Archive for the ‘Keepers’ Category

Interesting Catcher Prospects

6 Comments
January 19th, 2010 by Mays
Categories: Keepers, Projections, Sleepers

Last week, I pointed out some unexpected players who had positive fantasy values due to their speed and stolen base potential.

In combing through the Price Guide, there is a second set of relatively surprising players who show up above replacement level: Minor league catchers.

The problem here is twofold: First, the replacement level for catchers is really low, especially in leagues that start two of them. When a guy can hit .260 with 12 HR and be considered above average, you know it doesn’t take much offense to be above replacement.

The second issue is with the defense rigors of catching. There are quite a few guys in the minors who have a major-league quality bat for a catcher, but not a major-league glove. (Likewise, they could handle first base on defense, but their offense wouldn’t be worth it.) So they are stuck in the minors until their defense improves.

There’s no one as interesting as Matt Wieters was last year, but there are several of relatively unknown catchers who are showing up in positive territory:

J.R. House (KC – $5)
This one is a mystery to me. House is 30 years old and has just finished his third year in AAA. His 2007 and 2008 minor league stats look good, so I’m guessing that’s part of what is driving CHONE and CAIRO to both place this guy above replacement level (basically on par with Chris Iannetta).

Luckily, this projection is an enigma that shouldn’t cause much concern. House is buried on the Kansas City depth chart behind the newly-arrived Jason Kendall and returning favorite Brayan Pena.

Carlos Santana (CLE – $4)
Buster Posey (SF – $1)
Carlos Santana and Buster Posey have some similarities and are worth looking at together. Both are top prospects, and neither is really blocked by anyone on the major league roster. Cleveland traded off Victor Martinez (BOS) and Kelly Shoppach (TB) to free up a spot for Santana, and San Francisco let their incumbent, Bengie Molina, leave for free agency.

Now, it is possible that one or both of these teams will attempt to acquire a 1-year stopgap to give their prospects more time to develop (and to prevent them from accruing service time). That was the case last year with a somewhat better catching prospect in Baltimore, as the Orioles grabbed Gregg Zaun with the intent of easing in Matt Wieters. Even with the possibility of their teams bringing in a veteran, I’m still counting on an ETA for both of these guys sometime in 2010.

The projections are split on who they like better for 2010. CHONE ranks Posey a bit above replacement and Santana just below it. CAIRO places Santana about $12 higher than Posey, with one on either side of the replacement level. Posey has the better prospect pedigree of the two and probably the one I would favor as well.

I’d say that Wieters’s 2009 is about the best you can expect from Santana or Posey in 2010: Two-thirds of a year with about 10 HR and a not-deadly average. That’s a lower end starter in a two catcher league or a decent bench player for leagues starting one catcher.

Jesus Montero (NYY – $1)
Montero is the Yankees’ clear number one prospect, recently drawing a comparison from John Sickels to perrenial fantasy first-rounder Mike Piazza. Unfortunately, Montero is unlikely to see any time in 2010 with Jorge Posada entrenched as the starter and a couple of solid backups (Jose Molina and Francisco Cervelli) already in place. It’s possible that he could enter the picture in 2011 (the last year of Posada’s current contract) and potentially handle the lion’s share of starts in 2012.

All of that assumes he sticks at catcher, which isn’t a guarantee at this point. For 2010, despite already having 20 HR power, his only value is as a keeper.

Jonathan Lucroy (MIL – $2)
Angel Salome (MIL – $1)
We’ll tackle these two Milwaukee catchers together. Jason Kendall has moved on to Kansas City (see J.R. House above), which means Milwaukee should be trying out a new catcher in 2010. Interestingly, CHONE seems to prefer Salome to Lucroy, and CAIRO like Lucroy more than Salome.

The bottom line: Posey and Santana look like the main targets, guys clearly worth bidding on this year. Lucroy or Salome could be a $1 flyer in two-catcher leagues, depending on how the Brewers handle things. Montero is a 2011/2012 keeper only, and House is probably not worth targeting.

A couple of other names of interest that the projections like:

John Hester (ARI)
Tyler Flowers (CWS)
Michael McKenry (COL)

Keeping Better Players

11 Comments
January 21st, 2009 by Mays
Categories: Keepers, Strategy

Should you favor keeping better players, even if they represent a smaller savings? This issue came up in the comments on “How Do You Decide On Keepers?” and I want to spend some time addressing it.

Let’s stick with the Justin Morneau example from last time–a $20 player who can be kept at $14. And let’s pretend that we also have David Wright available at $42–the exact amount that what we have him projected at. We can either keep Morneau and save $6 or lock up Wright for no savings.

Which one of those would you keep?

Wright is definitely the better player, and our team is better with Wright than with Morneau. But this isn’t actually an either/or situation, because our final team isn’t based just on who we keep. Keeping Morneau doesn’t prevent us from drafting Wright, and keeping Wright doesn’t preclude drafting Morneau.

So we are concerned not just with how much our keepers are worth, but also with the value of players we can acquire at the draft if we kept certain players.

If we keep Morneau and draft Wright for $42, we have saved $6 overall. If we keep Wright at $42 and draft Morneau for $20, we haven’t saved anything. Keeping Morneau seems to be the better deal.

Inflation
That ignores inflation, though. Keeping players always creates inflation, and inflation has a greater effect on the top-tier players (see “Should Inflation Affect Your Keeper Choices?“). Thinking back to high school algebra, we can solve a simple equation to find the point where inflation makes keeping Wright or keeping Morneau equal propositions (i.e. the cross-over point):

$42x + $14 = $20x + $42
$22x = $28
x = 1.27

So if inflation is 27%:

We can keep Morneau at $14 and draft Wright for $53 ($42 * 1.27), paying $67 for $62 of value.

Or we can keep Wright at $42 and pay $25 for Morneau ($20 * 1.27), also paying $67 for the same $62 value.

If inflation is any amount above 27%, Wright is the better deal, even if he isn’t kept below value. But any amount below 27% favors Morneau.

The Bottom Line
I doubt most leagues have 27% inflation, except for ones that lets teams keep players for extremely long time periods at their original prices. (I’m picturing a league where Hanley Ramirez and Johan Santana are $1 keepers…) If that’s the case, then it’s unlikely that you are thinking about keeping Wright at $42.

I’m guessing that inflation in the typical keeper league is closer to 10-15%. At that rate, I think Morneau is still the easy choice.

How Do You Decide on Keepers?

5 Comments
January 19th, 2009 by Mays
Categories: Keepers, Strategy

Let’s suppose that you have Adrian Beltre available to be kept at $5 and Justin Morneau at $14. Using CHONE’s projections in the Price Guide, those players would be worth $10 and $20 respectively in 2009. (For the moment, we’re assuming that both players have an equal probability of meeting their projections.) If you can only keep one, which player do you keep?

Deciding on keepers involves comparing two things: how much a player costs to keep and how much we expect that player to be worth. The player’s keeper cost will be determined by our league’s rules. The player’s expected value will come from our projections.

So for our two players, which one is the better deal?

From one perspective, keeping Morneau saves you $6 of value ($20 – $14) and keeping Beltre nets an extra $5 ($10 – $5). That would favor Morneau.

On the other hand, Beltre’s price represents a 50% savings ($5 / $10), while Morneau only saves you 30% ($6 / $20). Advantage Beltre.

Keep in mind that the goal of the draft is to walk out having accumulated the most value with the $260 you have to work with. Every time you draft a player below what they are worth, you are allowing yourself to get more than $260 worth of talent.

Since the goal is to draft as much value as possible, I think I would go with Morneau here. If you keep him, and then get no bargains at the draft (i.e. your remaining $246 gets your exactly $246 worth of players) you will end up with $266 of value. Beltre in the same situation will give you a slightly lower total of $265.

Given the prices and projections, whom would you choose?

Should Inflation Affect Your Keeper Choices?

No Comments
January 5th, 2009 by Mays
Categories: Keepers, Strategy

Yesterday, Advanced Fantasy Baseball posted Ten Questions to Consider in Keeper Leagues. While a lot of the questions are common sense for keepers, this one intrigued me:

9. How much is the inflation in your league? Calculating a rough estimate of the inflation in your league before keepers are declared can give you edge on the rest of the league. It will help you figure out what the players in the pool will cost while you still have the ability to alter your keeper list.

What affect does inflation have on your keeper list?

Let’s suppose we are trying to decide if we should keep Adrian Beltre at $5 or Justin Morneau at $15. Using CHONE’s projections in the Price Guide, in 2009 those players might be worth about $10 and $20, respectively. We save five bucks regardless of whom we keep.

But what if we’re expecting 20% inflation based on the other teams’ keepers? If we throw back Beltre we can expect him to go for $12 at the auction. Morneau, however, would probably end up at $24. Now Beltre’s keeper price is $7 below the auction price, and Morneau is a slightly better deal at $9 below.

So while I don’t think inflation considerations should play a large part in keeper decisions, it does seem it could made a difference. If you are expecting significant keeper inflation in your league, it might make sense to favor keeping more expensive players.