Fantasy Baseball Today - Mailbag! McCullers Hurt, Closer Updates, Saves Plus Holds & More (2/24 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: February 24, 2023

What matters most in spring training (1:00)? ... News (5:00): Lance McCullers is out with an arm injury. How long should Hunter Brown rise? ... What is the strategy in saves plus holds leagues (20:44)? ... Older pitchers or younger pitchers (25:50)? ... Should Shohei Ohtani be drafted first overall in daily lineup leagues (29:55)? ... How should you value early-round keepers vs. late ones (40:33)? ... How does Scott rank the Peeps flavors (44:25)? ... Will White Sox hitters bounce back (47:50)? Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Get Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-baseball-today?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-baseball-collection Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Been to Fantasy Baseball today on February 24th. Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White, bringing you another mailbag podcast. We'll hit the latest news and notes. Got all different kinds of information coming in from spring training, some things that Scott might have to walk away from so he doesn't hear. A bunch of your questions as well, both Apple Podcast reviews and emails. Scotty, we have spring training games starting this weekend. very exciting.

What are some things that you pay attention to generally throughout spring training? So I guess the simplest way to put it is I pay attention to comments. I pay attention

to what managers and players are saying and what beat writers are reporting on. It's kind of the opposite during the season. Not that those things don't matter during the season.

It's just you can tell a lot more from the results themselves. In spring training, the sample is so small and the focus is so different that the stats are mostly meaningless and can lead you down some bad paths. But what is being said about what the players are doing counts for a lot.

And it's caused me to change my thinking on some players heading into the season before in ways that have turned out to be quite beneficial. I mean, even just, gosh, a couple years ago, I remember it didn't get a whole lot of attention. Shohei Otani, that was before his big breakout where he emerged as his first round type player. And one of the things I caught during spring training was Joe Madden talking about how they wanted to get as bad in the light of as much as possible. Like they weren't going to do the thing they did at the start of his career where they rested him the day before he pitched. and the day after he pitches,

and I think as early as then, Madden was saying he might even bat him on some days that he pitched. And I don't know. I guess Shohei Otani was kind of just not top of mind in fantasy for a lot of people at that point. He was still more like a mid-round type. So for whatever reason, it didn't get a lot of attention.

And I ended up with a lot of show-hay-O-Tani that year, and obviously it paid off big. He won the MVP and everything. So that's the kind of stuff you look for, you know, even more so than for, than for obvious starters like that. Prospects who are trying to break in, trying to earn a spot on the team,

players whose roles are in question, see if maybe you can get some insight on what they're looking at role-wise, heading into the new season. Those are the main things, I would say. And I keep a close eye on it. Every week I'm going to have a spring training observations article for you to check out. Today, I've been working on the top 30 position battles,

so that's something you can dig into over the weekend. And that'll help steer you more specifically in terms of actual player names and actual situations, things that you should be looking out for. I generally agree that stats don't really matter, Scott, except for position battles, right? Like, those are the guys we want to follow and see, all right, well, who's performing better,

who's got a leg up on the competition? prospects which you mentioned, I think it's very smart to pay attention to what a lot of these young prospects are doing. Guys like Oswald Parraza, if he performs well, then he's got a chance to be the starting shortstop for the Yankees or Andrew Painter if he has a big spring and he could be in the rotation for the Philly. So those are a few of the players that I like to look at their spring stats. A few other things for me, Scott, I think playing time for some young players. I want to see that throughout spring training. Lineup spots, specifically when we have a full lineup, right? This is more so later on in spring, but you can learn things from that,

just seeing where players are batting. I think I saw a mock lineup for this weekend that Yoshita for the Red Sox is going to back cleanup. So, you know, maybe they're kind of experimenting. All right, do we want them to back cleanup? Do we want them to bat lead off? So things like that. Velocity with pitchers, new pitches being reported, and obviously injuries. So those are some things that I like to pay attention to as well.

Let's get into some news and notes. We mentioned this on our starting pitcher preview part three, but Lance McCullors is dealing with an arm injury and won't be ready for opening day. Scott, how far do you plan to move up Hunter Brown if you maybe you've already done it in your rankings? He's SPARP eligible for CBS, so obviously that matters a lot for headsad points leagues.

Yeah, I haven't done it yet. He definitely won't move ahead of Grayson Rodriguez, as we talked about in part three of the pitching preview. I'd rather have Rodriguez, even knowing that Hunter Brown appears to have a spot. Brown has some questions. about how consistent of a strike throw he's going to be.

I'll move him a lot more in points, please, because of the relief pitcher eligibility. But how about instead of stalling, maybe I could give you a rough idea of where I want to move him. I personally like Red Dempers

more, and I know Red Detmer's ADP is so low that I might not end up being able to draft Hunter Brown if I rank him behind Deutmers, but that's kind of where I'm thinking right now, kind of that Red Demers in my own rankings here, John Gray. I'd certainly put Brown ahead of Andrew Heaney. So in the 60 to 65 range, it's starting pitcher for me.

In terms of relief pitchers, I moved him into a group with Pete Fairbanks, Yoan, Duran, and Paul Seawald. Do you think he should be ahead of that group as a relief pitcher? That's probably about right. So there's a little, that's kind of a distinction between tiers and my latest relief pitcher tiers 2.0. I made some tweaks there. And now I have a tier that includes Ryan Helsley, Camillo Duval, Clay Holmes, David Bednar, Alexis Diaz, and Daniel Bard. It's kind of, it's the tier of pitchers who seem to be clear closers, but there's still some, some small

questions about them. And I think Hunter Brown would slot right behind that tier for me in points leagues, which sounds like about where you have them. Yeah. Okay. So he'd probably be ahead of that group, Fairbanks, Duron, and Seawald. I have them just behind them for now, but I could see making that adjustment. Yordaude Alvarez is not swinging a bat due to left-hand soreness, and last year Alvarez went on the IL with soreness in both hands, though it was listed as right-hand soreness. Got any concern. Obviously, this is a late February, just soreness for now, but does this worry you with Yordaun Alvarez? I mean, I rolled my eyes at it because it's

like talking them up as a first rounder, the, you know, the left-handed version of Aaron Judge, basically. I made that case for Jordan Alvarez, and it's just like, you always seems to have something, some nagging physical issue that gives you pause, and this is it.

I mean, obviously didn't hinder his production last year, or maybe it did. I mean, just imagine if it did, what kind of numbers he could have put up. But he put up for first round numbers regardless is the point. So I think I'm just going to keep drafting him as I had been. But if it becomes a bigger issue,

the deeper we get into spring training, I may have to reassess. All right, Scott, this is the part of the podcast where maybe you want to go check on the kids, go use the bathroom, change the laundry, something like that. Dodgers prospect, Miguel Vargas, suffered a hairline fracture in his right pinky

and won't swing a bat for a few days. He did play defense in an inter-squad game on Thursday for what it's worth and apparently made a great defensive play. I was reading more about that. So it doesn't seem like a huge deal, Scott, but obviously it's not ideal for one of our favorite sleepers this year.

Yeah, and he's supposed to start swinging as soon as he's able to tolerate it, which could be a matter of days, they've said, which I found a bit surprising. But that is encouraging. What I'm hoping results from this is that it kind of, it kind of lets some of the helium out of the balloon

and I could still get Vargas for the very discount of price that seemed like we were able to get him for a month ago. He's been rapidly rising up draft boards, understandably, because it appears he's in line to get the second base job and has a lot of talent. So hopefully this will put the brakes on that a bit and I could still, you know,

the price doesn't get out of control for him. It doesn't sound like it's going to be a big deal. But it is that sort of thing where if Miguel Vargas is scuffling this spring or even gets off to a slow start during the regular season that will wonder about, like what if this hadn't happened or what if they had given him more solid time off to get healthy, I could see that becoming a storyline later. But for now, I'm not going to let it worry me. All right, we've got a bunch of closer news coming in early on in spring training.

New Marlins manager, Skip Schumacher, indicated that he doesn't plan on using a traditional closer and will instead. Instead, podcasting during the day, this is what happens. Instead, he will play matchups with Tanner Scott and the team's other high leverage options. There's also Dylan Floro who ended the season last year as the closer, Matt Barnes, and recently acquired AJ Puck. Do you have a favorite here, Scott? I think Puck's the most talented. Yeah. And a lot of times managers say this is what my intention is

and the rubber meets the road and they find out they have to do one way or another. Either they say they want just one closer and they have to go with a few guys because there's not one who singles himself out. Or in this case, he says he's going to go with a few guys. But he really comes to trust one a lot more than the others. and even in situations where they don't have a traditional closer,

a lot of times it becomes apparent that the highest leverage guy is, and that highest leverage guy is still most often called on in the ninth inning, so that more or less he's a closer still. So it's a messy situation. It's one of like a dozen very messy bullpen situations. and I want to put it near the top of that list in terms of how promising, how much promise there is within the mess,

but it does make it unclear who to target. I kind of get the sense from reading between the lines with some Marlins beatwriters that Matt Barnes might get a stronger look in that role. He finished strong, of course, and he has closing history, but it's, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know how motivated I am to target him. I just get the feeling that maybe he's beginning to emerge as a favorite. Angel's general general manager, Perry Manassian recently expressed optimism that Carlos Estevez will earn the team's closer role this season, though he made it clear the decision will be made by manager Phil Nevin. Estabez's career away from Corsefield, obviously spent his

entire career with the Rockies before this on the road. 3.51 ERA 1.26 whip 9.5k per 9.2.7 walks per 9. Not an elite reliever by any means, but yeah, pretty good numbers. They're all right. It is a little weird how hard they're pushing Carlos Estevez. Yeah. I mean, it's it's encouraging from the perspective of, okay, at least they're giving us a name, you know?

Yeah. But Jimmy Hergett seems better than Carlos Estevez. He was the one getting most, the majority of the saves down the stretch for the Angels. I don't, I don't know why they want to go with him. He's just so unconventional, Scott. He does not throw hard. He just kind of floats in a breaking ball. Yeah, well, I mean, it works.

I mean, it works. I mean, it works. It was a good closer for a while. That's true. That is true. You know, I think Matt Moore is a real dark horse here, too. I'm just going to continue bringing that name up. He was signed recently by the Angels.

And he was awesome as a reliever with the Rangers last season. So just a name to remember. Speaking of the Rangers, their new manager, Bruce Bochie said, team's closer situation is, quote, somewhat fluid and then mentioned Jose LeClerc's name first, among other options. The other options include Joe Barlow, who is working on a new split-finger fastball. Brock Burke, who was great in a multi-inning relief role last year, and Jonathan Hernandez, who had a chance, Scott, and didn't do too well with it. Yeah, I found it encouraging that Bochee mentioned LeClerc's name first, and Bochie being more of an old-school manager. I think there's a

good chance he settles on just one. I'm hopeful it's LeClerc. I do include the Rangers bullpen situation in that group of messy bullpen situations, meaning I wouldn't invest a lot in anybody, but I think LeClerc is clearly the one to target.

Brandon Hughes will likely compete with newcomers Brad Boxberger and Michael Fulmer for back-end rolls in the Cubs bullpen. Do you have a favorite there, Scott? Really don't. That is one of the messiest of all. Brandon Hughes If I had to draft one, it would probably be Brandon Hughes, but that isn't based on much.

All right, Felix Bautista threw a bullpen session without issue on Tuesday. He's being eased in with shoulder and knee issues. So some good news there. Tyrone Taylor is expected to miss two weeks after suffering a right elbow sprain. Scott, you hear that? By God, it's Sal Freelix entrance music. I'm rooting for Sal Freelick, man. I think there is, I think there's pretty big upside with him this season.

Yeah, I mean, it's like Stephen Kwan upside. That's the easy comparison. Right. So it's not like he has early round potential. But someone that's going outside the top 300 who could become like a mainstaker lineup, you know? At a position where we have a great need. And of course, everybody's interested in batting average and stolen bases at that point at that range of the outfielder ranks. So I agree.

I like South Freehook a lot more than I do. Shoot, what's his name? Garrett Mitchell. Garrett Mitchell, yes. Gosh, man, I'm getting toward that age where, like, you can't. I'm not even 40 yet. What am I talking about? Okay, yeah, I like Sal Freelick a lot more than Garrett Mitchell,

even though Garrett Mitchell got the first crack last year and seems to have a clearer path to playing time this year. Tyrone Taylor doesn't deserve to be a starter, I don't think. He's going to be there and in there mainly for defensive reasons, but Freelick wouldn't be a downgrade as far as that goes. With all of that being said, the Brewers then signed Tyler Naquin and Luke Voight to minor league deals. So we'll see if they could do anything throughout spring training. Yeah.

So like, because I was putting together this position battle article and I was wondering if I should address the Luke Voight signing in there. But with Jesse Winker, I don't see a way they get Jesse Winker, Luke Voight, and Rowdy Tellez in the same lineup. In which case, how did they get Voight in that lineup? I don't really see it, barring injury. Yeah, he's probably limited to a short side platoon role for now, unless he proves he can do more than that, which frankly, last year, Luke Voight was not very good. I brought this up as a possibility during our catcher preview,

but Dave Roberts noted Will Smith will not DH quite as much this season because of the JD Martinez signing. Last year, Smith played 25 games and saw 108 played appearances at DH. He did clarify Roberts that, he doesn't want to say Will Smith is going to get fewer at bats. Yeah. I think it could even out, Scott, where maybe Will Smith catches 120 games and DHs 10, something like that, you know? Yeah.

Which would bring us pretty close to last year's plate appearance total as well. All right, Scott, once again, you know, go check on the kids, do whatever you want. Alex Kierloff is not yet cleared for live batting practice, but has been swinging in the batting cage without issue. So it's a little good, a little bit. More good news than bad. Potentially. You're spinning all the Kirillov updates in the most negative light, Frank, I have to say. Scott, there was a report like a month ago that said his wrist still hurt.

I am not lying to you. I can find it for you. I think it was an article in the athletic. Not making it up. I think it was though he still feels some discomfort in the wrist, but a lot less than he used to pre-surgery. I think that was the report. So, yeah, you could take that negatively, but you could also. take it positively and I think the way it was written you were intended to take it positively.

All right. We all have our guys, Scott. I get it. Stalling Marta Aet's live batting practice on field Thursday as he works his way back from groin surgery. Chris Brian has been a full participant in all activities so far in Rocky's camp. Best shape of his life alert. Eloy Jimenez said Wednesday that he dropped 25 to 30 pounds over the off season. All right. Let's see what he could do with it. New pitch alert. Alex Cobb is working on incorporating a cutter and a slider into his pitch mix. Drew Waters is out six weeks with a left oblique strain.

Kyle Isbell is expected to start in center field with Edward Olavaris and Nate Eaton earning more playing time. I think this is notable, Scott, for deeper AL-only leagues, I've always kind of been interested in Edward Olivaris, but the Royals just seem to find any reason to constantly send that guy down.

Yeah, it probably means he's not that good. I've got over... Whenever he's played, he's been pretty good. Yeah. but realistic, like, talent-wise. I mean, he's been pretty good with a 260 batting average in 703 OPS and 358 career of bats. Let's not.

Let's not. He's put up some interesting minor league numbers. I think he had a big spring once, and the fantasy baseball community got excited about him. But the hype just won't die, even though it's clear. Nobody wants anything to do with Edward Oliveris except as sort of a, organizational depth role. If he was on any other team, Scott,

I would agree with you. But the Royals stink. I mean, it started with San Diego. That's fair. I see what you're saying. Yeah. I mean, will they have an opportunity for him? Look, Tyler, Gensary needs an opportunity

before Edward Oliva. Olivars does, okay? Well, see, I like Gentry too. I've drafted him in a few very deep draft and hold leagues. And he was awesome last year. It was at double A. He was also 23.

years old. So kind of old for the age. I'm interested though. The name there, Tyler Gensry. Unfortunate Guardians prospect news. Daniel Espino has been shut down for eight weeks due to a strain and muscle tear in his right shoulder. Continued injuries with him. He's got electric stuff, but pretty bad news there. And outfield prospect Chase DeLauder, who was drafted last year in the MLB draft, will be sidelined four to five months after undergoing surgery to fix a fractured toe. So some unfortunate news there for the Guardians. Before we hit a break, starting next week, we'll podcast for you. We'll have podcasts for you six days per week, Monday through Saturday.

All different discussions. We'll have one live mock draft per week and a bonus mailbag podcast on Saturday. So make sure you can catch us live on YouTube. That'll be Sunday through Thursday around 10 p.m. Easter time. You record the night before. And then obviously it drops into your podcast feed the next day. Let's take a break and we'll be back. right after this.

Let's get into your Apple Podcasts. Review questions. Thank you all for the five-star rating and reviews from Tiny Tin. Dear Joelle, Ellie, and Tess. Oh, man. That's from The Last of Us. Three characters. From the video game, The Last of Us.

And I guess now the HBO series that I haven't checked out yet. I haven't either. I'm interested. I just finished Piki Blinder. So I think this might be next up. Scott will probably have to wait, you know, a decade before he watches it. No, no, no. It's just a one-season thing, right?

It's one-and-done. I have no idea. I need to do my research. But, alas, I've heard very good things. I don't like watching shows until they're over or, you know, in their last season. That's what Frank is referring to for people who haven't been listening a long time. My 5x5 Categories League uses quality starts and saves plus holds instead of wins and saves. Can you talk about some of the biggest winners and losers with these changes?

P.S. My nephew Mark has a birthday coming up and loves the show. Can you give him a shout out? Well, happy birthday, Mark. We appreciate you. Thank you for listening and loving the show. But let's get back to the question here, Scott. So, saves plus holds, I think it's kind of a cop-out, Scott. I get why people do it.

It's like saves are such a headache and teams rarely. Like, not every team uses a traditional closer anymore. but it does allow you to just draft the most skilled reliever, which I think is the point of fantasy baseball, just drafting the best skilled players. So what I like to do there is you just target relievers on the best teams that have good ratios, get your strikeouts, but I don't think that you should over-emphasize,

like the top-end save leaders or anything like that. I think there are a lot of names that you could find either throughout your draft or throughout the season. Oh, yeah, during the season. season. That's the thing. It completely transforms my approach to relief pitcher. I mean, I say this based on the one or two of these that we played in before, saves plus hold leagues. We did change the podcast for the People League,

which already has some weird rules. We did change that from saves to safe plus holds last year just so I could speak about it with more authority. But having experienced that now, like, just let everybody else pay for relievers because there are going to be saves plus holds guides emerging all year long. and there's no reason to pay for them. So that would be the biggest change as far as using quality starts instead of wins. I think that's much less of a change.

As we talked about in the Pitching Preview Podcasts, I'm already inclined to value pitchers who are capable of six plus innings with regularity. I'm already inclined to value them much more than ones who don't do that regularly. Once I don't trust to do that regularly, precisely because of the wind potential. And obviously six innings is the minimum required for a quality start.

So it has even a more direct correlation to that. So I would say just lean into that tendency that I'm already inclined to lean into even harder. Quality. And you know, you could look at, I guess pitchers on bad teams would have, like pitchers who fit that description on bad teams would have more value than they do in traditional win leagues. That would be another factor.

consider. But that only includes a handful of guys, I would think. Quality start leaders from last season, Framber Valdez, Alec Manoa, U. Darvish, Sandy Alcuncuncara, Shane Bieber, Martine Perez, Miles Michaelis, Corbin Burns, Garrett Cole, Justin Verlander, Joe Musgrove, and Max Fried. Names that are lower on the quality start list than you might expect. Blake Snell, and lots of five-in-starts in there. Luis Garcia with the Houston Astros, Drew Rasmussen, and of course, my boy, Jeffrey Springs. How many quality stars did Jeffrey Springs have last year?

Oh, geez. It could not have been many. Let me see if I could pull it up real quick. He had six. Okay. I think he only went six innings either six or seven times, so almost all of them were quality starts. I had one more note on saves plus holds. The breakdown of saves versus holds is very interesting.

AJ Minter was the leader last year with 34 holds. The saves leader was a manual class A with 42. There was two relievers with 40 plus saves. There was only one reliever with 30 or more holds. And again, that was AJ Minter. But there are a lot more pitchers who get 20 and 10 holds than there are saves. I would rather have like three free holds guys than two expensive saves guys, you know. For sure, yeah.

There were 21 relievers with 20 plus holds. 91 with 10 plus holds. Last year there was only 35 pitchers with 10 plus saves. So think about that difference. 91 versus 35. So again, 10 and 20 plus range of holds. A lot easier to find that than it is to find saves. This next one's from de gambling.

Wanted to get your takes on older guys. Oh, well, this is perfect for Scott. Older guys like Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander from Scher's IEL Stints and both of them climbing in age. Do you take the risk or do you go with a young? young gun like Alec Manoa, Dylan Sees, Luis Castillo, etc. To Gamblin, I thank you for your five-star review. I get the impression, though.

You're not someone who listens to the podcast very often. Because if you were, you would know that my top two pitchers in my 5-by-5 rankings and numbers 2 and 3 in Head-Dad points leagues are Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer. So they're not even in the same discussion for me as guys like Alec Manoa, Dylan Sees, and Luis Castillo, even though ADP shows that they are, I think they're being highly undervalued because of their age, which as I've mentioned quite a few times, I don't see that number as a particularly big risk factor for starting pitchers in particular, in part because there are just so many risk factors for pitchers that just seems like a chinty one.

And in part because the fact that they're older means that they've shown this ability to take on workload time and time again. And that's the biggest question for the young guys is can they repeat those big workloads over and over again? Well, we already know Verlander and Scherzer do. So big question answered. Yes, Scher has missed some time in recent years with injuries.

I don't think a single one of them was arm-related. It's been like back stuff and neck stuff and oblique and, you know, maybe it does show that his, his body is not rebounding as well as it used to. I don't want to completely dismiss it, but it's not, it's not the kind of injuries that would normally concern you about a pitcher and his ability to stay healthy. All right, this next one's from R-Gen, RNFJ. Interesting. 10-Team Keeper League, categories with OBP, who are you taking in the second round? Bo Bichette, Bobby Witt Jr., or Mookie Betts?

I think we have the same answer. Oh yeah, bets. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. Yeah, you probably can get him in like the early second round in the 10-team league. So yeah. You'll be kind of lucky. You'll be kind of lucky, too.

Yeah, he's probably going towards the end of the first. But either way, if you're just deciding between those three names in a vacuum, I think it's Mooky Betts for each of us. And I'm willing to wager at Tmuki Betts for Chris as well. In a 10-team OBP league, I'm not even sure Bichette and Witt are second rounders. That's fair. Like, Betts is arguably a first-rounder. Bichette and Witt are like, maybe Bichette's a third-rounder and Witt's a fourth-fifth-rounder.

I don't know. And an O-B-P league, we're talking a shallow O-B-P league. Bobby Witt Jr.'s OB. Last year was 2-94. So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I get it. He's going to give you, he's going to give you the,

a little bit of power, a lot of speed, hopefully. But the OVP is quite bad. And then Boba Shett was at 333. He's helped out because his batting average is so good, but he doesn't really walk very much. This one's from small, beefy baseball boy. Nice. Yeah, I guess we don't really show those a lot of love.

I don't even know. Who would be a small, beefy baseball boy? Yeah, that's what I don't, I don't really, like a short guy who have. Like a short stocky? I mean, like Alejandro Kirk. Kirk is, yeah, he's short and he's a little stocky. I was thinking of big.

I don't know that that's so much related to height. It's just size regardless. Yeah. Yeah, so maybe this is kind of a contradiction here. I thought of Corbyn Carroll too just because he's jacked and he's small, but he's not, you know. Yeah, kind of like a lean and muscular. Yeah, he's pretty jacked up, but he's small. He's like 5'10 or something like that.

I have the first overall pick in a 10 team head to head. categories draft with daily lineups. Should I pick Otani because he's like two players in one or go with Aaron Judge? Scott, I know you love Aaron Judge, but this will test the limits for me. No, I mean, if you can change your lineup daily, I don't even care what the scoring format is you have to go with Otani because you're getting an A-Sand-a-stad-stat bat. It's just no need to overthink that one. But that's all, that only goes for leagues that you can change your lineup daily, which we don't typically cater to at CBS. Yes. Well, it doesn't mean we won't, but yeah, obviously, we try to work it in, but it's not the focus of our analysis.

I'm just, right. I'm just clarifying for the people. Why don't you ever talk about Otani is the number one overall pick? Well, that's why. We're usually thinking in terms of weekly leagues. For sure, yeah. And we've received this, a form of this question a lot recently. I was looking through the email inbox and a lot of Daily lineup league. Are you sure Otani is number one? Yes. 1,000%. If you're If you play in a daily lineup league where you can reap all of Otani's benefits, use him as a hitter, use him as a pitcher, and he's only one player. He is the number one player. There is no doubt in my mind. This one is from CDM 083, 10-team Keeper League, need to keep five of the following players. This is another one of those humble brags, Scott. Freddie Freeman, Ronald de Cunia, Julio Rodriguez, Pete Alonzo, Aaron Judge.

How did you get all these players? Michael Harris, Corbyn Burns, Sandy Alcantara, Jacob de Grom, and. and Framber Valdez. Only five. He doesn't specify whether it's points or categories. Does he? Nope. Okay, so definitely Judge J. Rod, Acuna,

Freeman, I would say. And then it comes down to Alonzo and Alcantra, I think, depending on the scoring format. Well, I mean, I guess you could consider. Okay, so if it's a points league, definitely Alcantara is the fifth keeper for me because of all those points he gets on the innings. If it's a Categories League, you could debate Alonzo and Burns. As much as I want to load up on hitting, I guess the value of Burns would be too good to pass up.

Scott, you've already got four first round players on your team. I think you could take one elite pitcher. Yeah. Yeah. I'm taking Corbyn Burns, regardless of the format. So the top four you said and then Corbyn Burns, for me. This one's from JR Zero. 12 team heads head to head categories salary cap slash auction league with $260 budget. Keep three. Manny Machado for 31. Starting pitcher Otani for 19. Dylan

Sees for 14. Dalton Varsho for 11, Adley Ruchman for seven, and Willie Adamas for six. Does not say if it's a two catcher league or not. But head to head categories, I would assume it's one. Yeah. I think I would keep Machado for 31, Seas for 14, and Varsho for 11.

They're all good choices, though. Yeah, they are. I actually have Otani ranked ahead of CIS just as a pitcher. But he's five more dollars. Yeah, it's close enough where I probably would just take the savings. So, yeah. You could keep both if you wanted to give

back Varshot, but I think $11 for a potential 2020 catcher is probably too good to pass up. Yeah, and it's tough because we both like Willie Adamas too, but shortstop is deep. You want to keep the elite third basement with Machado. I think I agree, Scott. Machado, Cease, and Dalton Varsho. This one's from Kevin Reed's head to head categories league pick four. Trey Turner in the first, Vlad Jr. in the second, J. Rod in the seventh, Wander Franco in the 9th and George Kirby in the 21st. Also adds in that he doesn't think the teams ahead of him will keep players in the first

round. So there's a chance that Turner makes it to him with the fourth overall pick. Somebody better than Turner might make it to you with the fourth pick if that's the case. Plus, Jay Ram could make it to you with the fourth pick. Do you want to keep Trey Turner and Wander Franco? I mean, that's another conversation where... Well, I mean, just talking values, because I assume we have to keep four.

Yeah, it's four. but like could you keep fewer than four and just have an extra pick? Because I don't feel like Wander Franco in the ninth round is really a discount. You know, I don't know. I mean, I guess he could go in round eight instead of round nine. Yeah. I'm just not that impressed by the value there.

George Kirby, 21. Okay, that's a value. J. Rodden, round seven, obviously. Vlad in round two. Again, that's kind of iffy. I lean yes on it. So those three, I feel pretty, solid about. It's just trade Turner

and round one based on what, like, without that additional context of you don't think people are going to keep a lot of first rounders, trade Turner and round one would be the fourth choice for me. But knowing you could maybe get somebody I like even more than Turner, because Turner's is like my sixth ranked player. Yeah, you might

be able to get Judge or Jose Ramirez, you know? Right. Then I guess Wander Franco in round nine would be the fourth. I guess that's fine. Yeah, I think given the context, I'm a right throwing Trey Turner back and seeing who makes it to me at four. This one's from Sean Black,

72. I played in a five-by-five categories league with middle infielder, corner infielder, and five outfielders. Should I be concerned with position scarcity? This is another one, Scott. Right up your alley. Probably know if you've been listening, but should I be concerned with position scarcity and take

outfielder in round two and round three, like Scott suggests, or take the best player available With my utility spot corner and middle, I could field three third baseman or three first baseman or even three short stops. And I've seen YouTube chats and comments got kind of bringing this up that

the possibility, are you going too far with the position scarcity? So obviously, like you can answer a question like that. Like you have Rafael Devers as a first round pick. I was looking at ADP earlier today. His ADP is 20, right? So that means he's a late second rounder. Are you passing up on more assured

stats or players like Freddie Freeman or Mookie Betts just to shore up third base. And I have heard other people ask a question like that. So what would be your response? No, not in that case. I mean, I understand why they're asking. I'm stressing it hard because I think people are going to underestimate the importance of it. So it's natural that people who are inclined to underestimate the importance of it from my perspective are going to accuse me of overestimating the important of it.

just that seems like a natural development. But I think they're wrong. There is a point where you can overvalue it. I don't think saying, okay, Rafael Devers and Freddie Freeman, they're likely to provide stats that are pretty similar. Maybe Freeman's a safer bet for batting average. Maybe Devers is a safer bet for home runs. But the overall expectations for stat line with them is not that far apart.

So obviously I'm going to take the player at the weaker position. Now, to address this question specifically, it's kind of a weird situation because, yes, I think it's very important to fill outfield early. But he's talking about round two and round three specifically. The best round to draft an outfielder in is round one, because seven of them go there, and they all deserve to go there. Round two, it's kind of, there's kind of like a hole in round two and round three at that position. Mike Trout in round two, okay, that's fine. You could talk about, like Fernando Tatis when he comes back, it sounds like he's going to, we didn't talk about this in the outfield preview, but it sounds like Fernando Tatis is going to be primarily an outfielder when he comes back. He won't have eligibility right away. You can't draft him to fill that spot immediately. But you can draft him thinking of him as an outfielder. And then in round three, it's like Michael Harris, who I'm not saying I absolutely want to take, but we all have concerns about Michael Harris. So because you're, you're, you're, You're asking about round two and round three specifically.

Your broad question, should you prioritize outfield early? Yes, but round two and round three specifically, it's hard to get an outfielder worth taking there. Round four, it starts to look interesting again with players like Kyle Schwerber and who's another fourth round outfielder, Frank? Adolius Garcia came to mind, but I know that you don't like it. That's too early. Come on.

Probably too early for him. Randy a Rosa Rana, I guess. Luis Robert. Cedric Mullins. Yeah. I mean, that's the time to start thinking about outfield again, my favorite of the Mishwarber. You don't mention what's going on with you in round one,

whether they're keepers or you just have something you know for sure you're going to do in round one that doesn't involve taking outfielder. I don't know. But like round one is the round where I want to get an outfielder unless I get Jose Ramirez. All right. This next one is from Hot Pie, 865 dear Harry, Ron, Pat, and Boog. Or Boog?

I think seeing Harry and Ron our first thought will be Harry Potter. But I think these are Cubs broadcasters. Boog Shambi. And then, I don't know, I assume the other ones are or Cubs broadcasters at some point. I'm sure Cubs fans everywhere are yelling at the podcast right now. What are you? You don't know the Cubs broadcasters. Anywho.

Shambi does Cubs games now? Yeah. I know that. Yeah. Okay. 12-team, 5-5 categories league. Which two of the following? Should I keep?

Otani, pitcher only, J.C. Realimuto, U. Darvish, George Springer, Alex Breggman, Jose Abraeu, and Christian Javier. Which two should you keep? Okay, I guess Real Muto. I'm not thrilled about investing that much in Catcher, but he's clearly the best player here. And apart from him,

O'Tonnie, the pitcher. I was going to say, do you take Breggman? just to get the third basement, Scott? No. See, that, that I think is going too far. Might be. It might be. When you're giving up a fourth, fifth round caliber pitcher for a seventh round bat.

Yeah, so the two to keep are real muto and Otani. All right. We're going to take... The pitcher. The pitcher Otani. Yes. We're going to take one more break and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back into Fantasy Baseball today. We do have more of your Apple podcast review questions. I do appreciate all of them. but when it gets us some emails as well. So we're going to save the rest of these APR for next week.

And let's get to some emails, which you could send us at Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. That's the letter I. This one's from Alexander, Dear Henley, Brew, and Motley. Crews? Different C-R-E-U-E-W crews? Like Motley Crew, brew crew. I don't know what Henley Crew is, but is that a person?

I don't know. Henley Crew? Is that like a type of shirt? like a Henley with like three buttons up here and Kurnak. I don't know. But I think you're on to some here, Scott. I think that makes sense. 5 by 5 standard roto.

10 to 12 teamer. Well, which one is it? 10 or 12. Three keepers. Two set, but third is an uncertain choice right now. Raphael Devers in the second. Luis Castillo in the 12th. Luis Severino in the 20th.

I'm keeping Kyle Tucker in the 13th and Jrodd in the 14th. So outfield is not a concern. But third base is because of the cliff and where I draft. I think this is a really interesting question, Scott, because it really tests the limits of how much do you value position scarcity and an elite hitter early on versus the late round value that you can get from a keeper later on in your draft. Yeah, I valued a lot.

I'd take Devers in round two. Luis Castillo in round 12 is almost tempting enough to hesitate. Severino in round 20 really isn't. I mean, Severino gets drafted much earlier than round 20. Yeah. But it's, he's drafted more in a range where expectations are, you know, you're just, you're just understanding that pick is a lot more likely to go wrong. So picking up a few rounds doesn't make a huge difference to me there. Yeah, I definitely keep Devers in round two.

This email is from Brian. Where would you rank Jeffrey Springs amongst the relief pitchers as he is eligible as one in my league? raw stripling is as well, but not sure how the Giants will use them. Stripling's going to be a starting pitcher. So if he has relief pitcher eligibility, I don't know if this is ESPN or Yahoo, whatever it might be. Yeah, I mean, those guys definitely pick up some more value here, Scott. I'm eyeballing your rankings right now. Maybe Springs kind of moves into like that.

Ryan Heldsley, Camillo Doval kind of range. What do you think about that? Is that too high for Springs? Uh, uh, uh, Yeah, no, I think that's about right. That's about right. Okay. And then Ross Stripling, I assume, would be a little bit later than that.

So maybe similar to what we said about Hunter Brown earlier, where once you get past, like David Bednar or Alexis Diaz, David Bednar. I just said David Bednar twice. Daniel Bard is who I wanted to say. I am losing it, man. And we're not even at March yet. I think right after that group of, like, closers, I feel pretty good about their job security.

Like maybe Ross Stripling would. slot somewhere in there. Yeah, I'd put him behind Hunter Brown. Okay. But it definitely deserves to. I presume this is a points league. There's not much reason for asking otherwise. And I definitely, in that scenario where Stripling has RP eligibility and it's a

points league, definitely one to draft them. But it can be later. I know there are head to head categories leagues where you can, I guess Sparps would be eligible to where you have like two starting pitcher spots, two relief pitcher spots. and then just three pitcher spots. But you're right. I mean, it's more valuable. There are scenarios where you might want to use him in an RP spot,

but like you need saves too. So you're kind of blowing your chance to get more of those if you do that. This next one's from Andrew. Went to a candy store that had double hot chocolate peeps. I am on Scott's side with peeps, but not sure if that is a flavor I can get behind. Has Scott ever tried this flavor?

And what are the top three peeps flavor? according to Scott. I mean, I don't do the whole flavors thing. I don't eat that many peeps, first of all. I just think... Look at the size of Scott. If he ate peace every day, I think he'd be a little bigger. I think...

I just think the hate directed toward peace... Towards peeps feels very recent, feels very social media driven, and feels inauthentic to me. and people are being ridiculous. That's my true stance on peeps. It's a sugar-covered marshmallow. Whatever, it's fine.

Get over it. I have tried the hot tamales peeps. You know, the candy hot tamales, the same company that makes Mike and Ike, they have a cinnamon flavored. Interesting. And that's just one of my favorite candies, period. And so, you know, you get that,

you infuse that flavor in with the peep. And it's very good. I like that more than the original peep, I would say. But I haven't tried much. otherwise, just original and the hot tamales peeps. And I like them both. I agree, though. I've seen some of these peeps that are like dipped in chocolate and stuff. If it's something like that, like that just seems. I'm sure it's fine. If you like it, I'm not going to give you grief over it, but it doesn't seem necessary. Yeah, I mean, they have some pretty crazy flavors that I'm

looking at here. One of them is like part cake. One of them is strawberry. shortcake, fruit punch. They're getting pretty crazy with these peep slayers. Sweet lemonade. Yeah. All right. Look, Easter's coming. I know a lot of people like to fill their baskets with the peeps.

So, hey, it's relevant this time of year, Scott. We've got to know. We need all the answers. Keeper question, 12 team head said categories, auction draft. Basically, points league roster size, three outfielders, no corner or middle, et cetera. It is six by six categories, normal roto but add walks for hitting and losses for pitching daily lineups so pitching

you risk it for streaming four weeks ago the crew had a great discussion on auction drafting crew yeah the motley crew uh auction drafting and how it factored and what that does for middle tier talent typically being raised during the draft which brings that question of who i should keep up to four uh two of the four are locks so there are two for three spots he's got jrod and Vlad for $1 each, obviously. Shane O. Mac, Shane McClanahan for $29, Luis Castillo for 13, and Framber Valdez for one. Yeah, I keep the cheaper guys in this case.

Framber Valdez for one easily. Yeah. I think he's in the same tier as Luis Castillo. But even Castillo for 13, I like more than Shane McClainahan for 29. I don't think there's a huge difference in my expectations for them. I do have McLeanahan a tier higher. I think technically two. years higher, but you're talking about more than double the price.

In Castillo, I still see him as a high-end arm. So I think, I don't think McLeanhan's worth the upcharge in this case. All right, this next one's from Mick. Ever since Frank Menackino was hired as the hitting coach for the White Sox, he has expressed his hatred for home runs, favoring a more contact-oriented approach leading to disappointing seasons for most White Sox hitters. With new management and new coaches this year for the White Sox,

Do you find yourself buying bounce back seasons for guys like Luis Robert or Andrew Vaugh or even Jose Ibrahimu now that he is on the Astros? And I've seen this reported, Scott. I've heard other people talk about it. I think it's a really fair conversation to have. Last year, the White So, White Sox were seventh in strikeout rate. So clearly put an emphasis on making contact. But they were just 26th in ISO, which is isolated power.

You can find it on Fangraphs, slugging percentage minus batting average. It's just basically a tell-all. power statistic. The White Sox this offseason brought in Jose Castro as their hitting coach and former player Chris Johnson as their assistant hitting coach. Castro spent 24 seasons as a hitting coordinator in the minors. And most recently, eight seasons with the Atlanta Braves as their assistant hitting coach.

So what do you think, Scott? I think this is a pretty interesting theory that maybe we can get guys like Luis Robert and Andrew Vaughn, a little bit more pop this season. Well, I hadn't heard about any of this before, but it's interesting because Pedro Grifold is the White Sox new manager. And if I have him right, and I hope I'm not misattributing this, but this was a storyline for the Royals back when like Eric Hosmer and Mike Bustakis were first coming up. And Pedro Grifold had the same issue where he was emphasis like he wanted them to be contacted.

hitters. You know, want them to be power hitters and people were stressed about it. They thought he had interfered with those emerging talents growth. You know, he messed up their development. People blame him for that. Now, he's the manager of the team that you're saying the hitting coach did the same thing with last year. So it's, it's, that, that's, that's been my connotation with Pedro Grifold ever since. So I wonder if it's going to improve that much now that he's the manager. But putting that aside, I could see if that's not an issue and the hitting coach is the one calling the shots and he doesn't feel the same way, then I don't know, it can make a

difference. I do wonder, like, I don't really understand the relationship between a hitting coach and a player. What I mean by that is, is it more like a military situation where the player has to be a player has to follow the hitting coach's orders? I don't think so. I think it's more the hitting coach has to sell the player on the changes,

and if the player is sold on the changes, he applies them. And if the player is not, doesn't apply them and doesn't perform, then yeah, he could potentially lose his job. But if he does perform, I don't think whether or not he follows the hitting coach's advice is going to make a difference. So, like, I think it ultimately comes down

to what the player wants to do, right? I don't think it's like, oh, it's insubordination because you didn't do whatever. I could be wrong. I don't know clubhouse dynamics well enough. But like they're grown men and they have more at stake in their career than the hitting coach does. And the hitting coach might not be long for that job anyway. So if you don't buy what he's selling, just don't do it. That is what I assume the relationship is like.

But I could be completely wrong about that. So what I mean, so what I'm trying to say is I'm not sure that all the numbers you're looking at has everything to do with the hitting coach. Because if the players don't think it's working, why would they keep doing what he says? I think that's fair, Scott. But I also think there is something to, we kind of saw it widespread on the White Sox last year, right? Where Jose Abraeu, power was down. Luis Robert power was down. I mean, there could just be legitimate reasons for that.

Luis Robert, maybe he was playing hurt. obviously you missed a lot of time due to injury. Jose Brayu getting a little bit older. I mean, it could just be coincidence, but it also wouldn't shock me. It kind of makes sense that maybe they put an emphasis on that approach. So either way, I think the White Sox hitters are talented enough where their power should bounce back regardless,

whether you want to buy into this theory or not. So that's basically the main point there for the White Sox. And Scott will wrap up with this, a comment from YouTube. Peeps equals pitch clock. pure garbage. I'm sorry, Scott. Would you like to respond? I think you're going to be surprised

the effect the pitching clock has on your enjoyment of the game. Not so much the pitching clock. Oh, I love the pitching clock. But how much it speeds up the action. I think you're going to enjoy watching baseball more because of the pitching clock, whether you recognize that it's because of the pitching clock or not.

I agree completely, Scott. I mean, if we can get games under three hours, that sounds totally fine to me, which means we could also maybe start the podcast a little bit earlier at night during the season. So I'm all for it. Let's make the games go a little bit faster. We're going to wrap there for Scott. I am Frank. Thank you all for listening and watching this mailbag edition of Fantasy Baseball today.

We'll be back again next week. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Yes, we will. Wait. I wanted to click, I wanted to click, correct the record on Pedro Grifold. Okay. Because I have slandered him. Uh-oh.

So he was the one brought in with George Brett to correct the mistakes of the previous hitting coach. Pedro Grifold is now doing the same thing for the White Sox. He is not the problem. He is the solution. Let's go. Give us all the power, baby. Luis Robert. 30 home runs. Let's get it.

For Scott, I'm Frank. We're going to wrap there. We'll see you next week. Bye-bye.