SubscribeLast Player Picked is a site exploring various aspects of fantasy baseball analysis, especially relating to drafting and player valuation strategies.
Much of what is discussed here will involve the Price Guide, an online tool I developed to build dollar values or player rankings customized for any league configuration.
I realized after the first year of the Price Guide that pure computer projections were not always that useful for fantasy.
For example, look at CAIRO this year and you’ll notice Reds prospect Billy Hamilton at $25, although he probably won’t see the majors this year. Stephen Strasburg is projected to pitch 55 innings, good for $7.
Clearly, something needs to be done to lower the value of minor leaguers like Hamilton that won’t sniff the majors. Something else needs to be done to bump up the value of guys like Strasburg who are coming off of an injury. That’s why the past couple of years I’ve added the option to the Price Guide to apply playing time adjustments to give a more realistic picture of 2012 values.
I’ve made a first pass at playing time projections for 2012. Lots of guys like Hamilton are projected for either 0 AB or 0 IP, removing them from the rankings. Strasburg now shows up with 149 IP, lifting him to a $23 player by CAIRO. (That seems high, but I think that’s due to optimistic rate projections rather than optimistic playing time.)
I’ve noticed that the playing time adjustment causes more money to shift toward pitching, probably more than is realistic. It also has sent catcher values into the stratosphere, which is also not going to reflect real drafts. Those are both usual tendencies for the Price Guide, but I’d like to damper them if I can.
I’ll keep tweaking the numbers as the spring progresses. There are a few low-impact guys that still need projections (e.g. Jose Lopez, Alejandro de Aza). If you notice any questionable omissions, please let me know.
Last spring, I made two posts identifying my picks for guys who were underrated or overrated at their ADP from MockDraftCentral. To hold myself accountable, I decided to look back at how I did.
Here are what I consider to be my top picks for 2011:
Mike Napoli is a round 10 bargain; Ian Stewart is a risk.
I noticed that these two players with ADPs in Round 10 had similar concerns — low batting averages and a risk of losing playing time. I thought that the lower offensive standards of catching made those things less of a problem for Napoli.
Really, all I was getting at was that even a best-case scenario for Stewart (good power and a bad average) would still only be worth a late round pick. It just turned out that both players far exceeded my expectations. Napoli did much better than projected, Stewart much worse.
Casey McGehee is a bad choice in Round 9.
McGehee managed to knock in 100 runs in 2010, but I commented that it looked flukey. There was some debate on this one in the comments at the time, and I argued that guys who hit 20 HR a year can’t consistently get that many RBIs.
McGehee, in fact, struggled in 2011 and finished up below replacement level. With 67 RBI.
Ryan Braun is a great choice at #9 overall.
It’s hard to pick an underrated guy for the first round. I thought Braun looked like he was a being a little undervalued with an ADP at #9. He ended up with an NL MVP and, absent a 50-game suspension, would be an easy #1 or #2 pick for 2012.
Ichiro is “perennially overrated in fantasy.”
There are always cheap sources of steals, so even a favorable projection for Ichiro wouldn’t merit the 3rd round pick drafters were using for him. His batting average continued to fade in 2011, slipping below .300 for the first time in his career.
Take Daniel Hudson over Brandon Morrow in Round 11.
Both guys were being drafted at about the same spot (pick #126 vs. pick #130). However, I had Hudson valued at $12 and Morrow at $2. Their actual 2011 values were $11 and $0.
A few other good sleepers I nailed:
Mike Stanton (ADP #140, finished #61)
Drew Stubbs (ADP #157, finished #89)
Hiroki Kuroda (ADP #175, finished #109)
So that’s pretty conclusive evidence of some amazing prognosticating ability, right?
Actually, that just tells you that if you make enough picks, it’s easy to pick out a few to brag on.
I noted earlier about an unusual degree of flux at the top of the first round that perhaps ends the three-peat of Albert Pujols and Hanley Ramirez being the consensus top two picks. And so I was very interested to see how the first projections of this year, CAIRO, would rank the first round.
Here are three things that surprised me about CAIRO’s first round rankings:
Albert Pujols is still a top choice.
Pujols had a down year in 2011, failing to record 100 RBI or notch a .300 batting average for the first time in forever. With the possibility of a little age-related decline, I expected that he would be dragged down at least into the middle of the first round.
Not so, says CAIRO. Pujols’s down year really wasn’t that bad. In fact, he was only one RBI short of 100, and just a few decimals away from a .300 average (actually finishing with a .299). Combine that with an usual lack of top candidates, and Pujols still has an argument for being the top fantasy draft choice.
Matt Kemp could be for real.
My strong suspicion is that 2011 will be the best we see of Matt Kemp. He’s been a 2nd or 3rd rounder for a while before putting up a monster year across all five categories in 2011. I figured the .324 average was a fluke even if the speed and power were real. Like the Dodgers in real life, I figured fantasy drafters would put way too much stock in an out-of-character 2011 and overpay bad in 2012. This is just like the Carlos Gonzalez story of last year.
The surprise? CAIRO projects a .280 average for Kemp, and he’s still a top-ranked player. He’s basically only behind Pujols and Miguel Cabrera (and Ryan Braun) in the early projections. Even if last year was a fluke, Kemp still has the best shot at being a 30-30 player, and that kind of player is still a top pick in fantasy. I am still concerned that he ends up a lot like CarGo did last year, but I’m a little more optimistic, now.
Say goodbye to premium positions.
A key to determining player value is that you don’t look at a player’s total stats, but you look at their stats relative to other players at their position. This has meant that there are often players in the first round whose stats don’t compare favorably to slugging firstbasemen, but they make up for it by playing a premium position like SS or C. This is the basic argument for ranking Hanley Ramirez, Joe Mauer, and Troy Tulowitzki in the first round in years past.
This is looking like the year of the 1B. Pujols is still a top choice, as is Miguel Cabrera. But the early projections have Adrian Gonzalez, Joey Votto, Prince Fielder, Mark Teixeira, and Ryan Howard all among the top 12 hitters.
Typically, the wealth of quality players at firstbase drags some of these names down into the second round. But other positions aren’t showing many players who can distance themselves from the competition. Cano is a quality 2B and Tulo looks like a solid SS, but CAIRO doesn’t see many players who can vault themselves into the first round with a premium position.
It’s still too early to put too much weight into projections; things will shift around quite a bit as playing-time estimates are added and more projections are added. But it’s looking like 2012 will be an interesting year for fantasy drafts.
Round 1 of your fantasy draft is supposed to be filled with the perennial greats. With your first pick, you are not only targeting players with great stats, but players who have a track record of being great. You are paying for both greatness and consistency.
I have run dollar values on Last Player Picked since the spring of 2009. Each of the last three years, the players that have had the highest projected dollar value are Albert Pujols and Hanley Ramirez. In that order. For the last three years. That’s the definition of consistently great.
However, that pair’s run at the top of the first round may end in 2012. Hanley just finished up 2011 with a painful $3 end-of-year value. Pujols also disappointed from his high standards, finishing as the 10th best hitter in 2011. The top of the draft will look different in 2012.
So who takes their place as the #1 player going into 2012? My next choice would be Ryan Braun. He’s ranked as the #5, #4, and #4 hitter in my projections for the last three years. That’s consistency, and that’s greatness — the recipe for a top draft choice. The fatal flaw is the 50-game suspension that’s still hanging over his head. The first round is not a time for risk-taking, and right now Braun is a huge risk.
The elimination of those names really only leaves one player untarnished at the top. The Price Guide projections have ranked him #6, #7, and #3 over the past three years. That player is, of course, Miguel Cabrera. Your new #1 ranked fantasy player.
With the start of Tango’s Community Forecast, I’m switching over to that as my source of playing time data. FanGraphs’ fan projections suffered from the weight of projections early in the spring, before injuries and situations were better known. They were also rough around the edges for fringe starters who can be important in AL/NL-only leagues.
This is illustrated in some of the biggest drops after the change:
Chase Utley
Kendrys Morales
Johan Santana
Kevin Slowey
Marc Rzepczynski
Picking up time, mostly due to recent Spring Training news, include:
Brad Emaus
Dustin Ackley
Mark Trumbo
Mike Morse
Will Rhymes
Rick Ankiel
Brent Morel
Brandon Beachy
I’ll update everything in a couple of days as the votes even out.
A small update: I’ve included a playing time projection for Michael Pineda, as it looks increasingly likely he starts the season in the Mariners’ rotation.
Given 140 IP, he actually projects above replacement level in a standard mixed league ($3). He’s in a mix of high-upside pitchers valued in the low single digits (Jordan Zimmermann, Brian Matusz, Johnny Cueto). I think a 4.00 ERA and 1.30 WHIP are actually pretty realistic for 2011, especially since he gets a little help pitching in Safeco.
Lately, I’ve been imagining a tool that would offer in-draft advising about which fantasy player to draft. I’m curious if anyone else thinks this sort of tool would be useful and if anyone knows of an existing fantasy tool that does this.
Essentially, I’m interested in two things during the fantasy draft:
Tell me how much each available player helps my team. I imagine this in terms of Standings Gain Points (SGP) — how many points in the standings would I gain if I added this player to my team? If it knows which players each team has already drafted, these would be SGPs customized for my particular team and situation. And so it presents a list of players ranked by their SGP benefit to my team.
At first, the players with high dollar values will also be the ones with the biggest SGP benefit. However, I could see things shifting as the draft progresses. Maybe I’m weak in stolen bases, so that drafting Juan Pierre could move me up 5 SGP. Pierre might not be the highest valued player on the board in terms of dollar value, but he could be the player with the biggest benefit to my team in this particular situation.
Pierre’s dollar value — calculated for an average team in an average league — could still be static. But I might be willing to go a few dollars over his book value if this tool tells me I really need SB. Or I let a similarly valued player like Carlos Lee slide (even at a low price) so that I can save an OF spot for Pierre. Or I see that Pierre, Brett Gardner, and Rajai Davis would all provide a good SGP boost to my team, so I don’t need to spend any extra as long as I get one of them.
Potentially, all of these data could be factored in to actually adjust Pierre’s dollar value. My initial, simplified idea would just present an assessment of the pros and cons and let the drafter decide how to use that information.
Tell me how much each available player helps each other team. Secondarily, I’m also concerned about keeping players from my rivals. What hurts my opponents may help me, even if there is no direct SGP benefit for my team. I might draft a player who gives me no SGP if that ensures he stays off the team of my closest opponent (where perhaps he would give 5-6 SGP and let that team pass me in the standings).
And so I imagine the tool listing out — alongside the SGPs each player contributes to my team — the SGPs that each player would give every other team.
Those two things seem like they would be pretty simple to implement. And so I’m curious:
Would this tool actually help in a fantasy draft or auction?
Does anyone know if there’s already a fantasy product out there that does this?
What other information might this type of tool factor in to its recommendations?
You may have noticed an addition to the Price Guide‘s projection options over the weekend — the 2011 Steamer projections.
Steamer is the work of J. Cross and a team of high school students. But before you disregard this as a simple high school project — Steamer’s pitching projections were the best performing in 2010. Better than CHONE, ZiPS, CAIRO, and Marcel. This makes me sad after seeing their projection for Daniel Hudson (4.45 ERA, 1.42 WHIP), who I’ve been hyping all spring based on his otherwise favorable projections. Needless to say, though, these are quality projections comparable to or better than the others available here.
The only reason Steamer hasn’t got much publicity here is because they have typically been released after much of the fantasy drafting season. It’s fortunate for us that they’ve managed to push them out much earlier in 2011.
Note that these are currently not part of the composite projections. I’ll work them in if I get the chance.
As you may know, it is possible to display Price Guide dollar values inside your league homepage using a Firefox add-on called Greasemonkey. A Greasemonkey script with values customized for your league is available at the top of each Price Guide results page.
I’ve talked about this feature in the past, and a reader suggested I add it as a category to the blog. I thought that was a great idea, so now you can click Greasemonkey Scripts to the left to see past posts about this, including screenshots of the scripts in action. I encourage you to check out those posts if you haven’t tried out this feature before and want to find out more.
The same reader asked how to have two (or more) scripts to handle multiple leagues with differing configurations — for example having different scripts for two different Yahoo leagues. I actually don’t think I’ve made a post about that, although I may have explained it in emails and comments. In Firefox, just go to Tools – Greasemonkey – Manage User Scripts and click Edit for the script you want to change.
In whatever text editor (e.g. Notepad) that pops up, you should see a line near the top like this:
@include http://baseball.fantasysports.yahoo.com/*
Change that line to include your league ID:
@include http://baseball.fantasysports.yahoo.com/b1/000000/*
…where 000000 is your numeric league id. (It should be the same as the URL to your league homepage.) Make sure you keep the “*” at the end. Save the file and close, and the script should only apply to that particular league. Repeat those steps for the scripts for your other Yahoo leagues as well.
The process is similar for CBSSports and ESPN. On CBSSports the include line will be something like:
@include *leaguename.baseball.cbssports.com/*
…where leaguename is the name of your league. (Once again, it should match the URL of your league homepage.)
ESPN will be this:
@include http://games.espn.go.com/flb/*leagueId=00000*
I’ll be happy to explain more in the comments if anyone has questions about this.
Yesterday, I started going through who I like and don’t like at their current ADPs, looking at Rounds 1-10. Most of these are come just from comparing composite projections here on the Price Guide to MockDraftCentral’s ADP, but there are a few where I’m disagreeing with both.
Round 11:
Brandon Morrow (126) – I like the K’s, but he hasn’t shown he can get his ERA under 4.00, yet.
Daniel Hudson (130) – I’ve already talked about why I think he’s a bargain. Obviously, he can’t maintain a sub-2.00 ERA, but he’s a steal at his current position if he can even put up a 3.70 ERA.
Round 12:
Ricky Romero (136) – He’s Brandon Morrow without the K’s. There are plenty of better pitchers still available.
Mike Stanton (140) – Great power upside should at least put him in the top 100.
Round 13:
Alex Gonzalez (148) – I like the old Braves SS (Yunel Escobar) better, and he comes about 170 picks later.
Jorge Posada (149) – He’s not dead yet. I think he’ll get plenty of ABs at DH.
Round 14:
Chris Perez (158) – Looked good in half a season, but I’m not sold, yet.
Drew Stubbs (157) – Power/speed combo that is mysteriously undervalued. What’s the difference between him and Ian Stewart four rounds earlier? The only one I see is that Stubbs can also steal 30 bases.
Round 15:
James Shields (172) – Like most people, I expect him to bounce back from last year’s 5.18 ERA/1.39 WHIP campaign. However, his ERA wasn’t great in 2009 either (4.14), so I’m concerned about him getting back in the 3.00′s.
Hiroki Kuroda (175) – The K’s aren’t overly impressive, but they aren’t terrible either. The Price Guide sees him as basically equal to Yovani Gallardo (trade some K’s for WHIP), but Gallardo is being drafted 100 picks earlier.
Round 16:
No complaints.
Round 17:
Marco Scutaro (193) – I’m thinking Lowrie gets at least 400 AB this year, and Scutaro is going to be the playing time victim. If he has the same stats as in the past but loses 200 AB, Scutaro drops off the mixed league radar.
Ted Lilly (195) – I’ve got him projected to basically be Chad Billingsley with a better WHIP (3.60 ERA, 1.25 WHIP). Billingsley is going 84th overall.
Round 18:
Jon Niese (209) – Is there reason to expect him to improve on last year’s 4.20 ERA?
Matt Thornton (206) – Dominance against lefties and righties makes him the obvious choice for the closer’s job. I think he ends the year as a top-tier closer.
Round 19:
Derek Holland (226) – Good K/9 points to upside, but I think the risk is greater.
Jose Tabata (224) – I think there’s a bit of Pirate-ignorance among baseball fans. Tabata looks very similar to me to Shane Victorino (ADP 145) — .280 with 10 HR and 30 SB. I also like Neil Walker (277).
Round 20:
Fernando Rodney (230) – A scary closer.
Rajai Davis (236) – Can steal 50 bags and score plenty of runs at the top of the Toronto lineup.
Round 21:
Matt Capps (250) – If I’m grabbing a closer in waiting, I’d much rather have Joaquin Benoit (ND), Daniel Bard (304), or Luke Gregerson (386). Not only do I think they have a better shot of saves this year, I think they are just better pitchers than Capps.
Angel Pagan (242) – Breakout 2010 gives Pagan playing time for 2011. He looks like a well-rounded late-rounder.
A few other names with large gaps between ADP and the composite projections:
Joe Nathan (217)
Chris Iannetta (268)
Neil Walker (277)
Tsuyoshi Nishioka (281)
J.P. Arencibia (310)
Yunel Escobar (321)
Chris Coghlan (331)
Dallas Braden (364)