Fantasy Baseball Tweetbag

The word “Tweetbag” can be used in one of two ways: 1) When referring to a total douchebag on Twitter (e.g. “That Ashton Kutcher is a total tweetbag!”), or 2) When referring to a mailbag of Tweets (e.g. what you are about to read).  Glad I could educate you all on that.  Open the Tweetbag!

@fed73 draft three sps in same team like Halladay Oswalt Hamels? Good / bad idea in 16TM h2h. Keeping longoria /tulo

In this case for sure it would be a great idea. Halladay, Oswalt, and Hamels can do you no wrong.  In general I never worry about having pitchers on the same MLB team. Evaluate your pitchers individually; if they’re studs, they’re studs. The theory against it I suppose is that you are then “putting all your eggs in one basket.”  If the team was on an extended road trip or playing a good offensive team, those pitchers all play poorly at the same time. However remember you have at least 5-10 other SPs contributing, not to mention that its impossible to predict with regularity how pitchers will perform on one road trip or in one game alone.  The one caveat would be avoiding midrange pitchers who are in the offense-heavy, DH-laden AL East. But I would still draft my studs in that division without thinking twice.

@Dano_Lives Who on the Padres this year is worth a shout as a low risk-high reward late pick?

Since PETCO is a pitcher’s park, if you’re looking for late round Padres value go with a pitcher.  With the exception of Mat Latos you can get all in the Padres starters in the later rounds. Clayton Richard is the one who sticks out to me initially.  He’s going as the 75th-85th starter taken in most drafts.   He had a pretty solid year (3.85 ERA, ~7 K/9) and improved on almost all fronts (K/9, P/PA, P/IP, OPS) in what was essentially his first full year starting.  His WHIP is a little scary (1.41) but not many of those BBs/Hits turned into runs thanks to a top 35 LOB% (74.9%), which is a testament to PETCO.  At 27 he still has his best years ahead of him and I expect him to have a good year, which is good value this late in the draft.  I also might take a flyer on Aaron Harang and hope for a bounce-back year for the ball park factor alone.  And Tim Stauffer went from the bullpen to the starting rotation late in the season and finished with a 1.85 ERA.  Since he is expected to start he is probably worth a look too.

@smith_keith I have 3 keepers. which two do you leave out? Dunn, Longoria, McCann, Linecum and Greinke

It’s tough to say without knowing the full rules of your league. Do you have to keep each player where you drafted them the year before? Do you have a salary cap system where some players cost more than others to keep? Are any of them on a prior “keeper contract” of say five years that has one more year left on it vs. being able to sign a new player to a contract for 5 years? What type of scoring system does your league employ? Since this info wasn’t provided I will just assume that each team in a 5×5 league gets to keep 3 players straight up, and the draft starts after that.  So the way I would determine who to keep would be to first look at where they are being taken in an average draft (their ADP).  Over at MockDraftCentral these guys are being drafted Longoria (5th pick),  Timmy (22), McCann (31), Dunn (46), Greinke (53).  In this case I am definitely keeping Longoria and Timmy, so the final keeper is narrowed down to McCann, Dunn, and Greinke.  Given the position scarcity at Catcher vs the depth at 1B and SP, I keep McCann.  McCann is my #2 catcher and I think he has an awesome year.

@TheGreatGrams what are some realistic projections for Beltre in texas? What about Mike Stanton year 2?

I’m going to post my 3B rankings soon, but I’ll give you a sneak peak with Beltre now.  Obviously the move to the Rangers hard hitting lineup doesn’t hurt him in terms of Runs and RBI, I think he’ll get about 85 in both, give or take 5-10 based on where he hits in the lineup.  He’ll have the protection he needs to hit for power, so give him at least 25 HRs.  His BABIP last year of .331 indicates that his BA of .321 was pretty lucky, I see his BABIP coming back down to career average of .294 and BA back toward the .275 mark. He might steal you 5 bags.  Slight risk factor in that he is almost 32 and may get injured.  Also slight risk in him having trouble acclimating to the new team.  I will probably rank him 7th at 3B, after which there is a big drop-off in production on my list, so you could definitely do worse.

Mike Stanton is a tough player to predict.  Having ridden the Stanton roller coast in a few of my leagues I know first-hand how inconsistent he was.  He batted .218 against lefties on the year vs .272 against righties. He hit .182 at home and .320 away.  But when it comes to inconsistency, here is the good news. In June (his first month up) he hit .230 with 2 HRs in 74 ABs (37 AB/HR).  In Sept/Oct he hit .312 with 8 HRs in 109 AB (13.6 AB/HR).  He finished the year with 22 HRs in 359 ABs (16.3 ABs/HR), which is pretty damn impressive.  Did I mention that he ALSO hit 21 HRs in 240 ABs in AA before June? I don’t expect him to match 43 HRs again this year, but I wouldn’t rule it out. I do expect him to hit at least 30-35 HRs with a low BA of .250-.260.  He is a talented monster that at 22 – no, 21 years old – already has Adam Dunn power.  Could he easily crush my projections here? Yes.  Could he just as easily suck and get sent back to AA?  Sure.  Am I drafting him on every freakin’ team this year anyway? You bet your ass I am.

@AthlonBraden Even at scarce SS position, how anyone can make the case for Hanley Ramirez over Pujols?

First, let me start by saying that no player in Fantasy Baseball, not even Albert Pujols, is 100% a “sure thing”.  Pujols may give you the best shot of having a “sure thing” as anyone for his level of production, but anything can happen.  Pujols is not old per se but he is 31 and there is an inherent injury risk once a player gets into his 30’s (my expert medical opinion).  Pujols is dealing with a new contract situation which at the moment doesn’t look like it will be resolved, and you never know how an argument over money will affect a player’s emotions.  First base is deep this year, and I don’t think it’s inconceivable to have someone like Prince Fielder or Kevin Youkilis available to you at the end of the second round.  However, the chances of you getting Hanley or Tulo with your second pick are zero, you would be left with Jose Reyes if you’re lucky.  So the question is, what combination do you like better? Pujols and Reyes (if you’re lucky), or Han-Ram and Fielder (if you’re lucky).  If you think Han-Ram, who is 27 in the midst of his baseball prime, is going to have an outstanding 30/30 type year I think you can justify it.  With that said though I wouldn’t recommend straying from the pack on this one.

@UncleRico23 w/ Jeter. Not sure if he’s worth keeping or not. With SS being thin & our draft beginning in Rd 6, i lean towards yes

I think the answer depends on a few other factors.  Are other shortstops being kept? Who on your team are you not keeping in order to keep Jeter?  Assuming that Han-Ram, Tulo, and Reyes are kept (at least) Jeter would be the #2 available shortstop according to my rankings (and #1 available according to some others).   You pretty much know you will get solid production from him rather than relying on someone like Stephen Drew or Alex Gonzalez.  This has me leaning toward yes, but again, if I was you I would want to know who else is being kept if possible, and think about who else on your team you can’t keep if you keep Jeter.

That’s it for now, but I’ll do this again real soon so keep your questions to @fantasynewsman coming. Until then, don’t be a tweetbag!