This article is part of our The Z Files series.
Apologies for skipping last week's column, I was in Phoenix for Baseball HQ's annual fall First Pitch Forum, a weekend filled with fantasy baseball panels, drafts, and Arizona Fall League games plus extra-curricular activities with 150 other attendees and speakers.
I'll admit I'm the last person you want to ask about specific players in the AFL, or even who I though stood out? Not only do I have a terrible memory for that sort of thing, it requires watching the game and not talking to someone or nodding off at the time. I'm not blessed with many skills, but being able to sleep in an upright position is one. While it helps me catch up on sleep while flying, it can be a hindrance other times. Let's just say there's a reason I don't make any references to movies I recently saw.
For a more comprehensive review of some noteworthy players, check out colleague Derek Van Riper's blog post. I'm sure there will be more player talk on site podcasts. I'll share a few observations from the eight games I took in, though.
Ronald Acuna, OF, Atlanta Braves: Leading our Top 400 Fantasy Baseball Prospects rankings, Acuna is thought to do everything very well. That is, he may not shine in a one or two-game sample, you need to watch him for a longer stretch to appreciate his talent. I saw him five times, so I did get a feel for that. You'll read some reports
Apologies for skipping last week's column, I was in Phoenix for Baseball HQ's annual fall First Pitch Forum, a weekend filled with fantasy baseball panels, drafts, and Arizona Fall League games plus extra-curricular activities with 150 other attendees and speakers.
I'll admit I'm the last person you want to ask about specific players in the AFL, or even who I though stood out? Not only do I have a terrible memory for that sort of thing, it requires watching the game and not talking to someone or nodding off at the time. I'm not blessed with many skills, but being able to sleep in an upright position is one. While it helps me catch up on sleep while flying, it can be a hindrance other times. Let's just say there's a reason I don't make any references to movies I recently saw.
For a more comprehensive review of some noteworthy players, check out colleague Derek Van Riper's blog post. I'm sure there will be more player talk on site podcasts. I'll share a few observations from the eight games I took in, though.
Ronald Acuna, OF, Atlanta Braves: Leading our Top 400 Fantasy Baseball Prospects rankings, Acuna is thought to do everything very well. That is, he may not shine in a one or two-game sample, you need to watch him for a longer stretch to appreciate his talent. I saw him five times, so I did get a feel for that. You'll read some reports where he looked tired, bored or even cavalier. This may be true, but the same was said of a guy named Buster Posey.
Victor Robles, OF, Washington Nationals: I'm not a scout nor did I stay at a Holiday Inn Express on the trip, but my speed grade on Robles is wicked fast.
Monte Harrison, OF, Milwaukee Brewers: In my first ever trip to the AFL in 2000, at the first game I saw, Albert Pujols hit a shot over the trees beyond the left field fence in Scottsdale Stadium. Given I'm not good at remembering these sorts of things, I'll reckon it was the longest homer I saw in the AFL, until I witnessed this destroying of a baseball by Harrison:
Monte Harrison (#Brewers) with a tape-measure #AFL homer to left field at Salt River Fields. Here's the swing: pic.twitter.com/pPkn3Lq9IZ
— Mike Rosenbaum (@GoldenSombrero) November 8, 2017
Sean Murphy, C, Oakland Athletics: I know we don't talk about it much for fantasy purposes, but when awake, I like to watch players on defense as much as at the plate, since prowess with the leather can often pave the way to a major-league spot. Apparently, this is nothing new for Murphy, but this play caught my eye (video courtesy of Jason Pennini of The Baseball Bell Curve).
A recurring theme throughout the conference was the trend of increasing power hand-in-hand with fewer steals and more strikeouts. This is a topic I've discussed previously, but since it was front and center with 150 fantasy baseball nutcases over the weekend, it merits further attention.
In formal panels, live podcasts and private discussions, how to adjust one's draft strategy to the recent trends was a hot button topic. Humbly, I'd like to think my dearth of prospect knowledge is balanced by forward thinking with respect to game theory. That said, my best advice for 2018 drafts and auctions is to do nothing differently, aside from a couple of minor considerations to be discussed in a bit. Everyone is working with the same inventory, thus everyone is faced with the same challenges.
Perhaps the most asked question was regarding category targets and where to set them. For those unfamiliar, a popular ploy is setting category targets at a level typically reached by the league winner, and making sure you surpass each during your draft or auction. I vehemently oppose this tactic, but that's a story for another day. Putting aside my bias against the idea, if I were setting targets, I'd probably use a weighted average of 25 percent of 2016 and 75 percent of 2017. This assumes the power/speed trend has leveled off while accounting for the chance whatever is causing the increased power wanes a bit.
This is something I had already thought about when doing my initial player projections. The standard baseline for projections is a weighted average of three to five years worth of data, with most recent performance carrying the greatest influence. There's two reasons for the heavier weighting. The first should be obvious; most recent performance best reflects a player's current skill level. The other helps account for a changing landscape. That is, the current landscape best reflects what will happen the ensuing season.
The difference for 2018 is, power has been clearly on the rise beyond expected variance. So the question is, what will happen next season? Of course, to answer that, it's necessary to know the cause of the present trend. Saving that debate for a different time and place, my more than ample gut suspects there will be a small pull-back on the power surge, thus I made a slight adjustment to my projections. Since many leagues don't have three years of data to pull for category targets, the 75/25 weighting of the past two years does the trick.
Earlier, I alluded to a few considerations to handle the changing power/speed/strikeout environment. To best address those, I'll first answer another oft-asked question from the conference. Since I'm the resident "value guy", several people wanted to know how player values will change in the current landscape. There are a few different methodologies, but I favor the system allocating categorical dollars proportionally to categorical contributions. As such, on a per-stat basis, steals are trending up with homers dropping a tad. Therefore, speed specialists like Dee Gordon and Billy Hamilton are seeing higher prices.
On the pitching side, as a group, starting pitchers are throwing fewer innings. Other than reducing the chance of a win, the main repercussion is that their ratios influence fewer innings. For some, this is a good thing. For those with helpful ratios, their contribution in ratios doesn't change much, since the number of innings a fantasy team accrues is dropping, so the percentage contribution is the same. However, for the handful of starters still going deep into games, their positive ratios carry an even greater effect.
Tying this back to game theory and draft strategy, just because Gordon and Hamilton are "worth more", that's not an invitation to draft them. How you handle steals is still more of a strategy than a value thing. I'm not saying not to draft either. However, it is more important than ever to formulate a plan that allows for a stolen-base specialist to occupy a spot on your roster. This isn't ground-breaking analysis, but Gordon and Hamilton account for an even greater percentage of what you need in steals. Especially if they come at a discount because the room doesn't want to sacrifice power for speed, it's perfectly viable to grab one then focus on pure power hitters, adding more bags here and there. Aiding this is that many of your competitors will be targeting hitters that are primarily power hitters, but chip in with some stolen bases, leaving the pure sluggers for you. The take-home lesson is don't follow a rankings list or dollar values list blindly, as depending on the system, stolen bases will be even more "overvalued" than in the past.
Similarly, the gap between the likes of Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, Corey Kluber and Chris Sale and the pack will be even greater than before. Again, this doesn't mean you have to pay up or expend a first-round draft pick on an elite arm. In some instances, it's worth it, just don't do it because it's dictated by their value in a vacuum. Go into your draft or auction with a plan if you're starting your staff with an ace. Such plans will be the topic of future Z Files.
Another popular topic was whether middle relievers should become a greater part of the game, and if so, how should rules be changed to make it happen? I'll start with the former. Yes, middle relievers, especially those with a high strikeout rate, should be more liberally deployed in lieu of streaming starters. However, with respect to the latter, no rules need be changed, their inclusion is organic. There's no need to add holds, or something along those lines.
Putting my valuation hat back on, according to my initial 2018 projections, seven middle relievers naturally appear in the draft-worthy set for 12-team mixed leagues. That jumps to 17 in 15-team mixed, ballooning to 40 in a 12-team American or National League only format. As expected, the deeper the league, the greater the impact. By the numbers, a typical 15-team mixed staff should be six starters, two closers and a middle reliever, while those playing in a single-league format should deploy a maximum of five starting pitchers.
Obviously, league rules feed into the context, but the bottom line is you don't need to force middle relievers through rule changes for them to be draft worthy. That said, the one change to consider is lowering the innings pitched minimum, as the average start has dipped from 5.7 innings to 5.5. By means of example, lowering the limit from 1200 to between 1150 and 1170 properly accounts for the new average length of starts.
Before calling it a day, I'll offer this piece of advice for those with dirty clothes in need of a haircut: find a laundromat and barber shop without train tracks on the road in between. On the final day I spent in Arizona, with a 6:20 AM plane to catch the next morning, I decided to kill the time between AFL games. My map app found a laundromat within a mile of a barber shop. The plan was going swimmingly until I headed back to pick up my clothes with a new buzzcut, to discover a train jumped the tracks about a quarter of a mile before the laundromat. The officer estimated the road would be closed at least three hours. So, I turned around and headed to the game. Concerned there would still be a traffic jam, I left a little early in case I had to find a way around the tracks. Luckily, the road was clear and getting to the laundromat was seamless. Actually, I have one more piece of advice. When you're using dryers with a top and bottom row, make sure you know which one you're putting money into. At my usual place, the top one is controlled by the panel on the left. Guess who assumed that was the case 3000 miles away and didn't bother to make sure the dryer was spinning?
Good times.
