Seeing as how we often focus on picks by team, I thought I would look at picks by different price windows, just to mix things up. I'll chose a hitter and a pitcher where I can.
Studs: $30+
Hitter: I really like Adrian Beltre at $31. Donaldson, the top 3B, went for $39, and while Beltre might not match Donaldson in HR, Beltre is well ahead of Donaldson in batting average. If the Rangers offense bounces back the way it is expected to, I could see Beltre matching or beating Donaldson in 4 out of 5 categories for 3/4ths of the price.
Pitcher
There's only one pitcher that qualifies, and Chris Sale at $35 is quite a bit for a pitcher who has never made more than 30 starts and only once thrown more than 200 innings. When Chris Sale is pitching, he is outstanding, so if Bill can piece together a few OK starts from the wire, he'll be fine (and it's probably easier to find decent pitching early in the season when breakout pitchers are still unidentified and offense is down on the whole).
Dishonorable mention: Jacoby Ellsbury at $34 is a hell of a lot to pay for a guy who tends to miss time and whose value is based mainly in stolen bases.
Keeper: I feel the need to mention Jose Reyes. At $30, he seems way over priced. Taylor must be counting on a thumping Blue Jays lineup to push Reyes to 100+ runs. He's a fairly substantial drag at RBI, which is not what you want in a $30 keeper.
All Stars: $20-$29
Hitter: I'll cop out here and name a few. I like a lot of the hitters in this tier. Ortiz at $24, Longoria at $23, Kyle Seager at $24, and Pablo Sandoval at $20 are all solid deals. There's nothing spectacular about any of these picks, but they are all solid values for
Pitcher: Jeff Samardzija at $20 is a nice pickup. Even if he regresses some on his walk and home run rates, $20 is about right, and it's a rare pitcher pick in this price range with upside.
Dishonorable mention: I'll rule out Alex Cobb, since it hardly seems fair to give Bill a hard time about a player that got hurt after he was drafted. Instead, I'll turn and focus on myself. This tier had a few overpriced guys (Hanley was a bit rich, Fielder and Pujols are counting on health), but Cespedes at $28 is quite an overpay. I'm counting on him to bounce back to his power levels of two years ago while keeping the batting average and counting stats of last year. I may get some of those, but I really need all of them to happen to make Cespedes worth $28.
Plus Starters: $15-$19:
Hitters: Again, there's a lot to like in this tier. As Bill mentioned, Kinsler at $19 is a great pick considering where other 2B went (Altuve was kept at $16, Cano at $30, Kipnis and Pedroia drafted at $18 and $19). another guy I like here is McCann. He's a reliable power source at catcher, and given how much Gattis went for, he's a solid deal.
Pitchers: This seemed to be the tier for a lot of closers. Roberston ($18), Street ($15), Perkins ($16), and Britton ($14, just outside my completely arbitrary cutoff) are all about right in terms of cost. My favorite pitcher here is Matt Shoemaker at $18. He's going to finish in the top 5 for Cy Young, and will be an outstanding keeper for next season.
Kidding. I do like two of starters at the bottom of the tier- Gray and Sanchez are strong bounceback candidates, and could turn a small profit. All in all, there's nothing too flashy, pitching wise, but a lot of reasonable deals.
Dishonorable mention: It has to be Shoemaker. I painting myself into a corner here by missing out on ALL of the closers listed above, and needed to spend the money somewhere. My draft board was insanely high on Shoemaker ($16.10), but I ended up in a bidding war with Bill hwen my money would have been better spent on guys like Cecil and Boxberger, particularly Boxberger as a hedge for McGee.
Starters: $10-$14:
Hitters: Bogaerts at $12 makes for an excellent upside pick at shortstop. Odor at $12 is another solid infield pick. My favorite here might be Oswaldo Arcia at $11. Huge power upside there.
Pitchers: Salazar at $12 is risky, but has a lot of upside. I also like Pineda at $13 and McHugh at $13 as pitchers that could be outstanding at a reasonable price. Britton at $14 is my pick, though. His stuff is outstanding (check out the whiff rate and zone rates for last year- ) and he's closing on what looks to be a solid Orioles team.
Dishonorable mention: The catching duo of Wieters and Perez at $12 and $14 shares the award for this tier. Too much risk, not enough production relative to the much, much cheaper lower tier of catchers. Both have injury risk (Perez from the INSANE number of games he caught last year, and Wieters is recovering from Tommy John surgery), and just aren't worth the price.
Super subs: $5-$9
Hitters: Joe Mauer at $9 provides serious batting average upside. It's hard to believe just how fast he has fallen. Just take a look at his prices over the previous 5 seasons ($21, $17 (keeper), $17, $25, $32). Marcus Semien might be the best pick here. He's only $9, can play 2B, 3B, and will gain SS eligibility early this year. His 2014 line looks worse than a limited stint in 2013, but Semien took a step forward in all the underlying numbers, halving his whiff rate and increasing his walk rate. The 27.5 K% from last year looks ugly, but the underlying numbers and his minor league numbers don't suggest a high strikeout player. Semien could hit 0.265/15HR/10SB, while plahying three positions. That's roughly (Pun intended!) what I am hoping to get out of Odor, without the position flexibility AND for a few bucks more.
Pitchers: Boxberger is the guy here. As Bill said, his numbers last season were insane and he could grab on to the closer's chair and keep it all year. He's basically Wade Daivs with a much clearer shot at a season of closing. Those trades I made with Bill look worse and worse and worse. First I trade McGee AND JD Martinez for Dozier, THEN I trade Dozier for McGee, THEN it looks like McGee could possibly not close. Moral of the story here? Don't trade with Bill. Especially multiple times.
Bench guys: $1-$4
The $1 to $4 tier has so very many players that I'm not going to do a full write up, but I do like some of the following guys.
Hitters: Brad Miller could be a servicalbe shortstop at $1, and Travis Snider is the rare post-post-post-hype sleeper. Asdrubal Cabrera is nothing special, but he's fairly reliable and $3 is super cheap.
Pitchers: I like a lot of picks here. TJ House, Drew Pomeranz, Taijuan Walker, Jesse Hahn, and Wade Miley have nice upside and a touch of keeper value if things work out.
Dishonorable mention: Mike Moustakas. Why would anyone draft Mike Moustakas? Christ almighty. What sort of idiot would do that?
13 comments:
McCann!
Not sure how Brett Cecil managed to get missed in both of our write ups, but at $9, he's a steal. Although an official announcement hadn't been made yet, with Aaron Sanchez to the rotation following Stroman's injury, Cecil was pretty much locked in to the closer role. Cecil's K rate was almost as good as Boxberger's was last year, and although his walk rate is a touch high, the tons of ground balls (54%) help offset that. A real nice pick there by Spencer.
Also, hooray McCann! He wasn't a steal on my board (I had him at $17.50), but I did have him well ahead of the other catchers that went in that neighborhood (Perez who was drafted for $14, Wieters for $12), and not too far behind Gattis, who went for $27.
Agreed on Cecil. I only touched on him in relation to Shoemaker, but he is an outstanding deal.
wait, i drafted a closer?!
Bah! Donaldson will beat Beltre in 4/5 categories!
Don't worry Spencer, he wasn't totally officially a closer yet. So I think you can not count him.
Just to clarify, I'm not saying that Beltre will beat Donaldson in 4/5 categories, I'm saying he could be close enough. Let's break it down. Donaldson is likely to steal about 5 bases, Beltre 1, but 4 SB isn't huge, so I'd call that close enough. Donaldson will almost certainly take HR, Beltre likewise for average. That means it really comes down to runs and RBI. I think with the healthier, better Rangers offense, Beltre could be looking at a 90/90 season. Donaldson might beat Beltre in 4/5 categories, but I'm not sure he does it by enough to make up for the price difference. Last season, in spite of Donaldson beating Beltre in every category except batting average, there was only a $4 difference between the two in value ($25 vs $29, no inflation, according to last player picked).
All fair points. I don't disagree that Beltre has better value at $31, but alas I found myself in a Murphy bidding war for Donaldson.
The other thing to remember about Beltre is that he's 36. Like Papi, he keeps being good every year, but you never know when he might fall off that cliff.
I don't expect the gap in AVG between the two to be 70 points again, and I expect Donaldson to rack up a ton of Rs and RBIs batting 2nd in that insanely good top half of the order in Toronto. Beltre could do 90/90, but Donaldson could do 100/100.
$34 for Ellsbury may have been a bit high, but dishonorable mention? I disagree he is a one category player, he hit 16 HR last year with 70 RBI. He was the AL leader in the Bill James Power/Speed stat last year. As for health, he has over 600 PA in 5 of 7 seasons, which is better than all but 2 of the $30+ players:
Total Seasons with 600+ PA, 2008-2014:
Miguel Cabrera 7
Robinson Cano 7
Adrian Beltre 5
Adam Jones 5
Jacoby Ellsbury 5
Edwin Encarnación 4
Hanley Ramirez 4 (he went for $29 technically)
Jose Reyes 4
Jose Bautista 3
Josh Donaldson N/A
I mostly like all of these players for what they went for, except maybe Reyes. I appreciate you have to pick one player from this group, but I would have picked Donaldson at $39. Donaldson's upside is basically Encarnacion (35 HR, 90-100 RBI, 90 Runs, 270 BA), who went for $40. Which I guess that just shows my preference for guys with projections more or less line with their recent performance vs projections that count on improvement.
Hmmmm... maybe that's why I have never won a keeper league.
That is an interesting point, Mark. Also in your favor is the fact that Ellsbury's lost season with the Sox was due to getting steamrolled by Beltre. Repeatedly.
Also, hooray Hanley, bringing up the back half of that list! I'm absolutely terrified of Hanley's ability to play almost a full season. I had him leaps and bounds ahead of all other shortstops, so I rolled the dice, but if he's still injury prone in the outfield, I'm fucked.
Also, Donaldson should have a 2 seasons of 600+ PA in your list. He had 668 PA in 2013 and 695 in 2014. He's only at the bottom of the list because he is recently established. Since he started hitting, he's been remarkably healthy and consistent (158 GP in 2013 and 2014).
I definitely see the criticism on the Ellsbury pick. My question about him is whether he can match the power production and whether we are seeing a new normal for for average. Those, plus the natural aging curve for stolen bases, make me question his value. Donaldson at $39 is high, but he could conceivably put up a 30+ HR/100R/100RBI season.
I guess, in the end, I see Donaldson as having more upside as a player. That said, no one is buying 30+ players and expecting a profit. If I had to do it over, I might just do Reyes and leave it at that. I'm still not sure what Taylor was planning on there.
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