Fantasy Baseball Today - Auction Draft Strategy & Spring Training Updates from the First Weekend! (2/24 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: February 24, 2025

We got some headlines from the weekend, starting with Felix Bautista who faced live hitters (2:35). ... Players are getting hurt, including Wyatt Langford who has an oblique injury (8:20). ... Corbin Burnes' velo was down while Triston McKenzie's velo was way up (14:31). ... We got some fun team debuts from Clay Holmes, Alex Bregman and others (21:08). ... Some prospects got in on the action (24:31). ... Why play in auction leagues (26:22)? ... How to develop a plan in auction leagues (37:01)? ... Stars and scrubs or spread the wealth in an auction draft (41:25)? ... How does one create auction values (47:10)? ... What's the optimal hitter vs. pitcher split (49:19)? ... What is our nomination strategy (51:25)? ... What about bidding (1:03:00)? ... We wrap up with any other final auction thoughts (1:10:30). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  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, @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. And first pitch, watching. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Going once.

Going twice. So, welcome into Fantasy Baseball today on Monday, February 24th. I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White and Chris Tavis. It is Strategy Week. Today on the show, we are talking auction strategy, just general strategy talk on the format. Plus, we'll get into the nitty gritty, some nominations, bidding, all that fun stuff. But it was a very busy weekend, the first of spring training. We've got some news. We've got some statcast data, some pitch mix stuff to talk about. So let's start there. We'll get that out of the way.

And then we will get into some auction talk. But news and notes from the weekend. And just going to quickly talk about some general headlines first, and then we'll go by injuries and stack cast stuff and so on and so forth. So first up, Felix Bautisa through live batting practice Sunday. First time he's faced live hitters. Live hitters. I mean, they're always alive, I would hope.

Since having Tommy John surgery, so that was a good step for him. James Wood, who's dealing with left quad tendonitis, participated in outfield drills on Sunday and continues to take batting practice. So some good news for him. Friday Freeman began a running progression Thursday and is on track to make his Cactus League debut this week. Carter Crawford might not be ready for opening day due to Pateller tendon, soreness.

The White Sox are considering Mike Clevenger, that Mike Clevenger, in a late inning relief role. So maybe saves, who knows. And the Brewer signed both Mark Kana and Manuel Margo to minor league deals this weekend. So something's there, any reactions. How was the weekend? How are you guys doing?

How about that news? Does any of it matter? It's good to see James Wood progressing because that had been one of the more quietly concerning things in the early going. He's dealing with tendonitis and his left quad and hadn't really been doing anything but swinging for the first week or so after reporting. But sounds like he's progressing well. And I mean, hopefully we'll be able to see him in games by the beginning of March. So that that's a good one. Freddie Freeman obviously didn't sound like there was any concern about his opening day availability. Remember, the Dodgers open about nine days before everyone else when they play the Cubs on March 18th in Korea?

Yes. Japan. Korea. Japan. Tokyo. This one's in Tokyo. Yeah. But it sounds like he'll be ready for that.

And the Cutter-Crawford thing. It's a little concerning. Well, it's concerning, but it's clarifying. because if Lucas Gialito is fully recovered from Tommy John surgery, they got six guys for their rotation. And you imagine, as we talked about last week, you imagine at some point the Red Sox like every other team are going to rely on a sixth man in their rotation,

but not as consistently as the first five. And so if Cutter Crawford, we can't even be sure he's available for the start. Well, that would automatically make him the sixth man. Again, presuming Gialito is good to go. And that probably would take him off draft boards. Yeah. And all but the deepest of leagues.

And he should be the odd man out, I would say, if Giolyto's healthy. It just now there's even more reason for it. He's not healthy. It's a weird rotation because it could be pretty good. But it's really easy to see things going disastrously for the Red Sox rotation. Because, look, I think we all agree crochet is awesome. Tanner Halk is good, but solid. Walker Bueller, who knows.

Lucas Gialito, who knows? And Brian Beyo has been slowed at the start of spring training with a shoulder injury. Yeah, that's another injury to their rotation already. Yeah, so it's, and for all the prospect depth that the Red Sox have, I don't really have a lot of great pitching depth in the mind. So yeah, it's, I don't know, we could be seeing Quinn Priester in the Red Sox rotation soon. And, you know, that would kind of, things are, things are a little weird with the Red Sox all over the place right now. Yeah, because you had Alex Bregman starting at third base on Sunday, notably their intended second baseman starting at third base.

Maybe. I mean, we genuinely don't know what position he's going to play. Profile Devers is not currently healthy enough to play third base, despite his I am a third baseman protestations. Yeah, I mean, there's still a chance of a trade. I think the Red Sox are the second most likely team to make, well, the third most likely team to make a trade this spring because, I say third most likely because talks between the Cardinals and the Astros have picked up again for Nolan Aeronado.

And you know, you know the. Astro, you know the Cardinals want to shed Nolan Aeronado. They've already said they want to get 550 to 600 of bats for Nolan Gorman, and I don't see how that happens if Nolan Aronado is still there. And the Astros are intending to move Jose Altuvae to left field, it seems. They could put Issaq Baradis in second, Nolan Aronado a third, great defense, good park for it. It just makes too much sense. Now that the Red Sox option has closed for Aeronado and he can't cling to that.

And yet there was also a report this. weekend that there were conflicting reports on the Aronado's front. There was the talk that they are opening discussions back up. There was also talk that when they, they did discuss it after Bregman signed, and he was still not open to it. So I think that was the athletic that reported that. So it's like,

it does make sense to everyone except Nolan Aronado apparently. Yeah, I thought he was, I thought the report I read said that he was more willing this time. but yeah, I don't know. Yeah, it's, there's a lot of moving parts in a couple of different places, both the Red Sox. Yeah, that rotation feels like he goes sideways pretty quickly. And Rafael Devers is, he didn't have surgery on his shoulders,

but apparently he is not 100% yet, which is, I don't know. It's a little concerning. How about some injuries that popped up this week? And I'll just read off all these and then you guys can react. Wyatt Langford held out of baseball for five. to seven days after being diagnosed with a mild oblique strain. We learned about that on Friday. Jaron Duran was scratched Sunday due to calf soreness,

not believed to be serious. Elliot Ramos is dealing with a slight oblique strain as well and is expected to be unavailable for about a week. Parker Meadows tweaked his triceps on a throw Saturday, though it's not viewed as a serious concern. White Sox reliever prelander Baroa has a grade one right elbow strain, and Rangers pitching prospect Alejandro Rosario needs elbow surgery and we'll miss the entire 2025 season.

This only really affects those who play in dynasty leagues, but obviously still sucks because he was a fast-rising prospect, so we won't see him at all this upcoming season. Very exciting prospect was Alejandro Rosario and Tommy John surgery, presuming that's what it ends up being. Yeah, that sounds like, yeah. I sometimes feel like prospect stock drops too much with Tommy John's surgery, but you got to imagine like part of it is just stashing a guy not knowing anything

for a year and a half no no updates on his and what if he comes back and he's just a shell of what he once was i remember stashing jake eater and that raised prospect whose name escapes me at the moment shame boss no no um he hasn't amounted to anything of brine honeywell no when he came back from

Tommy John's surgery he didn't look the same. And that's always a risk, even for a prospect as exciting as Alejandro Rosario, who's exciting, but doesn't have a great track record of success yet. He hadn't been in the minors for that long.

I would say of these injury stories, though, the most concerning for fantasy is Wyatt Langford. Absolutely. Obliques sometimes don't appear serious, but then they just linger. And they're giving him a week off. There are only so many weeks till opening day.

And so what if what if one week bleeds into two and two weeks bleeds into three? And then where are we? I've seen Wyatt Langford going as early as round three sometimes. I mean, that's his ADP. I did an ADP review piece. And I looked at the biggest risers from January to February. His NFBC ADP in February is 38.4. I had the reaction like Jason Lee and mall rats.

That kid is on the escalator again. because like we're doing this again with Wyatt Langford, except now it's a top 40 pick. He didn't even homer yet. Hey, he didn't even have a good spring yet. At least last year he had a good spring. Look,

I get it. And what can happen is like if it's a player that everybody wants, it's just you end up in our arms race and everybody has to take him one pick earlier every time. And I guess that can happen. But I'm hoping this cools the price down on Wyatt Langford a little bit for our own sake, just because we are running the. risk of drafting why Langford too high again.

I think even his January ADP was 43.8. That's verging on a little too high, although I can see the case for it. But third round pick, if that's where he ended up, would be really tough to stomach. And hopefully that's all this ends up being.

Remember Matt Shaw started spring training with a little bit of an oblique thing and he seems to be past it now. So it may just be the five, seven days is all that White Langford misses, but it's impossible to say for sure at this point. You hope that they are really, really careful with it. Because like Scott said, baseball is all about rotational movements.

And that's a big thing with the oblique. And that's why if you don't let it fully heal, these things have a tendency of just lingering and lingering and lingering. So there's no reason to push him. I hope we don't see him in a game until mid-March at this point. I'd rather that than him rush back and not be 100% when he does. I hopped in a NFBC slow draft last week on Wednesday, 15-team Roto, draft and hold. Wyatt Langford went at pick 30 before the news came out.

So at the 2-3 turn of a 15-team league. So it looks like at least for the time being that price will come back down a little bit. We'll see where it settles in for Wyatt Langford. Let's take a quick break when we return. We'll go over some Stackcast data from the weekend. and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back in Fantasy Baseball today, recapping the first weekend of spring training

before we get into some auction strategy talk. And I've got some Stackass data. This is all pitcher-related. I wasn't going to bring up hitter stuff yet. We'll wait until we get some more hitter data. But just from the first starts that we've seen this weekend, it's mostly velocity-related. But Corbin Burns is cutter, sinker, and change-up

roll down over two miles per hour compared to last year. He still struck out the side in his only inning of work. So, I mean, that's kind of within the range of like, yeah, he could just get built up over the course of spring training. Sandy Alcansor made his... Plus, we want the cutter to be down for Burns from last year because things got better for him in September when he... He stopped overthrowing that pitch. Yeah, but it was also down on everything else. So I guess it's something to monitor.

Yeah. Sandy Alcanser made his return from Tommy John on Sunday. He averaged 98.8 miles per hour with his fastball. He only threw one inning of work. Kenta Maida's fastball, sweeper, and Sinker, and Splitter, excuse me, were all up between 1.5 and 2 miles per hour in his start. Zebby Matthews, who is a, I don't think he's still prospect eligible, but a young player in the Twins organization.

His fastball slider and cutter were all up between 1.7 and 2.1 miles per hour, so maybe a deep post-hype sleeper there. Tristan McKenzie averaged 94.2 miles per hour on his fastball. That was up three miles per hour compared to, where it was last year and it was up almost two miles per hour compared to when he was at his best back in 2022. Jack Leiter threw

two scoreless innings of relief. His velocity was up over two miles per hour on fastball slider and change up. He also debuted a new sinker that he threw seven times. David Festa, a pitcher for the twins. His fastball was up one mile per hour, slider up 1.6. Change up up 2 miles per hour.

And Casey Mize, his fastball was up 1.4 miles per hour. Average almost 97. His split was up four miles per hour in his start Sunday. Last one, Matt Waldron's knuckleball was up almost four miles per hour compared to where it was last year. There's a lot of names here. I don't know that all of them matter, but a quick thought on any of them. A lot of them are exciting talents.

It's certainly the two twins, David Festa and Zevie Matthews. I think their rotation only has room for one. And not that either was guaranteed a spot coming in. But those two are the ones I'm probably most excited about should be an interesting battle there. But Tristan McKenzie, of course. Wasn't that long ago we thought of them as a must-star pitcher and fantasy. It's just usually first spring start for these guys, right? And usually at the start of spring training, we're here like, okay, the velocity's down for these guys.

Don't worry about it so much. They're building up. To have this many pitchers who weren't even really on our radar so much for drag. drafting suddenly come out with greatly improved velocity like this, it's hard not to get excited because this is the start of spring training. They're not supposed to be up to full capacity yet, you wouldn't think. The pitching pool is so deep that I don't know what to do with this. I don't know how excited I'm supposed to get about David Festa because how can I fit him

into my draft plans. Yeah. And like you said, it's not clear if there's room for both Fester. dad Matthews in the twins rotation. Matthews, it's very interesting just because he's such a command and control over stuff guy that if he can add some stuff without sacrificing the command, well, all of a sudden things start to look a lot more interesting for him because, you know, he's one of these guys who's like 10.5K per 9 in the minors, but, you know,

sub two walk rate. And he got hit really hard when he got to the majors because if you don't have premium stuff and you're pitching in the zone, you might be able to get away with that, you know, against guys in the minors who can't do anything with it, but major leaguers are going to make you pay for it. So if the stuff plays up there, that's really interesting. And then I just want to focus on Tristan McKenzie for a minute because this is, I don't want to say it's the hardest he's ever thrown because that's probably an exaggeration. But, I mean, he averaged 92.5 in 2022 when he was very good. So there is a,

a world in which a healthy Tristan McKenzie throwing mid-90s consistently. Yeah, the hardest he's ever averaged in a start was 94.5 miles per hour. So not far from what he was at in this spring outing. If he can sit 94, that's a big deal because he's very fastball heavy. He always has been. It's 55% fastballs at least usually. Curveball slider. it's a thin margin for error as we've seen the past couple of years for Tristan McKenzie.

And if the fastball can play up, I think it does put him back on fantasy radars in a way. He really hasn't been. We're jumping around here. Sandy Alcantara, obviously first start back from Tommy John surgery. One thing that you can say is sometimes guys when they know they're only going to throw an inning, even in spring training, they can just air it out. But the fact that Sandy has looked like Sandy, I think is a big deal. And I did see Craig Mish on Sunday say, I don't know how much of this is reported versus his own gut feel, but he's very plugged into the Marlins. He said he doesn't really expect any limitations for Sandy Alcantra this year.

Maybe I think it would be still surprising to see 220 innings like we saw. I mean, that would be a record by far for a pitcher fresh off Tommy John surgery. 180? I think 180 is a reasonable like seal. I'm not saying that's close to the record, right? Matt Harvey has the record. What's his name? The big dude, Lance Lynn.

He threw a ton of innings in his first year back from Tommy John's surgery. Let me see if I can find that. It was 189 and a third for Lance. Matt Harvey. It was 186 and a third for Lance Lynn in 2017. I don't know if he pitched in the postseason that year at all. But that's not a concern for Sandy Alcounter. I mean, I'll take the under.

My understanding is the Marlins front office now is pretty forward thinking. So they're not just going to like, ah, rub some dirt on it, kid with Sandy Alcounter. I think they're going to protect that asset. Yeah. Some fun team debuts this weekend. Clay Holmes with the Mets, three perfect innings with three strikeouts. He debuted a new cutter and a kick changeup, which seems to be. like the talk of the baseball world right now.

This is one of these things that just like, it's just a specific grip on a change up. And like, but because I don't know, I think it's like a trad athletics thing that they've become known for that like, they're like branding it. And it's just a different, it's a change up that gets more downward movement,

basically. Sure. I was encouraged though to see how often he threw that change up because, you know, lot of times you hear about a guy working on a new pitch in spring training and then he'll throw one or two in a spring start. It's like, okay, is this really going to be part of your repertoire? But he threw 21% of his pitches were changeups.

And Chris has pointed out before that Holmes got hit hard by lefties. And you would imagine he's breaking out that pitch directly to counter lefties. And look, I like him either way because 65% ground. ball rate. Hitters can only do so much damage with a 65% ground ball rate. But if he has a new weapon against lefties, that only helps Clay Holmes. Yeah. And it was also three cutters all to lefties. So I think that's going to be the plan here for Clay Holmes is four seamers and sinkers, a lot of changeups, a lot of cutters, and then a little bit of the sweeper. All of a sudden, it's a six pitch mix. He threw six pitches in his spring debut. Now, will he throw a changeup

21% of the time in the regular season. I would doubt it. And, you know, obviously he's working on it and trying to get live reps and all that. But I think it's a good sign. Yeah, I definitely came away from this weekend. I don't care about the results. I care about the approach and what the arsenal look like. But it's what we need to see from Clay Holmes to make me believe that he can be a starter.

It was a pretty rough Saturday for you, boy, because on top of Clay Holmes, we had Juan Soto very first at bat with the Mets, hits a home run, just breaks the hearts of all Yankee fans everywhere. Alex Bregman went three for three with a home run in his Red Sox debut on Sunday. Garry Crochet recorded five outs in his debut, four of those via the strikeout. Jeffrey Springs, two shutout innings

with two strikeouts for the A's on Sunday. And Danny Jansen, Homer for the Rays. You know, if he's healthy and gets everyday playing time, you know, maybe we could get 20-ish home runs from someone like Danny Jansen. I will say spring means nothing. Like spring performance means nothing. I don't care that Alec Bramwin went for three for three.

That being said, I don't know if you guys saw today. I was watching that game. It was like the perfect proof of concept of what Alex Bregman at Fenway Park, because they have mini Fenway down in, I don't know, whatever small town in Florida they play in. And he hit the home run over the green monster, and the double was right off the top of the green monster. So, like, that was the perfect proof of concept of Alex Bragman.

I think the home run was just like one of those super, super high, not really all that far home runs that just probably would not have been out in most parks, but it was there. Some prospects I'll quickly mention, three in deeper leagues that could maybe make an impact this season. White Sox shortstop prospect, Colson Montgomery homered in his spring, spring debut, Rocky's outfielder, Zach Veen went one for three with a sock into shoe. time I've said that this year on Saturday. Former top prospect for them. Magnificent bat flip for Zach Vien on that 433-foot home run too.

It really was magnificent. And he was added to the 40-man roster for the Rockies this off-season. Blue Jays prospect, Orrelis Martinez, Homer on Saturday. Sounds like he is competing for a job on the team. And then two names we, well, one of them maybe we could see this year, but for your first year player drafts, your Dynasty League's Cardinals' first round pick from last year, J.J. Weatherholt, 2 for 3 with a home

run on Sunday and Royals first rounder Jack Caglione hit a home run 115.4 exit velocity 435 feet on Sunday. Maybe we could see him in the second half of the season. All right, that was a lot to get to you from the weekend. Quick things to promote here programming for the week. We'll have head-to-head strategy on Monday. We'll talk about both points and head-to-head categories. We'll have a live head-to-head points mock draft on Tuesday night. And you can expect one of those per week basically up until the start of the season. So come head-to-head points. So come head-to-head points mock drafts on Tuesday. hang out. Scott, do we have a time on that yet? 9.30 p.m. 9. 9.30 is what we're aiming for. Okay, so you could come. You can watch this draft live.

We'll probably recap our teens at the end of it. But yes, we will have one of those. I think either on like Monday or Tuesday every week leading up to the start of the season. On Wednesday night, we'll have Roto Strategy. Thursday night, we will have a mailbag. And then we'll have a bonus pod coming out next Saturday. That will be with Jeff Zimmerman, who is obviously super smart. He's a friend of the industry. And he's coming on to talk about book that he co-authors the process. Thanks to everyone watching us live. Make sure to hit the like button

and subscribe to the channel. If you haven't already. Let's talk a little auction strategy and very fun format, a very strategic format. There's always a lot that goes into planning for them if you plan for them.

Chris, we'll find out if you're planning for them this year. And just within the draft, I mean, there's so many different things that can happen and so many things that you could think about. So some elements of this conversation, I think will be useful more for beginners.

I think other elements will be more useful for skilled players, people who have played in this format before. But Chris, for those who haven't played the auction format, it's exactly what it sounds like. You have a finite amount of money, usually $260 that you're using to bid on players. It's not like a snake draft where you're just kind of beholding to where you are in the draft and ADP and things like that.

For those who haven't tried to get, why play in the auction format? What do they need to know about it? one, it's just the most fun way to draft your team. And fantasy sports are supposed to be fun. So you should lean into that. I mean, look, obviously everyone's different and you don't have to enjoy a salary cap or auction draft. But I think, and I think most people who play fantasy fairly seriously,

think it's the best way to disperse your talent. Because one, it just adds an element of uniqueness and, randomness. You know, your snake drafts tend to follow very similar formats. And you know if you're picking 12th, you're not going to have the chance to get Aaron Judge or Shohei Otani or Bobby Witt. In an auction or salary cap draft, you can get whoever you can afford. And that's where the fun comes from is you can really decide.

This is where you get to put your personal mark on your team and decide, okay, these are the guys I'm going to get. This is the approach I want to go. I want to go, you know, super heavy on stars. I don't want to spend any money on pitcher. Whatever it is, you can build that team and you can play psychological games with your league mates and you can exploit your league mates tendencies. And you can go like, we just did the Skywhite dynasty draft today.

And I went into the draft knowing there was no way I was going to pay for Roki Sasaki. No matter what, like, if he was sitting there, prices in this league are. super inflated. If he was sitting there at $30 and two seconds were left on the clock, okay, I'll hit plus one. But that was never going to happen. He went for 51. I went in knowing that if I was in the nominating order early, Roki's society would be the first player I'm going to nominate because I want to get him out and get the, it ended up being $51. Get that off the board. And so you can be a little more strategic about how you approach it in an auction. Yeah, for me, look, I agree. I think it's the most fun.

way to play fantasy. And again, that's subjective. You know, a lot of people love doing snake drafts and I love them too. I just love auctions a little bit more. It's, you can get any player you want, kind of, up to a certain extent, right? Like, you can't literally get every single player you want. But, you know, if you have a feeling about Julio Rodriguez bouncing back, if you, you know, had the, if you have like the third pick, you're probably not going to take Julio Rodriguez and he's probably not going to be there for you in the second round.

But if you play an auction, you can just say, hey, I have a feeling on. Julio Rodriguez, I'm going to go out and get them this year. Yeah, you can do that. I'm kind of in a weird place with the auctions right now, because in theory, all of that's true. In theory, you can get exactly who you want. In theory, you can really put your mark on your team. In practice, that's easier said than done.

But see, this is why you guys always get in your heads about auctions. Well, I'm trying to avoid. My whole point is I'm trying to avoid that. See, if I say, I don't know, in the most recent ones, some of my favorites like Ryan Mountcastle and Bo Bichette went for way more than they were projected to go for. I had them penciled in, first base and short stuff. This was an AL only, by the way. Ryan Moutcastle, Bo Bichet.

I like them more than everybody else. Certainly I could get them for the price I have them listed for because I like them more than everybody else. But they went for way more, which makes me wonder why everybody drafts them as late as they do. Is it just because like you're pre-programmed in a draft? You know, you can. Because you know you can. So what I'm saying is my favorites often end up being everybody's favorites. And so if I've planned to draft a guy, and maybe it won't be Ryan Moucassel and Boba Chet, that that seemed weird that they happened to be inflated.

But a trendy pick like Lawrence Butler, let's say. Let's say I really want to get Lawrence Butler. And I think he's a good value at his price. So I'm going to try and get him at his price. I'm going to pencil him into an outfield spot that way. Half the league's probably done the same thing. And so it becomes a game of chicken who's going to back down. Well, the reason I liked Lawrence Butler primarily is the price relative to the production.

So I should probably be the one to back down. But then I need to have a backup plan. And the danger of coming in with too firm of a plan is that, by the time Lawrence Butler has his name called, how many of those backup plans have already gone off the board? Yeah, no, and that's the thing is it. If you have a plan for a player and they don't go until 150 picks in, one, you may just not have the money left.

And two, if you miss out, you might be in a position where you can't afford not to draft them. And so that's why this has been a long running argument on the pod, not really an argument, just a philosophical difference because I am not a planner. I don't, I'm not organized in my life in anything. Like I'm, I'm a mess. I, I do all of my writing in one Google Doc that just says random that has like 12 half written things dating back like literally I was looking the other day. There's something like four years old sitting 27 pages down at the bottom.

I am an extremely chaotic person. and I know that I can't go into a draft with a plan because I'm not one I don't want to spend my time doing that. There's video games to be played and whatnot. And two, I don't want to feel like I'm because there's a lot of psychology that goes into the draft into the auction. And I don't want to feel like I'm hemmed in and I have to get a player because that's not how I think about fantasy baseball or fantasy sports in general. It's the specific player matters way less than the way you want to build your team. So like I have theories. I have ideas.

I have concepts of a plan. But I don't want to say I am getting Lawrence Butler because it's because I watch every time we will do one in March at some point. Like two or three weeks, right? And we always do it live and it's always this four hour ordeal. and you guys are like melting down 40 minutes in. Well, let me, how do we get to this? How do we get to this conversation? We got to this conversation because we were saying,

this is the chance for you to get any player you want and put your mark on your team. I'm saying, not really, not really. And it used to be more that way. It used to be I could come very close, 90% of the way to executing my plan in a given auction. But, and this is true like in every fantasy format, and we've talked about it a lot. I have found over the years, my opinion starts to look a lot like everybody's opinion

because analysis has just gotten so much stronger and it makes for less room to disagree on players. So the same players I think are good bang for the buck options. other people are likely to. So what I'm trying to say is I think I am going to try to go about it a little differently this year, believe it or not. And like early in the draft, if I see a value, just take the value. And it's going to require some improvisation with those lesser positions. but that's how I won the Memorial Magazine League last year. I didn't go into that expecting to draft Shohei Otani for goodness sakes or Freddie Freeman.

Normally, I target players at scarcer positions. DH is not a scarce position, obviously. Francisco Lindor. I think those were the three most expensive players I've bought, Shohei Otani, Fredri Freeman, and Francisco Lindor. And I just happened to like the price of them. And if you'll remember listening to that episode last year, we were drafting for the Memorial Magazine League.

I was a mess. I won the league. Well, because you always, because it's always 40 minutes in the podcast, Scott is a mess. He's just melting down. He's apoplectic. Nobody's ever been more upset about anything in fantasy sports than Scott,

40 minutes into every auction he's ever done. And then by the end, it's like, I kind of like this team. And it's like, of course you do. Your team is not done being built. And that's why, like, you, the like if you I will I am much more likely to draft a player that I don't really like in auction if everyone just decides they don't like them because ultimately you still you got to fill those those 23 spots they're not all going to be with your plan a they're not all going to be with players you like so I I appreciate the flexibility to jump on values when they're presented find the ebs and flows in the

drafts because there are some drafts everybody spends a ton of money early and you know the middle round of the draft the middle part of the draft the middle class is going to be the best values and then sometimes people just don't want to spend their money early and you end up with you know guys who should be $45 going for 41 and so it's all different and that's why I don't want to go into the draft with the auction with a plan because yeah it's going to go sideways you cannot predict how 12 different people are going to to handle the market? It used to be the plan I came up with was more like a salary range I wanted to, or a salary amount because I want to go in knowing my plan adds up to $260.

A salary amount I wanted to end up to drafted each position, but obviously some flexibility. I knew I wasn't going to hit every single one. I think I'm going to go in with a looser plan this time of a couple of mid-range targets at every position, but see what studs I get at prices I like. See what studs I get at prices I like at the start of the auction, not really worrying about what position they fill. And then kind of looking at those mid-range targets, I singled out at other positions and figuring out which ones I'm actually going to need

to draft or which ones I've already filled the position for. I do just want to quickly defend having a plan because I do have a very specific plan going into each and every draft. And it's finding player ranges within a team. guys that have similar projections that I think are going to go for a similar dollar amount. For example, like the most clear example to me is third base, right?

Austin Riley, Devers, assuming healthy, and Mani Machado. All kind of similar projected players this upcoming season. Say I want to spend around $25. And I'll have a range. Like I want to spend 23 to 27 on this group. And I'll have that written in for third base. And you kind of

have to be agnostic about, I don't really care which one I get from this group. Just that I want to get one when they're not if I can get them out a good value kind of thing. Now, if your plan is kind of built around, hey, I need to get this guy, then you might want to throw that player out early just to know if you get that player or not.

Like if your entire strategy is built around that player. But I basically do that for every position. I'll say, I want to spend $5 on my catch or two. I want to spend $30 on my SP1. And I will find three players I really like that are projected at around $30, and I'll just try to make sure I get one of those players. It doesn't always work out that way, but that's how I like to know.

No, it's, it's true. You know, I think the, kind of the default thinking is always nominate guys you don't want, but it's very much a feel thing. I can't tell you exactly when you should nominate a player you want versus one you don't want. But there are times when you want to nominate somebody you want, just because you know the places you would pivot to if you can't get them for the price you want are running out. And so you don't want to leave yourself with nowhere to pivot

if you can't get that singular target at the price you want. So just go ahead and put them out there, see if you can get them. And if you can't, then you have things to pivot to. All right, let's take our final break when we return. There's still a lot to talk about. Well, we'll do that right after this. Welcome back in Fantasy Baseball today.

talking auction draft strategy. And Chris, I know obviously you don't really have a plan going in, but do you have a general draft strategy in this format that you like to go by? Do you like to go stars and scrubs? Do you like to spread the wealth? Does it just depend on the day? Like, do you have a normal like set strategy or something that you know that has worked for you in the past that you like to do?

I am more willing, I think, from our discussions to pay up for like the $40 players than you guys. You two both talk a lot about like you tend to want to spread. your money out. And I don't as much. I don't know that that's true and that the size leagues that people listening. Sure, maybe 12 teams. It's more for deeper leagues that I like to spread out the dollars. What I would say, though, is here's a little psychological tip I have picked up on in in auctions. And it didn't play into the Dynasty League draft today because we didn't take a break. But I have noticed people tend to run hot early.

And then especially if you take a break about an hour, an hour and a half in, which most leagues will do, people just dry up immediately after they come back from that break. I don't know what it is, but like this, this is actually been kind of my conscious approach lately is I will buy a couple of the high dollar players in the early going and then just kind of try to be patient. Because my, I've got the way my brain works, I want to be on the action all the time. And I'm just like, oh, I like that guy. And like, I need to consciously tell myself. And this is where like the psychology of drafting really plays in with auctions is knowing yourself and your league mates and how people tend to react. But I, I've tried to be active early, but not blow it.

And then be sitting on a sizable. amount of money for the middle class and and be able to kind of pick and choose who from the I don't know 50 to 150 range of the rankings I want and be able to be be flexible enough to go that extra dollar and fill out my roster that way that that's one of the things where I don't know if it's stars and scrubs or whatever it is but like stars and scrubs is a viable approach you just do have to be disciplined about it. That's something that I'll struggle with because like what you can't do if you're going Stars and Scrubs.

Let's say you go classic Stars and Scrubs, you get three first round players, which is possible. What you need to then do is say, okay, well, Anthony Santander is sitting there for $13. And you think he's a $16 player. So you hit 14 and you end up with him. Well, technically you got a $2 value,

but it's going to screw things up because you've just blown a large, portion on a good player but not an impact player and that's the if you're going stars and scrubs like whatever your approach is going to be you need to be disciplined and you need to think through the the limitations and the downsides and how things can go wrong with that approach yeah and if you are going stars and scrubs after you get your stars you're basically just sitting out for a while You shouldn't literally turn your back because you never know when a surprise $4 player is going to go off the board

but that's kind of the price range you're living in and you can get some late in the draft you can get some great values in that $3 to $6 range so that's what you're those are the kind of scrubs you're shooting for and you're kind of ignoring the whole like $12 to $20 range

of players. Scott to your point you kind of touched on this earlier I think league size and depth really can contribute to what your strategy or philosophy might be going into the auction, right? Where in a 10 or 12 team auction, you can more so go with a Stars and Scrubs approach because the players that you're going to get as like one, two, three, four, five dollars are just going to be better overall players than the ones that you will get in a 15 team mixed league or an AL or NL only league where in those formats, maybe you want to live more in the 10 to 20. 10 to $25 range where you just know you can have a solid starter at every position throughout your draft. Yeah. I mean, I don't even know how much I have to add to that with really deep ones like ALN only, which I know hardly anybody plays in anymore.

I pretty much just don't even buy anybody in the $30 range, much less 40, because the scrubs are going to be true scrubs. Like you're not even sure they're going to get at bats kind of scrubs. You don't want one or $2.2. players in motto leagues, you just don't. Like, I think the minimum is like four or five dollar players. Standard-sized leagues, like a 12-team are certainly less. The shallower the league is, the more I am in favor of stars and scrubs, because the scrubs

are the impactful players. The scrubs are the ones you're trying to trade two, three-for-one, four during the season. So just do it from the get-go. That might be the biggest benefit to a salary cap draft is you can make those kind of two-for-three-for-one trades you're trying to make in season, you could just make them in the draft itself, essentially, by just straight up buying them, you know, when they're actually an option for you to buy them and filling out your roster with players who you're likely to replace off the waiver wire in season. Shallow leagues, you know, there's going to be a lot of turnover on the waiver wire, and it's going

to be quality turnover. So take advantage of that in a shallow league by loading up on studs and taking your best shot with scrubs, but knowing it doesn't end with the draft. Obviously, knowing how much to spend on a player is extremely important. We've talked, you know, we alluded to that multiple times throughout this podcast. But how does one come up with auction values? I mean, I think there's multiple ways that you can go about it. Like, Fangraphs has an auction calculator where, you know, you could plug in a projection

system, plug in all your league settings, and it'll spit out auction values on how much a player should go for. I know NFBC has average auction values like they do ADP. Those are also for 15-team Roto League. so not necessarily applicable for everybody. So, I mean, either of you, like, how should someone, like, if someone's just getting into an auction for the first time, outside of just looking at our auction values,

how do you come up with auction values? I would kind of say, just look at our auction values, or it doesn't have to be ours. It doesn't have to be ours. You just need to know that it adds up to the total amount of dollars that are going to be spent in your league so that you can gauge things in those early stages, whether people are overspending or underspending,

how much money is going to be left out there later in the draft. You can tell that by seeing relative to what the auction values are, how much people are spending. If unless you are like a math whiz and have like a system for it, it's probably not worth the squeeze to come up with your own auction values. You should just be, you know, use our combined or Fangraph's auction. auction calculator or any number of projection systems that are out there, it's just going to be really ultimately what you want to know is what the market value for

these players is. And then adjust based on who you like and figure out who, which, but like, I think it's more valuable to just have that idea of what the market's going to look at and say, okay, well, this guy. The consensus is that this guy's a $22 player. And right now he's at 16. Hit plus one. That's fine.

I don't think it's going to be worth it for most people to come up with a full auction value of their own. Do either of you have a typical hitter versus pitcher split? And, I mean, does it matter? Because in the standard auction uses $260 budget, as I mentioned earlier. In Roto Leagues, there are 23 active spots, 14 hitters, nine pitchers. That means hitters take up 61% of your roster. most leagues that I've been in and most analysts I've talked to, I mean, usually 60 to 70% of your budget on hitters

is what I hear most, and then the rest of that money being spent on pitching. But do you guys have a specific split that you try and target heading into a draft? I never really break it down that way. It's more how much I want to spend at every single position and pitcher is among those positions and how much I want to spend on pitcher.

It kind of depends on how deep the pitcher pool is in that particular year. It's a very deep year for pitching this year. So I might spend closer to 80% of my budget on hitting this year or 75 or something like that. But it's not something I'm usually that conscious of. I just know generally going into this year, pitching is not something I'm going to be doling out big dollars for, which means, of course, I did it in the AL-only auction the other day. Well, AAL only is a different store. It also, like, you got to read the room more than anything because in, at least in the snake drafts we've done, I haven't done a full auction yet.

I think AL Labor is this Friday for me, and that'll be my first. So that we'll see. But in the mock drafts that we've done so far, and even the drafts we're going to play out, I've noticed pitchers tend to be pretty cheap. And I'm interested to see how that's going to go in the auctions, because if that's the case, that might make me even more interested in paying up for the, you know, a Zach Wheeler type just because I, if I know that no, at no point in the draft are people going to be paying up for pitching,

then getting that distinct advantage might have even more value. What about nomination strategy? We talked a little bit about this earlier, getting money off the table, maybe nominating some players that you don't want. Chris, do you have a, specific strategy with something like this. Do you, is it always just nominate players you don't want to get money off the table?

Or do you try and change things up to so that people don't read your moves, right? Maybe you nominate a player you do want just so you're not predictable, I guess. I mean, I don't care if nobody, if everybody in my draft knows I don't want a specific player because there's still 11 other guys out there. And if it's a player that I know I'm lower on, I don't care if everyone else knows I'm lower on them because the market is still going to be what the market is. right like not every not every player is not going to have 12 people bidding on them and it only takes two to to jump a player's price up so i i don't worry about like being predictable or not the one thing i

will say is i generally do try to focus on players that i don't want who i think are overvalued so like this year roki susaki might just be my number one nomination in every draft just because i think people are too high on him he's dropping a little bit but still a top 100 player but I think you can also go the other way and take your late round guys that you do like. And there is value in locking in some price certainty with some of your sleepers and saying, I think this is a $5 player. And everybody's worried about the big dollar guys. Sometimes there can be value in throwing out a later guy for like $2.

And just seeing, yeah, no, it can go wrong. That's why you can't get too focused on the spin. specific player you have to have because then if you put that guy out for two, what you're hoping for is the whole room just goes, well, hold on, I don't want to spend $3 this early.

But that's why. Okay, go ahead. Finish your thought. But what you don't want is, oh no, someone bid four. Well, now I got to go five.

Now I, and like that, that's what you don't want. Because you never need, you never want to be in a position where you have to get a player. Unless like, you know, the way the draft has worked.

But early on, I don't think you ever want to be in a spot where you're like, I need that player. That should never be your thought process. Yeah, early on, it shouldn't it because there are plenty of alternatives. But what I like to do is early, pretty early, maybe my first or second nomination, I like to throw out a pretty obscure player, who I know I'm not going to get for a dollar. Somebody's going to bid something. It's not a player I want. It's not a player I care about. It's just a pretty obscure one, one who would go typically lay.

but I know I'm not going to get them for a dollar, right? And see what it goes for. To see if you're in the sort of league where no matter what you throw out there because everybody has a pile of money, they're going to pile money onto this guy. And if they do, which is usually how it goes, usually money gets piled onto that obscure player, definitely don't nominate your favorite sleepers for a while. Yeah. Because the same thing's going to happen with them.

So, you know, played a little more by the book, nominating high-end guys or other obscure ideally actually other obscure players that you don't really want until that price starts to come down

to a range where it's like yeah I can live with that I will say though one thing I do like is to nominate a player you truly think is a $1 player who you would be happy to have for $1 and happy

to let go for two and just see I always think about it the Cody Bradford one last year, I think in our head-to-head auction. I threw him out really early in the draft for $1, and I got him for $1, and it was like, ah, who? And it was like, that's because I specifically knew that that was a guy that was going

to be one of my $1 targets, but I didn't need him. There were plenty of other sparts. It was just, I don't mind locking up a roster spot on this specific $1. And if I don't get him and someone else spends $2, great, that person's got one fewer dollar than they should. But Chris, what happens? if you do get a player for $1 early on. And then let's say later in the auction,

you only have a few spots left to fill. And there's a value in like the mids here. And maybe you've already filled that spot with like a $1 player, you know? You probably don't want to do that at a spot where you only have one lineup spot. Right. So maybe an outfielder or a starting pitch or something.

Yeah, I think outfielder or starting pitcher. One of the, like this year, it's, there's a lot of, it's not a good year for Sparps. But there are a lot of Sparps who I'm, perfectly fine with a dollar on. Yeah. Like I would love in my head to head points auction to get like three or four one dollar sparse of the Mike Soroka, Grant Holmes, whatever range.

And so I'm perfectly willing to throw those guys out there early on and just hope that the whole league says, I'm not going to worry about that yet. Like that guy's not worth, that guy's barely even worth rostering because like if it works out, it can be a pretty big hit. If it misses, who cares? It's a dollar. Yeah. Well,

I don't like, I don't like giving up too much late round fodder early. The ones I'm genuinely interested in. Right, right now. That's what I'm saying. It's specifically the guys that I could, I could, I would be happy to have him,

but I can take the leave. It's not, it's not important to have. It's not like, you know, Carlos Correa could go for a dollar or two in a lot of draft, but he's, I think,

you know, should be a six or seven dollar player maybe. Right. I'm not going to, to throw him out early because okay so you're hoping to get him for two or three i'm hoping to get him for what people actually value him for rather than what i value him for right so it's it's more about those true like last round types of players nomination strategy and maybe you're about to pivot to this frank end game are we going to talk about end game we were going to get there yeah but you you could bring

it up now nomination strategy comes a lot more important in the end game at the end game at the end game is the most important part of the auction and I feel like it doesn't get as much attention. Because you want to be the one who controls the bidding in the end. But that doesn't mean you leave yourself with a huge pile of money because obviously you don't want to leave money on the board. You want two to three times as many dollars as you have spots available, ideally. Once you get to that point where your budget is two or two. three times as high as your spots available, you are being very, very, very careful from that point forward because you don't want to get to a point where you have nothing but dollar bids left.

That is the ultimate way to sink an auction, I feel like, because obviously your only chance of a player is a guy you nominate yourself. And if anyone else in the league pits him up, you got to wait through a whole. round of nominations to have a chance at somebody else. And you're going to end up with some true scrubs that way. Here's what else you want to avoid. If you only have $4 left, let me think, think of, yeah, if you only have $4 left, you probably don't want to nominate a $1 player.

Because what's going to happen is you're going to nominate one. Next bid's going to be two. You're capped out below your max for that. next one. So that's what I was getting into about nominating late. When you have, when we're, when you're clearly in end game mode, two or three times as many dollars as, as roster spots, the players you're putting out there for a dollar are sort of like you were saying earlier, Chris, ones you could live with for a dollar, but you don't really want. They're not your favorites of the remaining options. You could live with them for a dollar to be okay. But ideally,

you're just trying to bleed others out of money with that. nomination and wait for the others in your league to put out the players you really want and then jump in quickly with two or go straight to three if it's one you really want or go straight to four if it's one you really really want and you know what other people's max bit is and i think that's where you can get in trouble if you do true stars and scrubs if you just if you're too aggressive early on and then next thing you know you've got seven dollars left for your final seven spots, everything that these guys are talking about is you can only nominate a player for $1.

So even if you think, hey, maybe I could sneak this guy by for a, it's a $5 player, I think I can get him for one, you're most likely not going to get him because everybody else can, just needs to go two and you don't have a bid that you can go higher. So you really do need to pay attention to that end game and maybe saving, like Scott said, double or triple the money you have per roster spot. So if you have towards the end of the draft, five roster spots left, leave yourself 10 or 15 bucks

just so you can maybe go two or three dollars per player on those final roster spots. I will say I would rather be stuck with four $1 players at the end of my draft where I have no money left, then leave $20. 1,000. The worst thing you can do is leave more than $5. Like I just, there is,

I would much, much, rather, there are still going to be viable options. For $1 players is okay. But sometimes you see people with $12, $1 players. Yeah, partially just because you're spending half your draft just nominating $1 players you're never going to get like that. But just as a general rule, I would rather err on the side of not having enough money left than having too much money left because that means you're leaving value on the table.

Yeah. I wanted to bring up a few other quick things on nomination strategy. I typically do like to throw players out there that I don't really want to draft myself. I think early on in the draft when there's a lot of money and people are aggressive with spending, Chris, something you said, like throwing out a hype player that is like a mid-tier player, like a Roki Sasaki, or in your case, you don't want Lawrence Butler. You know he might go for $3 to $5 more than you're willing to spend on him. Throw him out early when the draft is hot and people are going to spend money on that player.

Or, yeah, just any- You know what I might do the first round of every not auction? What's that? Whatever I have Y Lankford for, 20, 21, 15? I don't know what he had him for. Yeah, whatever I have him for, I think it's 15. I will throw him out for that exact dollar amount.

And because that way I know he's going to go, either I get Y Lankford and great. I'm happy to have him. He's probably going to go for a lot more than that. And I think there's a chance of even more inflation if you start him at a higher level than if you start at one and let people build. I also like nominating players at positions that I already have filled just because I know I'm not really going to be in on that player. Again, same example as earlier, Machado Riley Devers,

similar tier, similar projected players, $25 players, if I already have Machado on my team, maybe my next nomination is Devers, I know I'm not going to be in on that player and I know he's still going to go for around $25. So let me just get some of that money. off the table by doing that. What about bidding strategy? And if you haven't realized, we're going to go a little bit longer just because I want to give this format it's due.

It's very interesting and there's a lot of strategy behind it. Talking about bidding, there are many different ways that you can go about this as well. You can bid early in the count. Going once, bid. Or you could wait until the very last second

and bid, which will throw someone like Chris crazy. If you hear free advice for anyone in my ALA labor draft later this week. If you wait until the last second to bid on a player that I was about to win, I will 99% of the time go that next dollar immediately. Yeah.

It is the worst character flaw I have as a fantasy player. And I just, I cannot beat it out of myself. There's so much psychology involved in it too, because if you're having a bidding war with someone and, you know, maybe you change up your cadence. You wait till the end to bid and then that other person bids and then you bid right away again. And then they kind of get thrown off and say, whoa, what the. There's different ways to go about it.

It's interesting. I try when I want somebody to think I'm reluctantly bidding a player up and not that I've been waiting the whole draft for this guy to come up. I tried to wait until late in the countdown to bid him up. I don't know that it actually works. I have no evidence that it actually works. Maybe on Chris, it does have the opposite effect. You're going to lose that player.

Yeah. Man, if Gus Johnson says sold, but it didn't actually sell, oh, I see red. I'm going to, I'm going to just leave my home and come find you. Well, and a word of warning for people who are listening and potentially drafting with me later on, there are times I am actually reluctantly bidding the player up. I am deciding with two seconds left, I can't let him go for that little, and I'm bidding him up. And so if you automatically bid me up thinking, I must really want this guy, well, you may, you may end up taking him home because. So, like, you can't be sure exactly what I'm doing.

It's probably better just not to pay attention to the cadence of my bidding. Because there are also times when I'm in a quick volley with somebody. And I just, I just stop. We just, we just get to the breaking point. I can't go any higher. I wanted them, but that's it. So I don't know. I wouldn't read too much into it is the bottom line.

It changes too depending on if you're doing an in-person auction versus being online too Because I mean online you really have to be careful with the plus one button because sometimes people Will jump bid they want to move along a first round player right say someone throws out Paul Skeens for $5 and the next bid is hey I want to keep this moving I'll manually submit $35 And you hit plus one thinking that it's going to be six next thing you know you're bidding $36 on a player so You really have to be careful of that and in an In an online auction in particular. It's not even just that.

It's sometimes, you know, six people plus press plus one at once. Yep. And it takes a second for the last one. Yeah. And so like, it goes way up beyond what you were thinking you were bidding. I almost never hit the plus button. I almost always type in the night. I almost never type in.

Well, I tell that to people and they act like it's some major hardship to type in a number. I mean, most keyboards have this little calculator interface on the right side. You've been punching numbers into a calculator your whole life. You know where the numbers are. You just hit the two numbers and hit enter. Like, it's not hard. And you save yourself a lot of heartache potentially by doing that. Do you guys ever jump bid?

I brought this up earlier, but not even just jumping from five to 35, but when you're in a competitive bid, jumping two bucks to throw someone off. for when there's a round number coming, you're in a bidding battle for Aaron Judge and it's at, you know, $38 and you just go, let me go 40. Like instead of going one by one, just jumping two. Do you guys ever do anything like that? Yeah, that specifically, like if it's nine,

and I, if it's already at nine, and I know I'm only going to spend 12, like I can only go 12. I might just jump straight to 12 at that point. Mm-hmm. I can live with giving up a dollar. If it's at nine, best case scenario, I'm going to get them for 10. I can live with potentially giving up a dollar or two at that stage.

But I'm not likely to do the, you know, when we're in the later stage of the draft, there's still a fair amount of money out there. But it's not, you know, it's not early where you're expecting everybody to go for huge sums of money. I'm not going to go from like five to 20. I'm going to see if I can get the guy for 16, you know? So it just depends. In very narrow circumstances, I might skip a dollar or two. I will also say when you're late in your draft,

there will be times when you have $16 left for four spots. And so your max bid is 13. One thing you, and let's say there's one really good player left, like a player who's clearly an outlier for the rest of the group. that's when I might, I will either jump straight to my max or make sure I'm only bidding odd numbers. You get me, you can get, like I said earlier, you can get locked out of a player. If you are the one who bids, your max bid is 13 and you bid 12, you're out. If you don't get that player for 12, you're done.

Right, right. And so that's one other thing that I would say is like, be cognizant of what your max bid is and make sure that you don't access. box yourself out of your max bid on a player. And that's very specific circumstances, but it's when there's one clear outlier player remaining or one clear need. Yeah, I was going to ask about that. Because I was going to ask how strict you are with your max bid. Because if it's end game, if it's that, if it's that point in the draft where I'm saying,

you know, you have two or three times as many dollars as roster spots left. And you know you're going to jump in exactly at two or exactly at three, depending on how good the player is. And that's it. Because if they go for more than that, you know, you got to control the end game. You can't afford to go beyond that bid.

So I'm very strict about my max bid in that scenario. But if it's earlier on and we're in the $13 price range, you know, I might want them for 13. 13th's the number I have in mind. But if I really, if I got to go to 14 to get them, I'm not going to sweat that too much.

I'm specifically talking about situations where you have a max bid. And like, it would be nice to have a few. extra dollars to play with. But like there will be times when there is one save source left and you need saves. That it's it's not always going to work out and there might be plenty of times when you're better off spending that 15 or whatever on four players rather than 13 on one and whatever. But there are going to be times where you have to be cognizant of what your max bid is and make sure you can get to it. Because the way if you're going against one person, you're on an even number

and your max bid is 13, you might need to make sure that your next bid is not 10, it's 11. You know, am I making sense? Yes. A couple of rapid fire things, I'll quickly wrap up with here.

You guys mention this. Please try your best not to leave money on the table. It's just an awful feeling if you get to the end. And, you know, you didn't spend up on, you could have went a dollar or two earlier on a first or six round player. And then you,

by the end, you realize, oh, crap, of like sixth round players. I don't know if this team is going to compete or anything. A dollar or two, I don't lose sleep over that. That may have just been the cost for making sure I controlled the end game and I can live with that, but you just don't want to leave $15 on the table, something like that. Yeah, it's just, it's a terrible feeling. If everybody is overspending early on, right, on these first or second round players, do you join in? I mean, is there a limit? If everyone is going, let's say, $3 to $5 over what you have

them valued at. Are you okay getting in on that? Is there a breaking point? If everyone's going for, I don't know, six, seven, eight dollars more than they should, to just say, all right, like, there's going to be really good values at some point. Let me just kind of sit this out for now. It depends. It depends how much they're going over by, and I can't give you a precise number. I might go into a 12-team draft, let's say, so on the shallower end, wanting four studs. And if they're all going for $5 beyond their projected amount, five to $10 beyond their projected amount, okay, maybe I'll only get two studs.

You know, because, and I'll take advantage of some of those dollars that will not be available later to create discounts. One thing I will say is it probably also depends on who the guy is in the first, you know, among those studs. if they're all getting pushed up, I don't think I want to be the one who pays a premium for mooky bets, who has a nice safe floor but doesn't have the $55 upside return. I'm more likely probably to draft a guy who I think is in the same tier in like Ellie de la Cruz.

I'd be more likely to chase that dollar sign on the guys who have that super, super high end ups. side. And look, it's hard to define that. But in Ellie De La Cruz's case, like a 35, 70 season. Mookie, I mean, we saw one two years ago, so it's not like impossible. But generally speaking, I don't think Mookie has the Aaron Judge, Shohayotani, Bobby Witt ceiling that we saw last year. So if you are going to pay, I think I'd rather chase the potential for the huge return. if I'm going to have to pay that super premium for a high-end player. All right.

There is a lot to talk about. Is there anything that we've missed? I'm sure you could probably do a two-hour podcast on this, but is there anything that we haven't talked about that you guys want to mention before we wrap up? Are you more likely to pay up for closers in this format in an auction than a snake? That's exactly what I was thinking is there is that scarcity for saves.

Yeah. and so that's always a dollar amount like I always have a dollar amount in mine that I want to spend on that and it's usually not enough and that's okay in a shallower league but in a deeper league that scarcity becomes even more profound and so you have to uh you know maybe maybe you have to be willing to budge on that a little bit to avoid chasing saves all year long that's category in particular, the scarcity just feels a lot more acute during an auction than it does during a draft where you kind of know what points you can find it. Also, just at the end of the draft, I will say your focus for your dollar players and your reserve round players, if you're in a league with a reserve round draft, it should be more exciting higher upside players who you might have to drop, but you'd rather spend the $2 at the end of your draft or spend a reserve round pick than the 250 in Fab

that you might spend in the first waiver run. So, you know, those guys who are on the bubble at the end of spring training, we're not, like, if we don't know, like if Rafael Devers is suddenly playing a ton of DH this spring, and we don't know if Christian Campbell's going to make the roster, you should be more willing to spend $2 or $3 at the end of your draft just in case. because if he does make the roster and he's a free agent,

that's a 40% of the fab type of player. Yeah, it's harder in the deeper leagues like that, but with a reserve picture. But I was going to say, the reason stars and scrubs or studs and duds, whatever you want to call it, the reason it works is because you're, in a shallow enough league,

your duds or your scrubs aren't actually duds or scrubs. They don't have to be anyway, But you have to give yourself a chance by getting a higher upside player. All right. We're going to wrap there for Scott and Chris. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning in some fantasy baseball today.

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