Fantasy Baseball Today - Tyler Glasnow Value, Statistical Trends & 2022 Lessons Learned! (10/11 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: October 11, 2022

EARGATE! We start off with a recap of the Wild Card round (2:00). ... Tyler Glasnow looked great in his three starts (7:55). ... Home runs were down while steals were up in 2022 (11:20). ... Pitching was better this year and there were more saves available (29:00). ... News (38:44): Ozzie Albies is out for the NLDS and the Braves signed Spencer Strider to a six-year extension. ... Which players did we get right/wrong this season (45:20)? ... Which players were on the most championship teams on CBS (57:15)? ... We wrap up with a look at Frank's first draft (59:40). Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Get 20% off Fantasy Baseball Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-baseball-today?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-baseball-collection Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your lead. Where fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank Scott and Chris. Scott, your ears are looking really shiny tonight. Yeah, we're going to need a substance check.

Up. Come take a look at this guy because I don't know. Something's going on. Welcome in to another off-season edition of fantasy baseball today on Tuesday, October 11th. Frank Stamphle joined by Scott White. Today on the show, we're gonna recap that first round of the wild card playoffs.

Little ear gate going on with Joe Musgrove and the New York Mets. Some statistical trends from this past season. The dust has settled. The data is ready to be evaluated. So I've got a whole bunch of different things from home runs, steals, saves, endings pitched, we'll get to all that.

what we got right and wrong, lessons learned. And Scott, please don't judge me. But I have started my first draft for next year. I don't judge that. That's fine. Well, wait, is it, is it like, it's not just a mock you're saying? It's a real. Oh, it's a real draft.

It counts. It counts. Yeah. Yeah, he kind of seemed like a degenerate then. That's okay. It's all right. I came to that realization years ago, so I'm totally fine with it. But I went on the NFBC.

I saw a draft. It was like 14 out of 15. Staring me in the face. I was like, all right, I'll just do it. Plus, I could just use this to evaluate basically all season long and all offseason long and see what other people are thinking. But yes, we do have a stacked show. So let's jump in. Scotty, how's the weekend, man? Did you watch any of the playoffs?

I watched a little bit of the playoffs. Yeah, it did. It did. What did you think? It's good. Well, I mean, You got to start with the Mets, right? Meet the Mets.

I can't do that. I feel bad. 100 wins. They're out after the first weekend of the playoffs. It's Grom, Scherzer, 1001 win team. Yeah, I mean, that's, that goes to show you how big that series was in Atlanta, the second to last series of the season where the Braves swept and thereby took the season series, which ended up being the tiebreaker.

There's two teams tied with 1001 wins. But the Braids got the first round by, and the Mets got knocked out in three games by the Padres. Don't say it with such exuberance, Scott. No, I mean, look, it's unfortunate. I mean, certainly, you know, certainly I've experienced a lot of early exits as a fan myself. But, you know, that's, when you have a best of three,

series, that's going to happen a lot. It's just such a small amount of time to sort things out. Something fluky happens in even one of those games, well, obviously you have to win the other two. And a fluky thing did happen in this, right? Max Scherzer had

some mechanical issues going on in game one and got knocked around a bit by the Padres and then you Darvish on the other end did his thing. And the Mets couldn't couldn't then run the table to, you know, sweep the remaining two games to take the series. And so they're out.

And I think, I believe this is true, three of the four lower-seated teams won. I mean, yeah, yeah, three of the four lower-seated teams won. So there were three, the four series that happened, three of them were upsets. Yeah, that is correct. And three of them were swept two out of three. So there wasn't, it didn't require a third game outside of the Met, and the Padres. Speaking of the Mets,

look, the final month of the season, they shot themselves in the foot, Scott. What comes down to is they blew it. They lost some, they had some bad losses

against bad teams, the Cubs, the pirates, the Marlins down the stretch. So obviously all eyes on that series with the Braves, but they have no one to blame but themselves,

especially when you lose that many games to bad teams. They just had to take one against the Braves because then they swept the nationals to end the year. And so just one, win against the Braves.

The Braves lost two or three to the Marlins. The only game they did win to clinch the division was a two-one game against the Marlins. So, yeah, I mean, it came down to just one outcome for the Mets. And maybe that would have been the difference between them going to the World Series or not. We'll never know. I mean, obviously a one-two punch like de Grom and Scherzer, you like that against

any team. Not saying they would have definitely gotten there. obviously the Dodgers are good, the Braves are good, but could have been all the difference. But that, I mean, that goes to show you how important it is. I do think it's a good thing that teams aren't able to coast into the playoffs with whatever seed and basically have equal odds of advancing.

You know, you've got to, even if you're one of the three best teams in your league, you've got to be pushing to be one of the two best teams of your league. so you could skip that chaotic best of three series. And I do think that's a good thing, but it is going to lead to disappointed fan bases when their team gets knocked off early. Last point on this Mets Padre series, the Joe Musgrove thing, obviously, you know,

start off the show, Scott's ear is glistening. I mean, it was, here's my thought. Seven shutout innings for Joe Musgrove, he was fantastic. One hit, five strikeouts, 12 swinging strikes. He was very good. There were many images of his ear looking very shiny. I get that. call for the substance check and the umpires come out and then there's a clip of him wiping his ear off

with his jersey just before they come out to rub down his ears and for anyone who wasn't aware, the spin rates were up across the board for Joe Musgrove in this start. A slider was up 248 RPM. His curve was up 170. His fastball was up 106. But his velocity was also up and those things are correlated. So I have this tweet from Enosaris. Joe Musgrove's velocity is up a tick, and his four seam spin rate is two. These things are related. His spin per mile per hour is only up a little bit, 27.6 to 28 RPM per mile per hour. So more velocity equals more spin rate. Basically, Scott, what I'm saying is, I don't think that there was anything wacky going on here. I just, I think he pitched really well, but that's just me. Yeah.

Yeah, Devin Fink, who I believe writes for MLB analyst, formerly with fan graphs. Okay, that's what I was thinking for Devin Fink. Yeah, he basically said the same thing. He was probably amped up for the playoff spot, was throwing harder, and so the spin rates were up as a result. I mean, the umpires came and checked and didn't find anything, so I think you got to let it go at that point.

It's certainly reasonable to conclude that he wasn't doing anything nefarious, and if he was, he managed to evade. the ways of checking it. So I don't think there's anything to fixate on at this point. Fair enough. Padres are moving on. As are the Seattle Mariners who had a huge comeback on Saturday. They were down 8 to 1 in that game against the Blue Jays. They stormed all the way back and they won 10 to 9 to sweep that series.

The Guardians pitching was amazing in that series against Tampa Bay. Did want to quickly highlight Tyler Glass now, Scott, who also looked great. He went five shutout with five strikeouts to zero walks, 15 swinging strikes on 63 pitches in that game on Saturday. And he made three starts, which spanned 11 and 2 thirds innings pitched. He allowed just one earned run during that time. I know I asked you last week about, you know,

where you might have him ranked, which is obviously very early and subject to change. But in this draft that I'm doing, which will count, he was the SP 25 off the board, which might be aggressive, but he also looks really, really good. And he was awesome the last time we saw him. too. So he went just ahead of Robbie Ray, Clayton Kirchall, Logan Webb.

What do you think about that, Scottie? I mean, it wouldn't be me. It wouldn't be me. I've long tended to emphasize durability over ratio, like raw stuff, the potential for killer ratios. Tyler Glassnow's career high innings is 111 and two-thirds. And, you know, maybe he'll set a career high next year. but you know

the pitchers you were saying went after him I mean Robbie Ray he had an uneven season I get it but there were a lot

of dominant starts in there and he was the Cy Young winner just last year you know I couldn't take Tyler Glassnow over them

I think Tyler Glassnow's good there's certainly a point where I'd be happy to take him but that's putting a lot of eggs in that basket that really

really, there really hasn't been much to justify, I don't think. Yeah, me personally, I wouldn't take Glass Now over Robbie Ray either, but Glass Now versus Logan Webb, I think that's a little bit closer, you know, the stuff isn't nearly as good for someone like Logan Webb. He's more of an accumulator, an ennings eater, if anything. So, I don't know, that one's a little bit closer, but we'll have all offseason to figure that out. And last but at least, the Phillies wound up winning their series against the St. Louis Cardinals. and they had a big comeback on Friday. They were trailing going into the ninth inning.

They had a big ninth in that one. And speaking of the ninth inning, Scott, Zach Eflin has pitched the final inning in the Phillies last three wins. So this is dating back into the regular season. I don't know what their situation is like in the off season, but I just kind of thought it was interesting that even with having David Robertson,

and I know they've used Alvarado in some higher leverage situations recently as well, the team has opted to go with Zach Eflin. Just kind of interesting. Yeah, it is interesting. I think that'll come back to bite them if they continue doing that. Yeah, I mean, I presume Eflin's probably going to be used as a starter next year and it won't be a situation that continues beyond the playoffs if it even continues that long.

All right. And farewell to the Cardinals grades, obviously. Albert Pooholz, Yadier, Molina, maybe Adam Wainwright. I don't know if it's been confirmed whether or not he is retiring. Kind of seems like he might do it. It would make sense with all of his buddies retiring as well. but I watched an interview with Yadir Malina where he was getting emotional

and it's the end of an era these are guys that I frankly grew up watching throughout my entire baseball livelihood my fantasy baseball fandom has included all of those names with the Cardinals so it's just kind of weird to see them all go let's jump in Scott to some statistical trends this season and we will start off

with home runs I mentioned I've got some speed something about steals I've got innings I've got strikeouts, I've got saves. But we will start with home runs, which were definitively down this season. 5,215 home runs hit in the regular season, the fewest in a full season since 2015. Here's the breakdown. Hitters with 40 plus homers the last three full seasons. Four this year, five last year, 10 back in 2019.

Obviously, that was like the height of the juice ball era. hitters with 30 plus home runs the last three seasons. 23 this year, 43 last year, 58 back in 2019. That is just a huge disparity. 30 plus home run hitters, 23 this year, 43 last year. And then 20 plus home run hitters the last three seasons. 71 this past season, 102 last year, and 129 back in 2019, Scott. So as we, you know, figured throughout the course of the season, now that we actually have the data to back it up, there's just not many, as many home runs being hit throughout the course of baseball.

Yeah, I mean, you compare 2019, which was when the juice ball was at its juiciest to 2020. And you're talking about 20 home run hitters, it's almost half the number just from 2019, just three years earlier. And 30 home run hitters, it's even less than half the number hitting 30 plus home runs. But this is a more conventional aesthetic. I mean, the juice ball era was weird in that way, how widespread home runs were. And it lasted so long. I mean, you say 2015, that 2015 was the last year that league-wide this few home runs were hit. Well, 2015 was the year before the juice ball era started.

2016 is considered the starting point of that. So, you know, 2015 to me isn't that long ago because I've been doing this job for 15 years. But for a lot of people listening, I mean, their entire, the entire time they played fantasy, or at least as far back as they can remember, they're used to everybody who's anybody being able to hit 20 home runs. And we're getting away from that. and I think that's a good thing. It's going to make the game a lot more strategic because it's going to give you a lot more to think about

in terms of statistical scarcity if you play in a roto league. And that's going to translate to positional scarcity. And the positional scarcity thing is going to matter in all formats. I had been frustrated with points leagues in recent years because, you know, particularly the CBS Standard points leagues, you start just nine hitters. it became really hard to differentiate yourself at the hitter spots. It was basically just how much pitching do you have in points leagues

because the hitters, you could find eight guys who hit just as well as your opponent's eight guys without trying that hard. And that's not going to be the case anymore. So it's a very good thing for the health of the fantasy game. But it's going to be an adjustment for people. And I mean, I assume many people experience that adjustment, just going through this season and hopefully we can help lead them the right direction

so that they're better prepared for it next year. So what does it mean for fantasy, right? Scott, I think you just broke it down. But in layman's terms, there's a bigger disparity between the haves and the have-nots, specifically when it comes to home runs and sluggers, right? So that's why we're going to see Aaron Judge

be likely a top three, no later than a top five pick in every draft next year, or an emphasis on Pete Alonzo as a second or early third round pick or just guys that we can almost pencil in for 35 or 40 plus home runs and those are the two names that stood out right away to me. Home run to fly ball ratio, Scott.

This is something we highlighted all throughout the season because we remember April was brutal. Offense was down. Power was down across the board. It was obviously still pretty cold around all the ballparks where baseball was being played. And we wound up at 11.4% overall. That was the home run to fly ball ratio.

That was also the lowest since 2015, which makes sense on the previous stat, which I gave out. April was 10%. May jumped up to 11.4, which is actually a pretty sizable increase month over month. June 12.3, also pretty good. July, 11.5. So back down to that range where we were at in May. August was 11%. So dropping a little bit more. September slash October, pretty curious, Scott.

I know we talked about this towards the end of the season, 11.8%, which is typically not what we see in terms of just power and home runs being hit in baseball. You know, if you want to theorize that maybe they were mixing in some juice balls with all these home run records being chased and judge and pooholes and everything else that was going on,

it might have happened because Scott just doesn't really make sense in my mind that we would see a downtick from June to July to August and then it would go back up in September. Does that make sense? Yeah, I mean, I think that's the conspiratorial way of looking at it. And, you know, even if you don't want to be conspiracy-minded, just incompetence, you could make that accusation.

Since last year, you know, we thought we were looking at the effect of the deaden balls last year, and it turns out there are mixing a lot of old balls in still, a lot of the juice balls in still. And there wasn't really much rhyme or reason behind when old balls were being used and new balls were being used. So we couldn't really get a sense for how the league was going to play with the new ball last year. And that seems largely like a measure of incompetence or indifference. And maybe something similar happened.

I think what it actually was, though, is it was just an unusually hot September, particularly in places like California. And you'll remember when we checked it earlier in September, it was actually much higher than 11.8%. It was higher than June even. It was, September was shaping up to be the most homer friendly month of the season. And so the fact that it dropped below the June amount by the end suggests to me, okay, thanks started cooling off by the end of September. And so the home run to fly ball rate fell.

And May was similar. You know, you said there was a big increase from April to May. Remember the first couple weeks of May? That wasn't so much the case. It was an unusually cold April this year. And, you know, the reason. I'm emphasizing hot and cold, well, baseballs always have traveled better in the heat, but that's going to be even more the case with the widespread use of the humid or how it's stored, the conditions

that is required to be stored in. I don't remember exactly what it is, but it needs to be stored in the same temperature, the same humidity at every stadium. That's going to suppress how well the ball flies in colder, drier months, but it's going to improve the way the ball flies. And, warmer, more humid months. So we're going to see this greater disparity based on environment, at least if those

baseball sticks with those settings that were applied to the humidor this year. Yeah, I think it's something to remember for next year where if you have a proven hitter who gets off to a really slow start, we saw Marcus Semyon get off to a dreadful start this year, and then basically from May on, really June 1st on,

but he got back on track as the weather started to heat up a little bit. Just keep that in mind. Maybe you stream pitchers a little bit more, get as much pitching in for the month of April as you possibly can. But I do think if they use similar balls next year, the humidors are in play, that we will see offense down in April once again

as the weather starts to heat up, as the humidity starts to rise, then we will see more offense around baseball. Speed, less home runs. Obviously meant more players on base, right? So that led to more steals overall. 2,487 steals was the worth of the most that we've seen in baseball since 2017. Players with 40 plus steals the last three seasons, we had just one this season.

That was John Bertie. We had two last year. We had three in 2020 in 2019. Players with 30 plus steals, six this past season, six last year, eight back in 2019. Players with 20 plus steals, 24 this past year, 19. in 2021 last year, and then 21 back in 2019. So Scott, where we really saw the biggest increase here was the mid-tier.

We saw more players with 10 plus, 20-plus steals this past season than obviously in 2021 and 2019. And something that we've talked about is next year the rule changes coming in, bigger bases, limited pick-off attempts. We've already kind of theorized that that will lead to more 10 and 20 plus steel players than we've seen in recent years. So I think that number is actually going to rise next year as well.

What do you think about it? Oh, I think it's going to rise a ton. And I think you've seen it basically play out that way in the miners. It's, I don't know that I can pull up the article quickly enough to give the exact stats. Actually, maybe I can. I think it's my PIN's tweet. So I'll try to pull that out. But basically, and one of the people who studied this for MLB, his name is Morgan Sword,

he said that if the increase in stolen base rates in the minors with these rule changes is applied to the majors, we're going to see stolen bases return to a level they were in the early 2000s. So that, you know, 2015, if 2015 seems like a long time ago to you, the early 2000s seems like, ancient history. I don't even know how old you were in the year 2000, Frank. You're probably like seven years old or something. Nine, nine. I'd like some credit there. Okay, you were nine. So that, I mean, that seems like ancient history to you. But what was the number you gave for 40 steel players this year? One? There was one. It was John Bertie. That was it. You know how many players stole? Let me see if I have the stat right. No, I didn't write down how many players had 40 or more.

Okay, you know how many players had, okay, so 20 steals or more? You said there were 24 of those this year. You know how many players had 20 steals or more in the year 2000? I will say 40. 42. That's pretty good. So close to double. Wow.

And then I think there's a case to be made that it could even, like, I think Morgan's Sword could be underrepresenting this, because minor leaguers were already inclined to run so much more than major leaguers because minor leagues are more about development than they are about wins and losses, right? So players are trying to stretch their limits, you know, really push the boundaries of what they're capable of doing so that they can elevate their stock and get to the major sooner. And organizations want them to do that too. So they were already taken much more chances on the bases than major leaguers were doing.

Basically, these changes, the limited pickoff throws and the increased base sizes, and I think it's really the pickoff throws that make the bigger difference. What they were doing, what those changes meant is minor leaguers improved their steel rate, their success rate on stolen bases to what it already is in the majors. It's about 75%. If there's a similar increase in the measures, if it gets to be an 80 to 85% success rate on stolen bases, the reward is very much worth the risk at that point.

So I think we could see guys running wild. I mean, what we're talking about with the pickoff limits is a pitcher is allowed two disengagement per a bat, which can include several things, but one of them is pickoff throws. They're limited to two pickoff throws, maximum. Those are their two engagements, two disengagement, fine.

But that means once they've already had their two disengagement runner can take a pretty big lead. Now, he can't walk halfway to second base because the pitcher

could still throw over and if he gets him out, he gets him out. But if the pitcher throws over a third time and doesn't get the runner out, then it's a bulk. So he gets on second base anyway.

So the pitcher's not going to throw over unless he's pretty confident he's going to get him out. Right. And how often to pick-off attempts succeed as it is, very, very infrequently.

So runners are going to be taking big leads, and that's, the success rate is going to climb so much on stolen bases that you're just going to see a lot more runners running. A lot of guys, we can't envision as 20 steel guys now, are going to become 20 steel guys. Certainly 10, 15 is going to be within the range of possibility

for, for most players, I would say. I'm not saying every player is going to get 10 to 15 steals, but it's going to be a lot more than I think people are imagining right now. And it's going to be similar to what the juice ball era did for home runs. It made an environment where everybody who's anybody gets 20 home runs and you can find them in all sorts of places. I think you're going to see a similar effect with stolen bases. The overall number won't be as high,

but they're just going to be more widespread. And so that's going to change the game in some pretty significant ways too. And I also think for the better, because right now we're to a point in rotisserie leagues where stolen bases are so scarce and only so few players contribute them, that the early rounds kind of feel like just get all your stolen bases while you can. Like that's all anybody really cares about with hitters. And I think that's, I don't think that's good for the health of the game either. I'd like to see a wider variety of strategies in the early round.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is these numbers from the past three years looking about how stolen bases changed this year. I think they're completely irrelevant because we're about to get a major environment change for stolen bases, unlike we've ever seen before, really, because other changes to the way teams have run have been entirely based on how strategies have changed. how much based on how easy it was to score runs other ways or just how much of an understanding teams have of the numbers they've decided that the reward on a stolen basis wasn't as worth the risk and that's what's changed how frequent stolen bases are in the past

but now we're seeing changes applied to the physical characteristics of the game that are going to change stolen bases. unlike we've ever seen before. Yeah, I agree, Scott. I agree with that take completely. You know, in the past, really the past five years, right, during the juice ball, it's, you know, balls are flying out so frequently.

With the success rate down on steals, why would you take the chance of someone on base running into an out, which could turn a potential to run homer into a solo home run? Like, that's basically the logic behind it. And last point on this, before we move on, I think we could see a lot of these, like, 20 and 30 steel guys also turn into like 30 and 30. 40 seal guy, Scott.

Ronald Acuna comes to mind where, you know, I think he can go wild. I think he can still like 40 plus bases or even, I'm looking at the top players in sprint speed right now. Corby Carroll was actually first in baseball. He can run wild. Bobby Witt Jr. Tray Turner is still up there, top five

in baseball. O'Neill Cruz actually ranks really high on this list. 12th. Julio Rodriguez is 16th. So these are just guys that are already really fast and maybe now they put their tools to good use moving forward. somebody's going to steal 60 this year, and it wouldn't surprise me if somebody stole 70. Somebody did still 60 in 2000 to continue with that comparison. Luis Castillo of the Marlins

led the majors with 62 steals that year. Three players had 50 or more. And like I said, I think it could go beyond that. I think maybe the people applying these changes don't understand And relative to the minors, there may be underestimating with the improvement because, as I said, it's more of a risk analysis for major league teams in a way it isn't for minor league teams. And the risk is going to become so worth it that they're going to go from being cautious on the base paths to pretty aggressive, I think. And I think we already started to see it not completely changed. Scott, I know you said, like the past three full season trends don't really matter. that much. And I agree, because I think it's going to look completely different. But we already started to see teams be more aggressive this year in terms of running the ball. So I think it's

going to be the Wild Wild West heading into next season in terms of steals. On the other side, pitching obviously was much better with home runs and just scoring down around baseball. The league-wide ERA was 3.97. The first time it's been below four since, you guessed it, 2015, which was just before the juice ball. Ending's pitch. They were up compared to 2021, which makes sense because we were obviously coming off the short in 2020 season. Pitchers with 200 plus innings, there were eight this past season. Sandy Alcantara led all of baseball with 228 and two-thirds innings pitched. That was the most since David Price had 230 back in 2016.

That number was cut in half last year. There was only four in 2021. 15 back in 2019 with 200 plus endings. If you drop that number to 180, we had 27 this past season, only 20 last year, 33 back in 2019. I don't personally see that changing very much, Scott. I think the way that baseball is trending right now, we're probably going to live in that 25 to 30 pitchers getting 180 plus innings. Is there any reason that you believe that number will rise or fall dramatically either way? No.

No, I think that's going to continue to. trend down but slowly as it already has been. Yeah. I don't think any of the rule changes that are going to be taking effect next year or any environmental changes that I can anticipate are going to improve that. I mean, I guess it's possible that offense decreases to the point that pitchers are just naturally able to go deeper because they're not having to throw as many pitches. but I doubt that. Especially if you're thinking,

if you're thinking the shift ban, quote unquote, shift ban is going to increase the overall number of base runners that's going to force pitchers to work harder. So it's probably going to negate, you know, the offense going down in general, but runners on base is going up

probably going to lead to basically the same trends we've been seeing already in recent years as far as how deep pitchers work into games. What about those pesky saves? Well, they were slightly better this season. 1,232 total saves. That was the most since 2018. How many pitchers had 30 plus saves? We had 10 this past season. 9 last year, 11 and 2019. So those numbers are all relatively similar. Pitchers with 20 plus saves. We had 18 this past season, 19 last year, 22 and 2019. Also kind of similar. and then pitchers with 10 plus saves. 35 this year, 29 last season, 37,

back in 2019. So I looked a little bit deeper, and it seems like there were more pitchers. If everything was the same with the numbers I just gave you, yet there was more saves overall. That means there had to be more pitchers getting less than 10 saves, Scott, which clearly is not what we want for fantasy. Obviously, we'd like to have more devoted closers

and pitchers that we can rely on for saves. But I haven't dove too deep into this yet, but it seems like there was more in that like one to nine save range than there has been in recent years. Yeah, that would make sense. I think that's exactly what's happening. Is teams look more at how high leverage a situation is and employ their relievers based on that

rather than having roles that are tied to innings. You're seeing more closer committees, fewer straight-up closers. I don't think it's, you know, I think some people exaggerate sometimes how much that's happening because we still did have how many relievers with 20 saves or more, 18. Yep, 18 this season. And we still had 10 with 30 or more. So a third of all teams had, what I basically, call a full-time closer if you're getting 30 or more saves over the course of an entire

season. It's hard to do that if you're not getting them, the vast majority of them basically from start to finish. So that's still a third of the league. So, you know, I don't want to overstate it, but we are seeing things continue to trend that way, where at least for stretches of the season, a lot of teams don't really seem to know who their closer is. By design or not. And obviously, I'm going to dive more into this in the offseason. I think the goal as of now, if you play in a Roto League,

I like to come away with three safe sources typically. You have nine pitchers that you can play. I like to go six starting pitchers, three relievers. I think the goal should be try and get one closer you think can give you 30 plus. Just basically how I broke it down, right?

One that you think can give you 20 plus. You know, maybe it's part of a committee, but you like the skills kind of for that pitcher. And then one that will give you 10 to 20, where you know, you take a shot on someone, again, who has good skills, questionable bullpen, maybe questionable manager, you don't know what to do. But if you get each of those, then you get 60 saves. And I'm sure you're competing, at least in the top half of the league, in terms of saves. Oh, yeah. 60 saves will get you in the upper third of the league. I looked at all my roto teams. This was the case. So if you get two 30 saved guys, you're golden.

and I kind of, I kind of agree with you. I think saves can be a very easy category to win, but the players who contribute to the saves category are the most specialized of all. They don't really contribute that much in anything else. So I'm still very reluctant to invest too much in a guy who's only going to contribute to that category, because what if, you know, what if Josh Hader had his blow up in April instead of July, you know, and that it, you saw him drafted in round two in some 15 leagues, usually higher stakes ones. I don't think the average fantasy player was drafting Josh Hater in round two. But you saw those like really, the most valuable trustworthy closers. You saw them drafted higher than ever this year. And I'm still thinking that's just, there's just too much risk to that.

for the sake of that one category. But at the same time, because saves can be a very easy category to win, I look at, you know, I feel like that's what's been missing with my roto teams the past couple years is I've just not doing as well in the saves categories I used to. Because it used to be pretty easy to find pop-up closers

and just plug them in and they'll remain the closer for the rest of the season or long enough anyway to make a series contribution in the category. But that's becoming less so. So I think I'm going to be committed to getting three guys who I think are their teams closer, but I still don't think I'm going to go for like a Josh Hader or Liam Hendricks or a very high-end guy. Like maybe the Kenley Janssen tier, he was somebody who was going, what, round seven, round eight this past year. Maybe I'll grab my first one there and then go kind of lower end with the other two.

Hopefully I get a Scott Barlow out of it or a Daniel Bard. I should say. Barlow didn't get to 30 saves, but Bard did. Barlow came close enough. So I think that's the way I'm going to approach it. And that's not that different from the way I approached it before. That's what I tried to do before. But now I'm going to make sure I do it,

as opposed to just trying to do it and being okay if I don't. Well, a little sneak peek, Scott. The first pitcher that I drafted in this draft that I am playing out, once again, may have been a closer, but we'll get to that in just a little bit. For those watching live or on demand, please hit the like button, subscribe to the channel,

and drop a comment if you haven't already. For those listening, please hook us up with a five-star rating and a review on Apple. We're closing in on 3,000 reviews, so it's a pretty big milestone. The boss is like, that kind of stuff. So please help us out if you can,

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award show with live Arizona Fall League updates from our guy Chris Welsh once again. Let's take a break and we'll get to some news and notes here on fantasy baseball today. The news and notes, obviously Scottie, we're entering the off season. We've got the playoffs going on, so there's not a ton of news going on, but some things that I thought were kind of interesting. Ozzie Albies is no longer sporting a cast to protect his fractured right pinky finger, but is unlikely to be activated for the NLDS. If the Braves make it further than that,

then perhaps we could see Ozzy Albies. Speaking of those Braves, Scott, they did it again. The devil magic that they continue to work. They signed Spencer Shreder to a six-year, $75 million deal. I'm being a little bit facetious because there is risk on both sides. Obviously, signing a player this young, you never know what can happen, right? Particularly a hard throwing pitcher. Yeah.

And I mean, there's a chance he washes out after two years, you know. But most people's reaction instantly, Scott, is how could Spencer Shrider take this deal? You know, bet on yourself? Which I also understand. Like, look at Juan Soto. He got offered the biggest contract in Major League history and he did not take it. He's betting on himself. So everyone's different.

But to have that kind of, you know, financial stability, it's... 75 million guarantee. Pretty legit stuff. So like that's you're set for life. You know, like if you've gotten this far in baseball, you want to make sure you're set for life. I feel like, I feel like that's the position I take, you know, obviously negotiating the best deal you can for yourself. But ultimately taking it. I think that's what I do.

What's interesting about this Spencer Strider contract relative to some of the others is, you know, usually the money's pretty, pretty evenly distributed over the life of the contract. And in Spencer Strider's case, it's very different. They're not, he's getting like 20 million plus beginning in year three, I think it is, three or four. And not much at all the years prior to that. So, you know, you look at some of the brave short-term deals. They got their paying Ozuna a lot of money the next couple years. They're paying Charlie Morton a lot of money next year. So maybe that's what the breakdown of this deal is meant to account for.

Just, okay, Strider's not going to cost us much. while we're still paying those guys and then and then we'll pay him like a really high end arm after that. Or maybe they're going to make a run at DeGrom on a short-term deal or Verlander on a short-term deal. You know, I said the other day when they extended Morton, okay, this probably means DeGrom's out, right? Because they don't have a spot in their rotation.

I was still thinking Ian Anderson's part of the rotation. He's nothing's guaranteed for Ian Anderson anymore. So I'm guessing Bryce Elder would be the favorite for that fifth spot going into next year. Mike Soroka? No, yeah, Soroka. But you can't count on Soroka and there's no reason to guarantee Elder or anything. So maybe they will make a play for one of those perennial sci-young candidates. I don't know.

Scotty. They've been most closely connected to Grom. There's been a lot of chatter that that's where DeGrom wants to be. I don't know. But. Scotty, stirring the pod, huh? Metz just got eliminated. He's already talking about

Siding DeGrom. Geez, man. Last point on Spencer Strider, he did have two years of team control in 23 and 24 and then three years of arbitration eligibility

after that. So if you look at the entirety of this extension, they only bought out one year of his free agency. So he will still hit free agency when he's 29 years old. There's a team option too.

Right. You know, if he's going strong, then obviously exercise that option. But yeah, I think he basically gets a raise for maybe all but the last two years of that deal. So, you know, yeah, I don't, I don't think there's any reason to, I don't think there's any reason to blame Strider for taking it personally. The Philly assigned interim manager Rob Thompson to a two-year contract extension.

He obviously did a fantastic job. When he took over, they were below 500, and they wound up making the playoffs. and now they're advancing to the NLDS. So shout out to the Phillies. Cubs president of baseball operations, Jed Hoyer said they will extend the qualifying offer to catcher at Wilson Contreras, which I think is something like one year,

$18 or $19 million. And if another team signs Wilson Contreras, then they earn a supplementary pick, something like a late first or early second round pick. So we'll see what happens there. This was kind of a wacky one. Our oldest Chapman left off. the Yankees ALDS roster after skipping a mandatory workout.

Apparently he just flew to Miami on his day off and stayed there. And I've seen reports that that all but confirms he will not be back with the Yankees this offseason. I don't know what they're going to do, but I could see them either signing a big name, closer, reliever, or trading for somebody. I don't know that Clay Holmes or Scott Fross will be the closer of the Yankees next year. The Giants are planning to decline Evan Longoria's $13 million club option, which would make him a free agent for the first time in his career.

And some early off-season rumors, Scotty, the Giants will not only pursue Aaron Judge, but also Trey Turner. Apparently, Turner prefers the East Coast and could be a target for the Phillies. So, damn, I mean, those are two of the biggest names available, Dansby Swanson, Carlos Correa could be. He could opt out of his deal,

which I think he's leaning towards doing. So lots of big names, lots of short stops available once again. per Bob Nightingale, who has never gotten anything wrong before, the White Sox plan to part ways with Jose Abraeu. This one's actually kind of surprising, Scott. That would likely move Andrew Vaughn to first base, and Eloy Jimenez, the everyday designated hitter for the White Sox. Okay.

Now you could understand, like the White Sox have too many plotting corner types and probably need to get more athletic. more defensive-minded, especially with some of those alignment changes that are coming next year. So you can understand why they do this. But I'm still not ready to rule out of Brayor returning. I think he'd prefer to be there. So we'll see. He's a good bat still, obviously.

Yeah, I mean, he's going to have no problem finding a job. If he wants to continue playing, which I assume he will. What did we get right? What did we get wrong this year? Some lessons learned. Don't want to spend too much time on this, Scott, because I do want to reveal this team of you. I'm obviously so excited to hear what you have to say about this team, Scott, because obviously no one knows what they're doing at this stage. It's October 10th that I'm drafting a team.

It's completely ridiculous. Oh, I got a pretty good idea what I'm doing actually. Oh, all right, Scott. I feel good about my 20, 23 plans. All right. No player specifics yet, but just in terms of like broad strategy. But anyway, we'll get to that in a minute. All right.

So basically, Scott, I looked into our sleepers, break. and busts, the last iterations of those articles. I looked into our bold predictions. So I'll pull those up in just a second. But basically, players we were higher on that we got right, players that we were wrong about. Is there anyone that comes to top of mind immediately?

I mean, I have all of them written down. I didn't realize you wrote about so many sleepers and breakout, Scott. There's like 20 on each of these articles. So, you know, you had Julio Rodriguez on your sleepers 3.0, which is obviously a huge standout. here and someone you get a ton of credit for, Justin Verlander. His ADP at the time was 105, so he's likely going to win the Cy Young. He finishes one of the best pitchers in baseball this

year. But also on this list, you had Charlie Morton, you had Riley Green, you had Aaron Ashby. So, as always, we've got a little bit of a mixed bag here. Yeah. And like, I'm okay with that. You know, I feel like a success rate on these sleepers breakouts bus columns of 50% is like really, really good. And maybe some people say, ah, it's a cop out, 50%. That's a failing grade. But like the whole idea is you're going out on a limb

for someone who's not expected to do what you're saying he's going to do. So of course, the success rate is going to be relatively low. I think the only one I got a 50 per, like I did best with my bust picks this year, I will say, having already looked, having already done this for myself,

looked at how many I got right from each column, The busts were the best overall. But, yeah, I mean, some of the breakout picks, Alejandro Kirk, I'll take that as a win, even though he kind of stumbled to the finish line a bit. Kyle Schwerber. Corey Seeger kind of was, I mean, he had 33 home runs. Had some trouble with the shift, but that won't be. Like, if he stands out to me as the single player who might improve the most from the shift band,

Corey Seeger. So once again, I'm going to be very high on Corey Seeger next year. as you should, and I agree, Scott. I mean, he was someone who, like, again, every time I'm on the clock in this draft that I'm doing, I'm, you know, deep diving each player, players that I'm considering. And the expected stats were so much better for Corey Seeger this year.

The XBA, he still makes a ton of contact. He had a career high in terms of home runs. There's so, so, so much to like about Corey Seeger heading its next year. Some of those players that were on your bus list who, well, let's just run through some of them. Cody Bellinger, obviously. With his struggles in spring training, that really was a precursor to the entire season,

which just really never got anything going this year for Cody Bellinger. Javier Baez is one that was on here. They got right. Trevor Rogers, that was a great call because I know he's a pretty popular breakout candidate this year. Max Muncie, Jesse Winker, Giovanni Gallegos. Jared Walsh.

You know, Giovanni Gallegos technically pitched well this year, but Ryan Helsley was just better. So he wound up losing his job. And I didn't think. Gaiagos was going to pitch poorly. I just didn't think the Cardinals were going to commit to him as a closer. And Ryan Mountcastle is here. I'll count that as a win.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, he was not great. He only hit like two-thirds as many home runs as he hit last year. Austin Meadows clearly was terrible. Trent Grisham. Officell Garcia. Yeah, I got a lot of bus picks right. But then, you know, the ones I didn't get right look very, very wrong

because I'm not calling them busts unless. they're being rated highly. So the ones I got wrong include Marcus Simeon, Randy Rosa Rana, Zach Gallen. Okay. But yeah,

for the most part, the bus picks were pretty good. I was going to ask, got, did you learn anything from undervaluing a player like Randy of Rosa Rana where it's hard to differentiate

which players this actually matters for and which ones it doesn't? But he just kind of strikes me as this freak athlete where while he doesn't have these gaudy stat-cast numbers, he's just a really, really good player.

And we saw that on display again, this season. And I think Jazz Chisholm is kind of in that same discussion. His stackass numbers are actually a little bit better. He's not a very disciplined hitter. He strikes out quite a bit. He doesn't walk all that much. So there's flaws in his game. But he's just like a Rosarena.

He's just a freak athlete. So do you learn anything from maybe undervaluing guys like that? I'm going to say no. And I'm not going to say, like, I'm not just saying that to be like bullheaded, you know? I think there came a point where in my evaluation of players and exercises like this, I tried to learn too many lessons. I saw enough exceptions to my rules happen that it kind of just muddled the whole process for me, and I kind of gave too many passes to players that I should have been skeptical of.

I think a healthy skepticism was warranted for Randy or Rosarena. Now that he's kind of broken the process two years in a row, okay, I might make a special exception for him going forward. He's just somebody who this rule doesn't apply to, and I can accept that. But I needed to see that second year of it to come to that conclusion for him. And I don't think it's a reason to abandon the process. I think there have been times when I've been too quick to abandon the process because of a miss when really it was just an acceptance. to what was a pretty good rule. One look at my sleepers and breakout, Scott, on this list.

And this is 2.0. I think the 1.0 ones were a lot better. They had like Shane McClan on them. And I don't know if I wrote about San Diego Concord, but obviously I was pretty excited about him. Alex Cobb was on one of those lists. But the second iteration of these were flat out not good. Sleepers 2.0, Eddie Rosario, Andrew Benintendi,

Jamer Candelario, Marcus Stroman, Jesus Lazzardo. Stroman was fine. Lazzardo was really good when he pitched, but the hitters, I think I just, you know, have to swing for the fences more. I mean, those are pretty boring guys. They were basically just players I thought were undervalued because they were boring, and I thought they were going to outperform their draft value. And it just turned out that they were really boring. And they really weren't that great. Same thing for the breakouts. Willie Adomis was very good. Lordis Gariel fits into that same category I just spoke about. O'Neill Cruz was not up as soon as basically everyone thought he was going to. to be. Jesus was a mess. Eduardo Rodriguez was not good. He just kind of had a weird season because he had like a personal thing going on and he missed time with injury. Taylor Rogers for the first two or three months looked really, really good with the

breakouts. Still gave you 30 saves if you had them in the lineup for all those. But then he kind of fizzled out too. I think something I learned here, Scott, is for sleepers and breakouts, I'm going to take a few more chances. I'm not just going to look at players that can slightly outperform their ADP. it's, you know, I think I just have to be a little bit more, take a little bit more chances on guys like that.

Yeah, I came to that conclusion a couple years ago too and that I'd rather, specifically for Buss, like I'd rather avoid the true disaster picks as opposed to, this guy's going to be slightly overvalued, so I'll call him a Bust. I think there's a more appropriate label for that player than Bust. And I, you know, I might be. be less successful on the bust picks overall.

Turns out that wasn't the case this year. But I think it's a bigger deal to avoid players who are just absolutely going to wreck you with an early pick as opposed to just kind of underwhelm you with the mid to late round pick. Bus 2.0? Brutal for me. I had Dalton Varsha in that list. Austin Riley, who was amazing this year. Ryan Mountcastle was a bust.

That's fine. Jesse Winkert, sure, Carl Sordaun. I have this thing, Scott, where I'm almost too safe when it comes to injuries. So Carlos Sordaun, the velocity being down late last season, not getting the qualifying offer from the White Sox, I just really bought into that narrative. But I think once we saw him pitch in spring training and the contract that the Giants gave him, that should have given me more confidence to be in on Carlos Sordon. So I think that's one lesson, you know, maybe don't worry about some of the

injured guys so much if they're looking good in spring training. I would have beat yourself up for Carlos Rodan as a bust. I do think spring training, seeing him in spring training, relieved a lot of my own concerns personally. And maybe, maybe you know, I had a bus 3.0 article. You didn't. You just stopped at 2.0. So maybe if you had written a 3.0, he would have, you would have corrected for Carlos Rodan.

But I think it was right to approach him as a very risky ask. said who would bust potential, even though that's not the way it played out. Players that I was higher on, obviously, if you go back and listen to our starting picture previews, Sandy Alcounter is somewhat, I think I had like a 10-minute monologue, just talking about how much I love Sandy Alcounter this season. Shane O'Mack, Shane McClain, you know the deal. Here comes the money. Here we go. Money talk. Here comes the money.

Now what I need to do is trust myself more because as much as I liked Sandy and Shane O'Mack, I just didn't have enough shares. So that's kind of the next evolution. of my analysis is buying into what I'm actually telling people. And the profit pocket. We can't forget about it. We had a group of four first baseman that I labeled the profit. That's P-R-O-F-I-T, not like a religious profit. Some people were confused about what kind of profit I was talking about.

But these are players that are going to provide profit and fantasy. Josh Bell, Reese Hoskins, Joey Votto, C.J. Cron. Votto was a huge miss. And I think there's a pretty good lesson to be learned there, too. like just buying old players coming off clear, outlier seasons, at least for Votto, it was power. I think that's just not a recipe for success. C.J. Cron was very good. Josh Bell was good for like half the year. Rees Hoskins was fine. So I'll give myself like two and a half out of four. I think that's okay.

Bold predictions. Scott, you actually crushed it with your bold predictions this year. Boom. Bold and the beautiful. Joe Adele has more combined home runs and steals than Jared Kelnick. they were tied with 12. That one's like, whatever. Jake McGee doesn't get more than five saves. He finished with three saves and a 6.81 ERA. That is just prime time and I wish I listened to you because I drafted him in the main event and he was absolutely awful. For what it's worth, I didn't think he was going to be awful.

I just thought Camilla Deval was going to take that job and run with it for the Giants. That was really the gist of that prediction. But whatever, I got it right. That is exactly what he did. CJ Abrams leads the National League and Stolen Bases We can skip over that one Dalton Varsho and Alejandro Kirk are both top five catchers

There's something going on on CBS right now where you can't, I can't pull up the leagues that I played in, I think there's some kind of transition period they're going through but at least in terms of points leagues They're both top five catchers Scott Boom! Varsho and Kirk, it's great call

Yeah My bold predictions, something I learned Scott I think I need to be less bold with my bold predictions. Lordeus Grille finishes as the best hitter on the Blue Jays. What was I thinking? We have just one 30-30 bat this year and his name is Akeel Badoo.

What happened there? We actually had 0.30-30 bats this season. We did have 4.25-25. Kyle Tucker, Julio Rodriguez, Adoles Garcia, and Marcus Semyon. Jeremy Pena finishes as a top three fantasy hitter in the Astros lineup. It looked pretty good early on.

I think Jeremy Pena is, a player, that was pretty bold too. And Shane Bieber finishes no better than third best in the Guardians rotation for fantasy this year. He was clearly the best. But the Guardians in general, Trista McKenzie was SP 18. Cal Quantrell was SP 31. Pretty surprising stuff. So, Cal Quantrell is the strangest player to me. I have no idea what makes him good. But he's done it two years in a row. Yeah, he's kind of like right-handed Marco Gonzalez. He just don't really understand it. I mentioned this last week.

The players that were on the most championship teams, and I mentioned that Justin Verlander, I think, was going to be on a large majority of them. He was indeed on the most championship teams this season. So someone who, you know, in early drafts, was around Pick 100. Once we saw him in spring training, he moved up into like the four to six round range,

four to seven, and he was a top three pitcher in fantasy. So it makes sense to me. Oscar Gonzalez and Jake McCarthy, two outfielders, we picked up. Second half of the season, they were both very good.

Shane McClanahan, there was a lot of profit with him. Gunner Henderson, similar to Gonzalez and McCarthy. You picked him up late. Performed pretty well for you. Yordaun Alvarez, Aaron Judge,

second, third round sluggers that were obviously both amazing this year. Sandy Alconso was the starting pitcher version of Yordaun and Judge. He was a second, third round pick and likely to win the National League Syung.

Dalton Varsho, it's like the fifth or sixth catcher being drafted off the board, but performed like a top three guys, so he was amazing. And Michael Harris. I mean, that one speaks for itself near, I think he nearly went 2020. I got called up midway point of the season, basically, and he was an absolute stud. So this list makes a ton of sense to me, Scotty. Yeah, I mean, Oscar Gonzalez, Jake McCarthy, Gunner Henderson, that's kind of a chicken and

egg situation where they weren't on the champion, they didn't make the championship teams championship teams. But the championship teams were obviously in a position to pick them up late in the year. So that's why those guys are on there. But I think Justin Verlander,

Shane McClanahan, Sandy Alcantra being such guys who gave back their value and then some at starting pitcher like the three biggest examples of that. And then Aaron Judge, of course, makes total sense

since he was far and away the best hitter in fantasy and wasn't drafted like it. Jordan Alvarez is kind of surprising that he's that high. Why him specifically? There were other players who put up first round numbers without costing you a first round pick.

So that's kind of interesting. But yeah, I absolutely expected to see Verlander McLeanahan judge and Alcantara on here. All right, Scottie, well, we're kind of up against it here. Should I talk about this team? Should I save it for Thursday?

It's not really necessary. It depends how much you want to talk about. I mean, I do, but you know, sorry, we're pretty late in the podcast, right? All right, whatever, we'll do it real quick. I couldn't help myself hopped in a way too early NFBC draft champions. It's a 15 team, 5x5 roto. It's draft and hold.

So it's 50 rounds. There are no waivers or trades, which is crazy for someone drafting in October for the following season because we just have no idea what's going to go on. It's, as I mentioned, a 50 round draft. And I had the third overall pick, Scott. So my first five picks in this draft were Aaron Judge, I took third overall. Jose Al-Tuvay, I came back and took him in the second round. Emmanuel Class A was my third round pick, which was, that's what I alluded to earlier.

The reason why I did that specifically in this format, you almost want to, you don't need to, but you want to have a lockdown closer, especially when we're this far out. I just have no idea what's going to happen with closers in the off season. True. He was the second closer drafted, and I had him in a few spots this year. He's amazing, so I felt okay making that pick. I got Starling Marte in the fourth round, and then I took my first starting pitcher, Shane Bieber in round five.

And pitching went so late, Scott. Like DeGrom last to the third round. Furlander went in the fourth. It's almost like everyone had the same idea of we're all just going to load up on hitters in the first two or three rounds. And then we're going to start attacking pitching. Yeah.

I mean, there's just so much high-end pitching out there. And hitting, high-end hitting is becoming scarcer. So that's, I mean, it's discouraging to see that so many had that idea. and I wonder if it'll be different in different league formats. This is kind of a specialized format. Obviously 15 teams and super early. And the NFBC landscape is just kind of bonkers overall.

So I don't know that it'll actually play out that way with every league. But I hope it's a better kept secret than it appears to be so far. Round 6 through 10, Scott. Here's who I wound up with Joe Musgrove. He's my SB2 with Shane Bieber. I took Tim Anderson in round seven. I just, I felt so good about that. He was like a third round, fourth round pick last year.

So I don't know. Maybe I've always liked Tim Anderson. I did, you know, take a bit of a chance. I took Gunner Henderson in round eight. Third base is terrible. And that is the position he played most. So he will start with third base eligibility. Scotty, I got your guy, William Contreras,

as my catcher won in round nine. And then I got George Kirby as my SP3 in round 10. Okay. It seems like there's a drop. off there in the player pool in general if Contreras is your ninth pick. So you go from Musgrove, Anderson, Gunner Henderson, 6, 7, and 8, and then William Contreras and George Kirby, 9 and 10. That feels like a drop off there.

Not seeing the whole draft and not having ranked players that far yet. I can't say for sure. That's the case. But that's how it feels to me. Round's 11 through 15, I took John Carlos Stanton, Chris Bassett. He's my SP4 at this point. Pete Fairbanks, which might be a curious pick, but again, trying to project closers, relievers, bullpens this far out, just kind of draft for skills and hope that they went out ultimately.

And then I took Rowdy Tellez and Gene Seguera. So some kind of boring, safer picks in this range, Scotty, but, you know, just kind of filling out the roster spots, filling out the stats. So Stanton, Bassett, Fairbanks, Tellez, and Segarra. I'm kind of surprised just based on how tempted, how high I was tempted to rank him. And maybe how high I actually ranked him. Routi Tolez, him going that late.

14th round in a 15-team Roto League. So his home run total this year was 10th, or actually tied for 8th with 35 home runs. And, yeah, he didn't hit for much bad. average, obviously, but you look at his breakdown as a hitter. He seems like one of the guys who's going to benefit most from the decreased shifting. And I've noticed, especially when it's a left-handed hitter, kind of a shortcut way to figure this out, is look at expected batting average versus actual batting average. And then if you dig deeper, that's kind of the explanation for why some of these left-handed hitters underperformed their expected batting average so much.

and I think that applies to Rowdy Tellez. So, you know, if he's able to maintain the power into next year and be more like a 250 hitter, then, I mean, obviously, that's got to be a steal at this point. That's the hope, Scotty. That's exactly what I saw. 219 batting average. I think his XBA was 240, 35 home runs.

But even if it comes down a little bit, 30 homers, 240, 250, something like that, I'll take that from Roddy to Les. So far, that's my draft through 15 rounds. on the clock right now. It's a slow draft in October, and people are complaining that it's taking too long, so I don't really understand that,

but right after I finish this podcast, I will make my pick. With all that being said, Scottie, I do have one final team name Tuesday, and it's a championship edition one from Joe, and he sent in, near Lars, wherever Newt Bar was defeated by Albies,

your crying, Schwerber. I'll be your crying shore I'll be your crying shoulder Is that what it's supposed to be? I think these are both song related I'll be your crying shoulder Thank you You like that?

Not nearly as good as that amazing I reminded me of Yeah that's what reminded me of Hey that's why I'm here right All right we're going to wrap there for Scott I have Frank think of all for listening and watching A long offseason edition of fantasy baseball

today. We'll be back again on Thursday. Bye-bye.