Blake Snell, Brendan McKay Haven't Been Throwing Off A Mound

Tampa Bay Rays starting pitchers Blake Snell (elbow) and Brendan McKay (shoulder) are among the two-thirds of the team's pitchers that haven't been throwing off a mound during the coronavirus shutdown. Pitching coach Kyle Snyder hasn't seen video of either pitcher, but he expects them to be ready to go with "zero limitations" whenever the […]

ERA Lie Detector: Finding 2019 Overachievers With SIERA (Part 1)

Skills-Interactive ERA (or SIERA) has been around since 2011 when it was introduced at Baseball Prospectus by Matt Swartz and Eric Seidman before moving to its current home at Fangraphs. Much like xFIP, SIERA attempts to quantify the skills that underpin a pitcher's ERA, albeit in a different manner. Although technically a backward-looking evaluator,  SIERA […]

Brent Honeywell Undergoes Another Elbow Surgery

Tampa Bay Rays pitching prospect Brent Honeywell (elbow) underwent a decompression procedure on his right ulnar nerve on Wednesday in Los Angeles. The surgery was performed by Dr. Neal ElAttrache. The Rays are saying that scar tissue was removed from the area of the nerve. Honeywell is scheduled to begin strength and mobility exercises on […]

Rays Opening Stadium For Player Workouts Next Week

The Tampa Bay Rays will open Tropicana Field on Monday, May 25, for limited and mostly individual player workouts. It will be the first official action at a team facility since March 17 during an optional workout at the Port Charlotte spring training facility before it was shut down due to COVID-19. Players will be […]

Hitters Ready To Break Out Late

Depending on the chosen method of understanding performance declines by age, MLB hitters generally start to decline sometime between the time they turn 28 and 30. Nevertheless, some players can have their best seasons after what is typically a hitter’s peak years. Since many of these hitters have had underwhelming careers before their breakout seasons, […]

WPC+ Videocast: New Draft Strategies for a Shortened Season

Pierre Camus and Nicklaus Gaut review the draft board for RotoBaller's recent expert mock fantasy baseball draft and explain how their strategies have changed with the likelihood of a shortened MLB season in 2020. Like and subscribe to the RotoBaller channel on Youtube to get all our latest podcasts and catch us on iTunes and […]

Blake Snell Not Willing To Take Less Pay For More Risk

Tampa Bay Rays starting pitcher Blake Snell said the risk of returning to play in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic is "just not worth it," at least not for significantly less than his original $7 million salary for this season. "Y’all gotta understand, man, for me to go, for me to take a pay cut […]

RotoBaller MLB Mock: Revising Draft Strategy for a Short Season

With rumors of a proposed plan to start the MLB season becoming more of a reality, it is time to start mock drafting again. I joined some writers from RotoBaller to take place in a 12-team mock draft (full draft results here) for a traditional 5x5 rotisserie league draft with a 24-player roster. It was […]

ADP Comparison: Biggest Risers From March To May

A delayed start to the MLB season has allowed several relatively high-profile MLB players to heal from offseason and spring training injuries, but improved health isn’t the only cause for a rising ADP. Some players have benefited from adjusted roster projections, and some for unclear reasons. With that in mind, here is a list of […]

Detroit Tigers: Top 10 Dynasty Prospects

Major League Baseball will return. When it does, minor league systems may be more important than ever. With all teams losing money during the pandemic layoff, teams will be looking for sources of cheap production. It might also take older players longer to rebound from a long layoff meaning we could see more injuries and […]

Willy Adames (SS, TB) - Fantasy Baseball Draft Sleeper

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~260 CURRENT ADP: ~325 overall ANALYSIS: Willy Adames is coming off his first full season as the starting shortstop for the Tampa Bay Rays. The once-heralded prospect started to shine with a stat line of .254-20-69-52-4. The 20 home runs were a career-high and also came with a career-high ISO of […]

Drafting First Overall In Rotisserie Formats

I really do believe there’s no such thing as too much draft strategy. There are a lot of factors that play into draft selections. I will be discussing topics ranging from positional scarcity to team construction and many things in between. The idea is to go into my strategy and targets through the first 10 […]

Third Base ADP Reflections

Third base is arguably the deepest position in fantasy this year, with plenty of highly productive options outside of the first 20 third basemen being drafted. The position is so deep that if a player isn’t a lock for an OPS above .900, doesn’t have positional versatility, or doesn’t offer stolen bases, then they may […]

Mid-Round Shortstops - Targets and Avoids in 2020

Once you reach the middle-to-late rounds of drafts, it would be smart to consider drafting some upside fliers that can provide a great return on value. You can take a risk or two on a variety of different players, including a prospect, forgotten veterans, players returning from injuries, or even players with skills but have […]

Deeper Draft Sleepers - Catcher

When we do analysis here for deeper leagues there is some semblance of universal acceptance on the parameters. While there is no definitive rule on what constitutes a "deep league", that isn't really the point. This series aims to highlight players not normally drafted but can offer value in leagues where more than roughly 300 […]

Introducing xPA to Project Plate Appearances

I like big rates and I cannot lie. You other readers can't deny. When a rate walks in with an itty PA and an integer in my face, I get sprung...Whoa! Wait just one second, Sir-Mix-A-Nick. Before I go full-Rhymenoceros on everyone, maybe we oughta back the track up a little bit. What I like […]

Dynasty League Buy/Sell

With the uncertainty of opening day, there is no better time to play in an MLB Fantasy Dynasty League. Due to the league format, it by far the most unaffected by the delay of Opening Day. Drafting and trading can proceed in full force as the value assigned to these players go long beyond this […]

Electronic Strike Zone: Who Benefits and Who Doesn't

Among the more high-profile MLB rule changes expected to take effect over the next few years is the usage of an electronic strike zone. The electronic strike zone was used in the Atlantic League in 2019, and the MLB Umpires Association has cleared the way for its introduction to the major leagues at some point […]

How a Revamped MLB Season will Impact Fantasy Baseball

No matter how this MLB season plays out it will look like something we have never seen before. Not only is the start of the season already delayed, but there is no definitive end in sight. If we do see baseball this season, the game is going to look very different. First, there will be […]

Second Basemen Likely to Return a Loss in 2020

As mentioned in my article covering 1B that we might be over-drafting, my goal in these articles is to point out players who might "bust" at their current ADP. The definition of a bust that I'm using is when you invest a large amount of draft capital in a player who doesn't hit the production […]

OPS Overachievers: Using xOPS to Judge Performance

We've already dug into xOPS by looking at the biggest underachievers from last year. Now, it's time to examine the other side of the coin - the less shiny side. Many might believe that wOBA is the stat you should be looking for and people much smarter than I have been duking out this debate […]

Gavin Lux (2B, LAD) - Fantasy Baseball Draft Sleeper

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~150 CURRENT ADP: ~169 overall ANALYSIS: Lux earned a call-up in September just in time to earn a starting job as the Dodgers second baseman. Although he had some strong moments, including five multi-hit games and a pinch-hit home run in Game 1 of the NLDS, he ultimately hit .240 in […]

Starting Pitcher Deep Sleepers for AL-Only Leagues

Finding deep sleepers is one of the most fun and important things to do when it comes to draft prep. As you come towards the end of a draft you want to take players who have upside or potential to provide a lot of draft day value. That is what a draft is all about, […]

Charlie Morton (SP, TB) - Fantasy Baseball Draft Target

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~40 CURRENT ADP: ~50 overall ANALYSIS: Morton’s price may rise as more top-end starting pitchers succumb to injury or potential COVID shutdown, but his current discount is nearly a full round in most formats. That’s plenty of room for profit given his elite turnaround since adding velocity at the end of […]

OPS Underachievers: Using Differences in xOPS to Judge Performance

Add a player's on-base-percentage to his slugging-percentage and you wind up with OPS. Easy-peasy, lemon squeezy. But some things don't need to be complicated to be useful and descriptive. There are a hundred ways to judge a baseball player's performance but OPS remains one of the best proxies for quickly judging a player's overall offensive […]

Stock Your Dynasty Farm: AL East Sleeper Prospects

The AL East features the top farm system in baseball, two uber-prospects, the only Canadian team, as well as two of sports’ most prestigious franchises. Needless to say, there are some storylines to mine for content here. And yet, what may be the richest and most influential division in baseball is, in my humble opinion, […]

AL Players Who Could Benefit From Expanded Rosters

Although we still don't have baseball, we're starting to get a lot of proposals on how we COULD have baseball this summer. The plans may wind up just being a fantasy, but, hey, this is a fantasy site, so it makes sense for us to take a look at it. One of the facets of […]

The King's Fantasy Baseball Insider Report: Exclusive Scouting Reports From an MLB Veteran

The award-winning Fantasy Baseball Insider Series continues on RotoBaller, this time with the seasoned input of a current Major League Player. Every year during fantasy baseball draft season, Scott Engel talks to prime MLB sources to get exclusive nuggets of information. On the condition of anonymity, former and current players, executives, scouts, media members and […]

Man vs. Machine: Nick Mariano and ATC's Over/Undervalued Players

Welcome to Round 2 of Man vs. Machine, where one fantasy analyst goes toe-to-toe with one projection system for ranking supremacy. We here at RotoBaller are fortunate enough to have FantasyPros’ Most Accurate Fantasy Baseball Draft Ranker from both 2018 and 2019 on our roster in Nick Mariano and Ariel Cohen, respectively. Ariel also created […]

JB's Bullpen Method - Building Aces out of Relief Pitchers

If you read my Top 10 Draft Tips piece, you got a preview of the method I have been using for many years in fantasy baseball. It's really less of a method or strategy, and more a state of mind. The Bullpen Method is a lifestyle! I always speak about the importance of balance on […]