Fantasy Baseball Today - 🚨MLB & The Players Agree to New CBA! Baseball is Back! - Emergency Podcast (3/10 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 10, 2022

Join our FBT March Madness Bracket for a chance to join our listener leagues- cbssports.com/FBTbrackets MLB and the players have agreed to a new CBA and baseball is back! What are our initial reactions (1:10)? ... What does this mean for prospects and universal DH candidates (3:15)? ... How early should you draft Ronald Acuña (12:15)? ... What effect might this have on starting pitchers (17:17)? '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

Now here's Frank Scott and Chris. Finally, baseball is back. Welcome in. Let's go! Welcome in to an emergency edition of Fantasy Baseball today. The most glorious emergency edition of the podcast, Thursday, March 10th. I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White and Chris Towers after 99 days of a lockout between Major League Baseball and the Players Association.

They have reached an agreement, and baseball will be played in 2020. Opening day scheduled for April 7th, training camps open this Sunday. Spring training games will start either on March 17th or March 18th, and we're recording this around 4.25 p.m. Eastern Time on Thursday. Free agency could start within hours. So make sure that you are subscribed to the YouTube channel, Download, follow wherever you listen to podcast because I have a feeling a lot of emergency podcasts are coming your way very soon. Scott, your initial reaction. Baseball is back.

It's good. My reaction is positive. We're going to get a full season in, which seemed like a ship that had sailed twice previously, but it has not. April 7th, that's only a week later than we were expecting to get the start time. In the end, this is, like, when all of a sudden done, this is just going to feel like a bad dream, right? Because we're going to have a full season. It's going to start more or less on time. And, yeah, it should be a lot of fun. It'll be a quick ramp up to fantasy. I know we've all drafted some teams already.

Some of our biggest drafts have already happened, TOW wars, TGFBI. I know, Frank, your Tau Wars draft hasn't happened yet. Has not. But there's still a lot of drafts we're going to fit in in a short. short period of time. I know everybody listening. The majority of them probably haven't had their drafts at all yet because most people wait till the last minute to do theirs. So you're, you're going to get a deluge of information and content in the four weeks, I guess, leading up to opening day. Yeah. And this is exactly why we told people to stick with us, because we knew that

once a season was announced that there was going to be this quick ramp up and that you needed to stay ready, right? Like now, I mean, people who may have, you know, tune fantasy baseball out, they're going to fall behind a little bit. So, uh, happy for everyone who stuck with us here. And I think people are probably wondering, you know, what do I do with my draft? I think if you were scheduled for late March, probably just stick with it. I mean, you know, if you can get it closer to that opening day date, which again is Thursday, April 7th, I would encourage you to do that because the more information we have, it can only be beneficial for you as a fantasy drafter. We still need to learn more about Jacob de Grom, Ronald de Cunia, and hopefully we see these guys

in spring training quite soon within the next week even. Chris, let's talk about some of those takeaways when it comes to fantasy baseball, obviously here. And let's talk about maybe the potential winners in this agreement. And obviously the Universal D.H, we spoke about that a couple of weeks ago. There are a few names that stand out there. But prospects, and I'm really interested to see what happens here, do you think that we actually see a change? Because Apparently, teams are incentivized into calling up their top prospects sooner rather than later. That was a huge, you know, part of this CBA. Do you think that we can maybe see guys like Bobby Witt and Adley Rutchman and the Tigers guys,

Spencer Torkelson, Riley Green up on opening day? Because that could be massive. I mean, we're four minutes into the podcast. I wanted to keep things positive. I feel like those guys are winners, potentially. My understanding of the carrots and sticks in. involved with regards to service time manipulation are that they're very, very limited. Basically, the biggest disincentive to leave a top prospect down is that if they finish in the

top two in rookie year voting, no matter when they are called up, they gain a full year of service time. And then there's also the carrot part where if teams call up their top prospects on opening day and they finish high and work in the year voting and MVP voting and Scy Young voting throughout the first three years of their career. The teams will get a bonus draft pick. So those, there are incentives and disincentives. I don't, I don't think they're particularly strong, but incentives and disincentives, given that it's only two players that it would affect in any given season at most, or four, I guess. So, like, if teams wanted to keep Spencer Torr, the Tigers wanted to keep Spencer Torkelson down.

I don't think this is going to change it. That being said, I like to believe that the people who run baseball teams are capable of feeling some amount of shame. And I feel like trying to do the, gosh, you know, I know Adley Rushman is considered one of the best college baseball players in the last decade and was considered potentially major league ready when we drafted him and has, you know, an 80 grade major grade. makeup and defense and everything, but I think he just needs like two, maybe 11 days more work in the minors. Like, I feel like doing that after this protracted battle would probably look really bad. And so I'm putting my faith in the ability of Major League Baseball owners to feel some semblance of shame.

So I will say it is more likely right now than it has been in years past for the top prospects to be called up. And especially because most of the guys we're talking about, it's not like Joe Adele three years ago, where he had gotten to AA and played like 30 games. We're like, ah, he could get called up. These are all like Torkelson,

Julio Rodriguez, Bobby Witt, Adley Rushman. Did Riley Green? Yeah, Riley Green played in AAA? Yeah. The Holyo Rodriguez didn't for what it's worth. I thought he did get to triple up. No, he got to double A. All right, so maybe we don't include him, but, you know, possibly.

Yeah. But for the most part, these guys all got to the high miners, spent most of last season in the high miners, and excel at AAA. I mean, Bobby Witt, Adley Rushman, these guys were awesome at AAA. So the idea that they need more time, I think we all know it's pretty silly.

Well, it's hard to tell in a lot of cases what readiness actually looks like. But there's no, like, meter of readiness that they can fill up. I know. But internally, I do believe teams have a better gauge of us than us on the out of it than us on the outs. Yes, they do. We all seem sure Jared Kellnick was ready and it was clear he wasn't. Sure, but I don't think like an extra four weeks in AAA was going to be the difference there.

I mean, it might have been, but I just don't, I don't think that's how it works. You are willing to give them more of a benefit of the doubt than I am. Yeah. I think they are primarily motivated by the very obvious advantage. and incentives that they have to keep guys down. Those incentives are slightly muted. So hopefully, teams will make the decision to call up their most talented players.

Let's hope so, because again, lots of talent on the way. Bobby Witt, as I mentioned, but he's not the only one for the Royals. MJ Melendez, Nick Prado, they're coming soon. Adlead Ruchman, Casher with the Baltimore Orioles. Mention the Tigers guys, Spencer Torkelson, Riley Green. We could see those names sooner rather than later. And you know what? Whether or not they're on the opening day roster

could be determined by what they do in spring training. Not that that should matter all that much, but if... Well, it's less about what they do than what they show, I would say. If they look comfortable, you know. They convince the team that they're ready. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Obviously, you know, we spoke about this probably like a month ago now. We did a podcast about it when it was announced,

but the Universal DH has been confirmed. There will be a designated hitter in the National League. And, Scott, let's just quickly run through, I guess, some of the biggest winners there. I mean, Darren Ruff is someone. we've talked more about recently having value with the San Francisco Giants. There's a multitude of Mets players, Dominic Smith, J.D. Davis, Robinson Canoe. Looks like he'll be in the mix there.

Marcel O'Suna, he was likely going to play anyway, but I think he's projected to be the D.H. Seth Beer with the Diamondbacks. Those are some names. Anyone else that comes to mind, Scott, that could benefit here with the Universal DH. Yeah, so I'm definitely interested in how it shakes out for the Mets because Dominic Smith, Robinson, Canoe, and J.D. Davis, all three have shown the potential to be impactful in fantasy. What kind of timeshare happens there? How much does Robinson Canoe end up playing the field? How much does Dominic Smith end up playing the field, for that matter? When they had Universal D.H. in 2020, I believe Dominic Smith actually played more first base than Pete Alonzo did. Alonzo spent a lot of time at DH.

so that could happen again, which would obviously give the edge to Smith over a couple of those others. But I see them all as deep sleepers, and I'm invested in each of them in some of my deeper leagues. You mentioned Aaron Ruff. Yeah, I think that's a good one. Lars Nubar for the Cardinals, he bats left-handed.

There's also a guy who we haven't seen in the majors yet, Juan Yuppez, who bats right-handed. So either of them could emerge as the DH for the, the Cardinals, maybe it starts out as a platoon. Tyrone Taylor of the Brewers, I don't know if it'll be him exactly that plays DH, but just by having that extra lineup spot open, maybe another outfielder moves to DH for them,

and Tyrone Taylor, who showed the potential, I think maybe for 20 Homer's 10 steals, maybe even 25, 15, if he was an everyday player. I think he is an interesting sleeper. And basically every catcher in the NL could end, up going probably not probably not getting quite the playing time

Salvador Perez got playing 161 games for the Royals last year but Will Smith Wilson Contreras given that the Cubs don't have a lot of hitters yeah I could see them playing more than they ever have before

beyond that it's hard to go too deep into it because so many players are so unsigned right including the quintessential DH, Nelson Cruz. That's, I think, I think the free agents are potentially the biggest winners because collectively it opens up

15 new hitter jobs. Now, this was expected to happen, and obviously some teams have guys already there. I don't think the Mets are likely to sign Nelson Cruz, for one. But actually, the Mets have been linked to or rumored to be interested in adding another bat, so we'll see. But I think it opens up the free agent market more for the guys who are remaining,

Nicastiano's Nelson Cruz, a handful of others. I think it's good news for utility types. You know, a Luis Erius, Chris Taylor, those guys were going to play every day anyway, most likely. But I think it makes it all but certain that they're going to be in the lineup somewhere every day, if there were any questions about that. So I think that's good news. I'll also throw out Garrett Cooper. That dude hits the ball really well.

Yep. He's had injury issues, but he's a potential, like, decent batting average 20 to 25 homer guy. Yeah. So I like him. Lewin-Diaz came on strong for the Marlins late last year and is a first baseman like Jesus Aguilar is. So he could factor in that mix as well. He's somebody who I'd look into in especially deeply. Chris, obviously there's a lot that still needs to happen with free agency

and we're going to get a lot more information about players returning from injury and what they look like, what their velocity looks like, Jacob de Grom, most notably, Shane Bieber, we're going to be following very closely. Ronald de Cunia, let's have this conversation. We now know that April 7th is going to be opening day and all along, you know, the further the season gets pushed back, the more it helps someone like Ronald de Cunia who's returning from ACL surgery that he had last season. Apparently he was targeting May as a return date.

We will learn more, but knowing what we know right now, how do you handle players like Ronald Acuna and Jacob O'Grum? I mean, it's not, I think DeGrom and Acuna are in different categories, because Acuna is, like, I think Acuna is more in the, you know, potentially Max Muncie category, where it's mostly just like I want to see them and see them look good. And once that happens, I'm pretty much bought in. I guess this isn't the best case snare,

for Ronald Acuna. You know, the best case scenario would have been MLB's deadlines being real and, you know, them not being able

to play until the 14th or, you know, some of the conspiracy theories about MLB teams not really caring about playing games in April, you know,

that would have been better for Ronald Acuna, but if you look at the timetable, you know, he tore his ACL on July 10th. So April 10th would put him,

January, February, March, April, that would put him nine months out. I was looking at like Andrew McCutcheon, who an outfielder towards ACL at a similar point in the season. I think he was playing nine months later. I think nine months is a reasonable timetable. It's the shorter end of the timetable, but it absolutely would not be out of the question for Ron O'Cun to be playing on opening day or right around there.

We'll know more or less, I think, in the coming weeks. You know, I think within a week, we should know with a high degree of, a certainty whether Ronald Acuna is going to play. We haven't got an update on Acuna beyond just, here's a video of him hitting. We haven't gotten an update on him since November, right, when Acuna himself said he was aiming for May. Yeah. So I'm not sure, like, if that still holds, if Acuna's timetable from then still holds, I'm

not sure we will see him in spring training. Yeah. I think spring training is happening too early. Oh, if I think the timetable has changed since November and that would be great. But I stand by my original position where I need to see him playing in spring training games before I invest a first round pick in Ronald de Cunia because the possibility of a setback if he's not already to the point of playing in games is just too high for me.

Scott, let me give you two different scenarios here regarding Ronald Cunia. Let's say he does not play in spring training at all, and we learn that he will not be ready for the start of the season. He will start on the IL. Where do you feel comfortable drafting Ronald Cunia if that is the case? Where I haven't ranked right now, which is like middle of round two. So I think that has him behind like Luis Robert in five-by-five leagues. Maybe just ahead, either just behind or just ahead of Luis Robert.

Chris, let me give you the other scenario. Let's say that Ronald LeCunia is progressing well. He looks really good in spring camp, and they decide to play him in games, and they announce that he will be ready for opening day. How early are you taking Ronald de Cunia if that's the case? No later than, I would say no later than eighth overall. I think probably, I think you could make an argument for him ahead of Boba Chette.

It's harder with that kind of big five of Fernando Tati, Swan Soto, Trey Turner, Vladimir Guerrero, Jose Ramirez, just because while he is as good as any of them when he's right, there is just enough doubt that, you know, either he suffers a setback early on, or that, you know, like Dalvin Cook a couple years ago in the NFL, he came back from the Torn ACL, missed a lot of that first season with hamstring injuries. You know, that kind of thing could happen. So I think there's just enough concern there and also concerned about whether he'll run as much that I think you probably put him just outside of that top tier.

Yeah, I think it would become, for me, a top six. I think it would be those top five hitters and then either Cunia's on the back end of it or if he really looks good and maybe he's pushing towards the top of that top six. But again, we will learn more. You're saying if you actually see him in games and they say he'll be ready for opening day, that was the scenario.

Yeah, I think you would be part of that top six. What do you think, Scott? Looking at my dollar values, I have that top five at 39 or higher. It's basically Ramirez at 39 and everyone else at 41 in kind of a four-way tie for first. So I think like then Boba Shet at 36

and Mike Trout and Mookie Betts also at 36. so I think it would be like Ronald Acuna 38 or something like that. Yep, I think that makes plenty of sense. Scott, we were talking beforehand, and it's really hard to say what the effect of this will be. We won't really know until the season starts, obviously, but I don't want to be doom and gloom, but I'm a little bit worried about the ramp up period here

and how quickly it's going to happen, specifically for pitchers, right? So spring training games looking like they're going to start a week from today, March 17. March 18th. That gives us about two weeks worth of spring training games before we get to opening day. Does that worry you about the readiness of starting pitchers early in the season?

Not really. I mean, we just dealt with this two years ago. I don't know if everybody's already memory hold two years ago. It wasn't that long ago, guys, where we had a very similar ramp-up period. And it was like the stakes were higher because we were only dealing with a single. 60 game season then.

So if it took pitchers too long to build up to their usual workload, you know, the season could be mostly over by the time they did. That's not going to be the case this time around. And it ended up being not that big of a deal. It was a big deal in a couple of scattered, you know, in just a few scattered cases like Walker Bueller. I don't think he ever ended up making a six-inning start during the 60 game season. But for the most part, pitchers got back to where we're used to.

to seeing them very quickly. Now, there is a longer-term concern that because it's a full six-month season instead of just 60-game season, that maybe in ramping up the process quicker and in an unconventional way, we see an increase in pitching injuries, that seems probable.

I don't know to what degree the injuries will increase, and I certainly am not in a position to pick out which, which pitchers will be injured because of it. I don't think anyone can. I don't really see much practical advice I could give on that based on that concern. It's just another risk factor,

but I don't know. Not one that I'm going to put much stock in, I guess. Yeah, Chris, I'll give you the final word here when it comes to starting pitchers. Do you have any concern? Again, I agree with what Scott's saying. It's really hard to know. which pitchers this would affect, if any, until it actually happens, right?

Unfortunately, like, if something were to happen to a pitcher, you can kind of point to, all right, well, maybe the ramp up was too quick. But are there any pitchers that stand out to you, maybe some younger starting pitchers or starting pitchers with workload concerns that you might be worried about early on in the season? No, I don't really think there's any utility in trying to identify either specific types of pitchers or classes of pitchers. I think it's entirely possible that you could do. the research and look into 2020 and try to find risks, but even there, it's a one-season

sample size. So you're not really going to get much from that. You could look at pitchers who signed late or didn't arrive at spring training on time due to visa issues, which is something that happens often or something like that. But I generally think you probably just treat the pitching pool the same. And if anything, if you know, Michael Kopex in the rotation at the start of the season, but he's only making four and five innings starts for the first month.

That probably means he's going to be in the rotation a little longer, you know, because they don't have quite, you know, the, the innings will be lower in the beginning of the season in a way that might allow him to pitch deeper. So I don't think there's really all that much value in trying to identify which one,

who might be impacted, you know, it. Like you said, afterwards, there are going to be injuries, and maybe there will be more injuries than normal in April, and we'll be able to say, yeah, you know, that quick ramp up. And especially just how weird the past three seasons have been and what the cumulative effect might be in the fact that they did almost a full spring training in 2020, then had to stop for three months, then did a short spring training, pitched 60 games, pitched a full regular season last year, and now they're dealing with this. Like, there could be some heightened.

effects of that for sure. But I can't tell you that it's more likely impact Corbyn Burns versus Zach Wheeler or anything like that. I don't think anybody could. Yep. Scott, shield your eyes, maybe take your headphones off. People in the chat are saying that Freddie Freeman has signed with the New York Yankees. That is not true. That is not true. I want to reiterate that. Oh my goodness. And I will use this time to let everyone know that watch out for people on Twitter today because there's going to be a lot of fake breaking news and make sure that you're following the right people. I will end with this. I am disappointed. My heart sank,

Frank, when you said. I am, Frank. I'm disappointed that you didn't ask me about the status of my Skull Toon NFTs. Oh, poor Jeff Passon, man, getting hacked on the biggest day, potentially of his career, man. That was just ridiculous. That was rough to see. I will end with this, though. Brendan, I don't know how to pronounce his last name. It's K-U-T-Y. It's either Cuddy or Q-D. He is a reporter for NJ.com. and the star ledger covers the Yankees. He says that according to sources, Yankees expected to engage with star Freddie Freeman with free agency set to start ASAP.

Quote, still on the table is what I'm told. And I'm sure he'll hear this about many free agents. I'm sure Freddie Freeman will talk with the Braves, or at least he should, because it would be awesome to see him, you know, spend his entire career with the Braves. But ultimately, lots of info, lots of free agency things coming soon.

Again, baseball is back. Opening day, April 7th, training camps open this Sunday. Spring training games will start either March 17th or March 18th. And we're hyped! Baseball is back. We're going to wrap there. I may have hurt my ankle during my celebration at the beginning of the show. For Scott and Chris, I am Frank.

Thank you all for listening and watching this emergency edition of Fantasy Baseball today. We'll be back when there's more breaking news. Bye bye