Fantasy Baseball Today - Mailbag! Saves Plus Holds Targets, Mid-Round Draft Strategy & More (3/19 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 19, 2022

Let's get this started with your apple podcast questions (1:35). ... Grade the trade involving Jose Ramirez (3:35). ... How to value Kyle Schwarber in an OPS league (5:05). ... What is Wander Franco's value with third base eligibility (7:07)? ... Scott got chased down by a clown (15:05)??? ... Let's get to emails. Should you stack players on good teams in Fantasy Baseball (19:51)? ... Who are the top saves plus holds targets (24:40)? ... What is our strategy betweens picks 110-200 (28:08)? ... Should we be worried about players who haven't signed yet (37:54)? 'Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  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

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. With fantasy! Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. You've got questions. We have answers.

Hopefully. Welcome into Fantasy Baseball today, a mailbag edition. On Saturday, March 19th, Frank Stamphill, joined by Chris Towers and Scott White. Scotty, making his return. to the mailbag. How's it going, bud? It's going great. Going great. Full transparency. We're recording this on Thursday St. Patrick's Day. Chris, will you be enjoying a Gennis or maybe another ice cold beverage on this day? I will certainly be having some sort of ear. I don't know if it'll be Guinness. I don't really know if the bar that I typically go to has Guinness. I can't

remember. So we'll see. You know? Shame on them. Maybe some Jameson. Oh, whoa, all right. I celebrate my Irish heritage. Yeah. Are you Irish? I don't have any Irish.

Oh, all right. I'm sick. If you look real close at my beard. Scottish, if you go far enough back. If you look real close at my beard, I have some red, some orange in here, but you know, you've got to get close. I don't know if you want to get that close. Let's jump right in.

We've got some Apple podcast review questions. We have your emails as well, fantasy baseball at CBSI.com. And this first one is from I feel your pain. My only for sure keeper is Mike Trout in round one. Keep five of the following in a head-to-head points league can keep as long as I want for their previous year's draft value. Undrafted players count towards the latest draft pick that is open. Austin Riley, undrafted.

Luis Robert, round 22. Spencer Torkelson, round 17. Zach Wheeler, round 3. Chris Sale, round 11. Shohei Otani, the pitcher, round 13. Alec Manoa undrafted. And Noah Cindergarde round 23. All right, keep five.

Scott, what are we thinking? Riley, Otani, Robert. Reber. Manoa. And probably probably Wheeler in round three, though I could be talked out of that. All right.

Yeah, that's one where I'm not sure Wheeler in round three is a surplus value right now. Obviously, if he's healthy, he would be. but not so much that it would be an obvious value anyway. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, if you're going to keep a fifth one, he's by far the best player. And so the value doesn't matter all that much. Like, I'd rather have him in the third than Manoa, I think.

Well, Manoa was one I picked, but like Cindergarden around 23. Cindergarten around 23, sailing around 11. You want to make sure your keeper is impactful, first and foremost. Yeah. I think Riley, Robert, Manoa for sure, just based on the value. Otani, round 13, I like it. Yeah.

If sail wasn't hurt, it would be sailover Wheeler for me. Correct. Yeah. With that, with the rib strain or the fractured rib, we just, there's no way you can do that. Yeah, he's going to miss half the season, at least, I think. Yeah, it's tough. Let's go with Zach Wheeler there.

Round three is the last one. This one's from IMSH-N-E. Grade the Trade, 12 team head-to-head points. With 10 keepers, I just received Raphael Devers. I have now traded Marcus Semyon and Frember Valdez to get Jose Ramirez. So now I have Devers and Ramirez at third base and my corner infield spot. I was not keeping Valdez but felt I could flip Semyon for a points league monster in Ramirez. I also got a 12th round pick while giving my 13th.

So, all right, let's just grade the initial trade here. It is Marcus Semyon and Framber Valdez for Jose Ramirez, 12 team. heads head points. Yeah, that's A. Yeah, that's an A, I would say. Anytime you can get a first round caliber player without giving one up,

let alone moving up and around. He got a 12th for a 13th, so he's also swapping the worst pick for a slightly better one. So we just did, A plus. To put this in perspective, maybe this is a good way of doing it. So we just did a 12 team head to head points,

same size and format. salary cap draft and Ramirez went for $47 Devers went for 33 Rumber Valdez went for nine so just you know just by that

measurement 47 compared to 42 and I you know I don't even think that's necessarily the best way of looking at it but it's it's another way of looking at it and you make out ahead in that too all right this next one is from Jaxico Burris

Dear de Grom, Darno, and Dendekker. Those are former Mets whose first names begin with lowercase D. Or last names begin with lowercase D's. Yeah, that's interesting. Ten Decker. I think Den Decker was a Met, right? Yeah, I think he was. Sounds about right.

Interesting. Need help selecting my six keeper. We keep six each year as our first six draft picks, six by six with OPS added for him. hitting. Endings pitched, quality starts, K-per-9 as the, they're like added categories, but they replace some other things that, you know, we're not used to on the pitching side. I'm keeping Bobauchette, Brandon Woodruff, Starling Marte, Pete Alonzo, Jose Altuve, I need one more, U. Darvish, Kyle Schwaburber, Anthony Rendon, and Wilson Contreras.

So that would basically be his sixth round pick. Is it worth it? No. Well, hmm, I wonder if everyone's. keeping that many players. Swarber, if you're swapping average for OPS. OPS is just adding. Or I guess you're not swapping it. You're adding OPS.

Right. None of us would take Schwerber in round six, right? It's as simple as that, isn't it? If it was average instead of, if it was OPS instead of average, I think I would. Because you're talking about a potential 900 OPS guy who might hit 240. But with average plus OPS, it becomes a little riskier. He does basically project to be very good or elite in four of the six categories here. Home runs, runs, RBI, and OPS.

It's just he's a relative nothing. It depends who you ask, obviously, because if he did project to be elite in all those categories, he wouldn't go as late as he does. Sure. All right. So, Scott, you're not keeping any? No. Yeah, I think I would pass on those.

All right. This next is from Chai Sox in 22. Can Tony Laruso make it happen? Who knows? Keeper question. 14 team head to head. Seven by seven. Need to keep four.

And they represent our first four round picks. My first three are easy with Trey Turner, Jose Ramirez, and Juan Soto. Have to choose between Kyle Tucker and Wander Franco, who has eligibility at both third base and shortstop. Which I believe might be the standard on Yahoo. So that's interesting. We haven't really talked about that. but it definitely helps Wander Franco

if he has third base eligibility. It helps, but I don't think it comes close to bridging this gap. Unless you're talking about like the next five years, but even then, Kyle Tucker's what, 24? He's currently better than Wander Franco. And, you know,

I think Wander Franco will develop in time into an elite fantasy option or, you know, he has a very good chance to. But based on what we've seen so far, I do have concerns about what kind of fantasy asset he's going to be this season. You know, his, his, like, 150 game pace last season was, what, 15 homers and four steals, something like that?

So I'm not, and like, it wasn't like the underlying number suggested that he hit the ball incredibly hard, you know, obviously he's 20. He should get better, but I actually don't think he's going to be a stolen base guy in the majors. I'm not counting on that from him, given the fact that he was, like, a 55% success rate guy, and it's the raise. So I think Kyle Tucker is the better option here. It is a 7 by 7 league, and I assume that two extra hitter categories would elevate Wander Franco quite a bit.

It's really just the 5 by 5 categories that, you know, if he's exactly who he was last year, you wonder if it's going to be enough to live up to his ADP. Well, I think it depends what those two extra categories are. They are... They are... It's probably pretty close. Hold on. It's runs, home run. RBI, steals,

strikeouts, total bases, OBP. Yeah. I think OBP's probably... Those last three categories would definitely

help Wander Franco's case. I mean, I think OBP's a wash and total bases is definitely Tucker. Like, ultimately it's not really an argument because Tucker's a first rounder

already. So why are you giving up a current first rounder for a hypothetical first rounder? Yeah. So I guess that makes it easy. We'll go with Kyle Tucker. This one's

Vilwock 79. Dear Earl, Frank, Brooks, Jim, Eddie, and Cal. Those are Baltimore Orioles. I definitely cannot name all of them, but you guys probably can. Earl Weaver, Frank Robinson, Brooks Robinson, Eddie Murray, Cal Ripkin, and Jim Palmer? Jim Palmer, that sounds right. I don't know when we've ever done a six-man podcast though, so I don't know which of us is supposed to be which year. That'd get pretty messy pretty quickly. Yeah. 12 team mixed roto with 5xed Roto with 5 by 5 scoring using OBP and saves

plus holds. We can keep we can each keep five players for three dollars more than the previous year's contract leading to pretty high player values in our live auction. I have Vlad for $9, Jose Ramirez for 40, Walker Bueller for 9 and Freddie Peralta for

six. My thoughts on J-RAM is he'll be much more expensive in the auction and I will be locking down third base. Am I right to keep Ramirez or should I throw him back and keep an extra of the two keepers mentioned below? So depending on that answer, which one

or two? Miles Straw for four bucks, Jesse Winker for five, or any of Alex Kirloff, Ranger Suarez, from Bervaldez, Shane Boz, or Alex Wood for three bucks. No, you definitely keep Ramirez. It's no question. And even a better format for him. OVP

instead of average. Yeah. And even even if it was just a even if you weren't factoring in for inflation because of all the low dollar players being kept in a 12 team roto league I would expect Ramirez to go for more than $40. So yeah, yeah, he might go for like

$60 in your format. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, for sure. And it's just, it's the kind of thing where even if you just look at the total value, $64 for Ramirez, Vlad, Bueller, and Peralta, even if you're paying a little extra for Ramirez, you're locking in two high,

high impact bats, top six picks overall. And in this format, I mean, you can make a not unreasonable case for Ramirez is the number one player in this format. Because you're going to get similar steals and Homer production,

probably similar runs in RBI from him as Trey Turner, but probably a better OBP, right? Or at least very close. Yeah, it should be close because obviously the batting average is lower, but the walk rate is higher. So it's probably close to a wash there. He does need one more keeper between Straw for four bucks, Winker 5, Kirolov, Ranger Suarez, Frember Valdez, and Wood for three. I think even though we're all not really excited about Winker, he's probably the best value at five. Yeah, I think you could consider Shane Boz as like a now and future value because I think he's probably valued as more than a $3 player by all of us.

And obviously there's the potential for him to be a $20 player next year or more. So I think I would go, I might just go boss. What do you think, Scott? Yeah, I think I agree with Chris. All right. I considered straw just because OBP is his better format. So he is a better option here. And, you know, for $4, that could, him and Ramirez could go a long way to making sure you don't have to worry about stolen bases.

It's a nice combo with Vlad, too, because, you know, Vlad's not giving you any speed and obviously gives you so much power. Yeah. So I would consider Straw as well. I might have Straw over Winker at $4 versus 5. All right. This next one is not. Strictly an OBP. This next one's not a question.

but I had to ask about it because I don't know about this story. This one's from... Wait, wait, wait, wait, hang on a second. Hang on a second. Winker's better an OBP too, even more so than Straw is. Sure. Yes, he has a very good OBP. However, with Straw, the idea would be that you're locking in a potential elite stolen base guy

who's helpful in OBP. That's my thought, whereas Winker, yes, he's very good in OBP. He's going to give you a very good OBP, but as we talked about the other day, you know, I think the counting stats might be pretty lackluster. And so I think there's a chance that Winker's like a good hitter who's an OBP specialist. Obviously going to be lackluster in Strauss case, though. I mean, it's... Sure, sure, but it's the stolen base scarcity. Tout Wars, my Tout War's draft is 15-teamor, but it replaced OBP with batting average.

Winker went in round three. I don't think he should have gone in round three, but he went in round three, which goes to show you. That's fair. You know, he gets on base a ton. Do you know where Straw went in that drafts got offhand? I mean, I'm sure it's much later than when Winker did. Much later, yeah. Round 10 or beyond, I'm not sure.

I saw a report recently, too. One of the beatwriters for Seattle said that they expect Winker to play more against left-handed pitching this season. So he's very bad against lefties. I think we have enough of a sample of just his major league career against lefties. It's quite bad. So maybe that even brings down the overall numbers, the overall batting average in OBP for Jesse Winker this upcoming season.

As I mentioned, this next one is not a question, but some kind of story that I've got to find out about. This one's from Frank Hippolito. Big fan of Scott White. I still smile whenever I think about that time he was chased down by a scary clown. Oh my gosh. I do not smile thinking about that. That was one of a handful of moments in my life where I had the honest thought. I might be about to die here, you know, like that.

Probably three or four moments in my life like that. That was one of them. Yeah, it was, it was terrifying. Well, Scott, can we get some deets? Because I don't know the story. Oh. I don't know if I want to relive it. But, okay, so I was, you know, I was leaving.

We lived in an apartment at the time. I was leaving my apartment for whatever reason. There was this tree right outside between the apartment and where my car was parked. I glanced over at the tree, I guess, because I saw some color or some movement or whatever, and kind of standing behind the tree like she was hiding. Like she was hiding, but the tree was too narrow.

The tree is like a skinny tree. So it was a bad job of hiding. Like, kind of pretending like I'm hiding, but I'm not really hiding, you know? And it's this clown made up all like scary like, though, you know, like scary facial paint and everything, like purposely scary looking clown. And I look at her and she grins at me and she starts walking toward me. I freaked out and ran. Because that's a rational response, right?

Was this Halloween or just like a random day? No. No. But do you remember in the news a few years ago? It was like this trend of like these packs of clowns terrorizing people. You remember? That sounds familiar. And this happened when that was going on.

I don't blame you, man. I mean, it was broad daylight, but still. That's what happened. Jeez. This was like four or five years ago. All right, Chris really liked that one. Chris is like falling out of his chair for those watching on YouTube right now. YouTube.com slash fantasy sports game.

I'm not sure I had the exact same reaction. The first time I heard was terrifying. It is. Not even Halloween either. That is wild. The thing is like I had, I didn't know, like, I ran back to my apartment and I'm like, why would I run here? This is just leading the maniacal clown back to my family. Like, I didn't know what to do.

Like, the clown came and knocked on our door and my wife answered despite my police for her not to. And it was the neighbor. What? I don't know why the neighbor was dressed up as a clown. That adds a whole other else. him into the story. Like Scott's there begging his wife. Your neighbors are constantly changing. It's not like we were having block parties or anything, but I know what to tell you. It was lucky to make it out of that one. I'm happy you did, Scott. Here today, we need you, we need you on

the pod. We need to answer more questions. So we're going to take a quick break when we get back. Emails here, fantasy baseball today. All right, so let's answer some of your emails. Fantasy Baseball at cbsi.com. That is the letter I. This one's from Elliot, dear Wayne, Derry, and Squirley Dan. This is one that I feel like if I knew it, I would know it.

This is... If you know, you know. It looks like something called Letter Kenny. No idea. Okay. How much... I have friends who are very into that. I've never watched it. No idea. How much do you guys think about, quote, stacking when making your picks as a

draft progresses, as in choosing two batters on the same team that are close in the batting order might mutually benefit from the RBI and runs produced in a single play. I'm guessing Chris has looked up some math on this somewhere on how much of an impact it really has. Of course, this comes to mind because I was able to keep Trey Turner this season, and now I'm wondering if I should be aggressive in getting Freddie Freeman or Mookie Betts in the second round. I also think there may be opportunities later in the draft to stack Yankees or Blue Jays. I had Lindor and J. Ram in 20, 18 and felt like I was constantly experiencing double happiness. Do you find yourself reaching for players in a draft that would give you a stack?

No. No, this feels like more of a fantasy football thing. Well, it's a, the way I would look at it is it potentially increases the like total upside of your team. If, you know, murky bats and Freddie Freeman both have high. you know, high variance or high outcome seasons, you know, but that would also be true if you just had them on your team, you know, like, I think the way it can make more of an impact would be in, obviously DFS is where this concept really comes from, but also weekly leagues. You know, you could have scenarios where you have an especially good week because you have players on the same team who all go off at the same time. However, it shouldn't be more than a tiebreaker. Like, I think. I think Freddie Freeman is fine to draft in the second round. And if you took Freddie Freeman and Mookie Betts at the one-two turn, I think that would be a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

But that's also because I have them ranked that high. It's not because you have Trey turn. So that's, it's a very minor tiebreaker at best. The idea behind it in DFS is your, if that team happens to have a great night, then your team will benefit. But like when you're talking about a full season, the context of a full,

like players are going to end up with the numbers they end up with irrespective of what, yeah. Baseball is kind of weird because it's a team sport, but it's also an individual sport. So every player does what he does independently of what's happening around him. And yeah, there's some with runs in RBI,

there's some, you know, there's some degree of line of context mattering and all of that, but not to a major degree. The biggest thing is those things are already baked into their prices. Right. So in a season-long roto especially, I don't think it really matters at all. Except that it, I guess, slightly increases the chances of like a truly huge outcome for those, for your team, I guess. Now, you brought this up recently, Frank, that you've had times before where you invested in too many Rockies hitters. Right. And so when they were on the road, your whole lineup suffered.

So there may be something to that. Very specific scenario where, you know, that one park where everybody's much worse on the road than they are at home. Or like, you could envision a scenario where, like, The Phillies draw the short straw, and they end up having to face Max Scherzer Jacob de Grom every single time they face the Mets, you know, in all six series that they play against them. But I don't know, even then. You can't anticipate that in the draft. Yeah. Yeah, no, it's a good point that you bring up, Scott, especially in head-to-head leagues with, you know, any kind of weekly scoring. I remember there was one year, I had either two or three Rockies hitters on my team, and it just, you know, when they were on the road, it just completely sank. So I would say keep that in mind when playing in weekly lineups.

You know, too many Rockies could be not a great idea. So it's kind of a slippery slope. Like you don't want to put too much value. Obviously you want to target hitters on good teams. But again, that's baked into their price. Use it as a tiebreaker, but not much more than that. This one's from Andrew in Norwich in the United Kingdom. Hi, boomer, Monkey and LaFonda.

This is. I looked this up and I know what it is now that I looked it up. These are Mark Maron's cats. Mark Maron, the comedian and podcaster. Gotcha. Ends his podcast, WTF, by shouting, Boomer Lives. That's the context in which I understand it. Gotcha.

All right. Love the show. I have a couple of questions. I play in a standard 5x5 Roto League, except it saves plus holds. Should this elevate those relievers in committee situations as if they don't end up being closers, they are likely to pick up holds.

And if so, anyone you'd recommend. Oh, Andrew Hittridge immediately comes to mind. Yeah. That's like two-thirds of bullpens in baseball, basically. It does. It's always worth pointing out that holds are not accumulated as quickly as saves are. The saves leaders are always going to be higher

than the holds leaders. There were only three. Over ten. Only three relievers with 30-plus holds last season. Yeah. It's even worse than saves. So it's not, it's not, they're not equal. When they're combined into one category, that doesn't mean they're equal.

But yeah, I think you're. But it does broaden the pull of potential options. Yes. And because it takes someone like Devin Williams and makes him a good source of holds with the upside to be a great source of saves plus holds, which is what someone like Paul Sewell had last season when he had, what, 11 or 14 saves, something like that. And specifically, I think it elevates the value of the guys who you know are at least

going to factor in the closer role, even if they aren't the true closer. David Bednar, maybe. Giovanni, Giovanni, Gaigos? Yeah, I mean, if he doesn't last, which I think there's a good chance he's just more or less the closer, but if he doesn't last in that role, which is possible as well, then, you know, he'll be getting a lot of holds. The Mariners guys too I mean Ken Giles

Diego Castillo Paul Seawald I think are in that mix A few other names The Marlin situation You know I've seen some Rumbling some whispers recently That they may want to work

Anthony Bender in there So whoever doesn't win the role I guess Flora or Bender They should provide good ratios regardless Not that they're on a wing team or anything I think more often than that Like you want to just in this format you want to target relievers that have lots of strikeouts, good ratios, and are on good teams,

because they're probably going to give you either holds or saves in that scenario. In the saves plus holds league, I think basically what it does is it just makes those elite non-closers more valuable. And it pushes them closer to the elite closers. So, you know, if someone like Devin Williams, you know, if you think he's going to throw 70 elite innings and get 110 strikeouts, you know, he might end up with 10, 15 fewer. saves plus holds than someone like Giovanni Gallegos, who if he stays the closer the whole season, but it dramatically shrinks the gap and value between the two of them. And I think it probably makes the elite closers less value. And a saves plus holds league, you shouldn't see this mad rush

for the handful of sure thing closers that we usually see. All right, he does have a second question. I've been doing my standard draft prep. And as always, I find it easy and interesting to get excited about the top 100, 110 picks. Then I hit a bit of a wall and look at players who are just a bit blah. I tend to find my mind wandering to those deep sleeper slash breakout guys and can find myself getting interested in exciting again. In drafts, I always look at this stretch 110 to 200-ish and just knowing nothing about them and not being excited to take them and making bad choices on the spot or reaching far too

early for my sleeper slash breakout guys. How do you get interested in this tier of players? what do you look for at at this range this isn't the first time i've heard this too i've had some other people tweet in me saying like they look forward to drafting picks 200 rather than like the 150 to 200 right 100% feel that way yeah so what do you so what do you do so the further down in the draft you get the less difference there is between each round like once you hit probably this range. Your chances of any given pick hitting are probably no better than a coin flip.

And you're probably going to drop a decent amount of the guys you draft between 120 and 200 anyway. And so, you know, it's... That's why I've always subscribed to a Stars and Scrubs approach in auction, salary cap drafts, because of precisely that. I mean, you could spend $12 on a guy. that you're likely to drop or you could spend $1 on a guy you're likely to drop, you know?

So I think a lot of it depends on what your team build is. I like taking pitchers in that range personally. You know, my preferred draft strategy is probably two pitchers in the first hundred picks, two or three maybe. And then I start loading up on the higher upside pitchers that I like in that range. Like, you know, Trevor Rogers, if he lasts, Tyler Malley, you know, fill in the blank with your personal. picks, Patrick Sandoval, Alex Cobb.

Yeah. But that's usually just because pitchers are so volatile, and the historical data suggests that there isn't that much difference between like the 60 to 100 range at starting pitcher than the 100 through 140. And so that's generally my approach.

And you all, in our recent mock draft, Chris, you I think you ended up taking like O'Neill Cruz in round 13 and there was somebody that you elevated significantly like that. I can't remember now. We were kind of giving you a hard time about it. I think it was Carasco.

On the YouTube channel. Yeah. Yeah, I think it was. But it's, there comes a point, and I don't know if it's quite there. It may be a little after that for me, but there comes a point where,

you know, just take the guys you want most, you know, particularly if it's high upside guys like that, particularly if it's shallower league like that. and not worry so much about ADP. I mean, you think about ADP because obviously you want to maximize the return from every pick, and you're trying to, like, create this perfect path to the end of the draft

where you get everybody you want at the most optimal place to get them. But what naturally happens as draft season nears opening day is those guys all tend to get elevated because somebody like Chris did in that mock is just like, screw it, I'm going to take him because I want him. Yeah, ADP matters a lot less in the last week of drafts. And this is true in every sport. If you do enough drafts, you'll notice that, you know, most of your first, most of the drafts are pretty predictable.

And you can say, all right, this guy's going to go in this range. Once you get to the last week and everybody's been drafting forever and it's, you know, we tend to draft more of our leagues that actually, that were playing out. That's when you start to see people just like, screw it. I'm not going to play the game and risk missing out on a guy who I really like. I'm just going to go get the guy. And it drives me nuts.

My last few teams I draft are always the ones I feel worst about because people stop following the script. And so I don't want to anticipate anymore. You know, I think there's a philosophical thing where you talk. a lot about how you rank, not just in the order that you think guys will finish, but where you need to take them. Right. So you try to avoid what I did with O'Neo Cruz, where I moved him up to 150, just because that's the range where it's like, okay, I'm going to get O'Neo Cruz. And I like the player and I like the upside. And I'm just going to make him a priority. And so, you know, I think that's a philosophical difference. But once people start going off

script, you know, like the head-to-head league we did last week when, I mean, every single pitcher was drafted seemingly. And like in the first 10 rounds. Yeah. That was where like, we were taking like Dane Dunning at the end of this 12th team. I think I took Patrick Sandoval on like the 10th or 12th round or something, which is way before his ADP suggests. But, you know, there also has to be that flexibility.

So, you know, it also depends on how the draft is going. All right. This next one is from Ben. Chris, Robert, Chris, and Mark. Those are Marvel. It's in my second grade class, I don't know. Marvel superhero actors? Are those?

Yeah, that's the Avengers, the OG original four. Big four, I guess. Head to Head League, five by five with OBP instead of average. Twelve teams, we keep five each with no cost. So assume top 60 and 80p will be kept. My keepers are Trout,

Bichette, Corbyn Burns, Paul Gulchman, should my fifth keeper be Salvador Perez or Josh Hater? I'm scared to keep a catcher because I've kept Sanchez in Rio Muto in 2018 and 2019, and both times have gotten burned. Did Rio Muto burn you in 2020? He was 2019. He was like a high 700s OPS bet. So, you know, I guess. Like, Salvador Perez was obviously better than.

So in 2020, in 2020, JT. Real Muto had an 840 Ops. It was a career high 840 OPS. So I don't know. Yeah. I don't know why he's saying he got burned keeping Rio Muto in 2019. But, but I mean, like, Perez is, Perez is in a different class than Rio Muto was then or Sanchez was the year before. Like, they may have been the top ranked catcher going into the next season because somebody had to be.

But, like, Salvador Perez is just so far ahead. of the crowd. We all have Sal above Goldschmidt, right? Yeah. I think so. I definitely do. It's an OBP league. So it's worth mentioning Salvador Perez

does lose value in this format. That does hurt Sal a little bit, but there aren't that many catchers who are helpful in OVP, so I'm not sure it changes. But yeah, he is a legitimately bad OVP guy. He might,

I mean, he was above 300 OBP last year, right? Yeah. Yeah, but not. I think it was like around 320. Yeah. It was. 3.

16. There you go. Not great. But yeah, go with Salvador Perez. This next one is from Nick. In a 10-team head-to-head points league with daily lineups.

If you think the calf is healed, is it fair to consider Mike Trout over guys like Vlad and Jose Ramirez? 10-team heads-head points, daily lineups. I can't confidently say Trout will be worse than those guys. No, he feels riskier. but he's been the best hitter in baseball for the last decade when he's been playing.

So, you know, and when you're talking about a points league where it doesn't really matter if the guy gives you steals, then it's easier to justify Trout over Ramirez in that case. So look, if you're really confident, if you're really not going to, if you're not that worried about Trout's health, then it's fine to do this. but I feel like you need to have a little bit of concern there. Yeah. I mean, like, if you guaranteed every player was going to play 162 games, Mike Trout might just be the number one pick. He's still like that good of a hitter.

Especially in a point. Yeah, especially in a point. But, you know, like Scott said, there's risk. And obviously there's risk for everyone. But Ramirez in particular has not had many injury issues. Vlad has had a couple over the course of the three. years he's been in the major so I don't want to say there's no injury risk there so I just yeah I don't know if you have to take trout over those guys and in a

10 team league like he might just be there in the second round hmm not late in the second but he could fall to like 15 depending on where you're picking it's possible it possible just give me a name for the second question in round two which injury risk are you most eager to draft Ronald de Cunia Jacob deGriac Shane Bieber. I have a Cooney ranked highest of them, so Ronald Cunia. Even in a points league?

Points league. Even in a points league. DeGrom might be ahead of him in a points league. Yeah, well, I mean, that's... I think I do have DeGrom ranked ahead of Bieber, but he says eager to draft, so I'll say Bieber. All right. This was from Anthony, dear Johann, Francisco, Brad, and Jim.

Those are pitchers from the mid-2000s. twins. Santano. Were they all starters? Francisco Liriano. Liriano. Brad Radke. Brad Radke.

Was he on that era? Jim? I think he was around that still. Jim something. I don't know. Are you at all concerned about players like Trevor Story, Carl's Korea, etc., who remain unsigned in terms

of slow starts this season? Would this be any reason to drop them in the rankings? Do you feel differently about starting pitchers who remain unsigned? Well, all the big starting pitchers have been signed now. Right. I think, like Michael Panetta is still out there, but nobody were that interested in fantasy.

Zach Grinky was the last one. So, I, you know, I don't think I worry about them anymore than any other pitcher who's basically getting three weeks to ramp up since they have signed. Players who haven't signed at all yet, like the longer it takes them to sign, the more concerned I'm going to be. but I don't think we're there yet

I mean by the end of this weekend they may have all signed yeah I was I've heard some whispers about Trevor Story's elbow apparently dealt with an elbow injury last year and some people being worried about that so I don't know maybe teams are worried as well I'm looking up the

mid to late 2000s Minnesota Twins pitchers and I was reminded of a fantastic baseball name Boof Bonzer Boof Bonzer Long live Boof Bonzer I can't figure out who Jim was though Jim Yeah I don't know

All right It was Brad Radkey Hey we got a little Scott White Junior there on the broadcast Yes we do Let's uh we'll hit one more And then we'll get out of here

That's something very important to get into me A piece of paper he found on his bedroom floor Is it another drawing of Freddie Freeman No it's not That was not his drawing. That was the other one's drawing. This one's from Scott Wolf. Hey guys, real quick, I have the number four pick in my draft.

Head to head categories, OBP instead of batting average. And my plan was to take Jose Ramirez if he's available. But I just noticed Mookie Betts has second base eligibility on Yahoo. Would you take a dual eligible Mookie over Ramirez? Or is that getting too cute? I would take Ramirez. Too cute. Second base isn't that bad.

I agree. It might be closer for Chris. Chris, I know you're very excited about Betts. I think Wiki Betts are going to have a big bounce back season, and OBP helps, certainly. But no, I think I would still take Ramirez all over him. All right. We are sweeping the floor. Jose Ramirez across the board for Scott and Chris.

I am Frank. Thank you all for listening and watching this mailbag edition of Fantasy Baseball today. We'll be back again on Monday. Bye-bye.