Fantasy Baseball Today - NFBC Roster Construction & Draft Strategy w/ Jenny Butler! (12/30 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: December 30, 2021

Welcome to the show... Jenny Butler (1:10)! ... What are the first things to look at when it comes to roster construction (8:55)? ... How do you find positional targets and then backup plans (13:36)? How does Jenny create her roadmap when it comes to draft strategy (20:20)? ... Let's try and create a balanced roster with an early pick in the first round (31:30). ... What is our draft strategy with a mid-first round pick (40:43)? ... How do we build a team from the back of the first round (51:32)? ... We wrap up by using Steamer600 projections to find undervalued and overvalued players (58:12). '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. I drive. Center field. What is magnificent? Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy becomes reality.

Now here's Frank Scott, Chris and Adam. What's up, everybody, and welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today on Thursday, December 30th. I am Frank Stample. Scott White is back next week. and I want to wish everybody a happy and healthy new year. Don't do anything that I wouldn't do. But seriously, be careful, drink responsibly. Fun show plan for you.

High-stakes NFBC players out there. Don't be intimidated if you aren't a high-stakes player. I think a lot of what we're going to talk about is applicable for home leagues as well. What exactly are we talking about roster construction? More on the game theory side of things. Not as much diving into the players here today. Draft strategies.

We'll talk about really that side of family. Fantasy Baseball and kind of looking at things more so from a macro point of view. Who are we talking with? First time, long time. An accomplished high stakes fantasy baseball player, she has an amazing article in the FTN, Five Tool Fantasy Baseball Draft Guide, where she breaks down NFBC roster construction.

Very happy to have on today. Jenny Butler, how you doing, Jenny? I'm good. How are you? I got to tell you, this is so surreal because this is the podcast that I listened to first, and, you know, this was the OG. So I'm, this is a, I'm so honored to be a part of it. I've heard that from so many of the guests recently. And it never gets old. I love hearing it, too,

because I am one of you. You know, I started listening to this podcast. It's the first fantasy baseball podcast. I listened to. I've been listening to it since I was in college, which sounds crazy, right? And now I'm here, fill the shoes of the great Adam Azer. It, you know, it was no easy task. And it's still no easy task. You know, I'm still trying to live up to, uh, to the bar that he said. because let's be honest, Adam Azor is the man, and I truly do believe that he is the best fantasy host in the industry. But it's really fun to have people on and hear that.

You're not kidding. You know, I said first time, long time. OG, you've been listening to this for a while. And what was so awesome when I asked you to come on the podcast, you said that you were in the original for the people podcast listeners league, which had Heath Cummings in it at the time when he first joined the fantasy baseball today podcast, Al Melchior in that league.

We were talking beforehand. That is so awesome. The fact that you were in that league and now you're on this podcast as well. I know. That's part of what makes this so funny. I remember when Heath started and they had their original podcast league

and then he wanted to do something different and he just sort of like went out on his own and asked for entries. And I just basically wrote in a couple sentences that said like, please let me. I promise I'll try my best, you know, that kind of thing. And I, you know, I'm listening to the pod and the car on my way to work.

And then I hear him read my name. And it was just like, what? Are you kidding me? So I nearly wrecked my car. But I, you know, got to work and check my email and I had an invite for it. And it was so much fun. Like it, those two, Al and Heath were in it and also Chris Towers and Scott and Adam and we had, you know, the 16 teams. And it was a great group of people.

You know, the original song creator, Doc Cros, was also in that league. And he does the great Kokomo song. I love that song. He does so many good songs. you get to play some of his other ones at some point here in off season. But yeah, I mean, that league was great. And Al, we kept it going afterwards. And Al will stay on as the commissioner after he left CBS. And they're still going. I dropped out a couple of years ago. I had to do some downsizing of leagues. I couldn't keep up with everything. But they are from what I understand.

They're still going. And it's a great group of people. Yeah. No, that is, that's awesome to hear. Doc Cross, it's a funny story, by the way. I met him for the first time. We played on a soft football team this past fall. It was me. It was Chris. It was Doc. We had Nick Pollack from Pitcher List. We had Adam Rohnis from, I don't want to say, I don't know exactly where he's from. Let me pull it up because I don't want to say the wrong thing. But we had a bunch of people from the industry and a bunch of my friends that I grew up with. Adam Ronis is, of course, from Fantasy Alarm. A little mind fart there. But yeah, it was, it was a lot of fun. You know, Ellen Adair would come out and watch us play and cheer us on and Ruta Sonsa. It was great time. Doc is an awesome

dude, and this seems like as good a time as ever to reveal, I guess reveal, that he may or may not be working on an updated version of Kokomo Friday that includes me in the lyrics. So, hopefully we get that before the season starts. We'll see. I'll check it on Doc and see where he's at with that. But Jenny, I could tell we were talking beforehand. She's a humble player. She's a great fantasy baseball player. Like we're talking about in the high stakes arena, going up against the best and dominating. And, you know, And you play very well. And, you know, I've, I've been on other podcasts with Deadpool hitter, Rob DiPiatro.

And I know that you guys have, like, tag team some leaks together. So you, I thought were as good as anyone to have on here to talk about this specific subject, roster construction, specifically in the NFBC. And when it comes to the high stakes arena as well, more on your background. I want to hear more about you. What is the day-to-day life of Jenny Butler when she's not dominating people in fantasy baseball? Well, I'm a chemist. by profession. I work in the national security field. I spend most of my time right now. I train

soldiers on how to run their chemical agent detection equipment. So I go, I travel a lot. Pre-COVID I traveled a lot. And hopefully I'm about to start again, traveling to different bases around the country and training the soldiers on their equipment, which is fun. But then I also spend a lot of time writing procedures and instructions, things like that. But I love being in the lab. Being in the lab is what I hope to do more often. And so that's really what I enjoy. But, you know, then I spend my evenings looking at fantasy baseball because I have a regular nine to five job and it's, it can be very demanding at time. So I have to squeeze in every minute where I can to try and get the fantasy baseball working because as you and I'm sure all your listeners know,

it's the time spent really translates to success. You really have to put in the time every week, not take weeks off and take fad periods off and things like that. So especially in the NFBC with the, you know, the amount of money that we all invest to do it, you really have to be on top of it all the time. Wow. All right. So, you know, I thought I had a semi-important job here, but Jenny's out here, you know, chemists, training soldiers, how to use all different kinds of things. Wow, that is, that is awesome. And I asked you beforehand, but I'll ask you anyway, how realistic is Breaking Bad? You might get this question every now and then.

Obviously, you're a chemist. It's my favorite show. Obviously, you know, I haven't watched a lot of television. I haven't seen a lot of movies, but I have seen Breaking Bad. Chemistry teacher, he goes on the run, he has cancer, he's trying to make money for his family. He creates a meth lab inside of like a Winnebago. How realistic is that? I mean, I don't know the recipe for making meth.

But I mean, people seem to do it in crazy locations. So I guess it's doable. I have said, you know, I live in Ohio. I live in, unfortunately, kind of an area where meth is prevalent. And, you know, one thing I've always said is, you know, I can't believe that people ingest something that was made by some guy in a trailer or in his basement. You know, I wouldn't ingest anything that I made.

and I know how, you know, I know I could probably do it. And so I wouldn't even take anything that I created. So, I mean, I know enough of synthetic chemistry to know that, like, if you're not doing it right, there's a lot of byproducts and things that are going to be in there that I wouldn't want to put in my body. So I can't imagine. But, yeah, I mean, I guess somebody could do it. I haven't seen you know, though. I'm going to lose some, I'm going to lose some fans on that one.

but I don't watch much fictional television. I do want to see it though. Your recommendation goes a long way. So if you haven't seen a lot, but if that's your favorite show, I need to get back into it. Yeah, it is amazing. It is amazing.

So I would recommend definitely for anyone who hasn't seen Breaking Bad. And even if you started it, yes, it starts kind of slow, but it's more about the journey where it starts to where it ends. So I definitely recommend watching Breaking Bad for anyone who hasn't.

You said that you're going to lose followers. Jenny, hopefully that's not the case. People should be following you. Follow her on Twitter at Jenny Butler 830. Let's jump right in and just start off with roster construction in general. And again, you wrote this awesome article. It's in the FTN Fantasy Baseball draft guide. I encourage everyone to go check it out.

And just when it comes to roster construction, the first thing you talk about basically is just evaluating the player pool and understanding position scarcity, which it seems easier said than done. I mean, on top of that, knowing what position provides statistically, right? So you give the example where, look, first base, more often than not, you're going to get some power.

You should be able to get some decent batting average. You're not really going to get many steals. You know, outside of the pole, Goldschmidt, there's really, I don't know, Freddie Freeman will chip in, you know, six to eight steals, something like that. But you just, these are just things that you need to know from the top down. Because as we'll talk about through the rest of this podcast, when you're creating your draft strategy, you need to know what positions can I get at what part of the draft and what are they providing me statistically?

so that you can ultimately create that draft strategy. So if you can, talk more about that. Yeah. So, I mean, I've gotten more into roster construction in the last few years because I'm not somebody. I tried in the first few years that I was playing in the high stakes leagues to try and do player evaluation and do my own sort of, you know, scouting on players.

And I spent a lot of time and effort and it just wasn't getting me anywhere. I wasn't getting, I wasn't any better than anybody, the next person over. So I think the way that I can differentiate myself and try to gain an advantage is by, you know, looking more into the game theory and the roster construction side of things. And that's the part that I enjoy the most anyway. So I take, you know, the player evaluation almost entirely out of it on my end. I go with projections that are provided to me. I use Seamer or ATC or the bat or Masters ball. And I work with those as the starting point.

and the way that if you're just going to use projections that everybody else has, you have to find ways to take advantage that other people aren't using. So the way that I was thinking about doing it is just trying to map out the draft as best as I could. So, you know, when you're looking at position scarcity, you know, it's real easy to say, you know, third base is shallow. Everybody says that. Third base is shallow. Well, you need to get maybe a little bit more in depth than that.

So, you know, maybe there are some third baseman right at the top that you like. Then maybe there's a pocket, you know, in the six, seven, eight round that are also kind of interesting. Then maybe there are some late flyers that you can take. And you need to sort of look at each position and the ebbs and flows of what that position has to offer so that you know that if I don't get one of my very top targets, then there are these other places that I can fall back on. And when I do need to do that, what does that mean for the other positions and how I need to draft those other positions? So, like, you know, if I know that I'm going to have to go with a second tier, third baseman, well, what stats is that going to provide me? And then what, where do I make up for that? Like, what do I need to make sure I get at the beginning?

What do I need to make sure I get at the end in order to account for the little downgrade that I'm going to get by taking a second tier third basement? Yeah, and I thought what was so interesting there, what you mentioned is, you know, just having basically a plan, you know, knowing what your top target is at each position, a backup plan. And I talked about this on the previous podcast. We had Ariel Cohen on who actually does the ATC projections. He does a fantastic job. We had Ian Conn on who is seriously, like one of the best fantasy baseball players that I've ever interacted with. And I told them that when I'm creating my salary cap strategy, my auction draft strategy, I basically choose a player that I want to target at that position. One or two players that I think project similarly and then I'll have a backup plan and maybe I'll have another backup plan, an A, B, and a C, and players that, you know that obviously the further you get into the draft

or the less money you spend on a player in an auction that they're not going to give you the same level of production, but something similar, you know, like, okay, I know, let's just use Anthony Rendon, for example. We're talking about the third base position. some people think that it shall. He's the last of the top, you know, nine third baseman that I want as a starter on my team. If I miss out on him,

who is a player later on that could provide something similar? Justin Turner, right? Justin Turner, you know, probably not going to do something far off from what Anthony Rendon would do if he's healthy. So I thought that was really interesting in your article as well. So talk more about that. The having a target, someone, the last person you feel comfortable drafting at that as your starter,

and then how you kind of use that to create targets for your corner infield, your middle infield spots, maybe, you know, your fifth, sixth, seventh outfielders as well. Yeah. So I, in the draft guide, I put, I put in there my, the little table that I make every year. And I put in there the one from 2021 because I haven't totally worked out, you know, the, map for 2022 yet. But, you know, the way that I do it is to sort of, you know, have three columns, one with the starting pitching and closers, second column with infielders, and the third column with outfielders. And so I map out, I physically write in there where the last, you know, for instance, shortstop

is that I feel comfortable taking as my starter and see how the different positions sort of line up with each other because often you can have a situation where you say like, oh, I know that I like some late second basement. And I know that I like waiting on outfield a little bit. And I know that I don't want to pay up for closer, but then you get to rounds 10 through 15 and you need to get all of those things that you waited on all at the same time. You know, maybe the closure that you're targeting, the late closer that you're targeting, is going in the same places, those sleeper second basement that you think you have.

And you need to sort of see ahead of time how all of those things line up with each other and think ahead of time, well, if these are all going at the same time, I need to create a preference in my head. I need to know that this is going to happen so that I know that, well, really, I don't need to wait on second basement. I really want to wait on a slight closer. So maybe I would jump up the second basement that I want a round or two. Or maybe I think, well, I even like a couple of second basemen even later than that. So I can wait even a little longer.

The thing that you run into when you're looking at sort of the last place that you want certain positions, is that you need to, if you have specific targets, like last year, I liked Semyon and I like Dansby Swanson as my last short stops that I was comfortable taking as my starter. But I think their ADP was around 100 late in March last year. So I wanted to make sure that I got them because if you wait and then you don't get the people that you want, you're really going to be in trouble. So I jumped them up around or so and drafted them in the sixth or seventh. round just to make sure that I got them and I wasn't left scrambling.

All right. So you're doing all of that for the players that you want, the players you want to target. Do you do something similar to figure out which players you want to avoid? Obviously, you know, people have bus lists and, you know, they have an idea of which players they don't want. But do you maybe go into a draft with like an ADP list and you'll just cross players off before you even get in there and say, I don't want anything to do with these players? Yeah, I'm not somebody who does that so much. And I, it's interesting because there are so many really great players. You know, Casey Chaw's the one who's famous for this. Crossing off 80% of the player pool and just going into the draft with his sheet.

And he's really good at it. He makes it work. And it's not as good for me because I like to leave my options open. So the only people that I'll really cross off, I'm pretty risk-averse when it comes to injuries. So I don't, like, for instance, I don't foresee myself drafting Noah Sendergarde this year, for instance, because we never really saw him. come back full strength. I'm weary of him. You know, there's a couple others. You know, I don't know that I would draft Tatis in the first right at the very top of the first round just because the shoulder injury scares me. You know, there's a few others like that where I don't foresee myself drafting them at their current ADP. But I don't really like to just cross people off because I think

that lots of different players can fit depending on how your draft is going. And if you, you know, it's going in a way that maybe you are on, you've already run through plan A, B, and C, and you're on plan B, well, maybe that player that you didn't think you would take fits in plan D. And it works. And, you know, I like to keep an open mind. I like to try not to be too rigid in my opinion of any player.

And I think that that has helped me a lot to sort of see both the positives and the negatives and the percentage chance that it goes well versus the percentage chance that it's a bust. and, you know, think that either one of those things is possible. So, you know, it's, I think that for me personally, keeping an open mind on players works to my advantage. All right. Well, as the great Ted DiBiase once said, everybody has a price.

So maybe you don't want to completely cross those names off of your list, but say, all right, you know, if Jacob de Grom continues to go in round two, I'm just not going to have him there. Now, if he falls to round three, all right. You know, I could start to take home. a little bit more risk in that range. Jacob de Grom, I think, is just a perfect example right now, too.

You know, I've done already two early drafts. I've done one D.C. I'm in a best ball draft right now. Jacob de Grom right now, he's off the list. He's, I need to see him pitch in spring before I invest. You know, obviously if he falls like the fourth or fifth round, I'll take a shot, but like, that's just not going to happen. Shane Bieber, another one.

I need to see him pitch in spring. I need to see what's going on with that shoulder with a velocity is at before I can invest. He's going early still, you know, he's a late second round pick. That's a lot. That's a lot to invest in a guy that's coming off a shoulder injury. The velocity was down when he returned. He hasn't looked the same since sticky substances were a thing. So there's a lot of risk going on with players like that.

So I think I'm going to start to do it more this year because last year I was just so open to, I said, I want, you know, two pitchers in the first three rounds. I don't care who those pitchers are. I just want two pitchers in the first three rounds. I want three pitchers in the first five rounds, so on and so forth. I will tell you one player. He's off the list. Zach Plesack.

He's gone. Zach Leesack is gone. I drafted him in the main event last year. So did I. And, you know, I should have realized, right? Like, you're playing against such smart people in the main event, too. And I did the NYC live event. So it's like, we're all sitting around a table.

There's, you know, me and 14 other people. Actually, 15 other people. I had my partner was there drafting with me as well. And it's like, Zach Plissac is there at the end of the seventh round. His ADP, you know, was like the fourth or fifth. And we're just like, what's going on? They know. I mean, you're playing against smart people.

If they're passing up on Zach Plessack that much, that should probably be an indication like, yeah, something's not going on. Something's not going right here. So, Zach Plesack, I think he is one name that I'll just, no, not going to do it again. I'll cross his name off the list. Let's get more into specific draft strategies. And you talked about this roadmap that you included in that article, Jenny. And I thought it was awesome. Like, just visually looking at it, it's, you know, you did a good job describing it where you have like these three different columns and you're putting different positions.

for different rounds. And for example, you wrote SP2 and your first closer from rounds three to five. You want one of those in there. You want an outfielder in rounds four to six. And then you want that shortstop in round six. You wanted one of a semi and wanted Danesby-Swanson.

And round six in a 15 team league, you know, by the time you get to round six, end of round six, that's picked 90. So their ADP is 100. You're jumping them up around to make sure that you can get those guys on your team. And some people might be listening to this and they say, well, it's not good to plan out your draft this much in advance.

But I think it's different the way that you're doing it because you are presenting yourself with options. You're not saying I have to get this player here. You're saying, okay, if there is an SP2 or a closer that I like in this round range, that I can go that direction. If not, there's an outfielder in rounds four to six that I know that I like and I can go in this direction. So I think that that's a really cool way that you set it up.

Yeah, that's exactly the point of it is to keep it flexible. So, you know, I purposely leave the first few rounds very flexible. You know, I think I put in that that I wanted to get, you know, a starter because I've always in the main event been pretty starter heavy in the early rounds. So, you know, I put rounds one and two. I would like to get a first starter. But then other than that, I just sort of put in best available because I want to see how the draft falls and I want to be able to take the best available players in the first couple rounds. But then after that, what I do in those first rounds dictates how I go later. So, you know, I mean, even though I had shortstop listed in round six, well, maybe I got lucky. And in the first round, Tray Turner fell to me, which happened in my first main event. So I took Tray Turner. So then, you know, you just cross off that shortstop in round six and you're left with, okay, well, also in round six, I know that when I looked at it, I also liked a pitcher and I also liked an outfielder. So, you know, it leaves you open to doing a lot of things. And really, you know, I leave it in a few round blocks.

So, you know, if there are outfielders that I like in rounds, you know, seven, eight, I'll, you know, put that block in there as like six, seven, eight. So that I know that, you know, if you look across the table, you can see that in round six to eight, I want to get a pitcher. You know, I could get my late shortstop there and I could get an outfielder there. That's sort of the way I want to do things. And it just sort of helps me organize in my head. But of course, it's not always going to go that way.

And, you know, you need to be able to pivot. But, you know, I try to sort of think through the decisions that I'm going to have to make before the draft so that you're not in the middle of the draft scrambling to try to figure out what to do when the draft isn't going the way you thought it would. And I noticed that you made that, basically that chart for all 25 rounds in that draft. Now, do you do something similar for a draft champions type format, a draft and hold where it's 50 rounds? Do you map it out that far as well? I usually don't only because I don't do a ton of draft champions, but when I do them, they're always slow drafts. So I have the opportunity to think through as ongoing.

This sort of map is a little bit more geared towards those one-minute clocks where you really need to have your plan in place and try to stick to it as closely as possible and try to be adaptable without having to just completely rethink your whole philosophy. you know. Yeah. And in addition to this roadmap that you created as prep for this season, also included in the article,

you provided these flowcharts that help you map out really the first four rounds of your draft, which I think is so pivotal. I mean, I guess you could go, you know, five, six rounds, but really the first three or four rounds, I mean, that is everything. I mean, that is the base of your team, you know, a very, you know, cliche saying when it comes to fantasy baseball, you know, you can't win your draft in the first round.

first couple of rounds, but you can lose your draft. So I think knowing what to do early on there and mapping that out is very pivotal. And something that you do is that you grouped players into three different categories in these flowcharts that you created. Speed, pitching, and power, which, you know, it seems pretty straightforward. You know, for the speed, you include guys like Trey Turner, Fernando Tatez, Jose Ramirez, Boba Ched. I mean, these are guys that can provide 20 plus steals.

Pitching, obvious starting pitchers, closers. you know, especially this year, closers. I mean, we're seeing guys going like the third, fourth round being pushed up the draft board. So you might hear, you know, really? Are we considering closures that early? Yeah, in this type of format, especially in draft champions right now,

people are drafting closures that early. And then power guys include Juan Soto, Vladimir Guerrero, Bryce Harper, Mike Trout. You know, some of these guys, maybe they'll chip in eight to ten seals, but really more so known for, you know, they're 35 plus home run upside. So you run through each scenario

And, you know, it's awesome to see. For example, like you basically do, if you take Tatis first, then you want to save power bat in the second. You take your first starting pitcher in the third. And then you take maybe a speed, a speed type of hitter in the fourth round. And all the while, you are considering statistical balance.

So I guess basically just talk about these flow charts that you make and like how you're, you're, I guess, keeping track of like the statistical balance that you want to account for with all these picks. Yeah, I mean, it's something that I've done for several years now. And usually I'm sort of scribbling it on a piece of paper while I'm in Las Vegas the night before the draft. But because I try to do it, you know, as late as possible to try and, you know, get my most recent opinions and the most recent ADP involved. But, you know, like for the example that you gave with Tatis,

you know, I, there's very few guys that offer both big speed and big power. And he, in theory, is one of them. So any guys that were like that, I put in the speed category, anybody that offers both speed and power, if they offer enough speed, I try to put them in the speed category. And then, you know, the home runs that you get are a bonus. But like, you know, for instance, you know, the Tatis example, you know, he's, he has great stats, but he also comes with risk, you know, that, like I said, that shoulder, injury worries me that he didn't get surgery on it. So, you know, I went in that situation with

a very safe batter. I think I, you know, went with like the Freeman sort of route in the second round because I wanted to shore up the hitting in case something happens to Tatease. Whereas, you know, you pick a big speed power guy like a Jose Ramirez or a Trey Turner, then you're maybe safe to go into some pitching for a little while and then come back to the hitter later. So it's also sort of about not only balancing categories, but you're also trying to work in the risk there. And there were also some places where I showed, you know, that there's a third basement. That's a good option here. And, you know, we all know that third base kind of dries up. So, you know, I went for the third base option there. So there's, you can kind of try and combine everything with the

statistical balance, the position scarcity and the risk balance and try to kind of combine all those and get a good balance of all of that. And for me, I work sort of visually. So I like having that as a visual marker. And I'll sort of keep it as a, when I'm going into the draft as sort of a blank flow chart, you know, with just everything open. And then as I'm drafting,

I'll kind of circle who I took and put in the arrows to try to dictate, you know, help myself know where I want to go next. Yeah. And I think, look, it doesn't make sense to draft in excess of any one category. in a league that doesn't allow trading, like the NFBC, obviously draft champions.

These are 50-round drafts where there's no waiver ads, there's no trades, you just draft your team and you set your lineup all year long. Even in the main event, obviously there's FAB, you're making pickups there, but there's no trading. There's no trading in the NFBC. Obviously, there's a lot of money on the line. It wouldn't make sense because there could be collusion,

so on and so forth. But if you play in a league that does allow you to trade, if you play in a home league, which obviously many of those allow trading, then obviously you can draft an excess of, you know, whether it's category excess, whether it's position excess, whatever it might be. And then you could try and trade out of that later on for, you know,

whatever people are looking for. And obviously you're trying to acquire. But I mean, I would say if it just winds up that way, then sure. I wouldn't try to draft excess ever. I mean, you know, who drafts to trade something? It's, you hear this in fantasy football all the time. Like, oh, there was this great quarterback. I couldn't let him go.

And, you know, I'm going to draft him and then trade them later on. It never works. I mean, no one wants to trade. for quarterback. So I would say, you know, all in, like, to wrap this up, just try and draft a balance roster regardless, whether there's trading in your league or not, if it turns out that you do have an excess,

then obviously you could trade out of that later on. But I enjoyed what you did so much with these flowcharts. We basically trying to create the most balanced roster as possible that I figured, why don't we do it? Why don't we do it here on the podcast? So we're going to look at each different segment

of the draft, the early part of the draft, the middle part of the draft, basically terms of first round pick. So if you have an early pick, if you have a mid-pick, if you have a late pick, we're going to map out those first four rounds, and we're going to try and create the most balanced roster as possible. But before we do that, I don't want to remind everybody that you can now rate podcast on Spotify. So if you are listening to this podcast or Fantasy Baseball today in five over on Spotify, please hook us up with five stars. It goes a long way to people being able to find the podcast as well. So we do appreciate that for all of our Spotify listeners out there.

let's take a quick break when we return draft strategy from one of the top five picks here on fantasy baseball today. So let's jump in and say that you have the fourth pick overall. Jenny, who would you rather have, Jose Ramirez or Bobeshet? Both of those are really good options. And I was a little bit wary of Boba Chet last year because I would like a little bit more of a track record, but he really proved himself. And I think the decision to make there is, you know, Jose Ramirez is, safer. He maybe offers a little bit more speed than Boba Chet, maybe. However, he's in a worse lineup and then Boba Chet is. So maybe his counting stats won't be as good. And maybe, you know, he'll stick out on that lineup as being somebody that pitchers don't want to pitch to. But

he is a third baseman. And that's really nice. So I think I'm going to go with Jose Ramirez just to shore up that third base pick. Yeah, I think that makes a ton of sense. And I don't think that there's really a wrong answer here. Bobichette's going to give you more batting average. He'll probably give you more counting stats, though. I believe Jose Ramirez had 100 plus runs and 100 plus RBI last year, even in that Cleveland lineup.

So, I mean, that's just... That's just a testament to how amazing he was last season. I know Boba Chet did it as well. But yeah, I mean, I think the third base aspect just kind of pushes him over there. Of course, we are using NFBC ADP from the month of December. So this is the most recent ADP that we have over there. All right, so fourth pick,

we're taking Jose Ramirez. Let's come back around in the second round here. And that would be pick 27. So I'm going to present the best hitters that are available based on ADP and also the best pitchers. And we can talk to Sal, we can go back and forth and try and figure out, you know, if you were on the clock, what might you do? So you already have Jose Ramirez on your team. The best hitters available, Cedric Mullins, Whit Merrifield, Marcus Semyon, Teasca Hernandez. And then for pitchers, we have Julio Reyes, Liam Hendricks, Josh Hader, but also Sandy Alcancera, Lucas Gilito, and Aranoa. I will point out that according to ADP, Sandy, Giolito, Noah,

they're all there in round three as well. So I think this is something that's probably in the back of your mind while you're drafting. So, Jenny, what do you think if you're on the clock here in the second round? Well, this one's interesting because with Jose Ramirez, I got really good speed and really good power, but I'm a little bit deficient in average. And average is something that I like to try and get early in the draft as much as I can because, you know, it dries up quickly. And I don't really see any of these four hitters giving me that average that I need.

And I also have always been a proponent of taking early pitching. So I think I'm going to go for a pitcher in the second round. And it's an interesting choice because Haleo Rios, Sandy Alcantra don't have the track record. Gialito and Nola were a little bit down last year, although I personally believe in both of them. Interestingly, I think I am going to go with a closer and take Liam Hendricks. I am not scared of taking a closer early this year. I think that, especially if you're drafting early, like we are right now,

there are not a lot of set closers. So I'm going to go with a pitcher and I'm going to lean towards a closer. So I think I'm going to go with Liam Hendricks. All right. And I should have mentioned this is for 15 team league. So if anyone's out there like, Frank, you didn't do the math right? The second round, pick 27. This is for 15 team leagues, which are a lot of the high stakes leagues that are being drafted right now, 15 teamers.

And even, you know, as we get closer, the main event as well. So, all right, you're taking Liam Hendricks here in the second round. Some people might be listening and saying, what are you doing? How can you take a closer in the second round? But look, there are not a lot of locked in ace closers that we know are the closer for their respective teams. I mean, you could count them on one hand, maybe like one and a half hands. So there's really not a lot. And we know Hendricks is going to provide ERA, great whip, lots of strikeouts.

And at least 30 plus saves, obviously he can provide 40 plus, assuming he stays healthy. And, you know, the white socks are still good, which I think they should be. All right. So you have... I think that that's an underrated factor of these closers, too, is the fact that the really good ones will give you good ratios and we'll give you good strikeouts. And there are some closers later that even if you guess right in that, they do end up being the closer, they're not going to be great for your ratios or for your strikeouts. Yeah, tell that to my Alex Colomé pick in the main event, Jenny. So, geez,

yep. It was not great. So, yeah, I think we dropped him like a month and a half into the season. And then who picked him up later on and reaped all the rewards, our good buddy Rob, D.P.HR., who was in our league. Of course he did. I believe he wound up winning that, that main event league, obviously he didn't win the overall because Phil Dussoe won everything. And he was awesome. All right, so you have Jose Ramirez. You have Liam Hendricks in the second round. We're up to the third round. You have picked 34.

The best hitters available in this spot. Tim Anderson, Trevor Story, Yordaana Alvarez. And then for pitchers, we do have the aforementioned Alcansara, Lucas Gilito, Aranola. So do you want to double down on a pitcher? Obviously, not a closer, but grabbing your first starter. Or maybe do you want to shore up some more offensive statistics?

You know, I'm looking, there's two good shortstop options here. I think those are great. We're getting close to probably the end of where I want to take a short stop, and I really like both of those guys this year. Jordan Alvarez, I also like, however, looking at, you know, the balance of stats and how the position, you know, he's outfield eligible this year, and how that breaks down, you can get Yorda and Alvarez's stats later in the draft.

So I'm going to avoid him. So I think that I'm going to go with a starting pitcher, and I would have maybe gone with Gialito or Nola in the second round, But if they are lasting to me in the third round, I'm going to take one of them. And I think I'm going to go with Erin Nola. All of his peripherals were good last year. He shouldn't have had the year that he had. And he still was going to strike out.

So I think that he's a pretty safe bet. And if I'm going to wait until the third rounds, it makes me nervous to not have a starting pitcher after the third round. So I'm going to go with Aaronola. Yeah. He had a 4.63 ERA, but a 3.37 X-FIP, 3.26. Sierra, 3.37 expected ERA, his K-minus walk rate, 24.6%. He was phenomenal. It was just baffling. We would come on every fifth day that Aaron Noah pitched last year, and we would say, what is going on?

How can we keep rolling this guy out there? I mean, his underlying numbers were great, and like, this is just part of the variance involved in baseball. I mean, you can go a whole baseball season and have bad luck, which it sounds weird, but it's possible. I remember a couple of years ago, Marcelo Zuna, he had an awful year offensively, and all of his statcast numbers said his XBA, his ex-slug, he should have been way, way better than he was, and then the next year he came back, and he was amazing. So it's just sometimes you could be unlucky for an entire baseball season,

which sounds crazy, but it does happen. All right, so through three rounds, we have Jose Ramirez, Liam Hendricks, Aranola, and then the fourth round is pick 57, The best hitters available, George Springer, Pete Alonzo, Nick Castiano's, Javier Baez. And then in terms of pitchers, we have a manual Class A, Kevin Gosman, Lance Lynn, and Jack Flaherty. So I'm going to stay away from the pitchers. I'm good with pitching. Hobby Baez, a personal opinion of mine is that I tend to shy away from guys in the first year of a big contract. I know that that's an old adage of the smart system of, I think it's cold. and the Wolfman that do that.

But it's something that I've found kind of works for me. So I'm going to stay away from him. And it's really, and it's something, you know, as I'm doing this, I'm thinking, okay, now I know that I'm deficient in average and I know that I am running out of short stops. So, you know, I need to keep that in mind for the, you know, fifth, sixth, seventh round. But, you know, so that sort of leads me with Pete Alonzo and Nick Castellanos. I think I'm going to go with Pete Alonzo. I feel like he's pretty safe.

Not great average again, but he will give me a ton of. power and I'm going to be really set in a good place with power after I take him. Yeah. And Pete Alonzo, somebody who I do really like the value, his draft costs as of now. I really don't see a big difference between him and Matt Olson. And Matt Olson is going at the middle end of the third round. And Pete Alonzo, we're getting here, you know, end of the four, sometimes the early fifth in these 15 team leagues. And he just had a phenomenal second half, Pete Alonzo, pulling it up here, a 270. batting average, 20 home runs in 74 second half games. He had a 921 OPS. I know he was dealing

with some kind of injury last year. It might have been a hand or wrist. It was something he was playing through in the first half. Came out in the second half and he was just awesome. So the team here, if you're drafting in the early part of the draft, fourth overall pick based on ADP right now, Jose Ramirez, Liam Hendrix, Aranola, Pete Alonzo. You got some speed, you got some power. You have to work on the batting average a little bit, but you have a closer. elite ratios, and you have Aranola who we're expecting to bounce back there. You have your ace starting pitcher. Let's move on to draft strategy if you're drafting from the middle part of the first round.

So let's say anywhere from pick 6 through 10, and we'll use 9th pick. So if you have the 9th pick as of now, December ADP, the best pitcher is available. And this is where the first pitcher is typically going off the board now, which is interesting because in years past, it seems like there's always like a top 3 starting pitcher that, you know, someone who's being drafted in the top three picks or top five, and maybe by the time we get to March, you know, Garrett Cole will be pushed up there. But as of now, he's going around pick nine as is Corbyn Burns.

So you have to decide between one of those. Or you can take a hitter in Bryce Harper, Kyle Tucker, Ronald Acuna, who we don't really know when he's going to be back. You know, maybe it's mid-April, maybe it's early May. So there is some risks there involved with him. Jenny, what would you do? So if you'll notice, a lot of the times when I'm looking at these, I tend to, I'm doing this sort of by process of elimination.

So for me, I am scared of Akuna. You know, it's possible that he's fine. And I know I talk to Ruvain Guy and, you know, that pods with Errol Cohen in Arizona. And he's very confident that Akuna will be great. And he'll be ready on time. And I am scared to death of it. I, weird fact about me.

I grew up with my dad being a, he's a professor for orthopedic surgeons. So he's not a surgeon himself, but he teaches them. And he specializes in ACL injuries. That's what he did. And so I was traveling with him recently, and I asked him about Ronald Acuna, and he said, that seems way too fast for me for him to come back. And so I'm going to trust my dad on that one. And I'm going to stay away from Akuna in the first round.

So then we're looking at pictures. I think Cole and Burns are both great options. Burns, you know, I'm paying for a career year potentially. I mean, you really can't get much better than what he just did. Garrett Cole is maybe starting to be on the downslope a little bit, but he also feels very safe. So I think it's really hard for me to decide between those two, but I think I'm going to go with Garrett Cole.

And the other reason I didn't take the other two hitters that I wanted to mention is I'm trying, you know, maybe to not fill up out. outfield in the first round. All right. So Garrett Cole is the pick that you're going with here. If you do have the ninth pick, and I think that may sense. Like just based on everything that you've said so far in this podcast, early on in the draft, it seems like you want safety and you want guys that have a track record.

And, you know, while Garrett Cole, he had the sticky substance situation last year, even after the crackdown, the underlying numbers were still very good for him. The K-1-Walk was still very good for him. So, yeah, I don't know that there is a safe. starting pitcher to draft than him. So that is who you are going with here. And then in the second round, this would be pick 22. We have for pitchers,

Zach Wheeler, Jacob deGrom, Shane Bieber. And then for hitters, we have Manny Machado and Starling Marte. Let's see if I could get you another hitter there in case you want someone else. Cedric Mullins, Whitmerfield, Marcus Semyon. Those are the hitters that are going at pick 22 or later. Yeah.

Yeah, so I'm looking at, I think I'm going to, you know, I'm not going to go pocket aces, especially not with those three options. You know, Wheeler, I think, can be great and I would be happy to have him. Maybe as my number one. But when I have Cole, I don't think I need to do that. So, this is not, I'm feeling like this isn't a great choice for me because Machado is great, somebody that, you know, I'd be happy to have. He's not giving me a ton of speed. You know, he's projected in steamer for 10 stolen bases that, feels like kind of a lot to me, but he'll definitely give me great power.

Starling Marte is coming off an amazing season that I don't think he can repeat. So I might go, Cedric Mullins is also, you know, somebody who's coming off a crazy year. I'm thinking I might go with Merrifield there just by process of elimination, but this isn't, I'm not loving these choices, I got to say. Yeah, I almost wonder, like, would you rather go with like a Bryce Harper in the first and then get Zach Wheeler in the second? Shout out to Philly's fans out there. I mean, this is kind of what I'm what I do ahead of the draft when I'm looking at this is if I see myself, you know, I look through the options and you know, okay, if I take a picture in the first round, what are my options in the second round?

Well, I really don't love this. So maybe I should go back and rethink what I was doing in the first round and maybe I should go with a Bryce Harper because he will give me some speed and some power. although, you know, it might not be that different than what Manny Machado is going to do. And Manny Machado is third base. So, you know, now that I'm talking through it, maybe Mishado is the pick. Yeah, this is a tough one.

Yeah, so, you know what's so interesting is I did my first D.C. and I had picked 10. And I took Bryce Harper in the first round. And then in the second round, we were going to take a hitter. We were all set to take a hitter. And then Max Scher fell all the way to pick 20, which 20 or 21.

I guess it would have been. But I think at the time, it was like tied for a max pick, and it felt weird to really just let Max Scherzer go because we wanted to take a hitter. In hindsight, the way the draft played out, I wish that I took actually Manny Machado to pair with Bryce Harper. It's not a ton of speed,

but obviously you fill up the third base position and helps with power, helps with batting average. So we did go with Scher, but I think, you know, in hindsight, we should have went with Manny Machado there. So, all right, do we want to go with Machado? Garry Cole with Manny Machado? Yeah, let's go with Bouchado.

All right. Let's see how this plays out. All right. So then in the third round, we come around, and it is pick 38. We have some of those starting pitchers still available, Giolyto, Aronola, Robbie Ray now. And then we do have Trevor Story. We have Aaron Judge. We have Matt Olson.

Zander Bogarts are the best hitters available. So I'm getting nervous that I don't have enough speed. And Bogarts will give you a little chip in speed, but not much. and I think I'm still okay waiting on my second pitcher. So I think that I'm going to go with Trevor Story. He will be in a new place, we're assuming, but I think that it's going to be offset by the fact that people will not expect him to do as well outside of Colorado. And I have faith that he'll do okay.

So I think that I feel fairly safe with taking story in that situation. Yeah, I think if you just look at his 2021, at face value, it was a down year for him. There's no doubt about that. Another one who I drafted in the main event. But the batting average was right around 251. Each of the previous three seasons, he was 289 or better. So I kind of look at his 2021 as maybe a baseline projection

for what we should expect for him outside of Colorado. 250, 24 homers, 20 steals, 88 runs, 75 RBI. It's not a slam dunk great year, but it's still a very good year. you're getting 20-20 out of him from a player getting in the third round. So I think it's perfectly fine. And I think it's actually pretty, I still want to see where he winds up. You know, Seattle, they were talking about. They were interested. Kyle Seeger just retired. So shout-out to him. Solid career. But yeah, like Houston's interested in Trevor Story. That would be a great landing spot for him. Obviously, really good lineup. So we'll see where he lands. But I think that's the right call here.

Cole, Machado, and then Trevor Story. And then let's move on to the fourth round where it's pick 53. the best pitchers available, Freddie Peralta, Kevin Gosman, Emmanuel Class A, and then Randy Rosarena, JT, Real Muto, Wander Franco, George Springer for the best hitters. What are you thinking? This is an interesting one. So what I'm looking up real quick is Iglesias, an option instead of Class A. I like him a little bit better, and it looks like maybe. So maybe I would go Glacius.

I feel is a little early for Class A to me, especially because I don't think the Indians are going to be very good. Freddie Peralta is a good option. I'm not a fan of the Springer pick, and I'm not a fan of the Wonder Franco pick. Wonder Franco may be great, but I don't think he's going to return the kind of stats that are going to give you worth,

that are going to be worth this pick. You're paying essentially for his upside is what I'm getting at there. Rose Raino would be maybe a good option because I do think, you know, The story will give me some steals, but, you know, adding like another 2020 guy on top of story would be really nice. I am also somebody who is willing to draft a catcher early. I know there's a lot of people that don't like to do that. So, I think I'm going to go with a Rosarena there.

All right. But Ria Muto and Iglesias would also, I think, be options that I would like to have. Yeah, so based on ADP, 50, 54. He would be available here. I'm using the left side, which is like what player are they available. So he's the 50th player available, which means he's not available at pick 53. So I don't know. It's just one of those weird clunky things. But Garret Cole, Manny Machado, Trevor Story, Randy Rosa Rana. I think it's really good. You know, you have your ace. You have Machado with the power and solid batting average 280 plus. And then you have two potential 2020 guys back to back with Trevor Story and Randy a Roserana. In that draft that I already did, I wound up with Randy Rosarena in the fourth round. So I think we went Harper, Scher, Sandy Alcona. We actually double tap starting pitcher. And then we took a Rosarena.

So we get some speed there. I think I'm learning from this. I don't really like pick nine. Yeah. No, yeah. This was a lot of hard choices for me. I didn't really love a lot of the options. So this is an interesting.

This is a good exercise to go through for deciding what pick you want, even in the first place. Yeah, yeah, for sure. You know, so interesting is at the time, in the fifth round, we actually got Wander Franco. And I agree with you. I think, you know, his early ADP was the third round. Now he's starting to fall a little bit. Even in the fourth round, I think it's probably too early.

But we set the max pick for Wander Franco at the time at the end of the fifth round. And, you know, maybe he's like a 2010 guy with a good batting average to start. Maybe that's even a little bit optimistic. I don't know. I mean, there's still an unknown factor where, you know, maybe he just has this monster second season that we saw from like, Juan Soto, I wouldn't project that, but that's something like a 90th percentile outcome. But I think it's possible. I think it's possible for him. So if he falls a little bit, I have no problem taking him. But yeah, I mean, his current ADP is probably a little bit too high.

Let's wrap up here and do the back half of the first round. So draft strategy from pick 11 through 15 and we'll go with the 13th pick here. Differentiate ourselves a little bit further from that ninth pick that we just did. And at the 13th pick, the ADP, best available hitters, Mike Trout, Mook. Bette's, Luis Robert for hitters, and then Walker Bueller, Max Scherzor, Brandon Woodruff for pitchers here in the first round. What do you think? So I'm saying Mike Trott and Mookiee Betts are both great, like very safe options, I think. I know that everybody is very worried about Troutts injuries, and I think you have to factor

that in, but that's part of why he's going as late as he is. But neither one of them, I'm not very confident in Betts also maintaining the speed that he's had over the last few years. kind of put those two in the same bucket. Luis Robert, on the other hand, I think, is young, and I have some confidence that he'll have some steals. So I think I'm going to go with Luis Robert, with maybe my second choice being Brandon Woodruff. But I think I'm going to go with Elise Robert there.

All right. So we get Luis Robert at pick 13. And then in the second round, that would be pick 18. Best available hitters, Raphael Devers, Freddie Freeman and Ozzie Albies. And then for pitchers, we have Zach. We have Jacob deGrom, Shane Bieber. So really, I mean, based on ADP, the 14 and 15, that's where all the pitchers are going.

So if you, maybe you want to grab one to make sure that you get one of those guys, if you feel safer. But based on ADP, Bueller, Scherzer, Woodruff, they go at the turn. And then your best available option here would be Wheeler, DeGrom, or Bieber. So you're looking at a hitter or maybe you want to grab one of those pitchers? I like all the hitter options. but as I'm looking down a little further, I'm not liking the third round pitching options,

and I'm going to want to have a pitcher, you know, in the first few rounds, that's where I feel comfortable. So I think I'm going to go with Wheeler there because he's going to give me the innings and the strikeouts, and I think he's fairly safe. To me, the difference between him and what my options are in the third round is greater than, you know, one round. So I think I'm going to go with Wheeler and get a starting pitcher.

All right. So we have Luis Robert, some power, some speed. Had an awesome batting average last year. We'll see if he can keep that up here in 2022. And then you get your ace in Zach Wheeler. Let's come back to the third round. That would be pick 43. And you're looking at Zander Bogart's, Paul Goldschmidt, Francisco Lindor,

as the best hitter is available. And then Robbie Ray or Chris Sale in terms of pitchers. So this is why you took Zach Wheeler, because you're saying you don't want Robbie Ray or Chris Sale as your SP1. Yeah, Sayle makes me nervous. And Robbie Ray is another one where I feel like I'm paying for his max value. I need to look more into him, but I don't really feel like I'm hearing people talk about the fact that Robbie Ray was great once before. And he fell back off the cliff again.

So I need to maybe go back and look and see what made him great the last time and where it went wrong. and then see if that's sort of the same thing that he did this time. I just am not, everybody is fully buying in to this Robbie Ray when we've been fooled before. So I need to do a little bit more research. But as of right now, without that research yet, I'm a little scared of Robbie Ray. And I'm paying for his career season. So I'm not, I'm not down with that. Goldschmidt, I love, I've loved Goldschmidt for several years now.

But I'm not dying to take a first baseman yet. but I think that Francisco Lendor is being undervalued. And one thing that I like to do, while I don't like to take a guy in the first year of a big contract, getting that guy in the second year, when he has had a disappointing first year, can often be very profitable. So I'm going to go with Francisco Linder.

I like that call a lot, too. He had a huge September. I remember, I think it was a three-home or game, actually, against the New York Yankees. And that basically capped off just this massive September that he had where I think he hit something like 260, 270, it was nine homers and OPS, you know, over 900.

He didn't have any steals, but it was good to see the power return for Francisco Lindor. It's going to be interesting to see. You know, I looked this up recently. Buck Show Walter, while he managed the Baltimore Orioles, those teams did not run now. Is that he didn't have the personnel? He just didn't have guys on his team

that were fast enough. You know, there was like Chris Davis and Mark Trumbo and Mani Machado and all those guys when he was managing the Orioles. Or is that just, part of his philosophy. So we'll see, obviously, it affects guys like Starly Marte and Francisco Lindor when it comes to the New York Mets and obviously what they're going to do on the base path.

So we have Luis Robert, we have Zach Wheeler, we have Francisco Lindor. In the fourth round, that would be pick 48. We have Tyler O'Neill, Adelberto Montesey, Austin Riley for hitters. And then we have your guy, Ryssela Iglesias. He is available, Logan Webb and Freddie Peralta in terms of pitchers. Yeah, this is tempting. I'm tempted. I wanted to take Iglesias there. I think he's about as safe as you can get for a closer. I'm also looking at Austin Riley. He has good power, maybe, you know, not really any steals, you know, so-so average, but he's third base, and that's going to fall off pretty quickly. So I think I'm going to go with Reisel Iglesias, but Austin Riley is also very tempting there, too. I'd have to take, you know, maybe if I hadn't mapped out whether, you know, I thought that there was a good. closer that might be there in the fifth. Maybe I'd go Austin Riley. If we're, there's still a couple of third baseman left and maybe I'd go Iglesias. But without, you know, just looking at this, I think I'm going to go with Iglesias. All right. So yeah, the team here from

Pick 13, Luis Robert, Zach Wheeler, Francisco Indoor, and Ricellel Iglesias. Again, you're, you're hitting a little bit of everything. Robert, power, speed, hopefully the batting average carries over. Zach Wheeler, you get your ace, Francisco Lindor. I'm thinking for the batting average. We're probably looking at a, you know, 260, maybe he, he, can get back up to like a 270 type bat, but, you know, 25 homers, 12 to 15 steals. I think that's very doable for Francisco Indoor. And then at Glacius, you know, you get your lockdown closer. He was awesome this past season.

Hopefully we're getting 30 plus saves. Hopefully the angels could stay healthy because I think if they do that, they obviously could win a ton of games with Otani and Mike Trout and Anthony Rendon. It's the sky's the limit for that line up. They just have to find a way to stay healthy. So there you go. If you're drafting in the beginning, the middle part, the end of the first round, those are a couple of different ways to build balanced rosters here.

And let's just wrap up with this, Jenny. I thought it was really cool. Something you brought up again in that article was using Steamer 600 projections to find sleepers or maybe players that offer comparable stats at a later part of the draft. So for those who don't know, obviously Steamer is a projection system which you can find over on Fangraphs. Steamer 600, you could also find on Fangraphs.

What it does, it gives every player exactly 600 plate appearances. And when you do that, it's basically just a way to find players who have really good skills, but maybe they're not projected for a lot of playing time, whether it's a platoon situation, a prospect who's not being called up

until later in the season, whatever it might be. This is a good way to find players that have good skills, but maybe are not projected for enough plate appearances. So I know that you have a few different comparisons here, Jenny,

and I will let you take it away. Yeah, so I like using Steamer 600, primarily for hitters. You know, I think that it's best for counting stat rate stats or obviously rate stats. But, you know, I think that it can be great when we want to look at skills outside of playing time projections. Obviously, the people that do these projections know what they're doing. And for the most part, they're going to be pretty right on. But it can really help with seeing guys who are either over-projected or under-projected. You know, last year we thought that the Dodgers starting pitchers,

there was just so many starting pitchers there, they're not going to get enough innings. And then it turned out that they did. You know, often guys that are not projected to get a lot of plate appearances, you know, there will be a couple injuries in front of them, and they'll get that playing time. And so it's good to sort of have an idea of what these guys are capable of if they do have the playing time.

At the same time, you know, steamers sometimes overprojects, you know, all of the projection systems. Like, for instance, Steamer has George Springer projected for 678 plate appearances, which seems pretty generous to me. So it's good, I think, to take it down sometimes to 600 also to sort of see where they fall. So what I did was looked at a few third basemen. So Raphael Devers, Austin Riley, and Alex Breggman, they are going at very different ADPs. Devers is going at 19. I think I looked at the last maybe two weeks.

Devers is going at 19, Riley's going at 59, and Bregman is going at 105. So it's a wide range there of what you would have to pay. And the way that I sort of like to think about it is you don't need to look at the specific number, but you sort of look at what range they're in. You know, even though the Steamer 600 has Devers getting 33 home runs and Breggman getting 25, there's a pretty good chance that they could both land on 30 or, you know, that Breckman could hit more home runs than Devers. You know, they're all in the range of, you know, 80 to 85-ish runs.

And in the, you know, mid-90s RBIs, they, none of them are going to give you very many steals. Devers on the Steamer 600 is going to give you six versus really nothing from Riley and Breggman. But you never know. You know, maybe he gets four or maybe Breggman gets four. They're also all in the, you know, 275 batting average range. So when you look at those, it's easy. it helps to sort of have those things in mind when you're making a chart like the one that I put in the draft guide so that I can see, well, if I don't get Devers, I can wait and I can get Bredman and get roughly the same stats.

I mean, anytime that you're looking at projections, you're really looking at an estimate and there's an error bar, you know, on both sides of that. And so you need to sort of keep in mind that it's not a hard and fast number and it can vary. And, you know, a little, you know, a few more from Bregman and a few less from Riley. sitting on the same number. And there's a very good chance that that could happen. So when you look at them and sort of put them into like buckets of, okay, good home runs, good runs, good RPAs, no steals, pretty good average, they all sort of fall into the same group. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that that last part is so pivotal too is finding players who have similar projections, right? So we know none of these third baseman, you know, maybe Devers gives you six to eight steals, but he's not going to be a steel's

contributor per se. So finding players who do similar things in terms of skills, right? So, you know, okay batting average, some pop, you know, decent runs, decent RBI, and you want to kind of group these together and find ones that stand out who either have too low of an ADP. That's how you find your undervalued hitters or pitchers you could do it for. And then the same thing on the other side, where you can use it to find maybe some hitters who are overvalued based on their ADP. And I think it's really interesting to, you know, when you pull up these steamers, 600 projections on fan graphs. You see the ADP ball on the side. So, like, don't take it for gospel, but, you know, I think once you draft your entire team and a draft champions or a best ball league,

whatever it might be, you could take a few shots on these players who maybe have lower played appearance projections, but based on Steamer 600, they have the skills. So someone like a Frank Schwendell or like a Rowdy Tellez, someone like that, who you don't really know exactly what the playing time is going to be like. Steamer likes the skills. So it's a good way to find those players. You know, players who have the skill, but, you know,

maybe they just need a few things to break right for them in order to work into an everyday playing time role and, you know, ultimately, you know, breakthrough for fantasy. So I think it's a good way to find sleepers, to find some undervalued and overvalued players as well. And they may not even be guys that you draft and may be guys that you can keep an eye on,

you know, when you see somebody, and you see maybe Dan Vogelbach get injured in the Milwaukee, you can jump on Routi Tala's quicker because you've done the research and you can see that he, if given the time, could be a great contributor. So sometimes it's guys to sort of keep on your watch list. All right. This was a lot of fun. We're going to wrap there. Jenny, make sure that you follow her on Twitter at Jenny Butler 830 and go check out the awesome article that she wrote in the FTN5 Tool Fantasy Baseball draft guide where she talked about basically all, everything that we did on this episode and then some. She went even further on some of the things that we spoke about here,

really talking more about NFBC roster construction for those who play in high stakes. But again, I think even if you play in a home league or wherever you play, there are things that you can find in that article, and even on this podcast today, that I think are applicable for those who play in Roto leagues, if you play in a head-to-head categories league, whatever it might be. So, Jenny, really, really appreciate you coming on. You were fantastic, and who knows? Maybe we'll have you on again soon. I really appreciate you. Thank you so much. This has been such an honor to be on such a great podcast that I've listened to since the beginning. So thank you so much. Yeah, it was awesome once again. I do want to wish a

happy and healthy new year to everybody. And this is the last podcast before we get to 2022. Scott White will be back next week. So again, just a huge shout out to all of our listeners and people who support us all year long. You guys are awesome. When it comes to just the questions that we receive, the support that we receive, the awesome submissions. We're trying to find people for the People Podcast League, the other listener leagues that we do. You guys are so awesome. So we really do appreciate all of our supporters, listeners,

people who watch us on YouTube as well. Again, have a happy and healthy new year. We will talk to you again here in 2022 for Jenny. I am Frank. Thank you all for listening and watching. I don't know when we're going to be back. We might be back on like Monday or Tuesday. I'm still trying to figure out the schedule,

but we'll be back next week. Bye-bye. No.