MLB 2017


Tonight is Big Papi's number retirement night. Bet you that when they go to pull off the sheet for his number, there is nothing but today's lineup card with Ortiz hitting 4th.
 
The Cincinnati Reds traded Alfredo Simon, Mike Leake, and Todd Frazier for Eugenio Suarez, Adam Duvall, Jose Peraza, and Scott Schebler. All of which were criticized when they happened but we made out like bandits. It saddens me that we're still light years from contention because of our injury luck with our starting pitchers :(
 

Texas Cloverleaf

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I don't think there's been a player on my team who hasn't been injured yet
In other news completely unrelated to my earlier complaints, I had a lengthy streak of sustained success during the middle of the season to bring me into a playoff spot followed by a streak of losses to drop me out into seventh.

This was of course in no way influenced by the timing and volume of recovery from and subsequent succumbing to injuries by bad players such as: Kershaw, Price, Syndergaard, Trea Turner, Robbie Ray, Jason Vargas, David Dahl, et al

Really disappointing. Y'all were giving me shit for complaining about injuries but I'm pretty sure the only great player I had who mostly avoided it was Altuve, every other great player I had was injured for months+ of the fantasy season. When I had most of them healthy I did legitimately well, played at the level of a legitimate contender. My draft plans turned out about as well as they otherwise could especially with pickups like Smoak and Vargas being among the best 30 producers. But alas, injuries doomed me to yet another 7th place finish.
 
You had some tough luck to be sure, but don't act like it wasn't your choice to hold onto players like Dahl (not gonna register a single PA for you this year LOL) and Vargas (peripherals pointed toward his decline all season and he's been every bit as terrible post-ASB) when you could've added impact players to propel you into that 6th spot.

But I'll never understand it - people rather play for the future than now, I guess. Be active enough on the wire and you can be competitive every year no matter how injured your team is/bad your keepers are.
 

Texas Cloverleaf

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Yeah that's a crock of shit when I've added impact players like Bundy, Smoak and Morrison off the wire, Dahl wasn't holding onto any spot that a waiver flyer would be using to get into the lineup. Try telling me again how I'm wasting roster spots when I somehow have room to pick up Sabbathia and Britton coming off of injury recovery. I have eleven players in the overall top 100 players on the year, seven in the top 50, yet somehow it's my fault that my team couldn't hold up. Try telling me again how going half the season without Thor, Kershaw, Price, and Turner is just desserts for my flaws.

Player: Season Rank
- Posey: 149 (C)
- Smoak: 31
- Altuve: 7
- Davidson: 531 (3B)
- Cozart: 120 (SS)
- McCutchen: 53 (OF)
- Pham: 41 (OF)
- Turner: 191 (OF)
- Encarnacion: 58 (1B)
- Morrison: 87 (1B)
- Joseph: 577 (1B)
- Bell: 136 (OF)
- Reddick: 122 (OF)

Best replacement on the waiver wire: Shin Soo Choo: 103 (OF)
Tell me again how holding David Dahl is hurting me so badly that it's solely responsible for my team's failings.
 
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Stallion

Tree Young
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I needed one hit from Cargo and Arenados last two at bat's to take down the #1 seed. In Coors vs the padres. So of course they both don't get a hit.
 

UncleSam

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Idk David Dahl was droppable like four months ago Texas even if it seems like there's not great options it's better to take a flier on guys who are on a hot streak than to sit on someone who doesn't play the whole year (and who was pretty obviously not going to play since like June). That being said I owned Kershaw across a few leagues and the timing on his injury really sucked.

Don't think I've mentioned to anyone here but I did a little experiment this year and joined the max number of leagues across two accounts (none in the same league ofc) and have learned just how terrible the average yahoo free league is rofl - I'm leading 13/16 of them and am no worse than 4th anywhere.

I think that the biggest things I've learned have been:
1. that the top players are way more valuable than they would appear, especially in smaller leagues. It's not that they outperform everyone else, but that, barring injury, they perform really well consistently. Having consistent top-tier options narrowed to as few roster spots as possible allows for maximum flexibility for those who are looking at the waiver wire even just once or twice a week (as I was).
2. Punting categories is dumb af in roto (though could be viable in H2H?). The one roto league I'm not running away with (I'm in 9 H2H and 7 roto) I punted BA, drafting Dozier, Trumbo, Chris Davis, Edwin Encarnacion, and Trevor Story. Putting aside all of those except Encarnacion sucking massive sacks of horse dick, and of course I have 100 points but sit tied for 2nd 10 points behind the league leader because I have a 2 in BA and he has a 12 (and most of the other managers are armless monkies). It's just not worth it to punt a category in Roto, and I doubt it is in H2H - you have to at least make them try to beat you.
3. Top-tier 3B are massively underrated right now. And by this I mean mostly Arenado but also Bryant. 3B is such a bad position this year that even with how disappointing Bryant has been at least he fucking produced at a top 100 level this season. Oh well, Devers covered for the teams where I drafted Beltre (lol) or Longoria (LOL) or god forbid Seager (literally kill me) for a few weeks at least.
4. Ks are the most valuable H2H stat. This wasn't obvious to me going in, but Ks are pretty much the only pitching stat you actually control to any meaningful degree. Even in the leagues where I drafted dominating SPs, I lost the ratios like 6 or 7 times at minimum. Meanwhile, in leagues where I spent literally 10$ on SPs, I'm no worse than 10-12 in any ratio. I'm not convinced the spread of going 10-12 to 16-6 is worth all the extra money for elite SPs - though I do think that good but not great guys who rack up Ks and pitch for good teams were undervalued by me at the start of the season, as it's hard to win those categories with zero investment against decent teams with competent managers. Ks on the other hand you can easily go 20-2 in without a ton of investment if you draft high-K starters and look for good streaming options. Again, having top tier players to improve your flexibility helps out a ton here.
5. Never draft guys with SBs as their primary selling point - especially in H2H. Billy Hamilton, Jose Peraza, Starling Marte, AJ Pollock, Jonathan Villar...none of them (or players like them) will ever see one of my rosters again. They're garbage hitters and even if they manage to steal a ton of bases (like Hamilton) they will be such overkill in one stat while being garbage in others that it's just not worth it. Maybe Hamilton would be ok in roto if you like angle to trade him mid-season but even then just not worth it. Not to mention when they steal bases it is condensed to one week or another, so that you don't even win steals as consistently as you should.
6. Elite Closers are really good in roto and bad in H2H. No clue why they cost the same regardless of format - the IP limit in roto makes their ratio contributions actually meaningful and their Ks/9 are godsends. In H2H neither their ratios not Ks matter much since you're squeezing so many starts in, so all you care about is filthy saves, no matter where they come from. Similarly, elite SPs are amazing in roto and not great in H2H, for the same reasons - their per-inning contributions are more valuable in roto.
7. Prospects contribute. A lot. I honestly didn't go into this year giving a rip about top-tier prospects, but obviously the leagues where I got Bellinger or Judge went a lot smoother than those where I didn't lol. I definitely underestimated how sometimes guys can go on crazy hot streaks and really carry your production in the here and now - like Del Rio said a few posts above me, focus on the now, never let your team just sit and flounder and lose games.
8. I fucking hate catchers. Yes, all of then. Posey is so goddamn overpriced for his garbage production but there is just nothing beyond like him / Contreras / Perez / Realmuto / Sanchez (when those other guys are even playing...), there have been NO breakout performances from prospect catchers this year and Lucroy has been abysmal after I drafted him in a bunch of leagues. I am currently running without a catcher in five different leagues and am winning all of them - I really think it is viable to give that roster spot to an extra SP or vulture save prospect in H2H, or an extra prospect or hot-hand option at an actually useful position who you'll only be able to play twice a week, versus floundering with some guy who plays 110 games, hits .220, and for your trouble you get like 10 HRs and 50 Runs and RBI. No thanks, I'll just let my pitchers throw to backstop.

Hope the Smogon League is going well, and this ends my entirely unsolicited rant on Yahoo Fantasy Baseball.
 
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Holy shit. Great writeup man. I agree with most of what you said, except I would say homers is the most important H2H stat because it secondarily contributes to R, RBI, AVG/OPS. It might be less valuable than before because you can literally pick up a FA with 30 homers nowadays, but the same could be argued for pitchers who rack up Ks. Everyone strikes out now (except Mookie, Justin Turner, and Votto ironically) because that's how the game is nowadays, so the value of a high Ks pitcher is diluted. But in roto, a pitcher's K/9, along with 5-cat hitters, is one of the most important things I look for. It's so important to address every category in roto, whereas in H2H, my calling card has been loading up on power bats and throw shit on the wall for a pitching staff and hope something sticks, which I've had reasonable success with I think.
 

UncleSam

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Holy shit. Great writeup man. I agree with most of what you said, except I would say homers is the most important H2H stat because it secondarily contributes to R, RBI, AVG/OPS. It might be less valuable than before because you can literally pick up a FA with 30 homers nowadays, but the same could be argued for pitchers who rack up Ks. Everyone strikes out now (except Mookie, Justin Turner, and Votto ironically) because that's how the game is nowadays, so the value of a high Ks pitcher is diluted. But in roto, a pitcher's K/9, along with 5-cat hitters, is one of the most important things I look for. It's so important to address every category in roto, whereas in H2H, my calling card has been loading up on power bats and throw shit on the wall for a pitching staff and hope something sticks, which I've had reasonable success with I think.
I see what you're saying, and to some extent I agree - bats are definitely where your money should be. What I mean, however, is that Ks should be where your focus is. You can't control whether your team hits 2 or 20 home runs in any given week - all you can do is give yourself the best possible chance to win Runs, Home Runs, and RBI week in and week out (and, given how correlated they are, they definitely should be the primary focus of any H2H team). Ks, however, you can reliably win every single week simply by staying active and making smart pickups / playing your weekly matchups, and it's an easy way to start out effectively up 1 - 0 in any given matchup if you're paying attention. There's really no other stat that is that reliable.
 

Stallion

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I went without a catcher for a few weeks, but Wilson Ramos almost saved my season in my semi final so I have mixed feelings on it.
 
I feel like the best kind of catching target for a high output offense is a low risk, low reward late round/waiver catcher. I drafted a flyer on Travis D'Arnaud in my money league, but I've rid out Alex Avila for the first part of the season and Christian Vasquez for the second half. I feel like the value of having an average-centric catcher that can provide chip counting stats while not affecting your average is a valuable addition to have in weeks where your offense just can't pull away.

Unlike with pitching stats, where IPs can fluctuate drastically from week to week and you're a slave to the randomness of when your two-starts hit or when your closer will be used and can correct that by investing in streams to fill gaps... you usually are given a fairly consistent range of ABs that you have in a week to accrue stats and losing possible insurance stats to run an entire week without a catcher to me is overly risky. Over the course of a season, you win/lose categories by the smallest margins at times and having that fairly consistent contribute can make the difference between a W/L in a week and seeding in the long term.

I have absolutely no appeal in chasing .230 / 15-20 HR catchers because the inconsistency is not worth the hassle and the wasting of precious weekly moves to keep swapping out streaking catchers is definitely not worth it to my play style. But there are enough FA catchers out there that are low risk enough to give you some stats without giving you the headaches to consider completely punting the position/ABs completely.

---

Also, side note, I fucking hate H2H playoffs. It's fucking trash to decide a league on the last 4 weeks of a baseball season with September Call Ups, managers resting players, starters and position players checking out or tiring out, injuries coming to a head and DL stints becoming non-existent and fucking up lineups.

In an active league, it is so much better to just have the season go until the end of the year without playoffs and just whoever has the best record at the end of the year win. You don't need a playoff system like you do in real sports because the end of any regular season throughout all sports in selective greatness but overall garbage.
 
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Stallion

Tree Young
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I feel like the best kind of catching target for a high output offense is a low risk, low reward late round/waiver catcher. I drafted a flyer on Travis D'Arnaud in my money league, but I've rid out Alex Avila for the first part of the season and Christian Vasquez for the second half. I feel like the value of having an average-centric catcher that can provide chip counting stats while not affecting your average is a valuable addition to have in weeks where your offense just can't pull away.

Unlike with pitching stats, where IPs can fluctuate drastically from week to week and you're a slave to the randomness of when your two-starts hit or when your closer will be used and can correct that by investing in streams to fill gaps... you usually are given a fairly consistent range of ABs that you have in a week to accrue stats and losing possible insurance stats to run an entire week without a catcher to me is overly risky. Over the course of a season, you win/lose categories by the smallest margins at times and having that fairly consistent contribute can make the difference between a W/L in a week and seeding in the long term.

I have absolutely no appeal in chasing .230 / 15-20 HR catchers because the inconsistency is not worth the hassle and the wasting of precious weekly moves to keep swapping out streaking catchers is definitely not worth it to my play style. But there are enough FA catchers out there that are low risk enough to give you some stats without giving you the headaches to consider completely punting the position/ABs completely.

---

Also, side note, I fucking hate H2H playoffs. It's fucking trash to decide a league on the last 4 weeks of a baseball season with September Call Ups, managers resting players, starters and position players checking out or tiring out, injuries coming to a head and DL stints becoming non-existent and fucking up lineups.

In an active league, it is so much better to just have the season go until the end of the year without playoffs and just whoever has the best record at the end of the year win. You don't need a playoff system like you do in real sports because the end of any regular season throughout all sports in selective greatness but overall garbage.
Or better still, we could play roto again if you want no play-offs and no stupid variability.
 
Head to Head is way more fun than Roto. Our league would be really cool if we didn't sift through those 2 inactives that throw things out of balance because they auto-drafted and haven't made a roster move since May. It'd be nice to have a league where people played you hard and adjusted their rosters a majority of the time for the majority of the seasons.

Maybe next year we can convince UncleSam to play, since I ask him every year and he just says eh. Now that he has come out and said that he played 16 leagues this year I feel like we need him to play one more...
 
UncleSam won't play unless it's redraft. Which is fine. We can have a side league that's roto redraft since I'd like our keeper league to remain H2H. Prolly won't get 10 (from Smogon) but that's manageable
 

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