Fantasy Baseball Today - Verlander, How to Build a Winning Roster, Emails (03/10 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 10, 2020

When should you draft Justin Verlander now? It's hard to know how long he'll be out, but we'll tell you what to do with Verlander if you're drafting soon. Do the other aces have even more value now (8:00)? And we run through more MLB news including items on Nick Solak and Mauricio Dubon ... Last week on the show, we completed a 12-team, H2H Points mock draft. Let's look back on that draft and find our favorite teams (16:30). What did those Fantasy managers do right? What's the best way to construct a roster in a Points league? Then, Adam reveals his Roto pitching strategy which for now we're calling "TAPHAPAMC" (34:05). So catchy! ... A bunch of your emails (39:50) about openers, middle relievers, SP strategy, prospects, Taijuan Walker, the MIA rotation and more. And we finish with Fill in the Blank (51:35). Who will be this year's Cody Bellinger? Who will be this year's Kirby Yates? Who will lead MLB in steals? ... Your emails at [e-mail] Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @CBSFantasyBB, @AdamAizer, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite Join our March Madness Bracket Challenge at http://2020podcast.mayhem.cbssports.com/e/d7feed30238637cc2387331ab3061dc1fb5219555f0e9a8b?ttag=BPM20_cpy_invite_new 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/ 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. One, one pitch, basketball pulled, and Matt. Alborated, toward the point. Got a fantasy question? Email fantasy baseball at cbsi.com. Get ready to win your league. Where fantasy. Now, here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris.

Another day, another pitcher injury, but also hitter injuries. Hitters get hurt, too. Welcome to the show, Fantasy baseball today here on Tuesday. March 10th. Adam Azer and Scott White and bringing back to the show, Chris Towers. We missed you Sunday, Chris. Yeah, yeah, I couldn't. I was doing a little day drinking on Sunday. Had some plans. Couldn't break them. Bought some records. It was a lovely day. Had some sausage. Scott and I don't day drink. So just so all of you listeners know, we'll always be there for you. No matter what. It was just, it was kind of a last minute, like, switch to Sunday. I had already

made plans with some of my pals. How do you have so many friends? You've been in New York for like three months. I've been here for five years. I don't have, forget it. All right. I have one more friends, Adam. Justin Verlader has a mild lat strain.

He is unlikely for opening day. And Scott, where did you move Verlander in your rankings? So we don't have a timetable yet. He said he felt his only other aisle in his career was 2015. And he said this, his feeling was similar. to that although that was a triceps thing. That's what this was originally called to. I did look that up.

I want to provide some details on this because that was a lat strain actually. There was a story, I think, two years ago. The first time he went back to Detroit after getting traded to the Astros, he talked about the fact that, so he was out until, that was like March 27th, he suffered the injury.

He was out until June 15th. You might look at it and say, long after. Well, that's 11 weeks. That's a really bad thing. But it was originally diagnosed it's a tricep strain. He tried to pitch through it, just couldn't get right. Eventually they finally figured out

that it was a lat strain. Yeah. And they had to kind of reset the whole rehab process. So he says this one doesn't feel as bad as that. They don't give a timetable, but I'm just thinking in terms of having to start over the ramp up process again. I'm not counting on earlier than like

mid-May. Maybe early May. Whoa. Mid-May. That's a while. Well, look, we're in mid-March right now. Are we there? When do you get to mid-March? Yeah, I guess the 10th. And he's going to sit out at least two weeks, I would guess.

I don't know. It's a lot of guessing, but I'm not, I don't want to guess too optimistically and then have a bad pick. So I've moved him down based on the idea he could miss a quarter of the season to just a little outside my top 20. I dropped him behind Chris Paddock, U. Darvish and Sunny Gray. I have him ahead of Trevor Bauer and Brandon Woodruff in my starting pitcher rankings. That's an $18 player in Roto still. Enormous. Yeah.

See, the thing there is like, let's say he does miss a month and a half. That's probably what? Six starts, seven starts? A quarter of the season would be more like between seven and eight starts. More like eight, yeah. I mean, if Justin Verlander makes 27, 26 starts and pitches anywhere close to the level he has the last two seasons, 20 is going to be a steal.

I'd rather be a steel than have a guy I drafted to be an ace, be like holding my team back for a long time. So I'll do the math now. Let's just get 75% of what he did last year. year, which was probably not something you'd be able to do again. 765 times 0.75, 5773 fantasy points. If we remove him, that would make it 1, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. That's probably pretty similar to what Patrick Corbyn did last year.

Better. 30 points better than Patrick Corbyn. Cole, Granky, Strasberg, Bieber, de Grom, and then that would be Verlander, 573. Now, he went 21 and 6. That's hard to do no matter what, no matter how good you are. but you know, you're at least talking about a top 10 overall pitcher if he misses 25% of his starts based on last year's fantasy points. So, you know, that's...

You have to find a way to contend for the first quarter of the season now. You do. At least stay around 500. You do. It's... And I mean, by the way, Josh James is better for him. It certainly leaves a rotation spot likely open for the first month of the season. The thing is, we don't know yet.

I did some research and the problem is they didn't say exactly the severity of the sprain or the strain for his lap but the fact that they didn't, that it does seem mild makes me think that it's probably more like a grade one strain. Uh, if that. And that's usually six to eight weeks. And so six to eight

weeks from now, yeah, you're looking at early May in the worst case, but it could be late April. Mid April, really. By the way, I'll give you a, a nice comp. How about Max Scherzer last year? Because 75% of Verlander's innings from last season would be 167 and a third basically. And Scherzer threw

172 and a third. And he had a 292 ERA at 1.03-3 whip. Shurzer was a lot better than that before his injury. Verlander would probably be better than 292 ERA 103-1303 whip. But Scherzer was a top 10 pitcher. I think he was ninth in Roto. and in points he was not, though,

in points he was like 15th or 16th or something. So there's a comp for you. All right, let me ask you about a couple of emails for Justin Verlander. From Bebal 10, what is Verlander's trade value right now? Somebody offered me Verlander and Lugo for my Shane Bieber in a Roto League.

Would you give up Bieber for Verlander and Lugo? I mean, if I moved him down beyond like Sunny Gray, I obviously won it. No, no, no, you can't do that. email from Brian well I mean I can't say you can't do that Scott wouldn't do that mid-May

when you said that I kind of took me by surprise I was thinking more like May well how long spring training he's going to have to basically do it over again I hardly have time to stretch out as it is

three rea so if he's down for two weeks and he makes three starts he can be back in late April maybe I don't want the thing is we just don't know. Yeah, I understand. If Justin Verlis,

this is something that I wrote about last week. I've been talking a lot about the kind of injury vacuum where there's this period between when the injury happens and when we know a concrete timetable. And that's when you can either get great deals in drafts. Like if Justin Verlander falls to the fourth round

and it turns out that he's only going to miss three or four weeks, that's a potential like, huge advantage for your team. Also, it could go wrong and he could end up missing 8 to 10 weeks, and then you kind of get screwed.

So it just depends on your risk tolerance at this point. We might know more in two days. Okay. Yeah, and that's kind of difficult to gauge. Last year, I had Clayton Kirshaw as a bust candidate, and then he got hurt

and started to falling to like the round 7 and 8 range. So I ended up with a lot of Clayton Kirschaw. All right, email from Brian. Does Garrett Cole become that much more of a difference maker if Verlander breaks down? And should we be taking, this is really, let's expand it to the other three of the Super Four or whatever, however you want to tier them. Does this make those guys more valuable? I think it would be a gigantic mistake to look at the 37-year-old starting pitcher with a ton of innings breaking down and are getting hurt in spring training and saying,

you know what I need to do? I need to move up the 36-year-old starting pitcher who started breaking down last year. That's what I need to do on my draft board. So I think that would be a huge mistake. This should be, yes, Max Scherz, this should be a reminder of the fragility of starting pitcher. I don't think it will be, but this is the risk. Like, guys who don't have injuries ever get hurt. Yeah, well, so does Michael Conforno?

Well, I think the problem is it has a lot of injury. It just kind of shrinks the number. It shrinks the pool of high-end starting pitchers that you can draw from and count on at the start of the season. And so that's going to make the competition for them fiercer. And if you want to have redundancies like I do, so when these injuries inevitably pop up, you're going to want more of them. I guess so. The train of thought got derailed by the, uh, by the, uh, by the,

the phone going. But it's a good point. Like, you must think I get texts all day. You are the most pop. You are the one who has so many friends. It's really just my wife who texts me. That's about it.

Oh, my wife wants to talk to me all the time. Stop bragging, Scott. Okay. Well, I mean, I think it's an interesting point. I think it does make the big four is now a big three. Maybe Walker Bueller's in there. Yeah. I mean, I'm not moving them up either, but like,

I haven't done a draft yet, so I'm not sure how that's going to go. Sure. And we've already got Verlander, Snell, and Sale dealing with injuries. Sale being obviously the most severe by far. And it is sort of the nature of the beast, although hitters get injured too. As you'll see, Willie Calhoun has a fractured jaw. Do we have a timetable for Willie Calhoun? Not really a timetable for him either.

The fact he needed surgery to have a plate inserted there. it leads me to believe it's going to be on the longer end than the shorter end. He still hasn't been tested for a concussion yet, but they're thinking one, it's likely he suffered one. So I'm not counting on an April return for him either, but I don't think it's a situation where he's going to miss like half the season. I dropped him outside of my top 40 outfielders,

and if you can get him with late route pick, it's probably good value, but you shouldn't count on him at the start of the end. In fact, they've already named his replacement at the start of the year. Nick Solac's going to be playing left field virtually every day. I figured he'd get a lot of playing times as a super utility player anyway. But now this just makes it even more obvious that he's somebody you should target in the late rounds. So what do we expect from Nick Solac?

What kind of an impact could he have? He batted good numbers. 293, five home runs, 17 RBIs, two steals, a 393 on base percentage. though, with a 293 batting average for Solac as a rookie last year. He's 25 years old. And yeah, I mean, is he a must. He was a must-owned player, I'd say, last year. But, of course, he had position eligibility at that point,

and it was second base, right? Yes, it was. And it seems like outfield's what he's going to pick up first this year. But third base, second base could come later on when Willie Calhoun is healthy again. So he could be a pretty versatile player. I think in spite of his home. run pace when he got called up and what he did in the miners last year. He's probably more like a

20 homer guy than a 30 homer guy in a season where things go right. But there is the on-base ability that you point to. There's some steals potential there. I think he could be a pretty valuable player who nobody seems to have much interest in, in part because he's DH only right now, but that's not going to last. Would you rather have Nick Solak or Shogo Akiyama who is going to back lead off for the Reds when he plays, which may not be against lefties. But who would you rather draft? I'd rather have Solac. Okay.

Solac or Andrew McCutcheon, who will start the year on the IL. I'll take Solac there too. And Solac or Aristides Aquino. Well, Solac. I mean, Aquino is probably going to begin the year in the minors. All right. Michael Conforto is going to have tests on his injured side, and we'll get back to you with that. E. E. E. E. Hennio, Suarez, making progress, could be ready for opening.

Day, Mike Clevenger was scheduled to throw a bullpen session yesterday. Did he end up throwing the bullpen session, Mike Levenger? Yes. Oh, good. That's good to Dell. And he is looking on pace to meet the most optimistic timeline, which would probably be like

mid-April. Yeah. Oh, here's an article. Jake Bowers, quote, figuring things out. Just look, I was Googling Mike Clevenger. He is talented. His lower half is really improved. All right, Jake Bowers. a year later, he's a sleeper now.

Gary Sanchez, just kidding. Gary Sanchez won't play until Friday due to a back issue. San Francisco's Maricio Dubon could play center field quite a bit, according to Gabe Kapler. What's our interest level in him? Their outfield is really, really gross, so it wouldn't surprise me. Dubon or Solac, how do they compare? Solac seems better at getting on base.

he seems a little bit better as a power hitter, especially given the venue disparity there. So I'd rather have Solek. Dubon provides the only valuable resource in fantasy baseball, though. He steals. What is that? He steals bases. Well, Solek does, too.

Is he still this winning? Solek, I think, does more reliably than Dubon does. He had a 38 steal season in 2017, 2018. No, 2017. He didn't play much in 2018. Yeah. What did he do last year? Three and thirty games.

13. Between the majors. Three and majors. Yeah, I think it's 30s deal days. They're over. Okay. And he's got Gabe Kapler, so that doesn't have. Ryan Weber could make the Red Sox rotation.

Wow. What bad numbers does he have? Does anybody have any interest in Ryan Weber? Nick Solex still seven bases last year. Well, fair enough. Is that a no on Weber? I thought it was more than that. No on Weber.

All right. Today on the show, we're going to talk about our favorite teams from last week's draft and the best way to build a roster. We're going to read your emails at Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com, and we're going to read your tweets, your fill-in-the-blank tweets at some point in the show. We also have to tell you about Seat Geek. Use the promo code, Fantasy, for $10 off your first Seekkeek purchase. Again, the promo code is Fantasy on Seat Geek.

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fantasy. Download the Seatgeek app. The promo code is Fantasy. Again, one more time. Fantasy. The promo code on Seekek for $10 off your first purchase. Okay, so we did this mock draft last week. We did it on the air. And looking back at it, I wanted to know if you guys had a favorite team. A favorite team. I do have a favorite team if you're not prepared, but I can go first. You can go first. That's fine. Okay. So my favorite team was George Moselleys.

Now, I'll say this. I think George might be listening. So I love you, George. I didn't think he made all of the right picks later. Well, I wouldn't say that. I would have done it differently. Like, I wouldn't have drafted Mike Talkman. I would have had a better third baseman than Ryan McMahon. But I want to highlight his team in a 12 team head-to-head points league

because I think four of his first five picks were pitchers. And I just think that George proved that you can do this and still have really good hitters. So his team was Mookie. Betts seventh overall, which I think is, it's hard to have like a steal at seven overall, but that might be it in a points league. Because two pitchers had gone ahead of bets. So I thought that was great. Shane Bieber in round two.

I would have taken Jack Flaherty, but okay. Clayton Kershaw in round three, I would have taken Aaronola, but that's not the point. Noah Cindergarde in round four. Pitchers were going very early. Round five, Jose Barrios. So he takes Mookie Betts And then he takes Shane Bieber

Clayton Kershaw Noah Cindergarde And Jose Berrios I thought he went a little early on Nelson Cruz in round 6 But if he hits then that's going to be fine Carlos, like if he hits Not like if the draft pick hits

But if Nelson Cruz is Nelson Cruz It's going to be fine Carlos Correa round 7 Josh Bell round 8 Really good Jeff McNeil Round 9 So now George has an infield

of Bell McNeil. And McNeil's really, like, he leads off, he gets on base, doesn't strike out. He's a good points league guy. Bell, McNeil, Correa, and Nelson Cruz, along with four top, like, 25 starting pitchers. Roberto OZuna, I think, is a really good pick. He's, you know, could lead the league in saves. Then I thought, you know, like Jose Orkitti in round 11 might have been a bit of a reach. But that's his fifth pitcher.

Tommy fan, I would have taken Marcel Ozuna. instead of Jose Orkidi. He took Tommy Pham. He could have taken Eddie Rosario. He could have taken Matt Chapman. And then instead of having to rely on Ryan, on Josh McMahon as, or Ryan McMahon, excuse me, as his third baseman.

He could have taken Matt Chapman there. So I think there were some missteps along the way late. But, you know, maybe I'm wrong. Tanaka, McMahon, Danny Santana in the outfield. See about that. Nateaaldi is one of his RPs. John Gray. Buster Posey.

The rest of the team doesn't matter. is he could have walked away with a pitching staff of Bieber, Kershaw, Cinderguard, Berrios, Erkiti, Tanaka, etc. And still had

Posey, Bell, Jeff McNeil, Matt Chapman, if he had made that pick, Correa, Mookie Betts, Danny Santana, Marcelo Zuna, Nelson Cruz. Like, he could have had a just load... I think that team could have worked.

So four starting pitchers with his first five picks in a 12 team head and head points league makes me actually want to do it when we do our podcast league draft or our next mock draft. Oh, man, you just raise the value of all the starting pitchers in the podcast draft. And that's the thing is that in head to head points leagues especially this year, pitchers are just going so incredibly high that it's going to be really hard to do that because multiple people are going to be trying. That's the only thing I would say is that you could say that that makes getting early pitching a priority, but it also might mean that you're reaching for guys who aren't necessarily worth the spots that they're going. And that's something I've had to do a lot is just kind of hold my nose and take them, even though I see Nolan Aronado still on the board and I'm taking Lucas Gialito and it hurts and it's not it goes so against instinct.

Aaron not Aronado. Yeah, I've done that before. You take, Scott. I don't know if, I don't know if Nolan Aranado's this. It wasn't. In this instance, you know what I'm saying. No. Let's not get caught up on the details.

Well, hold on. Hold on, Chris. That's not getting caught up on the details. Like, at one point, you know, like two months ago we did a mock draft and you took Gialito over Altuve and Aaron Judge. And I was like, whoa, that's crazy. But understandable. But no one Aronado, I think.

Like, if you take Gialitos had one good half season over the most. consistent hitter of baseball, I think I would smack you. He didn't take them over my trow. But this seemed to be the point you were making, right? Is that there are still so many good hitters available after that pitching run is over that you just don't want to get left out of it because what is your pitching staff going to look like? And if you have a bad pitching staff, particularly in this format, I've already said,

I just don't see how it's even possible you could win. You're condemning yourself to a loss. It's kind of true. Yes, your broader point is certainly taken there. But, like, you did pass on Trey Turner for Lucas G. Leat with your third. There you go. Yeah, I mean, and obviously, Trey Turner is probably more like a late second rounder than a first rounder in this format.

Points league, yeah, point. Even so. All right, so Scott, Chris, who are your favorite teams? You guys have one. I hate to say it. I think it's Scott's. Oh, yeah. And it's partially because Scott drafted more like how I usually would than how,

how he usually would. Because he went, I mean, he had the number one overall pick. He took Mike Trout. Smart move. Way to go, Scott. Then he took Patrick Corbyn and Lucas Gileo, but then his next two picks were hitters. After that, he went three pitchers in a row from that kind of third or fourth tier where there's a lot of upside. The only, it was Jordan Alvarez in round four,

Telmar tan, round five, and Mike Soroka, Frankie Montas, Jesus Lazzardo. I wouldn't have taken Soroka that high, but he's fine. And then Montas and Lazzardo, there's obviously a ton of potential there. Luzardo being a spark as well helps. But then this is the thing about pitching getting pushed up so much is that you have guys, Matt Olson going 97th overall. Eugenia Suarez is going 120th.

There's just, there's going to be values at hitter. And so you can go one of two ways. you can either load up your hitting with like you could probably with your first four picks get like four possible first round hitters if that's the way you want to go that's what I did in the auction head to head auction that we did two weeks ago or you can load up on pitcher and they're still going to be pretty good hitters as long as you know when to take them and so that Matt Olson pick at 97 a E. E. E. E. E. Henni Oswar is in 120. Those are really great values. So the thing is

I just think that Let's compare Scott's team to George's team Because I think George's team is just better You know And they had I don't know Do they have similar strategies Like Scott took

Scott's team is good But Scott took Mike Trout First overall And then two pitchers George took Moogie Betts seventh overall And then two pitchers But then he actually took four pitchers

But like okay fine That's just pound for pound Catcher. Scott has Ramos, George's Posey, Scott wins. First base, Joshua versus Matt Olson. Is that a draw? That's a draw.

Second base, McNeil versus Jonathan VR. In a points league? McNeil. I'd rather have McNeil, but... Although, I'm not sure VR wasn't as good as him last year in a point sleep. I was about to say that. Yeah, he was.

Yeah, I think... I'm expecting a bigger step back for VR than McNeil. Third base, yeah, E. E. Eugenio Suarez for Scott McMahon for George But again, that should have been Matt Chapman But still Scott gets the win there

Shortstop is Mondesi for Scott and Correa for George. So George wins that. Presumably. Probably whoever's healthiest. It's just a bad format for Mondice, but Yeah, I mean, when you steal that many bases

Yeah, that's the thing is like he strikes out a lot, he doesn't walk, but he steals a ton of bases. He's probably going to lead to majors and steals, he's probably going to hit for some power. Yeah, but like Billy Hamilton was never, well, okay, it's better. I'm going to compare their points per game last year just because I'm curious. I would guess why to see him get more home runs last year than Billy Hamilton's entire professional. Yeah, but Correa was bad last year, right?

Like, Correa was good when he was healthy. And he was better on a per game basis. It's 3.49 versus 3.22. Not the 3.22 is bad. I mean, Glaber Torres was 3.28. but sorry Correa was bad in 2018 I'll give the advantage to George there All right outfield

Trout yeah Big edge for Scott Trout Catel Marte J.D. Davis Betts Danny Santana and Mike Talkman but again he could have had Marcelo Zuna It's actually FAM rather than Talkman

He put FAM on his bench for some of these FAM well he could Okay should have had OZuna Nelson Cruz for Alvarez for Scott Nelson Cruz for I think Scott has slightly better hitting. I'll say that. But I like the pitching

better for George of Yeah, that's fair. I did end up with four of my mythical top 36 and Gioledo Sorro-I'm sorry, Corbin Gioledo, Soroka and Montas. But Soroka and Montas are near the bottom

of that. And you also have Lazzardo and Maeda as your RPs. So that's huge edge too. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm not dissatisfied with the way it turned out. I normally like to have a little bit better pitching than this, but I got some good upside there from my bench. I also got Adrian Houser, who in case Luzardo or my dad doesn't work out for some reason.

There's another spark there. Alex Wood, who I like a lot. Garrett Richards, Dylan Seas have both been getting a lot of buzz this spring. So I think the pitching, I think the pitch will be fine. I do want to point out one thing, because we haven't talked. talked about it yet. It's about Jose Barrios, George Maselli's number four starter. He is reworking his curveball in spring training. He's always done that big, like, looping slurvy curveball that's kind of between a slider and a curveball. Looks like it should be a really good pitch,

doesn't really get a lot of swings and misses with it. He is reworking it to get more, to get less horizontal movement more vertical break with the hope of, getting more swings and misses with it and having it look more like his fastball out of his hand. And so I do want to point out that if that's an effective change and it does make the curveball a better swing and miss pitch, Jose Barrios could take a big step forward. I just wanted to talk about it because we haven't talked about it.

I appreciate that. That's always good stuff. I love to hear those types of spring tidbits. And Barrios is a guy that just has so many great starts and that to me just means that there's some capability there of him being just great. You know, he's been good. I just feel like there's a way to unlock something there with Jose Barrios. He does things that most starting, like he'll have more starts of like seven innings one run

than just about any pitcher, but he has too many bad starts too. I made a kind of weird comp early in the offseason, but I stand by it. He has a lot in common with Kyle Hendricks. It gets more strikeouts doesn't have quite as good of control, but what they both really, they go about it in different ways. Berrios stuff looks a lot better, but,

and he throws six miles an hour harder, but what they really excel at is limiting hard contact. Jose Barrios is one of the best starters in baseball at that. And so if he can get the strikeout rate, you know, up over a strikeout parading on average, because he does it occasionally. and keeps that ability to limit hard contact.

There is a chance that he finally, after everyone's kind of written him off as just like a mid-rotation guy, could take a lead. Last thing. Berrios, in the last two seasons, has 19 starts of seven innings or more and two or fewer earn runs. Walker Bueller has 15 in those two seasons.

Zach Rankie has 18 in those two seasons. And Berrios has 19. He can be so great sometimes. So there's some hope. for more, I guess. And Scott, did you have a favorite team in this league? I mean, if, being honest, it was probably mine, but I'm apparently not supposed to be that guy.

Boo! We can move on. George has popped out to me too, but I will highlight another one. I will highlight Phil Penebchek's team, which is probably, is it the weakest in hitting of the three we've highlighted already? I mean, it's not bad. Wilson Contreras is a catcher. Carlos Santana at first base is, of course, a stud in this format.

Tommy Edmund at second with Garrett Hampson as a fallback. Eduardo Escobar at third with Justin Turner as a fallback. Marcus Simeon is short, an outfield, strong outfields. George Springer, Jorge Solair, Andrew Benintendi. David Dahl is at his utility spot. I mean, he didn't slack in his... It's not like he has a late rounder at any of those hitting spots. I guess maybe Tommy Edmund comes the closest.

And then his pitching staff is Zach Granky, Chris Sale, Corey Kluber. Oh, I missed the top one. Geez. Jacob de Grom, Zach Granky, Corey Kluber, Junjun Ryu, and then Chris Sale when he gets back.

He has Carlos Martinez as a SPARP. Ian Kennedy, yeah. Me and Kennedy. being Giovanni Giegos too if he wins the job. Yeah, that's really, that looks like a really strong team. Weaker maybe in, like not a lot of big name hitters, but you could certainly see that lineup going right. And so let's take a look at how he did it.

He took DeGrom fourth. So he took DeGrom ahead of Christian Yellich, because Cole was third. Which I wanted advise. Yeah. Trout, Acuna, Cole, DeGromch. That was top five. So he took DeGromam, Springer, in round two.

which is probably a reach in a roto league, but not necessarily in a points league. He's possibly going to lead the league, lead baseball and played appearances, and that matters. Zach Granky in round three, Marcus Simeon in round four. Seems like...

Yeah, Richie, right? Yeah, I mean, he could have taken Glaver Torres, you know, that's a surprise. I mean, we've talked about how Glaver Torres is being overvalued, and I just told you what his points per game was last year. But we all like him better than Simeon, right? Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's interesting when you're breaking down pick by pick

because those sound like bad picks, but I think this is a year where you really have to be mindful of overall roster construction as opposed to just take the best guy available over and over again. Okay, so anyway, he went to Grom, Springer, Granky, Simeon, Kluber, Sale. That's four of his top six

were pitchers. Sale went after Sunny Gray. He went before Mike Soroka. So round six doesn't seem like that much of a discount, but he went late among starting pitchers. He went after Bumgarner after Sunny Gray. All right, good stuff. Thank you.

And the results of that draft are available. You can go to CBSports.com slash fantasy slash baseball. and then you scroll down a little bit, kind of in the middle of the page, there's these mock drafts, and you can click on them and see the mock drafts. Enter our podcast league.

Do something created, do whatever you want. Songs are always appreciated. One thing you shouldn't do, though, is give me a parody song that's just lyrics. Like, hey, here's a parody I wrote of this song and just give me the lyrics. Like, that's not going to do it. I just don't really enjoy those.

So someone asking, just asking to be in the league, might get in. Yes. But someone who takes the time to write out full parody lyrics. Yeah, it won't get. Will not. Right.

Right. You're a monster. Tribes are accepted, by the way. Put podcast league in the subject line. You have to put podcast league in the subject line. We also haven't come up with a date for the draft. So we'll have to do that and hopefully announce that tomorrow or Thursday. The bracket challenge.

Join our March Madness Bracket Challenge. The link is in the description. The time codes are also in the description if you're looking for specifics on when we talk about things. And please be kind and leave us a nice review on Apple Podcast. That would be very kind of you. Five-star review. you with a, you know, hey, these guys are awesome.

I love them. You can put that verbatim. We'd appreciate it. Roto Pitching Strategy, I teased this a little bit. I executed it in a mock we did a couple weeks ago, and then I did it again in the auction. And I'm working on an acronym, acronym for it. But so far I have tap hap AMC as my rolls off the tongue,

acronym, tap half a mc. Taffa Pampk sounds like a town in Massachusetts. Taffa Pampk, sure. Taffa Pampk with a C at the end, yeah. That's two aces plus Hader and Paxton and more closers. That's my strategy. It's two top six. It's got to be two top six.

And it can't be, well, now it's two top five because of Verlander. And it can't be Bueller and Flaherty. So it's got to be like one of the top three plus. or two of the top three. And then Bueller's clarity could be one of them. So you're paying up for dependability at starting pitch.

I'm paying up for 300, potentially 300 strikeouts, sub one whip, 250-ish ERA from one or two players. You know? Like just the best of the best. Hoping they stay healthy.

Hoping they stay healthy, yes. And then you have to get Josh Hader because he gives you like 125 strikeouts. some saves and also a great ERA and WIP. And then you win saves. You get three more closers. You win saves.

You're winning ERA. You're winning WIP. You're winning saves. I get Paxton because... Adam. What? You're drafting... You're drafting four closers and you're going to have two.

Yeah. In like a best case scenario. No, the best case scenario is you have four. The realistic scenario is you have two or three. And you're aggressive on waivers and you're, still prioritize saves because yes, those are not going to be the foreclosers you have throughout the season, but you'll have a leg up on the competition. Okay.

So you're kind of, you're kind of, you're not necessarily counting on winning saves, but you're kind of overdoing it to safeguard against volatility, which is kind of what I'm doing against starting, at starting pitch. Yeah, I would say that's more fair. I put Paxton in there because he's discounted, and I thought he was only going to miss, like, a little more than a month. but I've been reading lately that he might miss most of May. I thought it was more like early May.

So that actually matters quite a bit. But I've seen conflicting information on him. Yeah, I feel like he's on the same timeline as, he's thrown a bullpen, I'm pretty sure, like Clevenger has. Yeah. But I was hearing more optimistic things as we got closer. Timetable was May to June. Yeah, but I...

But he keeps beating his timeline. been hearing that it moved up closer to the early end of that. Right. So, you know, this is just kind of what I'm going for. It's two studs, hater, three more closers, and then you can do whatever the hell you want with the other spots. But I would recommend, like I have Luke Weaver on the auction. I would like to have like four starting pitchers that I could throw out there all the time,

and five relievers. And they don't all have to be closers. Like you can get a Seth Lugo. I drafted Dellen Batanzas. Hopefully he needs to get his velocity up. But that's the basis of the strategy. and tap hamp tap hap amc tap hap amp to fab what is it chris tap a pamk tap a tap we'll see how it goes we'll see how it goes it's team dave tuesday

lord of war w you know like wins above replacement a highly underrated film according to the person who submitted lord of war never seen it sounds like something somebody would say who submitted Lord of War. Probably. Glenn Perkins, like Ann Perkins and Parks and Rec, gave that one away last week. Dude,

you're getting Adele, like Joe Adele. Yeah. I like that one. I've been going for him in these, been doing a lot of drafting holds, these like 50-man rosters, and Joe Adele has been a key part of my strategy.

How about Molly Hatchet, like Tyler Malley, Malley Hatchet? I like it, yeah. I thought you would. set to the tune of Huey and Huey Lewis and the News classic, Do You Believe in Love? Riu believe in Lux.

Sure. I don't know. I hate when they try and cram a second name in there, unless it really works. Is that one on news? What'd you say? Is that on news? I don't know.

I don't know, Chris. Who cares? You're such a show-off. You're such a show-off right now. I don't know, Huey. Get out of here. And finally, this one's perfect for... Sports, that's what it's called.

It's not news, it's sports. Wrong segment of the paper. This is a Carter Key Boom reference. Okey Boomers. Okey Boomers. Okay, yeah. Yeah, like that. Okay, boomer.

Yeah, I like that one. All right, read emails. Oh, sorry. So, Roto World's most recent updates of James Paxton, Paxton keeps saying late April or early May, and he's scheduled to begin throwing on Wednesday. So two days after Clevenger. I don't know.

He tends to fall really far in drafts, Paxton, but I think he's becoming a good value if Rodo World is right there about what they keep saying. Well, he's part of Taphapp AMC. Now you know. All right, here's some emails, then we'll do fill in the blank. This is from Jeff in Nog.

Dear Murray Quinn, Volcano and Gatto. I don't know. which raise starters will have openers go before them. Chirinos and Yarbrough? Those would be the only ones. And even that, they kind of moved away from that

with Yarbrough at the end of last year, didn't they? And I feel like they weren't doing it much with Chorinos at the beginning of the year when he was at his healthiest. Let me see how many starts versus relief appearances he ended up making.

Those were the impractical jokers. Yeah, they were impractical joker. use the last names of the impractical jokers. He'd have done like Sal and Mur, I would have gotten it. 18 starts eight relief appearances for Torinos. So yeah, after pioneering that strategy, the Ray's kind of backed off from it. You're on a first name basis with the impractical jokers, Adam? Everybody is. By the way, Ryan Yarbrose's last nine appearances were all starts. He threw 51 and two-thirds innings. He had a 453 ERA. He did have a good walk-to-strikeout ratio, was seven walks, 47 strikeouts, and 51 and two thirds.

But his last two starts were only a... Well, no, one of them was only three and a third. Okay, next email's from Jonathan. Dear J.D., Stephen, Stubbs, and Pomerantz. This one I get. Drew's? Drews. Yeah.

Ten teams, six by six, head-to-head categories leagues, withholds. After Pomerant's moved to the bullpen, his underlying numbers look fantastic. What say you about Drew Pomerantz's performance? And does he stand out next to Ryan Presley is one of the top holds relievers in 2020? I mean, just look at what the Padres gave him this offseason. So clearly they are buying in. Yeah, he was awesome.

He had eight walks, 45 strikeouts, in 26 and a third with a 0.9-1 whip in the bullpen. I thought that was with Milwaukee, though, with Pomeranz. It was. Okay, okay. But I'm saying he signed with the Padres for a big deal. deal this offseason. Okay.

So he went from San Francisco and he was mostly a starter there. Then he went to Milwaukee. They used him as a reliever. 239 ERA. 0.91 whip. Ridiculous strikeout rate. Okay.

Put him on your... Yeah, that's another guy. He could be part of Tapp Hap AMC, the Roto strategy, Drew Pomeranz. This is from Adam. Please make fun of my friend who kept Vladimir Guerrero over Trey Turner in an eight team league

with only five keepers. That is all. Thank you. I refuse to do it. This could be a brilliant move. It could be a brilliant move in a year. It's impossible to justify if it's a Categories league, whether head to head or roto. If it's a points league, I still want to do it.

But you're at least not giving up those steals that are so necessary. This is from Brian, from following Scott's pitching strategy all offseason. Nobody took his best available two SPs in the latest points mock draft. What bats, if any, were available in late round two and early round three, would force him to abandon his early starting pitching strategy. He passed on Trey Turner. All right, so what he's saying is Scott took Mike Trout, then he took Corbyn and Giolito.

Were there any bats that could have been on the board that would have made you stray from Corby? I think he's asking which bats could be available that would make him switch. That's exactly what I just said. that's exactly you you know just go listen to your Qie Lewis no no

you asked it wrong it was a hypothetical I'm saying which bat yes Chris you're right which bats could it would have been available God you're such a jerk for Scott to have strayed from

the Corbyn Gialito back to back picks you guys are telling me Nolan Aeronado and I'm inclined to agree with you he went early in round two in this draft but Freddie Freeman

and I kind of pair Aeronado and Freeman in my mind. And Freeman went with the eighth pick of round two. If he was still there, I probably would have had to consider him. I could see Anthony Rodone actually went in the first round of this particular draft. And obviously, points is where Rendon is even better. He was better on a per game basis than Aeronado in 2018 as well as 2019. So if Aeronado was there at the end of round two. I'd probably have to take him.

I think it's possible like Juan Soto could be there. What about J.D. Martinez, Scott? It's not likely, but that's what it would take. It's just something that unlikely happening. Well, J.D. Martinez is fairly realistic. In fact, he was picked two spots before Corbyn and Gialito. Would you have taken J.D. Martinez? I don't know.

I want to say yes, but I'm not sure I would. I feel like I've passed them up at that range before. Okay. I think, yeah, okay. And this is all contingent on you having a hitter with your first pick and Trout. Like if you had gone with a pitcher. Of course, if I took, if I had Kohler de Grom at this point, then it's easier to take the hitter with the second pick. And then I still probably take a pitcher with my third in a points league.

And then let's just one more scenario, right? Let's say Scott goes Mike Trout and then someone falls to him like Soto or Freeman, or maybe he doesn't. does take J.D. Martinez, and he takes Patrick Corbyn. He skips Gialito. And then in round four, instead of taking Alvarez and Cotel Marte, you take one of those two, Jordan Alvarez or Cotel Marte, and then you take Wheeler or Cluber or Burrios, who would be your favorite there, Carrasco, Bauer? Which of those pitchers would be my favorite? Yeah, who would you have taken? Of the ones you listed Bauer,

are Darvish and Sunny Gray gone at that point? Sonny Gray is there, Darvish is gone. Darvish is gone. Let me see where Sunny Gray went. In the middle of round six. He's still there. Yeah, Sunny Gray would be the first time prior ties up then.

All right, so what do you like better? Final thought here. Trout, Corbin, Gialito, Jordan Alvarez Orrout, Corbyn, J.D. Martinez, Sunny Gray. Well, I mean, just among the four players, I like the Martinez combo more, but it's then going to have an effect

on what my pitching staff looks like. And I was already... I was already a little uneasy about the four I went with at the top there, so I think I'd have to stick with the Gialito just anticipating what my full team is going to. to look like. This is from Noah.

Can you give me an analysis of Taiwan Walker this season? I'm very interested in seeing what he does in the spring. It sounds like the velocity's mostly been there coming back from Tommy John surgery, but the biggest problem with Taiwan Walker has pretty much always been

that he just doesn't really have a putaway pitch. His curveball was the closest, but the swing and strike rate on that was just okay. So I haven't seen any reason to believe that's changed. If he has spent his rehab from Tommy John, developing, you know, either tightening the curve ball

or developing the cutter into more of a swing and miss pitch, I could see being interested in him. But right now he's nothing more than like a late round flyer in a deep league. Tyler is back with Seattle after a few years with Arizona, where he didn't do that much. This is an email from RJ. Howdy, gang? I've got a single NA stash in my lineup for prospects.

We have a 30 waiver move limit for the season, but the NA position adds without penalty. I've had Royce Lewis in my spot since the start of last season. Is Royce the kind of prospect worth hanging on to in this spot until he's called up? Would it make sense to try to get the likes of a Michael Kopeck once the season begins and try to add Royce Lewis at a later time? So Royce Lewis is coming off a pretty bad season. Of course, he's a former number one overall pick. and I think

I think I think evaluators are split on his bat right now particularly if he's going to be hit for much in the way of average but he almost certainly will be the twin starting shortstop at some point it won't be this year maybe he breaks through next year

I think when you're talking about only one minor league spot and that's true for every team across your league it makes sense to play the more near-term game unless it's unless it's a prospect so high end that like McKinsey

Gore who himself might be up at some point this year but what's a better example maybe Jared Kalenick but yeah no I think given the options you presented going the Kopeck route probably makes more sense

I'm going to read two more questions involving Marlins pitchers. This is from Josh. I'm in a head to head points league. I've got a killer group of pitchers. Cole, Bieber, Glassnow, Freed, Wheeler, Clevenger, Hayter, Kimbril, and

Caleb Smith. But after listening to you guys talk about Sparps, I'm wondering if I should drop Caleb Smith for any of the following. Kyle Gibson, Adrian Hauser, Yanni Cherinos, or Kevin Gosman. I would drop him for Hauser. I would also drop him

for maybe I want to drop him for Trinos but I definitely would drop him for Hauser. All right. And then Chris, this one's for you. From Dan and Richmond, Virginia. Dear Carlos, Jesus, Ryan, and Adrian. This is the wrong one. Dear, okay, sorry,

Dan from Richmond. We are not reading your email. From MD from T.O., which is Toronto. Go Raptors. Dear Pugsley, Wednesday, and Morticia. Okay, I know them. I tweeted this to Chris, but I fear he may have thought it was a troll. It really wasn't. It was inspired by all the talk of the pirates' rotation,

reminding me of the talk of the stallions of the Marlins last season. We'd love to hear your thoughts on how are they now regarding Richards, Alcantara, Smith, and Lopez, compared to the Helium with the Pirates guys this year. I'm still willing to take Alcantara, Smith, or Lopez with a late round pick. For Lopez, it has to be more of a deeper league, but I've actually drafted a surprising amount of uh, Sandy Alcantara. He's another guy who,

um, like Jose Breas and Kyle Hendricks is elite at limiting hard contact. And so the question for him, whether he can get the walk rate into a manageable range rather than just very bad, but I think there's potential there. Um, and Caleb Smith, I mean,

he was excellent before the injury. So it's just, it's a question of how much you believe his bad second half was the result of the hip injury and how much you believe it was. was regression to the mean. All of the underlying numbers in the first, it was like two months of the season where he was one of the best pitchers in baseball

and the underlying numbers mostly backed it up. So I think there's still potential there. It's just a question of how much of it, again, was the result of the injury, derailing him. All right. Those are emails of Fantasy Baseball at cbsi.com. And let's do some fill in the blank to finish today's show.

From Danny Perez, this year's Cody Bellinger is blank. who become a fantasy superstar this year. Man, this is tough to pull out of thin air. I am going to say... Joanne Moncada. Oh, Mukata? Okay. Did you say Vlad? I am going to go with...

I don't know. Matt... I don't know. Sorry. Matt Olson. Matt Olson, I feel like we haven't seen his full upside in the season yet. From Ross, blank will be the most productive mid-season promotion for 2020. Joe Adele. I'm going to say, Tramanzini. I'm sorry, not Tray Mancini. This is the other guy for the Orioles.

I'm sorry, Ryan Mountcastle. Yeah. It's supposed to be like word associations, Scott. You just got to say the first name that comes to mind. Well, regardless of if it's wrong. Regardless if it's wrong. Yes, people, they don't care about accuracy. They just care about speed.

Yeah. This is from Garrett Atkins, who drafts with us at times. Garrett Atkins, or no, excuse me, not Garrett Aginz, but Blank will be this season's Hunter Pence. Garrett Atkins is not the answer to this film in the blank. He will, uh, blank will be this season's Hunter Pence, aka a former fantasy stud who will rise from the dead in 2020. I feel like Chris. I feel like Chris drafts a lot of those guys. I would bet more on Matt Carpenter than Joey Votto.

I think both are good answers Miguel Cabrera Actually I wish we hadn't talked about it this late in the show But Eric Hosmer Please Eric Cosmer is finally talking about hitting the ball On the air for the first time in his life

And actually doing it so far in spring training For his spring training career He has, I hate that MLB.com Only has ground outs versus flyouts but that's all we have. We don't have ground ball rate. Before his spring training career, he has averaged 2.3 ground ball outs for every fly ball out that he has recorded.

This year, he has averaged, oh God, the math is way less straightforward. Two ground ball outs for every five fly ball outs, I think. Either way, he is hitting the ball in the air a lot more in the spring. Glad you finished with that, because I got lost in the math there. Elite skills, but that, yeah, that's the, he hits the ball really hard. He always has. He's always been really, really good with runners on base for his career.

And for the first time in his career, he is actually talking about hitting the ball in the air. It's 2020. I hope Eric Hosmer joins us. Okay. And how about, let's see, next fill in the blank is from Andrew Grubbs. Miguel and Duhar will finish as a top blank outfielder. 40. That's where my thought was going to, yeah.

From Jake, you should draft Chris Bryant over Josh Donaldson because, blank. He'll injuries. I'm more confident he'll play, yeah. Batting average should be better, I would think, right? Yeah, yeah. But if they stay healthy, I mean, Donaldson's probably going to out home or Bryant, I would guess. Yeah, it'll be similar if they stay healthy, but they're... I mean, Donaldson had like 10 more last year, right?

I don't know. Home runs? He may have. And Donaldson have like 39? No. He had... I think he may have. I think it was pretty close if it wasn't 10 full more.

He had 37. I think it was 8 more. And Brian. Bryant didn't hit 30 last year? No. I don't think he did learn. He had 30. 30 on the nose.

It was more like five apart. Wait, how many do you have? It's officially six apart, 37 versus 31. But it's closer to five than 10. Round up to 10. We round up to 10. You always round up. Yes, that's true.

Six rounds up to 10. Cannot argue with that. It's 100% factual. From Brent. From Brent, the stolen base leader for 2020 will be blank. Adelberto Mondesie. I don't see how it could be anyone else if he's healthy. from Josh

you or actually I think I forgot the A I think this is from Joshua by that I just wrote Joshua Blake is this year's Kirby Yates a K.A. A.K.A. low-key closer who could be this year's saves leader. Literally any closer.

That's just not true. You cannot. Well, actually I guess that is true because Yates, I think they were last place team. Jim Johnson led the league and saves two years in a row. Yeah, but you got to be on a good team typically. or at least not a bad team. Giovanni Gallegos, that could definitely be the case.

Eric Baker, Jordan Alvarez pronounces his name blank and my evidence is blank. Jordan and I'm the worst person at pronouncing things. So there is no evidence. Jim Bowden. Jim Bowden is what this all goes back to. The most plugged in guy. I believe he was, I believe he got that from Jeff Luna. Right.

It's pronounced Jordan. But I always hear it as Jordan. So I'm going, Jordan. Yeah. I have, with other players of, you know, with Hispanic names, I've never heard the Y pronounced as a J for any other. I have heard the J pronounced as a Y like Johan Santana, but I haven't heard the Y pronounced as a J before. From Brian, Blank is the shallowest position in the head-to-head categories league. besides catcher I guess That's second base

Second base Yeah From Luke Blank is the best Blank is the best spot To draft from In a 12 team Head to Head to Head Points League

One Three Okay From Matt Williams Who On a points league I'm sorry Two

Two Yeah Trout or Yelich Trout or Yelich Yeah Okay And Matt Williams Who we said

had the best team in our auction. Blank is my dark horse to lead the majors in home runs. Well, since he didn't get an A-plus from Scott's ranking, I'm going to say Mike Trout counts as a dark horse. I am going to say, does Miguel Sanoe count? I think so. Bramil Reyes would be an even darker horse. Love Frammel.

Love the franimal. I mean, it seems like Jorge Saler would be kind of a dark horse, even though he led the AL, right? has been so bad in the spring. He has like a 50% strikeout rate. Uh-oh. Come on. No, don't come on.

That's Travis Shaw's territory. What are we supposed to dismiss spring stats? That's strikeout rate. How many of bats does he have like 14? No, it's like 20 something. And you're rounding up. We always round up. So now it's 30.

Are you just making this up? No, he has 29 plate appearances and 13 strikeouts. So he struck out in half of his at bats, not half of his plate appearances. That's a lot. Mike Mustakis would be my dark horse and Eric Hosmer would be my other dark horse based on what Chris just said.

Thanks for listening, I am not going to be on the show tomorrow. So Chris and Scott, good luck. I think tomorrow we're going to talk about how to draft in different formats and maybe recap the categories draft that we're doing. It's a category of draft today, right? Yeah.

I don't know why I answered. I have no idea. Do you believe? All right. We got to go. For Chris and Scott, I'm Adam. Thanks for listening. Talk to you tomorrow.