Fantasy Baseball Today - Injury Updates, ADP Trends, Auction Review (03/09 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 9, 2020

We'll talk about (5:00) Aaron Judge, Justin Verlander, Trey Mancini and Carlos Carrasco and tell you when to draft these guys as we await more information. Then we'll tell you about a sleeper who may be being overlooked (19:05) and Spring Training storylines to keep an eye on (22:00) ... Let's look at some recent ADP trends (26:00). The Round 2 hitters are interesting as Alex Bregman appears to be underrated, or are steals just overrated? Keston Hiura is being drafted earlier than we expected (39:12). What about Blake Snell (44:40)? And we talk about the ADP for the elite Catchers and more ... We review our auction (47:30) and talk about a team that took the Studs and Duds approach to a new level. We tell you the lessons we learned and the team that looks like the best in the league right now ... 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 Join our March Madness Bracket Challenge at http://2020podcast.mayhem.cbssports.com/e/d7feed30238637cc2387331ab3061dc1fb5219555f0e9a8b?ttag=BPM20_cpy_invite_new Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday 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 cast, Alvarez, and twilight. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. We're fantasy. Now, here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris. It's Sunday night.

It's Fantasy Baseball today after dark, and we are just now emotionally recovering from the auction we did on Friday afternoon. Actually, Chris hasn't recovered. That's why he's not on the show. He's still, like, regretting every movie made. Adam Azor and Scott White, no Chris tonight. I just kind of discovered. This whole show won't be about auctions, but we'll definitely recap our thoughts from the auction.

You know, it's impossible to do an auction without having some regrets along the way, Scott. Impossible. No regrets, Adam. It's tattooed on my chest. Spelled incorrectly. No regrets. No regrets.

and you feel like you go into an auction, you're like, well, I can control everything because I'm going to have a strategy. And it just doesn't work. It doesn't work out that way. I don't know if Chris has a lot of regrets. He doesn't seem like a very regretful person after auctions typically.

He seems like he hated himself, though. They're stressful, but they're thrilling. And I'm usually pretty happy with the way they're going, but this one was I was depressed for most of it. I think I recovered toward the end, but for most of it, I felt like it was basically

four straight Fridays of auctions, and I was like on, you know, just a couple hours sleep, and I just basically did not have the discipline that I would normally have during an auction. I think your team's good. I like your team. Yeah, I like it too. Like I said, I got

I kind of recovered at the end, by miraculously getting all of my most typed sleepers, which is something that almost never happens during an auction. So I feel better about it because of that. But yeah, for most of it, I was like, why did I spend this amount on this guy? And it's just, it's hard to have discipline in the moment because you have to make a split second decision, you know?

Like, oh, that guy shouldn't be going for that cheap. But does he fit into my plan? Does he fit into how much money I have left? and even if you have a well, a carefully crafted plan, like you said, Adam, you know you're going to have to stray from it at some point and choosing exactly when to do that is, is just an instinctual thing and it's difficult.

Sometimes it's, I'm going to stray from my plan because I have to get this guy at this value. You know, for me, I didn't plan on getting Freddie Freeman, but I just thought like, oh, I really like that value. I'm going to get them. and then that sort of changed my strategy. But anyway, second half of the show will be auctions.

Today we're going to talk about Aaron Jones. We're going to talk about Justin Verlander, Gary Sanchez, Willie Calhoun, Tray Mancini, and more. I think he meant Aaron Judge, right? Aaron Jones is a football player. We are going to talk about Aaron Judge. We're not going to talk about Aaron Jones. This is a Packers Free Show.

We're going to talk about potentially a forgotten sleeper, someone that was mentioned on our shortstop preview, and maybe even mentioned once since. Spring training storylines, recent ADP trends based on the last week of NFBC drafts, which are high-stakes expert, you know, good fantasy players there, and we'll take a look at some of the recent trends.

The round two picks are really interesting. There's a group of round two picks going 16 through 22nd overall. Bregman, 16th overall for Bregman, Tatease, Jose Ramirez, Freddie Freeman, Bryce Harper, Anthony Rendon, Raphael Devers. And it's an extremely important part of your draft. So make sure you're getting your second round pick right. We'll talk about those guys.

Let's go. Oh, quick correction from, I don't remember if it was the Friday show or the mailbag show on Saturday. We were talking about relievers and guys we want. And I said Diego Castillo. And then I started giving all these reasons for why I wanted Diego Castillo. But I really meant to say Jose Alvarado. So Jose Alvarado is the radio.

is reliever that I'm most interested in. Well, no, I guess I'd rather have Nick Anderson, but wouldn't surprise me as Alvarado became the closer or had at least a similar number of saves as Anderson. He, I think, had a good excuse for his struggles last year. His family was in Venezuela, and that situation was terrible for him. He took like a month off. Then he came back.

He was out of shape, and his numbers were crap. But in 2018, 239 ERA, 80 strikeouts and 64 ratings. 1-11 whip, both 2017 and 18 a 11-whip, which isn't great for a reliever, but I think he's really talented. They seem to be raving about him. I said Diego Castillo. I meant Jose Alvarado.

I said Aaron Jones. I meant Aaron Judge. Scott, let's start there. Stress fracture in his rib. During the auction, I got Aaron Judge for $21, which, you know, if there had been... Everybody was nervous at that point.

We didn't know fractured rib, but we were nervous. Right, right. We found out about three hours later before the end of the whole thing that Judge had a stress fracture in his rib, in which case he probably would have gone

for like $10. But to give some comparison, he went for $21. I think Pete Alonzo went for like 23 or something. I'm trying to find comparable. Let's see what Devers went for. 27. So I like the value. And then now I don't.

When would you take Aaron Judge at this point? What are you expecting? So let me, what am I expecting? Okay, let's get into that first. I actually moved him down to a $10 value. I moved him down to 120 second overall. I just had to refresh my rankings page here because it was left up on my desktop here from last week.

So, yeah, I moved him down to 120 second overall in Roto just behind Ramon Luriano and Michael Conforto. In a points league, I think I'd still have him ahead of Luriano, but basically right outside my top 30 outfielders because I am not feeling great about this. First of all, how do you feel as Yankees fan, knowing that? This is an injury judge suffered in September. Luis Severino's elbow was hurting since last September.

James Paxton was having back issues since at least last September, right? These are all things that could have been addressed at the start of the off season. I think Severino was October. I think he heard it in his final start. of the postseason. Okay. And he was going to pitch. If there was a game seven, they lost in game six.

He was going to pitch in game seven. Even though he had this issue, I was just reading today, Aaron Judge, sort of took responsibility for not saying anything during the off season. He felt like he could get through it and it was just a minor thing. But it's frustrating. It's really frustrating. They fired their whole training staff. Yeah, it's insane.

It's insane. Like, even, okay, if it was just judge, okay. You know? Like, okay, stuff happens. Things, guys aren't honest about the way they're feeling, whatever. But all, like, three of their top six players, they wasted six months of recovery time. It's insane. Yeah, it's terrible.

So here's what we know. He has a stress fracture in his rib. They're avoiding surgery for now. They're going to reevaluate in two weeks. I don't really think there's any timetable. And I don't know what the timetable would be. Maybe you know, I haven't seen it, if he needs surgery. because surgery is not off the table,

but if judge needs surgery, I haven't seen how long he'd be out. So I just Googled rib removal surgery because that's... I think there's even a lesser surgery than that, but that has been mentioned that possibly removing the rib.

And apparently, as extensive as that sounds, you're back to feeling like you're pain free after six weeks, according to Google. I'm sure there was a more specific thing I was looking at, but then like the top Google results. This is not a super official thing,

but I just wanted a rough idea of what he was looking at. But even so, like if he goes under the knife two weeks from now, is feeling 100% six weeks after that. Like he can't, regardless of whether or not he has surgery, he can't start swinging a bat again until the pain is completely gone.

Now, he, because with a stress fracture, if you're putting that kind of, force on it if you're if you're constantly in initializing it like that then that's going to lead to a full fracture like it has to be recovered you know so

I'm not even sure if it changes the timetable that much like he's going to need a while to feel right now he says otherwise he says uh the the the cat scan showed that it was healing and he thinks that within two weeks he'll be ready to ramp up again but I just

I think he's being too optimistic there I'm not a doctor or anything but just in terms of how recovered it sounds like he needs to be and then he has to go through a full spring training basically because he hasn't seen a

pitch yet you know he hasn't played yet so I think the most optimistic I'm willing to to estimate for him is like mid-May and it seems like the sort of thing where he could keep re-aggravating it and potentially miss half the season. It stinks.

Yeah. All right. So about the end of round 10 for Scott in a 12-team league, around the same time as Michael Conforto and Ramon Luriano, that's Aaron Judge. Meanwhile, Willie Calhoun was hit in the mouth by a pitch. So he went to the hospital, hopefully he can recover quickly. Same with Tray Mancini. Tray Mancini is going to have a non-baseball medical procedure.

I mean, obviously the details are very. vague. They're respecting his privacy. He's going to be out for some time. So where did you drop Trey Mancini to in your overall rankings? I haven't moved him yet because we just don't know anything.

So I don't know. I guess if we go too long without hearing anything, I'll have to move him down just out of an abundance of caution, but we don't know anything yet. So I'm hoping we hear something in the next day or two and then I can make a decision then.

Okay. Because it sounds like it's, it sounds like he's getting tested for something and, and they don't know if there's anything beyond, like maybe just the test clears it. But I'm just kind of reading between the lines there. Well, how about Justin Verlander? He left with tricep soreness, you know? Yeah, it's still too early.

Verlander, to me, this is just a personal preference. So much of fantasy is just personal preferences. He's on my unofficial do not draft list. Obviously, if he fell far enough, you know, if he was like there at the end of round two, I take him, but I know he isn't. So I've made him my definitive fourth of my big four, and I think most people like taking him over Scherzer.

But even though Scherzer has dealt with injury two years in a row, really last year being most specific, but I'm worried about Vernal-Lander because he keeps making these deep runs into the postseason He's way up there in age. And, you know, it's basically just the innings piling up. I'm waiting for that one year where he finally starts dealing with injuries. So he has been an avoid for me.

And he's already had a groin issue. I really didn't care about that. Now tricep, soreness, and this happened earlier today on Sunday. So we don't know much. But how are you just feeling about him in general? I felt pretty, I mean, as good as you can feel, about a 37-year-old pitcher, right? I'm kind of acknowledging there's a lot of risk with every pitcher.

And so to fixate on the age when he's showing no signs of decline is probably not really useful. Innings, he has such a track record of health. He only has one DL stint, or IEL stint, sorry, in his entire career. And it was a DL stint back there. It was before we even call it the aisle. No, for me it's about the innings, not about the age. But yeah. Yeah.

Um, so, you know, he apparently was throwing more like low to mid-90s in the start before we're being removed. But second start of spring training, if he has a sore triceps, I don't think that's necessarily a red flag that there's something serious happening. They just don't know. He's, they called, the Astros called it precautionary, but the fact they sent him for tests means the test could reveal something or they could not. And he just needs a little time off. And it ends up being no big deal. It's just, it's, the range of outcomes here is too wide for me to, to really have a strong reaction one way or the other.

Do you prefer him to Scherzer? Where are you on that? Yeah, well, maybe not with this going on. If I was drafting during this window of time where we don't know anything, yeah, I'd probably take Scherzer instead. You actually have Erlander second ahead of de Grom, at least before this tricep soreness. Yeah, obviously changes that too.

I thought I'd made that switch actually I thought I'd move to Gromahead but apparently not Gary Sanchez has back sornis he thinks he'll be fine in a couple of days but he's extremely injury prone he probably had this back issue in September so but anyway Gary Sanchez is back soreness

are we thinking about downgrading him not really if I was on the fence about Twem and Real Muto that this would lead me more toward Real Muto but he described it as being a, Sanchez described it as being a little uncomfortable and that this is the time

to take care of it as opposed to the regular season which makes it sound like no big deal to me. Carlos Carrasco has elbow inflammation. Reaction? That also was being strongly downplayed. Terry Francona said after his first spring start every year

he has elbow inflammation. And I do feel like Yeah, there's not a great place to look up spring training injury history, but I do feel like we've had this conversation in the past with Carasco and spring training about, oh, he's hurting. Are we, should we be scared of drafting him? He's already so low in that group of pitchers that I feel like have the potential to actually be of some benefit that I'm not really alarmed enough to move him down based on this. but it's obviously something to monitor.

Griffin Canning is going to be shut down for three to four weeks. He's got those chronic changes in his UCL. We'll see what happens after those three to four weeks. Tommy Fam could play the outfield this week. He has side soreness and a sprained UCL. Partially torn UCL, you said, for Tommy Fam? Yes. Oscar Mercado day-to-day with a mild wrist sprain,

and he's played through it in the past. Yeah, fan masks, yeah. Oscar Mercado day-to-day with a mild wrist brain, so he avoided serious injury there. Blake Snell expects to pitch on Monday, which is good. We'll see how he comes out of that. A few things to promote. Exciting stuff.

The Facebook group, fantasy baseball today. Go to Facebook.com slash groups slash fantasy baseball today. Join the group. We've got keeper threads. We've got just generic questions that you can chime in on. Hopefully you can get your question posted. Good topics of debate. Good discussions with other fantasy baseballers.

And the podcast league. It's been too long. Let's get the podcast league up and running again. So we'll do two leagues like we always do. You know by now that Heath is not on the show as a regular contributor anymore. So I doubt he's going to want to be the commissioner of the For the People League. But we'll still do a For the People League. I really hate that league.

I hate it too. Why are we doing it? I'll tell you why. I think it's important to have a 16 team league for content purposes. So we can say, well, in a 16 team league, this happened. And I think it's important to have a head-head categories league because, you know, a lot of people play. in that format. Yeah.

So. We could do one that's not a 16 team. Like, you know, I play in some 15 team leagues at them. I would be open

to doing a 12 team head-to-head categories league. I'm already in one of those. But we'll definitely have two podcasts league. So here's what you're going to do. You're going to email.

Four people are like, ah, don't do that. You're going to email fantasy baseball at cbsi.com. You're going to put podcast league in the subject line. And you can do whatever you want. You want to just say,

hey, I've been listening for 10 years. I love the show. Please put me in. That's fine. If you want to write a poem or a limerick or a haiku or something funny, you can do that. Something creative, creativity is great. Last year, may remember, we had this. John Gray, you can draft him if you want to.

The song went on. We had this. It was about drafting Aaron Judge. So we can get to the lyrics here We'll get there, Scott. Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com That's what you're going to want to email. And here come the lyrics.

In three, two, one. It starts when my trial, then we'll keep that. We'll reach for an ace. Okay, there's that. And then this was the best one. This was about drafting pitchers to the song Picture by Kid Rock and Cheryl Crow.

I won't go on, but it was really good. And it got into the podcast league. So, yeah, go ahead, sentiment at Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. And we'll start drafting probably around the 20th or something like that. So you've got a little bit of time. Don't make this mistake, people. This ended up being kind of prophetic, right? All right, good stuff.

All right, let's talk about a forgotten sleeper. I think you mentioned him on the shortstop preview. Dansby Swanson, before going on the IL, he played 100 games, and he was good, you know, 265, 3.30 on base, 468 slugging. It's a 798 OPS. But he was on pace for 28 homers, 35 doubles, five triples, 10-ish steals. I think he stole 10 bases in 127 games. So that's a useful player.

It's not someone based on those numbers that's going to win you your league, but he's also still just 26 years old getting better. And I just wanted to know what you thought about Dansby Swanson if he is being completely overlooked. I mentioned him in the shortstop preview as my sleeper, right? I kind of qualified it by, you know, there's gotten to be so many good players here that it's hard to find a sleeper. But yeah, I mean, the difference before and after the injury, which I think was a heel. thing, right? Something to his heel was startling. And before he missed that time with the heel injury, he was looking like another one of those big breakouts at the shortstop position where, okay, this is another guy you have to get in your lineup in some way, even if it's at your utility

spot. The fact that he was a viable base dealer, obviously was a factor in that, but he's just kind of an all-around decent hitter. And he ended up, the final line, I'm sure a lot of it was influenced by him, you know, trying to play not at full health. He ended up outperforming his expected stats pretty significantly, 20 points on the batting average, 30 points on the Wobah, slugging percentage was like 60 points that he underperformed it. So, I mean, he definitely improved in terms of exit velocity, an ideal launch angle.

The strikeout to walk ratio has always been pretty good for him. And yeah, I can see him taking another step forward. Even if he was just meeting the expected stats, he's probably going to be, I mean, he might verge on a top 15 option at that very deep position. Yeah, sorry I interrupting you there. I was just going to say his last 27 games after coming off the IL, he hit 194 without a home run.

So it makes his numbers look a lot. Again, useful player about an 800 OPS and underperformed his expected stats. Dansby Swanson, would you rather have Dansby Swanson or D.D. Gregorius? I probably do rank Gregorius ahead of him. I think Swanson, I'd be more likely to wait and take Swanson. Like if I was that hard up for a shortstop at the point where D.D. Gregorius is going. I'm probably just waiting for Swanson. Let's talk about some spring storyline, Scott.

Is there anything that you want to update us on since we talked on Friday? I know Miguel Cabrero was a big storyline for you. Anything over the weekend that jumped out? Will Brent. Sorry, no, Will Brinson. After dark. Lewis Brinson is having, continues to have a very good spring. I think the most notable stat is that he struck out one time, I want to say.

and he had his third home run over the weekend. Don Mattingly said he's a different guy this spring. A former tip-top prospect who has just not been able to get anything going in the majors during the regular season. I know he talked about, I think he struck out twice now, but twice and 25 bats. And he talked about barreling up balls more this year. So I don't know. I mean, he's not going to show up on my sleeper list, but let's not totally forget about him. Another guy who was known for striking out a lot, and I might be more eager to draft if I knew he had a job, was Austin Riley.

He's had a very low K rate this spring and has worked to close some of the holes that were found in his swing during his rookie season. He might win the third base job. He might beat out Johann Camargo for that job, but Camargo's having a pretty good spring too. Let's see. Other big things from the weekend. Well, I got one, and I'll let you think. Okay.

Robbie Ray's new delivery. Yeah. Could be a game changer. Kind of reminds me of Blake Snell decided to change his positioning on the mound midway through the 2017 season, I believe. And then he won the Cy Young the following year. Didn't he win the Cy Young that year?

Did he? Oh, 2018, yeah, he did. Yeah. So it just changed his control. I mean, so Robbie Ray, I had mentioned this on the starting pitcher preview. I'm not sure if we had mentioned it since, but Robbie Ray, he has been falling off to the mound toward third base. He's trying to stay straighter, align himself differently. And so far, so good, the results, the control's been better.

It's like six innings or something like that. But it's just something to keep an eye on. Could this unlock some new potential in Robbie Ray? that was somebody who went for a very low price in our auction and I kind of wanted to get him but again I couldn't stray from he went for $4. I couldn't stray from my strategy. I feel like we're not going to see enough evidence of that for me to really believe in it because it's just on his windup.

But it's interesting. He worked on it with Zach Branky apparently who of course is a great control pitcher. So yeah, it's interesting. Mike Fultenevich had a big start on Saturday, six strikeouts and three and two, third one-hit innings, and he threw a bunch of sliders in that start. Remember him lacking the slider coming off of an elbow injury early last year is what got him sent to the minors to kind of figure it out again. And then he came back up and looked very strong.

So Mike Fultenevich might be, might end up being, I might end up undervaluing him by not including him with the pitchers that I feel like are going to be fairly reliable contributors for you this year. Would you rather have Fultenevich or Robbie Ray? I think Fultenevich. Ooh. All right, we'd rather have Fultenevich or Luke Weaver. Man, Weaver's been getting pummeled this spring,

but I'm going to try and not overreact to that. And I'll say Luke Weaver. Good for you. It's like we know we should not overreact to that, but it's hard not to see bad results and not react. But we'll see. There's still a lot of spring training left. All right, should we go to some recent ADP trends?

Sure. Okay. So we're looking at NFBC average draft position trends since March 1st, currently March 8th. Let's talk about that group in the second round. Here's what we're going to talk about. We're going to talk about the second round hitter run. We're going to talk about Austin Meadows going 31st overall ahead of Altuvei and Bogart's. Kestanhira, 39th overall. One spot ahead of Charlie Blackman for Kestanhira. J.T. Raamuto, 43rd overall. Gary Sanchez, 69th overall. Yasmine. Grandaul in 95th overall. So a big difference between Ray Almutto and Sanchez. Blake Snell, 48th

overall, and then I'll tell, I'm not even to tell you who's going 49th overall, because you won't believe me. Well, I'll tell you a little bit though. But let's start with that round two hitter run. Breggman 16. This is Rodo, by the way. And I actually don't know, Scott. Is it OBP? It can't be

OVP, right? It's got to be batting average. I'm pretty sure it's batting average, yeah. Because if it's OBP and Alex Breggman's going 16th overall, Yeah. That's insane. Bregman, Tatez, Ramirez, Freeman, Harper, Rendon, Devers. Those are picks 16 through 22. Bregman, Tatis, Jose Ramirez, Freeman, Harper, Rendon, Devers.

What do you think? I mean, it's still pretty insane where Alex Breggman's going. I'm not sure he isn't the third best hitter in baseball. Now, obviously, when you're talking a roto context, you're counting stolen bases as a fifth of a hitter's production and so that kind of skews the thinking there I understand

I don't rank Bregman like the third best in that format and others like Buckey Betts Cody Bellinger I mean they have obviously a case in there too but if I was just ranking them by pure hitting expectations and ability I would probably put Bregman third

behind just Trout and yellow So to see him go in the second round, and he's dual eligible, too. And he's dual eligible, exactly. You know, we don't talk about that, but he's Cody Bellinger, Alex Bregman. I think they're the only two hitters going in the first two rounds that are dual eligible.

You know, I mean, I think so. I think you're right. I'm looking on NFPC, according to their eligibility, it's just them. And then the third one would be Glaber Torres in round third. So that's not a huge deal, but it's not a small deal. It's very helpful. I've had drafts where I've taken Bregman expecting to play them at one of those spots

and then I end up playing them at another. It just opens up your options. Yeah, it's nice. I have to assume it's just fear about the Astros situation and all of the uncertainty surrounding that. I think it's a lack of reaction. But that's, that's, that. That's the only way I can explain it.

It's a lack of steals, too. I think that's a big part of it. But you think at Breggman might run a little bit more. I think so. I think he's capable of it. He's been a 17 steel guy in the past just a couple years ago, right? And now he has Dusty Baker as his manager. He could absolutely turn it on and steal 20 bases this year.

I'm not saying you should draft him expecting that. But, yeah, it's just to just assume he's a. not a steals guy, too, I think is probably doing it wrong. All right, so he's obviously your number one there, and I should say, these are picks 16 through 22. There are five pitchers off the board at this point, the Big Four plus Walker Bueller. So you're talking about hitters 11 through 17.

So Bregman, Tatis, Ramirez, Freeman, Harper, Rendo, and I don't understand. I'm wondering if it's the wrist injury with Freeman, because he might be like the fourth best hitter in baseball. He is an awesome hitter. And Freeman had a terrible September when he was playing through a wrist injury, but he had a 964 OPS before September. Now he's still dealing with this wrist thing a little bit,

or he was as of recently. So maybe that's it. You know what it is? It's stolen bases. I'm looking at all the names now. It's stolen bases and it's high in starting pitchers are getting slotted ahead of these guys. Because the top five are the, the top

are what the top five have always been in some order Acuna trout Yelich Bellinger Bensh Bats actually is behind Garakole here

so another ace but all of those guys you have all five of those guys you have some kind of hope for stolen bases from them then the next hitters

are Lendor Wan Soto and Story Lendor and Story of course will give you steal Soto had 12 last year and he's just he's just a guy who everybody seems to be

expecting another step forward from, I don't know, I feel like he shouldn't go ahead of Bregman and Freeman, but I'm not surprised to see him go ahead of Breggman and Freeman. And then there's Trey Turner, obvious steel candidate there. Okay, then there's Aeronado, but Aeronado, Bregman, then there's Tatis and Ramirez who are a couple big steals guys, then there's Freeman. And in the meantime, you have, of course, the three starting pitchers, the four starting pitchers who were normally Sego early, Cole de Grom, Verlander, and Scherzer, and then also Walker Bueller, sneaking in as the fifth guy.

I don't know that he deserves the same upcharge those first four do, but nonetheless, that seems to be what's happening. Okay, it's not that crazy. I think that, you know, we obviously have been saying that Tatis, it's too early for him at 17. It's not too early for Jose Ramirez.

Bryce Harper is an interesting pick at 20 overall. I think in an OBP league, it's perfectly fine. You're talking about a guy who seems be almost guaranteed to hit 35 home runs and have more than 200 runs plus RBIs and he's going to have a really healthy on base percentage. Batting average

league gets a little bit tougher. Healthy is an interesting word to use with him. He's been pretty healthy. I mean, he's kind of kicked that injury thing, Bryce Harper. It was healthy, what, last year? I think it's been like four. Was he healthy the year before? I think it's been like for the last five years

Bryce Harper's been healthy. I'll tell you right now, but that's one of those kind of surprising things. Now he's played through it. He played the least 145 games, you're right. He had that one year, though, where he played hurt and he was good for like two months and then he got a back injury. Yeah, that was 2016. So, but yeah, 159, 157 games last two years for Harper. Yeah, I don't know.

How do you feel about Harper in the top 20 or was he 20th? I think it's stolen bases again. It always comes back to stolen bases with hitters. When you're wondering why a hitter is going where he's going, look to the stolen bases. He had 15 last year. That's good. an insignificant number. Yeah.

And I think he already has three this spring, so it doesn't seem like they're shying away from that for however much you can base team tendencies on spring training stats. But you gotta think Joe Girardi is going to be more willing to let Harper run than Gabe Capilar was. Well, seems like anybody would be than Gabe Caplar, right? Yeah.

I'm surprised he stole 15 bases with Gabe Capillars as manager. I don't think I really like Rendon in Devers. I know I don't like Devers 22 overall. Rendon, it's probably too late for him in a points league. He's 21 overall, but in a Roto league, I want to know how you feel

about that. This is what he's done the last three seasons. He has been the number 21, number 25, and number three hitter in points leagues. But remember, he has been on a per game basis, because he hasn't played that many games, right? Per game

basis in points leagues, he's been the number 21, number 8, and number 3 hitter. It's been a top 8 hitter, two straight years in points leagues, Rendon. Roto is usually not as good. He's been the number 36, number 28, and number 5 hitter in Roto last three seasons. Because of the home runs, I mean, he hit 34 home runs last year. I think his previous career high was 25. So he had a lot more home runs at home than he did on the road.

He's going to a worst park. I wonder, he's not a steals guy. So 21 for Rendon I would take Flaherty over him I would take J.D. Martinez over him. I don't know if there are any other hitters I'd take over him other than those two, but other than J.D. Martinez that went after Rendon.

But yeah, curious your thoughts there. I think I'm fine with him there. I originally ranked him even a... I ranked him a lot higher than that before I realized I needed to move up steals guys and high-in starting pitchers because that's where most of the value, that's just what you have to spend on

because of how consequential it is in a 5-by-5 league anyway. And ahead of those two players specifically, I have them just ahead of J.D. Martinez, and I have them three spots ahead of Flaherty. So I do have them behind Bueller. I have him behind Beaver, who is my number six starting pitcher.

I know there's a lot of disagreement about that, but I do have him behind Beaver. It really, he hit the ball a lot harder last year. The numbers he earned, which were incredible, MVP level, were justified, but why did he hit the ball

so much harder last year? I don't know. I don't know that I've seen a good explanation for that yet, and I'm not sure that I would, it might have just been one of those fluky things that happened, you know? I love Rendon. He's kind of a great all-around player that all of his greatness is captured in points leagues.

Great play discipline. He could hit like 50 doubles. But usually he just doesn't hit that many home runs. And he's like a better real-life player than he is in 5-by-5. Last year he was not. Last year he was number 5 hitter in Roto. If the home runs go back to like 25, I don't know that you're going to want him 21st overall. Just throwing that out there.

All right, Scott, let's go down a little bit, and let's get to Austin Meadows, 31st overall. So that's pretty interesting. He went for $24 in our auction out of a $260 budget. By comparison, Mike Trout and Ronald Ocuna were a little bit more than 50. Let's see, Jose Al-Tubei was also 24, Meadows was 24, and he's going ahead of Al-Tubei, and he's going ahead of Zander Bogart's in the last week of NFBC drafting. So he's also going ahead of Cotel Marte. Curious, your thoughts on Meadows at 31 overall.

I don't think we've talked all that much about Meadows. I don't. I'm not particularly suspicious of Meadows production last year. Just the fact that it was his first year doing it. I know there's some natural suspicion that comes with that, but the numbers seem like they were earned based on the batted ball data, the stat cast data. and it's five category production.

The fact that he had 12 steals, most years that number wouldn't be one that jumped out of me. But given the scarcity of stolen bases today, I think you have to factor that in to your assessment of him, 12 steals for a guy who hits for average and 30 plus homers. Hopefully he can do that again. And he only played 138 games, Austin Meadows. Oh, there you go.

But his steals were interesting because he had seven steals in his first. first 39 games, then he pretty much stopped running. He had five in his last 99 games. No idea what that means, but was interesting. I think the one, or maybe there's three outfielders who go behind him that I kind of, that give me balls. They make me wonder if that's the right move. And I would probably, we know that it's not.

Our Cattel Marte, just because he's got the second base eligibility, that's a more difficult position to fill. Charlie Blackman, an incredible track record, and was studly last year, too. He stopped running almost completely last year, but he's usually, the last few years, he's been good for about a dozen. I don't think it's outrageous to think he could bounce back with that number again. And then George Springer, who was just a total monster last year, and is obviously more proven than Meadows.

So I would take those three head of Meadows. He's going 15. picks after Meadows, George Springer. Yeah. I was just sorting by outfielders. But yeah, 15 picks overall, that seems like, that seems like, yeah, I don't love that. I don't know what's going on with Meadows there. That doesn't seem right.

How about Keston here, a 39th overall. One spot ahead of Charlie Blackburn, seven spots ahead of George Springer. If you want to just look at second baseman, let's see, the next second baseman off the board, would be Whitmerryfield, 58th overall. So Kestanhira, 40th overall. That's the middle of round four.

And wow. It's very high for Kestan Hira. Yeah. You're ranking him alongside hitters that you hope he's as good as. In a best case scenario with the bat, he'll be something like Charlie Blackman, I guess. Which is, again, leading to me to believe it all comes back to the stolen. basis for the amount he contributed in half a season's time. You're hoping he gives you 15 to 20. And if he does, maybe it'll be worth it. But it's just so frustrating because I don't want to

get behind paying that much for steals, which are so volatile and so hard, difficult to predict. And yet, you have to get them from somewhere. If you just pun on that category, it's, it's, I've never been a big believer in punting. I think it, it, it, it, it, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, I've never been a big believer in punting? I think it obviously lowers your team's potential, the overall ceiling. It gives you fewer ways to maneuver in season as things are happening that you don't expect to happen. So I don't like doing it, but it's, you're forced to, you're forced to, it, it's, it's,

it's sort of like the risk with starting pitchers, frankly, like, I know a lot of people have been really reluctant to buy into pitching, high-end pitching as hard as I've been doing it because of the volatility there and the injury risks and we've seen it affect a lot of pitchers here even before the season started. So I get it. You're making riskier picks, but it just seems like a no-win situation because if you don't make those picks, you're kind of condemning yourself to lose, it feels like, because where are you going to get that otherwise? So, Are you saying you're okay with Kessonira going 39th, 40th? No, I'm not.

I'm not. But you understand it. I understand it. You cannot overlook the history of players who just really struggled in their sophomore season when we had very little to go on. Cody Bellinger. Raphael Devers. These are just recent examples. But it's possible.

I mean, to take him ahead of a guy like Charlie Blackman, a guy like, A guy like, a guy like, well, he's going right behind him. A guy like George Springer, some of these pitchers. And that's what I lean into. Two, like consider the full history of the guys you're drafting. Like I was saying for Black men, yes, he basically didn't run last year, had two stolen bases and seven attempts. So it was a poor success rate.

But the previous three years, 12, 14, and 17, the year before that was 43, that's obviously not going to happen. But why couldn't he get double-digit steals again? And how much worse is that than what you're hoping for from Kestin Hira? George Springer, I think, is... No, I think he's probably been less than that in terms of steals. When he first came up, we were hopeful he was going to be a base stealer, but then never materialized.

Yeah, he's been 6-65 the past three years, so maybe not with him. But I kind of lean into the volatility there. My approach, if I don't happen to get Trey Turner or in round one or Jose Ramirez in round two, somebody I can really count on for a lot of steals early, certainly Acuna first overall, something like that, is to just kind of, to gravitate toward the hitters

that I don't think will be a complete zero in stolen bases and hope to get like eight here, 12 there, and put together a competitive total that way. And usually, like, anything short of 20 steals from a player in the past historically, I wouldn't have considered that guy a base dealer, but it's forcing me to take a more kind of focused look at stolen bases

and just really add up the marginal contributions there because that may be the best way to go about it so that you don't end up having to take Kestenhura in round four. Or another way to do it is like just make sure you get Jonathan V.R. or Tommy Edmund's a guy I'm drafting a lot but of course if you're putting all your if you're putting all your chips in that

if you're putting all your eggs in that basket it may end up you may end up spilling it and getting just runny egg mess on the baby righty egg mess okay Scott fire through this so we can get to the auction

ready? okay J.R JT Real Muto 43rd overall Gary Sanchez 69th overall yes Monty Grandal 95th Wilson Contreras I think is 111th Rea Muto

26 picks ahead of Sanchez Sanchez is 26 picks ahead of Yasmani Grandal. Yeah, I've really come to like Real Muto most. Two rounds earlier? I don't think so. See, before you were talking about how Röomuto was going too late, right?

And now in round four is what we're talking about in 12 team league? I don't like it either. Yeah, I'd rather wait. But he is definitively number one, I think. I have an easier time paying up for him, I think, at a points league, because of the playing time advantage is so significant there. Yeah, agreed.

But what's happening most often at catchers, I'm just taking Mitch Garver. Blake Snell 48th overall, just behind Corbyn, Kershaw, and Gialito, just ahead of Paddock, Darvish, Nola, and Charlie Morton. Blake Snell 48th. Blake Snell 48th is not a pitcher I'm drafting very often, where he ranks among other starting pitchers. Yeah, behind Corbyn, Kershaw, Gialito, ahead of Paddock, Darvish, Nola, Morton.

Yeah, I'm not sure why we're paying up for him, especially since he's had some elbow issues, especially since they're concerns about how deep he's going to pitch into games. He's probably the best pitcher of that group, though. Yeah. On a inning-for-in basis, you know, he's... But what is that worth, really? I'd still take him over,

Gialito. I cannot take a half-season wonder over Blake Snell. But I believe in Gialito in general, but I take Gialito over Snell all the time. Also, I take Aaron Nola, Charlie Morton. Yeah. You wouldn't take Paddock over

Snow. That I couldn't do either. Yeah, I wouldn't do that. I haven't really faced that decision yet. Somebody, I'm always in a league with somebody who takes Snell more like here. And so it never happens. I think I've taken Snell in one league, and I think it just happened to be a league where he fell

beyond all those other guys. So, yeah, I rank him lower than the consensus, clearly. Matt Olson, 49th overall. That's the guy. Matt Olson, I couldn't believe that. When you do auctions, you know, there just ends up being these really good hitters that, like, go very, very late when almost nobody has money left. And Matt Olson was probably the last of those hitters, and he went for 10 bucks.

But 49th overall for Matt Olson, that's too early for me. Yeah, he goes ahead of Chris Bryant. Why? He goes ahead of... Vlad, he goes ahead of... Also, these great pitchers. Paddock, Darvish. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I'm too focused on pitching at that point. The hitters, like, I could see it. He goes ahead... I don't know why you take him ahead of Chris Bryant. I mean, I guess he definitely could out-home or him. He will, but... This might be an NFBC-specific thing because those are 15 team leagues, generally, I think.

They might have a few different... options, but usually I see it in a 15-team context. And a 15-team league, first base becomes kind of iffy. It's true. It's true. Okay. All right, let's talk about the auction. Listen to this team, everybody, and just think about how you like it, right?

$260 budget, you start two catchers, first, second, third short, middle infield, corner infield, five outfielders and a DH. So how many hitter spots is that? 12. There are 14 hitters spots. Nine pitcher spots. Those pitcher spots are not specific RP or SP, just nine pitcher spots.

And you've got five by five categories, batting average, home runs, runs, RBI, steals, wins, ERA, strikeouts, whip, saves. Pretty standard. Okay, listen to this team. Catchers are Jason Castro and Sean Murphy. First base is Trey Mancini, which obviously looked like a better pick

on Friday. Gavin Lucks at second, Brian Anderson at third, Paul DeYoung at shortstop, John Bertie at Middle Infield, and Juck Peterson at Corner Infield. That is by far the worst infield I've pretty much ever seen. The outfield is okay. The outfield has Christian Yelich, Mike Trout, and Ronald O'Cunia. Pretty amazing. Luis Robert and Shinsu Chu. D.H. is Aristides Aquino, and that's going to be a revolving door at D.H. for this team, because we don't even know what his playing time is going to be. But basically, you see what happened here. He took Yelich, Trout, and Acuna. Trout and Acuna for $52. Yelich, somehow, for only $45. And the rest of the hitters are, like, the fourth best hitter is probably maybe Louis Robert, Tray Mancini, otherwise. It's crazy. Let's look at the pictures. The only other guy he spent on beyond those three hitters, the top. three hitters in virtually every draft is Shane Bieber. He spent $31 on him. Yeah.

Let's look at the pictures. Bieber. Beber Montas, Otani, Eduardo Rodriguez, Jake Oterese, although in the notes I put him as joke Oterese, which is unintended and a mean thing to say. Bieber Montas, Otani, Eduardo Rodriguez, Jake Oterrezi, Jose Cantana, Liam Hendrix, Jose Kintana, Liam Hendricks, Tony Watson, Wade Davis. I could not believe what was going on

when he gets Yelich Trout and Acuna and I wanted to see what would happen I think I hate the team but we'll see what happens I don't think the pitching is good enough I used to do stuff like this back when position scarcity was more of a thing I'd do things like draft

Joe Maurer and Victor Martinez as my catcher I'd take Troy to Lewitsky as my shortstop and Hamley Ramirez as my middle infe just so nobody else could have a good shortstop. But that world doesn't exist anymore. So what I ended up spending, like I like to find the scarcity and pay up for that. And the scarcity right now is high in starting pitching, so I ended up with four of those.

But like, I've won leagues doing this sort of thing before. It could totally work out. You have to be confident in your ability to find low dollar sleepers and play the waiver wire. but it's in a league of this size, it's absolutely something that can happen. Obviously, you need those players to perform up to expectations. But, yeah, you have to be very careful

with your money for the rest of the auction when you do this too. And I think it was. Do we even mention who it was? No, donkey teeth. I was about to. Donkey teeth of Rasball. That's not his birth name.

But that's what he goes by, donkey teeth. So, yeah, I don't like he did capitalize on a lot of those values in the later stages of the draft when everybody had kind of spent a little more than they should early. So there just wasn't a lot of money left for some pretty good players. What value did he get late in the draft? I'm not. Well, Trayman C for 7 was good. We'll see if it was good turns out. Frankie Montas for 12 was great.

Edwardo Rodriguez for 5 was great. maybe. Yeah, for five, it's pretty good. What do you think about Jose Cantana? Any interest in him? No. Okay. All right, so, you know, this is an interesting strategy.

We'll see what happens. You really have to play it out because, you know, you, again, Scott said you've got to be confident in your ability on the waiver wire. So you've got to see doing a mock draft with this strategy doesn't really do anything. You're not going to have crappy players. You got to see if using the. waiver wire and all the unexpected breakouts throughout the season, plus having the arguably three best players in fantasy baseball, yell at Strouda, get to win. And I don't think, like, I thought about doing this going into it, but I don't think the scarcity is there among high-end

bats to do it for high-end bats, you know? That's kind of where I landed on it with it. So this is a piece of advice that I thought about during the draft that I should have given out on Friday. Figure out how many players are going to be auctioned in your league. How many roster spots times how many teams? And then look at either a top 300 or look at average draft position. And take a look at the players that, like the last 30 players. What did we have? 270, what?

270, how many? 276 players are auctioned in a 12-team league with 23-man rosters. Yeah, and then we do a seven-round reserve draft. But the auction was 276. players. So take a look at the last 30 players in that group in either ADP or rankings or whatever. How do you feel about them? These are the guys that you're going to get for a dollar or two. These are the guys you're going to fill out your roster with. And if you feel good about them, then it encourages you to spend more on studs. Now, I'm not talking about what donkey teeth did because

that's just an extreme version of it. But for me, I have four top, let's see, I have Trey Turner, Freddie Freeman, Walker Bueller, and Max Scherzer. So that's four top, like, 18 players, which obviously you can't do in a draft. And I was sitting there doing the auction, and I thought almost everybody that got bid on, I was like, yeah, this player's good, you know. I'm interested in these players. I like I like I have a scrub in my lineup. I have, look, I'm weak at Garrett Hampson's my starting second baseman.

That might stink. Gene Segar. It might be great. Might be. You might have gotten a 40 steel guy. Yeah, for $3. Gene Seguro, $1 at middle infield. But most of my team, you know, like I took Ian Hap.

I know Ian Hap's probably not top 270 and eight. He might be. But Ian Hap is a sleeper that I like, I got him for a dollar. Most of my team I really like. So my point is... I like your team too. I gave it... I highlighted four or five teams that I liked in the write-up for this,

and yours was one of them. Yeah, the judge thing hurts. But I can, you know, but I can get by. But again, I think you want... understand the depth and you understand the types of players that are going to be on your roster late in the auction. And if you like those players, then you go big on the studs. I think that's a good way to determine what your strategy should be. I want to make sure that I get at least one of the trendy breakouts. And see, Scott, I'm I'm less inclined to do that in an auction

because if I have four top 18 players, the need for a breakout isn't quite as big. But I was able to get Miguel Seno. They're trendy breakouts. They're probably somebody everybody was expecting to get. And so they end up going for too much. That seems to happen a lot. I got Miguel Seno, so I was happy to get at least one of them.

But I wanted Kestin-Hiro. I just couldn't do it. And then last thing, I have a Roto strategy. I'm going to save it for another show so we can all kind of talk about it and debate it, but I have a roto pitching strategy that I more or less executed. Might have made one mistake with it, but I'm interested to see how it goes. But you can see the results on the website, and I mean, I have a pretty good team,

and I had the most money at the end, and I bullied everybody, and I got the guys I wanted, and I really like, I have Edwin-on-Carnassion for $3. I really like that, you know? I was happy to get Garrett Hampson. I was thrilled to get Wilson Ramos for $2 as one of my two catchers. So I love being a bully at the end because, again, when you think that the player pool is good, that the guys you're getting late are good, you want to have that money so you can kind of pick David Dahl for five bucks, Michael Brantley for six bucks.

Just because these guys are top 120 picks or whatever, they went really late in the auction. They were some of the last good players that went. And I got them. I got most of the guys I wanted. So that's my takeaway. And Scott, what do you have to say about the auction? Yeah, so I kind of wasn't as disciplined as I normally liked to be, and I got kind of sidetracked a couple times by,

oh, this guy seems like good value. I better bid on him. Not necessarily just to raise the price. Like, I was aware I could win him, But then after I won him having some immediate regret because, oh, I had other places that I probably needed to devote those dollars. So there was a $26, Charlie Blackman that I won, and a $12, Carlos Correa that I won, and you were competing with me for him, Adam, even though I already had Trevor Story. So there's Carlos Correa in my middle infield spot for $12. That's a great value.

Like, for you to get Correa for the same price that I got, Suno, obviously it could go either way, but I think you won that. that. But then it left me with like 10 lineup spots to fill and only $18 to do it after that Carlos Correa bid. And that was when you could see that a lot of really good values were coming up and would I have rather divided those dollars differently. Yeah. But the thing is, like, it's never too late to get disciplined. It was kind of my takeaway from this. Because after that, I just shut it down. I talked about this on when we talked about, what was it, Thursday show when we talked about auctions or Friday show. Yeah. How when your max bid is basically double or half of what your total balance is, then you need to only bid two or three dollars on players, two dollars on the ones you

want, three dollars on the ones you really want to go straight there. And that's what I did from that point forward. But one thing I did in addition to that was my favorite sleepers still all happen to be out there and I was very careful not to nominate them myself just to see how long they could get through everybody else's money could be drained to a point that I could actually compete with them with my two and three dollar bids yes and I ended up getting a two dollar mark cana a two dollar g O'Shella a two dollar obviously all garcia two dollar dylan bundy actually Josh James for one dollar Alex Wood for one dollar have you heard me talk about about these guys at all on the podcast.

Yeah, you did well with that. And you waited it out. I did the same thing because I noticed that a lot of, there was a point in the draft, about midway through the auction. People kept nominating someone for a dollar or two. And then those guys would start going for four, eight, you know, so I said, okay, people got too much money right now. I'm not nominating my sleepers right now.

Like, I wanted to get Jose Alvarado for $1. I was not willing to pay three for him. I wasn't really willing to pay two for him. I had to wait a few rounds of bidding to feel comfortable that nobody was going to put a second dollar. He's not even a closer, so he's maybe not a great example. But everyone in Carnaccio, I wouldn't have gotten him for $3 if I had nominated him 40 minutes earlier. I had to wait it out. I did the same thing you did.

You got to get some money off the table. Don't put your sleepers out too early. If you notice that guys are going consistently for more than you thought they would, don't put your sleeper. And with those crummy players, like I almost brought this up when you were talking about, look at the last 30 in a top 300. A lot of those guys who probably should have gone in the reserve draft got nominated, and they got nominated in a point where they went for too much, because this is something that consistently happens even among experts.

So I would assume among non-experts, it happens a lot too. Just in the early to mid-ranges of the draft where there's still a lot of money out there, anybody who gets nominated seems to get bid on even though he probably doesn't deserve it and obviously you could take that too far and nominate some I don't know

what's a good example Freddie Galvis for a dollar you'll probably win him you will yeah but you know if it's if it's somebody you kind of want you wouldn't mind winning him for a dollar but he's not one of your like sleepers either

and you're just looking to drain some money throw them out and see what happens. Joe Adele went for five bucks. Like, David Doll went for six. Joe Adele went for five. Yeah, I mean, that was kind of a timing thing. Exactly. That's what I'm saying. That was more of an underpay for doll

than an overpay for Adele in my mind. Right, and the reason why it happened is because I didn't go into it thinking, hey, I'm going to wait and wait and take David Doll. You never know when he's going to be auctioned off. But he is somebody that I wanted, you know, late batting average, cheap batting average source. and when I nominated David Dahl

or I don't know if I nominated him or I just went aggressively after him people had spent all their money so if David Dahl had gone had been nominated one pick after Joe Adel probably goes for close to $10 because Adel went for five he went for six so you know it's just

timing is so important in auctions and it's why you have to be patient and you have patience what of my two piece? Preparation of patience have a strategy and you know you can stick to it but don't be too rigid you know if there's a great value like i i don't think you're going to regret the carlos carea pick i think even if it screwed things up a little bit for you might end up being awesome and the charlie blackman pick i mean 26 bucks for

blackman that i thought that was awesome i was like oh damn it's scott definitely find value in a vacuum. It just for as many roster spots as I still had to fill in as many much money as I had already spent primarily on pitchers. Well, no, I got, I got Story for 38, I got Breggman for 37, then Strasbourg for 30, Golito 25, Kershaw 24, Sunny Gray for 18, I got my four aces that I wanted there. And that's a lot of money between six players. So to then throw 26 at somebody else, especially knowing some of those hitter values, I might have would have preferred to split those 26 into two guys who are just a little worse than Charlie Blackman,

because that's what they ended up going for. Like a Matt Olson, what did Matt Olson go for? 10. He went for 10. But he was one of the steals. He was, everybody was like, how is Matt Olson still available? He was, I mean, top 50 player in NFBC right now,

and he was one of the last great player, potentially great players. I mean, I'm just looking at two with the guys on the same team. Matt Olson for 10, Yon-Milkeada for 17.

They went for a combined 27 Blackman for 26. Would I rather have those two or the one? Probably those two. But of course. But you just don't know. It's hindsight's 2020. Yeah.

But that was Matt Williams. I don't want to say it wrong. I think he's the Turn 2 podcast. And I think I might like his team best of anybody. He was very disciplined about waiting for those bid range bargains. And the weakest hitter he drafted was probably like Jorge Polanco. I mean, his lineup is awesome. His pitching is a little questionable.

It's not how I would have wanted to build a pitching staff, especially in an auction where you have this so much control. Let me read it because it's interesting. Okay, so this is Matt Williams' team. Grandal and Salvador Perez. Matt Olson, Kestin-Hira, Jose Ramirez, Jorge Polanco, Ahmed Rosario is middle infield, Yohan Moncada is corner infield. J.D. Martinez, Austin Meadows, Fram El Reyes, J.D. Davis,

Lordes, Geryl in Outfield with Max Kepler at D.H. That's okay. That's okay. Those hitters? Martinez and Matt. I think there's some serious uncertainty there. J.D. Martinez is not, but Austin Meadows is unproven, but he got a good value. 24 is fine. Yeah, I mean, like, no, he didn't do badly there, but...

That's obviously a high-end player he got there. Well, it's a theoretically high-end player. It's one who's being targeted like a high-end player. Framo Reyes, J.D. Davis, Lordus, Gouriel, that could go terribly wrong. It could, but if you came out of a draft, a roto draft with those 14 hitters in those spots, I mean, that would be amazing. No, it's good. and Kepler at D.H. It's good, too.

Darvish, Glassnow, Wheeler, three of the top 37. Robles, Erkidi, Musgrove, Kinsler, Savale, Hunter Harvey. Ross Stripling on the bench. Yeah, I, you know, the funny thing is you can look at all these 14 hitters

and nine pitchers and you've got really good hitters and obviously the pitching's not great, but those nine pitchers make up half your scoring. So he does not, he does not on paper have. He didn't punt pitching, though. And I think there were a couple teams in this league that did. He got two of my top 37, which I guess, do I need to lower two at 36?

Because Sale moved down, I guess so. He got two of them. No, I thought he got three. Oh, yeah, Zach Wheeler, I guess does count as one. Darvish Glass now in Wheeler. He's got three closers. He's got Robles, Kinsler, and maybe Harvey. Maybe Harvey, yeah.

And he got some upside arms there in Arkiti and Musgrove. Those are kind of trendy sleepers. I've even seen Savale mentioned as a sleeper in some places, though I don't totally see, I don't buy into that so much myself. So he gave himself a chance to have a good pitching staff. It's not where I want my money going. Like, I want to make sure I feel really good about my fishing going in, as we've talked about many times. But he didn't, he didn't neglect it. And he still ended up with those hitters.

So I think he probably comes out of the auction with the best team. on paper. Okay. And on Tuesday's show, we'll read a lot of your emails, Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. We've got some good questions. I've already put them in the notes. So I'm excited to read those.

And yeah, I do want to get everybody's thoughts on my roto pitching strategy, which is two top six pitchers, Josh Hater, and then I'll explain the rest. That's it for today's show. Good night, everyone. Well, you're going to hear this in the morning. So have a great Monday, everybody.

For Scott, I'm Adam. We'll talk to you Tuesday with another interview.