Latest / Cards & Categories / Ep. 71 : Ottoneu Omnibus

Transcript

Ep. 71 : Ottoneu Omnibus · Cards & Categories

0:15
Speaker 1: Hello, WN, Welcome everybody to episode seventy one of Cards
0:19
Speaker 1: and Categories. I am Mike cool Art from Rasball, joined
0:22
Speaker 1: as always by my very good friend Jeremie Brewer, also
0:26
Speaker 1: from Rasball.
0:27
Speaker 2: How are you doing tonight, Buddy.
0:29
Speaker 3: Doing just fine? Ready to go. We don't have as
0:32
Speaker 3: much news today as I'm a little disappointed that we
0:34
Speaker 3: don't have seventeen thousand transactions to go through with the
0:37
Speaker 3: Winter Meetings.
0:38
Speaker 1: As the bloodown and postwriter, I am very very thankful
0:42
Speaker 1: for that, but.
0:45
Speaker 3: I might say my voice a little bit snice. So
0:47
Speaker 3: I'm excited about that, and I'm excited to get into
0:49
Speaker 3: one of my favorite topics late in those shows. So
0:52
Speaker 3: I won't bear the lead yet, but I'm ready to
0:55
Speaker 3: go tonight.
0:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.
0:57
Speaker 1: So we are recording here on Wednesday, December eighth.
1:00
Speaker 2: Teenth.
1:00
Speaker 1: Should hopefully be a little bit of a shorter episode
1:03
Speaker 1: because we've got to get to the Survivor finale after
1:06
Speaker 1: this recording. And you know, I think we gave you
1:09
Speaker 1: enough of our voices last week and our marathon pod
1:11
Speaker 1: covering all those Winter Meetings moves, and it does seem
1:15
Speaker 1: that like all of the front offices and MLB have
1:18
Speaker 1: moved on to the holiday season, as we won't be
1:21
Speaker 1: recording next week for Christmas, but we've got this little
1:24
Speaker 1: nugget to put in your ears, as we will cover
1:27
Speaker 1: for our main portion the autnew just format on fangrafts
1:32
Speaker 1: dot com autonew roster management dynasty fantasy baseball. It's probably
1:39
Speaker 1: my favorite format of fantasy baseball out there, just given
1:42
Speaker 1: the constraints that puts on roster management and everything. So
1:46
Speaker 1: we're in a league together. We've hinted at it over
1:49
Speaker 1: time here on this pod. But even if you aren't
1:51
Speaker 1: in an autonew league, hint, I would suggest you go
1:54
Speaker 1: join one right away because it's really awesome and really fun.
1:56
Speaker 1: But if you aren't, I think there's lots of great
1:58
Speaker 1: nuggets in there in terms of just offseason dynasty and
2:01
Speaker 1: keeper league management that I think you'll be able to
2:04
Speaker 1: pull out a lot of good threads from that discussion anyway.
2:07
Speaker 1: But before we get into that, let's cover some of
2:09
Speaker 1: the news and notes that have cropped up since we
2:12
Speaker 1: talked last week and went through that Megapot pod. So
2:18
Speaker 1: the first one we've got is a huge significant move
2:21
Speaker 1: at the top of our pool. We've got a first
2:23
Speaker 1: round draft pick in Fantasy leagues going and hitting the
2:28
Speaker 1: trade market. That is, Kyle Tucker, outfielder joined the Cubs,
2:33
Speaker 1: was swapped from Houston for Estak Parades, Hayden Westnski and
2:38
Speaker 1: the Cub's most recent first round pick, Cam Smith. So
2:42
Speaker 1: this should line up Kyle Tucker to start every day
2:45
Speaker 1: and write field obviously for the Cubs. We'll see whether
2:48
Speaker 1: or not there's extension talk. I don't think he's actually
2:51
Speaker 1: gonna sign up for an extension, just because he's so
2:54
Speaker 1: close to free agency.
2:55
Speaker 2: He might as.
2:56
Speaker 1: Well play out the year. Plus, I'm not exactly sure
3:00
Speaker 1: the Ricketts want to be handing out any money.
3:03
Speaker 2: To players like Kyle Tucker.
3:04
Speaker 1: That's why they had to go out and make this
3:06
Speaker 1: trade on Jed Hoyer's side for the Astros. Odd move
3:11
Speaker 1: for contender, certainly to be trading a guy who sure
3:14
Speaker 1: Tucker was injured last year with that shit injury, but
3:17
Speaker 1: had a magnificent year in the limited time that he played,
3:20
Speaker 1: was a on pace for you know, would have been
3:24
Speaker 1: in the al MVP talks in terms of the war
3:26
Speaker 1: output was he was going through there in Houston, And
3:31
Speaker 1: really it just kind of opens up more questions on
3:33
Speaker 1: where Houston's gonna go forward. We've got I think an
3:36
Speaker 1: interesting name in paradis there landing in Houston with that
3:39
Speaker 1: short porch, And I'm really interested in what this actually
3:43
Speaker 1: does for Wesnsky and Cam Smith too. But you are
3:46
Speaker 1: the resident top one hundred hitters guy. You dig into
3:50
Speaker 1: Kyle Tucker all the time, so let's start there. Obviously,
3:53
Speaker 1: he's the biggest name in this deal. What do you
3:56
Speaker 1: think this portends for Tucker's value going forward as he
4:00
Speaker 1: moves to Wrigleyville.
4:02
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, Tucker's a top ten hitter in my book.
4:05
Speaker 3: He's got the speed, he's got the power he has
4:07
Speaker 3: for a decent average, and so moving to Chicago, maybe
4:12
Speaker 3: it maybe a little bit of impact on the power,
4:16
Speaker 3: but probably not that terribly much at the end of
4:18
Speaker 3: the day. And really the question is what's going to
4:22
Speaker 3: happen with his his speed. And at the end of
4:25
Speaker 3: the day, the Cubs tend to run, you know, they
4:28
Speaker 3: run more than Houston. You know, it's, yeah, somewhat driven
4:33
Speaker 3: by the players there, but they were in the top
4:35
Speaker 3: ten last year in steels and Houston was in the
4:36
Speaker 3: bottom ten. So maybe you trade off a little Homers,
4:39
Speaker 3: maybe add little steeles. You squint and say it's still
4:42
Speaker 3: Kyle Tucker. I don't think it's really changing the calculus
4:45
Speaker 3: for Kyle Tucker. Kyle Tucker at the end of the
4:47
Speaker 3: day that said, you called it right, E'zak. Prate's is
4:52
Speaker 3: the most interesting part of this trade. And I think
4:54
Speaker 3: we talked about before. It is like, yeah, no interest
4:57
Speaker 3: in Chicago, like what are we doing here? Many times
4:59
Speaker 3: and then the one team that is extremely interesting for
5:03
Speaker 3: his Pratees traded for him. Wonder why maybe they saw
5:06
Speaker 3: something that we saw. And you know, I already know
5:11
Speaker 3: you've looked up the numbers and if you have it,
5:12
Speaker 3: I'm shocked. But you know, he hit nineteen home runs
5:16
Speaker 3: last year. If you look at his spray chart, there's like,
5:20
Speaker 3: if you're going to put a guy somewhere in the
5:22
Speaker 3: field to try to catch these, doc praides to be
5:25
Speaker 3: the left field bleachers down by the foul pole like that,
5:28
Speaker 3: that's where you want to put a guy. And there's
5:31
Speaker 3: a short porch there in Houston that he wants to
5:35
Speaker 3: take advantage with. And so his expected home runs last
5:38
Speaker 3: year we had this nineteen in Houston, that would have
5:40
Speaker 3: been twenty six and that's the adjusted numbers by baseball
5:43
Speaker 3: savant to adjust for walheist distances and environmental factors. If
5:48
Speaker 3: you don't adjust for those environmental factors and just look
5:51
Speaker 3: at just purely trajectory and so try to take out
5:54
Speaker 3: all the stat cast you know, ballpark figures he would
5:58
Speaker 3: have had thirty. That's a significant difference in he's ak
6:04
Speaker 3: Paridi's profile because he's a power only guy, and this
6:07
Speaker 3: moves him into a the ballpark of all these other
6:11
Speaker 3: guys we've talked about. We just talked about Jake Berger
6:13
Speaker 3: last week, and it's like, now the same guy to
6:16
Speaker 3: a degree as a third baseman in the same division,
6:22
Speaker 3: hitting two fifty maybe and hitting thirty bombs, Like that's
6:26
Speaker 3: that's the guy that you're you're looking at with Ezac
6:29
Speaker 3: Praidi's there, so I think he's the most interesting one.
6:32
Speaker 3: I think he jumps up significantly on my board because
6:33
Speaker 3: he was probably off it before. I don't know that
6:36
Speaker 3: I've thrown into the top one hundred by by any means,
6:39
Speaker 3: but he's definitely a viable corner infielder after this trade,
6:43
Speaker 3: assuming Houston's gonna use him, and I don't see why
6:46
Speaker 3: they wouldn't. They are still looking at bringing third basement
6:49
Speaker 3: in so maybe he gets the multipositional eligibility to maybe
6:52
Speaker 3: he just DH's. We will see. So at the end
6:55
Speaker 3: of the day, Brady's is the is the key interesting
6:58
Speaker 3: guy for me in this trade.
7:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, I absolutely like it stands out immediately in terms
7:04
Speaker 1: of you nailed it with the spray chart. You can
7:05
Speaker 1: also even see like the little notch in Tropicana Field
7:09
Speaker 1: whereas there there's like there used to be just that
7:11
Speaker 1: little little short like four foot wall porch in the
7:15
Speaker 1: very corner, and you can see that in the profile
7:18
Speaker 1: that that's where esoch Predies was aiming it for it
7:21
Speaker 1: every time. We know he can hit it to left
7:23
Speaker 1: field very very well, doesn't even need to hit it
7:26
Speaker 1: that hard to get to the Crawford boxes. So I
7:29
Speaker 1: do agree that this is a huge up arrow for
7:31
Speaker 1: Esac preidees, especially if you're in a daily Moves league
7:35
Speaker 1: where you can play him only at Houston bench him
7:38
Speaker 1: on the road. That is fantastic because you might just
7:42
Speaker 1: be able to absorb like what's like on pace like
7:45
Speaker 1: a fifty home or third basement if you play him
7:48
Speaker 1: only at uh oh, they just named they just renamed
7:51
Speaker 1: their field. I know, I can't remember some weird air
7:55
Speaker 1: conditioner or something. I'm just gonna call it enron Field
7:58
Speaker 1: because that's what deserves to be for for all time.
8:01
Speaker 1: And you know we're elder millennials. We live through the
8:04
Speaker 1: whole en Ron crash. I'm an accountant, auditor, and so like, yeah,
8:08
Speaker 1: that everything I've been taught has been like in the
8:11
Speaker 1: backdrop of Enron. So I love calling it in ron Field.
8:15
Speaker 1: But parades is a huge target. I think that, especially
8:19
Speaker 1: if you've been drafting early.
8:20
Speaker 2: He was uber cheap.
8:22
Speaker 1: I'm looking at the ADP of NFBC all drafts from
8:28
Speaker 1: November fifteenth through today, twelve eighteen, and he is the
8:32
Speaker 1: twenty first third basement off the board. There's a couple
8:35
Speaker 1: of people in front of him between like Jordan Westberg,
8:39
Speaker 1: Luis Bronhifo, MIKEL. Garcia, who you wouldn't be playing at third.
8:42
Speaker 1: I think you'd be playing them all at second. He's behind
8:45
Speaker 1: Willie Castro and right in front of Ryan McMahon. Obviously
8:49
Speaker 1: gonna move up pretty significantly. So, like I said, that's
8:52
Speaker 1: twenty first, let's just kind of play a little like
8:55
Speaker 1: the Price is Right game with the yodel a he
8:57
Speaker 1: who guy the guy who goes off the mountain. Let
9:00
Speaker 1: me know, like when you stop in terms of ranking
9:03
Speaker 1: of third basement, where you would stop with parades. So
9:06
Speaker 1: twentieth Willie Castro, Bradies nineteenth, Max Munsey, Praidies eighteenth, Nolan Arnado.
9:17
Speaker 3: Oh that hurts because because I'm just a homeboy for
9:19
Speaker 3: the Cardinals. But he'll be off there soon.
9:20
Speaker 1: So Pratties seventeenth, Josh Young Hill with Praidies there, okay,
9:29
Speaker 1: close sixteenth Michael Garcia. I probably take Garcia, but that's
9:35
Speaker 1: real close there, Okay, just because of Garcia's multi function,
9:39
Speaker 1: multifacet game, the speed he the he brings in there,
9:41
Speaker 1: and he's as one dimensional, I would I would go
9:44
Speaker 1: Parades over Garcia there because it was also announced recently
9:47
Speaker 1: that Garcia underwent some sort of like shoulder surgery and stuff,
9:51
Speaker 1: and it's.
9:51
Speaker 2: A weird bad of ball profile and stuff.
9:53
Speaker 3: But who's next, Who's next next?
9:56
Speaker 1: This is where I think I would stop is fifteenth
9:59
Speaker 1: au Annual Tarez. But like this is where it's a
10:01
Speaker 1: toss up territory for me.
10:02
Speaker 3: Yes, Suarez I think is actually I have him kind
10:05
Speaker 3: of as a really high wash candid this year with
10:08
Speaker 3: how he finished last year. So you're starting to get
10:10
Speaker 3: into the guys like, yeah, there's there's upside here, and
10:13
Speaker 3: we're already baking into the upside with parades here and
10:16
Speaker 3: moving to Houston.
10:17
Speaker 2: So yeah, and then fourteenth is Alec Bohm.
10:19
Speaker 1: So I think that's more of like the tier he'll
10:21
Speaker 1: be in is that boom years tier as we get
10:23
Speaker 1: deeper into draft season, because at that point, yeah, you
10:26
Speaker 1: can't ignore what Suarez did last year. And then Alec
10:30
Speaker 1: Bohm could also be on the move himself, but it's
10:33
Speaker 1: a little bit more of a well rounded profile, great lineup,
10:37
Speaker 1: and I would say just that day and day out
10:40
Speaker 1: steadiness where parades it's gonna ebb and flow a lot.
10:43
Speaker 1: But like I said, if you're in a daily Moose league,
10:45
Speaker 1: I would keep going up that ladder for parades and
10:48
Speaker 1: like backfill it, you know with somebody. If you could
10:50
Speaker 1: actually like a great pairing would be Parades and Ryan McMahon,
10:54
Speaker 1: And if you're trying to like put that together with
10:57
Speaker 1: a coorist field and paradees at end run, that would
11:01
Speaker 1: be the dream. But let's get a little bit more
11:03
Speaker 1: into cam Smith and Hayden west Nesky, because I think
11:07
Speaker 1: they're very interesting here that both significant arrows up between Wesnsky.
11:12
Speaker 1: You've got to love with the Houston Astros have done
11:15
Speaker 1: in terms of pitching development, and it just seems like
11:19
Speaker 1: the Cubs were not getting the most of Wesnsky that
11:22
Speaker 1: they could. I've always liked what west Nesky could do
11:25
Speaker 1: coming out of the New York Yankee system, and with
11:28
Speaker 1: Cam Smith it should move him, i would say, closer
11:32
Speaker 1: to the major leagues in terms of looking at the
11:35
Speaker 1: systems that the Cubs were kind of clogged at the
11:38
Speaker 1: corner spots in terms of you have Matt Shaw at
11:41
Speaker 1: third base, who I think is probably going to take
11:44
Speaker 1: over for the Cubs there for parade ase, and then
11:47
Speaker 1: like you know, Michael Bush is in the mix, Matt
11:49
Speaker 1: Mrvis is still around and stuff. So Cam Smith had
11:52
Speaker 1: some more people to jump. He was the first round
11:54
Speaker 1: pick out of Florida State by the Cubs in Houston.
11:58
Speaker 1: It's a much clearer path to playing time within the
12:01
Speaker 1: next few years. So give me a little bit of
12:03
Speaker 1: background on what you think this could portend for Westnski
12:07
Speaker 1: and cam Smith going forward.
12:09
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I think, you know, let's start with with
12:12
Speaker 3: Cam Smith here. You know, Cam Smith is a first
12:16
Speaker 3: round draft picks. You have to love, you always have
12:18
Speaker 3: to love the pedigree. He was kind of comps Alec Baum.
12:21
Speaker 3: We were just talking about coming coming out of Florida State,
12:25
Speaker 3: and I mean that's probably right. He's he's kind of
12:27
Speaker 3: a more of a high average guy. His college career
12:32
Speaker 3: he hit three thirty thirty, three thirty one and he,
12:37
Speaker 3: you know, i'd say it is kind of a no speed,
12:42
Speaker 3: decent power, middling power type of guy. And he's already
12:46
Speaker 3: moving kind of up the ladder quickly reaching reaching double A,
12:51
Speaker 3: so I you know, looks like he's not overmatched, doesn't
12:54
Speaker 3: have big strikeout issues. Again, I think Alec bombkons Is
12:58
Speaker 3: is a really reasonable one and you know, being that
13:01
Speaker 3: righty there in you know, n run is not gonna
13:06
Speaker 3: gonna hurt. So I think his arrow is definitely definitely up,
13:10
Speaker 3: and he's probably arrived sooner than when it was Chicago
13:13
Speaker 3: because Houston is a little bit more willing to move
13:15
Speaker 3: those guys through the system. Uh So, definitely definitely intrigued there,
13:20
Speaker 3: but not not necessarily a guy I'm like jumping that
13:22
Speaker 3: trying to go get like the Alec baumbkomp Is. You know,
13:25
Speaker 3: I think he's higher floor than higher ceiling. Uh type
13:29
Speaker 3: type of guy for us here was was new Ski
13:33
Speaker 3: uh Is. He's an interesting one because there's nothing in
13:39
Speaker 3: this profile that is like scary, but there's nothing that's
13:43
Speaker 3: like fabulous. And he's so he's He's no Spencer Araghedty,
13:48
Speaker 3: He's like he was. I don't think he does what
13:50
Speaker 3: to do with nobody's do with Araghedty, but his lost
13:55
Speaker 3: he's increased eascht of the last three years. He does
13:58
Speaker 3: a good job of keeping the ball in the He's
14:00
Speaker 3: had some tough luck. He strikes out just enough guys.
14:04
Speaker 3: He has just good enough control, which is what I
14:07
Speaker 3: really like because Houston seems to get the next gear
14:10
Speaker 3: out of their guys, and so it's not hard to like,
14:13
Speaker 3: I can't pick out a piece of his profile that
14:15
Speaker 3: they're really gonna lead into. Maybe there's a pitch mixed
14:19
Speaker 3: shift that they see and maybe you see that I'm
14:23
Speaker 3: I'm not, but I just have to think that they
14:25
Speaker 3: have something up their sleeves and they're gonna rely on
14:28
Speaker 3: if nothing else, He's that probably a solid three four
14:31
Speaker 3: guy for this Houston team.
14:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think what Houston also does pretty
14:37
Speaker 1: well is like emphasizing pictures with great pitches in west
14:41
Speaker 1: Nesky's slider really really pops. And I think that just
14:45
Speaker 1: the way that we've seen Houston developed pictures in terms
14:49
Speaker 1: of like Lance McCullers with its curveball, even Ronew Blanco
14:52
Speaker 1: with his change up recently, that they seem to have
14:55
Speaker 1: a great strategy in terms of deploying pictures that have
15:01
Speaker 1: one standout, one standout offering and then might be suffering
15:06
Speaker 1: across the board. And so that's where I think it
15:08
Speaker 1: piques my interest as well as like he can turn
15:11
Speaker 1: into a pretty wipeout reliever I think as a floor.
15:14
Speaker 1: So I don't think that unnecessarily like moving on west
15:17
Speaker 1: Nesky like too heavily, but certainly somebody I'm keeping my
15:20
Speaker 1: eye on going into spring training because the back end
15:24
Speaker 1: of that Houston astro's rotations a little bit and flux
15:28
Speaker 1: with injuries. You know, we've got Luis Garcia training to
15:31
Speaker 1: still work his way back, Christian Javier, Lance mcculor should
15:35
Speaker 1: be in the mix a little bit, and you just
15:37
Speaker 1: alluded Tora Getty's very boom or bust Ronel Blanco. It
15:42
Speaker 1: still doesn't fully seem like it should work, but it
15:46
Speaker 1: held up for twenty twenty four.
15:48
Speaker 3: It's still not touching that one.
15:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so there's lots of different ways that this
15:52
Speaker 1: can go that I think west Nesky has to get
15:56
Speaker 1: passed to playing time in Houston as opposed to in Chicago. Okay,
16:00
Speaker 1: let's move on to a couple more trades, because the
16:03
Speaker 1: other two major trades that went down this week happened
16:06
Speaker 1: in the Bronx in the fallout of losing mon Soto.
16:09
Speaker 1: The Yankees, we'll go.
16:12
Speaker 2: With chronological order here.
16:13
Speaker 1: So the first one, the first trade that they made
16:16
Speaker 1: was swooping in to pick up closer Devin Williams from
16:19
Speaker 1: the Milwaukee Brewers, sending over to the Brewers in exchange
16:25
Speaker 1: Nestor Cortez and Caleb Durban. So I think this is
16:28
Speaker 1: another trade where all three pieces gonna have fantasy impact
16:31
Speaker 1: going into twenty twenty five. Let's focus first on Devin Williams. Obviously,
16:35
Speaker 1: he's the biggest piece here. He's coming off a great
16:39
Speaker 1: year in terms of a one to twenty five ear array,
16:41
Speaker 1: but it was only in twenty one and two thirds
16:43
Speaker 1: innings coming off of a back injury where he had
16:47
Speaker 1: like stretch fractures in his back, and it's been a
16:50
Speaker 1: litany of injuries over the past couple of years for
16:52
Speaker 1: Devin Williams.
16:53
Speaker 2: So that's what's always kind of given me pause.
16:56
Speaker 1: And then I know it's really really small sample size,
16:59
Speaker 1: But you also think about his postseason performances. You think
17:02
Speaker 1: a lot about the Pete Alonzo walk off homer that
17:05
Speaker 1: he gave up this year. Doesn't exactly seem to thrive
17:09
Speaker 1: in high leverage like in my view. So what do
17:12
Speaker 1: you think Devin Williams can do in New York And
17:16
Speaker 1: are you moving him up or down or moving him
17:19
Speaker 1: around anywhere in your closer rankings because of this move
17:22
Speaker 1: over to the big City.
17:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I love Devin Williams. I think he's great.
17:29
Speaker 3: He's that pro typical closer, like he's just blow up,
17:32
Speaker 3: blown up there. H He is hard to hit, and
17:34
Speaker 3: he's got an amazing you know, one or two pitches
17:38
Speaker 3: as that's what it is. Uh, he controls lacking ground
17:42
Speaker 3: balls are a little questionable. Uh. He doesn't have the
17:45
Speaker 3: highest vlosity for a closer. He's in like ninety four range,
17:49
Speaker 3: so you'd expect more. But he's just a lockdown, down guy.
17:52
Speaker 3: You know. His he's been under three or under two
17:55
Speaker 3: Era for the last three years, and I get last
17:58
Speaker 3: year was a little less, but he's just been phenomenal's
18:00
Speaker 3: entire career, So I like the move in general. The
18:04
Speaker 3: reason I'm not like jumping up and down is you know,
18:07
Speaker 3: you go to the Yankees and you're not in as
18:08
Speaker 3: many close ballgames as what you are with Milwaukee. So
18:12
Speaker 3: I think he may get more theoretical opportunities for the
18:18
Speaker 3: Yankees because they're winning more ball games, but they also
18:21
Speaker 3: might be less close ball games than what you'd see
18:23
Speaker 3: for the Brewers. So I at the end of the day,
18:25
Speaker 3: I kind of see it as generally a wash. Ballpark's
18:29
Speaker 3: actually relatively similar. Surprisingly, Yanks seam has been a little
18:34
Speaker 3: bit tougher overall than pitching in Milwaukee. There. Actually, on
18:39
Speaker 3: the flip side this, I think Nestor is a little
18:41
Speaker 3: more interesting in the ballpark park aspect in it. But yeah,
18:45
Speaker 3: I like Williams and probably keep him right where he's at,
18:48
Speaker 3: maybe giving him a slight up arrow because he's not
18:51
Speaker 3: gonna get traded mids mid season to who knows where,
18:54
Speaker 3: and so you know, he's the closer in New York,
18:56
Speaker 3: so I think there's a little bit more job security
18:58
Speaker 3: here for for Devin Williams. So am I right on
19:01
Speaker 3: track where you shine away from Devon in the Bronx
19:05
Speaker 3: just because it's a big, scary place.
19:08
Speaker 2: I think a little bit.
19:09
Speaker 1: But I mean the Yankees move doesn't help. Having to
19:14
Speaker 1: shave his beard doesn't help.
19:15
Speaker 3: There were reports that is unfortunate that.
19:18
Speaker 1: He hasn't gone clean shaven in six years. So I mean,
19:21
Speaker 1: that's not exactly like a comfortable feeling to like if
19:25
Speaker 1: that is a part of like who you are and
19:27
Speaker 1: the way you want to present yourself, it's it's a
19:29
Speaker 1: little bit not great. I would say, it's another kind
19:32
Speaker 1: of just con to it all. I do think that
19:36
Speaker 1: he's gonna move probably up to the second closer off
19:40
Speaker 1: the board. He's gonna leap frog Edwin Diaz and Josh
19:43
Speaker 1: Hater by the time we get around to draft season,
19:46
Speaker 1: and that's because the Yankees tacks. And at that point
19:48
Speaker 1: it's just gonna be too rich for me because of
19:51
Speaker 1: that injury profile. Like you said, last year, the fastball
19:55
Speaker 1: velocity was sitting at ninety four to seven, like when
19:57
Speaker 1: he was in his prime. What made Devin Williams really
20:01
Speaker 1: devastating is that he would hit you with a ninety
20:04
Speaker 1: nine ninety eight mile on our fastball, and then you
20:07
Speaker 1: didn't know when the change was going to come, and
20:09
Speaker 1: they all tunneled together. And if the fastball starts degrading anymore,
20:14
Speaker 1: it's gonna be really tough, I think.
20:19
Speaker 2: Ye.
20:19
Speaker 1: Also, you just look at the other players around him,
20:21
Speaker 1: Luke Weavers obviously there. It's not like the Yankees have
20:25
Speaker 1: a ton invested here in Devin Williams. It only costs
20:27
Speaker 1: them Cortes in Durban that they have Williams for one year.
20:33
Speaker 1: They don't They're not wetted to him, you know what
20:35
Speaker 1: I mean that they could totally downgrade him into a
20:38
Speaker 1: different role if he's struggling, and on top of the injury.
20:42
Speaker 2: Risk is just so crazy. It's just such a high.
20:46
Speaker 1: If you're looking at snake drafts and even in auctions,
20:49
Speaker 1: I'd just rather be spending that draft capital somewhere else.
20:52
Speaker 2: That Like, I love the profile, but like, I.
20:55
Speaker 1: Just don't think there's ever going to be a discount
20:57
Speaker 1: on Devin Williams to get him to kind of like
20:59
Speaker 1: this slightly lower price tier I want him at.
21:03
Speaker 3: Yeah, you get you name a guy like Jeh Josh
21:05
Speaker 3: Hater there, I'm taking Hater all day, like he's scary,
21:08
Speaker 3: He's he's like, I bet it wouldn't be shocked to
21:10
Speaker 3: see Hater Gill Craig kimberl on us at some point.
21:13
Speaker 3: But like right now, I'm definitely taking Hater the certainty
21:17
Speaker 3: that I see there versus william that has there's a
21:21
Speaker 3: the question marks aren't huge relative to Hater, but they're
21:24
Speaker 3: more And to your point, there's gonna be the Yankee tax, Like,
21:26
Speaker 3: that's that's not what you want to see. There's also
21:29
Speaker 3: the trade tax. There's all these little things that just
21:32
Speaker 3: boost that price a little bit more. And so you
21:34
Speaker 3: go into the draft you're like, I'm not sure. Well,
21:36
Speaker 3: I know the Yankee straight for Williams, so they've got
21:38
Speaker 3: to be, you know, relying on him. Let me pick
21:40
Speaker 3: him up. So I think there's gonna be I think
21:42
Speaker 3: you're right there, Like, I don't think it changes the
21:44
Speaker 3: value a whole lot, but I think the market might
21:46
Speaker 3: react a little bit more.
21:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, let's go to the Milwaukee side of the trades.
21:49
Speaker 1: So you already mentioned that this is definitely an up
21:53
Speaker 1: arrow for nest Cortez. He came off of a pretty
21:55
Speaker 1: nice year, going nine to ten over one hundred and
21:57
Speaker 1: seventy four one thirds innings with three seventy seven ERA.
22:03
Speaker 2: And eight point four K nine, So pretty solid season,
22:06
Speaker 2: but ended on.
22:08
Speaker 1: A sour note in terms of well, not only the
22:10
Speaker 1: Freddie Freeman homer, but he had his elbow was barking
22:14
Speaker 1: down the stretch and there were reports that even like
22:17
Speaker 1: when he was pitching during the playoffs and kind of
22:20
Speaker 1: like was added to the roster, he didn't necessarily think
22:24
Speaker 1: he was in the best of health, which is from
22:26
Speaker 1: a pitcher who usually like they're bulldogs, you can't ever
22:29
Speaker 1: remove them from games. For someone to openly talk about
22:32
Speaker 1: that is really concerning. And on top of it, right
22:36
Speaker 1: now roster resource has him slotted in is only the
22:40
Speaker 1: fifth starter for the Brewers, which is kind of amazing.
22:42
Speaker 1: But there's also a few i would say pieces of
22:46
Speaker 1: wish casting there that Brandon wood Druff has slotted or
22:50
Speaker 1: slotted in as the second starter there, there's already reports
22:55
Speaker 1: that he might not be ready for the start of
22:56
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five. You still have Tobias Myers, who's coming
23:00
Speaker 1: off of that kind of magical season, and Aaron Savali
23:03
Speaker 1: who is up and down. So I think Cortes will
23:06
Speaker 1: always have a pathway to a rotation spot with the Brewers.
23:10
Speaker 1: But health is going to be a question. And you've
23:13
Speaker 1: talked a little bit about the parks, But what do
23:15
Speaker 1: you think Cortes can do with the Brewers and moving
23:18
Speaker 1: to the in nol Central. Yeah, I mean you may
23:21
Speaker 1: have over read me earlier.
23:22
Speaker 3: Like when I talk about the park factors, I feel
23:24
Speaker 3: like people are gonna think it's a better move than
23:26
Speaker 3: it really is, because on the surface, Yankee Stadium is
23:30
Speaker 3: much tougher on pitchers than Milwaukee. The big caveat being
23:36
Speaker 3: from a home run perspective, Milwaukee is not that much
23:40
Speaker 3: different than Yankee Stadium from actual park factor perspective. And
23:43
Speaker 3: if there's one thing that Nester Cortez does is he
23:45
Speaker 3: puts the ball in the air a lot. And I
23:48
Speaker 3: think that's gonna hurt him because he's not taking advantage
23:51
Speaker 3: of the rest of what plays well in Milwaukee. Everything
23:54
Speaker 3: else does better in Milwaukee than Yankee Stending, except for
23:57
Speaker 3: home runs, is relatively similar. So I look at that
24:01
Speaker 3: and that that concerns me because that's the one thing
24:04
Speaker 3: that he's trying to do. He's a fly ball pitcher.
24:07
Speaker 3: He's not a high velocity guy. He's a kind of
24:10
Speaker 3: control guy, and frankly, he's had a decent amount of
24:14
Speaker 3: luck in his career, and it is not hard to
24:16
Speaker 3: look at him and be like, hey, if you just
24:18
Speaker 3: regress a little bit the home run for fly ball
24:20
Speaker 3: rate or your babyip or something like that, yeah you're
24:24
Speaker 3: gonna You're gonna get hit hard. And so I look
24:27
Speaker 3: at that plus an injury risk, and I'm I'm sticking
24:29
Speaker 3: pretty far away from Nestor Cortez and I don't think
24:34
Speaker 3: it's even a question, Like I don't know that I
24:36
Speaker 3: mad even draft him, and even if he was towards
24:39
Speaker 3: the end of the draft, just because I don't feel
24:42
Speaker 3: comfortable that he gives enough upside over the injury risk
24:46
Speaker 3: and over what I see as a pretty low floor
24:50
Speaker 3: for a pitcher that's frankly, you know, been up and
24:53
Speaker 3: down his career, and he capped out one hundred and
24:56
Speaker 3: seventy four Indians last year, which is his highest inning
24:59
Speaker 3: total of his career.
25:00
Speaker 2: He's only why the elbow was barking.
25:02
Speaker 3: Yep, it's only been over one hundred year. It means
25:05
Speaker 3: one other time, So like it definitely there's question marks
25:09
Speaker 3: there for me. So I'm I think you know he's
25:12
Speaker 3: gonna get a marking up arrow, but I think it's
25:15
Speaker 3: uh level or down at the end of the day
25:18
Speaker 3: for me.
25:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think there's a pathway to maybe like
25:21
Speaker 1: greater ceiling, but like you said, the floor is pretty low,
25:24
Speaker 1: and it's certainly somebody who I want to see perform
25:27
Speaker 1: a little bit in spring training and in season to
25:30
Speaker 1: make sure that elbow is feeling good for Nestor Cortez.
25:32
Speaker 1: So I think more of a watch and see, But
25:35
Speaker 1: if he starts performing out the gate, then I think
25:37
Speaker 1: he's a pretty easy back end kind of pick up
25:39
Speaker 1: because he's going to be sitting kind of on that
25:42
Speaker 1: that Teeter Totter I think of roster rostered and unrostered
25:46
Speaker 1: going into the season. So let's have the Caleb Durbin discussion,
25:51
Speaker 1: because I think we were going to eventually get to
25:52
Speaker 1: this point as he was a standout in the Arizona
25:57
Speaker 1: Fall League led.
25:58
Speaker 2: That league in steals.
26:00
Speaker 1: Is this little scrappy second baseman infielder. I think he,
26:06
Speaker 1: I mean, he should end up opening the season for
26:08
Speaker 1: the Brewers. It looks like currently roster resource has him
26:12
Speaker 1: slated on the bench, but the Brewers have always kind
26:16
Speaker 1: of mixed and matched up the middle and into the
26:18
Speaker 1: infield in terms of, you know, he doesn't have too
26:21
Speaker 1: many huge hurdles in front of him. With Bryce Terrain,
26:24
Speaker 1: who I think was actually kind of in this mold
26:27
Speaker 1: of Caleb Durban and broke out with a fifty stolen
26:29
Speaker 1: based season last year, Joey Ortiz, Oliver Dunn's there, Tyra
26:34
Speaker 1: Blacks in the mix. Andrew Monasterio I think is still
26:37
Speaker 1: hanging out somewhere on this roster. Yeah, there he is
26:39
Speaker 1: down in triple A. So I think Durbin enters this mix.
26:44
Speaker 1: But do you think there's enough in the profile from
26:47
Speaker 1: Durban to be like a dart throw on draft Day?
26:51
Speaker 1: Because of that speed that Like, do you think that
26:54
Speaker 1: there's enough power in the bat to sustain him enough
26:57
Speaker 1: just in his overall off offensive profile that would make
27:01
Speaker 1: it worth owning for the steals.
27:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, He's one of those interesting guys that like, I'm
27:09
Speaker 3: I'm tempted. I'm just tempted because it's not hard to
27:12
Speaker 3: look at and be like, man, how did I miss
27:14
Speaker 3: this guy? Because he could hit two ninety and steal
27:17
Speaker 3: forty bases and you're not like you look at his
27:19
Speaker 3: minor numbers and you look at things like that you're like, oh,
27:22
Speaker 3: why did I not see this coming? But also there's
27:25
Speaker 3: very little like pedigree to him. There's been very little
27:29
Speaker 3: like helium in his name and scouting reports things like that.
27:32
Speaker 3: And he's he's a small guy, like I think, is
27:35
Speaker 3: he what five six? Like that's a small dude. And
27:44
Speaker 3: you know he's that like Tyler O'Neill without the power
27:50
Speaker 3: something like that. So I think he's he's interesting. And
27:54
Speaker 3: I love that the Brewers will take advantage of that speed.
27:57
Speaker 3: They will let him run wild, like kind of like
27:59
Speaker 3: Bryce trained it for this last year. But I also
28:04
Speaker 3: they just don't seem to want to like give a
28:06
Speaker 3: guy like that a full leash, and so it'll be
28:09
Speaker 3: very very interesting. I like him as a late round
28:12
Speaker 3: start for Brow, especially in deep leagues, just to see
28:15
Speaker 3: because you're not really gonna be out anything, but it's
28:19
Speaker 3: not hard to see if he hits and he's got
28:21
Speaker 3: enough little pop that you're not gonna you're not looking
28:24
Speaker 3: at kind of like uh Luis Ariah's situation with steels
28:28
Speaker 3: and no power and you know some average you know,
28:33
Speaker 3: you're not looking at that kind of empty, empty profile.
28:36
Speaker 3: So I'm slightly intrigued, but it doesn't feel right. It
28:39
Speaker 3: is kind of where I'm landing.
28:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think I'm kind of in the same
28:44
Speaker 1: boat where like I can see it working. I just
28:47
Speaker 1: like it's gonna take a lot of little dominoes to
28:51
Speaker 1: fall for it all to work out, and certainly there
28:54
Speaker 1: is a pathway, but I'm not gonna put too many
28:57
Speaker 1: eggs in that basket over all that. Like, you know,
29:00
Speaker 1: maybe I'll take a dart throw here or there in
29:03
Speaker 1: some of the deeper leagues like you're talking about, but
29:05
Speaker 1: certainly not somebody I think you can rely on at
29:08
Speaker 1: this point unless we see otherwise coming into the spring,
29:12
Speaker 1: where you know, if he is opening and playing every
29:15
Speaker 1: day at second base, because I do think they probably,
29:19
Speaker 1: like Oliver Dune is slated there now, but he's not good.
29:24
Speaker 1: Like I think that if the Brewers had their way,
29:27
Speaker 1: they would get a Caleb Durban kind of breakout ish
29:31
Speaker 1: where they can put Durban at second, terrain at short
29:34
Speaker 1: and or Tease at third base. That that's how they
29:37
Speaker 1: would love to construct this team. But even the Brewers
29:40
Speaker 1: themselves aren't too sure. So it's one of those kind
29:43
Speaker 1: of I think we'll have to see a little more
29:46
Speaker 1: how it unfolds going.
29:47
Speaker 2: Into the spring.
29:48
Speaker 3: Yeah. I wouldn't give a second thoughts to Durban until
29:51
Speaker 3: you kind of know what's happening with that roster. Like
29:53
Speaker 3: if he's making noise in the spring training dark, throw
29:56
Speaker 3: the dark, throw the dark. If he's not getting at bats,
29:59
Speaker 3: he's not much move on like that. That's it's that
30:02
Speaker 3: simple to me.
30:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, so, okay, let's move on to another
30:06
Speaker 1: trade the Yankees made, which I guess I did these chronologically,
30:09
Speaker 1: but I probably should have sandwiched them the other way
30:11
Speaker 1: because the Cubs were involved in this trade as well.
30:14
Speaker 2: Just like the Kyle Tucker trade.
30:16
Speaker 1: This seemed inevitable once Tucker was moved over to the
30:20
Speaker 1: North side of Chicago that Cody Bellinger was the writing
30:24
Speaker 1: was on the wall that he needed to leave town,
30:27
Speaker 1: and especially since in the Tucker trade, the Cubs were
30:30
Speaker 1: trying to move either Bellinger or say a Suzuki and
30:33
Speaker 1: get an outfield or flushed out so that they could
30:35
Speaker 1: bring Tucker in. Like I said, they certainly freed up
30:38
Speaker 1: third base for Matt Shaw, so he's another big winner here.
30:42
Speaker 1: But Bellinger was moved to the Yankees straight up for
30:45
Speaker 1: Cody Petit and the Cubs even kicked in five million
30:48
Speaker 1: bucks to make it happen, So essentially it was a
30:51
Speaker 1: salary dump to get Cody Bellinger out of town. And
30:55
Speaker 1: this one, I think is going to be a pretty
30:57
Speaker 1: significant upgrade to Cody Bellinger's overall profile, because I mean, one,
31:02
Speaker 1: he also like just hit like crap at home. Last
31:06
Speaker 1: year he hit two forty seven at home with just
31:09
Speaker 1: eight homers and three stolen bases. It was I don't
31:14
Speaker 1: know if he just has issues like seeing the ball
31:17
Speaker 1: outside in Wrigley or you know, maybe the extra curricular
31:22
Speaker 1: activities he had access to in Illinois compared to other places.
31:27
Speaker 1: But Cody Bellinger is coming off a pretty tough year,
31:30
Speaker 1: gets a really nice upgrade to be able to hit
31:33
Speaker 1: it in Yankee Stadium, get a chance at that short
31:36
Speaker 1: porch and right field. Well, we did our off season
31:39
Speaker 1: previews last year for free agency, I thought Bellinger would
31:42
Speaker 1: go to the Yankees and it kind of always seemed
31:44
Speaker 1: like a nevill fit. Also allows Aaron Judge to move
31:47
Speaker 1: over to right field, so lots of cascading great effects
31:50
Speaker 1: here for the Yankees. Do you think that like Cody
31:53
Speaker 1: Bellinger can return to useful form I would say in
31:58
Speaker 1: the Yankees because he was pretty bad last year from
32:01
Speaker 1: where we're taking him at taking him in fantasy draft.
32:03
Speaker 1: But do you think that there's like another mid thirties
32:06
Speaker 1: homer profile or like season in his profile now that
32:10
Speaker 1: he is playing in the Bronx.
32:14
Speaker 3: I think it's possible. I also think it's doubtful. Like
32:17
Speaker 3: I that's kind of where I'm with Belinger. It just
32:19
Speaker 3: it just seems that he's lost his way over the
32:22
Speaker 3: last few years, and the quality of contact and kind
32:27
Speaker 3: of even just his uh willingness and ability to not
32:32
Speaker 3: chase the bad pitch has just not been there. And
32:35
Speaker 3: so he's he's a profile now that he can't You
32:39
Speaker 3: can't look at him as potentially a three hundred hitter.
32:42
Speaker 3: You can't look at those a guy that can steal
32:44
Speaker 3: maybe twenty or thirty bases. You can't look at those
32:46
Speaker 3: guys that can still you know, hit thirty home runs
32:48
Speaker 3: like they're one of those might happen, but it's not
32:51
Speaker 3: across the board, like and that's that's the problem I
32:53
Speaker 3: have with him. And it's I hate to say it,
32:58
Speaker 3: but like if a team like the Cubs are trying
33:01
Speaker 3: to get rid of them, what why would you want
33:06
Speaker 3: to really jump in too much, Like they just gave
33:09
Speaker 3: the guy away and tried to move some money with him.
33:14
Speaker 3: So I think it's a warning sign that the potential
33:18
Speaker 3: is there, but the cost is I think, what's really
33:21
Speaker 3: gonna hold me back? Because I can squint and I
33:23
Speaker 3: can say, yes, Cody Bellinger has been there before, he
33:26
Speaker 3: could do it again, better playing, situation, more confidence, team
33:30
Speaker 3: wants him, all those things. But at the end of
33:32
Speaker 3: the day, he's still, you know, going off the board
33:37
Speaker 3: in kind of like the tenth round. And that's too
33:41
Speaker 3: much for me, Like, that's just too much for a
33:44
Speaker 3: guy that you're hoping for. And I think you're gonna
33:46
Speaker 3: find a lot of other useful and interesting guys at
33:50
Speaker 3: the draft table around around Cody Cody Bellinger. I mean,
33:53
Speaker 3: he's twenty eighth outfielder off the board. I'm like, I'm
33:59
Speaker 3: looking at some names after him, like a Randy Rose Arena,
34:02
Speaker 3: which I get Randy has had a hard time at
34:04
Speaker 3: the end of the year there, But you've got even
34:07
Speaker 3: a Dollas Garcia. You can talk about Mike Trout, you
34:11
Speaker 3: can talk about Costiano's Carrie Carpenter that there's just plenty
34:16
Speaker 3: of other names that feel in the same ballpark, why
34:21
Speaker 3: waste the pick on Belger at that point, So I'm
34:25
Speaker 3: kind of down on him and this isn't really changing
34:28
Speaker 3: my mind.
34:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think I'm there with you.
34:32
Speaker 2: Obviously.
34:33
Speaker 1: I think he's got a bump up in value from
34:35
Speaker 1: where he was, but then you added Yankees tacks, and
34:38
Speaker 1: I think the price is going to get a little
34:40
Speaker 1: bit unreasonable throughout draft season. I mean, there is one
34:44
Speaker 1: spot where I'm looking to keep him in one of
34:47
Speaker 1: our leagues where he's a really cheap keeper, and like
34:50
Speaker 1: that is where I'm going to take probably a shot
34:53
Speaker 1: at him just because like I have him for just
34:55
Speaker 1: like a few bucks. And so it's that's if you're
34:58
Speaker 1: in that situation, I think that it's great because you
35:02
Speaker 1: can take that chance, you know, and not have to
35:05
Speaker 1: pay because I think he's probably gonna end up. He
35:09
Speaker 1: said he's twenty eighth right now, I'm just trying to
35:13
Speaker 1: think of where that is. So he's going like one
35:16
Speaker 1: hundred and twentieth, so he's in the twelfth round. Like
35:19
Speaker 1: I think he's going to move into the top one
35:21
Speaker 1: hundred draft picks here moving to the Yankees. That that
35:24
Speaker 1: seems like a foregone conclusion, and you can't count on
35:27
Speaker 1: those stolen bases anymore. That this just does feel like
35:30
Speaker 1: a case of ever since he got that elbow or
35:34
Speaker 1: the shoulder injury from the celebration in the twenty twenty
35:38
Speaker 1: World Series, you can just see the barrel rate's gone,
35:41
Speaker 1: and I think his entire power profile has disappeared with that.
35:45
Speaker 1: So until we actually see that barrel rate bounce back
35:50
Speaker 1: at all, that I think this is who Belener is
35:53
Speaker 1: in terms of like a I mean, in Yankee Stadium,
35:56
Speaker 1: is probably going to hit thirty homers, but if you
35:58
Speaker 1: put him in a neutral park, you're looking like twenty
36:00
Speaker 1: twenty five homers, like a two fifty ish average, and
36:03
Speaker 1: the stolen bases have dried up. So like he's kind
36:05
Speaker 1: of like terrible Brandon Nemo like, which you know doesn't
36:12
Speaker 1: excite anybody. That's the type of player that always falls.
36:14
Speaker 1: It's just that Cody Belender's name is attached to that profile.
36:17
Speaker 3: Now, yep, I couldn't agree more.
36:20
Speaker 1: Okay, next transaction we have I think is near and
36:23
Speaker 1: dear to our heart because we talked about him when
36:25
Speaker 1: he was posted at the beginning of this offseason. It
36:28
Speaker 1: is legendary Japanese pitcher from MPB, Tomoyoki Sugano signing with
36:35
Speaker 1: the Baltimore Orioles and coming over. He has won I
36:39
Speaker 1: believe two MVPs over in NPB, so this is essentially
36:42
Speaker 1: like I would call him like the Greg Maddix of MVB.
36:46
Speaker 2: Honestly of Japanese baseball.
36:48
Speaker 1: He's been always way more of a control artist than
36:51
Speaker 1: like a strikeout guy, and just kind of that like
36:54
Speaker 1: bulldog mentality for the Yuman Yuri Giants throughout his career.
36:59
Speaker 1: He is coming over as an age thirty five season,
37:03
Speaker 1: so that's what he'll be entering, and it's a pretty
37:07
Speaker 1: nice landing spot I think for him overall in terms
37:09
Speaker 1: of great team situation, for the wins.
37:13
Speaker 3: Great.
37:15
Speaker 1: I mean, the ballpark's not as good as it was
37:17
Speaker 1: as they've moved in Mount Baltimore, but I mean still
37:21
Speaker 1: certainly I think it's going to be a little bit
37:24
Speaker 1: more of like a neutral park with that, it's not
37:26
Speaker 1: going to go back to a hitters haven, and you're
37:29
Speaker 1: just it's a great opportunity. I don't think that there's
37:31
Speaker 1: any chance that Sugano doesn't like just get a rotation
37:37
Speaker 1: spot in Baltimore.
37:38
Speaker 2: And not hold it down all seasons.
37:40
Speaker 1: So I think the question mark here probably going forward
37:43
Speaker 1: is going to be what does the k rate look
37:46
Speaker 1: like as he as it translates over from Japan. He
37:50
Speaker 1: put up a k rate of just six point four.
37:53
Speaker 2: Last year in in the.
37:56
Speaker 1: MPB, but came with a one sixty seven ERA and
37:59
Speaker 1: one hundred fieft two thirds innings of work. It is
38:03
Speaker 1: a little bit of like a dead ball period over
38:04
Speaker 1: in Japan, so kind of keep that in mind. But
38:07
Speaker 1: this is a really fantastic pitcher, and so what do
38:10
Speaker 1: you think he can do coming over to MLB here?
38:12
Speaker 3: Brow, Yeah, you're right, it was all right you call
38:16
Speaker 3: out the right pieces here. He's a very interesting pitcher
38:18
Speaker 3: because you know, he is historically proven across his career.
38:22
Speaker 3: He can keep the runs down, he can keep the
38:24
Speaker 3: ball in the ballpark, and can keep his whip down.
38:27
Speaker 3: But he doesn't strike anybody out. And if you're playing
38:30
Speaker 3: a roto game, that's a big old penalty. That's a
38:33
Speaker 3: real big penalty. And the guys that are kind of
38:37
Speaker 3: like this are going very far down in draft boards.
38:41
Speaker 3: And I have to think that Sugano, based on coming
38:44
Speaker 3: out over he's a new shiny toy even Aga did
38:48
Speaker 3: really well last year with what I would argue is
38:50
Speaker 3: a better profile for MLB at a younger age. I
38:54
Speaker 3: think Sugano is going to get more helium than it's
38:57
Speaker 3: worth and people are going to just try to look
39:00
Speaker 3: the other way because of those low strikeouts, and I
39:02
Speaker 3: think he's gonna be more susceptible than some of those
39:06
Speaker 3: other guys that came over that had that strikeout ability
39:08
Speaker 3: and can get themselves out of jams. If he's relying
39:11
Speaker 3: on contact soft contact, you got deeper lineups, you got
39:15
Speaker 3: more power. I think it's it's gonna be it's gonna
39:18
Speaker 3: be tough, and you just have to look at that
39:21
Speaker 3: aging curve man come over at thirty five, like that's
39:26
Speaker 3: that's that's a tough spot for pictures. And he's got
39:30
Speaker 3: he's got money in the bank, like he's he's proven
39:32
Speaker 3: everything he needs to over there. So I hate to
39:34
Speaker 3: root against the guy, but I'm just not that excited
39:37
Speaker 3: about it, and so maybe maybe I'm a little too
39:40
Speaker 3: sour here, but I look at a guy like this,
39:42
Speaker 3: and there's very few times but I do kind of
39:46
Speaker 3: I call black ball players when I draft. If you
39:48
Speaker 3: do something, you know a certain skill so poorly that
39:52
Speaker 3: it is a negative impact of my team. I won't
39:54
Speaker 3: touch you. That's why I can't stand Louis Riahs. That's
39:58
Speaker 3: that's why you know I never draft drafted Joe Bigallo.
40:01
Speaker 3: That's why I probably won't draft to Sigano because he
40:04
Speaker 3: is going to like unless you have like seven Spencer
40:08
Speaker 3: striders on your team, the healthy versions, then it's gonna
40:13
Speaker 3: be hard to overcome the penalty that he brings, especially
40:16
Speaker 3: in your Indian cap leagues.
40:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think that's fair. I think that's probably
40:21
Speaker 1: where Sigano is on my list too. That like a
40:24
Speaker 1: streamer certainly, Like I'm interested in two start weeks and
40:27
Speaker 1: things like that, but if you're in any sort of
40:29
Speaker 1: league with like a K nine category or a strikeout
40:33
Speaker 1: rate category, it's a non starter right now. That like,
40:37
Speaker 1: unless there's something that changes in the profile and the
40:40
Speaker 1: Orioles unlock something which is not probably gonna happen with
40:44
Speaker 1: a thirty five year old. I think a better in
40:47
Speaker 1: real life story in IRL situation than it is for fantasy.
40:52
Speaker 1: On top of you know, I think from Baseball cards too,
40:57
Speaker 1: it's gonna be obviously I think a fun because there
41:01
Speaker 1: is I think a pathway for Sigano to be a
41:05
Speaker 1: great pitcher, but just without the strikeouts. And if that happens,
41:10
Speaker 1: like you're looking at somebody who might find his way
41:14
Speaker 1: stumble his way into a Workie of the year because
41:16
Speaker 1: he just pitches all season, picks up, you know, mid teens,
41:20
Speaker 1: wins for the Orioles, and just grinds his way through
41:23
Speaker 1: an entire twenty twenty five.
41:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, it might kind of start to bring take away
41:27
Speaker 3: from the he could be a really really useful ball player.
41:30
Speaker 3: And I think that that's the point here, is that
41:32
Speaker 3: he could end up winning twelve fifteen games with a
41:37
Speaker 3: reasonable er and keep the whip low and go deep
41:40
Speaker 3: into games like. Those things can all happen. It doesn't
41:42
Speaker 3: mean he's gonna be valuable in the fantasy game, and
41:44
Speaker 3: this kind of profile creates that to buy. But you're right,
41:47
Speaker 3: it would be really interesting from that card perspective because
41:51
Speaker 3: the cards are gonna be hard to find. There's not
41:53
Speaker 3: gonna be as many out there. So if he does
41:56
Speaker 3: kind of bring kind his bulldog mentality over from all
41:59
Speaker 3: success and pay it just starts bowling through teams with
42:02
Speaker 3: like ground balls, it'd be really interesting to see how
42:06
Speaker 3: that card market reacts to that kind of picture after
42:08
Speaker 3: what we've seen with Imonaga and Yamn Moto.
42:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I mean, I'm gonna watch as many Sugano
42:14
Speaker 1: starts as I can during the season, like I think
42:16
Speaker 1: it's gonna be fantastic watching such a legend pitch. But yeah,
42:20
Speaker 1: I'm a little bummed that I can't Adam to all
42:23
Speaker 1: my fantasy teams too.
42:24
Speaker 3: Oh, you absolutely can't have no problem.
42:26
Speaker 2: Okay, I appreciate that.
42:29
Speaker 1: All right, we got one more transaction, and this is
42:32
Speaker 1: the trade. The race sent Jeffrey Springs and Jacob Lopez
42:37
Speaker 1: over to the Athletics in exchange for Joe Boyle, Jacob Waters,
42:44
Speaker 1: utility man Will Simpson, and a competitive balance pick. And
42:48
Speaker 1: so I'm just gonna lay it bare. I don't I
42:52
Speaker 1: hate this for Jeffrey Springs. And I don't think I
42:54
Speaker 1: really was into Jeffrey Springs coming into twenty twenty five
42:57
Speaker 1: because last year the stuff has not come back. After
43:02
Speaker 1: that second Tommy John surgery, the fastball averaged less than
43:05
Speaker 1: ninety miles per an hour. Certainly it was a little
43:08
Speaker 1: he wasn't you know, like a huge flamethrower before that,
43:11
Speaker 1: it was like ninety one ninety two, but it just
43:14
Speaker 1: did not look great and it looked like he was
43:16
Speaker 1: really struggling when he was out there and on the mound.
43:19
Speaker 1: The walk rate it was it was reasonable with three
43:23
Speaker 1: walks per nine, but that's over thirty three innings, and
43:27
Speaker 1: that's especially I think how Jeffrey Springs was finding success
43:30
Speaker 1: there for a couple of years, and like twenty one
43:33
Speaker 1: twenty two is like keeping a mini school walk Great,
43:37
Speaker 1: Now you're moving to the Athletics, who are playing in
43:39
Speaker 1: a rough minor league ballpark. Any interest in your end
43:44
Speaker 1: for jeff Springs on the Athletics.
43:47
Speaker 3: I got a little interest, And it's just because it
43:51
Speaker 3: seems that almost every time he's been fully healthy and pitching,
43:55
Speaker 3: he's been really really good. And yeah, his fastball of
43:58
Speaker 3: offices he dropped off. Not surprised it dropped off, as
44:02
Speaker 3: he was kind of recovering and trying to come back,
44:04
Speaker 3: and so yeah, I can see that coming back. But
44:07
Speaker 3: yet he's not. He's not going to play at Oakland
44:09
Speaker 3: like you would like to to see. So I definitely
44:13
Speaker 3: am willing to take a flyer on Springs because I
44:15
Speaker 3: think there is a really big upside if it all
44:17
Speaker 3: works out. But it very could well could go the
44:20
Speaker 3: other way very quickly, So I like that that potential.
44:24
Speaker 3: The biggest attraction I actually have is that the Rays
44:27
Speaker 3: straight away Jeffrey Springs, Yeah, for Joe Boyle, and they
44:32
Speaker 3: saw basically they see more and boiled than they do
44:35
Speaker 3: in Springs. I get we're you know, we're probably talking
44:38
Speaker 3: salaries and some other things in there as well, but
44:41
Speaker 3: that that's kind of a you know, a red check
44:45
Speaker 3: against Springs here, So there's some warning signs. I would
44:49
Speaker 3: still be willing to invest to him late in drafts
44:52
Speaker 3: and take flyers things like that when you're getting to
44:54
Speaker 3: that part of the draft where you're putaking guys that
44:55
Speaker 3: are just ben sure trying to maybe be the back
44:59
Speaker 3: of the irrotation. There's enough upside in Springs that if
45:01
Speaker 3: it works out, you'd be very very happy. If it doesn't,
45:04
Speaker 3: you move on with life, and you know you're none
45:06
Speaker 3: worse for the wear. So there's a spot in them
45:08
Speaker 3: for me. But I'm also the guy that tends to
45:11
Speaker 3: draft all the injured pitchers.
45:12
Speaker 1: So yes, exactly, Yeah, I think you have kind of, yeah,
45:18
Speaker 1: made all the right points, and especially the Rays are
45:21
Speaker 1: moving on from Jeffrey Springs. That's not necessarily great sign
45:23
Speaker 1: and the A's are just in pure salary acquisition mode
45:29
Speaker 1: as they are trying to avoid a labor agreements from
45:33
Speaker 1: the union in terms of where their payrolls have been.
45:37
Speaker 1: So like, that's I think a portion of this you
45:39
Speaker 1: did hear a little bit on Joe Boyle. I do
45:41
Speaker 1: want to just kind of highlight and star him a
45:44
Speaker 1: little bit because the stuff is super nasty. The strikeouts
45:47
Speaker 1: are there, but this dude cannot hit the broadside of
45:51
Speaker 1: a barn like right now. I do wonder if the
45:54
Speaker 1: Rays tweaked that at all. I mean, I'm not going
45:57
Speaker 1: to be the only person on Joe Boyle. Every buddy
46:00
Speaker 1: and their mother will be in on Joe Boyle considering
46:03
Speaker 1: where the stuff is.
46:04
Speaker 2: But certainly, if you're in a league where.
46:07
Speaker 1: You know, maybe you feel that some of your other
46:10
Speaker 1: league mates are not always up to speed on players
46:13
Speaker 1: like Joe Boyle, watch him going into next year because
46:16
Speaker 1: if he can cut that k rate even.
46:18
Speaker 3: To like.
46:20
Speaker 1: Four and a half per nine, I think he becomes
46:23
Speaker 1: a useful pitcher just because of the strikeouts.
46:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I think that he's one of those that
46:29
Speaker 3: it's a tweak or two away and if you make
46:32
Speaker 3: those tweaks or two and if there's a team that's
46:34
Speaker 3: gonna do it, it's Tampa. So I think that there's definitely
46:37
Speaker 3: some intrigue there. I feel like both of these guys
46:40
Speaker 3: are in the watch list category, Like, let's see what happens.
46:43
Speaker 3: Let's see the spring is healthy as Boil makes a shift,
46:46
Speaker 3: either one of those takes place, and I'm a lot
46:48
Speaker 3: more interested in him.
46:50
Speaker 2: Okay, well, let's get into a little bit of card news.
46:52
Speaker 1: So the first piece we kind of have is we're
46:55
Speaker 1: falling back up on our twenty twenty four Bowman Draft
46:59
Speaker 1: talk where we went over that overview of the checklist
47:02
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago. When we went through that discussion,
47:07
Speaker 1: there were no legend cards on the checklist at all,
47:10
Speaker 1: and so some of them have surfaced in the meantime.
47:12
Speaker 1: One is it's such a gimmick. It's We've talked a
47:16
Speaker 1: little bit offline about how just not great this is.
47:21
Speaker 1: It's just a total retread of last year's Tom Brady
47:25
Speaker 1: gimmicky rookie card with the expos that they put in
47:28
Speaker 1: Bowman Draft, which actually we were in favor of because
47:31
Speaker 1: it brought a little bit of life to Bowman Draft
47:33
Speaker 1: and really made the chase fun. But this year they
47:36
Speaker 1: did a total retread with just John Elway, so like
47:40
Speaker 1: it's like a hey, you know, we have food at
47:43
Speaker 1: Home version of Tom Brady, where like they tried to
47:47
Speaker 1: shoehorn the exact same gimmick in to the product, but
47:51
Speaker 1: like with a lesser name, jacked up the prices.
47:54
Speaker 2: And so.
47:56
Speaker 1: Anything that you have to say on this John Elway
47:58
Speaker 1: card and any any chance that you actually might be
48:02
Speaker 1: chasing it in terms of, like, you know, it's in
48:05
Speaker 1: a Yankees uniform, so it's got a little bit of
48:07
Speaker 1: that Yankees text that do you think that there's actually
48:10
Speaker 1: interest in the market for this card?
48:12
Speaker 3: The only reason I'd be chasing is to sell it,
48:14
Speaker 3: Like I just it's it's it's it just doesn't you know,
48:18
Speaker 3: feel right. I'd much rather have, uh, say, like a
48:21
Speaker 3: Russell Wilson, like a true like crossover a card between
48:26
Speaker 3: the sports, and it just it feels, like I said,
48:28
Speaker 3: it feels like they're just like we talked about last week,
48:31
Speaker 3: they're just like the Brady thing went really well, how
48:33
Speaker 3: else can we do the same thing again? And it
48:35
Speaker 3: just feels forced. It feels forced, And so because of that.
48:38
Speaker 3: I just I have no interest in the l way
48:41
Speaker 3: and you know, somebody's gonna make some nice money off it.
48:44
Speaker 3: I just I just don't see it really being exciting
48:47
Speaker 3: for folks out there.
48:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so that card is now in the checklists
48:52
Speaker 1: that have been updated out there.
48:54
Speaker 2: I've been looking.
48:55
Speaker 1: Nobody has updated their checklist for the other kind of
48:58
Speaker 1: chase card that came out in terms of retro factor,
49:00
Speaker 1: which is kind of crazy. I was like pouring back through,
49:04
Speaker 1: like even the marketing materials from tops because typically they've
49:07
Speaker 1: been really just hamming up the advertising of these retrofractor cards.
49:13
Speaker 1: If you think about when they first came out with
49:16
Speaker 1: like Roberto Clemente and Johnny Bench and when they did
49:19
Speaker 1: the Pete Rose ones and Luke Gerrig, they totally buried
49:24
Speaker 1: the lead on. There are Reggie Jackson retrofractor cards included
49:30
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty four Bowman draft. The super has already
49:33
Speaker 1: been pulled, and it was you know, shown on Reddit
49:36
Speaker 1: that I looked again on the Beckett checklist just today
49:41
Speaker 1: and the Reggie Jackson cards aren't in there. So I'm
49:44
Speaker 1: not totally sure like what parallels are out there of
49:46
Speaker 1: this card, And you know, how many autos versus like bass,
49:50
Speaker 1: But it doesn't seem that there's been too many polled,
49:53
Speaker 1: because otherwise they'd be surfacing a lot on Reddit in
49:56
Speaker 1: other places. But I just kind of wanted to give
49:58
Speaker 1: the heads up out there for our leader. Are our
50:03
Speaker 1: man in charge, Gray Albright. You've got some Reggie Jackson
50:07
Speaker 1: retro factors out there from twenty to twenty four Bowman
50:10
Speaker 1: draft to chase down and best of luck, it's.
50:14
Speaker 3: Only five million dollars in case you got a chance.
50:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, So, I mean it is.
50:21
Speaker 1: It does seem like it's going to be a trend
50:22
Speaker 1: going forward, but it's a little bit in like the
50:24
Speaker 1: John Elway vein where they're gonna start drying up on
50:27
Speaker 1: retro fractors here pretty quick that I think are desirable
50:30
Speaker 1: in the market. Like when I think about the next
50:33
Speaker 1: ones that will probably be in that tier, like they
50:36
Speaker 1: haven't released a Cardinals one, so I think the stand
50:39
Speaker 1: useral has got to be coming pretty soon, Like an
50:41
Speaker 1: Ernie Banks is coming pretty soon. You think about other
50:44
Speaker 1: legends that are still alive and can sign autographs. Nolan
50:48
Speaker 1: Ryan's got to be on there, like George Brett players
50:51
Speaker 1: like that. Who is there any retro factor that would
50:54
Speaker 1: actually like get you excited because I know, you know,
50:58
Speaker 1: reprints of players that have been long retired are exactly
51:02
Speaker 1: your jam. But is there a retrofractor out there that
51:05
Speaker 1: Bowman draft could move on to or Bowman in general that.
51:08
Speaker 2: Would just like get you.
51:11
Speaker 1: Overall like back in the game in terms of wanting
51:14
Speaker 1: to advertise and promote these things.
51:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm gonna go on the limb there and I'm
51:21
Speaker 3: gonna I'm gonna go between. The one that would really
51:23
Speaker 3: intrigue me would be a Ken Griffy Junior retrofractor. Okay,
51:29
Speaker 3: And so I'm not going way back. I'm not going
51:32
Speaker 3: to old because Griffy was right before that first Bowman
51:36
Speaker 3: time with that thing. I mean, there's Bowman cards of Griffy,
51:40
Speaker 3: but it wasn't his first Bowman. Like he didn't have
51:42
Speaker 3: the label, I didn't have the auto all those things.
51:45
Speaker 3: And if you talk about one of the best autocraps
51:47
Speaker 3: out in the game, it's King Griffy Junior. And so
51:50
Speaker 3: you can just see the amazing cards that that could create,
51:53
Speaker 3: and it could kind of bridge a little bit of
51:55
Speaker 3: that of that retro feel with the modern card. So
51:59
Speaker 3: if if you're trying to get me into that game,
52:01
Speaker 3: it's got to be something like that that's iconic. This
52:05
Speaker 3: is probably gonna sound really bad, and I apologize in
52:07
Speaker 3: advance for what I'm going to say. I do struggle
52:11
Speaker 3: with the autographs of the legends that you can just
52:13
Speaker 3: tell like it's not their signature, it's not their playing
52:16
Speaker 3: day's signature. And you can tell Reg Jackson's just he
52:19
Speaker 3: doesn't quite have it anymore as far as signing that card.
52:22
Speaker 3: And so you go back and I even see this
52:24
Speaker 3: in the in the card and the collectibles market. You
52:27
Speaker 3: can tell when the guy signed it during his playing
52:29
Speaker 3: days and in the beautiful signature it just flowed, and
52:32
Speaker 3: it's like that's just so much more desirable than a
52:34
Speaker 3: guy that was signing into his seventies and eighties. And
52:37
Speaker 3: I so appreciate the guys that signed all the way,
52:41
Speaker 3: you know, through their entire lifetime and just gave back
52:44
Speaker 3: to the hobby in the community. But if I'm looking
52:47
Speaker 3: to coglect a card, this represents your first Bowman card,
52:52
Speaker 3: it kind of like devalues it just a little bit
52:56
Speaker 3: for me because I'm looking for what would that would
52:58
Speaker 3: have been like, what it would have been when it is,
53:00
Speaker 3: and I feel like the only guy that can see
53:02
Speaker 3: kind of bridging that right now is Griffy. Ye. You
53:05
Speaker 3: could argue maybe a George Brad or something like that.
53:08
Speaker 3: You know, maybe they could still play that, but like
53:10
Speaker 3: there's just head and shoulders above Griffy for me. So
53:14
Speaker 3: I don't think it'll happen, but I'm my fingers crossed.
53:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's a good point that I think
53:20
Speaker 1: that's probably that would I really I think shake this
53:25
Speaker 1: up to the next level of something like that. The
53:27
Speaker 1: other one I can think of is like they don't
53:29
Speaker 1: ever put out like cards of dead ball players, like
53:32
Speaker 1: I would love an old Hoss Rod Radburn Bowman retrofracta
53:36
Speaker 1: like that would be Sick or King Kelly, some of
53:38
Speaker 1: those like really old old guys where honestly there's probably
53:42
Speaker 1: only like one picture to choose from, like that would
53:45
Speaker 1: be great. And more negro leagues, like they need to
53:48
Speaker 1: really be I think pushing the negro leagues, and this
53:50
Speaker 1: is the best platform for them to do it, and
53:54
Speaker 1: from a hobby perspective, And I don't know why they
53:57
Speaker 1: don't go that route as well too, that like it
53:59
Speaker 1: allows people to there just aren't a lot of Negro
54:02
Speaker 1: League's cards out there, so like it allows people to
54:05
Speaker 1: learn the history and actually start a collection with some
54:07
Speaker 1: of them, because I've been looking to do that as
54:10
Speaker 1: well too, Like I do collect more Josh Gibson's now
54:14
Speaker 1: that are even if there are like newer prints, but
54:17
Speaker 1: because like I want to build that and so if
54:19
Speaker 1: they did that with retro fractors, I think that's a
54:21
Speaker 1: perfect opportunity.
54:23
Speaker 3: I have to give you credit there because I am
54:26
Speaker 3: a sucker for the dead ball area. So so you
54:28
Speaker 3: throw me a Christy Matthewson and Walter Johnson, a naple
54:31
Speaker 3: of joy, a shoeless Joe, Like there's like because you're
54:36
Speaker 3: you're going that far back, it feels like you've kind
54:39
Speaker 3: of passed that odd oddity of like this guy is
54:42
Speaker 3: he gonna sign things like that and you're just going
54:45
Speaker 3: way way back. So that I'll give you credit there.
54:49
Speaker 3: I think I think you got a good idea.
54:51
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, well yeah, no, Old Hoss.
54:54
Speaker 1: I mean I guess they could get his ghost out
54:56
Speaker 1: and get him signing, but that that'd be uh. I mean,
54:58
Speaker 1: I'll sign them if they want to do like Santa Claus,
55:01
Speaker 1: Old Hoss relics with my signature, call me up.
55:03
Speaker 2: Tops.
55:05
Speaker 1: Okay, we do have a few changes to the baseball
55:08
Speaker 1: release calendar, so I will hit that real quick before
55:11
Speaker 1: we go into our break and return to talk about Autunue.
55:14
Speaker 2: So we still have.
55:16
Speaker 1: On twelve nineteen, so tomorrow that's also kind of a
55:19
Speaker 1: rare Thursday release. Tops Triple Threads will be hitting shelves,
55:23
Speaker 1: so that will be coming out as we get deep
55:26
Speaker 1: into the holiday season. Panini Prism finally coming out. It's
55:30
Speaker 1: coming out on Friday here the twentieth. We've got Bowman's
55:33
Speaker 1: Best still slated for the twenty seventh, the first twenty
55:37
Speaker 1: twenty four product that gets moved into the twenty twenty
55:40
Speaker 1: five calendar. Tops Archives people, it didn't seem like there
55:44
Speaker 1: was going to be back this year, but it is back,
55:47
Speaker 1: and it's just late in the calendar. Tops Archives is
55:49
Speaker 1: releasing on January fourth, and then we still have tbds
55:54
Speaker 1: on Tops, Lubinaries, and Tops Black and White, so keep
55:57
Speaker 1: your eyes open for those and see how many more
56:01
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four releases get pushed into twenty twenty five
56:04
Speaker 1: after we kind of come back from our holiday break
56:06
Speaker 1: next week. But we're kind of also running out of
56:09
Speaker 1: releases that there's not too many that I can think
56:12
Speaker 1: of that are holstered at this point, so tops to
56:14
Speaker 1: a pretty decent job of getting all those twenty twenty
56:16
Speaker 1: four products out in the year of their release. So,
56:20
Speaker 1: like I said, we're going to take a short break,
56:22
Speaker 1: but we will be back to discuss autonew. Stick around,
56:42
Speaker 1: hello and welcome back everybody, as we are going to
56:44
Speaker 1: get into some strategy talk of autonew So if you
56:48
Speaker 1: aren't familiar with what autonew is, it is a specific
56:52
Speaker 1: type of fantasy baseball dynasty that is run through Fangraphs,
56:57
Speaker 1: but it is kind of you know, can and run separately.
57:03
Speaker 1: What I think I love about AUTANU as just an
57:06
Speaker 1: overall system and set up for a fantasy baseball league
57:10
Speaker 1: is that it's relatively constrained, so like there aren't a
57:14
Speaker 1: lot of things that you can do in terms of
57:16
Speaker 1: customizing it for categories and rosters and all sorts of things.
57:20
Speaker 1: That the premise of it is that the rosters are
57:24
Speaker 1: supposed to mirror a real forty man roster in MLB,
57:28
Speaker 1: so you only have forty roster spots plus long term
57:33
Speaker 1: il like if you have a man on a guy
57:35
Speaker 1: in the sixty day IL, he doesn't count for your
57:37
Speaker 1: roster spot. Just like an MLB, you get a set
57:40
Speaker 1: four hundred dollars budget, but you can trade that budget
57:44
Speaker 1: back and forth between different teams. And then the other
57:48
Speaker 1: kind of interesting setup from the get go, I think
57:51
Speaker 1: is just the overall free agency system. That it's not
57:54
Speaker 1: like your traditional fab and you know waiver wire system.
57:59
Speaker 1: That it's an auction system. So if you want to
58:02
Speaker 1: add a player to your team during the season, you
58:04
Speaker 1: have to just nominate him and auction him and it's
58:07
Speaker 1: available to everybody, and then you have to use part
58:10
Speaker 1: of that four hundred dollars budget to be able to
58:12
Speaker 1: put him onto your roster. You've also got a few
58:15
Speaker 1: variation points in terms of rotisserie versus points leagues. So
58:21
Speaker 1: we've talked about the League of Autune that we're in,
58:24
Speaker 1: alluded to it on the podcast a few times over
58:28
Speaker 1: the year and a half we've been recording that we
58:31
Speaker 1: actually play in one of the rare roto leagues.
58:33
Speaker 2: So the more common one is the points league.
58:35
Speaker 1: So we will try to thread that needle here in
58:38
Speaker 1: this discussion between like the road o versus Points. But
58:41
Speaker 1: we know that lots of people are mostly in the
58:43
Speaker 1: points leagues, you get daily lineup moves.
58:46
Speaker 2: Oh, I guess I should also.
58:48
Speaker 1: Say yeah, everyone from our league league six to seven
58:50
Speaker 1: to two. Hello, we're gonna lay bare all of our strategies,
58:54
Speaker 1: so welcome to the podcast. I'm sure this will make
58:56
Speaker 1: its rounds to the.
58:57
Speaker 3: League, but I will absolutely regret everything.
59:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, Yeah, this is this is not going to
59:04
Speaker 1: help our off season trading move moves or anything like that.
59:07
Speaker 1: That Uh, there's no way I'm going to acquire any
59:09
Speaker 1: of the players that I'm going to suggest here because uh,
59:12
Speaker 1: we're about to just wax poetic about them for a
59:15
Speaker 1: little bit.
59:16
Speaker 2: Uh.
59:16
Speaker 1: The other off season transactions that I think are really
59:19
Speaker 1: interesting are there's an arbitration system, so at the end
59:22
Speaker 1: of every year there are salary bumps where everybody gets
59:25
Speaker 1: money to allocate to the to their league mates. And
59:28
Speaker 1: then this is how you know, you make sure that
59:32
Speaker 1: somebody like a one dollar La de la Cruz doesn't
59:36
Speaker 1: take forever to increase in price because the way Auto
59:40
Speaker 1: new is set up is you get automatic two dollars
59:42
Speaker 1: added to your price if you are in the major leagues,
59:45
Speaker 1: only one dollar if you're not in the major leagues,
59:49
Speaker 1: and so I think that gives kind of like an
59:51
Speaker 1: overview of some of these backgrounds in terms of the
59:53
Speaker 1: moves we're going to talk about, because I think especially
59:56
Speaker 1: that roster crunch and salary cap that you you have
1:00:00
Speaker 1: to deal with drives a lot of these off season
1:00:02
Speaker 1: decisions we're going to talk about in terms of targets
1:00:05
Speaker 1: that you want to look at to enhance your teams.
1:00:08
Speaker 1: But what are some of the other strategies that you
1:00:10
Speaker 1: kind of keep in mind as you're you know, toggling
1:00:14
Speaker 1: from regular standard five by five rodo into aut anew.
1:00:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean you cut out, you know. New is
1:00:22
Speaker 3: kind of a year round thing, which is one of
1:00:24
Speaker 3: the things that I absolutely love about it. You're always
1:00:27
Speaker 3: there's always something to be doing, whether you're in arbitration,
1:00:29
Speaker 3: whether you're in trade season, in the off season, whether
1:00:32
Speaker 3: you're a draft season. There's always something going on and
1:00:34
Speaker 3: there's these tough decisions you have to make. And one
1:00:38
Speaker 3: of the most exciting parts is draft season. And because
1:00:41
Speaker 3: you can go so many different ways. Initial draft is
1:00:43
Speaker 3: what you expect. It's a fantasy draft, it's an auction
1:00:47
Speaker 3: you're going you're going about it at the beginning of
1:00:49
Speaker 3: the beginning of your dynasty setting your team, but once
1:00:53
Speaker 3: you get through that, you have decisions you have to make,
1:00:56
Speaker 3: and as your league progresses, the the kind of there's
1:01:01
Speaker 3: an inflation aspect that hits all these players, and it's
1:01:05
Speaker 3: harder and harder to buy things at the draft, and
1:01:08
Speaker 3: people are holding players, people are hoarding the guys that
1:01:10
Speaker 3: you know they want to keep, and so you end
1:01:13
Speaker 3: up with really an interesting approach as you go through
1:01:15
Speaker 3: the off season of like how much do you want
1:01:18
Speaker 3: to play in the draft? Like do you want to
1:01:21
Speaker 3: tear this thing down because you got a four hundred
1:01:23
Speaker 3: dollars budget? Do you want to go into the draft
1:01:25
Speaker 3: with like three hundred dollars available and just play in
1:01:28
Speaker 3: the shallow end and go after everything? Right? Do you
1:01:30
Speaker 3: do you want to do that? Do you kind of
1:01:32
Speaker 3: want to go to the middle of the road and say, hey,
1:01:34
Speaker 3: I need I got a few things I need, so
1:01:36
Speaker 3: I want to I want to free up some money
1:01:38
Speaker 3: and not hold everything because I need to. I have
1:01:41
Speaker 3: a few needs that I want to go after. I've
1:01:42
Speaker 3: seen some guys cut that I'm curious. Or do you
1:01:45
Speaker 3: want to say I don't want to play that ball
1:01:47
Speaker 3: game because I know when you go to that draft table,
1:01:50
Speaker 3: there's like six teams that have all this money out
1:01:53
Speaker 3: there and there's two guys available, like and you know
1:01:58
Speaker 3: that you have to pay up and if you don't
1:02:00
Speaker 3: get the guy, it's over. I'm now picking from you
1:02:05
Speaker 3: know what's left. And so I think it's so interesting
1:02:08
Speaker 3: that the decision you have to make, and because the
1:02:12
Speaker 3: way atany works is there's a cut deadline at the
1:02:15
Speaker 3: end of January. Everybody has to make their cuts to
1:02:18
Speaker 3: get ready for draft season, and then you're kind of
1:02:21
Speaker 3: locked in with partial information because the trades aren't done.
1:02:25
Speaker 3: Offseason signings aren't done, injuries aren't fully vetted, closers don't
1:02:31
Speaker 3: have their roles, like, there's all these things that you
1:02:33
Speaker 3: have to make a call, and what does everybody do
1:02:36
Speaker 3: and not new they wait till eleven fifty nine on
1:02:39
Speaker 3: January thirty first to make their final cuts. You know,
1:02:42
Speaker 3: everybody's cutting a few guys here and there, like the
1:02:44
Speaker 3: obvious ones, but you don't always know what's going to
1:02:48
Speaker 3: be available in the draft to make your decision because
1:02:50
Speaker 3: everybody else doesn't know when they're trying to decide, And
1:02:53
Speaker 3: so I think it's really an interesting ballgame. And I've
1:02:55
Speaker 3: actually seen myself playing more and more of like I
1:02:58
Speaker 3: don't want anything to do with this draft, Like show
1:03:01
Speaker 3: up my backup catcher, like a minor league guy or
1:03:03
Speaker 3: something like that, and give me like fifty dollars to
1:03:06
Speaker 3: play with and let's see what happens. Like I'm like,
1:03:09
Speaker 3: sit there for like three hours and do nothing. Like
1:03:12
Speaker 3: I've almost gotten to that because it just feels like
1:03:14
Speaker 3: such a cutthroat game the longer and longer you league go.
1:03:19
Speaker 3: So I don't know where are you at in the
1:03:21
Speaker 3: strategy of drafting. Are you kind of a middle of
1:03:25
Speaker 3: the road guy or do you want to fill your
1:03:27
Speaker 3: roster going into the draft and just be very strategic
1:03:29
Speaker 3: and surgical or you like to tear it down and
1:03:32
Speaker 3: just go, hey, wi are the draft?
1:03:34
Speaker 2: Yeah?
1:03:34
Speaker 1: I mean I think a lot of this also depends
1:03:36
Speaker 1: on the maturity of your auto nee league. Like if
1:03:38
Speaker 1: you're in a new one, a brand new one starting up,
1:03:41
Speaker 1: or one that's just a year or two old, I
1:03:43
Speaker 1: think in that situation it makes more sense to tear
1:03:47
Speaker 1: down and because they're just be more available in the
1:03:52
Speaker 1: draft overall at right prices, and like because what happens
1:03:58
Speaker 1: is like if you're in a brand new one, like
1:04:00
Speaker 1: for instance, Shoheo Tani, like in our league, is criminally
1:04:06
Speaker 1: underpriced because when he was initially acquired back in twenty
1:04:09
Speaker 1: eighteen or whatever, it was under market value, and it
1:04:12
Speaker 1: just it takes forever, even with the two dollars increases
1:04:16
Speaker 1: and the arbitration, for him to get up to the
1:04:20
Speaker 1: correct market value. If you went into a new Auto
1:04:22
Speaker 1: nude league that started this year, Otani's already probably at
1:04:28
Speaker 1: his max cap of like where his value is, and
1:04:31
Speaker 1: so he's more likely to be cut. And so the
1:04:33
Speaker 1: top end guys get cut and get recycled a lot
1:04:36
Speaker 1: faster in earlier leagues, the more mature league is. So
1:04:40
Speaker 1: a lot of our league was founded in twenty sixteen,
1:04:43
Speaker 1: it was among like one of the first wave of
1:04:46
Speaker 1: auto new leagues, So a lot of the guys that
1:04:49
Speaker 1: are like in that sort of wheelhouse. For example, Like
1:04:53
Speaker 1: this is why in season, even though I was kind
1:04:56
Speaker 1: of like a little bit of like trying to thread
1:04:58
Speaker 1: the needle of a rebuild, I traded for Wan Soto
1:05:00
Speaker 1: because like, Wan Soto does not come up in the
1:05:04
Speaker 1: auction for probably another what three four years, I mean
1:05:08
Speaker 1: obviously after this pod everyone's gonna put all their three
1:05:10
Speaker 1: dollars of arbitration on him every offseason. But like that's
1:05:14
Speaker 1: the type of player where he doesn't hit the auction
1:05:18
Speaker 1: late into a mature autun league. The guys that are
1:05:22
Speaker 1: gonna be at the top and end that that draft
1:05:23
Speaker 1: pool when you're getting getting into a mature league are
1:05:26
Speaker 1: it's always George Springer and ken Lee Jansen in our league. Like,
1:05:30
Speaker 1: that's the type of player who starts getting thrown back,
1:05:32
Speaker 1: who's like in their early thirties, has lots of question marks.
1:05:36
Speaker 2: You're not.
1:05:37
Speaker 1: I mean, Trey Turner started to get into this, Bryce Harper,
1:05:40
Speaker 1: you know guys who were like they used to be
1:05:43
Speaker 1: first round, second round values and now they're starting to
1:05:45
Speaker 1: age and like show their wear and tear. That's not
1:05:48
Speaker 1: a great place to be shopping to upgrade your roster.
1:05:51
Speaker 1: And so because of that, now in a mature league
1:05:54
Speaker 1: I do it is a year round cycle of trying
1:05:58
Speaker 1: to make sure I've got the correct players up and
1:06:01
Speaker 1: coming to replace what I've got at the top of
1:06:04
Speaker 1: my roster that I'm gonna cut. So it's a much
1:06:07
Speaker 1: more of an art than I think any other dynasty
1:06:10
Speaker 1: or keeper league I've been in.
1:06:12
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I think you're right. That actually kind
1:06:14
Speaker 3: of parlays in the next piece I want to talk
1:06:16
Speaker 3: about is like your roster construction, because this, this truly
1:06:20
Speaker 3: is more like real world baseball than anything else. Like
1:06:24
Speaker 3: you can't just do one thing. You have to constantly
1:06:28
Speaker 3: be looking at your roster up and down in future,
1:06:32
Speaker 3: you know today, and decide what you're doing. And so
1:06:36
Speaker 3: you know things you have to look at, such as
1:06:38
Speaker 3: like backups, Like you literally have to consider like my
1:06:40
Speaker 3: bench depth and what that looks like. And I've been
1:06:43
Speaker 3: caught off guard a number of times where I'm like,
1:06:45
Speaker 3: I'm gonna fill up my my starters are gonna really
1:06:48
Speaker 3: anchor in there, and I'm just gonna fiell my you know,
1:06:49
Speaker 3: like a normal fancy I'm gonna fill the rest of
1:06:52
Speaker 3: my team with the dollar you know, dollar day guys
1:06:55
Speaker 3: type of thing. And then you get into the season,
1:06:57
Speaker 3: use it for you guys injury or something, you know,
1:07:00
Speaker 3: performance down, and you're just you're in a daily league
1:07:02
Speaker 3: and if you can't max out your games, you are
1:07:05
Speaker 3: all of a sudden just putting guys in and you're
1:07:07
Speaker 3: just like killing yourself from a ratio perspective. So you know,
1:07:11
Speaker 3: you have to actually think about the backups and what
1:07:13
Speaker 3: that looks like and building bench deep, which is which
1:07:16
Speaker 3: is tough. You have to like be willing to play
1:07:20
Speaker 3: the upside game and actually sometimes invest in guys for
1:07:24
Speaker 3: what they could become, not just what you know they are.
1:07:28
Speaker 3: And that goes for you know, guys that are you know,
1:07:31
Speaker 3: we're talking about Sugano coming into you know, guys coming
1:07:33
Speaker 3: into the league. That counts guys that have like maybe
1:07:36
Speaker 3: gone on tough luck and you're hoping they bounce back. Injuries,
1:07:39
Speaker 3: prospects all up and down, that kind of spectrums. You
1:07:44
Speaker 3: have to build a well rounded team. So my curiosity
1:07:48
Speaker 3: for you, because I'm just trying to learn literally everything
1:07:51
Speaker 3: I can to undo you this next year is which
1:07:54
Speaker 3: of these type of like roster construction type things is
1:07:57
Speaker 3: your biggest achilles heel it? Not which one because we
1:08:00
Speaker 3: all know we have, Like which which one do you
1:08:03
Speaker 3: struggle with the most that like you know it going in,
1:08:06
Speaker 3: you still do it again and you just can't get
1:08:09
Speaker 3: out of that cycle. And this is the year that
1:08:12
Speaker 3: you're gonna fix it.
1:08:14
Speaker 1: So who there's a handful, like I don't know if
1:08:18
Speaker 1: it's it's great to have a handful of Achilles heels
1:08:20
Speaker 1: and something like this.
1:08:21
Speaker 2: But I'll go through, like I think the some.
1:08:24
Speaker 1: Of the bigger kind of pain points, especially in terms
1:08:29
Speaker 1: of the way that I run my Fantasy Baseball teams
1:08:31
Speaker 1: and like have an overall perspective. One is balancing prospects
1:08:36
Speaker 1: correctly because it's a forty man roster, but it is
1:08:39
Speaker 1: a dynasty league. You need to holster some of the
1:08:42
Speaker 1: top end prospects, but finding the right kind of level
1:08:46
Speaker 1: of not too many prospects on your roster and not
1:08:50
Speaker 1: too few. I think previously on my team, I used
1:08:53
Speaker 1: to get into the habit of having too few, and
1:08:56
Speaker 1: then like when we got into a mature league, I
1:08:58
Speaker 1: didn't have any studs that were cheap, like you have
1:09:03
Speaker 1: Elie de la Cruz, Like that's the exact type of
1:09:05
Speaker 1: hit that you're looking for. So like this year, that's
1:09:08
Speaker 1: why I stocked up on like Sebastian Walcott, Leodalas Devrees
1:09:11
Speaker 1: and some of these other guys who you've got to
1:09:14
Speaker 1: take the gamble on them in high A and just
1:09:17
Speaker 1: like roster them for a couple of years and hope
1:09:19
Speaker 1: they pan out into something that is a first or
1:09:22
Speaker 1: second rounder. It's really tough, but that is something that
1:09:25
Speaker 1: I've learned finding that balance. Second is pitching. I same
1:09:30
Speaker 1: thing with I think starting pitching is almost like a
1:09:32
Speaker 1: same sort of conversation where I really devalue it. And
1:09:36
Speaker 1: so but when you're looking at aces finding because it
1:09:42
Speaker 1: is a daily moves league in what we're looking at
1:09:45
Speaker 1: for our rot, you're looking at K nine a lot.
1:09:47
Speaker 1: But even like the points the points leagues, the strikeouts
1:09:50
Speaker 1: are huge, So like developing that, retaining the starting pitching,
1:09:55
Speaker 1: and then like weathering all the injuries, it is really
1:09:58
Speaker 1: really hard to find the balance there. And then I
1:10:02
Speaker 1: would say that the third thing is not falling in
1:10:07
Speaker 1: love with platoons too much, because it is a viable
1:10:10
Speaker 1: strategy to use platoons home and road splits, especially like
1:10:14
Speaker 1: Colorado Rockies maxing them out at home. Isak Predes, who
1:10:19
Speaker 1: we were just talking about in the first half of
1:10:20
Speaker 1: the show, like finding players who you can platoon or
1:10:24
Speaker 1: even guys that like are only in their lineups as
1:10:29
Speaker 1: platoon bats, and like getting really good appearances. But you
1:10:32
Speaker 1: can't fall in love with it too much because as
1:10:34
Speaker 1: much as you want a platoon like the platoon of
1:10:38
Speaker 1: Ryan McMahon and Willie Castro in your MI spot isn't
1:10:42
Speaker 1: going to take you far enough at the end of
1:10:43
Speaker 1: the day. Like, it will fill in holes and it
1:10:45
Speaker 1: helps you build the roster death that you're talking about,
1:10:47
Speaker 1: but it doesn't equate to a starting player. So like
1:10:52
Speaker 1: trying to keep that in mind that you can make
1:10:54
Speaker 1: it by, but it shouldn't be your like, end all,
1:10:57
Speaker 1: be all strategy at one of your positions.
1:11:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's they're absolutely tough, uh prospecting and we could
1:11:04
Speaker 3: spend probably the entire pot on the prospecting aspect of
1:11:06
Speaker 3: at New Like it is a really tough game, but
1:11:10
Speaker 3: it's absolutely critical, uh if you're gonna be successful. I
1:11:13
Speaker 3: feel like that's one of the things I've done well
1:11:15
Speaker 3: and not new is oh yeah, I've figured out how
1:11:17
Speaker 3: to to bridge that gap and you know, extract value.
1:11:23
Speaker 3: But well all on, probably the two biggest achilles feel
1:11:26
Speaker 3: I have historically has been depth. I have intended to
1:11:30
Speaker 3: focus very much on the players that are I expect
1:11:33
Speaker 3: to be starting. For like a starting pitching perspective, you
1:11:36
Speaker 3: you know, you need six healthy starters to really get
1:11:39
Speaker 3: to your uh your innings is historically it's probably now
1:11:43
Speaker 3: seven with some of the in gaps we've seen, but six,
1:11:45
Speaker 3: six will six will do it, and so I send it,
1:11:48
Speaker 3: like give myself to like six or seven good starters
1:11:51
Speaker 3: and then like at the end of my rotation is
1:11:54
Speaker 3: just these random guys that I'm like on the waiver wire,
1:11:57
Speaker 3: like I literally have the seven starters on my on
1:11:59
Speaker 3: my staff and like I'm I have to go dominate
1:12:02
Speaker 3: a guy to try to fit it in, and I'm
1:12:04
Speaker 3: just like all the guys pitching are just doing phenomenal
1:12:07
Speaker 3: to they get two injuries and I can't hit my
1:12:09
Speaker 3: hittings and then you're you're you're It's always an uphill
1:12:12
Speaker 3: battle at the end of the year to try to
1:12:13
Speaker 3: do what you need to do. I'd say the same
1:12:15
Speaker 3: kind of on a hitting I've I've struggled with that,
1:12:17
Speaker 3: so you know, new Year's resolution, try to get better
1:12:21
Speaker 3: better there. And then I will say my other Achilles
1:12:24
Speaker 3: heel is I'm too stingy with my dollars and so
1:12:30
Speaker 3: I value the dollar sometimes too much because I'm like, oh,
1:12:35
Speaker 3: I want flexibility and free agency. I want to try
1:12:37
Speaker 3: to pick up the big guy that was caught. I
1:12:39
Speaker 3: want to I want to try to, you know, do that, Like, oh,
1:12:41
Speaker 3: I don't want to hold that six dollars prospect because
1:12:43
Speaker 3: I get a two dollars one dollars back in my
1:12:45
Speaker 3: pocket and maybe I can do something at the draft table,
1:12:48
Speaker 3: right and like, oh, I'm looking like I haven't forbid
1:12:50
Speaker 3: I acquire a thirty dollars closer, because man, and then
1:12:53
Speaker 3: you go to the draft, you're like Craig Kemberl's thirty bucks,
1:12:56
Speaker 3: Like yeah, exactly, like hold on, And so I have
1:13:00
Speaker 3: a tendency to be a little too stingy with with
1:13:03
Speaker 3: that dollar, just trying to like absolutely squeeze every every
1:13:07
Speaker 3: penny out of those transactions. And so I will find
1:13:09
Speaker 3: myself trading the five dollars prospect to try to get
1:13:12
Speaker 3: a three dollar one like two dollars, Like you're talking
1:13:16
Speaker 3: like zero point five percent of your budget, Like at
1:13:18
Speaker 3: the end of the day, that's not going to kill you.
1:13:20
Speaker 3: So I'm not gonna get into injuries because that's a
1:13:22
Speaker 3: well known fact if you listen to this pod, that
1:13:24
Speaker 3: I have an issue, and so like let's just let's
1:13:28
Speaker 3: just move on from from that one. But yeah, I
1:13:31
Speaker 3: think roster construction throughout the year is absolutely a critical
1:13:36
Speaker 3: strategy of ATNUE in it and it it does seem
1:13:39
Speaker 3: to be lost art, especially post trade deadline and when
1:13:43
Speaker 3: the football season starts is when the best new players
1:13:46
Speaker 3: come into play because they still pay attention to baseball.
1:13:49
Speaker 3: But that's you know, you can really make some big
1:13:53
Speaker 3: changes at the end of the year setting yourself up
1:13:55
Speaker 3: for the next year that people tend to overlook.
1:13:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, I totally agree.
1:13:59
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, I think we're gonna now kind of direct
1:14:02
Speaker 1: this conversation into more specific players. So I think what
1:14:06
Speaker 1: we've done is we've gone in groups kind of bigger
1:14:09
Speaker 1: categories of what I would call kind of like gold
1:14:12
Speaker 1: nuggets of Like this type of player profile is especially
1:14:16
Speaker 1: useful in the autnew format because of some of the
1:14:19
Speaker 1: things that we've talked about in terms of roster limitations,
1:14:23
Speaker 1: roster construction, salaries, inflation, things like that. These are the
1:14:28
Speaker 1: type of players where I think there's lots of value
1:14:32
Speaker 1: to them.
1:14:32
Speaker 2: And the nice thing about aud New is.
1:14:35
Speaker 1: Like you get to see the prices of all the
1:14:39
Speaker 1: players across all of the leagues in terms of both
1:14:43
Speaker 1: the five y five rot and the points leagues, and
1:14:46
Speaker 1: then also see ownership rates, So you get a lot
1:14:48
Speaker 1: of just overall group data that like a lot of
1:14:54
Speaker 1: these players are really very sharp, so you can direct
1:14:58
Speaker 1: your play accordingly. And so what we're going to hone
1:15:01
Speaker 1: in on our players where their average price in.
1:15:05
Speaker 2: Auto new leagues just makes a lot of sense.
1:15:08
Speaker 1: And they're guys that we're going to be targeting because
1:15:10
Speaker 1: they fit some of these profiles that we're trying to
1:15:15
Speaker 1: acquire overall in our auto new league. So the first one,
1:15:20
Speaker 1: this is my favorite because one of my best friends
1:15:24
Speaker 1: and you know him to our buddy John, but like
1:15:27
Speaker 1: this is his number one strategy.
1:15:28
Speaker 2: And we talk about all the time. And I love
1:15:31
Speaker 2: it too, because.
1:15:32
Speaker 1: The one thing that we didn't necessarily lay out was
1:15:35
Speaker 1: what your your starting roster is on today. So it
1:15:38
Speaker 1: is a standard lineup that you would think of. And
1:15:43
Speaker 1: in your standard rot league where you get I mean
1:15:45
Speaker 1: you can start two catchers, but you only get one
1:15:47
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty two games a catcher, first base, second base,
1:15:50
Speaker 1: third base, shortstop, m I five outfielders, one util. If
1:15:56
Speaker 1: you were listening to that real fast, you might have
1:15:58
Speaker 1: noticed I missed one of the standards starting and that's
1:16:00
Speaker 1: corner infield. There's no corner infield spot. There are five
1:16:04
Speaker 1: starting pitchers, five relievers. You can start every day and
1:16:07
Speaker 1: they have to be in those positions to get the stats.
1:16:10
Speaker 1: But because there's no corner infielder, there's a really big
1:16:15
Speaker 1: value for guys who are first base outfield eligible because
1:16:20
Speaker 1: it's a way to get an extra corner infield bat
1:16:23
Speaker 1: into your lineup because what will happen is, you know,
1:16:26
Speaker 1: they'll be a guy who's eligible for the outfield but
1:16:29
Speaker 1: plays every day at first base, plays like a first baseman,
1:16:32
Speaker 1: produces like a first baseman, and that's gonna usually exceed
1:16:36
Speaker 1: anything that you can find in terms of a fourth,
1:16:38
Speaker 1: fifth outfielder in most leagues.
1:16:40
Speaker 2: So it's really huge to.
1:16:41
Speaker 1: Have this player as well as, like you know, just
1:16:43
Speaker 1: to be able to have that Rothster flexibility, build that
1:16:46
Speaker 1: depth that you're talking about. So players in this vein
1:16:49
Speaker 1: that I'm looking at to target off season in Autne,
1:16:53
Speaker 1: Michael Tolia from the Colorado Rockies is a first basement
1:16:57
Speaker 1: outfielder five and a half dollars of average price in leagues.
1:17:03
Speaker 1: Cody Balanter is in this in this realm seventeen and
1:17:07
Speaker 1: inero point three dollars on average. Alex Burlson four dollars
1:17:12
Speaker 1: seventy six that that's his average price as well. So
1:17:16
Speaker 1: you're looking at, you know, three pretty solid first base outfielders,
1:17:21
Speaker 1: cheap prices, especially with I think they can produce in value.
1:17:24
Speaker 1: So which of these three interests you the most.
1:17:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, So, if if you read a of my work
1:17:32
Speaker 3: over Rasball, we do the hitter profiles. I finished up
1:17:36
Speaker 3: last season trying to find the next Rent Rooker. And
1:17:40
Speaker 3: you know, there's a few unique qualities about Rent Rooker,
1:17:43
Speaker 3: but really the search criteria was you strike out a lot,
1:17:46
Speaker 3: you hit the wall really far, and everything else looks good. Besides, yeah,
1:17:50
Speaker 3: quit striking out so much. And there was a few
1:17:54
Speaker 3: guys jumped in that. But the one guy that I
1:17:57
Speaker 3: kind of lazered in on was Michael Toplio from the Rockies.
1:18:01
Speaker 3: And if you look at what he did, like the
1:18:03
Speaker 3: guy hit to eighteen, hit twenty five homers, and he
1:18:07
Speaker 3: stole ten bases. But he just struck out too much.
1:18:11
Speaker 3: But it definitely looked like he was improving in his
1:18:15
Speaker 3: plate approach. He didn't get the most lucky with his
1:18:19
Speaker 3: contact quality, but he just hit the Jesus side of
1:18:22
Speaker 3: the ball like little things added up. And what I
1:18:25
Speaker 3: love from a player is when you have to make
1:18:27
Speaker 3: one change and all of a sudden unlocks things. And
1:18:30
Speaker 3: for Totally, that's like, just be a little bit more
1:18:33
Speaker 3: patient and the hit, swing at the right pitches, and
1:18:36
Speaker 3: everything else seems to come together. And so I think
1:18:38
Speaker 3: he's incredibly undervalued. I've already tried to trade from our
1:18:42
Speaker 3: league and it is not happening, to be very clear,
1:18:46
Speaker 3: and so I'm probably gonna try again. But I think
1:18:50
Speaker 3: he's one of those hidden gems that at the price
1:18:52
Speaker 3: point we're talking, most people aren't looking at him. I
1:18:55
Speaker 3: would not be shocked to see him hit two sixty,
1:18:59
Speaker 3: hit thirty five homers, and steal ten bases, and that
1:19:04
Speaker 3: is incredibly valuable for a first base outfielder. I've already
1:19:09
Speaker 3: talked about how I'm scared of Cody Bellingers, so I'm
1:19:11
Speaker 3: not playing in that game.
1:19:12
Speaker 2: I mean, for seventeen bucks, that's not bad.
1:19:15
Speaker 3: It's not bad, it's not bad. But Totally has got
1:19:18
Speaker 3: my heart here in this one, and I'm really annoyed
1:19:22
Speaker 3: that I do not own him.
1:19:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm in the same boat that, Like, Totally, he
1:19:27
Speaker 1: checks a lot of the boxes in terms of, you know,
1:19:30
Speaker 1: the first base outfield profile.
1:19:32
Speaker 2: Half of his.
1:19:33
Speaker 1: Game's at curis Field, although he actually has hit more
1:19:36
Speaker 1: homers on the road in his career. I don't know
1:19:38
Speaker 1: how long that'll sustain, but the average gets a boost
1:19:41
Speaker 1: at home, and certainly it looked like he was starting
1:19:44
Speaker 1: to find a little bit of a groove down the
1:19:46
Speaker 1: stretch in twenty twenty four. Yeah, I guess I should
1:19:49
Speaker 1: also caveat that all these targets they're not going to
1:19:52
Speaker 1: be easy to trade for. But certainly all these guys,
1:19:55
Speaker 1: if I'm in trade talks with them, I will start
1:19:58
Speaker 1: kind of like pushing it a lit little bit more
1:20:00
Speaker 1: to where it's not quite as like a favorable trade
1:20:05
Speaker 1: to me as you would think, because I want the
1:20:08
Speaker 1: extra kind of nugget that this these players offering their profile.
1:20:11
Speaker 1: So that is kind of like one thing I think
1:20:14
Speaker 1: we should also kind of put as a caveat for
1:20:18
Speaker 1: these targets is that they're not going to be easy
1:20:19
Speaker 1: to acquire.
1:20:20
Speaker 2: But if you need to.
1:20:21
Speaker 1: Kick in that like extra prospect, extra starting pitcher to
1:20:24
Speaker 1: be able to get these transactions done, these are the
1:20:27
Speaker 1: type of players I would be doing it for.
1:20:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think we're talking about guys here that
1:20:31
Speaker 3: are not your first targets. Generally they might be for you,
1:20:34
Speaker 3: but like you're not sending it that way, and I
1:20:36
Speaker 3: will I will own another strategy that again, if our
1:20:38
Speaker 3: league bates are listening, I yep, it's it's here, it is,
1:20:43
Speaker 3: and you know I do this, But I generally go
1:20:45
Speaker 3: into every off season negotiating before trading opens up, and
1:20:51
Speaker 3: usually when trading opens up, I've got maybe a deal
1:20:54
Speaker 3: or two that I've already kind of figured out and
1:20:56
Speaker 3: this agreed upon you and I've done this before, and
1:20:58
Speaker 3: we execute move on like I've already got a head
1:21:01
Speaker 3: start on everybody. But I have a tendency to say, hey,
1:21:04
Speaker 3: I'm interested in these four or five guys. Little do
1:21:08
Speaker 3: you know, I threw a few names in there that
1:21:10
Speaker 3: I have zero interest in. I listed off like you know,
1:21:14
Speaker 3: you're up and comers, like I would like Jackson Merrill,
1:21:17
Speaker 3: like I you know, I've I've kind of done that
1:21:19
Speaker 3: because I'm after Michael Toglia. Because I don't want you
1:21:22
Speaker 3: to know that I'm after Michael Toglia, and I want
1:21:24
Speaker 3: Michael Tokeley to look a lot less, a lot more
1:21:26
Speaker 3: interesting to trade than the other guys I list, And
1:21:29
Speaker 3: so I might come to you and say, here's the
1:21:31
Speaker 3: three or four or five guys. I'm kind of interested
1:21:33
Speaker 3: in any of the guys. These guys available, and I'm
1:21:37
Speaker 3: trying to kind of tear them out for you that
1:21:39
Speaker 3: there's a guy or two here are that they should
1:21:42
Speaker 3: that should don't feel as hard to trade. And I'm
1:21:44
Speaker 3: hoping that you're like, yeah, I'm not clearly not going
1:21:46
Speaker 3: to give you Jackson Merril, but I'll be open and
1:21:48
Speaker 3: talking about Michael Toglia exactly and so putting my cards
1:21:52
Speaker 3: on the table. But like, I think that's the kind
1:21:54
Speaker 3: of guy, that's the kind of game you have to play,
1:21:58
Speaker 3: and at new you play with the same guys for
1:22:00
Speaker 3: years and years, you have to have those relationships and
1:22:04
Speaker 3: be able to have them those negotiations to make your team,
1:22:08
Speaker 3: make your team happen.
1:22:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, I totally agree.
1:22:10
Speaker 1: And that's why, like somebody like Jackson Merril's not going
1:22:12
Speaker 1: to be on this list because like we know Jackson Merrill,
1:22:15
Speaker 1: you can't go and buy him at any price.
1:22:17
Speaker 3: He's not being traded. Yeah.
1:22:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, at least these guys I think you can target
1:22:21
Speaker 1: and actually execute a trade.
1:22:22
Speaker 2: So with that in.
1:22:23
Speaker 1: Mind, let's move into I think the most difficult offseason decision.
1:22:28
Speaker 1: But it's something you've got to entertain because we've talked
1:22:31
Speaker 1: about this in our pod. You know, over over all
1:22:35
Speaker 1: the episodes too. Of like in dynasty leagues, you've got
1:22:38
Speaker 1: to kind of build a bullpen for the ground up
1:22:40
Speaker 1: and aut anew is I think especially huge for that because,
1:22:44
Speaker 1: like I said, you have five relief spots, you've got
1:22:47
Speaker 1: twelve teams, that's sixty relief spots on rosters that like
1:22:52
Speaker 1: the good teams are going to be rostering, like four closers,
1:22:57
Speaker 1: and so not everybody's gonna have enough closers to go around,
1:23:00
Speaker 1: especially if you're in of roto league like us A
1:23:03
Speaker 1: five by five.
1:23:04
Speaker 2: It's really tough to get saves.
1:23:06
Speaker 1: But in points leagues too, saves get you lots of points,
1:23:09
Speaker 1: but holds do too, So that does help, I think
1:23:11
Speaker 1: a little bit relieve a little bit of this pressure
1:23:14
Speaker 1: in points leagues. But even still, like the ratios, and
1:23:18
Speaker 1: because you've got the cap on the innings, you want
1:23:21
Speaker 1: as much relief action as possible because the obviously the
1:23:26
Speaker 1: points per an inning, the value per inning is always
1:23:30
Speaker 1: going to be higher with these relievers. So I've got
1:23:33
Speaker 1: some cheaper options where some are free agents, some are
1:23:37
Speaker 1: backup closers right now, some might be closers where You've
1:23:42
Speaker 1: got lots of players here who I think kind of
1:23:44
Speaker 1: fit in this realm, and then you can pick your
1:23:46
Speaker 1: favorite one. So first off, we have free agent Kirby
1:23:49
Speaker 1: Yates at five point nine dollars, Griffin Jacks at five
1:23:53
Speaker 1: point four, who might be a starter but I think
1:23:56
Speaker 1: still fits in this conversation, Kate Smith from the Guardians
1:24:00
Speaker 1: at four point four dollars, Edwin and Yusada at six dollars,
1:24:06
Speaker 1: Jason Foley at five point one bucks, Tyler Holton at
1:24:10
Speaker 1: three point nine dollars, Yinier Cano at six point seven
1:24:16
Speaker 1: rip to Luke Weaver, he would have been on this
1:24:18
Speaker 1: list before that. Devin Williams trade now he's he's a
1:24:21
Speaker 1: total kind of nothing burger. But I mean, I'll probably
1:24:25
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know if I'm actually gonna
1:24:26
Speaker 1: be keeping him. But of those guys I listened off
1:24:29
Speaker 1: between Yates, Jack's, Smith, Usda, Foley, Holton, Cano, which guy
1:24:37
Speaker 1: interests you the most?
1:24:38
Speaker 2: And what is it in his profile?
1:24:40
Speaker 1: Is it like a is it something that's emblematic of
1:24:44
Speaker 1: just that player, or like something in general that you're
1:24:47
Speaker 1: looking for.
1:24:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of good names on
1:24:51
Speaker 3: that list, but there is one that stands out to
1:24:54
Speaker 3: me and you you kind of you'd hit on him.
1:24:57
Speaker 3: And there's a reason I'm blessed interested in him. Maybe
1:25:00
Speaker 3: is Gryffin Jacks. Gryffin Jacks is you know, it's just
1:25:05
Speaker 3: absolutely dominant. But he's one of those guys that didn't
1:25:09
Speaker 3: like burst onto the scene. He kind of had to
1:25:10
Speaker 3: try to figure things out, and once he did, it
1:25:15
Speaker 3: just keeps getting better and better and better. And he's
1:25:18
Speaker 3: you know, he's a thirty year old, so he's not
1:25:20
Speaker 3: like you can look you can kind of look past him.
1:25:23
Speaker 3: He's been hidden in that Minnesota bullpen with durand closing,
1:25:28
Speaker 3: but yet he's kind of snuck some saves in there
1:25:31
Speaker 3: Dran's health, so he's not been necessarily the best. But
1:25:35
Speaker 3: if you just look at his profile, he has an
1:25:39
Speaker 3: absolutely you know, we you know, wipe out ability with
1:25:44
Speaker 3: his sweeper, his fastball, they play up. Frankly, he has
1:25:47
Speaker 3: five pitches that play up, and so that's why you
1:25:50
Speaker 3: can see him, you know, being potential starter. But what
1:25:54
Speaker 3: also intrigues me is if you start looking at really
1:25:57
Speaker 3: that like Arsenal and and kind of pitch mix for
1:26:01
Speaker 3: for him, like it is he's got all the things
1:26:07
Speaker 3: that we look for and on like he can get
1:26:08
Speaker 3: extra Indians, he can go h strikeout guys. He's a
1:26:12
Speaker 3: strikeout percentage like thirty five percent last year. He just
1:26:16
Speaker 3: was so good. So Jackson really, like I'm also slightly
1:26:19
Speaker 3: intrigued by Cad Smith is just the track records not
1:26:22
Speaker 3: quite as long there. But as I look at guys
1:26:25
Speaker 3: like I go back a few years here, you look
1:26:27
Speaker 3: at a guy like Tanner Scott like who all of
1:26:29
Speaker 3: a sudden kind of figured things out when he had
1:26:31
Speaker 3: some control issues, and I think that's you know, fair
1:26:34
Speaker 3: to say for a few of these guys who you know,
1:26:36
Speaker 3: like Jack's, has had some control issues in the past,
1:26:39
Speaker 3: when they've kind of figured that out, then just the
1:26:41
Speaker 3: sky's limits. So I like Jack's. Cad Smith is just
1:26:45
Speaker 3: really intriguing because if you look at his profile as
1:26:50
Speaker 3: far as like similar pictures, I'm gonna list you the
1:26:54
Speaker 3: five of them unless you've already looked at them. Garrett Crochet,
1:26:58
Speaker 3: Jeff Hoffman, Tyler Glass, Josh Schader, and Bryan A. Bradw
1:27:03
Speaker 3: that's a pretty solid group. And so like for a
1:27:06
Speaker 3: guy that doesn't have a big tracker, who's only got
1:27:09
Speaker 3: you know, a total of seventy five innings in his career,
1:27:12
Speaker 3: but lower velocity. He's just intriguing on the surface. So
1:27:17
Speaker 3: if I'm taking one, I'm taking Griffin Jacks. I've had
1:27:20
Speaker 3: a trade officer sitting out for him for about a
1:27:22
Speaker 3: month now in our league and has not been able
1:27:24
Speaker 3: to get a response on that one. But I'm also
1:27:28
Speaker 3: interested in Cade Smith. They're little little as well. So
1:27:31
Speaker 3: how about you who stands out? Since I kind of
1:27:33
Speaker 3: took two off the board there, who stands out to you?
1:27:38
Speaker 1: I mean, I think, like, honestly, because I made the
1:27:42
Speaker 1: initial list all of them, like in terms of like,
1:27:46
Speaker 1: I would say that maybe the profile or like the
1:27:50
Speaker 1: you know, the beacon of what I'm looking at is
1:27:53
Speaker 1: somebody who's in a fluid ish team of closer like
1:27:58
Speaker 1: mix in terms of like you say to fully Holton, honestly,
1:28:04
Speaker 1: and Cano might end up here, especially you know, you
1:28:07
Speaker 1: got Felix Bautista coming off of the Tommy John surgery,
1:28:11
Speaker 1: but especially yusayed to fully Holton, they might not have
1:28:15
Speaker 1: like a lot of value in everybody's eyes because they
1:28:17
Speaker 1: might only be walking into five to ten saves. But
1:28:21
Speaker 1: especially you know, if you're in a points league and
1:28:23
Speaker 1: you get the holds, that's huge. But if you're in
1:28:25
Speaker 1: the rodo the five to ten saves out of somebody
1:28:28
Speaker 1: who's only like a five dollars reliever is really really
1:28:32
Speaker 1: huge in this format because you're not gonna just stumble
1:28:38
Speaker 1: into somebody who can rack up twenty five thirty saves
1:28:42
Speaker 1: really easily. That you've got to collect a lot of
1:28:44
Speaker 1: like these little guys and hope that they grow into
1:28:47
Speaker 1: something big. And so doing that on teams that mix
1:28:50
Speaker 1: and match their relievers is one way to do that.
1:28:53
Speaker 1: To be able to just kind of build the bottom
1:28:56
Speaker 1: end of your bullpen and then pursue higher end options
1:28:59
Speaker 1: at the top that like you've got to start with
1:29:02
Speaker 1: the building blocks and go from there because otherwise, like
1:29:05
Speaker 1: the other route is to go at high K nine
1:29:07
Speaker 1: reliever who's not going to bring home any saves, which
1:29:10
Speaker 1: will work in a points format. And so that's why,
1:29:13
Speaker 1: like maybe this is a little less concerning for those leagues,
1:29:17
Speaker 1: but if you're in a roto format, having relievers that
1:29:22
Speaker 1: have no shots at saves and are just racking up
1:29:24
Speaker 1: strikeouts and ratios for you is cool, but it really
1:29:27
Speaker 1: hurts you in the long run because you can't just
1:29:30
Speaker 1: punt a category overall. Okay, well let's move on to
1:29:36
Speaker 1: the next just profile that we're looking at that you
1:29:39
Speaker 1: know can be that golden nugget, And I don't know
1:29:42
Speaker 1: what it is, but finding great middle infielders is so
1:29:47
Speaker 1: so hard and auto noon partly is because you know,
1:29:50
Speaker 1: we don't have the SI. So, like, I think what
1:29:54
Speaker 1: ends up happening is guys who might end up at
1:29:56
Speaker 1: SI's in a standard Roto league kind of gets huffled
1:30:00
Speaker 1: into the middle and field, you know, if they have
1:30:02
Speaker 1: like second and third base eligibility. So no, wait, that
1:30:07
Speaker 1: would be the other way around now that I think
1:30:09
Speaker 1: about it. But but if it hollows out, am I
1:30:14
Speaker 1: from the perspective of, like you've got to fill the
1:30:17
Speaker 1: m I That's what I'm thinking of. Sorry, I know
1:30:21
Speaker 1: what I'm doing, but I see it across our league
1:30:26
Speaker 1: every single year that everyone's always struggling to like really
1:30:29
Speaker 1: fill in their middle infield and reinforce it from the back.
1:30:33
Speaker 1: And so finding guys who can play a lot do
1:30:37
Speaker 1: it relatively cheap and not having to, you know, pay
1:30:39
Speaker 1: a lot for it is really huge. And so what
1:30:43
Speaker 1: do you think about these four players? Which of them
1:30:45
Speaker 1: really kind of pop out to you as the best
1:30:48
Speaker 1: target here for the offseason. First, we've got Matt Shaw
1:30:50
Speaker 1: at three point eight dollars, who, honestly, it might because
1:30:53
Speaker 1: that trade now this week with Esak prey day Sking
1:30:56
Speaker 1: shipped out might be pushing Matt Shaw into an unattainable territory.
1:31:01
Speaker 1: But it is I think somebody who I would maybe
1:31:04
Speaker 1: go that extra mile to get.
1:31:05
Speaker 2: Because of this. We also have Jordan Westburg.
1:31:08
Speaker 1: At seven point six dollars, Spencer Horwitz at five point
1:31:11
Speaker 1: nine dollars, and Hasion Kim at eight point two dollars.
1:31:15
Speaker 1: So these are kind of like what I'm saying in
1:31:17
Speaker 1: terms of like middle infielders to play a lot, just
1:31:21
Speaker 1: offer production day and day out. Which one of them
1:31:25
Speaker 1: is your favorite out of this list?
1:31:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean there's one guy here to me that
1:31:30
Speaker 3: that stands, you know, much higher than the rest, and
1:31:33
Speaker 3: that's Jordan Westburg. I absolutely a fan of Jordan Westburg.
1:31:37
Speaker 3: Like if you if you look at what he's been
1:31:39
Speaker 3: able to put up. He's only twenty five, so he's
1:31:42
Speaker 3: definitely proven himself. He's he's earned a spot there with
1:31:46
Speaker 3: the Orioles. You know, he he has the you know
1:31:50
Speaker 3: he's had a like a struggle as far as like
1:31:53
Speaker 3: hitting for the kind of the level of average that
1:31:55
Speaker 3: we'd expect. But you actually kind of look at his
1:31:57
Speaker 3: like savant page and his expatting verges two eighty one,
1:32:01
Speaker 3: and so he's been underachieving from a batting average perspective
1:32:05
Speaker 3: this last year. His barrel rates kind of a twelve percent,
1:32:09
Speaker 3: Like you know, he he kind of grew throughout the
1:32:11
Speaker 3: year last year. And he's also a guy that's just
1:32:14
Speaker 3: not getting the full plate appearances, Like he hasn't gotten that,
1:32:18
Speaker 3: and so he's still kind of going under the radar
1:32:20
Speaker 3: to a certain degree. But it's gonna be in a
1:32:22
Speaker 3: really potent lineup. So there's a lot of things I
1:32:24
Speaker 3: like about Westburg. It's not hard to look at a
1:32:27
Speaker 3: guy that could easily, you know, hit twenty five homers,
1:32:30
Speaker 3: steal fifteen bases, hit two eighty and then you're talking
1:32:34
Speaker 3: about that as a cornerstone for your team. There's no
1:32:37
Speaker 3: no qualms about that. I was actually shocked to see
1:32:39
Speaker 3: his sprints, his sprint speed and have you looked at
1:32:42
Speaker 3: his sprint speed otherwise I'm gonna quiz you on his
1:32:45
Speaker 3: sprint sprint speed and scale. Yeah, so on the Jake
1:32:50
Speaker 3: Berger scale, what what? And I'm gonna give you a
1:32:52
Speaker 3: plus or minus ten. All you gotta do is, given
1:32:56
Speaker 3: that's a twenty point range from a percentile perspective on
1:32:59
Speaker 3: his sprint speed, you can do this.
1:33:01
Speaker 2: You can do this.
1:33:02
Speaker 3: Where's Jordan Westburg from a sprint speed perspective? And I
1:33:05
Speaker 3: give you enough foreshadowing here this isn't hard.
1:33:08
Speaker 2: Seventy two.
1:33:11
Speaker 3: And here we are, we still can't do it. Ninety
1:33:13
Speaker 3: first percentile for Jordan Westburg on a sprint speed perspective.
1:33:18
Speaker 3: That that's impressive. And so I think, you know, we
1:33:23
Speaker 3: we don't realize what he's actually able to able to do.
1:33:29
Speaker 3: And so he in you know, twenty three he was
1:33:33
Speaker 3: eighty eighth percent. He's ninety first percent last year. So
1:33:37
Speaker 3: he's basically top fifty guys in the league from a
1:33:42
Speaker 3: speed perspective. He just hasn't stolen as many bases, but
1:33:47
Speaker 3: clearly it's there. And so you have to think as
1:33:51
Speaker 3: he starts to get on base more he gets, you know,
1:33:53
Speaker 3: a little more comfortable, that's going to creep up. There's
1:33:56
Speaker 3: there's no question that that could happen. So I really
1:33:59
Speaker 3: like Westburg here. I also got a soft spot for
1:34:01
Speaker 3: haws On Kim, but the injury there is playing injury
1:34:06
Speaker 3: and playing location. Now that I don't think he's going
1:34:09
Speaker 3: to San Francisco, I'm a little more interested in him,
1:34:11
Speaker 3: but it still seems like San Francisco once, so I'm
1:34:14
Speaker 3: still dinging him a little bit there because haws On
1:34:17
Speaker 3: Kim and San Francisco is mostly speed and no power,
1:34:22
Speaker 3: which scares of the Jesus out of me. So I'm
1:34:24
Speaker 3: going Westbard there. Did I make the right pick?
1:34:27
Speaker 2: I think?
1:34:27
Speaker 1: So this was my pick too, because I think the
1:34:31
Speaker 1: end of his season with that hand injury and not
1:34:34
Speaker 1: playing captas numbers. But it also capped a lot of
1:34:37
Speaker 1: the arbitrations I think across the league because this is
1:34:40
Speaker 1: the type of player where usually it doesn't take too
1:34:44
Speaker 1: long for him to get into the mid teens. And
1:34:46
Speaker 1: if he's at an average price is seven point six
1:34:49
Speaker 1: dollars out there in auto new leagues, that means that
1:34:52
Speaker 1: there's some leagues where he's still pretty cheap, that he's
1:34:55
Speaker 1: under ten bucks, And I think that's a great target
1:34:57
Speaker 1: that like, you're looking at somebody who's going to be
1:35:00
Speaker 1: going into his eight twenty six season more and more
1:35:02
Speaker 1: comfortable in Baltimore, the walls coming in, lots and lots
1:35:06
Speaker 1: of just like up arrows, and Jordan Westburg's profile that
1:35:10
Speaker 1: I think he is the person to target out of
1:35:13
Speaker 1: this group.
1:35:15
Speaker 3: Okay, all right, I got one, right, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
1:35:18
Speaker 3: we did it.
1:35:18
Speaker 2: We got an agreement.
1:35:20
Speaker 1: I will get better at learning my sprint speeds I
1:35:24
Speaker 1: and also how to treat m I and autonew Maybe
1:35:26
Speaker 1: that's been my achilles he all this time. Okay, let's
1:35:30
Speaker 1: get in to the next I would say profile that
1:35:34
Speaker 1: really stands out as as something that is just absolutely
1:35:39
Speaker 1: valuable in autonew leagues both points and roto. That is
1:35:43
Speaker 1: finding an outfield stud that can kind of like break
1:35:46
Speaker 1: out and take you to that next level and not
1:35:48
Speaker 1: costing you an eighth or more of your budget, so
1:35:51
Speaker 1: that'd be fifty or more bucks that Obviously there are
1:35:54
Speaker 1: outfield studs out there, but finding them on the cheap
1:35:57
Speaker 1: and on the on the come up is where you
1:36:00
Speaker 1: can really take your team to the next level. Because
1:36:03
Speaker 1: you have to fill five outfield spots for one hundred
1:36:06
Speaker 1: and sixty two games. It is way harder than you
1:36:10
Speaker 1: would imagine and what it sounds because people get shuffled
1:36:14
Speaker 1: in and out and especially the way that like platoons
1:36:16
Speaker 1: and stuff work nowadays, as well as just like you're
1:36:19
Speaker 1: working in a league with forty man rosters, it's just
1:36:23
Speaker 1: a thin, thin spot. So being able to find somebody
1:36:27
Speaker 1: who is providing you with just like upper tier outfield
1:36:33
Speaker 1: production on the cheap or can do that and grow
1:36:36
Speaker 1: into it, is really really huge for Auto new leagues
1:36:39
Speaker 1: out there. So I think that's probably in general for
1:36:42
Speaker 1: Dynasty across the board, but especially when you're looking at
1:36:45
Speaker 1: like a format like Auto NEEW where it is like
1:36:48
Speaker 1: a game by game production basis, where it's like points
1:36:53
Speaker 1: per game, you know, ROTO production per game, it even
1:36:57
Speaker 1: comes in to be more and more valuable. So I
1:36:59
Speaker 1: think think the guys that we have here in this
1:37:02
Speaker 1: group you're looking at also just like more awe round
1:37:05
Speaker 1: production for ROTO purposes, and I mean for points, it's
1:37:08
Speaker 1: obviously gonna add up to but I think, you know,
1:37:12
Speaker 1: we've got some pretty good values here. So Corbyn Carroll
1:37:15
Speaker 1: coming in at twenty nine point eight dollars, Lawrence Butler
1:37:18
Speaker 1: of the A's at seven point four, Pete crow Armstrong
1:37:22
Speaker 1: coming in at six point four dollars, Trevor Larnak of
1:37:26
Speaker 1: the Minnesota Twins coming at four point four dollars and
1:37:29
Speaker 1: Carry Carpenter coming in at seven point seven dollars from
1:37:32
Speaker 1: the Detroit Tigers. Which one of these players intrigues you
1:37:36
Speaker 1: the most.
1:37:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I'm gonna there's two guys here I want
1:37:41
Speaker 3: to talk about it, and I'm gonna pass by. Probably
1:37:43
Speaker 3: what I say is the two guys apply the most value,
1:37:45
Speaker 3: which is like Corbyn Carroll and Lawrence Butler, just because
1:37:50
Speaker 3: I think that they're so known or and I think
1:37:53
Speaker 3: maybe Carroll's known and Butler's already got like this crazy
1:37:57
Speaker 3: helium it feels like from the offseason. So I think
1:38:00
Speaker 3: if you own Butler, you're not really letting him go.
1:38:04
Speaker 3: And I still think there's the jury's out as far
1:38:06
Speaker 3: as how well he can stand up, because he did
1:38:10
Speaker 3: kind of come out of nowhere, and there are a
1:38:12
Speaker 3: few warning signs with with Butler. As far as how
1:38:15
Speaker 3: much of this will will truly stick. I think a
1:38:17
Speaker 3: lot of it sticks, and you have to like the
1:38:21
Speaker 3: situation going into next year of not being at the coliseum.
1:38:25
Speaker 3: But I just don't think people like he's one of
1:38:28
Speaker 3: those guys that people aren't gonna trade because if you
1:38:32
Speaker 3: if you trade him does what people are hoping you
1:38:35
Speaker 3: look like an idiot, and so you don't want that
1:38:40
Speaker 3: to happen. So I'm gonna pass those guys up, and
1:38:42
Speaker 3: I'm going to go and say the guy I'm most
1:38:44
Speaker 3: interested in here is Carry Carpenter, but he's followed closely
1:38:48
Speaker 3: by another one. But Carry Carpenter stands out to me
1:38:51
Speaker 3: for a few reasons. One, the guy hasn't been able
1:38:54
Speaker 3: to be healthy, and we know I like injured guys,
1:38:57
Speaker 3: but when he has he is the cleanup hitter for
1:39:00
Speaker 3: the Tigers in an improving offense, and a guy that
1:39:04
Speaker 3: just absolutely rakes. He's got sneaky power. He's a bigger
1:39:10
Speaker 3: guy than you realize. He's six two to two twenty,
1:39:12
Speaker 3: so he's actually a pretty imposing guy at the plate.
1:39:15
Speaker 3: He's going to his age twenty seven season, and if
1:39:19
Speaker 3: any of those smart guys out there that do trend
1:39:21
Speaker 3: analysis tell you anything, age twenty seven is the peak
1:39:25
Speaker 3: of peaks for hitters in our fantasy game and in
1:39:28
Speaker 3: the real world game. And he's just absolutely crushed the
1:39:32
Speaker 3: ball whenever he has been playing you. So last year
1:39:37
Speaker 3: he didn't hit enough to actually qualify for some of
1:39:40
Speaker 3: the sack cast spetrics. But he was easily in the
1:39:45
Speaker 3: top quarter, if not better, on his ex batting average,
1:39:51
Speaker 3: his ex slug, his barrel, his hard hit, his sweet spot.
1:39:55
Speaker 3: He was just unbelievable in those And when you're playing
1:39:59
Speaker 3: and hitting clean up for a team and you have
1:40:02
Speaker 3: the potential to hit kind of two seventy two eighty,
1:40:05
Speaker 3: easily could argue hit thirty home runs. It wouldn't be
1:40:08
Speaker 3: a shock. Even a little bit more wouldn't be a shock,
1:40:11
Speaker 3: and you could probably drive in one hundred like that's
1:40:14
Speaker 3: what Carpenter can do. And his cost is absolutely like
1:40:17
Speaker 3: that of a fourth or fifth outfielder. So I could
1:40:19
Speaker 3: see it once. I will own he's a platoon bat,
1:40:22
Speaker 3: and so let's own that fact. But if he's doing
1:40:27
Speaker 3: all these things as a platoon bat, it's not hard
1:40:28
Speaker 3: to see them giving him a chance to go after
1:40:32
Speaker 3: it on the on the other side and face a
1:40:35
Speaker 3: few lefties here and there. So really excited about Carpenter,
1:40:39
Speaker 3: the guy I want to throw at you, which I
1:40:42
Speaker 3: think you made fun of me before we even started the
1:40:44
Speaker 3: pod tonight and said, why the heck is Trevor larch
1:40:47
Speaker 3: on This list is first of all, Alex Kiroloff retired,
1:40:52
Speaker 3: so there's plenty time to be had. And if you
1:40:55
Speaker 3: look at this profile, he absolutely smokes the ball. His
1:41:03
Speaker 3: average EXCEP lost these top ten percent the league, his
1:41:07
Speaker 3: actual like plate approach. He's actually a pretty patient hitter,
1:41:12
Speaker 3: and he just has not kind of got what he
1:41:14
Speaker 3: needed from kind of a overall results perspective in Minnesota.
1:41:20
Speaker 3: He's kind of just missed out on a few home runs.
1:41:23
Speaker 3: He hasn't had as much playing time because because of
1:41:26
Speaker 3: that platoon, and so it's he's a guy that I
1:41:29
Speaker 3: don't think anybody's really looking at, and he's really just
1:41:33
Speaker 3: gotten better. Like the second half last year, hit two
1:41:37
Speaker 3: seventy two. He in only fifty games, He had six bombs,
1:41:43
Speaker 3: he had thirty four runs, twenty two rbi. He was
1:41:46
Speaker 3: just really really solid, but the contact quality was incredible,
1:41:50
Speaker 3: And so it seems like he really is getting comfortable
1:41:53
Speaker 3: to play, and he's just had enough injuries and things
1:41:56
Speaker 3: out there that's just not gotta where he needs to be.
1:41:58
Speaker 3: But I think he's got a your path the playing time,
1:42:02
Speaker 3: and there's kind of no reason he shouldn't with a
1:42:06
Speaker 3: healthy offseason, be kind of like a prime middle the
1:42:09
Speaker 3: order guy for the Twins. So I think he's like
1:42:12
Speaker 3: viewed as a bench bat in a number of leagues,
1:42:14
Speaker 3: and I'm I'm he's in my lineup like I expect
1:42:18
Speaker 3: as long as he's facing righties. Let's let's let's let
1:42:21
Speaker 3: this thing fly. So maybe I'm too high on these
1:42:24
Speaker 3: platoon guys, but hey, in our game, if you can
1:42:28
Speaker 3: piece together a guy that can hit thirty home runs
1:42:30
Speaker 3: and knocking ninety and hit two seventy, I'm doing that
1:42:34
Speaker 3: all day.
1:42:35
Speaker 1: Yeah, And maybe that comment also came from a place
1:42:38
Speaker 1: of bitterness, because the other thing that I love about
1:42:40
Speaker 1: Autune is you get the whole like transaction history, and
1:42:43
Speaker 1: so like we've started this in our league that Matt
1:42:46
Speaker 1: Harvey was the first inductee to our league Hall of
1:42:49
Speaker 1: Fame just because it was the most hilarious transaction history
1:42:52
Speaker 1: you could imagine. Trevor larnak Is is gonna be kind
1:42:56
Speaker 1: of pushing. Maybe hall of Fame stands because I was
1:42:59
Speaker 1: on the Trevor Larara trained for three straight years. I
1:43:02
Speaker 1: kept him like three years. I kept him in the
1:43:04
Speaker 1: league and finally got off recently because of those injuries
1:43:07
Speaker 1: we were talking about. But what happened in the meantime
1:43:10
Speaker 1: is the twin stop playing him against left handed bat
1:43:13
Speaker 1: or pitchers like period he only faced he only had
1:43:17
Speaker 1: twenty three plate appearance against lefties in twenty twenty four
1:43:20
Speaker 1: versus three hundred and seventy seven against righty's. And so
1:43:24
Speaker 1: this is a great spot where like the price and
1:43:28
Speaker 1: the roster spot and everything that we were talking about
1:43:31
Speaker 1: of like pursuing a platoon bat essentially like Larnak was
1:43:35
Speaker 1: pacing for like a thirty homer, one hundred rbi season
1:43:40
Speaker 1: in a platoon situation. So like you can find those
1:43:43
Speaker 1: situations in daily lineups. And this is exactly like the
1:43:48
Speaker 1: type of player you should target the group that I
1:43:51
Speaker 1: originally went through. I think my target is Pete ro
1:43:54
Speaker 1: Armstrong because I think that there's you're talking a little
1:43:57
Speaker 1: bit about, like sometimes you have to be aggressive with
1:43:59
Speaker 1: players and really like kind of put your chips in,
1:44:02
Speaker 1: especially in more mature auto new leagues to be able
1:44:05
Speaker 1: to find, you know, players that can give you the
1:44:09
Speaker 1: most bang for your buck on your four hundred dollars budget,
1:44:11
Speaker 1: and I think Pca is one of those that obviously
1:44:14
Speaker 1: he's going to be expensive given that Cody Bellingder trade
1:44:17
Speaker 1: should open up a full time role for him in Chicago,
1:44:21
Speaker 1: but especially if you the I think there's a lot
1:44:25
Speaker 1: of great things in PCA's profile in terms of he's
1:44:28
Speaker 1: not one of these speed only no power guys. He's
1:44:32
Speaker 1: got a lot of pop in that bat, great barrel rate,
1:44:35
Speaker 1: he hits the ball in the air, and I think
1:44:38
Speaker 1: that when like there's a possibility where you can see
1:44:42
Speaker 1: him giving into twenty five maybe even like almost pushing
1:44:47
Speaker 1: thirty homers in like a peak season that you also
1:44:50
Speaker 1: got to like time in auto new leagues, like when
1:44:53
Speaker 1: you're kind of cycling through your upper end players, and
1:44:56
Speaker 1: especially with the four hundred dollars budget sometimes like if
1:45:00
Speaker 1: if you are a really good team, you get to
1:45:02
Speaker 1: the end of the year and you just run out
1:45:04
Speaker 1: of money to be able to keep all your studs,
1:45:06
Speaker 1: and so you got to peel some of them off. Pca,
1:45:09
Speaker 1: I think is a great kind of player for that,
1:45:11
Speaker 1: where you know, if you're holding somebody like a I mean,
1:45:15
Speaker 1: if I was in a situation where I was in
1:45:16
Speaker 1: a budget crunch on my team where I have Juan
1:45:19
Speaker 1: Soto and Francisco Lindor, this PCA is the type of
1:45:23
Speaker 1: player I would be peeling off some of those studs
1:45:25
Speaker 1: for because like I mean, I think there's a really
1:45:28
Speaker 1: great possibility that Pete war Armstrong ends up providing just
1:45:33
Speaker 1: other worldly value for you in your outfield and we'll
1:45:36
Speaker 1: play every day because of the defense that, like, the
1:45:39
Speaker 1: upside and the ceiling here for him is is just
1:45:43
Speaker 1: really huge at his price, and it might cost you
1:45:46
Speaker 1: a little bit in the trade market, but I think
1:45:48
Speaker 1: I'm willing to pay that right now.
1:45:51
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think there's a lot of upside here, and
1:45:54
Speaker 3: because he has a reputation for not having power and
1:45:57
Speaker 3: being a defense first player, and his numbers weren't otherworldly,
1:46:02
Speaker 3: but you can look on the cover and see like
1:46:04
Speaker 3: there's a lot of injury. Like that's the kind of
1:46:06
Speaker 3: guy you want to pick up because if you're wrong,
1:46:08
Speaker 3: it doesn't kill you, like you're not out so much.
1:46:11
Speaker 3: And so I think, I don't know that you can
1:46:14
Speaker 3: convince me on a thirty homer bat with peak Crow,
1:46:17
Speaker 3: but yeah, if you want to, if you want to,
1:46:19
Speaker 3: say a twenty homer bat, I'm I believe that that
1:46:23
Speaker 3: can happen. But there's a lot of value in that
1:46:26
Speaker 3: in in our game, and the fact that he can run,
1:46:29
Speaker 3: he can steal. I didn't look up his uh sprint
1:46:32
Speaker 3: speed because I I just I knew you probab knew
1:46:34
Speaker 3: that one by heart, so I couldn't I couldn't bring
1:46:38
Speaker 3: myself to do it to you, to you again here,
1:46:40
Speaker 3: but uh it's I think you make a good call
1:46:44
Speaker 3: that pekrow arm.
1:46:46
Speaker 2: You want me to ask you, let me go.
1:46:50
Speaker 1: For it, Okay, I will make sure to look Okay, yeah,
1:46:53
Speaker 1: I'm giving you a two margin.
1:46:59
Speaker 3: I I'm gonna go with ninety seven percent sprint speed.
1:47:02
Speaker 3: Damn you hate it. Yeah it's nine. The margin kind
1:47:08
Speaker 3: of gave it away there, but obviousally had to pick
1:47:11
Speaker 3: whenever we get to ninety nine because I don't know
1:47:13
Speaker 3: that they typically put one hundred except for like the
1:47:15
Speaker 3: top guy on. So whatever range you gave me, I
1:47:19
Speaker 3: was just subtracting. Well, I didn't want to subtract from
1:47:21
Speaker 3: a hundred were there, so it was pretty pretty easy.
1:47:25
Speaker 1: Okay, let's move into our the pitching side again. So
1:47:30
Speaker 1: the other key piece is to try to find those
1:47:33
Speaker 1: aces before their aces that like obviously we're doing this
1:47:36
Speaker 1: in general and dynasty leagues, but in auto new it's
1:47:39
Speaker 1: even more crucial because finding one is impossible and any
1:47:44
Speaker 1: of the ones that are gonna be coming through the
1:47:46
Speaker 1: draft are gonna be like obviously the Japanese pitchers coming
1:47:49
Speaker 1: over was a huge portion of like Rokie Susaki is
1:47:53
Speaker 1: gonna go for big, big, big dollars in mature auto
1:47:57
Speaker 1: new leagues to the point where it's just like not
1:48:00
Speaker 1: even worth it, Or you get somebody like a Garrett
1:48:02
Speaker 1: Cole where it's like a you know, a fading ace
1:48:06
Speaker 1: where you're still gonna have to pay again an eighth
1:48:09
Speaker 1: of your budget, like fifty plus bucks to bring somebody
1:48:11
Speaker 1: like that into your roster at the draft table.
1:48:14
Speaker 2: So being able to like.
1:48:16
Speaker 1: Find players who are more like top forty ish pittures
1:48:20
Speaker 1: but can maybe push themselves into more of a top
1:48:24
Speaker 1: fifteen range is really crucial for autune. Again a little
1:48:29
Speaker 1: bit more risky just because we're talking pictures, and I
1:48:32
Speaker 1: think compared to what you're saying about like PCA, where
1:48:34
Speaker 1: you can't really go wrong, you can go wrong if
1:48:36
Speaker 1: some of these elbows and shoulders and stuff blow out.
1:48:39
Speaker 1: But I think in terms of both roto end points,
1:48:44
Speaker 1: these guys are great for any basis, so like they're
1:48:51
Speaker 1: providing great value now, but I think they can.
1:48:53
Speaker 2: Reach an elite level going forward.
1:48:55
Speaker 1: And so the list that we've put together is and
1:48:58
Speaker 1: are attainable too, because like we were discussing that a
1:49:02
Speaker 1: little bit before the pod that you know, you'll go
1:49:04
Speaker 1: through and you'll find like Jared Jones is cheaper than
1:49:08
Speaker 1: some of these guys, but like you're not getting Jared
1:49:10
Speaker 1: Jones for the price that he's at, you know, kind
1:49:14
Speaker 1: of similar to like the Jackson Merril stuff. Obviously Paul
1:49:17
Speaker 1: Skeens is undervalued, but like you're not trading for Paul Skeens.
1:49:21
Speaker 1: I think in the auditory league, these guys I think
1:49:24
Speaker 1: are a little bit more you can actually bring them home.
1:49:28
Speaker 1: So we've got Brian Wu at eight point nine dollars,
1:49:31
Speaker 1: Bryce Miller at thirteen point two dollars, those guys both
1:49:35
Speaker 1: on the Mariners, Hunter Brown of the Astros at nine
1:49:38
Speaker 1: point nine dollars, Tanner Biby of the Guardians at nine
1:49:42
Speaker 1: point seven dollars, Jack Flaherty free agent six point eight dollars.
1:49:46
Speaker 1: Which of these players intrigues you the most?
1:49:50
Speaker 3: Yeah, all of them are very interesting names. But the
1:49:52
Speaker 3: guy that I'm gonna go with is a guy that
1:49:54
Speaker 3: I've had an obsession of for about a year and
1:49:57
Speaker 3: a half. In this Hunter Brown, I'm very, very intrigued
1:50:01
Speaker 3: by Hunter Brown, and he just I can't find something
1:50:05
Speaker 3: in the profile they don't like. And that's the hard part,
1:50:08
Speaker 3: which and the only reason I think we can even
1:50:11
Speaker 3: talk about him is because of how dreadful he was
1:50:15
Speaker 3: through March and April last year, to the point that
1:50:18
Speaker 3: he was droppable because he just looked so gushed on bad.
1:50:22
Speaker 3: But after April last year, so May first on, he
1:50:26
Speaker 3: went eleven and five and twenty four games he got
1:50:30
Speaker 3: into the seventh inning on average. In those games, he
1:50:33
Speaker 3: struck out nine and a half per nine, He's walked
1:50:37
Speaker 3: under three, kept the ball on the ground almost half
1:50:40
Speaker 3: the time with the two fifty one e RA. He
1:50:42
Speaker 3: was unbelievable. And his price is still being kind of
1:50:47
Speaker 3: held down because that overall line was just really, you know,
1:50:51
Speaker 3: brought down because of how bad he was at the
1:50:54
Speaker 3: beginning of the season. But Hunter Brown just seems like
1:50:57
Speaker 3: he's kind of figured it all out. He has velocity,
1:51:00
Speaker 3: He's kind of a ninety six mile ninety seven mile
1:51:03
Speaker 3: hour guy like he can he can definitely bring it
1:51:06
Speaker 3: in there. He throws a multiple pitches. He actually can
1:51:11
Speaker 3: go six deep on his pitches. But he is kind
1:51:15
Speaker 3: of a fastball first guy, but he kind of tailored
1:51:17
Speaker 3: that back and really uses sinker and cutter, which is
1:51:20
Speaker 3: again he's a he's a round ball pitcher, which making
1:51:23
Speaker 3: that work in Houston, that's kind of the ideal UH
1:51:27
Speaker 3: pitcher makeup. So I think Hunter Brown has another gear
1:51:32
Speaker 3: to go and he actually kind of showed us some
1:51:34
Speaker 3: of that this year. And you know the I always
1:51:38
Speaker 3: love the savant comps here pitch arsenal comps first two,
1:51:43
Speaker 3: twenty twenty four, Garrett Cole, Second one, twenty twenty three,
1:51:47
Speaker 3: Garrett Cole. Yeah, if they're going to compare yourself to
1:51:51
Speaker 3: a guy, I think that's okay. Tyler Glass was the
1:51:55
Speaker 3: third one. And another guy that folks love is just
1:51:57
Speaker 3: the injury issues. So like he's got amazing arsenal and
1:52:03
Speaker 3: it just hasn't fully come together because he's had a
1:52:06
Speaker 3: few rough patches. So I think if he's a guy
1:52:09
Speaker 3: out there and people you might have to overpay for
1:52:11
Speaker 3: him from an optics perspective, but I don't know that
1:52:13
Speaker 3: you're really overpaying. He's the kind of guy that if
1:52:15
Speaker 3: you have like a twenty twenty five dollars number two
1:52:19
Speaker 3: or three pitcher, you might want to see if you
1:52:21
Speaker 3: can flip it for a hundred brown at ten dollars
1:52:24
Speaker 3: and you might actually come out ahead and dollars and talent.
1:52:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think that's a good choice there. So
1:52:32
Speaker 1: I do have a different one here, and it's actually
1:52:34
Speaker 1: the most expensive one that I listed off. It's Bryce
1:52:37
Speaker 1: Miller because honestly, he might already be there that like,
1:52:41
Speaker 1: he quietly put together the nastiest second half of maybe
1:52:45
Speaker 1: any pitcher in baseball where especially like because I think
1:52:50
Speaker 1: his his profile is so fastball for it, it's almost
1:52:54
Speaker 1: like and he's got like a Spencer Strider fastball in
1:52:57
Speaker 1: terms of like the spin on it and the way
1:53:00
Speaker 1: it comes out of his arm slot, and like the
1:53:02
Speaker 1: way that he pushes it up.
1:53:04
Speaker 2: In the zone. And he's you know, not throwing.
1:53:08
Speaker 1: At the most elite velocity out there at ninety five,
1:53:12
Speaker 1: So I think he's got a little bit more of
1:53:14
Speaker 1: a durable arm. But the second half of Bryce Miller
1:53:16
Speaker 1: last year, first half he put up a.
1:53:20
Speaker 2: Let me find it on the page again.
1:53:23
Speaker 1: He put up a three sixty three ERA over one
1:53:27
Speaker 1: hundred and nine innings with a K nine of eight
1:53:32
Speaker 1: point one. Second half seventy one and a third innings
1:53:36
Speaker 1: one eighty nine era to go with a k rate
1:53:41
Speaker 1: that eclipsed nine at nine point two. So I think
1:53:44
Speaker 1: he's already pushed himself into a really elite territory very
1:53:47
Speaker 1: quietly that and it just doesn't seem like the market's
1:53:51
Speaker 1: quite there. Like I'm looking at the ADP data right now,
1:53:54
Speaker 1: he's going around pick eighty in the NFBC, and that
1:53:59
Speaker 1: puts in him around. We've got to always do like
1:54:02
Speaker 1: the Otani like subtraction, So thirtieth pitcher off the board,
1:54:07
Speaker 1: but like starters and going in front of him. He's
1:54:10
Speaker 1: going right in front of Rookie Sasaki and your boy,
1:54:13
Speaker 1: Bailey Ober. I would rather have Bryce Miller than both
1:54:16
Speaker 1: of those guys right now. I'd rather have him than
1:54:19
Speaker 1: showed to Imanaga in front of him from Bravaldez, Michael King,
1:54:23
Speaker 1: Pablo Lopez, Garrett Cole, even like, Bryce Miller's been really,
1:54:27
Speaker 1: really solid, and he's given you a really solid base
1:54:30
Speaker 1: of innings now here in twenty twenty four to build upon.
1:54:33
Speaker 1: So it's not like he's not going to be there
1:54:38
Speaker 1: for you down the stretch that you know he made
1:54:40
Speaker 1: thirty one starts. I think he's already in this territory
1:54:43
Speaker 1: and if you're talking to somebody who is you know,
1:54:45
Speaker 1: only thirteen bucks in autunu. This is the type of
1:54:48
Speaker 1: guy where, you know, I think if you took the
1:54:52
Speaker 1: the name off of the front and put Garrett Cole
1:54:55
Speaker 1: on the numbers, everyone would be automatically bidding him up
1:54:59
Speaker 1: to forty fifty bucks in an auction draft like out
1:55:02
Speaker 1: the Gate. But like, I don't think Bryce Miller would
1:55:05
Speaker 1: hit those hit those numbers. You know obviously would in
1:55:08
Speaker 1: my league. But like, I think you can get Bryce
1:55:11
Speaker 1: Miller for a much cheaper price than what we'll be
1:55:13
Speaker 1: talking about around like the midway point of twenty twenty five,
1:55:17
Speaker 1: when he you know, is clearly in that upper echelon.
1:55:20
Speaker 1: So is that too crazy? Am I too high on
1:55:24
Speaker 1: Bryce Miller? Is this also just another bitter thing? Because
1:55:27
Speaker 1: another great transaction history? In twenty twenty three, I drafted
1:55:31
Speaker 1: Bryce Miller, ran out of roster, space cut him. He
1:55:34
Speaker 1: got called up like three days before I could reauction
1:55:38
Speaker 1: him and read him to my team. So I've I've
1:55:41
Speaker 1: lost him ever since then, I have been chasing, chasing
1:55:43
Speaker 1: the ghost.
1:55:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I don't think you're off, Like you know,
1:55:48
Speaker 3: is things I look for a picture. I wished a
1:55:50
Speaker 3: little more velocity, little more ground balls, but like I'm nitpicking,
1:55:53
Speaker 3: Like he is a great pitcher, and I think that
1:55:56
Speaker 3: you have a little the West Coast lack of bias
1:56:00
Speaker 3: hitting him here. You don't have people paying attention. And
1:56:04
Speaker 3: you know, Miller's just steady Eddy. He doesn't he doesn't
1:56:08
Speaker 3: like go and put a night and then shut out
1:56:10
Speaker 3: in and strike out fifteen guys. Like he doesn't have
1:56:13
Speaker 3: those breakout games and things. He just seems to do
1:56:16
Speaker 3: all the things really really well. To your point, like
1:56:18
Speaker 3: it just seems like the market's not valuing him right,
1:56:21
Speaker 3: and so if that's the case from like a draft perspective,
1:56:24
Speaker 3: that means you might want to look at it from
1:56:25
Speaker 3: a trade perspective. Now, the caveat being there with all
1:56:30
Speaker 3: these guys, the guy that has them is probably more
1:56:33
Speaker 3: intimately familiar with him than everybody else, and so that
1:56:36
Speaker 3: they can be tough to pull away, But it's not
1:56:40
Speaker 3: hard to make that arguments, like, hey, even in the
1:56:42
Speaker 3: first year player drafts, he's not going that high. Like
1:56:44
Speaker 3: there's definitely some question marks, you can poke holes in him,
1:56:47
Speaker 3: but Bryce Miller looks really really good and if he
1:56:51
Speaker 3: maintains some that strikeout stuff, which it seems like was
1:56:53
Speaker 3: building last year. That's what gets scary. That's what really
1:56:57
Speaker 3: makes Bryce Miller stick out to me. So I think
1:57:00
Speaker 3: every guy we have on this list is drinking for
1:57:02
Speaker 3: one reason or another. That's what I love about pitching
1:57:04
Speaker 3: is you you you don't have some draft as if
1:57:08
Speaker 3: we've drafted all five of these guys, I would be
1:57:10
Speaker 3: absolutely thrilled with that type of rotation. And you're probably
1:57:13
Speaker 3: paying you know what you could try to get Garrett
1:57:16
Speaker 3: Cole Sinster Strider and nobody else. Again, I'm assuming a
1:57:19
Speaker 3: healthy Strider, but Miller and Brown really really stand out.
1:57:24
Speaker 1: So okay, yeah, all right, We've got one last category here,
1:57:28
Speaker 1: and I recall it kind of the swing pictures, especially
1:57:31
Speaker 1: what I'm thinking about here is looking at kind of
1:57:34
Speaker 1: like the trajectory of what like Seth Lugu has gone
1:57:37
Speaker 1: through right now, A Lopez, all these other pictures who
1:57:41
Speaker 1: have been converting from relievers to starters. I think I
1:57:44
Speaker 1: are really underrated for autnew because they're obviously coming through
1:57:48
Speaker 1: as like reliever prices and you can get some volume
1:57:52
Speaker 1: out of there where you're talking about, like you said,
1:57:55
Speaker 1: like it takes Honestly, I think it takes almost eight
1:57:58
Speaker 1: to nine pictures to really weather the storm of a
1:58:02
Speaker 1: pit of a season of getting enough innings in an
1:58:05
Speaker 1: autonew league nowadays, obviously you're gonna be cycling some of
1:58:08
Speaker 1: them in and out and like trying to find like
1:58:11
Speaker 1: spots and schedules where they've got easier stretches. But like
1:58:17
Speaker 1: you know, you've got to have a pretty nice stock
1:58:22
Speaker 1: of pictures going into the season to be able to
1:58:25
Speaker 1: survive the storm. And so I'm not sure if this
1:58:28
Speaker 1: is necessarily like the archetype as maybe some of the
1:58:31
Speaker 1: other guys that we've been talking about, where like there's
1:58:33
Speaker 1: like a true like golden nugget there, But I think
1:58:36
Speaker 1: just more of like you can always get these guys
1:58:39
Speaker 1: pretty cheap in trades, and like they'll always kind of
1:58:42
Speaker 1: be cheap. You can always fly them underneath the radar.
1:58:44
Speaker 1: They're not gonna be hit with too much arbitration. And
1:58:47
Speaker 1: so I've got three guys here in this category and
1:58:50
Speaker 1: seeing who you like the best. We've got Nick Martinez
1:58:54
Speaker 1: at four dollars going back to the Reds on that
1:58:58
Speaker 1: qualifying offer. We've got Chris Bubach for the Kansas City Royals,
1:59:03
Speaker 1: coming in at three point six dollars, so like barely
1:59:06
Speaker 1: a dollar in season before he hit the arbitration process.
1:59:10
Speaker 1: And our boy claim Hole Clay Holmes that we talked
1:59:12
Speaker 1: about last week, as he's now on the Mets converting
1:59:15
Speaker 1: to a starter at eight point eight dollars. Related note,
1:59:18
Speaker 1: claim Holmes already has a beard back, so maybe there's
1:59:21
Speaker 1: a little maget there. But of these kind of like
1:59:24
Speaker 1: three in this archetype, which player stands out to you
1:59:27
Speaker 1: the most and is most intriguing to you for Autunu
1:59:30
Speaker 1: and just kind of maybe overall.
1:59:32
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I feel like any of these can
1:59:34
Speaker 3: be a dart throw and I'm gonna if I'm gonna
1:59:37
Speaker 3: take a dart, I'm gonna throw it at Boobach here.
1:59:41
Speaker 3: And maybe that's kind of crazy your point, Like he
1:59:44
Speaker 3: was basically free, and I'm guessing his ownership rates not
1:59:46
Speaker 3: even that that crazy crazy high in ott New. The
1:59:50
Speaker 3: reason it's intriguing is, you know, he's really transitioned in
1:59:53
Speaker 3: twenty twenty four or from a starter to a reliever.
1:59:57
Speaker 3: And when he did that, his stuff played up and
2:00:00
Speaker 3: he didn't have to use his full arsenal, and all
2:00:02
Speaker 3: of a sudden, his fastball. It added a few ticks,
2:00:07
Speaker 3: almost two ticks to that fastball, and he was able
2:00:12
Speaker 3: to lean in and take that from what was an
2:00:14
Speaker 3: average pitch to a above average pitch and then rely
2:00:18
Speaker 3: on really his slider and change, and he became kind
2:00:20
Speaker 3: of a three pitch pitcher when historically he'd been kind
2:00:22
Speaker 3: of a four pitch pitcher throughout his career, trying to
2:00:26
Speaker 3: figure out what to do with kind of his his curveball,
2:00:30
Speaker 3: which he basically completely ditched last year, and so his
2:00:33
Speaker 3: stuff seems to be really playing up. It's a very
2:00:36
Speaker 3: small sample size and the you know, thirty innings that
2:00:40
Speaker 3: he got in, but you know, I love looking at
2:00:43
Speaker 3: guys that didn't get a whole lot of innings, so
2:00:47
Speaker 3: they don't show up on any leaderboard in the stack
2:00:49
Speaker 3: cast and things like that. And if you look at
2:00:51
Speaker 3: Bubitch here man that is pure red across the board,
2:00:56
Speaker 3: he is like in the top five percentile on so
2:01:00
Speaker 3: many different measures of just limiting hard contact and getting
2:01:05
Speaker 3: guys to chase, and like it's velocity is not crazy,
2:01:10
Speaker 3: but there's something he's kind of figured out as he
2:01:12
Speaker 3: made that transition, and of teams that make guys transition
2:01:15
Speaker 3: to kind of a bullpen roll that I figured that
2:01:18
Speaker 3: that transition in the past. The Royals oddly have figured
2:01:21
Speaker 3: that out, Like we even go back to like the
2:01:22
Speaker 3: way Davis stays right, They've kind of figured that that
2:01:25
Speaker 3: formula out. So it's just Martinez is interesting, Holmes is interesting.
2:01:29
Speaker 3: I just think the upside with Boombage is higher, and
2:01:33
Speaker 3: I'm feel like I can get him from basically nothing,
2:01:36
Speaker 3: and so I would be shocked to see him closing
2:01:39
Speaker 3: games in Kansas City by the end of the year.
2:01:42
Speaker 3: I wouldn't be shocked to see that if he really
2:01:44
Speaker 3: truly leans into this this reliever role. So I'm kind
2:01:50
Speaker 3: of shocked by my answer here. But the more I
2:01:52
Speaker 3: look at my I just can't ignore what I see.
2:01:55
Speaker 3: So how about you? Who are you staking?
2:01:57
Speaker 2: In this group?
2:01:58
Speaker 1: I mean, this entire group was created so that I
2:02:01
Speaker 1: could shoehorn in a conversation about Chris Boobach because back
2:02:04
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three, I was all bored the Chris
2:02:08
Speaker 1: Boobach cheering because of what you were seeing in that
2:02:10
Speaker 1: stat cast data. It just turned bright red overnight. As
2:02:13
Speaker 1: well as like the overall just mound presence was otherworldly
2:02:20
Speaker 1: for his three starts before he blew out and had
2:02:23
Speaker 1: to undergo the knife that Like, he was absolutely found
2:02:26
Speaker 1: gold until that happened.
2:02:28
Speaker 2: But just the pitch ability has been.
2:02:33
Speaker 1: The step forward was crazy and it's unfortunate that we
2:02:36
Speaker 1: didn't get to see it play all the way out.
2:02:38
Speaker 1: I will say, I don't he's not in the bullpen
2:02:41
Speaker 1: for Kansas. He's currently on roster resources their fourth starters.
2:02:45
Speaker 1: So I think really it's gonna yeah, I think he's
2:02:48
Speaker 1: gonna stick as a starter next year. That he was
2:02:50
Speaker 1: only in the bullpen this year to like rehab the
2:02:53
Speaker 1: rest of that Tommy John surgery, and so.
2:02:55
Speaker 3: I don't know about that. I don't that really, why
2:02:57
Speaker 3: would you? Why would they do that?
2:02:59
Speaker 1: I think they're gonna push him into a starter role.
2:03:01
Speaker 1: So like, but in twenty twenty three, it was just
2:03:05
Speaker 1: a total arsenal rehaul from the off season of twenty
2:03:09
Speaker 1: twenty two going to twenty three.
2:03:11
Speaker 2: You can see it across the board.
2:03:12
Speaker 1: I mean it was only sixteen innings in twenty three,
2:03:15
Speaker 1: but like ca nine went up from like his career
2:03:18
Speaker 1: rate over three hundred nine innings before that was just
2:03:21
Speaker 1: around eight.
2:03:22
Speaker 2: Bumped it up to nine.
2:03:24
Speaker 1: The ground ball rate used to be forty four point
2:03:26
Speaker 1: three percent uped it to fifty two percent in that
2:03:30
Speaker 1: in that small sample size in the thirty innings last
2:03:32
Speaker 1: year is fifty six percent. And just like everything else
2:03:36
Speaker 1: across the board looks great, he cut the walks and
2:03:39
Speaker 1: that's maintained in twenty twenty three and twenty four, and
2:03:42
Speaker 1: so like whatever he was working on in twenty three
2:03:45
Speaker 1: stuck in twenty four, And that tells me that there's
2:03:49
Speaker 1: something happening in the overall arsenal of Chris Bubach that
2:03:53
Speaker 1: like changed from twenty twenty two and he's not who
2:03:56
Speaker 1: he was from twenty to twenty two that I think
2:03:59
Speaker 1: you look at honestly like this is I don't think
2:04:02
Speaker 1: he's going to be as good as Cole Reagan's, but
2:04:04
Speaker 1: you're I think we're going to be looking at that
2:04:07
Speaker 1: level of breakout here with Kansas City and Chris Bubach
2:04:09
Speaker 1: that like I am heavily on board this train, and
2:04:13
Speaker 1: like I think I know there's a few others like
2:04:16
Speaker 1: out in the Fantasy Baseball podcast Realm, where I've heard
2:04:19
Speaker 1: them kind of bringing them up because I think they've
2:04:21
Speaker 1: seen some of the things that we've we've just kind
2:04:24
Speaker 1: of honed in on here. But like I think this
2:04:28
Speaker 1: is going to be a really significant piece going into
2:04:30
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five, and I'm elated to try to add
2:04:34
Speaker 1: Boobach to the end of Rosters because it is, I
2:04:37
Speaker 1: think a dart throw that could yield some pretty major
2:04:39
Speaker 1: results the way that, like Sean Maniya did, I think
2:04:42
Speaker 1: this this past year in twenty twenty four, it's the
2:04:44
Speaker 1: same sort of like setup where there's the entire profile
2:04:48
Speaker 1: has changed, and it's like you can't rely on the
2:04:51
Speaker 1: projections to tell you the path forward because all they're
2:04:54
Speaker 1: doing is averaging all of his career work and it's
2:04:57
Speaker 1: not what he used to be.
2:04:59
Speaker 3: Leave it to stand up with a podcast where we
2:05:02
Speaker 3: be thrilled with a lineup with Michael Toglia, Griffin Jack's,
2:05:07
Speaker 3: Chris Bubach and Carrie Carpenter like grit, Like that's that's
2:05:12
Speaker 3: the beauty Votanny though, is that's where the value can
2:05:14
Speaker 3: be find. That's where we're like, it's truly like real
2:05:17
Speaker 3: world baseball where you're trying to create and think about
2:05:21
Speaker 3: all these dynamics. Because I see him as a reliever.
2:05:24
Speaker 3: You see him as as a starter, but we're both intrigued.
2:05:27
Speaker 3: It just comes down to how you want to run
2:05:30
Speaker 3: your team and what you want to invest in because
2:05:32
Speaker 3: you can still do it. So love this format. I
2:05:35
Speaker 3: think there's a lot, a lot of opportunity. We've covered
2:05:38
Speaker 3: a lot in this one's night.
2:05:40
Speaker 2: Yeah.
2:05:40
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And so if you've got any thoughts on ordering yourself,
2:05:44
Speaker 1: any other golden nuggets that you think we've overlooked, reach
2:05:47
Speaker 1: out to us at cards Categories at gmail dot com
2:05:50
Speaker 1: or hit up the podcast on blue Sky at cardscategories
2:05:54
Speaker 1: dot bsky dot social. You can contact me at in
2:05:59
Speaker 1: cool set dot bsky dot social if you want to
2:06:02
Speaker 1: get in contact with me. We are rounding the corner
2:06:05
Speaker 1: into twenty twenty five if you're pretty fast. So we'll
2:06:07
Speaker 1: both be back at rasball writing for the twenty twenty
2:06:10
Speaker 1: five season. But brew let everybody know where they can
2:06:13
Speaker 1: find you on socials that they want to contact you
2:06:15
Speaker 1: in the meantime.
2:06:17
Speaker 3: Yep, find me on Blue Sky and I'm still on
2:06:19
Speaker 3: Twitter slash x as well. Jabrewer one seven and your point,
2:06:23
Speaker 3: we should be kicking off the off season analysis here
2:06:28
Speaker 3: starting probably within the next month or so and really
2:06:31
Speaker 3: get into some of these guys we've covered on the pod,
2:06:33
Speaker 3: getting the deeper dives, giving you all the data walking
2:06:35
Speaker 3: through everything that's happening. So come interact with us, come
2:06:39
Speaker 3: call us names, whatever you want to do. We're just
2:06:40
Speaker 3: happy that you're there. So looking forward to kicking off
2:06:43
Speaker 3: twenty twenty five.
2:06:45
Speaker 1: Yes, absolutely, And as always, if you're looking for links
2:06:48
Speaker 1: to anything that we've discussed, check it out in the
2:06:50
Speaker 1: show notes or go to rasball dot com and see
2:06:53
Speaker 1: the related post to this podcast. If you are have
2:06:57
Speaker 1: made it to the end of this podcast again and
2:06:59
Speaker 1: you're coming off the back to back of these two
2:07:01
Speaker 1: long podcasts, certainly rate review us, subscribe to us, down
2:07:07
Speaker 1: set us to auto download wherever you're listening to this podcast.
2:07:10
Speaker 1: It really just kind of helps us increase our visibility
2:07:13
Speaker 1: to others out there and also just provides us good
2:07:17
Speaker 1: feedback on what we're doing. And if you're looking for
2:07:20
Speaker 1: any swag with cards and categories logos on it, we've
2:07:24
Speaker 1: also got that. In the show notes, there's a link
2:07:26
Speaker 1: to hats, T shirts, smugs. You can check that out
2:07:30
Speaker 1: and get it ordered. I do think you will get
2:07:32
Speaker 1: in time for Valentine's Day, so check that out. Like
2:07:35
Speaker 1: I said at the beginning of this pod, we are
2:07:37
Speaker 1: going to take next week off for Christmas, We'll see
2:07:40
Speaker 1: how the week after that works out with the holiday schedule,
2:07:43
Speaker 1: but you should be able to hear from us soon
2:07:46
Speaker 1: and we'll be back right here when you need us.
2:07:48
Speaker 2: Thanks everybody, E.