We are getting close to the start of the MLB season (thank goodness!), and fantasy managers are doing last minute drafts. So I want to take one more chance to review some pre-draft players, data, and tips that could help fantasy baseball managers have a successful draft and beyond.
Strike 1
One thing that a lot of fantasy baseball managers wonder is how much stock to put into Spring Training stats. Do ST stats matter? I think that they matter for some players, and they can and should influence who and how you draft. Here are some examples of players whose spring stats matter to me in one way or another.
Boston first baseman Bobby Dalbec is moving up my draft board. He seems like a traditional 3-true-outcomes player. He is tied for the lead in spring training with six home runs as of 3/22, but he also has six walks and 15 strikeouts in 36 at-bats. If you do not mind sacrificing the batting average, he is a nice option for your corner infield or utility slots. A few other similar players (power hitters who are batting average risks) that are creeping up my rankings are Joey Gallo and Joc Pederson.
I think this is finally the year when things come back down to earth for Tim Anderson. He has posted an extreme BABIP the last few years, and it looks like in spring that things are evening out in the BABIP department. He has 10 hits in 43 at bats, but only seven strikeouts. He does not walk – he only has one walk in those at bats. I am fading Anderson in drafts. In most leagues, he is being drafted just outside the top 50 overall players. That is crazy to me. I am waiting on Dansby Swanson or Marcus Semien 60 picks later or players like Didi Gregorius and Tommy Edman later than that.
I am also moving Daulton Varsho down my rankings. He has an interesting positional combo of outfield and catcher, and he can run, but that is about it. A .143 batting average, 13 strikeouts, 1 walk, and no steals in 42 at-bats is worrying. The dual positional eligibility is not enough for me to draft him at all and neither is the steals potential. You have to get on base to get steals.
Strike 2
A benefit of waiting until just before the regular season starts is that you get to see how players are being valued in drafts. This is beneficial as you set up your draft board and determine who you think is being overvalued and undervalued. These are a few players whose ADPs have been rising and falling over the last week, according to ESPN trends, and how that rise/fall connects to where you should be drafting them.
Gavin Lux has seen a huge uptick in ADP in the last week. He is having a solid spring, but is it good enough to make him the number 18 second baseman? I would say no. He is not guaranteed the starting job at second base. He has not hit a home run in spring, and has only shown a power stroke in 2019, where he hit 26 home runs between Double-A and Triple-A. I believe he is being overvalued and is being drafted as if he has a job that he does not have. Why not take Ty France, who is going 50 picks later than Lux, and whose managers have said he will be Seattle’s designated hitter? I am not saying that Gavin Lux will be a bad player. He might be exceptional; I just think the value is better elsewhere.
Shohei Ohtani continues to climb in drafts as well. He is up to around pick 110 overall. He is being drafted ahead of players like Dansby Swanson, Marcus Semien, Kris Bryant, and Austin Meadows. He is being drafted well ahead of pitchers like Dylan Bundy, Patrick Corbin, and Joe Musgrove. My worry with Ohtani is that he does not play enough at either pitcher or DH for fantasy managers to extract maximum value from him. In weekly leagues, you should definitely fade Ohtani, simply because you will have to set him as a pitcher or in the utility slot for a full week. That alone limits his value. His value is limited because as a pitcher, he has an extra day of rest. As a batter, his value is limited each time he pitches since he does not bat on those days. A diligent manager in a daily league could find him useful, but pick 110 is too early for a player who does not play enough at either DH or pitcher. I would much rather have a full time starter at either position in that range of picks.
Finally, Trent Grisham has dropped a couple spots in drafts to pick 75. This is the perfect range to be scooping him up in drafts. He was out with an injury for about a week, which seems to have scared fantasy managers away, but in the last few days, he has been taking batting practice. He should be ready, if not for opening day, at least for opening week. If he is slipping to you after players like Charlie Blackmon or Michael Conforto, draft him, and laugh at everyone else for missing out.
Strike 3
I want to wrap up with covering what I think is the most impactful pitching metric to examine before you draft, no matter the league type (Roto, Head-to-Head, or Points), and that is K/9 or Strikeouts per 9 innings. Looking at a pitcher’s K/9 from the previous year or over their previous seasons can help you paint a picture of who they are or who they have become. Here is how to use K/9 to evaluate pitchers before the season (definitely still use it for evaluation during the season as well).
K/9, or Strikeouts per 9 innings, is a simple stat to understand. It’s how many strikeouts a pitcher averages over 9 innings. Rarely nowadays do pitchers go a full 9 innings. This stat is not that. The way it is calculated is that the number of strikeouts are divided by the number of innings, and then that number is multiplied by 9. So a pitcher who pitches 150 innings and has 140 strikeouts has a K/9 of 8.4. Conversely, a pitcher who pitches 140 innings and has 150 strikeouts would have a much better K/9 rate of 9.6.
The K/9 stat is important when evaluating pitchers because it helps you gauge how proficient a pitcher is at getting outs, and especially since most, if not every type of fantasy baseball league, values strikeouts, this stat becomes super important to focus on and understand.
I target high K/9 pitchers because these are typically pitchers who do not pitch to contact. Pitchers who pitch to contact have inherent risks, like giving up hits or home runs. Whereas pitchers with good strikeout stuff tend to limit hits. Some high K/9 pitchers can be high risk, high reward when it comes to giving up home runs. Some that come to mind are Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander.
The top 5 qualified players in K/9 last year were Shane Bieber, Jacob deGrom, Max Scherzer, Trevor Bauer, and Dinelson Lamet. And some of the players rounding out the top 10 are not surprises – Aaron Nola, Lucas Giolito, Gerrit Cole, Luis Castillo, and Brandon Woodruff are all there. Many of the leaders in K/9 are considered among the top pitchers in baseball. This is why you want to target players with a high K/9. Again, K/9 is a great place to start when looking for pitchers to draft, pick up, or trade for, but there are a lot of other factors that will play into helping you make those decisions.
Just based on K/9 data, a few players for you to look into this season, aside from the obvious top candidates, include Kenta Maeda, Dylan Bundy, Kevin Gausman, and Zach Eflin. Each of them average more than 9 strikeouts per 9 innings, meaning that their starts are productive and will fill up your stat sheet. They are middle-of-the-pack in walks, so there is little risk in that regard. Each of those players had advanced ERA metrics suggesting that their ERAs could have been better than they were in 2020, and that is something useful to consider as well. They all improved in walk rate, did not give up a ton of home runs last year, and you should not be afraid to consider them for your third or fourth starter on your fantasy teams this year.
