, maybe not based on the name.

It might be obvious. Fallback options, right? Would you prefer these more as your corner infielder, let's say in a Roto or a Categories League, compared to your actual starting first basement in fantasy? Yeah. Yeah, I would say so. That would be my preference.

If you do have to have one as your starting first basement, it's not a disaster. They're fallback options. It's kind of right there in the name of the tier, right? Yeah. especially in the case of Hoskins who, you know, entering last year, we saw as a starting caliber first basement in fantasy coming off a significant injury. And right now, we don't even know what his destination is. I think it's fair to downgrade him a bit.

But, you know, he could be fine. Jamer Candelario is one of my sleeper picks for this year going to Cincinnati. Boom was certainly startable last year, as was Isaac Peretti's. So, yeah, I mean, I think you could live with any of these guys as your starter, but it is an ideal. And there's really no need for it to happen, given how loaded the previous tier is. And what we have here is another very big tier.

So this is another thing that tiering positions can do is kind of give you a sense of the distribution of talent at the position. The top three tiers at first base had a grand total of seven players. and then the fourth tier itself had more than seven players. It had eight players in it. And now we're looking at another very big tier here in the fallback option. So first base is a position with a lot of like serviceable starters, but kind of light at the top.

It's not a super studly position. So you could go either way there. I mean, you could read it as okay. So if I go for a first basement early, I'll be one of the few people in my league who has a true stud at that position. That'll give me an advantage over my competition. Okay, that's a reasonable way of looking at it. Or look at it another way, if I pass up first base early, there's still a lot of talent there, a lot of useful bats there to, you know, maybe I'll be a little weaker than some of my competition, but I'll be strong enough, strong enough to be competitive. even if I'm sacrificing a little bit there.

And I think to a certain degree, it depends on the depth of your league. If you're playing a 10-team league, I think it's more important to get a true stud at first base from the very few options to choose from. But if you're playing a deeper league like a 15-team road a league, I think as a general rule, you don't have to be as concerned about distinguishing yourself from the competition at particular positions. mostly just want good, solid production at every position. And so you might be more inclined to say,

oh, first base is really deep if you play in a deep league. All right, let's move over to the last resort tier. And it also includes a ton of names, Justin Turner, who is still a free agent. I've seen them linked to the Mets, the Blue Jays, the D-backs this offseason. So we'll wait and see on Justin Turner. Andrew Vaughn, Anthony Rizzo, Jose Ibrahim, Brandon Drury, Josh Bell, and Thai France.

Scott, I'm not just saying this because I'm a Yankee fan, but of all the names in this tier, I feel like the best opportunity is for Anthony Rezo. If he can bounce back to full health, obviously was dealing with the post-concussion syndrome last year. His first 53 games before the injury, we mentioned this last week. He hit 304, 11 homers, 880 OPS,

was hitting a ton of line drives, and is now projected to bad cleanup in the first. that Yankees order, you know, just behind, hopefully, Juan Soto and Aaron Judge. So of all these names, I think the, perhaps the biggest upside or opportunity lies with Anthony Rizzo. For me. I don't disagree. Between Justin Turner, Andrew Vaugh, Anthony Rizzo, Jose Abrae, Brandon Drury, Josh Bell, and Thai France, the one I'd be most likely to call a sleeper is Anthony Rizzo. Yeah. And at times I've been tempted to move him out the rankings because that that's such a clear correlation there between the, you know, what the numbers look like before the

concussion and after it. You read about what he was going through when he was playing through the concussion. There's no way he should have been playing with that. It's, it's kind of makes you angry, to be honest. So, you know, I want to grant him that benefit of the doubt. But there is reason for doubt because he's 34 and because it was such a significant concussion. I mean, we've, we've seen players who are.

never the same after suffering a concussion like that. So particularly given that he's already on the older side, I think there's certainly no guarantee Anthony Rizzo bounces back as anything useful in fantasy, in which case maybe he has the most downside of this group. Yeah, that might be true. So perhaps in a deeper league, that's something you keep in mind. But he goes so late. I mean, even in that rotomoc we did last week.

I think I wound up with Rizzo as my utility bat in maybe one of the final three rounds of the draft. So you can get him really late, big upside, but I would agree also. Big downside for Anthony Rizzo as well. The leftovers tier is one that is loaded with names as well. Jonathan Aranda, Alex Kiroloff, Kyle Manzardo, prospect with the Guardians,

Luke Raleigh, DJ LaMayhew, Ryan O'Hern, Nolan, Shanwell, Wilmer Flores, Lamont Wade, Jake Cronoworth, Carlos Santana, Radi Tellez, who is now with the Pirates, and Ryan Noda of. of the Oakland A. Scott, really want to move on here, but is there anything you want to say quickly about this tier or not really? Doesn't really mean, is there ever a series of names that makes you think of me more than Jonathan Aranda, Alex Kirillov and Kyle Monsardo? Yeah, I mean, especially those first two. My gosh. Yeah. So, I mean, I guess just my point with that is even though it's the last tier at first base, it's the leftovers tier. There's upside to be found. It's obviously long odds for any individual one of those players to become an impact fantasy player this year.

But the potential is there. There are reasons that I like all three of them. Right now, I would say Ronda's clearly my favorite, which is why he's the first of the group. But I haven't, I like Manzardo a lot, and I haven't completely lost faith in Alex Kierloff. I probably should have asked you this earlier, but are the names ranked within the tier? In the order you would draft them? Yeah, I try to just go through my rankings and list them there. It gets a little sticky since I only have one set of tiers and two sets of rankings,

Roto and head to head. Right. But for the most part, they're listed in the order I rank them, though you're not really supposed to pay attention to that when you're doing tears. All right. Before we hit the news and notes, FBT is a finalist for the best baseball podcast category in the sports podcast awards. and this is the final week to vote. Thanks to all of our listeners,

we actually won the award last year, and now we're looking to go back to back. So to help us bring home the hardware, you can find the link in the podcast and YouTube descriptions, or you can scan the QR code on the top right corner of the screen. The whole process should take less than a minute, and we would really appreciate it. Thank you for your continued support.

Let's hit some news and notes, Scott. We did get some reliever news over the weekend, and the Angels signed Robert Stevenson to, a three-year $33 million deal. Basically, right after we wrapped up our Josh Hader emergency podcast, this news came out. The career numbers are not great for Stevenson. It's a combination of starting earlier in his career and, you know, pitching in Colorado, which obviously is not great.

But career 464 ERA 134 whip, much better last year. Breakout season, 310 ERA, a 0.88 whip. and he latched on with Tampa Bay in June, Scott. He picked up this new cutter, and he was awesome. I mean, after joining the raise, he had, I didn't write down the numbers. I got the numbers here. After joining the raise, Robert Stevenson had a 235 year.

Okay. 0.68 whip. Wow. 14.1K per 9. And his four months with the raise. And, of course, the rays have a history of doing this. acquiring a pitcher and knowing exactly what they need to teach him to unlock his full potential. And Robert Stevenson is his clear an example of that as anybody.

He was a former top pitching prospect for the Reds back in the day. So there was always this latent talent that he just never capitalized on. And now at age 30 seems to have figured it out that cutter. By season's end, he was thrown at like 75% at the time. It was such a good pitch for him. And as impressive as those numbers are, the 235 ERA.68 whip 14.1K per 9. It gets even more impressive than that.

So for the season, I'm counting his time with the pirates. For the season, Robert Stevenson had a 24.8% swinging strike rate. Number one in baseball among pitchers with at least 50 in a. Second was Felix Bautista at 20.8. he was four percentage points higher than the second place pitcher

in swinging strike rate was Robert Stevenson. And I got this number from MLB trade rumors, the second one. So during his time with the race, so we're back to talk about that four-month period with the raise, opposing batters put the ball in play against Steven. They put it in play. So they made contact in fair territory.

on just 49.3% of their swings. Now, I don't really have a frame of reference for that, but that was first place during that four-month period in baseball. 49.3% of their swings, they put the ball in play. Second place, Oroldus Chapman, 59% of their swings. 10% percentage point difference between first and second place. He was unhittable. By those measurements, you could make a case Robert Stevenson,

is the best reliever in baseball. It's over a four-month sample, I get it, but he should be the Angels closer. I mean, Carlos Estevez imploded down the stretch and was never really, never really stood out as a reliever before last year. 6.59 ERA in the second half for Carlos Estevez with way too many walks.

I haven't seen anything indicating the Angels' plans one way or another, but like Stevenson should be the guy. Yeah, so I read an article from Sam Blum of The Athletic, and he wrote that Carlos Estevez figures to be the incumbent closer. And that's kind of where it just started and ended. He didn't really elaborate too much on that. But I think if nothing else, this signing makes the leash much shorter for Carlos Estevez. For the reasons you mentioned the second half numbers and just how awesome Robert Stevenson really was.

So after the signing, did you move Stevenson up in your rankings at all? I haven't officially yet because I was hoping to hear more and haven't heard much more. But I feel like I got to rank him ahead of Estevez at least because maybe it won't be right at the start of the season, but it feels like an inevitability. And I'm probably going to tier him ahead of put him in a higher tier even than Carlos Estevez. So the fallback options tier at relief pitcher. It's another spoiler alert for you. Jose Alvarado, Clay Holmes, and Jose LaClerc. I think I'm going to tier Robert Stevenson with those guys.

A lot more upside than those guys, but just given the uncertainty of the role, that's as high as I can go with them. All right. The Astros had their fan fest on Saturday, where it was revealed GM Dana Brown had conversations with Ryan Presley before signing Josh Hater. And I actually saw this quote from New Mexico. Joe Espada in an article over on the athletic, quote,

we have an elite bullpen, elite three guys that could close any games at any time. I will sit down and I would like to assign roles for these guys so they know exactly how they're going to be deployed in the game. But like we've done in the past, if it's the eighth inning where there's some lefties and that might be a better pocket for some guys, that might be his inning. But I would like to have an established role for these guys. that makes it sound to me, Scott, like Josh Hader could be used in the eighth inning at times. I mean, very clearly, he's the only lefty of those, you know, Brian Abraeu and Ryan Presley.

So it kind of feels like he was alluding to Josh Hater there. But also at the same time, if they have set roles, my guess is Josh Hater is going to be the closer. So, like, how often does that happen? A handful of times throughout the season? Sure. Yeah. Yeah, I know. I mean, it's.

I still, I got some pushback too. what I was expecting it to be basically. Hater's the closer, but there will be rare circumstances where he enters in the eighth and maybe isn't allowed to finish the ninth because of that. But it's not going to be often enough to impact the rankings in a meaningful way. I got some pushbacks. I mean, people were tweeting at me.

Not all people, but some people were saying, Ryan Presley is still the closer, you know, the Astros' loyalty, blah, blah, blah. Yeah, last pitch of the World Series.

I heard some of that too. I mean, I saw some of it even before we did our emergency pod. I don't believe it one bit. Yeah, I don't know. Some people just like to say this guy is falling, I think. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, I guess you get people on the other side who don't want to,

who are slow to admit a bad development for a player of value. But I don't know. I feel like you see more the other way where, like I said, People want to claim the sky is falling, even though there's no good reason to claim it. From the Astros closer role to maybe the White Sox. They signed John Brebia to a one year $5 million deal on Saturday. And in his career has a 342 ERA 1119 whip over a strikeout per inning. Last year, averaged 94.5 miles per hour on the fastball with an 11.9% swinging strike rate.

Gregory Santos, who ended the year, I guess kind of as the closer for the white Sox might not be ready for the start of the spring training because of right elbow inflammation. Brebeah only has two career saves, Scott, but this kind of reminds me of the A's signing Trevor May last offseason. The White Sox just gave John Brebby a five and a half million dollars for what reason? I mean, my guess is, okay, let him be the closer. If he performs well, they could flip him at the deadline for anything. So that's what I think is going to happen. Okay. Yeah, I don't know that I think if Santos isn't ready to go would be more of a committee type of deal

because it's not like Brebeah has it's not like Brebe has been a shutdown reliever but who else you know if they're if they're stretching crochet out as a starter who else can they use in that bullpen well it's so bad one I don't think they're going to have safe opportunities very often true and like it took us a long time

to even really understand that Trevor May was the closer for the race or for the A's because they so rarely had a save chance. And I mean, the Royals last year, we never did get to the bottom of who the Royals closer was, even when Scott Breslo was still there. So I think the White Sox are going to be in a similar situation.

And I don't see anybody worth drafting from this bullpen other than Santos. And he's not going to be, he's not going to deserve a heavy investment. Look at some of the other names in this bullpen. Jimmy Lambert, Tim Hill, Davy Garcia, Tuki Toussaint, Shane Drohan or Drone. Yikes. I mean, I think there's a chance for Brebia. It's got more so Santos, but we'll see what happens if Santos is healthy in spring

training or ready for the start of the season. I did have some other non-reliever tidbits, but I do want to get to third base tier, so I'm going to save these notes for later on in the week, and there's nothing that's too pressing right now anyway. so we'll save those. Let's take our final break when we return third base tiers here on fantasy baseball today.

All right, here we are third base tiers and we'll start off with the first rounders or rather first rounder. Only one, Jose Ramirez, his NFBC ADP, so far is 14.3. Why isn't he going higher? My guess is got maybe for the reason you mentioned earlier.

There's 17 first round caliber, hitters, somebody has to fall a little bit in draft. So that's why I think Jose Ramirez is going a little bit later. He's going behind names like Trey Turner, Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, Shohay Otani, on average. That won't happen in every draft. Hasn't really been happening in the mock drafts that we've done. I know, you know, the power was down a little bit, 24 home runs, the counting stats as well for Jose Ramirez, Scott, but everything else under the hood, the plate discipline, stat cast numbers still good. I'm not really worried about Jose Ramirez. I want to say I'm worried either. He seemed like pretty much the same guy as he's always been last year. I think part of

what happened to Jose Ramirez is just so stolen bases took off for, well, around the league's stolen bases took off. I don't know if we did have, have we mentioned before that there were more stolen bases in the majors last year? It was the most stolen bases we've seen across the major since 1987. So basically nobody playing fantasy baseball today has ever experienced a stolen base environment like we saw last year. I didn't realize it went quite that far back. So my point in bringing that up with Jose Ramirez is while we saw Bobby Witt get to 50

steals and Corbyn Carroll and a lot of those first round types with just the kind of stolen base numbers that bowl you over, Ramirez still gave his 28. He didn't keep up with the Joneses there. So while he remained the same, the league around him improved, and that kind of made him less of a big deal for fantasy. But certainly somebody who you could be thrilled to get with your second round pick because I think he could still pass as a first rounder, obviously. That's why I have him in the first rounder's tier here.

and another thing to point out, part of what makes him the only first round caliber third baseman is that the depth that this position has improved so much and you're going to hear in future tiers, okay, so you're the first tier here at third base, one player, oh, it must be a weak position, every other tier is going to be big

because in a year's time, third base has gone from being the thinnest position to the fattest position. It's a remarkable turnaround. All right. That's all I have to say about that, Frank. It seemed unsure. Alright, let's move on to the also elite tier,

which includes four names, Austin Riley, Raphael Devers, Gunner Henderson, and Alex Bregman. Before everybody loses their collective minds, Alex Bregman is one tier lower in a Categories League. So if we're just talking about points leagues, Breggman averaged 3.3 fantasy points per game on CBS last year. The same as Austin Riley and Raphael Devers. So obviously he's elite in that format.

He drops down a tier in Roto or head-to-head categories leagues, not in head-to-head points leagues. Gunner Henderson, Scott, he is the new name here, the arrival of one of those top prospects from last season. The unanimous AL rookie of the year. Hit 28 homers, 10 steals, 100 run scored. got the batting average up to 255 after a slow start the first two months of the season.

Does he deserve to be here? Does he truly deserve to be here? Scott, what do you think about that for Gunner Henderson? So he was the single player I was most torn about when I was putting these tears together because I remember in our first mock draft and one of the principles I've had when drafting this year is I want to draft hitters,

until all the MVP caliber hitters are gone. And I kind of used Gunner Henderson as the cutoff in our first mock draft. And so I went with my third round pick in that draft. I went Kevin Gosman. I think Marcus Simi and Jose Altuva went right before him and I had them queued up. But they went and I didn't think Gunner Henderson

quite met that cutoff. So I went Kevin Gosman instead. But now I'm tearing Gunner Henderson. in a way that would suggest he is as good as the Jose Altuvays and Marcus Simeans of the world. And I'm not sure, I'm not sure how I think. Part of the reason I did it, honestly, is because I knew I wanted to get Alex Bregman in this tier for points leagues.

And in points leagues, I rank Gunner-Henderson ahead of Alex Bregn. Either I had to switch them in my points league rankings or I had to move Gunner-Henderson up to this tier as well if I'm going to have Alex Bregman in this tier for points leagues. And Alex Bregman on a per-game basis was as good as, Austin Riley last year. So I feel like Alex Bregman in points, Leagues deserves to be in this tier.

Okay. I think Gunner Henderson certainly has the upside to compare to an Austin Riley or Raphael Devers. His numbers, the breakdown for him last year, it was one of those last four months were a lot better than the first two months situations. So specifically,

I'll give you the exact numbers from, June 1st on, Gunner Henderson, hit 276 with an 8.56 OPS, 23 homers, eight steals. You'll give them 50% more in those categories. You're talking really high-end production. Obviously, Raphael Devers, Austin Riley, they don't give you steals at all. So if you can get 12 to 15 from Henderson, that counts for whatever he may lack behind them in terms of batting average. And there's a good chance he just takes a step forward performance-wise in year two. as well. So it's a little bit of a riskier pick than those two. And I'm not saying I would

absolutely pass up Austin Riley and Raphael Devers late in round two. But having Gunner Henderson as an option behind them, I think is what would prevent me from taking Austin Riley and Raphael Devers early in round two, you know? Fair enough. All right. Let's move on to the near elite tier, which includes Mani Machado, Ellie De LaCruz, Nolan Aeronado, Royce Lewis, and Hassan Kim. Machado underwent surgery on

his right elbow extensor tendon, which is technically, it's probably like a fancy way to say he had tennis elbow for parts of the past two seasons. The surgery takes longer on the throwing side than hitting, and it sounds like Machado could potentially open the season at

designated hitter. Does that worry you, Scott, when tiering Mani Machado is still in the near elite tier? It worries me to the extent that he's only in the near elite tier because my initial inclination was to put him

in the same tier with Austin Riley and Raphael Devers, which is how we were drafting Mani Machado last year. It's how we've drafted him for most of his career. And I kind of think when we get down to it in spring training and provided he looks healthy then,

I think we're going to see him move up draft boards quite a bit, and I may have to change what tier he's in. By the way, Ellie De La Cruz, if you just look at early ADP, at least on NFBC, which I think is higher than most of the other places. But NFBC has Ellie De La Cruz as the 21st overall player,

NFBC ADP. So a lot of people would tier him with Austin, Riley, and Rafael Devers, and make that also elite tier six players deep. You can make the justification it's actually six players deep by putting Machado and De La Cruz in it, rather than how I have it with Machado and De La Cruz tiered alongside Aeronado, Royce Lewis, and Haasong Kim. I don't know.

Saying it out loud, I'm not even sure. I'm not sure I like it. And I'm not sure what I want to do about it, whether it makes more sense to move Machado and De La Cruz up or Haasong Kim down, because they don't sound like they belong in the same. tier, do they? That's exactly what I have written down on the rundown, is that it feels weird to see Ellie Dela Cruz and Hassan Kim in the same tier. I may have to revisit it. I may have just in my rankings, I may have Hassan Kim too high. He's an interesting player. He's also among my bus for this year,

which may be now that I've written that is part of the reason I don't like it as much anymore. But potential to be a big steals contributor, right? 38 of them last year. with triple eligibility, second base, third base, and shortstop. So in deeper leagues especially, Haasso and Kim could be a very handy pick. But just mentioning him in the same breadth as in the same breath as Mani Machado and Ellie De La Cruz feels wrong to me. Yeah, I'm not sure what I want to do about that yet. But I'm going to, I feel like certainly in tiers 2.0, I'm going to have to change something there at the near elite tier at third base. I know you're not going to do this

and you shouldn't do this, Kat, but it kind of feels like Hassan Kim should just be in the Hassan Kim tier. You know, like, he's not near elite, but he's probably a little bit better than this next tier, which is the next best things, right? He's kind of a tweener, so it's like, where do you kind of, where do you land on Hassan Kim?

Maybe if it's, all right, your glass half full, he's one tier higher, maybe if you're a glass half empty, one tier lower for Hassan Kim. But I do agree, he's kind of a, kind of a tough. fit regardless. Well, and part of it, too, is I like, I want him in the same tier at each of those three positions. And so that complicates things too, because I'm looking at second base. He's in

the middle of that near elite tier instead of at the end of it, like he is a third base. So I don't know. I might be more inclined to move Machado and Dela Cruz up, but then it feels like I'm selling Riley, Austin Riley short. I don't know. I'll, I'll, I'll think it over some more, but this kind of speaks to the depth at third base that it's, there's so many good players there. It's hard to find the divisions between them. All right. Let's move on to the next best things tier,

which includes Spencer Steer, Jr. Camerro, who is one of the top prospects in the game, plays for the Tampa Bay Rays, Noel V. Marte, also one of the top prospect on the Reds, Max Muncie, Jake Berger, and Josh Young. We talked extensively about Josh Young last week on our rankings debate podcast. Scott, are you worried?

at all about the potential logjam here for Noel V. Marte. Or maybe that's the reason why he's part of this tier and not a tier higher, right? Maybe if we just had no concerns whatsoever, you could just say, boom, I'm going to pencil him in for 2020. That's what I think he could do. But, you know, lots of names on that Cincinnati Reds team. So causes a little bit of doubt for some of their players. Well, who else would play third base? Candelario? Yeah, I guess Candelario. My They probably don't want Incarnacion Tran doing that anymore. And they don't seem to like Spencer Stier there so much either. I feel like as long as Noel Vemarte lives up to his end of the bargain,

he'll just be the third basement. Not saying he'll never get a day off or have a day where he shifts over to DH. That'll happen from time to time. But I'm more worried about Christian Incarnacian and Tran's playing time than I am. Noel V. Marte's playing time. provided he performs. I'll also mention that this Spencer Steer tier is the same tier where at first base you had Christian Walker, Tristan Kossis, Spencer Torkelson, Nandi Diaz, Vinnie Pascuantino, etc. So that was the first really big tier at third base.

Think of all the names we've already covered at third base. And now we're to that same equivalent tier at this position. So that goes to shows to go you. That goes to show you the relative depth and how much stronger overall third base is than first base. That, okay, this is still a very big tier at this position. Still a lot of names here. Josh Young, Jake Berger, Max Muncie, and then the young guys.

But we've already passed through so many names to get here, unlike at first base. And if we're just comparing the two tiers, the next best things tier at first base and third base, based on the names you read me, I would much rather shop in the next best things at first base, comparatively to this tier. Maybe you don't feel the same way, but, you know, I guess just lining those up. I do like the names on the first base side compared to some of the names here. I guess the way I've been approaching it is I'm willing to wait a long freaking time.

at third base, because I'm fine with Jake Berger as my starter. And in a head-to-head situation where you don't have a corner infield spot to fill, that could be really late in the draft because people only have one third to pay spot to fill, and we're more than 12 deep here. So that's kind of how I've approached it. And, you know, that's not to say if it's not, if it's the right time to take Austin Riley in round two, I'll take Austin Riley in round two. If it's the right time to take

Manny Machado in round five, I'll do that. But I find that having this many next best things at third base compels me to wait longer there than any other position.

Jake Berger, by the way, also a fan. Scott, I have them in my breakouts 1.0, which will be published on Monday, again, when most people are listening or consuming this should already be out on the site. But just a little sneak peek, Jake Berger transformed who he was in Miami last year. He lowered his strikeout rate, still had elite power metrics. You know, the stack cast data is off the charts.

If he could somehow blend those two approaches together, I mean, we could see a truly elite player. And still, if he doesn't do that, he could just go back to being the guy he was last year, which was still a useful player. So I think the floor and the ceiling are both pretty high for somebody like Jake Berger, even though I guess he doesn't have the longest track record of performance. The fallback options includes Ki-Briyan Hayes, Jamer Candelario, Alec, Asock Parades, and Michael Bush. Scott Candelario, someone we haven't talked about really at all today.

He's part of both positions, first base and third base. He's coming off a career year, and now he's headed to one of the best ballparks in all baseball out there in Cincinnati. He's going to be in the middle of that lineup. The Reds paid him. Three years, $45 million. To me, he is the one constant. He will be in there,

surrounded by other very talented players. And man, this is, it's a great callback because if, a call out, because if I miss out on everyone else, I don't think I'm really that upset about getting Jimmer Candelario as my starter at either position, honestly. Yeah, I mean, if you look at Statcast,

their home runs, expected home runs by ballpark. Candelario, who hit a career high, 22 home runs last year would have had 30 if he had played every game in Cincinnati. No, he's not going to play every game in Cincinnati. He was going to play half his games in Cincinnati. And so I think 25 homers is a reasonable expectation. Candelario spent most of his career in Detroit

and now is going to Cincinnati. And the most prominent player I can think of who did that was Nick made that same transition was Nick Castellanos, who was better. in Detroit than Candelaria was, but then when he got to Cincinnati, he was like MVP caliber bat for them. And again, I'm not saying Candelari is going to be that, but if just the, the, if it's proportional, the increase in production going to Cincinnati, then I think he's going to be a very solid starter in fantasy. I'm thinking something like a 275 batting average with 25 homers

and good counting stats in what could be a great lineup. Certainly the RBI total should be good for Candallario. Yeah, I really like that call as well. I did want to quickly pull up where Castellanos finished that season because that is a great reference

and a way to think about things. Again, not that Candelario is going to be this good, but Castellanos went from being, let's say, a serviceable option for fantasy to finishing as a top 20, 20 player in 2021 when he hit, he hit 34 homers, 300 batting average, you know, he was awesome.

Yeah, 309, 34 homers, and 939 OPS and has won full season in Cincinnati. Awesome stuff there. So we'll see. I have a pretty good feeling, Candelario is going to have a good season here for the Cincinnati Reds. The last resorts at third base

includes Ryan McMahon, Brett Beatty, Matt Chapman, E. E. E. Hennio-Swarres, Yohan Moncada, Curtis Meade and Jordan Westberg. Some interesting prospects in this mix, including Brett Beatty with the Mets, Curtis Mead with Tampa Bay, and Jordan Westberg with the Orioles.

Someone else kind of interesting is Matt Chapman, I think Scott. I mean, he's still a free agent, only hit 17 home runs. That was despite an elite 17% barrel rate. So that was fifth highest among qualified hitters. I really don't know what's going on in Toronto with that ballpark, but it just has played weird so far.

Anything on these prospects in this group and maybe a Matt Chapman power bounce back depending on where he lands? I wouldn't say I'm especially hopeful for any of them. I still think there's a lot of upside for Britt Beatty, especially, but he got an extended look there for the Mets last year and did nothing with it. So while I wouldn't rule him out,

we'll rule him out from having a breakout season, and it's not worth a hefty investment because there's a good chance you won't get a good return on that investment. I get your point about Chapman too. I noticed his pull rate was way down and hitting it to right field seemed like a terrible strategy

at Rogers Center. It's been for a couple years now. So maybe the change of environmental help. But that's what we said when he went from Oakland to Toronto and it didn't have that effect. So it's kind of hard to be that optimistic about Matt Chapman at this point. Though, again, it's more of a I can't rule it out situation then. Oh, I think this is going to happen.

And lastly, the leftovers at third base, Oswald Parraza, Anthony Rendon, Michael Garcia, DJ LaMahue, Willie Castro, Luis Renhifo, Ezekiel Duron, Wilmer Flores, John Birdie, and two prospects. Colt Keith of the Detroit Tigers and Kobe Mayo of... the Baltimore Orioles. Again, you can find both Scott's first base and third base tiers, honestly, all of his tiers on the site right now. CBSSports.com slash fantasy slash baseball. But here we head first and third base, and we'll be doing

all the other positions over the next couple of weeks. 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'll be back again on Wednesday. Bye-bye.