The Fantasy Baseball Sherpa

When many fantasy baseball team owners get their hands on a set of player projections and rankings for the upcoming season, their first reaction is to perform a quick check on the projected stats for a few big-name Hitters and Pitchers. If these projections seem reasonable, the team owner concludes she/he is working with a reasonable set of projections and can proceed to plan their draft/auction strategy based on them.

This process may be a reasonable first step, but it is by no means an effective way to gauge the overall validity of a set of projections. In order to determine whether the set of projections you’re working with make sense from a “big picture” standpoint, I challenge you to ask the following questions:

1. Do the total number of At-Bats for Hitters and Innings Pitched for Pitchers make sense when compared to recent seasons’ results?
2. Do the total number of Pitchers’ Wins and Pitchers’ Losses equal each other? Do they both equal the total number of games in a season (2,430)?
3. Do the overall Batting Average and number of Home Runs/Runs Batted In/Stolen Bases make sense for Hitters?
4. Do the overall Earned Run Average, WHIP, and number of Saves make sense for Pitchers?
5. Do the number of Runs Scored by Hitters and the number of Runs Allowed by Pitchers balance?

If the answer to any of these questions is “No”, the player values and rankings based on the offending set of projections will be of little use to you during your draft or auction once you get past the big-name players.

During the rest of this week I will be putting some of the more popular/readily available sets of fantasy baseball projections under the microscope to see whether they pass muster. Since fair is fair, I will also subject my own projections to these tests.

Stay tuned!

The Sherpa

So, you’re in a 12-team 5×5 Mixed league snake draft, you pick towards the end of the first round, and Albert Pujols is still available. Do you bite?

I say no, unless you have the 12th pick and can immediately make your second selection. The adage about “high risk, high reward” doesn’t apply to fantasy baseball drafts - you must, must, must get a “sure thing” with your first-round pick. That means identifying players with known injuries in Spring Training and avoiding them like the plague in the first round. Before the news of the extent of Pujols’ injuries came out, I based my projections for him on the assumption that he would play 155 games this season. At that point I would have considered him with the 9th pick, factoring in the Position Scarcity analysis that underlies my player rankings. After the news came out, I scaled back my assumption to 145 games, and even that may be too optimistic. If Pujols’ health concerns persist and the Cardinals are as bad as I think they’ll be this year (i.e. - they’re mathematically eliminated in late August/early September), I think it’s definitely possible that the Cardinals and Pujols would mutually agree that it’s in their best long-term interests to cut short his season (ala Dwyane Wade).

So, why would I argue that Pujols is a good pick with the last pick in the first round or the first pick in the second round, but not a few picks before that? At that point I think the risk vs. reward scale tips back in favor of the reward, so I’d be willing to take that chance. I wouldn’t pair Pujols with Johan Santana - you need to get at least one “sure thing” Hitter in the first two rounds. However, if I could pair Pujols with a first-round pick of Miguel Cabrera, Ryan Braun, Chase Utley, Jose Reyes, or Jimmy Rollins, then I would consider the reward to outweigh the risk. But even if I did that, I wouldn’t necessarily commit to keeping Pujols for the whole season. Suppose Pujols gets off to a strong start, and the concerns about his injury subside temporarily. In that case I would look to package him with someone else on my team who’s off to an unsustainable start in return for two above-average players who help me in my weaker categories.

Until next time,

The Sherpa

Today I’m taking my first crack at projecting the 2008 baseball standings based on rosters as of the beginning of Spring Training. For those who are interested, the projected win total for each team is based on the projected difference between the team’s Runs Scored and Runs Allowed.

What does this have to do with fantasy baseball? A realistic set of player projections is the essential first step in assigning fantasy baseball value to each player. A top Starting Pitcher or Closer will be much more valuable from a fantasy standpoint if he’s pitching for the Yankees or the Tigers than he will be if he’s pitching for the Giants. The run support a team’s Hitters give their Pitchers can easily make a difference of 2-3 Wins for a Starting Pitcher and 10 Saves for a Closer. While the run support a team gives a particular Pitcher is subject to some degree of randomness, Pitchers on good teams will generally be more valuable than Pitchers of similar ability on bad teams.

I’ll take a closer look later this week at how to evaluate a set of player projections; then, I’ll put several widely available sets to the test. However, for now, here are my initial projected standings for 2008:

These projections are the basis for the Preseason Player Projections & Rankings currently for sale on my website (www.FantasyBaseballSherpa.com). I’ll update the projections towards the end of Spring Training when we all have a better idea of how the Opening Day rosters will look. In the meantime, let me know what you think of Take 1 - hit me with your best shot - fire away!

Until next time,

The Sherpa