Welcome back as I finish up my two-part series revolving around over-drafted players and now Part Two, the under drafted. While looking at my data, I realized something. Significant values are really hard to find in the top 225 draft picks. Especially if I’m looking for a two or more round discount. For this part, we will loosen up our requirements and we will be talking about players inside the top 285 picks or 19 full rounds, also they may be as low as a 20 pick discount. Now let’s jump into it!
First up, one of the bigger discounts I’ve seen calls his home park Coors. That alone could have him plummeting down boards as rumors of potential neutral playing sights emerged. Some would be quick to think about Nolan here as he has been overshadowed of late due to lack of speed, but this is no other than Mr. Natzy himself, Charlie Blackmon.
Bruce’s 2020 Projections-
568 AB 29 HR 101 R 83 R 6 SB .299 AVG $21
NFBC ADP
62
I’m well aware of his stark home/road splits, most notable in his OPS. Home 1.174 and away from Coors a meek .731 in 2019, but you’re still getting an elite hitter half of the year while getting some usable stats on the road. To me, it is worth the trade-off. Also, if we are talking about the DH in the league, Charlie is a candidate to get some reps there as he isn’t the best defensively.
He will not light the statcast page up in the areas most people want to see, barrels, exit velo, hard hit, and xWOBACON, but he isn’t hurting you in those categories minus exit velocity. The type of contact Blackmon makes generates a high batting average (xBA .294/’19 BA .314), add that with his home ballpark, lineup and ability to pull the ball at home (46.7%) he will hit for surprisingly good power, (25-30 home runs) and provide you with an ample amount of runs. All doing this with actually providing elite batting average that you will be hard-pressed to find other places. Four straight years of 29+ home runs with 100+ run and .290+ batting average. Three of those four being north of .310! A solid $3 profit in my book here.
Newly acquired Padre Tommy Pham is the second on the list for today.
Bruce’s 2020 Projection-
530 AB 22 HR 88 R 71 RBI 20 SB .277 AVG $19
NFBC ADP
77
Failing to register over 500 at-bats in a single season ever in his career, Pham was one that always produces when he was on the field for significant playing time. He was able to put up a combined 36 home run plus stolen base total in 2018 in only 494 at-bats, also while chipping in 102 runs. This might seem like a disappointment since in 2017 he was on a tear putting up 48 combined home run plus stolen bases, 95 runs, and hitting an impressive .308. Fast forward to the end of 2019, if I told you Pham put up his career-best in at-bats by over 60 you’d think you’d be in for fantasy GOLD!
While you wouldn’t be 100% disappointed you’d be left wanting more honestly. While adding a total of 71 total at-bats in 2019, Pham couldn’t launch more home runs (21 in ’18 and ’19), which might be concerning since it was a juiced ball and all. His runs scored fell to a three year low, 77, which is starting to actually hurt your team in the long run. The nice thing with Pham is his stolen base total reached mid 20’s levels again and will help in that department during the season.
Another thing to consider, my projections have 10 total players hitting the 20-20 mark this year, 20 home runs with 20 stolen bases. Here are the players I have projected for a 20/20 season in 2020, Acuna Jr, Yelich, T. Turner, Story, Lindor, J. Ramirez, S. Marte, Fernando Tatis Jr., and Tommy Pham. If you think I am a little conservative, consider this, there were only nine players in the MLB in 2019 to achieve this goal, and yes seven of these nine players were on that list.
So while I can point to a season where he might have a hard time getting another 20/20 campaign given he is 32, it is still extremely rare right now to get a 20/20 player and Pham is at least a $2 discount in my book.
Third, in my last article, I told you if you wanted the upside of Khris Davis, you go get him 80 picks later? Well, Khris Davis is one of the larger deals according to my workbook.
Bruce’s 2020 Projection-
538 AB 36 HR 80 R 96 RBI 1 SB .237 AVG $13
NFBC ADP
180.2
Let’s just start first with how much pick 180 or the last pick in round 12 costs. The end of round 12 and beginning of round 13 equates to around $8! An injury ended up sidelining Davis and from what a lot of people are saying helped contribute to his decline in 2019. Even with the injury Davis still hit 23 home runs and had a combined 134 run plus rbi. His batting average did break the four-year .247 figure that everyone is so used to seeing.
You must be yelling at your computer, “you have said no to low average power only guys this whole time, what gives?” Well, the price is right. I don’t know how to put it much clearer than that. He played 150 three straight years prior to 2019 when he ran into the wall, in those three years, he had at least 40 home runs and 100 RBI while hitting .247.
Looking deeper you hope it was the injury that derailed his season. In 2019 he had the lowest barrel percentage of his MLB time, still, at a solid 10.1%, it then wouldn’t surprise you that his xStats were all down across the board in ’19 as well. Now, do I expect full rebounds back to the 17% he saw the three years prior? No, but even at 10.1% he’s valuable but with any rebound, he could be back up to 13%-15% which would be tip-top of the league again.
The aging slugger title is thrown around quite often and I’m not sure it isn’t more applicable than right now for my final hitter Josh Donaldson.
Bruce’s 2020 Projection-
527 AB 33 HR 92 R 91 RBI 4 SB .261 AVG $17
NFBC ADP
99
Josh Donaldson seems to be falling through the cracks and is a reason I wouldn’t be upset if I missed out on all the elite and expensive top-end talent.. He proves to be an elite power source, 15.7% barrel, and pair that with a 50% hard-hit rate. OH LAWD! He gets on base at an elite clip, a 15% walk rate, which will keep him as a nice source of runs. All three of those stats are top 4% in the league or better. Given his clean-up spot in this explosive offense gives him a great shot at 100 RBI (in a full year).
In four of the last five seasons, Donaldson has hit 30 or more home runs while two of those seasons he missed a large amount of time. If you look within those five seasons at years he has played 150+ games, he’s had 37 or more home runs while being a monster and providing easily over 190 R+RBI.
If you want to just take a look at one round number for Donaldson let us take a look at OPS. (On base+SLG)
’19-.900
’18-.801
’17-.944
’16-.953
He has had injury concerns and is aging (34 years old), but this is a great source of power and could provide to be a plus for your team in three or four categories. I have him at a $4 profit. He could easily blow up in that offense and earn a tad bit more with counting stats and provide a solid batting average if he can hit his xBA from ’19 (.269).
The Final selection is going to be a tad different, as it will be a position as a whole and I’ll touch on a few different guys briefly.
Top End Closers.
This kind of dives a little more into my personal draft strategy for 2020, but a lot of it had to do with this position being identified as a potentially profitable pick(s). It just happens that saves are one of the key categories if you want to have a shot at an overall, unfortunately, I learned the hard way in my only Draft Championship last year. The nice part is, the room might let you have two of the top 10 closers without having to pay a premium.
Name | Team | ADP | W | S | ERA | WHIP | IP | H | ER | K | BB | PRICE | Profit |
Josh Hader | MLW | 66.4 | 3.6 | 33.05 | 2.81 | 0.92 | 71.9 | 42.5 | 22.45 | 123.25 | 23.9 | $24 | $6 |
Kirby Yates | SD | 72 | 2.9 | 35.15 | 2.51 | 1.01 | 59 | 43.05 | 16.45 | 86.55 | 16.6 | $20 | $2 |
Roberto Osuna | HOU | 90.2 | 3.3 | 35.6 | 3.05 | 0.98 | 60.7 | 48.15 | 20.55 | 73.5 | 11.5 | $19 | $4 |
Aroldis Chapman | NYY | 87.4 | 3.7 | 35.7 | 2.69 | 1.12 | 56 | 38.95 | 16.75 | 79.75 | 23.95 | $19 | $3 |
Liam Hendriks | OAK | 97.2 | 3.9 | 31.25 | 2.92 | 1.08 | 69 | 54.8 | 22.35 | 93.8 | 19.75 | $19 | $4 |
Kenley Jansen | LAD | 105.8 | 2.9 | 33.65 | 3.68 | 1.05 | 62 | 50.2 | 25.35 | 77.05 | 15.1 | $16 | $2 |
Taylor Rogers | MIN | 109.2 | 3.4 | 30.35 | 3.08 | 1.07 | 63.3 | 53.6 | 21.65 | 73.8 | 14.35 | $16 | $2 |
Edwin Diaz | NYM | 122.2 | 2.75 | 28.45 | 3.22 | 1.06 | 60.6 | 44.3 | 21.7 | 94.2 | 20.1 | $15 | $3 |
Brad Hand | CLE | 109.2 | 3.05 | 31.3 | 3.32 | 1.15 | 60.3 | 49.75 | 22.25 | 79.85 | 19.4 | $15 | $1 |
Nick Anderson | TB | 128.2 | 3.2 | 26.05 | 3.15 | 1.05 | 63.1 | 48.4 | 22.05 | 92.05 | 17.65 | $15 | $3 |
Ken Giles | TOR | 118.8 | 2.3 | 29.2 | 3.12 | 1.10 | 57.2 | 45.1 | 19.8 | 78.95 | 17.8 | $14 | $1 |
The above chart is my top 11 closers accompanied by projected stats. Nick Anderson was another one among being undervalued. To be fair, he has shot up a ton since he became the front runner from the closer job, but I felt it was fair to include him in this exercise.
As you can see, almost every single one of them comes out as a sizable profit. Most people will just point out to the saves and say that’s what you’re paying for, but I tend to disagree with some of these top-end guys.
Let’s take Josh Hader for instance, his projected ERA and WHIP are a boost to your squad as are the 120+ strikeouts that he will provide, this isn’t even taking saves into account. Here is the silly part, I have him projected for pretty large regression from 2019 and he still is the top of my closer ranks (unless I add in some hard-hit data I’ve been working on).
In 2019 alone, Hader struck out 138 batters while having a 2.62 ERA and ridiculous .81 WHIP. That WHIP mind you, is the same as 2018. To keep track that is 153 IP with a .81 WHIP. Right now the track record in the MLB is amazing and the price is still discounted, buy.
Kirby Yates is the closer that I wish I had a ton more of. Yates followed up his career year in 2018 with a few more career bests. Dropping the ERA under 2, saw an already elite K-BB% go even higher to 36.2%, among others bests’ like HR/9, GB%, and WHIP (.89). Another big plus mark for Yates is how well he ranked out in CSW last year. Looking it over he was 17th among relief pitchers with an amazing 33.7% mark. A top tier closer with a lot of value, sign me up.
I’ve been hearing a lot lately about Nick Anderson being the next Hader because of the mass amount of strikeouts he had last year. Sporting an impressive 34.9% K-BB% and 3.32 ERA he will surely continue his surge up the board, after the trade of Emilio Pagan early in the off-season has many to believe he is in line for the bulk of the save opportunities. If I’m talking up Yates and his 33.7 CSW, then you’ll for sure be taking note of Anderson and his third rank 35.8 CSW marks he held.
One thing you must know is there is a difference in value when you look at all three of these studs’ WHIPs.
In 2019 here is how their WHIP’s compare:
Josh Hader .81
Kirby Yates .89
Nick Anderson 1.08.
You’ll tell me, that’s nothing to really nitpick, but it is. If I told you someone had a 1.45 WHIP, you’d gag! (that’s the same difference between Hader and Anderson) In roto, or NFBC type of league every little bit matters. WHIP is the ever forgotten category in fantasy baseball.
Roberto Osuna would be another name to help out in the WHIP department as he has never held a WHIP higher than 1 in his major league career. Kenley Jansen and Aroldis Chapman are still the guys that man the ninth for their respective clubs, while both have seen their strikeouts fall down to around 80 a season, both should provide low to mid 30’s in saves. While Jansen has seen his ERA jump to near 4 last year, Chapman was able to post his best in three years near a low 2! I think it might be a great way to help lower ratios while also taking a significant stab at leading your league in saves by grabbing two of these top guys and I think the price is prime!
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