Fantasy Baseball Today - 7 Overvalued Fades Based On Early ADP! (12/30 Fantasy Baseball podcast)
Episode Date: December 30, 2025First up, James Wood fell apart in the second half. Fade both Carlos Estevez and Aroldis Chapman? Freddy Peralta is overvalued based on his 17 wins and run prevention. Oneil Cruz just hit .200 and is ...still a top-100 pick! Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: https://sptfy.com/QiKv 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, @CPTowers @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/ 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
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Which players are we fading based on early ADP?
Find out next on Fantasy Baseball Today Express.
Welcome into FBT Express on Tuesday, December 30th.
I am Frank Sample, Joy, by Chris Towers.
Let's talk overvalued fades based on early ADP.
And Chris, we will start off with you.
James Wood, ADP of 30.5, the 10th outfielder off the board.
He struggled mightily in the second half of the season.
Yeah, and you should generally look at full-season.
season numbers rather than trying to figure out, ah, the second half is who he really was.
That's, I don't think the second half is who James Wood really was or anything, but I do think
it gave us a hint of what a downside scenario looks like for James Wood.
And he was frankly unplayable.
He had a 39% strikeout rate hit 223, 690 OPS.
It was really rough.
And what really cements him as just being overvalued, not a bad player, certainly.
not a terrible pick necessarily,
but just someone who's probably going a little earlier than he should,
is that the stolen bases didn't make the leap that we thought.
I think it was 14 as a rookie and a half season.
Then he goes 15 last season and a full season.
I've been waiting for some kind of sign that he was playing through an injury,
but I haven't seen any updates on that.
And so I just,
I worry that if he doesn't have the stolen base upside to serve as a backstop,
the floor could get pretty low here.
and there's still plenty of power.
He's still young and could take a big step forward.
I think there's certainly a chance that we're talking about James Wood
as a top 12 pick this time next season.
But based on what we know right now,
based on what we saw from him last season,
I think top 30 is just a little bit too far.
All right, let's talk about a few closers here, Chris.
I've got Carlos Estevez with an ADP of 83,
and I understand that these early drafts are really aggressive on closers.
He's locked in as the Royals closer to start,
season, but if you look at the skills, he took a huge step back. The K rate was the lowest of his
career. The walks jumped back up after a strong 2024. Carlos Estevez's 11.9% K-minus walk rate
ranked 111 out of 147 qualified relievers. He gives up a ton of fly balls, a ton of barrels. His
ex-fip and Sierra were both in the mid-to-high fours. So just worry about all that and the fact that
there are two pretty good relievers behind him as well with Lucas Erseg and Matt Strom.
So Carlos Hesviz, going to be a stayaway for me.
Over to you, Aroldus Chapman.
His ADP is 55 as the sixth reliever off the board.
Why are you fading Aroldus Chapman based on this early value?
I think as a general rule, if you've faded a 37-year-old or 38-year-old coming off
what was effectively a career best season or right around there,
historically throughout baseball history, that wasn't a bad bet.
I don't know, Barry Bonds might throw off the curve.
But for the most part, that was a good bet to make.
And in a Roldus Chapman's case, he's 37 years old, he's had bad control for a long time.
And then all of a sudden last season, he jumps down to a 2.2 walks per 9, 7 per 6.6% walk rate.
It was 15% walk rate the year before.
And so I think you just look at that and say, yeah, that might be real.
The Boston Red Sox have done it very good.
job with their pitching development lately. Maybe there's something there. But
given the age, given the very small sample size we're dealing with right around 60
innings, I just don't think it's a particularly smart bet. Orode Chapman should be pretty good
and he should be valuable as the Red Sox closer. But I don't think he's going to be anywhere
near as good as he was last season. It just doesn't make sense for the career arc that he's on.
All right, let's take a quick break and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back in
the FBT Express, let's continue on with some overvalued fades, and let's talk about some starting
pitchers. I've got Spencer Strider here, 80P is 95, 26 starting pitcher off the board, and we did
talk about him recently. The ADP just feels so high this early, just based on all the questions
that we still have on Strider. You know, first coming back from the elbow surgery, the internal
brace, he looked pretty good, first 12 starts, final 11 were just awful, and that fastball got really
exposed. The velocity was down quite a bit, the shape, the whiff rate. He essentially became a one-pitch
pitcher. He still had the really good slider, but the fastball was not nearly as effective as it was
pre-surgery. So I need to see more or hear or read something this spring about the velocity
being up on the fastball or a legitimate third pitch. We just need to learn more. And right now we don't
have that information. As a result, I am not using a top 100 pick on Spencer Strider. Chris, over to you. Freddie
Peralta coming off an awesome season where his value was boosted by 17 wins.
Underlying stuff doesn't look all that different from previous years.
Yeah, I think one thing we talk about a lot when we talk about busts or we talk about these
overvalued players, whatever, is how hard it is in today's era of fantasy baseball to find
truly overvalued players.
I've been doing this for 15 years almost, and it was easy back then.
Every guy who had a good ERA, no matter what the skill set, they were just boosted.
stood up draft boards and we mostly have gotten away from that we know about the underlying
numbers we look at projections except with freddie peralta this season where he had a 270 year a
last season he had 17 wins both of those career best marks and we're kind of just drafting him as
if that's who he is now he's sp 15 i think he was sp 7 or 8 last season so there's a little bit of a
discount but when you actually dig into the underlying numbers it's not really much different about him
28.2% strikeout rate,
2024, it was 27.6.
It was 31% in 20203.
Walk rate, 0.3% lower in 2025 than it was in 2025.
It was actually 1.2% lower in 2023 as well.
All the underlying numbers mostly look the same.
XERA, he overperformed by about three quarters of a run last season.
FIPP is closer to a full run.
He's been more like a mid-3s to high-3s-ERA guy for his entire.
career one year of a 270 and we're just like cool he's a top 15 pitcher for a guy that's dealt
with a lot of inconsistency and doesn't necessarily pitch deep into games really hurts him in points
leagues he's a terrible pick at this price in points leagues um i just don't see the case for freddie
peralta being a top 15 starting pitcher if you talk about him as like you're number two or
ideally number three i'm on board i think that's great but potentially you're number one i think you
are putting yourself in a potentially very bad position for whip and probably not what you need
from your ace everywhere else except maybe strikeouts. He's always pretty good there.
And especially in a points league, you have to lower Freddie Peralta in that format. He just doesn't
give you the same volume that other, let's say, elite or almost near elite pitchers give you. He
went six plus innings in just 13 of 33 starts this past season. So keep that in mind on Freddie
Pralta. Next up for me is Tyler Glassnow who has an ADP of 110. He is the 28th starting pitcher off
the board. I just don't want to do this song and dance anymore. I just don't want to be involved
with hoping Tyler Glassnow could stay healthy. He was just limited to 90 in the third innings.
He's never thrown more than 134 in a third innings in a major league season. And the skills kind
of took a step back. The whiffs came down. The walks went up. His K-minus walk rate was 25 and a half percent
in 2024.
That dropped to 17% this past season.
So you have the skills taking a step back,
the fact that he can't stay healthy,
the Dodgers aren't going to push him in the regular season.
For all those reasons,
I am just staying away from Tyler Glassdown.
All right, Chris, bring us home here,
your final name, O'Neill Cruz,
being drafted inside of the top 100.
What are we doing?
This was a guy last season who,
I think he finished around 140th overall.
174th.
I was too generous.
He basically helped you out in stolen bases,
and that's it last season.
He had 38 of those, but you look at the rest of the numbers.
20 home runs, 61 runs, 62 RBI, and a 200 batting average.
That is replacement level or worse in all four of those categories.
That is not getting it done.
That is not worth a top 100 pick.
I don't care how badly you need stolen bases.
You don't really need stolen bases that badly anymore.
It's easy to find stolen bases.
It's easy to find stolen bases in the top 100 who aren't big negatives elsewhere.
And O'Neill Cruz is.
I don't know.
I know he hits the ball harder than anyone in baseball at the high end, right?
I know that the power potential is extreme, but he's 27 years old.
We're 1,500 plate appearances into his major league career.
It's time to stop talking about what he could do and start talking about what he is.
And what he is is is just a very flawed player who is not worth this kind of price.
I think there's playing time concern, even on the Pirates, because this is a
team that one actually wants to win games for the first time in O'Neill Cruz's career,
which is that's a change. He's a fine defender at best, but I don't think he's a great one.
He cannot hit lefties at all. The underlying numbers are bad. He had a 560 Ops against them.
I think there's a chance O'Neo Cruz is just a platoon bat who provides stolen bases and
basically nothing else for your fantasy team. I'll take him at 150, but not 90.
All right. Yeah, we are in agreement there as well. For more extensive
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