Fantasy Baseball Today - The Strategy Show! How To Handle Different Formats (3/9 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 9, 2021

Before we get to the strategy, we just realized that we are the official Myles Straw podcast. Who knew!? ... Let's start off with Rotisserie strategy, also known as Roto or the standard 5x5 format (3:...22). What do you need to compete in each category? What is our draft strategy? How should you handle starting pitchers and relievers? ... Let's move on to H2H Points Leagues (20:32). Why is there such an emphasis on starting pitching in this format? What types of hitters should you target? ... I'm sorry we've neglected quality starts but here is everything you need to know about them (32:30)! ... On to H2H Categories leagues (36:54). What is the Marmol strategy? Should you punt categories? If so, which? ... Let's hit on some Salary Cap Draft strategies (47:50). Which players do you nominate? What's your favorite way to bid on players? ... We wrap up with some dynasty and FAB tips and tricks (57:50). ... Email us at fantasybaseball@cbsi.com. Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday '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, @AdamAizer Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ 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

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. I drive, center field, and swing. This 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.
Starting point is 00:00:24 Sleepers, breakouts, and bus are in the books for now. But welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today. This is our official strategy podcast. Trying something new this year. It was a light day of spring training action, so I wanted to dedicate an entire podcast to just game theory and strategy for all of the different formats. We're going to try and get to everything today.
Starting point is 00:00:45 Head to head points, roto, head to head categories, salary cap leagues, some AL only, NL only, dynasty, some in-season stuff as well. We'll hit it all today. This is our official strategy podcast. But before all of that, last year I would like to say that, we were collectively the Corey Seeger podcast. We were, that was official.
Starting point is 00:01:06 We were all on record. We were very excited about Corey Seeger. Jack Allen. We like Gallen a lot as well. We also liked Rich Hill, so, I mean, can only pump up the things that we were right about. So upon talking to you guys
Starting point is 00:01:20 before we got started, I just realized that we are officially the Miles Straw podcast. And you love to see it. I did not know this, but we're talking, we're comparing, contrasting our great fantasy baseball
Starting point is 00:01:32 invitational teams, 15 team rotodrafts. And I'm like, yeah, my outfield stinks. I got Miles Straws, my fifth outfielder. Scott goes, wait, I have Miles Straws, my fifth outfielder. And then Chris goes, I can do you one better. He's my fourth outfielder. How about that? Miles Straw. Yeah, I mean, you know, he's
Starting point is 00:01:48 4A, 4B with Christian Pesche. You know, either one of them. You take any given day. It's not ideal. Oh, I'm fine with it. I'm fine with it. This is, I needed some steals still. And if he is the Astros everyday center fielder, he will contribute steals. If he's the Astros everyday leadoff hitter,
Starting point is 00:02:11 which seems to be the direction they're leaning right now, then he'll contribute a lot of runs too. So I think he's a legit sleeper. I mean, the non-power hitter profile is a difficult one to land in today's environment. and maybe pitchers will find out there's nothing to fear there and just blow the bat out of his hands and it's all over at that point. But I'll take the chance given the role that the Astros are carving out for him
Starting point is 00:02:39 and obviously a solid minor league track record. Yeah, he's averaged his 150 game pace between AA and AAA is 65 stolen bases with like a 90% success rate, I think. Yeah, 170 steals in the miners, 43 caught stealing. So that is a great success rate. And back in 2018, he stole 70 bases in the miners. With all that being said, he does have four home runs in 4669 career games in the minors there. So that is all the player analysis that you will get today. Miles Straw. So I hope you enjoyed it. The rest will just be strategy. Let's jump right in so we can get to as much of these formats as we possibly can. Rotisserie, also known as Roto, also known as the C. standard five-by-five format. And if you didn't listen to it, go back and listen to our Saturday mailbag from this past weekend. We explained the differences between each format.
Starting point is 00:03:33 We didn't talk as much about our specific strategies. I wanted to save that for today. But we more so focused on what goes into our rankings and explaining just the differences between specifically Roto, head-to-head points, and head-to-head categories. So we did that on our mailbag this past weekend. Before we get into the actual strategy for rotisserie leagues, some have emailed in and asked about category targets. What should you be trying to achieve
Starting point is 00:03:57 in each of your categories? And this changes year in and year out, but I looked back at the hitting targets from 2019, which was obviously the last full season, and based on an article that Chris, our very own Chris Towers, wrote last year, assuming 12 team leagues with your standard categories, this is what you needed to finish in first place
Starting point is 00:04:18 in each back in 2019. A 278 batting average, 383 home runs, 1,183 runs scored, 1,137 RBI, and 152 steals. That means the average 5 by 5 line that you should target for each of your hitters. It's not going to work out this way, but people have asked this as well. 278 batting average, 27 home runs, 84 runs scored, 81 RBI, and 10.8 steals. You know, good luck finding 10.8 steals from your catch. That's to win every category.
Starting point is 00:04:49 That's to win it, which you don't need to do. I think. Correct. Years ago, I remember Tristan Cockroff, who writes for ESPN now, he had a rule that he wanted to finish fourth in every category, which will probably work out more times more often than not if you do that. But, you know, obviously that's, you're not going to have a steady finish across the board anyway. But like, that's just something to keep in mind. You don't have to win every category or any category.
Starting point is 00:05:14 It's a good point. And you only have to win each counting stat category by one. So having the most steals in the world, sure, it's beneficial. If trading is allowed in your league, then you could trade off some of your steals once you get into first place. But you only need to win the category by one. So keep that in mind. And speaking of steals, just to remind everybody, the scarcity of steals in a Roto League, in 2019, there were just 2,280 steals across baseball. That was the lowest total for a full season since 1973.
Starting point is 00:05:46 So they are down. Last year, based on last year's numbers, they were actually. on pace over 162 games for, I think it was 2,400 steals. Yeah, 2467. I just did, so I just did a look at, I just averaged the plate appearances from 2016 to 2019 and then paste that out for 2020. And it would have been 2467. So a couple hundred more. So that's good. But still the second lowest of the last four, five years. So if you're wondering why we're drafting Miles Straw on a 15 team Rotel league, that's exactly why. Because steals are not easy to come by. On the pitching side, this is what you needed to finish first in each category back in
Starting point is 00:06:21 2019. 103 wins, 100 saves, 1,622 strikeouts, a 3.497 ERA, a 1.131 whip. So say you start six starting pitchers and three relief pitchers, you roughly need 11 wins per pitcher, 33 saves per each of your relievers. Good luck with that. And 180 strikeouts per pitching slot. With all of that being said, Scott will start with you. What is it your strategy when it comes to drafting in a Roto League? Do you target specific positions or specific categories earlier in the draft? I assume this is where you wax poetic about pitchers. Well, of course, the scarcity in every league is high-end pitching is pitching that isn't going to destroy you, basically. And that you can only feel confident about drafting early.
Starting point is 00:07:14 but the single biggest scarcity in Roto League, specifically five by five of leagues, is stolen bases. So the hitters, I mean, that's why Mike Trout never goes number one overall anymore, right? I mean,
Starting point is 00:07:29 he's still as good of a hitter as he ever was, but he's not really contributing to that category in a way others like Ronald de Cunia and Fernando Tatis and even like Juan Soto are. So it's really kind of overtaken the game just because there are so few players that contribute to it and it's as essential a category as any. So, you know, ideally you would get a pretty nice start in that category.
Starting point is 00:07:56 I find that I am too interested in taking pitchers and too interested in taking non-based stealing values like Corey Seeger and Alex Bregman and Anthony Rendon. It's rare that I actually get many steals. early on, unless I happen to pick very early and can take like an Acuna or Tatis type, is rather that I actually do that. And, you know, I'm not that worried about it. I'm not as worried as I was last year.
Starting point is 00:08:28 I feel like there are more, and, you know, Chris mentioned that the Steel's pace actually went up across the league last year. I feel like there are more mid and late route fallback options for that category than there were last year, guys like Miles Straw. Guys like John Birdie, Nick Madrigal. Tommy Edmund in the middle rounds. And a lot more.
Starting point is 00:08:50 You don't need a lot of steals to be competitive in the category. That's one category I don't aim to win. I just want to finish kind of in the middle of the pack. And I think you can do that without making a huge investment in it. Still, it's optimal to get it to get some contribution to that early. If you get 100, you're probably going to finish around the middle of the pack in 2019. 103 was seventh place, 108 was sixth place.
Starting point is 00:09:18 So, same for a hundred. Six or seven per roster spot. Early on in a roto draft, the hitters that I want to target are at least contribute in one of batting average or steals. So, Scott, you mentioned that you like to target Bregman and Corey Seeger, even Anthony Rendon, we all like him as well. I mean, those are going to be, hopefully, with Bregman as well,
Starting point is 00:09:41 for category contributors where they afford you the luxury to take Steele's contributors later on in your drafts that are not going to give you power or they might be a drain on your batting average you get that early on and then you could take some chances
Starting point is 00:09:54 on some Steele's guys later and the same thing with power if you need that late in your draft. Chris, do you have a specific rhodo strategy that you like to use? It's like Scott said it's more about stat scarcity than positional scarcity.
Starting point is 00:10:09 You can find in a 12 team league especially with the exception of catcher there's probably someone you'll feel good about starting at pretty much every spot assuming you don't wait until the 20th round to start drafting starting hitters
Starting point is 00:10:23 but for me I think my general strategy in Roto is probably one pitcher by the hopefully first two rounds another pitcher in the fifth and sixth round range and then I really like the 100 to 150 range
Starting point is 00:10:41 in ADP for starting pitchers, so I probably get like my number three, four, and five starters out of that group. I wrote about that on CBS Sports last week. So, you know,
Starting point is 00:10:53 I think, you know, Scott and I disagree a lot about starting pitchers famously, but it's funny. In the end, we kind of both have the same strategy. Like,
Starting point is 00:11:03 we're both aiming for five of the top. Yours is like top 35 or so. Yeah. Which is roughly transatl, Slates to five of my first picks, first 10 picks in starting pitchers. Yeah. Mine is more like, let me look at my rankings and see, like, based on what you're saying, Chris, five of my top 40 to 45-ish.
Starting point is 00:11:27 Yeah, I was going to say 45 makes sense for you. Which is different, but, you know, once you get down there, I think, you know, Scott, I think you have Dylan Bundy as a top 35 pitcher. I have them as a top 45 pitcher. you know, it's mostly we just like different guys. Yeah, yeah, I can see how it would come down to that. And I'll also point out that it's easier
Starting point is 00:11:49 to justify five starting pitchers with the first 10 picks in something like a 12 team league versus something like a 15 team league when I just couldn't do it. I mean, I spent three of my first four picks on starting pitchers in TGFBI here and then took, I took a fourth one, I think in round eight.
Starting point is 00:12:05 But I couldn't get that fifth one in there. It was just sacrificing too much. And it was already clear in a 15 team league. that I had a pretty big starting pitcher advantage. So, you know, deeper leagues like that, you obviously have to be reasonable. But the bottom line is I want to try to have the strongest pitching staff coming out of the draft
Starting point is 00:12:24 because bad things are going to happen to everybody's pitching staff, and I want to be the one everybody comes to when the bad things happen to overpay for pitching. To be clear, when we say pitcher in this context, we're talking about starting pitcher. Correct. Right.
Starting point is 00:12:41 I don't think any of the three of us is all that interested in spending a top 100 pick on a relief pitcher. I don't think I've done it. No. In any draft this year. And in TGFBI, which is 15 team league, I have zero relievers through 24 rounds. I'm not saying that's a great idea. Oh, my gosh. But, you know, there are so many unsettled closer spots this year at this point that, you know, hopefully by,
Starting point is 00:13:10 by the end of the spring, we'll have answers. But if you go back to our relief pitcher preview, it was close to half the league, who we just didn't really have a strong sense of who the closer would be. So if you throw three darts at the end of the round and you hit on at the end of the draft and you hit on two of them,
Starting point is 00:13:31 that's a viable strategy for relief pitcher as well. So for me, that's pretty much my strategy at this point. At relief pitcher, unless there are, Unless there's a really high impact, potentially high impact guy that falls, which we talked about on the relief pitcher preview for me, that's James Corrincheck. Trevor Rosenthal seems to fall.
Starting point is 00:13:51 He's dealing with a groin injury now, so we'll see what happens there. But it doesn't sound like a big deal. Will Smith for the Braves, I think is on the lower end of that. And kind of Amir Garrett, though Amir Garrett tends to go so late that he kind of fits into the strategy
Starting point is 00:14:04 of just waiting till the end. But otherwise, I'm loaded up on like the Greg Hollins, the Joaquin Sorias, the Daniel Bard. Daniel Bard, that's the name I was thinking up for the Rockies. Yeah, because they look like they're in position to be their team's closers. And even if they're not good enough to keep the job, whatever, that's going to go for half the position.
Starting point is 00:14:26 The closers you draft are very unlikely to be your save sources all season long. I just want to try and narrow down the guys who are going to be there at the beginning. I will say, I agree. I'm not going to use a top 100 pick. on a closer usually, but top 150, I think I will. I'll try to get one of my top 12. I mentioned in the relief pitcher preview. That 10 to 12 range,
Starting point is 00:14:47 that's the last of the ones that I feel good about. And again, that's a relative term among relief pitchers. But, you know, guys like Craig Kimbril and Kirby Yates, right in that mix. Just to highlight what middle of the road in the save category looked like in 2019, you could finish sixth place with 66. saves. Okay. So, yeah, that's about 22 saves per relief pitcher spot. Assuming, Chris,
Starting point is 00:15:14 let me ask you, you have nine pitcher spots in a Rotel league. You're starting, usually, is it six starting pitchers and three relief pitchers, seven and two? That depends what the, what the, how the draft goes. In DGFDI, I will probably be starting nine starting pitchers to open the season, and we'll see what happens. You know, it depends on the relievers. I'm not going to start, uh, ideally I would rather not start a like four point five ERA. closer just because he's getting saves. If he's one of two that I have, I might not have a choice. But I think the ideal would be two pretty good closers if you can get them.
Starting point is 00:15:53 It's rare to see a guy with a 450. I keep that role for long anymore, like the days of Mike Williams closing. Like that's, that's, you don't see a lot of that anymore. But I, I do. Okay, so you said 66 saves was good for sixth place two years ago, Chris? Yeah, in a 12 team. And what was first place? 100.
Starting point is 00:16:13 Like, here's the thing of it. I feel like saves is the easiest category to win. I go into every year planning on winning saves without making that big of an investment and relief pitcher. Because like, if you're just consistent about pursuing those guys on the waiver war, you don't got to try and like, you know, there are some new closer candidates, particularly early in the year with everybody blows out their budget to pick up. but at some point
Starting point is 00:16:38 saves fatigue will set in and it gets a lot easier to get those guys and you just have to be consistent about it. You just look at like a situation like Cleveland where they have, you know, I think we all probably agree James Karen Jack is the best option there,
Starting point is 00:16:54 but Nick Whitner is a really good reliever and Emmanuel Class A could be a lights out closer. That was the scouting report on him when they traded Corey Kluber for him. So, you know, if Karen check, you know,
Starting point is 00:17:08 he threw nine straight balls in a recent outing, I think I read that in Scott's spring notebooks column. You know, if he falters or if they just don't trust him, it could be Nick Whitgren. And if Nick Whitgren fail,
Starting point is 00:17:21 like there are more good relievers and good closers. Yeah. And yeah, if you're active on the, like shooting for 100 saves on draft day is way overkill. Like if you get,
Starting point is 00:17:35 if you're the kind of person who wants to get locked down elite closers, take Liam Hendricks and Roldest Chapman and don't think about it ever again. Because if you're investing that much in those two guys, if they lose their jobs, it's like there's no point in having a backup. And there are different ways to win in fantasy
Starting point is 00:17:53 and specifically in Roto, just because we're telling you not to use a top 100 picture on a reliever. It doesn't mean that it can't work. And I know you brought this up before as well, Chris, that if there's ever a year to target those guys, like Liam Hendricks and Chapman, say they pitch 60 to 70 innings each,
Starting point is 00:18:10 that can be, with the ratios that they give you, that can be half of an elite starting pitcher. We can be, you know, an elite starting pitcher might only give you 150 innings this year. And that's something to keep in mind when you're building your roto league is when you're looking at ratios, so specifically average ERA and WIP,
Starting point is 00:18:28 you have to think about the numerator and the denominator, so the amount of runs allowed and the innings pitched. And in this season, your innings pitch total is almost certainly going to be lower. I'm not sure. I think it's like 1,200 or 1,400 innings pitched is what you usually end up with, what the average fantasy team ends up with in a 12-team league. This year, that might be 1,200. And so that's something to keep in mind is the elite relievers,
Starting point is 00:19:03 should have a bigger impact on your ratios, which doesn't just apply to a Liam Hendricks, but it could also apply to a James Karen check if he doesn't get saves or Nick Anderson or... Devon Williams. Any of those guys, Devin Williams. And then that also both makes a low-inning elite pitcher potentially more valuable if you can get them at a discount.
Starting point is 00:19:27 And if Trevor Bauer pitches 210 innings with a 3ERA, that's going to be hugely valuable. Mm-hmm. Correct. Yep, good stuff there. Before we get to head to head points, I do want to promote a few things. It is the month of madness in the Ion College Basketball podcast is here as your audio guide for the entire NCAA tournament. Gary Parrish and Matt Norlander will offer a complete breakdown as soon as the bracket is announced on Sunday. So you stand a chance in your pool this year. The coverage continues with reactions after each day of games and previews of upcoming rounds. If you want the best March Madness analysis,
Starting point is 00:20:05 subscribe to the Eye on College Basketball podcast anywhere you find this podcast. Fantasy baseball today. Speaking of March Madness, you can create a pool to compete against your friends or fill out your bracket for the chance to win a Nissan Rogue. And a trip to the 2022 Final Four,
Starting point is 00:20:24 you can play on the CBS Sports app or at cbsports.com slash brackets. All right, let's talk about head to headpoints. Points Leagues now, and specifically the strategy here. This is probably, do you have the breakdown, Chris? Is this the most played format on CBS Sports Leagues, head to head points? I feel like it is. I think it's a plurality, but not a majority.
Starting point is 00:20:44 Okay. Or something like that. Okay. Whatever that means. It's the most, but not most. Less than 50%. I will point out that I love the head to head points format, but I've got to come clean. I think that
Starting point is 00:21:02 I talk about points leagues less than Adam Azer used to because I just I'm going to lose some people here, man, but I don't think that there is much strategy involved in a head-to-a-head points league as there is in a roto or even a head-to-categories league
Starting point is 00:21:16 which we'll talk about in a little bit. But I think in a head-ted points league you want to be aggressive on starting pitchers early. You want to target hitters with strong plate discipline who bat in the top half of really good lineups because those hitters
Starting point is 00:21:27 will get more plate appearances than hitters on bad teams, just because obviously they're making more played appearances and they're, and played appearances equal more fantasy points. So with that being said, Scott, what is your general head-to-head
Starting point is 00:21:42 points strategy? Are you more aggressive on starting pitchers in this format compared to any of the others? I think probably, I'm still trying to figure out exactly what I want. We haven't done enough mocks for head-to-head points leagues yet.
Starting point is 00:21:58 We're doing one later this week. It's been, it's the, it's the format I've played for the longest. It's the format I've probably done the best in by and large. But it's, you know, it's, what you're saying, there's, there's some truth to it, I think, Frank. Given the way, given what the environments become, where hitting is so plentiful and there are so few lineup spots to fill. I'm about to the point I want to I want to rehearse this a few times
Starting point is 00:22:34 before I get all the way there but I'm about to the point where I just want to draft pitchers until all the good ones are gone and then just take whatever's left at hitting and trust myself to fill in those hitter spots as optimally as I can over the course of the season
Starting point is 00:22:52 and just make sure I don't get screwed on pitching because everybody's going to to push them up their draft boards. I think I'm about to that point. I'm about to that point. Would I pass up Mike Trout in round two? Probably not. But barring something excessive like that,
Starting point is 00:23:12 barring something excessive like that, I think I want to try that next time because I mean, I didn't win the podcast listeners league last year. And it was probably the worst finish I had. And it was because I short-shed, changed pitching. You know, I didn't think I was short-changing pitching as the draft was playing out, but it turns out that's what happened. And that's exactly why I rank the three, the big three
Starting point is 00:23:37 starting pitchers, Jacob DeGrom, Garrett Cole, and Shane Bieber as my top three players in a head-to-head points league this year, Scott, is because I had the first overall pick in our podcast league last year, head-to-head points, and I took Christian Yellich. And by the time starting pitcher came back to me, I think I took Lucas G. Alito and Charlie Morton, which, okay, I, I, I, and, I, I think those were two of my top 15, but it did not work out very well. And I think once the season started, I ended up trading Yelich away for Kirschaw and Austin Meadows. I think that was the trade. But you just can never have enough pitching.
Starting point is 00:24:11 And the reason why we bring that up in a head-to-points league is that if you have bad pitching, you are going to get potentially single-digit points out of a start. You might even get negative points out of a start. And you can chase two-start pitchers, which I think is becoming a little bit outdated. Yeah, it used to be a way to make up for having a suspect pitching staff. But the disappearance of the middle class at starting pitcher is really ruined the two-start streaming strategy. Which, you know, that's not all a bad thing because it was kind of a lame strategy. It kind of ruined the whole head-to-head points league aspect for some people.
Starting point is 00:24:51 It didn't do it for me, obviously. But it kind of did for some people. Yeah, I don't think that's a reliable strategy at all anymore. Yeah, and you pick up two starting pitchers, two star pitchers. These guys could blow up twice in your lineup. You could get negative points from two starts in a pitcher in the same week. I mean, that's why the elite starting pitcher is as valuable as I think it is at this point. And it's head points.
Starting point is 00:25:12 Lee. Chris, do you have a specific strategy in this format? I've definitely draft starting pitcher a little earlier. And just, you know, we haven't done like a regular head-to-head points mock draft in a while, but we did do a salary cap draft recently. And 29 of the top 59 players in salary were starting pitchers. That's 29 of the 59 players with a salary over $20. So, you know, that is when you think about how the history of salary cap drafts has usually been, what, 180, 80 has been the kind of idealized. split 180 of your budget for hitters, 80 for your pitchers, something like that,
Starting point is 00:26:02 that's a significant change. And, you know, one thing I will say is there are definitely in head-to-head points because the push for pitching has gotten so extreme. I think zgging when everyone's zagging is a viable strategy. Because you can end up with, you know, five or six top 25. five hitters if you, you know, pursue that strategy.
Starting point is 00:26:30 And, you know, that can, that can give you an edge still. Because yes, you could have five or six top top 25 starting pitchers, but historically, three of those are going to be good.
Starting point is 00:26:46 One of them is going to be nothing. And two of them you might drop. Where do you get your pitchers if you, oh, sure. That's, that's always a question. Yeah, that's, that's, if Sandy Alcantara is your ace, I don't, I don't think it matters.
Starting point is 00:27:00 Yeah, no, I don't think Sandy Alcantara should be your ace. But yeah, I think zinging when everyone else is zagging is always a viable strategy, I guess, is the way I would say it. It's not necessarily always going to work out. But, you know, one thing about anthocis sports at this point, I've said this for both football and baseball the last couple years, is the markets are so efficient. It's so hard to find players who are truly undervalued that if everyone's pursuing the same strategy or if nine out of 12 teams in your league are pursuing the same strategy, that means you have to be better at that strategy than nine different people. Chris, I think you probably have the strongest hands ever. Because whenever I hear you type on the podcast,
Starting point is 00:27:49 it sounds so ferocious. Like, it is rapid and it's ferocious. And it's like, I hear it very clearly come through. It used to be louder, actually, when you had the lov mic, so it's gotten better, but. My wife was so upset when I told her I was getting a mechanical keyboard for my new computer because it's the clickety-clack, you know, that thing. She, she hates it. It's really bad that I'm a writer because I type very fast and very loud. Why would you do that, Chris? Why would you get that? Oh, because it's just such a better experience when you're typing. I do agree with that. And for gaming.
Starting point is 00:28:31 Yeah. It's better for gaming. It's more responsive. Yeah, I don't know much about the keyboard for the gaming, but definitely enjoy the mechanical keyboard when it comes to writing. Just go ahead, Scott. I didn't want to add something else here, just so we don't make the entire conversation about pitching.
Starting point is 00:28:48 I do think you have to play the position scarcity game a little more in head-to-head points leagues than you do in roto because you know there are going to be positions in a roto league because there are so many to fill where everybody's just going to have some kind of not so great players but in head to head points league it's that's not necessarily true you have so
Starting point is 00:29:07 few hitter spots to work with as much impact as you can get in each of them is like you don't want to be the guy who gets D.D. Gregorius as a starting shortstop in a points league. Not that D.D. Gregorius is bad. You could win with D.D. Gregorius is your shortstop but you'll be at a clear disadvantage at that
Starting point is 00:29:23 position versus everybody you play. And I know this kind of contradicts what I was saying about starting pitchers, because how are you supposed to have an impact player at every hitter position if you've used all your early picks on pitchers? But I think you can shoot for upside. I think you can target the deeper positions later. Head-to-head points league is probably the position where I'm most likely to invest in catcher for that reason.
Starting point is 00:29:47 Like, you have to differentiate yourself somehow, and that's one of nine hitter spots where you can do that. So I'm not saying I need JT Real Muto necessarily, but I don't, you know, if I can get Salvador Perez for a good price or, you know, if I want to shoot for the moon with Mitch Garver over somebody boring and safe like, I don't know, Christian Vasquez, I'd probably do that. You know, there are times when catcher's still the last position I fill in this format just because it's the way it works out. but I'm more likely to invest in a catcher in this format than I am, even in like a two-catcher roto league. And I think the positions to wait on probably shortstop in a head-to-head-points league because we've talked about there's kind of that top 13.
Starting point is 00:30:35 You got to pay attention to what other people are doing. If you don't get one of that top 13, yeah. If two people take their shortstop as a utility player, which I've seen happen, then you can't be the last person to take a shot. You can't be the last person to take a shortstop. And then Alfield, I think, is the clear one that you can wait on. And probably third base a little bit. I will just point out with short stops, Chris, that when we bring up that top 13,
Starting point is 00:31:01 that's usually for Roto where we include guys like Javier Baez. Not that he's completely terrible in a points league, but he just walks so few, few times. And he strikes out. Well, Mondesie. Mondesie. And Mondesie as well. Yeah, Monash is the one who drops, I think, to, yeah. that's that's fair he's he's he's startable in this format but he's not a standout and there
Starting point is 00:31:22 and then there are you know you got to remember there are guys like anthony rizzo um who is a little bit of an afterthought in rhodo at this point i mean he'll he'll go like around a hundred or a little later but um you know he's a viable top 75 pick if not earlier oh and i love getting him to walk a ton yep um you know max munsey's someone who's probably a little better in point points. Rees Hoskins. Reese Hoskins, because he'll walk so much. And yeah. So, you know, that's the other thing to keep in mind is there are guys like Adelberto Mondesi,
Starting point is 00:32:01 Kestin Hira, kind of for this. You know, I like him a lot in both formats, but he's a lot riskier in head-to-head points, I think, because that strikeout rate could be so bad. Yeah. Typically, you want to give a boost to players who have better. plate discipline in a points league, at least based on the CBS scoring system where you lose a point for a strikeout, you gain a point for a walk. So high OBP, the less strikeouts, the better for your hitters based on the CBS scoring system. The last thing I will mention about points leagues is quality
Starting point is 00:32:31 starts because they are a, you get bonus points for them based on the CBS scoring. And I think a lot of people, but just in general, if you play in any type of league that uses quality starts, I realize that we haven't talked a lot about quality starts. We did three starting pitcher previews and we didn't really talk about quality starts at all. So my bad, but they're a result of pitching well. Yeah, we talk about the six-inning threshold a lot. And that's the hardest hurdle to clear for a quality start. So, you know, indirectly we talked about it.
Starting point is 00:33:02 But yeah, I mean, like this format is where like, where guys like Tyler Glassnow, Julio Reyes. Blake Snow definitely loses value in this format. I don't know. I'm hopeful the Padres handle him differently than the Rays did. Famously, Snell made 17 starts including the playoffs last year
Starting point is 00:33:22 and didn't go six in one of them. So I get what you're saying. I'm just hopeful that changes now that he's with a different organization. I just don't know if that's a good thing, though. I feel like the Rays handled them well. They handle him the right way. They know something that we don't.
Starting point is 00:33:37 They handled him carefully. Yeah. But they lost the World Series. That is also true. I wanted to just point out the best pitchers. in terms of quality starts the past three years. Chris sent this over to me, so appreciate it, Chris. But the top 12 in quality start percentage
Starting point is 00:33:52 over the last three seasons with a minimum of 40 starts, Jacob de Grom, Clayton Kirschaw, Max Scherzer, Garrett Cole, Junjin Ryu, Corey Kluber, Trevor Bauer, Shane Bauer, Shane Beaver, Zach Granky, Steven Strasberg, Patrick Corbyn, and Aaron Nola. So if you want to give those players a slight boost
Starting point is 00:34:10 in a points league, that would probably make sense. It's pretty much the best pitch. over the last year. Right. So, you know, lower-end guys that would deserve a similar boost, I think, would be like Dallas Keikle and Marcus Stroman. Yep. Aaron Saval is actually. Aaron Savalai's got a 60% quality start rate in this career. I mean, we're drafting him no matter what. Like, get out of here, Scott, with your Savali is a bust. I know. No more Savali slander on this podcast. Brad Keller is going to be a surprisingly useful pitcher in this format. Like, I don't think he's must draft, but like, he's not going to be on the waiver wire for long. Some guys who surprisingly rank relatively high, Miles Michaelis, 58% quality start rate over the last three seasons. Jose Brrios, 55%. His is actually a little higher than Lucas Julito, although his breakout came in 2019.
Starting point is 00:35:04 Lance McCullors, surprisingly, 55%. I would have thought that would have been lower. He would have been a guy who I would have pegged for a lower one. He's ahead of guys like Noah Cindergarde, Blake Snell, Lance Lynn. I think we just assume that he doesn't go deep because his innings pitched have been so low, but that's just because he gets hurt.
Starting point is 00:35:25 I think when he actually pitches, he goes decently into his starts. So, yeah. Brad Keller, Brad Keller has a higher quality start rate than Walker Bueller over the last three seasons. Walker Bueller's 49th. Watch that man in head to head points leagues or in any type of quality start leagues as well.
Starting point is 00:35:41 but we told you that on our bus podcast yesterday. If you were watching on the video side, don't go anywhere if you are listening on the podcast. We're going to take a quick break, but when we return, head-to-head categories leagues here on Fantasy Baseball today. All right, so let's jump into head-to-head categories. This is where things just get completely weird.
Starting point is 00:35:59 We've talked about the Marmol strategy a lot in the off-season, but head-to-head categories is basically a combination of rotisserie and head-to-head points. You're going up against one other opponent, but instead of accumulating fantasy points, you are competing against each other in just those 10 categories. Other people play with more than 10 categories.
Starting point is 00:36:18 That's perfectly fine as well. We mentioned it on the Saturday Mailbag, but there are two different types of head-to-head categories leagues. The first, and I believe to be more popular, is where if you beat your opponent in all 10 categories, your record becomes 10-0,
Starting point is 00:36:31 and you just keep adding to that all season if you win 9-1 in week 2, your record then becomes 19 and 1. I'm not saying it's a good thing or a bad thing, but I just think it's the more popular format. I'm saying it's a bad thing. Chris doesn't like it, and then there's the traditional way to play
Starting point is 00:36:47 where as long as you just win six to four every single week, you will get one win and your record will become one and oh. With all that being said, Chris, we will start with you with head-ded categories. What is your strategy in this format?
Starting point is 00:36:58 Do you like to build for balance? Will you actually punt a category if you do like to punt? Which category do you punt? Yeah, punting's a lot easier. You can punt starting pitcher. to start with, you can punt saves, you can punt stolen bases. It's a little harder to punt, like, you can't just punt strikeouts.
Starting point is 00:37:17 If you're punting strikeouts, you're probably punting starting pitcher. If you're punting batting average, you can, but that usually, like, you can't really punt home runs. You can't really punt RBI. You can't really punt runs because those are so tied into the other types of hitting production. I don't know that you can completely punt starting pitcher either. I don't know if you meant it literally,
Starting point is 00:37:39 but there is a weekly innings minimum. Right, right. No, I, but I mean like not like not investing heavily. Yeah. Like you're never going to like you're never going to literally draft zero stolen bases. Unless you like really like can you clone Eloy Jimenez. Gosh, Chris, you hate him.
Starting point is 00:38:02 So you can you can punt and I think that it's a viable strategy. I think one, it depends on whether it's that 10 and 0 or 1 and no weekly scoring, because if it's 10 and 0 and you keep winning 5.5 to 4.5, you're not going to really have a good team. If it's 1 and0, then that's a different story because you can win 60% of your games, 6 to 4. And yeah, no, I'm definitely more likely to punt. steals or saves in this format. Yeah, I love punting steals. I mentioned it before.
Starting point is 00:38:44 I like to target guys that contribute in batting average and sluggers. I mean, so, like, for every guy that you take that will hit home runs that will hurt your batting average, you try and get someone who will prop it back up, someone like on Michael Brantley or an Alex Verdugo. But, yeah, every time someone hits a home run, they impact four different categories. They impact your batting average, home runs, runs, and RBI. So those things are all correlates.
Starting point is 00:39:06 and steals, I mean, it's just such a wacky stat. And especially, I mean, trying to predict steals for a season is hard enough. Trying to predict steals on a weekly basis is just impossible. So it's just completely lucky. It's really the upcharge for steals that makes it worth doing. I don't like, I don't, I've never been a proponent of punting categories, and I still don't think it's worth doing in roto because you have to give yourself a chance to move up in all the different categories over the course of the season.
Starting point is 00:39:34 But in this one, where, you know, that's not a thing. You're just going week by week with it. I think it makes sense. I think it makes sense as long as you're not, you know, gifted them in the first round with Ronald Acuna or Trey Turner or whatever. If you just happen to be in the right spot to take them, obviously you're not punting steals at that point.
Starting point is 00:39:56 You're probably going to win steals a lot of the time. But if they don't come easily, you don't, like, denying yourself steals doesn't rob you of anything else. you know, if you were to punt on starting pitcher, for instance, that's probably, that's, you're not giving yourself much of a chance in strikeouts or wins every week. But if you just punt steals, it's just steals. And you're, you're actually gaining in the other categories by not paying up for the steals the way everybody else is. And that's why steals and saves are the two easiest to punt because they are, yeah,
Starting point is 00:40:30 the most independent of the other categories. I get punting saves. I think that's true what you just said, but it goes back to what I was saying for Roto. I think it's such an easy category to do well in because there are new safe sources constantly emerging. And it also depends on if you're in a, I've played in head-to-head categories with standard Roto rosters
Starting point is 00:40:52 where you start 14 hitters by position and then just nine pitchers, in which case you can just go nine starting pitchers. One thing that I do like to do is keep flexible roster and look at the matchups. Because if I've got two relievers in my lineup and I look at the upcoming matchup and that guy doesn't have any relievers, I'll probably only start one of those relievers and, you know, try to get an extra starter in there to give myself a chance to compete in those wins and strike out categories and still, you know, hope that that guy gets a save that
Starting point is 00:41:31 week, which, you know, it's never a guarantee. I will once again remind people what the Marmel strategy is. We have talked about it a lot. But in case you've missed it, it is basically that you only draft relievers to put into your pitcher spots. And I think the standard Yahoo head-to-head categories lineup is two starting pitchers, two relief pitchers,
Starting point is 00:41:51 and then just four pitchers. So that can be either starters or relievers. And there are some pitchers on Yahoo that have starting pitcher eligibility that are relievers. I think Diego Castillo has it. Seth Lugo. There's a few others. I think Jose LeClerc has it as well.
Starting point is 00:42:07 But yeah, so you can get some relievers in your starting pitcher spots there as well. And the whole point here is you have to make sure your league has a low weekly innings minimum or no minimum at all to pull this off. And what you're doing is by not starting pitchers, you are punting wins and strikeouts, but the hope is that you dominate all other eight categories,
Starting point is 00:42:24 including offense. So you use your first 10 picks in the draft or something along those lines on hitters. So theoretically, you should have an awesome offensive lineup. And then you just load up on the best relievers that are available. Deerratically, but it's much harder to guarantee than I think it was in the years when the Carlos Marmull strategy was founded. When hitters came in a lot of different shapes and sizes, now everybody's just, most every hitter is hitting between 25 and 35 home runs, you know. And when you're breaking it down into week by week and having to outperform the other guy in the small sample of a week,
Starting point is 00:43:02 you know, just because you have the better hitters overall, which is, like I said, it's hard to guarantee in the first place. It's even harder to guarantee over a tiny sample like that. So I'm assuming you stay away from the Mar-Mull strategy, Scott. I was never in favor of it even when I thought it was justify. Frank, that's an insulting question.
Starting point is 00:43:25 Why is that? You would ask Scott if he would not draft starting pitchers? Come on. Hey, maybe this is the one format where he doesn't have to worry about it, right? So, um, no, Scott always worries in every format. True.
Starting point is 00:43:40 Especially about starting pitcher. Yeah. I mean, if he wasn't drafting starting pitchers, he would probably just be worried about not drafting enough relievers at that point. But, uh, I mean,
Starting point is 00:43:49 it's, it's funny that I've become this like starting pitcher proponent. Because I've, you know, I've been doing this, what, 13 years? Maybe it's my 14, I don't know.
Starting point is 00:43:57 It's been a long time. And for probably the first, eight, nine of the years. I couldn't have been further in the opposite direction. Like, give me my ace in round nine, you know? And it's just, it's just a whole league's turned upside down. You keep treating yourself like some iconoclast,
Starting point is 00:44:15 like you're some brave truth teller. Everyone agrees with you now, Scott. I know, I know. Like, starting pitchers cost more than ever. I wrote about this. I still want to go further than them, though, you know? I get it. You got people making pocket ace,
Starting point is 00:44:28 pitches for pocket aces. Like, that's not enough. That is not... I'm not saying, I'm not saying you can't go with a starting pitcher with your first and second pick. That's fine.
Starting point is 00:44:38 I'm just saying you can't rest on your laurels if you go starting pitcher first and second round. I have mentioned before that I use this pseudo-marmole strategy that I like to call the two by four, where I get two aces, two solid closers, two low-end closers,
Starting point is 00:44:54 and then two high-end setup relievers, and then just load up my entire bench with upside-on. arms. And I think it allows you to be competitive across the board. I used it in a league that I actually won, so that's why I like to stick with it at this point. We did a head-to-head categories mock just last week. You can find the results on the site, but here is what I wound up with using that strategy. Luis Castillo and Lucas Gielito were my two aces. Ricelli Glacius and Jordan Hicks were my two solid closers. Jose LaClerc and Brian Garcia were my two low-end closers.
Starting point is 00:45:23 And then I had Devin Williams and Giovanni Gallegos as my two high-end setup relievers on my bench, I had Julio Arias, Frankie Montas, Dallas Keikle, Tony Gonselin, and T.J. Anton. So, just hoping a few of those either hit or you just play the matchups, right? You don't have to start them. It's just you play them whenever they have good matchups. One thing I would point out is, you know, if you just do the math, five starting pitchers across 12 teams, technically you're not that undermanned at starting pitcher. You know, based on ADP, you've got five starting pitchers inside of the top 55. It's just your, you're aiming,
Starting point is 00:46:04 it's a high, low strategy, basically. Yeah. Yeah. But like that's, you're not, with this strategy, you're not necessarily sacrificing all that much. Like you got the 35th starter in ADP, you got the 48th and the 53rd. And T.J. Anto, who's going to finish as the number one pitcher this year? Gosh, he looks,
Starting point is 00:46:25 he looks so good. I'm excited. I'm excited about, T.J. Anton. He's not going to be in the rotation, Frank. Don't say that. Can we just get Wade Miley out of here? Like, why are we doing the Wade Miley thing? It's 2021. That's true. I mean, I can't say he'll never, Anton will never be in the rotation this year. But I don't think he's going to be at the start of the year. So he's going to get dropped in a lot of leagues and, you know, pick him up. Pick him up. All right. Let's hit some salary cap drafts. Honestly, we can do two hours on just strategy. And I knew this was going to happen.
Starting point is 00:46:53 But it's fine. There's a lot to talk about salary cap drafts. We can do two hours on strategy for each of. these formats. Seriously. Yeah, there is never-ending information. Salary cap drafts formerly known as auctions. We actually got this email from Wes Hughes a couple of weeks ago asking a bunch of questions. So let's do this a little bit rapid-fire style. And we will start with you this time, Chris. What is your nomination process in a salary cap draft? Do you nominate players you do not want so that everybody else has to spend their money? Do you like to mix it up? Do you maybe throw out a player here and there that you actually do want to get so you could spend some money how do you do it generally
Starting point is 00:47:30 speaking i go with a guy i don't want uh i think occasionally there's value in throwing out um you know very early on a lower end guy who you like just to see if uh you know the beginning of a of a salary cap draft will go one of two ways either everyone will be a little gun shy for the first few players or everyone will go nuts for the first few players. And so if you throw out a boring guy who you'd be fine getting for, you know, $5 like Anthony Rizzo, you might be able to get him for that price. Whereas, you know, if he went later in a draft, when people knew how many first basemen were left, you know, it might push him up a little bit.
Starting point is 00:48:15 So, but generally speaking, I prefer nominating guys I don't want. Scott? Yeah. What do you think? I kind of go, I've kind of, look, I don't want to say I always nominate players I want because that,
Starting point is 00:48:31 that's not something you want to reveal. And I don't anyway. I don't. There are times when I'm just looking to drain other people's money and then obviously it makes sense to nominate somebody you don't want.
Starting point is 00:48:40 But if my whole, if my whole plan hinges on me getting a certain player and you know I'm I'm keeping myself from bidding on other players that could potentially be good values because I'm counting on getting that player I got to just put that player out there because like it may it may be a lost cause I and then I've lost my chance to get all those other guys that would have been great and you know so that that happens several times over the course of the auction like okay I want this one player everything I do is going to depend
Starting point is 00:49:17 on whether or not I get this player. Let's just put the player out there. I also like throwing players out at a position that I've already filled. So, you know, you're likely not going to be bidding on that player anyway, so you can get more money off of the table that way. Scott, when do you enter a bid for a player? Do you jump in early or are you that person, that person, who waits until it gets down to like two, one, and then you bid?
Starting point is 00:49:42 Or do you change it up? I mean, change it up. change it up. I don't usually purposely wait till it gets down to two, one, because you don't know how, you don't know who else could jump in and then you end up having to bid
Starting point is 00:49:57 $2 up instead of one, you know, if you wait too long. If there's a good volley back and forth, me and one other guy just keep bidding each other up one. I might hesitate for like three, four extra seconds so that he thinks I'm like running out of steam in case he's trying to bid me up,
Starting point is 00:50:15 you know? Yeah. And then, you know, and then if he bids me up right away after that, I'm like, whatever. But that that's really the only time where I consciously wait to put in the bid. This is one of those things that I just acknowledge is like, is something I'm not great at with auctions is I definitely telegraph. Especially if like we're, man, anytime we've done like salary drafts in the office back when I worked down there and it was me and Heath in the same room. heath would troll me so much on it because he knew uh you know one which players i want and then he knew that i i hate when people wait until the last second uh it's just you know when you got
Starting point is 00:51:03 ADHD like it's just like that 10 second clock just takes forever when you got to wait again and again and so uh now i know you've gotten on me when i might be oh i i did that one i when I waited until the last second, but that is because I literally need until the last second to decide. No, that's the thing is some people do it. But like this is the fun thing about this format is there's a lot of, there's the psychology factor involved.
Starting point is 00:51:27 And you can, um, you know, try to psych the people that you're drafting without by waiting longer or hitting the button immediately. Um, or, you know,
Starting point is 00:51:40 I know R.J. White are our boss. He likes to, he just does the jump bid. Like if he thinks a player's worth $35, he's not going to sit around doing this $5, 6, 7, 8, he'll just hit $25.
Starting point is 00:51:55 Which, again, as someone who, you know, for whom patience is not a strong suit, I appreciate that. I'm writing all these things down, Chris, because we actually have a live salary cap draft podcast that we're going to do coming up soon so that it's going to be,
Starting point is 00:52:11 it's going to be wild. I'll just say, I think I handle. myself in salary cap drafts better than Scott does. Scott always just devolves immediately into self-loathing in the middle of salary cap. I spend most of every salary cap draft thinking I've ruined everything. That's that's there and then there comes a point usually about, you know, three quarters of the way through where it's like, okay, all right, this this is starting to shape up okay. But I usually do something early on or miss a chance to do something early on that just eats me up for the next hour
Starting point is 00:52:50 and a half. And this is the kind of thing where you can look at our salary values on the ranking site. You can look at the, what was it, head to head points, salary cap draft that we did last week. And you can use those as a guide, but there's only so much value you can get from them because you'll have, you know, some guys just go for way less than they should. Some guys go for way more. So, you know, that's another thing to keep in mind with when you're looking at those results.
Starting point is 00:53:22 You learn so much about your how it's going to go just from getting in there and seeing the way the first few bids go because, you know, if you see, you see the high end guys all going for way. This is really what projected salary cap values are about is. is to know how to calibrate your expectations, really is what I think that all they're, like if the top players are going for five to $10 more than what they're projected to go for,
Starting point is 00:53:51 you got to adjust. Okay, there's going to be some good values later. Yeah. And maybe you shouldn't invest in as many of them as you'd planned. If it's the other way around, then okay, go total stars and scrubs because you're going to overpay for some middling guys just because there's going to be too much money on the table later. You have to be able to account for inflation basically is,
Starting point is 00:54:08 yes, use them as a guide. in our draft kit, you can find all of our salary cap values, and you should have those going into your draft. And you should, you know, I usually like to plan out a whole thing. I have a bunch of different targets and players that I want, and I have an idea of what I want to spend, but say a player within that tier early on goes for $5 to $10 more, as Scott said, you have to be able to adjust and know,
Starting point is 00:54:32 okay, well, I don't want to be completely left out. If I am going to spend more money up here to get my player, so be it, that means, you know, some of the mid-tier players or even lower-end players, or even lower-end players are going to go for cheaper than they should. But just don't be completely scared off when you see players go for more. You have to adjust for that inflation. Be flexible in salary cap drafts more than any other format.
Starting point is 00:54:51 I did just want to ask, are you guys more likely to go with a Stars and Scrubs approach in a salary cap draft, or do you like to go with a more balanced approach, say, you know, the $15 to $30 players? Because for me, it's dependent on how deep the league is. I have a 15-team roto league that I play in every single year. and I will not spend more than $35 on a player, if that. I mean, I really live in the $20 to $30 range, and I just, I want to be more balanced than anything.
Starting point is 00:55:19 I don't want to pay up in that type of format, because you pay up, next thing you know, that player gets hurt, the replacement value in a deeper league is much worse than if it's in a 10 or 12 team league. Well, and it also makes a difference what the scrubs actually look like. I mean, a scrub, a $1, $2 scrub,
Starting point is 00:55:34 and a 12-team Roto League could be, you know, a high-profile sleeper. It could be who, Chris? Like, Jack Peterson, who might hit 35. Oh, it could be even somebody better than that, just depending, because somebody's, if people overpay for the studs, there's going to be really good players that go for cheap.
Starting point is 00:55:52 And then you also have the waiver wire. Like, the key to stars and scrubs, or studs and duds, whatever you call it, is that your scrubs aren't actually going to be scrubs in the end, whether because they're just good values in the draft itself, or because you know good options are going to emerge on the waiver wire
Starting point is 00:56:11 that you'll get to fill those spots later on. So if it gets, if it's such a deep league that the scrubs are really scrubs or that they're little waiver wire to speak of, then you have to balance your dollars a little more because you can't afford to have those holes. So I would say 15 team mixed or deeper, I try to balance more.
Starting point is 00:56:32 Certainly ALNL only. I mean, I might not get any real stars in those formats because I'm so concerned about filling all the spots with the budget I have. But, you know, 12 teams are fewer, definitely stars and scrubs. All right, let's do some rapid fire. I still have so much, but we'll just try to get to as many of these things in the next, you know, five to ten minutes. Let's talk a little dynasty. Scott, what is your approach in? If you're doing a startup dynasty draft, are you, when, this is, there's no way to do this fast. I don't even know why I said it, but whatever,
Starting point is 00:57:05 However long you want to talk, Scott, tell me what your approach would be in a startup dynasty draft. Are you more of like a win now? Do you look at like a three to five year window? Do you take all the top prospects and you punt years one and two? I mean, there are so many different ways to win in dynasty. Yeah, and I've started a few before. And, you know, I have dynasty rankings. The top 150, I actually just updated it.
Starting point is 00:57:24 And you'll probably notice that you're not going to get the highest end prospects if you follow those dynasty rankings. I know some people like to do a dynasty startup just loading up on prospects. just tanking the first couple years. I don't think there's any reason to do that. You know, most of the high-end players are young guys in their mid-20s, you know? Like, they're going to be, like, form a nucleus you can actually believe in because they're proven and they're going to help you win right now. And I'm not saying I sell out for right now.
Starting point is 00:57:58 I, you know, I build a solid nucleus of 20-somethings that I know are good. and then I take whatever values fall on both ends of the spectrum because a lot of 30-somethings are going to fall and then kind of those second-tier prospects are going to fall. A lot of them are going to end up being great values. And so I just gobble up the values wherever I see them on both ends of the spectrum. But my goal is to always content in a Dynasty League, always.
Starting point is 00:58:26 So you don't want to, you don't want to neglect anything really. if you build a strong core when other guys aren't, that's going to give you trade assets too, that you can then like, trading is such a part of my dynasty strategy. It's really the format where I invest the most time in trading. And I'm always, always trading for next year is kind of a goal of mine.
Starting point is 00:58:59 and if you're always trading for next year pretty soon you're going to be so strong in the current year that it's kind of hard to it's kind of hard to mess up at that point. Chris, not in Dynasty League, just in general. How do you handle Fab, which is free agent acquisition budget in season? In a minute or less,
Starting point is 00:59:21 are you aggressive early? Do you save it for the long haul? How do you approach Fab? I think you probably want to be more aggressive early. You know, you're always, I think there's, there's kind of a, you know, you can always save it for the next big guy. But if it's a need that you have right there and it can be an impact player, I don't really
Starting point is 00:59:43 see much reason to hold out. Because for one thing, if you're week two, you know, fab bid hits, you're getting 23 weeks out of them. Correct. Whereas if you're week 12, one, that being. said, early season guys can get overrated. And you can have, I'm thinking of like Matt Davidson hitting five home runs in the first four games or whatever was a couple years ago or there's someone last year who had a really, really great start. I think Joe, I think Joe Jimenez
Starting point is 01:00:25 had a save for each of the first three games. And he might have ended the season with three saves. Yeah, and so that's one of the things that you just always have to keep in mind early in the season, and it's not just for Fab, is just don't overreact to the first week. You know, the early results don't necessarily mean anything more, and that's always a really hard thing to keep in mind. But if it is a situation where, you know, let's say we get to opening day, Cleveland hasn't announced who their closer is, and all of a sudden Nick Whitgren get the first two saves, you probably want to put in a pretty hefty bit on him. You don't want to
Starting point is 01:01:04 be conservative there because that guy's good enough to be the closer all year long. Yeah, typically. I think it, yeah, I think it depends on the situation. Yeah, typically, I'm more aggressive early on. If you hit on a stud, as you mentioned, you have him for a longer portion of the season. So that's usually how I look at it. But I will point out that yes, prospects are going to go for a ton of money in Fab, but they usually get called up further into the season. First, month, second month. I remember a couple of years ago, you're Don Alvarez. I mean, he didn't break out until that year. And then he came up, I think,
Starting point is 01:01:36 in June or July. And he was the lead winner for a lot of people. What I would say is you don't want, you don't want to blow all your fad before the prospects get called up, which is, you know, there are, we generally know when that's going to happen. It's like after the first two weeks of the season, a handful of them will get called up. And then
Starting point is 01:01:53 starting in the middle of May for the Super two guys. So you don't want to blow all of it before that crop comes up. But you don't necessarily want to get past that point with a significant amount of your fab left, because then the opportunities are going to be rarer and rare for those impact players. There are two things to keep in mind with how you distribute your fab dollars of the course of the year, in my mind. The rest of your league is never going to be more interested than at the start of the year. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:02:26 And we're never going to know less about the season that's about to unfold than at the start. of the year. So there are going to be more impact players that you can get earlier and there's going to be less competition for your fab later. So, you know, if it's a league that allows
Starting point is 01:02:44 zero dollar bids, I might spend half my budget in the first six weeks and then slow way down because there's less competition for it, you know? Fair enough. Yeah, and you know, this season especially, we're not going to know anything. You know, early on we don't really know what the impact of the
Starting point is 01:03:00 dead and ball will be if it will have an impact at all. We were coming off a 60 game season, so we don't know who was real and who was fake last season. So there's going to be more turnover, I would think, at the back end of most rosters this year than last year because of those factors in particular. All right, we're going to wrap there. Let us know what you think, everybody. Did you enjoy our first ever, just full show dedicated to strategy if you do? Hopefully we'll make it an annual thing that we'll be.
Starting point is 01:03:30 do right before the season gets started. For Scott and Chris, I am Frank, thank you all for listening and watching fantasy baseball today. We'll be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye.

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