Archive for January, 2012

2012 Playing Time

14 Comments
January 27th, 2012 by
Categories: Site News

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.

Reviewing My Awesome 2011 Predictions

9 Comments
January 23rd, 2012 by
Categories: Busts, Sleepers

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.

Three First Round Surprises from Early Projections

1 Comment
January 16th, 2012 by
Categories: Projections

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.

First Round Flux

4 Comments
January 12th, 2012 by
Categories: Fantasy Basics

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.