Fantasy Baseball Today - Favorite Late-Round Picks; Betts Trade (Again); Roto Category Targets (02/10 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: February 11, 2020

Busy show! We begin with the revised Mookie Betts trade and tell you why Ross Stripling is currently a loser and Gavin Lux might be as well. Then we talk about the Emilio Pagan trade (6:35) and who is TB's closer, plus a new proposal to change the MLB playoff format (9:30). How are we feeling about it? ... Wondering how many HRs and RBIs you need to win a Roto category? We'll tell you what to target in each category (14:55). Then we've got some random Fantasy questions (28:50) about Carlos Santana, Jack Flaherty, Yoan Moncada and Juan Soto ... Our favorite late-round picks (45:42) including a couple of suspended SPs, a couple of overlooked closers, a late steals source and a bounceback candidate ... Email us at [e-mail] Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @CBSFantasyBB, @AdamAizer, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite 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

Welcome to the fantasy baseball today podcast from CBS Sports. One, one pitch, basketball pulled, and fast, Alborazzo, toward the corner. Got a fantasy question? Email fantasy baseball at cbsi.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy. Now, here's Adam, Scott Heath, and Chris. All right, it's Monday night.

FBT after hours. Atabaser, Scott White, and Chris Towers in the house. in three different houses, though. And yeah, right? So here we are. Very different locations. Very, well, just for you. Chris and I are, well, 30 miles.

Yeah, what guys could be in the same house? No, that's okay. You should try it. Maybe once. I'm going to come over, Adam. You have a car? I can get there on the train. What, the Metro North, right?

Yeah. That's the one. Oh, yeah, I know how to get there. All right, cool. I'll see you in a bit. So we're going to talk about the Betts train. We're going to talk about the Emilio Pagant trade. We're going to talk about possible playoff changes coming to a playoff near you.

Roto category stats, like how much of what category do you need to be good? Chris is going to break that down for you. The top five ballparks that our listener Lyndon visited. We're going to find out his favorite. A new type of gross beetle and some random fantasy questions. And our favorite late round picks will be later on in the show. and something that we definitely won't have time for, but I'm going to plug it anyway.

Scott versus ADP, the segment we'll never get to it. Okay. Yes, on March 25th, we'll get there, I'm sure. The big news. So the trade is complete, bets and price to the Dodgers. Alex Verdugo is still going to the Red Sox. They're not getting Bruce Star Gratterol from the Twins. They're getting Connor Wong and Jeter Downs.

Wong a catcher, Jeter Downs, a shortstop, who's going to Boston. I know it's disgusting. and I don't know, Chris, how you feel about this now? I mean, it's still a weak return for the second best player in baseball, but the owner told them they had to do it, so they had to do it. It's like I like this return more than Gratterol, but I think that's because I'm less optimistic about his chances of sticking as a starter, and it seems like the Twins and Dodgers both agree.

But yeah, I mean, I don't know if Downs or Verdugo has real superstar potential in real life, but there's a lot of fantasy potential in both of those. And even Wong actually has hit really well so far in the miners. He's a converted infielder who has only been catching for a couple of years. So I don't know how much the defensive metrics are going to like him. But he's hit pretty well. Jeter Downs was a 24-home or 24-steel guy last year, I believe. So, you know, there's the potential for this to be a very impactful fantasy trade from the Boston side.

You know, there's nobody at second base long term for Boston. And Alex Verdugo, you know, we talked about it a couple times now, but his high batting average floor makes him a really good fit in Fenway Park potentially. Like, it wouldn't surprise me if he hits 300 this year. And if he's betting lead off. which we talked about before, Adam, when we thought this trade went through the first time in front of the mashers in the late. They still have three mashers in that lineup,

and that's if you're not counting Andrew Ben and Tendee. Yeah, he's going to have a productive season. He's in my top 40 outfielders, I believe, when before he was probably outside of my top 70. So that is a big mover. It's hard not to assess this trade. from the standpoint of just comparing it to the trades that we already thought happened. And on that note, the biggest thing that happened was actually that the Angels portion of this trade didn't go through it.

Because if you remember, I was beside myself with excitement over the implications of this trade. The night, it first looked like it happened at him. and really it was the Angels part that put me over the top. And that was before we even knew the stripling angle, him going to the Angels, which obviously he isn't anymore. Jack Peterson isn't going to the Angels anymore. I know I've heard from a couple of Joe Adele owners who are excited about that.

I didn't really think it changed Adele's timeline. He's not going to be up in spring training at the end of spring training because he hasn't proven himself at AAA yet. And Peter's in there or not. He was going, once he was ready, they would have a spot for him. They could have played Peterson at first, whatever. But I'm a little worried about Gavin Lux now. Supposedly, Jack Peterson is still on the market,

and maybe the Dodgers find a taker before opening days still, but if he's there and they have to find it bats for him, obviously it hurts Pollock, too, but I think Gavin Lux might be in for less than an everyday role. And if they're not playing him every day, maybe he just begins in the minors. Well, also, you were excited about my Ada when we first did the podcast about a week ago. So that doesn't change.

That doesn't change. He's still on the twins. They got Bruce Star Gratterol. Instead of going to the Red Sox, he's going to the Dodgers. So it's the 67th pick in the 2020 draft. But Stripling's still on the Dodgers. So, yeah, I mean, stripling's a loser, right? Because he was.

Oh, yeah. I had to remind myself. I had to remind myself where I had it ranked in the first place because I moved him up so much. he's probably just he's probably still stuck in that swing man role for the Dodgers except they've got like four potential swing men and who's to say he's going to get

first priority at them yeah so they've got Kirshaw Bueller Price Alex Wood, Julio Reis Stripling and then the young guys that we've talked about Tony Gonsolin Dustin Mason May

even Jimmy Nelson is there and yeah so look it's not to say that stripling won't get traded. It's not to say that Peterson won't get traded, but right now they are still on the Dodgers and we of course will react when, you know, when news breaks. Now, Scott,

San Diego acquired Emilio Pagan from Tampa Bay for outfielder Manuel Margo and catcher slash outfielder Logan Driscoll. Pagan had a really good year. He led the raise and saves. He had 20 of them. He had a 231 ERA. He had a point 83 whip.

He had a great, great season. He's obviously not going to be the closer in San Diego. Who's going to be the closer for Tampa Bay? Because they're Tampa Bay, you hesitate to name any one individual pitcher the closer, but just because Pagan is now out of the equation, that makes for a more definitive answer, I would think. There's one less capable ninth inning option now, and by far the most capable appears to be Nick Anderson,

who the rays worked their magic on him after getting him from the Marlins. and what looked like a not so favorable deal for the raise, but then when you see what Nick Anderson became with them, it's like, okay, I guess they knew what they were doing. His 23 appearances with the raise, 211 ERA, 0.66 whip, 17.3Ks per 9. He was just the best reliever in baseball after that trade was made. And now I got to think, I got to think he's option number one for the ninth.

He moves way up. Two walks, 41 strikeouts in 21 and a third with Tampa Bay for Nick Anderson, who yeah, came over from the Marlins. It also gives me a chance to say, Mr. Anderson, because I finally watched The Matrix last weekend for the first time of my life. For the first time? Are you kidding me? Yep, yep, yeah.

What is the wrong with you? Did you also enjoy your eighth grade dance? I think I saw it. It was in 1999. It came out, right? So I was in high school. It would have been, oh, you were in high school. Okay.

Well, so you were finishing up a, it depends when it was. It was probably a summer movie, right? I was 15. So, yeah, we were in high school. You were a bit slow. I think I saw it when it came out, not in theaters, but like shortly thereafter, but I didn't really like it. I probably, like, tuned out.

So I was like, I got to give this movie another chance. It's a very good movie. It's a hell of a movie. Yeah. It's a good one. Yeah, it could think. Okay. So I also wanted to mention.

that last year, Jose Alvarado was coming off a great 2018. He had a 239 ERA and 80 strikeouts in 64 innings. He got the first four saves for Tampa Bay last year. He dealt with some family issues in Venezuela. His mother was sick. He missed a month to deal with the family issues. He came back. He may have been out of shape.

And that's not my opinion. That's what I read. He had an oblique injury. He had an elbow injury. So they have such a great bullpen. We're going to talk relief pitchers on Wednesday. that's going to be our first position preview. They've got Diego Castillo.

They've got Nick Anderson. They've got Jose Alvarado. So these guys are options, but maybe Anderson is the frontrunner. And we'll get into that. And I saw The Matrix. Okay. And Chris, what do you think about these potential changes to the MLB postseason? Some articles coming out.

We could have four wild card teams. One team getting a buy. The other teams get to choose their opponents, basically, like the higher seeds. you're not you don't seem too into it I I like the choose your own opponents thing I think we should do that throughout the playoffs I think we give them

as much bulletin board as possible I think that would be great half the league making the playoffs seems kind of dumb on the other hand I am a basketball well it is half the league isn't half the league makes the playoffs so well how many how many wildcard teams

How many teams would there be? There would be three division winners and four. So, yeah, it would be about half. 14 teams out of 30. Look, I mean, I don't know. I don't think this is going to, like, create a situation where it fixes any of the issues that are wrong with baseball.

I don't think we're going to see teams stopping tanking because they can make a wild card as like an 84 win team. I don't think that's going to change much. if anything, a team like Boston could justify trading Mookie Betts even more because, well, heck, we're not going to win the division. We're not better than the Yankees or the raise in 162 game season, but we could trade Mookiee bets, save all that money and still make a wildcard winning 85 games. And all of a sudden, we're right there in the mix. So I don't know, it seems like a solution in search of a problem. Well, I think it's good for the fans.

More fan bases getting into it, you know, because your team's not eliminated. Your more teams are going to be playing for the playoffs. It's probably going to lead to some upsets, you know, in the playoffs. It's just... I mean, that's the thing. It's going to be annoying. Apparently the Red Sox would have made the playoffs last year.

Yeah. If they beat the Yankees in a best of three series who were like 20 games ahead of them in the standing, like that's that's going to feel pretty cheap you know that's and it's totally possible I mean what I think separates it from basketball because I've seen the take that you know some people worry you know the there's a common complaint

is the NBA regular season is irrelevant because half the league makes the playoffs and so all that really matters is what happens there and but there are clearer favorites in basketball and baseball favorites but this there's just so much randomness and when you get to such a small sample size like that. This makes the regular season even less valuable for baseball. Well, but if you get the number one seed, you do get a buy.

You don't have to deal with. Well, grappling for those spots becomes very interesting down the stretch because each spot, you know, whether you're the number one overall seed, whether you're a wild card or a division winner, like the consequences are great for each of those seedings. Yeah.

Which makes it kind of confusing, too. I don't like the aspect that every time we're in the home stretch in September and teams are going to be wrangling for these spots, there's going to have to be somebody there with like a full screen of rules that he's explaining to the audience because people just aren't going to be able to keep up with it themselves, which I think is generally bad. Okay, I've got the solution. So right now, instead of, you basically have four playoff teams.

I mean, you could say the second wildcard team is a playoff team, but you're essentially playing a one game playoff to be the fourth playoff team. This is trying to expand it to seven. Give the number one seed a first round by and set the other six teams up where the two other division winners are picking their first opponent. And then the number one wildcard team is faced up, you know, with, right? Am I getting this right?

With the other team that wasn't picked. Here's what you do. The two division winners that get to, to pick their opponent, they get to play nothing but home games. Yeah, that's the other thing I like that. The last two teams you're in, but you've got to do it all on the road. I think that is how they're setting it out. Oh, is it?

Oh, I'm a genius. The best of the three series are all in one place. Okay, great. Well, then I'm brilliant. It's not going to happen. Okay, well... You don't think it's going to happen? Why not? Wait, I have a better thing I'd like to talk to Chris about. Stop criticizing the Red Sox. Because getting under the luxury tax and resetting the luxury tax is actually super beneficial and very important.

And the Yankees had to do it and it benefited them and the Red Sox are doing it. And the Dodgers, I believe, did it as well and benefited them. Red So, Adam, they're doing it. Very serious question. Yeah. Is it the taste of the leather or is it the taste of the polish that you like more? You're a boot licker. What?

Moving on. Okay, let's talk Roto. So Chris does a really good breakdown. You can check out the article on Tuesday. At some point, it's going to be up on Tuesday on CBSports.com slash fantasy slash baseball. What do you need in each category? What should you be aiming for if you're in a Roto league?

And what did we learn from last year? Yeah, let me find that email. I'm so sorry. I was not prepared to discuss this. What are you talking about? I told you right before I went out. And I emailed you earlier. Okay.

I got a great email. It's going to be up. This chart's going to be up on CBSSports.com. On Tuesday, I finished the hitting categories. And it's really interesting. So one of the things that really stood out to me, and this shouldn't be a big surprise, is home runs and stolen bases.

I looked at the data from 2017. So last year, the average first place team in CBS Fantasy 12 team leagues was about 1,000 leagues. The average first place team hit 383 home runs. Now, the average second place team hit 366. So you needed 367 to be in first place, basically. Two years ago, it was something like 340 to finish in first place. The first place team averaged like 3.57.

That's a significant difference. I mean, you think about 14 lineup spots. That's basically you had to average two extra home runs per lineup spot from 2017 to 2017 to 2019. and stolen base has moved in the opposite direction. It was like 166 in 2017. Last year, the number one team on average, had 152 steals. The number two team had 138.

So that's reflected in the way we're drafting. Like Scott's talked a lot about, power is really, really easy to find, and stolen bases really are not. Well, Scott, we talked about this too. Power is easy to find. fine, but I think it probably goes fairly early. If you wait and wait for a steel specialist, right?

You're going to end up with somebody who's not good in other categories. But if you wait for a power specialist, like how late can you go without getting a guy who's just going to kill you in every category? Like a Randall Gritchick, you know, is going to hit home runs, but he's terrible otherwise. Well, the thing about home runs is they're correlated to runs. Are you Scott? Yeah. Are you Scott? Yeah. Some people confuse them. I've heard. We're so light, Chris and I.

Chris Davis, Keras Davis, goes 273rd on average, and is very likely to bounce back with another 40 Homer season. Yes, he feels like an exception because we really, we talked about this like on our last podcast. I said, I'm going to have a lot of Chris Davis. People are downgrading him way too much. I think if Mark Kana, he keeps an everyday job. Fram Mel Reyes. All right, all right, I hear you. Okay, yeah, where's Fram Mill? Randmill is 150th overall. But, you know, we've certainly seen him go later than that.

In some of the drafts we've done, yeah, there are, like, even somebody like Christian Walker, who's very likely to go undrafted, he had basically 30 home runs last year, right? If you factor in the time he wasn't a starter, it certainly would have projected as that. There's always home runs. be found. Chris, what batting average should I be looking for? How many home runs?

How many are you? Give me the good. I think a good target across the board is to finish in third place. You know, you're probably not going to win every category, but if you're in third place or so, you're going to be in very good shape across the board. So to win last year

the batting average is 278. To finish in third place, it was 272. So, not a huge gap, but the thing you have to keep in mind about batting average and what makes it toughest in a roto league is players, you could get someone like Cowie Kendrick last year who hit 34 but did in a limited amount of playing time. He didn't really have that big of an impact.

You know, DJ LaMayhew actually had a bigger impact on your batting average. So what you want when you're looking for batting average is guys who get a lot of at backs and get a lot of hits, guys who like Mike Trout doesn't actually have as big of an impact on your batting average as you might think, because he walks at home. So that's one of the things you have to keep in mind. For home runs last year, sorry, less, one more clarification here. How many line-up spots?

How many hitters are we talking about? This is a standard roto league, so 14 line-up spot, 14 hitter spots, 9 pitcher spots. Okay, so that's, for those of you don't play in this type of league, it's two catchers, it's five outfielders, it's a middle infielder, corner infield, plus, first, second, third, and short, and then one utility.

So any number we give you, if you play in a shallower league, you're going to have to reduce it. But this is based on that. So 272 batting average, and what's the rest? 355 home runs, 1,125 runs, 179 RBI, and 128 stolen bases. Those are your third place targets in each one. And so, you know, it's like 25 homers per lineup spot. There you go.

That's a good way of thinking about it. 80 to 85 runs in RBI and about eight stolen bases per lineup spot but if you draft 14 guys who project to steal eight stolen bases you're probably going to finish in last place in steals. What is last place? What was last place in steals?

64. What was 11th place to steel? Second to last place? 76. What was six places? Steels. Six place was 108.

Okay, so even if you're aiming for like sixth place, just I don't want to get crushed in steals. You're going to need to come up with 108 somehow. Yeah. Which I don't, I wouldn't feel comfortable hitting that target unless I had 3.20 steel guys? Yeah, I mean, it depends on how you go. Like, if you have Trey Turner,

who was on pace to steal 45 bases, last season. You can feel pretty good that you're going to get it from the rest of your lineup, because then you're looking at an average of, what, five steals per lineup spot? That's much easier to do. I wonder, though, when you have two catchers, if we should. Sure. Because that's going to skew it a little bit.

I mean, they're like one bad base stealer. Two catchers is like one bad outfielder. You probably have a couple of guys. Like, if you take Jordan Alvarez in the first, fourth round, he's probably not going to steal any bases. That's something you have to keep in mind when you, but the nice thing about specifically home runs, runs, and RBI is they're really highly correlated with each other. I think 12 of the top 20 and home runs also had at least 100 RBI and nine of the top 20

had at least 100 runs. So when you're doing your rotodraft, you can feel pretty confident that as long as you're getting home runs, runs and RBI should follow. So you don't have to actually chase those three categories individual. But the point I was trying to make is if you're aiming for sixth place, if you're saying I need

three 20 steel guys to feel good about my chances of breaking 100 in that category. I mean, there aren't many 20 steel guys out there, especially once you get beyond, the first two rounds of hitters. I feel like it really drives home the point

why you need to use when you're targeting your first hitter in the draft, your first or second hitter in the draft, why you need to make sure it's a Stiegel's guy? Because if you're forced to pick three from like the Cabin Bigio, Tommy Edmund, Garrett Hampson, Victor Robles, like that group, the chances of you landing

three of them when everybody else is trying to gobble them up to at that point in the draft. I mean, I just don't think you can count on that. And the toughest thing about stolen bases is, you know, I looked at kind of total roto value. And only 21 players stole 20 bases last season. Now we project probably more than 21 to do it, but that's all that got there last year. Yeah. Right. Some that we project won't get there, some that did last year won't.

I mean, Jared Dyson doesn't have a team right now. 28 the year before, but also some of them are just like completely irrelevant. You know, like 28, Delano de Shields going to be on that list. That's what I was going to say. Greg Gallard. Roger Deans. Derived at least 30% of their total roto value just from their stolen basis. All right, let's go to pitching, Chris.

How many strikeouts do I need to be, and how many saves? Well, let's start with wins and saves because those are. most similar. To finish in third place and wins, 94 last year to finish in third place and saves, 82. Saves in particular were just, we've talked about it a lot, they were an absolute dumpster fire last year. The last place team on average in CBS Sports Fantasy League last year had 18 saves. Punting. It feels like a typo. That's a punting. Yeah. 11th place. 31.

Yeah, that's a big difference. Yeah, and that's what you usually see is first place and second play and last play first to second and last to 11th usually have bigger gaps than the other categories because you'll have teams that run away with it and teams that kind of drop out. But that also tells you there just weren't a lot of steals or saves to go around last season. And they were really spread out. I think I saw something that over 200 players had a save last season. The year, the two years prior, it was like 175. Wow. So I don't know if that's a trend.

It's just one year so far, but it does seem to be trending that way. And that could make saves even harder to come by in the future. Yeah. And I think I'll be giving these stats on Wednesday when we do the relief picture preview, but I couldn't believe it. Kirby Yates led baseball on saves, right? Mm-hmm. And he had 41.

I went back all the way to 2000. He's got the fewest this century for any player to lead baseball and saves. Josh Hader has the fewest fantasy points for a number one relief pitcher in any year of the last decade, at least. It was just a strange year for closers. Every high value closer last year was a disappointment, basically, except for Josh Hader, who wasn't drafted as a closer. Everyone, yeah, maybe. Was Chapman? It was Ozuna?

No, Ozuna. Ozuna was a little bit lower, but he was great. Yeah, Chapman is... He had Zuna number one going into last year. It wasn't a bad call, I mean... It wasn't. Yeah. Okay, well, that's on Wednesday's show.

So, saves, okay, to finish in third, you would have had an 82 of them, wins 94, strikeouts, 1,500 strikeouts. That's for nine pitcher spots. This is for nine pitcher spots to be divv it up however you want. starters, relievers, whatever. And 94 wins, 82 saves, 1,500 strikeouts. Read more about it on CBSports.com slash fantasy slash baseball. Here's our email of the day at Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com.

All right, Lyndon gave us his top five ballparks. He visited all 30 of them. Did a road trip last year. Here were his top. Chris said, you better have PNC Park on there. And Scott said, no, you better have Oracle Park on there. And guess what? I do a great Scott grits.

We really do sound a lot of like. We sound like those old guys from the Muppets. Yeah, it's kind of what I was going for. That wasn't a half bad impression of us. Nope. It was all bad. Nice. All right, San Francisco one, Pittsburgh 2, Fenway Park 3, Miller Park in Milwaukee,

4, San Diego, Petco Park, 5, and then he put 30th, Tampa Bay, Pocana field. Strong agree there. Tropicana is a rough place to see a baseball game. Good stuff. Lyndon, thank you so much again. San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Boston, Milwaukee, San Diego, the best home parks that he experienced. Email of the day number two is from James. If you guys think a Hercules beetle is gross, look up a stag beetle. They fly around my house in Pittsburgh. When they land, they do so horizontally. It is terrifying. a stag beetle it yeah it's it's

the stuff of nightmares it's not quite as gross I don't have quite the same visceral reaction as I did to the Hercules beetle this is much more terrifying because they've just got these massive pincers that I don't know how much damage they could do

to a human being yeah I don't want to find out yeah I see a YouTube video pitched by a giant beetle and it's that beetle It's the stag beater. It's leaving blood.

It's drawing blood. It's blood. There's blood there. Yeah. So we've learned, yeah. The beetles are, beetles suck and the stag beetles also gross. Now here are some random fantasy questions that have come to my mind and I want to ask you guys.

All right. Number one. Is there any Carlos Santana buzz coming off a career season? I believe he's going to be 34. Santana was the number four first. Baseman in points leagues and number seven in Roto. Is there any Carlos Santana buzz these days? Absolutely.

Should there be? No. No, this is buzz, but he's someone that you should be pretty happy to draft if he does manage to fall to you in the 10th round where he has been. I've been surprised how low he's going. Yeah. He's being treated like he didn't just have a career season, which is. probably probably fair

I mean obviously a lengthy track record there and after a good start with batting average which is the category where he's always always fallen short

he regressed to closer to normal in the second half I just thought based on where he finished last season that there would be a stronger push for him than there has been

people are kind of just ignoring last season when drafting him. So we're back to you should be thrilled to get him in your starter as a points league, but he feels like kind of a fallback option in a roto league. Santana's been a top eight first baseman four years in a row.

In points, in points. And that was 2018, he had a pretty bad year, but so did basically every other first baseman. It was just a bad year for first baseman. But he has been top eight in points, four years in a row. That's kind of crazy. He's You can't find a lot of first baseman with one strikeout to one walk.

In Roto, he's going 140th overall, going after Yulea Gerell, after... Doesn't make sense there. Well, I guess it kind of does. Batting average? Yeah, I mean, that's the one thing you can really count on from Gouriel, and it's the thing you're probably not going to get from Santana, and even though the power discrepancy is probably going to be greater than it was. last year. I think the scarceness of what Gurriel provides counts for more in Roto.

Next random question. What is not to like about Jack Flaherty and Walker Bueller? Well, Jack Flaherty was really bad for half a year. He seems to be a popular bust pick, Jack Flaherty, among the fantasy analyst community. I do not share in those feelings myself. but I assume that's what it is rather than treating the full season statistics like the guidepost for what to expect

from Flaherty going forward people are just very dubious of what happened at the second half and don't want to get caught with their hand in the cookie jar he had the third best second half in baseball history I know one of the people who had a, he had a 0.93 ERA.

Jack Flaherty was 7 and 3.93 ERA. 24 walks, 130 strikeouts, and only six home runs allowed in 106 in a third innings, 15% swinging strike rate, which is excellent. He gave up a lot of home runs in the first half. He gave up 19 in 90s, then 6 in 106 in a third in the second half. He wasn't alone there. I know Jake Arieta had a better ERA. I don't know who the other person was,

who had the other second half that was better than Flaherty. It was either Bob Gibson or Greg Maddox. I read two conflicting things, so somebody else could look that up. But look, Jake Arenda had a 0.77 ERA 2015 after the All-Star break. He won the Say Young. What are he doing in 2016? He went 18 and 8 with a 310 ERA.

He got worse, but he still was really good. I do want to spot. It wasn't just like bad luck on home runs. You know, his strikeout rate in the, in that final 16 game stretch was when he really turned it around was 33%. And the first 17 starts, it was 26%. 26% is good. But it's certainly not elite anymore.

It certainly doesn't lead to, it's not necessarily what you would expect from a guy with a 275. ERA. So, you know, he does need to give you the full season. And what was really frustrating about it was we just didn't have a good explanation. for why he struggled so much that I saw at least. Maybe Scott saw something. Well, I'm looking at the pitch selection now. And what I kept hearing as he was coming up through the miners

and really establishing himself as a prospect is that he has this great two seamer, which isn't a pitch that's in style so much these days. You know, historically, that's been, you know, the sinker. It's been good at getting ground balls and pitchers don't pitch that way anymore. But his, he started emphasizing his in the second half. He started throwing his slider more as well. And he cut down on the four seam fastball. And the thing is, his two seamer is a better swing and miss pitch than his four seamer.

So, like, he's kind of the exception there as the game is trending away from the two seam fastball, where his plays off his four seamer so well. And, of course, his slider is a great swing and miss pitch as most sliders are. that I think that's, that played a big part in just his improved ability to miss bats. I don't know that it explains all of it. I don't think there is explaining all of what went right in the second half. It was clearly, it was clearly too good to be true. But if he maintains that same approach for a full season, I think he'll be, you know, I think he'll be an ace.

What's funny is I feel like among the top 10 pitchers, the two trendiest busts are Jack Flaher and Shane Beeper. when they were two of the trendies breakout picks at this time a year ago. So it's kind of like everyone's like, well, we didn't think they were got to go that far with. And I will say on the Shane Bieber point, because I was actually going to bring him up as someone who I think there are reasons to dislike him.

He did a really good job of limiting contact. 30% strikeout rate last year is really good. Even when he pitched so well last year, when guys made contact, They crushed him. He had a 90.4 mile per hour average. Exile velocity was bottom 4% in the league. 43.1% hard hit rate was actually worse

than the year before in both regards. Give up a 408 X Wobon contact. And he's a guy who just, it seems like there's a razor-thin margin for error. And boy, I could see it going. wrong. This is a type of pitcher who I've been burned by a lot before, the elite control

guy who gets hit really hard but gets a lot of strikeouts and makes up for it. And I could see, I think there's a wide error bar on Shane Bieber is how I would put it. Okay. Beber by the way, he had a 327 ERA. That's the second highest

of any top 12 pitcher in points leagues last year. Highest was Steven Strasberg. Beber though had the second most innings pitched in baseball behind Verlander. So that became a Flaherty versus Bieber instead of Flaherty versus Bueller, that's fine. Does Yohan Mankata have first round potential?

Is he going to run all of a sudden? You never know. He ran a tie. He had his first two seasons in the minors. He still like more than 45 bases. Yeah, that's my thing is I think Yohan Mankata is an obvious regression candidate. I do like the skill set a lot.

He took, he made real improvements last year, but the thing that could keep him from regressing from a fantasy perspective and the thing that could catapult him to stardom is you know now that he is established himself as a legitimate hitter you know now that he's improved against left-handed pitching now that he's not quite so strikeout prone maybe they let the other parts of his game flourish and maybe now he starts to run you know he's got elite sprint speed he is one of the fastest players in baseball is one of the

most athletic players in baseball he showed in the minors I think he stole like at a an 85% clip in the miners too. It wasn't like he was just getting thrown out all the time and he was just running everywhere. So I think that skill sets there. It's just impossible to know, literally impossible to know if that's something he's going to start doing this year. I kind of wonder if this is, if this has to do with organizational philosophy.

Because you have him, Montcata, two-time 45 steel guy in the miners, who has yet to even have a 15 steel season in the majors. You have Tim Anderson, who stole 49 bases, one year in the minors. He only has 120 steel season in the major so far. Isn't that amazing? Only 120 steel. I feel like we bank on 20 steals from this guy, Tim Anderson, and he's only done it once before. I actually worry about this with Louise Robert.

You can read all about this on C.com slash fantasy slash baseball and Scott White. 28 burning questions for the start of the 2020 season with pitchers. and catchers reporting. Seameless. Probably Louis Roberts going to be a good enough hitter to justify a top 100 pick, probably, but he has bad plate discipline. And he's, yeah, just any rookie,

wonder how they're going to transition. But if he doesn't bring the steals along with him, which was never as good, he was never as, he stole 30 bases last year, but he didn't have, like, the 49 steel season those other guys had. I don't know. Maybe we shouldn't bank on those from him.

Be a nice bonus. Moncada's going 70th overall. what do you think good spot what you say like the value Scott um it's fine I'm trying to see where he that puts him among third baseman it's pretty high it's earlier than I would take him by a little bit it's earlier than I would take him because I do expect the banning average to go down and I don't think he's going to start running more so he has to get better as a power hitter I

think to justify that, which is certainly possible, but I'm not going to draft him assuming it. Terrible plate discipline, 404 Babbap, I think, last year for Montcada. He's the 11th third baseman off the board, but not everybody is going, like, not everybody's a true third baseman. LeMayhew is not going to play at third. Jose Ramir, yeah, no.

Okay, so 10th, 10th third basement off the board. But that's, you know, a lot of good third basement. What I was going to say is, I don't know, you probably don't want to. draft him 10th overall in a points league, but in a roto league it's different. You don't have to worry about the play discipline. Okay, last random question.

Does Juan Soto have top five overall player potential? He has to become an even better hitter or an even better base stealer. And I think we

probably saw something close to his ceiling as a base stealer last season. 12 steals. Yeah. Okay. He was the number... He was 12 for 12, wasn't he?

I have him as 12 for 13. 12 for 13. He was the number 13 hitter in points, number 14 hitter in Roto, Soto, 21 years old. He added 282 with 34 homers, 110 runs, 110 RBIs, and 12 steals,

and great plate discipline in 150 games. Yeah, between the youth and the plate discipline, I mean, just accomplishing what he has at the age he is. in rare company and like historic all-time greats is who he's ranking up there with and then when you throw in

that he's already one of the best plate discipline guys in the majors I have a hard time putting a limit on his ceiling I mean maybe as a base stealer yeah I don't know how much more they're going to ask him to run but just as a hitter I think

he does have top five upside this is the thing that's really hard do you think he has more upside as a hitter than 2019 Anthony Rendon? Because Redone was number five last year, but I put together a little tool where I can kind of, I was able to adjust everyone's rotos scores on a per 150 game basis. And he drops to number nine there. A couple of guys who pass him are Nelson Cruz, who not a base dealer,

but then Alberto Mon to see Trey Turner and Fernando Tatez on 150 game bases that came game bases do pass him and like Soto should steal more than five bases but it's just really really hard to get there if you don't run. Okay, but Nolan Aronado and J.D. Martinez have been there, right? Yeah, I mean, Nolan Aronado hit 41 homers, 220 combined runs in RBI and hit 315 last year and was the number 10 hitter last year. The bar is really, really high. And if you do the 150 game pace,

Aronado drops to 17th. I think he can be a top five points league player. Sure. He was pretty close among getters last year, I think. It was 13th. He only played 150 games. Like, that's not nothing, but he didn't play 155. He didn't play 160.

So it's possible on a per game. He says he was that good. In fact, we can look that up. And we will. I'm just going to read a bunch of news. They probably don't need much analysis. Houston's sign stealing originated with the front office, according to a report.

They're big cheaters. The White Sox signed Cuban pitcher Norhe Carlos Vera. The Giants signed Hunter Pence to a one-year $7 million deal. He was having a pretty good season before he got hurt. But, boy, he's in a bad ballpark now. The Giants also signed Billy Hamilton to a minor. League deal. The Rangers signed Cody Allen to a minor league deal. The Dodger signed Chris

Taylor to a two-year deal. Boston expected to name Ron Renicki, their manager. He's their bench coach. Tyler Glassnow had wrist surgery in November. She's fine. The White Sox, this is a bigger deal. They're going to give Nick Madrigal a chance to make the opening day roster and play second

base. That's pretty big. Yeah. They should. I don't know if they will. They haven't signed him to a long-term deal like Louise Roberts. So they may play the old service time manipulation game. But that's another potential steel source. Really good.

A guy, a rare sort of player in today's environment where he puts the bat on the ball almost without fail. It doesn't have a lot of power, but he can run. If the White Sox let him. He actually makes more contact than Willings Estadio. Yeah. Contact rate is higher.

Not just the strike rate being lower, but... Right. actual contact rate is high, which is incredible. His strikeout totals look like what you'd see in a caught stealing total. So if you are curious about points per game, fantasy points per game, you can go to our website, CBS.Bores.com slash fantasy slash baseball, click on stats. Well, like you hover your mouse over baseball, click on stats, and change from projections to 2019 and then fantasy points.

points per game is a column that you can sort. Here are your fantasy points per game leaders. Yelich, Trout, Rendon, Bregman, Bellinger, Springer, Kruse, Betts, Soto. So he's a ninth. It's pretty good company. Yeah. Yeah.

One more note on Nick Madrigal. Let's look at his last five seasons worth of strikeout totals. 14, 16, 7, 5, and 16. He's played 160. That's going back to college. He's played 163 games in the minors. He struck out 21 times. Wow.

Yeah. Wow. He's actually cut his strikeout rate since leaving college. He had 37 strikeouts in 151 college games. Who are your favorite late-round picks, guys? And alas, we are here. Scott, give us some names that you like drafting late. All right, so how late do we want to talk here?

Okay, let's say pick... 180 or later. Okay. Who's going in that range? I'm not trying to be... Yeah, 180's good. I'm just going to say Gio Orchella. Get this ball rolling with Gio Urchella

of the Yankees. Who... I mean, I think there's a lot to the breakout last year. I was watching some interviews from him before the season where he talked about reworking his swing incorporating his lower body more, and his exit velocity just took off last year. And that combined with his already existing skills, which was, he makes a lot of contact, he hits a lot of line drives.

It's the perfect recipe for a high average hitter. And if he continues to hit the ball hard, some of those are going to sail over the fence, which we saw last year. And he is such, I think the main reason he falls as far as he does, especially given that his safest category is batting average and it's very hard to find batting average guys who aren't going to kill you and everything else in the late stages of a draft

is because people worry about the playing time with Miguel Anduhar coming back but there is such a wide gap defensively there I mean, Urchella's kind of average I guess but Andouhar was a disaster of those things. You know, Urchella to me is a great defender. I don't understand how the metrics say he wasn't that good. So even better than that.

Do you want to say he's better than average? I think they love him. Yes, and do Harkandfield, so yes. Yeah, so I think among all the Yankees corner infield options, O'Sheael is the safest bet for playing time. And if he's making a lot of contact batting behind all those high-on-base guys at the top of the Yankees lineup, he's going to have a ton of RBI, too.

I think he could be a top 10 third baseman. Okay. And that's obviously saying something, especially given how deep third bas is, and I'm trying to draft them in all of my leagues. Gio Orchella. All right, Chris, give me another one. Luke Weaver.

184th, 185th overall right now. And, you know, you look at the fantasy bruce consensus, and he's below 180 in every draft that they are won every... You made the cut. Vider. So that's another guy that made a big change last year, started incorporating a lot more of the high-speed cameras in his off-season workouts. And you saw his spin rate start to go up. Strikeout rate went up as a result. And I just

think there's a lot to like. He was someone we liked a ton going into, was going into 2018 that we really liked him. And then he was a big disappointment. Yeah. Love that post type guy. I love that, you know, a little worried that his season got derailed by, I believe, an elbow sprain. Don't love that, but love that he didn't get to finish the breakout season, and so that keeps the price lower. All right, Scott, let's go. Keep on going. So there are a couple. I'm going to lump a couple together here. If we're talking about finding saves late and feels like you have to pay more. a premium for saves guys this year.

A couple I like to grab later, Scott Oberg of the Rockies, who isn't dominant, but I think is good enough to hold on the role, to the role, especially considering their alternatives there. And then Mark Malanson of the Braves.

Will Smith gets drafted ahead of him. Will Smith is a better pitcher. Maybe Will Smith ends up taking the closer role at some point. But that's not the plan right now. The plan is for Mark Malanson and to keep closing for the Braves. And looking at the way he performed in the second half,

basically, I think it started a little before he joined the Braves, but not much. It was mostly just during his time with the Braves. He kind of recaptured his old Mark Melancid form from before all the injuries that sidetracked him and made him such a bad free agent signing with the Giants. He is off the charts in terms of ground ball rate and in terms of walk rate. the two of the three

FIPP legs we don't focus on as much and then he got back to being a decent strikeout pitcher like more than a strikeout per inning which if you're thriving on those other two things is good enough I think he could conceivably hold on to that role all season and if you get them for next to nothing costs

closing for a team that I think most people are going to project for the postseason it's a pretty, pretty good deal. Pretty, pretty good. Who would you rather have, Oberg or Malanson? They're going within 18 picks of each other, Malanson actually going a little bit ahead of Oberg.

I think Malanson, just the potential for him to rack up saves is higher, so he would be who I'd prefer there. And obviously, you're always a little worried drafting anybody, anybody who throws a ball at Coorsfield, even if there are seemingly few alternatives there. Chris, you're up. One other pitcher.

Yeah, go ahead. head. Now you speak. I was asking if we wanted to know a picture. Oh, I thought you said one other pitcher. Okay. Andrew Heaney. Okay. Seventh overall. I had a really, really good strikeout minus walk percentage, which has become one of the, one of I think, the better metrics to use when when judging pitchers. And he's a guy who he's kind of weird because he pitches up in the zone with his sinker a lot and that can lead to a lot of hard contact and a lot of home runs. But I just think he still has the potential to develop into a very good starting pitcher. I think he's mostly there and it's just tweaks at this point.

Got a decent number of swing strikes last season. Health is obviously has always been an issue for him. But if he can stay healthy, I really think there's a lot of upset with Andrew Haney. One more round for each of you. Well, I just want to throw these names out real quick because they're my favorites, but I feel like I've talked about them a lot, so I want to talk about new players here. But J.D. Davis, Mark Kana, they're both going beyond the 180 range. I'm going to draft them every league.

I can draft them in. If I want to throw a new guy out there, I'm going to say, I'm going to say Carter Kibum, in deeper line of leagues is somebody who's popping up for me. a lot in the late rounds now because it's looking pretty clear that the nationals are going to give him every chance to win the third

base job and in fact want him to win the third base job and I know he was a disaster for a little bit of time he was up early last year when Trey Turner got hurt a disaster offensively and defensively obviously not going to be playing shortstop now so defense we don't worry about that

but the guy he can really hit He gets really hit, and he hits in the way that I think is most perfect, the best suited for this environment in that, like his just pure bat skills are really high, but it's not like he's a Nick Madrigal, and he's lacking any sense of power whatsoever. He hits the ball out of the park well enough that it's easy to see him being a 2530

homer guy in the minor, probably with a good average. Yeah, this is Carter Keyboom, yeah. Carter Key Boom is the one, if you need a middle and field option late and you're looking for upside, he's somebody who I'm beginning to target. Chris, last one. How about a name that probably hasn't been said

on a podcast that Adam and I have been on? John Bertie, who only became fantasy relevant very late last season. He's kind of the dollar store Tommy Edmund based on what he did last season. You know, 75 games, six home runs, so not much pop there, but 17 stolen bases. And he hit 273. Decent enough plate discipline to think that 270's not out of the question.

If he plays regularly for the Marlins, I think there's 30 stolen base potential, and he might play pretty regularly for the Marlins. Yeah, super utility at least. He's eligible all over the place in fantasy, I'm sure. All right, John Birdie is J-O-N-B-E-R-T-I. So I had to, a little trial and error there for me. I feel like we could do more of this, Adam. I jotted down like 25 names, probably.

All right, whatever. We'll save emails for tomorrow then. We can keep going. So far, let's recap. Luke Weaver at 184. J.D. Davis, 194 overall. Andrew Heaney, 207th. G.O. Rochella, 254.

Mark Malanson, 270. Carter Keyboom, 282. Scott Oberg, 288, Mark Kana, 292nd, overall. John Birdie, 307th. I'm going to throw in a couple of mine. I like Noamar Mazar. Let's see where he's going, 257th overall. And I like D.D. Gregorius at 200 and something overall.

I typed in don't know. Are your ADP values different from mine? I'm using fantasy pros. He's looking at the right column, not the left column. Oh, okay. Actual average, not their rank in the average. Gotcha. Ah, I see.

Yeah, so they're all late enough. I keep typing Dodo instead of Didi. What the hell's the matter with me? Diodigorius. Dodo is a really interesting case. Because he is the most extreme pole home run hitter in baseball. I don't know if there's anybody ever who has, I think he's over 100 career home runs and has never hit one left of center field

from the batters box. Wow. I don't know how that's going to play outside of Yankee Stadium. He has hit for more power at Yankee Stadium than anywhere else. But, you know, Philadelphia is not a bad place to hit, and it's a pretty good lineup. So I think there's some value there. See, down the right field line, I am looking at the dimensions right now.

Oh, it's not anywhere close. Right field line. 330 feet. That is about 300 feet farther than the Yankee Stadium Redfield line. Yeah. Yankee Stadium down the right field line is it's a middle school softball stadium.

It's ridiculous. All right, Scott, you're up. I'm going to pair a couple of pitchers together that are falling for obvious reasons. They're going to miss like six weeks at the start of season. Wait, let me guess. Let me guess. Yeah.

Michael Panetta. Yep. All right. Are we going Domingo Armand? Are we going Richel? Domingo or Mon. First two names out of your mouth. Those are the two.

Okay. Beautiful. And obviously this sounds a little wishful when you're talking about Paneda because he's been around for a long time. He's faked us out many times. But I think developing that third pitch, he may have finally cleared the hurdle in the last couple months leading up to his suspension. He was throwing that change up a lot more than we're used to seeing him throw it, and his numbers looked significantly better.

I'm trying to pull them up here real quick. Yes, we hear the typing. Yeah. Domingo Hermann. I mean, Domingo Herman just has to do what he did again. And now that we know what the suspension is going to be, seems like he's going to be with the Yankees occupying a rotation spot again. So it's just a matter of waiting for both of these.

So if you are in a position where you can afford to devote a roster spot to them, it's not an injury for either of them, so it can't be an IL spot. But if it's a league with a larger size bench and you are not wanting to use any of those bench spots on pitchers that you know are scrubs, which are the kind of pitchers that are going to be drafted in bench spots for most everybody else, these guys look like they have the potential to make a genuine impact at a position where getting an impact pitcher is paramount his last 11 starts per Paneda

last year 276 ERA a whip just above one 73 strikeouts and 65 in a third inning so good strikeout rate by Paneda standards yeah it looks like he may have figured things out all right Chris I think this will be our last round

our last one all right I'm going to be I'm going to be Charlie Brown and the Stephen Matt's breakout season is going to be the football and the hitters who face Stephen Matt's are going

to be Lucy because I'm going to buy into Stephen Matt's once again finish the season last year with a 352 ERA and his final 14 starts after the All-Star break, 75 strikeouts, 23 walks in 79 and a third innings. And I just, I still believe in his

talent level. I still believe in his stuff. I believe as the season went on, he started using his secondary pitches more often, especially that slider, which he had largely abandoned in recent seasons. So I'm just going to keep believing that Stephen Mats can be an above average pitcher who you can draft literally in the last round on draft day. Strong finish for him too. You're touting Stephen Mats, I'm touting Michael Paneda. It's 2016 all over again. Exactly.

I got to tell you guys, I'm getting really tired of your New York bias. It is like Domingo Armand, Michael Paneda, and Stephen Mats were the last three people we talked about. I mean, I know I brought up Didi Gagorius, but you guys. The G. G. O'Rshella. And J.D. Davis. Come on now. Man.

Yeah, that's what you get on this podcast. Well, I want to thank everybody for listening. We'll come back tomorrow. I'm going to try to get a guest on tomorrow. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, because Chris isn't going to be odd. So try to get a guest on. We don't do enough guests.

Let's get a guest on. Get a new perspective, fresh perspective. And then we'll leave pictures on Wednesday. All right. We'll talk to you on Tuesday, everybody. Tuesday next. See you.