The Weekender | Southern Tier 2X Stout, Bauer/Cobb, Capital Cities

Fantasy baseball is about more than just numbers and even more than just winning or losing. It's a way of life for many months of the year. Accomplishing the ideal fantasy baseball lifestyle isn't easy so I have a new weekly post here in honor of The Weekend and the pursuit of a fun fantasy season. You'll get beer recommendations, songs to listen to, baseball articles you should read and games you should watch each weekend. It's baseball season so let's live it up!

Beer of the weekend

Southern Tier 2X Stout

So, you want to watch some baseball but you don't know what beer would hit the spot? Well, this nice milk stout might do the trick. This is a beer that simply explodes with foam when it is poured so use caution if you have one eye on a baseball game as you pour. After pouring, you can probably watch a half inning of the game while the foam dissipates. After it finally does, you'll be able to whiff up a bit of some milk chocolatey goodness. Upon first taste, you'll notice it has a nice creamy taste to it but with also a bit of hoppy bitterness that adds some complexity to it. If you've had a milk stout, you might expect some sweetness but you'll only get a little tease of that here. It's the perfect drink for the cold days of early baseball season. It has the warmth of a nice winter drink with hints of the sweetness that is to come when the weather gets warmer. Think of it as the gateway between the darkness and complexity of winter and the promise of light, simple summer days ahead. Early baseball season in drink form.

Rating (1-5 scale)
Appearance (5), Aroma (2), Flavor (4), Palate (4), Overall (4)

Game of the weekend

Indians (Bauer) vs. Rays (Cobb) on Saturday at 7:10 PM EST

What game should you make time to watch as a fantasy baseball nut this weekend? There's some pretty obviously good pitching matchups this weekend. Darvish/Weaver, Cain/Wainwright/, Verlander/Sabathia, Hamels/Shields are just some of the gems that you could watch. But, for the most part, you know what to expect out of those guys and they're owned on every fantasy team in the world. If I'm going to watch a game from a fantasy perspective, I want to use it for information gathering. To me, the best game for that this weekend is the Indians/Rays game on Saturday night where Trevor Bauer is pitching against Alex Cobb. These are both young phenoms who could deliver potentially great numbers this season. Bauer is a total wildcard as he was a huge prospect that the Diamondbacks seemingly gave up on due to his eccentricity. Cobb has already shown some success but how high is his ceiling? These two pitchers should make for a fun matchup. In addition, I want to see what this new-look Indians team looks like as I think they put together some interesting pieces this offseason.

Article of the weekend

Does Plate Discipline Come With Age? (Beyond The Boxscore) - If you're a craft fantasy baseball player then you're always looking for a hidden age. Based on the evidence within this article, it may make OBP owners wonder if older players are the new market inefficiency.

Song of the weekend

Even though you're drinking a dark beer, we need a fun song to remind us that summer is coming and spring is coming. Get your toes tapping with this awesome, upbeat song called "Safe And Sound" by Capital Cities. Have a fantasic fantasy baseball weekend, my friend!

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Through The Waiver Wire | Week 1 | Cowgill, Chacin, Henderson

I'm not sure if you noticed or not but BASEBALL IS BACK. We now have a series of games under our belts which means that we finally have some decisions to make. If you're a John Axford or Carlos Marmol owner then you're already looking at other options. Meanwhile, Ryan Ludwick and Brian Roberts owners have been busy looking for replacements. Bryce Harper owners are doing their best Bryce Harper impression by being overly confident in their abilities right now. No matter how you slice it, the highs and lows of baseball are undeniably back and we should all rejoice.

While it should be noted that we're dealing with very small sample sizes, you should start checking out your waiver wire anyway. Sometimes these hot starts turn into breakout seasons and it's time to roll the dice and find out (disclaimer: don't drop anybody of value yet; patience is a virtue). Let's check out some of the hottest pickups and see if they are worth a damn:

Hot Bats

Gerardo Parra - Oh my word. He's leading off now and batting .500 after three games with a homer and stolen base. Of course, that means he's a hot pickup. He's filling in for Adam Eaton and is the type of player who could flirt with 10 HR and 20 SB with a decent AVG in a full season of plate appearances. He likely won't be a full-time player all season long but he's an attractive option for the time being.

Collin Cowgill - He homered on Opening Day! He's in New York! This got attention and made him worthy of punny headlines like "Need More Cowgill" and "Where There's A Cowgill There's a Way" and such. Oh, but aside from the homer, he's only had one hit. That being said, Cowgill did have two minor league seasons with about 15 HR and 30 SB so he's got roto appeal. In deep leagues, he's worth a look. <insert some sort of clever cow joke>

Tyler Flowers - If this guy was a flower then he would be some sort of beautiful but poisonous flower. This beautiful flower can smack homeruns like it ain't no thang and could probably flirt with 25 HR's in a full season of AB's. But, right, it's poisonous and will absolutely kill you in batting average and not contribute any stolen bases. No thanks, silly flower.

Evan Gattis - The story of Gattis' fall from grace, infatuation with marijuana then return to baseball is an interesting one. The story of him on your fantasy team likely wouldn't be as interesting. He's got power, yes, but he doesn't really have a full-time job. The Braves will have Brian McCann back eventually and Gerald Laird is still their primary catcher until then. So, while we can enjoy the Gattis batflip from afar, don't rush to the waiver wire.

Justin Maxwell - Mad Max hit 18 HR with 9 SB in a half season last year yet everyone kind of ignored him in drafts because, well, his batting average sucked. The good news is that it looks like the Astros are going to play him because they're the Astros. He's got appeal with his power and speed combo but he will likely still burn you in AVG. If you can cover up that deficiency on your roto team, he's worth a look.

Lucas Duda - Duda! Sweet! Duda! Sweet! Erm, sorry about that. So, last season, I had Duda pegged as a major sleeper and thought he had 30 HR potential. In three-quarters of a season, he hit half that number. I still think he's got the potential to smack out of a ton of HR's but this will be the year where we find out for sure. In the opening series, he did manage to hit a 2-run bomb which is hopefully a sign of things to come. He's one to keep an eye on and scoop up if he continues to mash.

Smokin' Starters

Dillon Gee - I've already written about him. He started off the season well. He's still not owned everywhere. Go correct that.

Jhoulys Chacin - After letting one earned run and three hits in his opening start, Chacin suddenly became a hot pickup. He's still Jhoulys Chacin, y'all. He will get you those 6 K and 3 BB in most of his starts but he'll likely do it with a 4.00 ERA and 1.40 WHIP. Have at it, if that's your thing.

Lucas Harrell - He will likely have a monster season. I picked him up prior to Opening Day but dropped him for J.A. Happ. If past fantasy experiences have taught me anything, it's that those type of little moves mean that I've just blessed Harrell with super pitching skills in 2013. But, really, he's a decent option for a fairly low ERA that won't contribute much else in any other category. In very deep leagues, there's some value in that.

Hishashi Iwakuma - Iwakuma bounced between being a closer, middle reliever and starter last year. He was most successful as a starter though as he posted a 2.65 ERA and 1.23 WHIP with 7.4 K/9 and 2.7 BB/9 over 95 innings. There's still question marks about whether Iwakuma can do this over a full season as hitters adjust but he started off 2013 on the right foot with a 7 K, 0 BB gem. He's worth an add.

Andy Pettitte - It's funny that Pettitte gets such little love each year in fantasy drafts. It's not "funny ha-ha" but more like "funny hmm," like a Wes Anderson movie. Regardless, Pettitte is a craft old man who still shows good control and ability to outthink other teams. You don't need to rush to a nursing home to help out the elderly; just pick up Pettitte instead.

Closer Carousel

Detroit Closers - Oh goodness. I don't even know. Your guess is as good as mine. Three possible closers and the Tigers even signed Jose Valverde to a minor league contract now. Until something clears up here, I'm not going to try to guess every game about who is closing.

Jim Henderson - I still like John Axford but he's standing on shaky ground right now after letting up 3 HR's in the first series of the season. If these struggles continue then Henderson is next in line. Henderson is worth a speculative add to see what happens here but I wouldn't drop Axford until something definitive happens here.

Kyuji Fujikawa - Meanwhile, a closer who is on even shakier ground is Carlos Marmol. He's still walking guys at an incredible rate and striking them out an incredible rate too. He's still giving Cubs fans heart attacks. I don't see how much longer this can go on. The Cubs have a nice option in Fujikawa waiting in the wings now too. Fujikawa has looked nice in his MLB debut thus far and I think he's got to take the job at some point soon. He's worth adding now though.

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Potential Waiver Wire Gems To Keep An Eye On

As I look out the window today, I see snow on the ground but I know baseball season is just days away anyway. Most of your fantasy drafts are either finished or about to be finished. What do you do in between Draft Day and Opening Day (two of the greatest days in fantasy baseball)? Well, you probably look at the waiver wire a lot. I wouldn't recommend making moves at this point. You drafted your team for a reason after all. I recall too many knee-jerk early season moves that I later regretted (dropped Joey Votto after drafting him late in 2008... oy vey). But, that doesn't mean you can't start to figure out who you want to scout out in the first few weeks.

So here are some names of guys that are on waiver wires but I'll be keeping a close eye on. If I start to see any signs of success from them, I'll likely be pouncing on them and hopefully reaping the benefits.

Andy Dirks (Available in 83% of CBS leagues) - I already profiled what Dirks brings to the table. He was aided by luck last year but still has the potential to hit close to .300 with 15 HR and 15 SB's.

Tyler Moore (Available in 98%) - The Nats traded away Mike Morse because they felt Moore gave them the same sort of production. Moore will be coming off the bench to start the season but he could be a big-time fantasy contributor if injuries clear a path into the lineup for him. In a full season of AB's, he has the potential to hit 30+ HR's (as he did in his 2010 and 2011 minor league seasons). Unless he gets a shot in the starting lineup, he isn't worth owning though. Optimistic projection - .260 AVG, 25 HR, 60 R, 80 RBI in 500 PA.

Darin Mastroianni (Available in 95%) - The Twins opted to start Aaron Hicks over him in CF. If he gets a shot to crack the lineup, he has the type of speed that roto players drool over. He stole 21 bases in 181 PA's last season and literally stole hundreds of bases in a few minor league seasons. Optimistic projection - .260 AVG, 5 HR, 80 R, 40 RBI, 40 SB in 550 PA.

Ivan Nova (Available in 62%) - He had a 3.70 ERA in 2011 then a 5.02 ERA in 2012 but nearly all of his stats improved. Despite his strikeout rate improving greatly and his walk rate decreasing, he was hounded by an unlucky BABIP and HR/FB rate. With those numbers returning to normal, he should be put up nice numbers in 2013. Optimistic projection - 12 Wins, 4.00 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 155 K's in 180 IP.

J.A. Happ  (Available in 90%) - For years, Happ was overrated as his ERA was far below his xFIP. Last year, he found some secret recipe for success but now is suddenly underrated. His strikeouts skyrocketed as he had 9.0 K/9 but he also was hurt by a poor BABIP rate. Now that he secured a starting spot in Toronto, expect good win totals and good numbers across the board. You may not need to rush to the waiver wire now but keep a very close eye on him. Optimistic projection - 12 Wins, 3.75 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 165 K's in 175 IP.

Jeff Karstens (Available in 98%)  - He was undervalued to begin with despite posting sub-4.00 ERA's in both of the two past two years. And, now he is starting the season on the DL so his value drops lower. Once he returns, Karstens is poised to deliver low ERA and WHIP totals. The only knock against him is a poor strikeout rate. But, hey, it has worked for Doug Fister so don't hate him for it. Optimistic projection - 9 Wins, 3.50 ERA, 1.15 WHIP, 95 K's in 140 IP.

Drew Smyly (Available in 78%) - Smyly came out throwing heat as a rookie last year with a 3.99 ERA and 8.5 K/9. Unfortunately, he didn't crack the rotation out of spring and will be in the bullpen to start the year. It might take an injury for him to force his way into their rotation but let's hope he does. In the minors, his ERA was sub-3.00 with a high strikeout rate. He could have a big impact on your rotation if he gets a shot. Optimistic projection - 7 Wins, 3.50 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 120 K's in 125 IP.

Carlos Villanueva (Available in 92%) - Villanueva pitched decently in the AL over the past two years but a move to the NL should help boost his numbers a bit. He has a good strikeout and walk rate with his major weakness being that he's susceptible to the HR ball. If he maintains his strikeout rate from last year, he's suddenly pretty valuable. He is worth keeping an eye on. Optimistic projection - 10 Wins, 3.75 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, 170 K's in 175 IP.

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2013 Fantasy Baseball Draft Cheatsheets (Roto, Auction, H2H) | Final Version

As Boyz II Men once said so eloquently, we have come to the end of the road. Opening Day is nearly upon us and this is the final release of the 2013 cheatsheets. If you have a draft coming up this weekend, you get the honor of having the hottest and freshest version of these Excel masterpieces. This latest version doesn't add any new features but gets all of the data up-to-date. All of the ADP and auction values are as fresh as they can be and all of the projections are from the current datasets. In addition, I've finally added in the Marcel projections (disclaimer: Tom Tango owns the Marcel projections and opted not to run them this year so this is a third-party version of the usual Marcel projections). Also, this version contains my custom projections which weight the projections individually for each stat based on my previous research.

So, if you love your cheatsheets and you want them to have the most current data around for your upcoming draft then you got it in this latest update.

As for the usual words of warning:

For those completely new to these fantasy baseball cheatsheets, I encourage you to read the opening post for more information on them.

Before downloading the cheatsheets below, please be forewarned that these cheatsheets are designed to work in Excel 2007-2010 and were designed in Windows. The Mac version of Excel (and older versions of Excel) has been known to have problems when trying to operate these cheatsheets. Also, Microsoft has a few security features which makes opening these spreadsheets more annoying than it should be. If you have the default security settings, you'll be asked if you want to enable macros when opening this spreadsheet and you must enable macros in order for this cheatsheet to work! In addition, Microsoft may point out that the file originated from an internet location so you will have to click the button that says Enable Editing. You can always change your settings in Excel so you don't get asked that again but those are two hiccups you might encounter before you get to play around in the sandbox here. Now that you've been prepped, go ahead and download your cheatsheet of choice:

2013 Roto Cheatsheet

2013 Roto Auction Cheatsheet

2013 Points League Cheatsheet

After opening the cheatsheet, you'll be presented with a form to enter some of your league specifications such as number of teams, team names, number of starters at each position, your roto categories and so on. You'll also choose what sources you want to display information from. Keep in mind that you can always change this info later if you just want to close that and peek around for now.

The Draft Central tab is your home base for these sheets and it is where you'll see a summary of information for each player throughout the draft and this is where you'll enter what team drafts each player. Changes on this sheet update the Live Standings and Team Summary tabs. The Live Standings tab will calculate each team's projected starters and base the current standings throughout the draft on that info. The Team Summary tab shows who is on each team and who is projected to be their starters. The Player Profiles tab allows you to compare players and look at all of the projection and expert data for them. For roto leagues, you'll also see a calculation of how many points in the standings you may gain (or lose) by drafting that player.

Data included for this v1.5 release:

• CAIRO projections
• Steamer projections
• Steamer (with Fan playing time) projections
• Fangraphs Fan projections
• Oliver projections
• ZiPS projections
• MORPS projections
• Clay Davenport projections
• Custom combined projection option
• "Marcel" projections
• Mr. Cheatsheet's special combined blend projections
• MockDraftCentral ADP data
• CBS ADP data
• Yahoo ADP data
• ESPN ADP data
• Fantasy Gameday ADP data
• RotoChamp dollar values
• CBS Sportsline dollar values
• Yahoo dollar values
• ESPN dollar values
• Fantasy Gameday average auction values
• ESPN rankings
• RotoChamp rankings
• Hardball Times rankings
• CBS Sportsline rankings
• David Gonos rankings
• Mr. Cheatsheet rankings
• FantasyPros expert consensus rankings

It's been another great year of fantasy baseball draft preparation and I hope you enjoyed these cheatsheets that I put out to the public. I put in a ton of hours into them and I'm very happy that I can put them out to the public for free this year and I hope I can continue to do that. However, if you'd like to give me a pat on the back or figuratively buy me a beer then feel free to punch that donate button below. Happy drafting, y'all!

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Hidden Value in Point-Based Leagues | Key Players for 2013

The industry standard for fantasy baseball leagues is still the traditional rotisserie league but point-based leagues have quite a market as well. These leagues make for an easy transition for those who started in the fantasy football world as they are set up in a similar weekly head-to-head fashion that relies on points for various player outcomes.

Some may scoff at the concept but these leagues are quite popular as evidence by the fact that, in the time that I've been tracking it, roughly one-third of my cheatsheet downloads have been for players in points leagues. In fact, most of my fantasy baseball years have personally been spent in the point league universe. However, most rankings and articles out on the web are targeted towards roto players and this can be confusing for an owner in a points league. Those owners aren't interested in balancing out SB's with HR's or any of that business; they just wants points no matter how they can get them. So, how does that change the rankings?

Well, first and foremost, nearly all point-based leagues are different because the scoring systems are completely customizable. Check your scoring system. Learn your scoring system. Exploit your scoring system. Find what is odd about it and attack that weakness. In this analysis, this is the standard scoring system that I used:

• Hitters: 1B (1 pt), 2B (2 pt), 3B (3 pt), HR (4 pt), RBI (1 pt), Run (1 pt), SB (1 pt), CS (-1 pt), KO (-1 pt), BB (1 pt)
• Pitchers: Win (4 pt), Loss (-2 pt), IP (1 pt), HA (-1 pt), BB (-1 pt), KO (2.5 pt), ER (-1 pt), Sv (10 pt), CG (5 pt), SO (5 pt)

It's a very basic scoring system but the concept should align with most formats. For hitters, extra-base hits get rewarded and strikeouts hurt you. For pitchers, strikeouts are generally very valuable. You may already see how this would change rankings over a roto league. Roto players don't worry about doubles or triples or whether their hitter will strike out a lot and that is going to change things. Roto players worry about a balanced team and point league owners couldn't care less about that.

I wanted to analyze players who should be valued differently if you're playing in a points league. In order to do so, I took the same projection system and ran it through the cheatsheets here to see the rankings for a roto league and then ran the rankings again for a points leagues. Looking at those who have big fluctuations, we can start to see some trends. Let's first look at the players who took a big dip in value in points leagues:

• Josh Hamilton - #55 in Roto, #92 in Points - More than anything, this has to do with projected plate appearances. Not a single projection has Hamilton at or above 600 PA's. For point-based leagues, every plate appearance is a chance for points so missing time hurts his projected output.
• Doug Fister - #147 in Roto, #258 in Points - A guy who doesn't have a high strikeout rate is less valuable in point leagues. Fister is projected to have a K/9 that is below league average. His WHIP and ERA rates are still very nice in roto leagues but don't play as big of a role in points leagues.
• Jay Bruce - #31 in Roto, #57 in Points - Strikeouts are the main culprit here. He has a very high K% and that brings down his value in points leagues by a bit.
• Adam Jones - #26 in Roto, #51 in Points - While Jones is still valuable in points leagues, his value is hurt by the fact that he doesn't walk much. In 5x5 roto, that's not an issue. In addition, his SB's which make him more valuable in roto don't benefit him as much in this format.
• Paul Goldschmidt - #50 in Roto, #99 in Points - I'm actually somewhat surprised to see him dip lower in points leagues as he has a decent walk rate and hits a lot of doubles in addition to what else he brings to the able. However, he is hurt by a somewhat high projected K%. His value in roto leagues is boosted by his SB's which don't have as big of an effect in point leagues.
• Roy Halladay - #37 in Roto, #89 in Points - His ERA/WHIP projections look nice and his K/9 looks pretty good so why would he dip in value for point leagues? Well, the projections see him missing some time throughout the year which limits his overall projected point totals.
• B.J. Upton - #35 in Roto, #90 in Points - His value in roto leagues is aided by his ability to contribute very good numbers in both SB's and HR's. In point leagues, the SB's aren't as valuable and his low AVG and high K% hurt him badly. Strikeouts and lack of on-base opportunities are the poison of point league owners.
• Carlos Gonzalez - #9 in Roto, #27 in Points - Carlos takes a dip because of his roto value being boosted by SB's but he is still quite valuable in point leagues.
• Giancarlo Stanton - #12 in Roto, #33 in Points - His decrease in value for point leagues is mainly tied to his very high K%. Those strikeouts pile up and end up cancelling out some of his positives.
• Matt Kemp - #15 in Roto, #56 in Points - There are two things at play here. First, he strikes out a lot as well. Second, some projections have him missing some time. We've seen that those two things factor highly in the value of hitters in point leagues.

Of course, the next logical progression is to look at the undervalued guys for point-based leagues:

• Carlos Santana - #83 in Roto, #34 in Points - One of the main reasons that Carlos gets a boost for point leagues is his high BB%. He's able to draw walks and those equate to points. In 5x5 roto, walks don't really play a direct factor on value.
• Yu Darvish - #93 in Roto, #45 in Points - Lots of strikeouts mean lots of points. Even if the pitcher lets up more runs along the way, strikeout totals are important in point leagues.
• Yunel Escobar - #354 in Roto, #176 in Points - Escobar doesn't move to the top of the charts in point leagues but his value is boosted by his ability to avoid strikeouts, which means more total points for him.
• Denard Span - #299 in Roto, #152 in Points - In addition to avoiding strikeouts, Span provides a bonus in point leagues because he projects to hit for a lot of doubles and triples. Those type of extra base hits don't do anything to his roto value but are important to point league owners.
• Martin Prado - #84 in Roto, #43 in Points - We're starting to see a trend here. Here's another low strikeout guy. He moves up way higher because he hits a ton of extra base hits too. He's much like Span above but to an even greater extent.
• Nick Markakis - #146 in Roto, #75 in Points - Copy paste. Low strikeout rate. Lots of extra-base hits, especially doubles. Point leaguers love it. Roto leaguers ignore it.
• Jeff Samardzija - #202 in Roto, #106 in Points - See Yu Darvish.
• Jeff Keppinger - #374 in Roto, #197 in Points - Insanely low strikeout rate here which means extra points as a result.
• Yovani Gallardo - #64 in Roto, #35 in Points - Once again, a high-strikeout pitcher gets a bonus. His slightly lower-than-elite WHIP gets cancelled out a bit more in point leagues by his strikeout ability.
• Marco Scutaro - #261 in Roto, #142 in Points - You can probably guess what I'm going to say at this point. Low strikeout rate with lots o' extra-base hits. Rinse, repeat.

There you have a small listing of some guys to target or avoid in point leagues. As I alluded to, there's some obvious trends as we go through the list. Those trends leave us with a few things to keep in mind:

• Health plays an important role in point leagues. If you have a great player, you need him to play in order to accrue points. Rate-based stats like ERA/WHIP/AVG don't mean as much as net production.
• Strikeouts are important in two ways. You want to be cautious of hitters with high strikeout rates while you give bonus points to hitters who can avoid strikeouts. In addition, you want to target pitchers who can accumulate strikeouts even if their ERA/WHIP may be a bit higher.
• Extra-base hits are much more important for point leagues. Hitters who can hit doubles and triples provide great value that moves them up in the point rankings.
• Hitters who draw a lot of walks also have more value so look towards OBP rates more than AVG when comparing players.

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Which Stats Are Most Scarce In 5x5 Roto? | Part 1: Hitters

You probably remember learning about supply and demand at some point in your academic life. The idea is that the quantity of a product that's on the market and the demand for that product have an effect on the price of it. You need not know everything about economics but this little concept is helpful to keep in mind for fantasy baseball owners in rotisserie leagues.

This concept comes to life when fantasy baseball owners talk about position scarcity in drafts. Though the top catcher may have less production than a mid-range outfielder, his price tag is fairly high because the market for the catchers is very thin and the demand is there because every team needs to own at least one catcher. Balancing production versus position scarcity is one of the major decisions fantasy owners have to make at their drafts. Despite position scarcity being a fairly known concept in fantasy circles, we don't talk as much about scarcity of the 5x5 roto stats.

In Round 1, you have the entire draft pool at your disposal and can draft for any stat that you want. You want a guy who can grab 40 SB? Sure! How about a 40 HR guy instead? Yup, there's one on that shelf right there! It's great. Everything is in stock and you are free to do as you please.

By Round 2, we already start to see some stats become more scarce. You want a 40 HR guy now? Well, you should have looked for that in Round 1 because there's only 30 HR guys left. But, hey, there's still lots of stolen bases on the shelves!

All of the draft choices in each round end up limiting the amount of production available for each roto stat from that point forward. If you went heavy on stolen bases early, you may find yourself scrambling around to find home runs later. Because, just like with position scarcity, the demand for each of the stats is there as you want to compete in all of the stat categories if you can. But as you go through the draft and players fly off the board, which stats are still available? And what stats are primarily available in the early rounds? Let's see:

The trend in projected value for each stat of players drafted from Rounds 1-25 (of a 12-team league)

What you see above is a lot of colorful squiggly lines which represent the value available for each stat throughout the draft. The first thing to notice is the purple line for SB's. It stays fairly flat throughout the entire draft while the other stats start out very high then dip down and drop out. With SB's, you can find nearly as much value in Round 21 as you can find at the start of the draft. This is significant because it means you shouldn't worry at all about finding stolen bases early on. If you had the choice between Giancarlo Stanton with a .280 AVG, 40 HR and 5 SB versus Justin Upton with a .280 AVG, 25 HR and 20 SB then you shouldn't really put much extra value on those SB's at that point and draft Stanton there. It's a lot easier to make up that 15 SB difference than the 15 HR difference as you go through the draft. Basically, don't worry about getting guys who can contribute in all five categories in the first few rounds. Draft four-category guys then worry about stolen bases later. They'll still be there but the homers and batting average may not be.

The other thing to notice here is that Runs and RBI's start out the highest but end up being nearly impossible to find at the end of the draft as they dip way below the other stats. As a caveat to this fact, I'll note that is is very hard to specifically draft for RBI's and Runs. Those two stats are the result of opportunity. A batter has more direct control over HR, AVG and SB. A player who gets on base more will hopefully score more Runs and a player who hits more HR's will hopefully get more RBI's. To specifically target RBI's or Runs is a fool's errand that will burn you.

That being said, the thing to notice about the HR and AVG line is that they have absolute peaks in value at the beginning of drafts, as expected. That's where you'll find the .300 hitters or 30+ HR guys (or, ideally, ones who can do both). You need to spend your first few rounds focusing on these two categories because it becomes much harder to find positive value in both of them as the draft goes on. By Round 6, the value for both stats dips to lower levels and then evens out for a long stretch. This may be the time to turn your attention to pitching as the hitting stats remain stable from here for quite a while.

In looking at the projected value across the roto stat categories for hitters, here are my main takeaways:

• Don't reward guys who can contribute in SB's at the expense of HR's and AVG in the early rounds
• In the first five rounds (of a 12-team league) at least, focus totally on getting high HR and high AVG players
• Turn your attention towards pitching at some point around the sixth round (paying attention to what value is still around, of course, because if HR/AVG value is still there then grab it now)
• As the draft goes on, start looking at guys who will help you in SB's. You may not win this category outright but you want to compete while you hopefully dominate the other four categories
• Don't focus specifically on RBI's and Runs. If you draft for HR/AVG then these will be byproducts of those categories

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Felix Doubront | 2013 Fantasy Sleeper Candidate

When it comes to identifying the next fantasy baseball breakout players, Mr. Cheatsheet's method helps narrow the field. I use a data-driven method to filter the draft pool to a small number of potential sleepers that are worthy of deeper consideration. When I look for undervalued pitchers, there are a few statistical benchmarks that I identified as being good ways to identify the pitchers who should be among the best in a luck-neutral world. While we know that pitchers like Justin Verlander should be in there, these benchmarks also identify some unheralded pitchers each year which can be found at a much cheaper price tag in your drafts. Based on past years, those unheralded pitchers often stand a good chance of being breakout players. Today, we'll look at one of the players that is on the list for 2013 and we'll see if Felix Doubront (SP, BOS) has what it takes to be a real sleeper.

Why He's Here

Way back in 2005, Doubront joined the Red Sox organization at the ripe age of 17 and started mowing through their rookie leagues almost immediately. Despite having evidence of success at a young age, Doubront was never considered a major prospect for the Sox. He occasionally appeared on organization prospect lists but mainly stayed under the radar.

His minor league career hit a bump when he had a horrible season in 2007 (7.45 ERA, 1.71 WHIP) but he started to turn a corner in 2008 when he ramped up his strikeout rate in Single-A ball. His K/9 went from 5.5 to 9.6 that year and his ERA dropped to 3.69 as a result. From that point on, he rose up the ranks in the minors and maintained a 3.36 ERA as he went through Double-A and Triple-A over the next three years.

He got his first cup of coffee in the big leagues in 2010 and another taste in 2011 but only accumulated 35.1 IP over that span. In 2012, he broke camp with the team and was a starter throughout the season for them. The results of that season look discouraging if you look at the base stats of a 4.86 ERA and a 1.45 WHIP. However, if you dig deeper, you can see signs that he was fairly unlucky as evidenced by a high BABIP and by his 3.84 SIERA and 3.81 xFIP rates. In addition, he was striking out more than a batter per inning on average. The general public is looking at the high ERA and WHIP and choosing to pass on him. This is why he is going undrafted in a majority of leagues and why he is a possible sleeper for 2013.

Why He Might Fail

First off, the amount of walks that he allows is somewhat concerning and that's not going away anytime soon. His 3.97 BB/9 last season is slightly higher than he was posting in the minors previously but not by much (3.59 BB/9 from 2009-11). So, expect him to allow a few free baserunners throughout the season in addition to giving up a fair share of hits. His BABIP was higher than league average last season which is usually a sign that the pitcher should regress back to the mean and allow less hits next year. In Doubront's case, he has shown a history of having a higher BABIP than average throughout his entire career so this seems to be the norm for him and I wouldn't expect a regression. Even if he dips down a bit, he seems destined to post a mark similar to his 1.45 WHIP from last season.

The other concern with Doubront is the fact that he is clearly not a groundball pitcher so is susceptible to the homerun ball. With his below-average WHIP and this possibility of letting up homers, there doesn't seem to be a lot of reason to expect his ERA to drop next season.

Why He Might Come Through

Here's an old fantasy blogger trick. I'm going to post you two stat lines without telling you who they are for then you'll be amazed when I reveal who the two pitchers are.

Pitcher A: 78.4 Contact%, 9.5% SwStr%, 1.68 Strikes/Balls, 10.0 BB%, 23.6 K%, 3.81 xFIP
Pitcher B: 76.9 Contact%, 9.5% SwStr%, 1.49 Strikes/Balls, 10.5 BB%, 22.8 K%, 3.73 xFIP

My goodness, those are fairly similar numbers! They must have had fairly similar results, right? Okay, time to get your jaw ready to drop to the floor. Pitcher A is Mr. Doubront in 2012. Pitcher B is Gio Gonzalez in 2011 (while still in the American League). Of course, you would rather own Gio in your fantasy leagues but it shows that someone with Doubront's pedigree can produce MLB success.

The difference between Gio and Felix is largely in their WHIP and HR's allowed. Last season, Gio had a HR/FB rate of 5.8% and Felix had one that was 15.9%. Both of these rates are likely unsustainable as they are on either side of the extreme spectrum. HR/FB rates have been found to vary greatly from year-to-year and Doubront should likely see a dip here closer to the league average of 9.5%. Last year, he let up 24 HR's but would have only let up 14 with a league average HR/FB rate (for a rate of 0.87 HR/9 which is much closer to his minor league numbers of 0.67 HR/9). Letting up a much fewer amount of HR's will definitely allow for a decrease in ERA that should point him in a direction closer to his SIERA and xFIP numbers.

There is no doubt that his strikeouts will stay as he has shown a long history for being able to do this for years in the minors and majors. While his WHIP likely won't drop too far, his ERA should dip down a bit with the HR's taking a slide. For fantasy purposes, he has the ability to give you above average performance in the major stat categories aside from WHIP where he will likely hurt you a bit.

Conclusion

In shallow drafts, Felix won't even be a consideration and will likely go undrafted. In those cases, he's just a guy to keep a close eye on to see if he starts out hot. For deeper leagues or AL-Only leagues, Doubront has some potential. He profiles as a pitcher who generate a large amount of strikeouts with a decent ERA and Win totals in Boston. The biggest concern for fantasy owners is his WHIP, which should be fairly high. Other pitchers have found a way to be successful with a fairly high WHIP like Yovani Gallardo or Anibal Sanchez. Due to his strikeout ability and control of the strikezone, I see him as being worth a flier for deep leagues. In other leagues, go ahead and just keep him on your radar as a waiver wire add.

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