Feb. 20th, Hour 1: First Base preview, Roto Outfielders, and more...

listening to the Fantasy Sports Radio Network. Fantasy best Friends Forever, m do too to do, to do too, to do, to do too to to to to yeo, it says, is no Fantasy best Friends Forever. Here the Fantasy Spoorts Radio Network alongside Frankie stamfle Greg. I's been Frank, what's going on? But Gregg? What's going on? Wednesday? Hump Day doesn't really feel like hump Day because we had the day off on Monday for President's Day, so we had a week off before that. There you go, looking the

Golden Brown, the hash brown. Greg Suster like it like here snow one here in New York City. Just it's crazy because it's snowing in New York City. There you go the pool noodle Greg last week and now this week snow right, and there you go. But I think it's important. And we did this a little bit later on, like there's there's Nobby back up Alex, so there's be like all my glory right like thrilled bathing suit, noodle,

smile noodle today, sweatshirt, snow boots. We'll get to that later on, Frank, Oh no, no, we can't get to that. I don't know we have to address to address the snow boots. Now. I want to get to it later on. I want later on. I want to get right into it. And I say, oh yeah, now he wants to get Yes, he want to talk about and I said about snowy dot com and and Suzanne, who whose identity theft f you? This guy walks in and he's wearing these snow boots.

Snow boots. They look like the female version of UGGS, which, like I kind of joked about him, like, oh, Greg, they'll look like He's like, well, guess what they are? Ugs. First off, I'm like, you're supporting Tom Brady because Tom Brady is probably the biggest advocate of UGGS for males. So that was first off. I wasn't really down with that, but it was next. What I saw after seeing the uggs was that Greg had his jeans tucked into his boots on his ugs, which we will now display to everybody.

So first of all us super comfortable. Why would I want super comfortable boots? Do you want to try Do you want to try on? No? Definitely not definitely. Not with my my jeans tuck into He's comfortable. To you, we weren't we the same? Was? It was just the most Are we the same shoes? Ayes? Right? Ha? What do you think Greg? I thought, with the same shoes size? Maybe? Yeah, I'm around there? You want to try my boot on? No? No, no, no, an, So here you go. I'll stand up tom Brady. There

you go. So he's gonna look. There you go. So they didn't look good outside of the boot. It looks so ridiculous. They just look all right? What is this guy? Loox? What do you think? What do you want boots? Not only is he wearing male ugs, he's got his jeans tucked to. They look good. They look good, like I'm better now to see what TV? This is how women wear their ugs? You call me a woman? Now is that's how I'm wearing my my legs. I mean, you know,

you're it's it's very metro of you. We're a Nick sweatshirt. What's up? These boots were made for walking. They were ready for walking. Yeah, walking through the snow. That's exactly why he's got them on. Walk right over. You got a booster mic man. Yeah, I don't. I don't hear I don't know down there. We can't really hear you that lit bit better. Alright, alright, sorry, we'll get that fixed. Added to the list. Carl, that's weird that you usually

been good her Martino fine yesterday problem. I think that microphone is kind of Diana heard some murmurs that it's not doing so all right anyway, So there you go. That's kind of situation. Ums talking m X in a while. That's okay, But you know, I have some more adecodes, but I'll save it over for the next two hours. That cool. Yeah, let's let's spread them out today on the program. It's first base ranks. For that. We do

have a special guest, our number two. It's Chris Venture the closer by the closer will join us an our number two to bring down that first base. We already know how much he likes Josh Bell. We'll see who else Venture is in on. At the first based position. He will join us for the entirety of our number two and that should be fun. But before we get to guys like Josh Bell, before we get to the middle tier, guys, the sleepers, if you will, I want to start at the top, and I want to start um.

I want to start at the importance of the position. How important is first basis year Frank to draft early. I don't think I put any more importance on first base than I do any other position. I wrote about this a little bit on my Patreon page. Go subscribe, check it out, check it out. Well. I also just found out about from Perry in the YouTube chat that I'm doing a very good job on my Patreon, So Pry now, Well, the content is free for now given everyone.

I'm giving everyone a taste, and then later on you you're like, oh, this is great content. I want to sign up and get more of it. So that's kind of the idea here. But I wrote about the first based position a little bit. I likened it to and you tell you give me your opinion of this analogy Greg, John Travolta, great actor, known for legendary films, I mean, whole fiction, face off Greece, How can we forget right? Saturday Night Fever. The list goes on and on. When

it comes to John Travolta, he was great. I'm just kind of asked John Travolta, buy well, he was great? Sure? Kind of how I feel about the first base position this year? You can pick it's not inaccurate. You can pick and choose your spots here at first base, and you know, I'll let you in on some of the targets that I'm looking at based on a DP. It used to be great, you know it. It uh turned out some of the some of the best sluggers in

the game in fantasy baseball, real life baseball. But I feel like it's not as deep as it once was. You can pick and choose your spots. I think there's a clear drop off after the top eleven or so once you get into eleven twelve, once you get into that next group, it's like, all right, all these guys kind of have some of some of their own wards here, but it's not as deep of a position as it

normally is. Greg normally even talk about first base like one of the best power hitting, slugging positions where you can get a lot of your offense. You can still get some offense there, but it's not as deep as it once was. But I think what's interesting about that is you say that, and I know, like the guys that you have tended to target at least in your early drafts at first base despite it not being very deep, you're targeting guys around like the tenth best first basement

give or take. Obviously, like you're not in on the top tier the the Freeman's who you loved last year, Um, gold Schmidt, Votto, Beldian, that's not really your guys like you're much more of And we'll get to this later obviously, Matt Olson, whose bread? How come do you think it's so tough? Heavy? There's nothing wrong with Paul gold Schmidt and Freddie Freeman, And I like those guys a lot more in points leagues, for sure, because they're both gonna

walk a lot. Freddy Freeman's gonna hit a ton of doubles, he doesn't strike out all that much. Paul gold Schmidt. They're great for points league and especially for O v P. But in Rhodo and it's you know, a lot of the analysis that we do is for Rhodo, you have to take these guys in the second round, early second round, late first round. To me, I want one of my first two picks, and it doesn't have to be this way. If they're the best on the board, then they're the

best on the board. Like, I'm not gonna shy away from taking them. Well, most of the time, I want to get an outfielder. I want to get an out of the earlier. So you say you won't shy away from taking them, And you've done a bunch of drafts now, and I've sat with you in the early rounds. I've done like two best ball drafts. You've never really considered

at your spot taking these guys. And according to the NFBC, where they're going through them in the February like ones at eighteen, Goldman's at eighteen, Freeman's at twenty, So that is the middle of the second round. That's where you've been, like you have been in the middle of the second round where you drafted. And I know one draft took Jacob to Graham on the first who just taking the other one the first and one of them I took to Graham, and the other I took Eronado. Okay, one

of them I picked out eleven. That's where that's where I got Eronado. I mean, great value. There couldn't of course, you want to pick the second other one. I think I had picked six, Okay, so that's right here. I mean I don't know, I don't know who's on the board, obviously, but when you were running down the players, like leading up to your pick that you wanted Golden and Freeman, like, we're never even in the conversation. So I know you say you woudn't shy away, but I think that's exactly

what you did. I know it's best ball. So it's a little bit of a different drafting format, of course. Um. But we did auction strategy talk this morning, and we'll have an auction show coming up closer to our auction will have for that too. In the second round, when I took to ground, I took Jiancarlo Stanton, one pick ahead of Paul Goldchman, and I took my head of Freddy Freeman as well. But you never understand that. But you can't say, hey, I won't shy away from those guys.

That's exactly what you did. They weren't even in the conversation. Well, here's what would have happened if Jihn, Carlos, Stanton was gone. Yes, I'm looking at those guys as the next best players, because after that it was it was Altove, Aaron Nola, Trevor Story. Trevor story would be in the conversation. For me, that's the interest name. We're gonna get to do sure stops next week. But to me, like after Stanton goes, Harbor was already gone, Bregland was gone, Paul gold Schmate,

Freddy Freeman, they should be in that area. But I think a lot of you know the drafts that I've done, it's just really the range of players that that's going around them. But still it's those second round story. But I stand five, that's the second round is as good as I can remember. Because you have Stanton, Harper, gold Schmidt, Freeman. Are these guys who have traditionally been the end of the first round, early second round, These guys are going

middle of late, like a top five three pick. Yeah, absolutely so I'm loving that second round. This year in general, there's a lot of big bats that you can get, and I think it makes an advantageous to start with the picture as you did in that particular jaff frank Um when you are in the middle to late first round. But let's stick with the first basement and I mentioned the top two. You can read Frank's first base rankings

on his Patreon. Please subscribe to that. Obviously. Frank mentioned the content is free right now, it will be free forever, so please limited time only while supplies last, So please subscribe to Patreon, even if it's just a dollar a month. He prefer five. But whatever, whatever you can, whatever you can afford for fantasy baseball prep, it's obviously well worth it. Frankie, your tier is what for the first base? What is

tier one? So Tier one is just those just to those two guys, it is Freddy Freeman and Paul Goldschmidt. I also should have mentioned this when I first started talking about the position overall, when I made my John Travolta analogy is part of the reason why I say it's not as good as it once was and is there are status to back sixt Upgreg So I looked at this and the collective batting average for first baseman last year was to fifty to fifty batting average for

first base. That was the lowest it's been for the collective group of first baseman hitters since night when it was to forty seven. It's fifty years ago year, fifty one years this has been the lowest batting average for first base fifty and then the collective ops was seven seven sixty last year for first basement UM and only two times since nineteen ninety three has been seven sixty year lower. That was the other year when only five first baseman hit thirty home runs. UM No only four

first baseman at thirty home runs. Last year there was only five of those. So it's just, you know, we don't get the same sluggers that that we once did at the position. But for me, it's Freddie Freeman and it's Paul gold Schmidt. Those are the clear top two in the tier, the the only guys going in the second round. And then you kind of break it into that next year, next year where Anthony Rizzo is going

in the third round. Do you want to like further dissect Freddy Freeman or Paul gold Schmidt or what to expect from these guys. It's just kind of like status quo, you know what you expect. Well, I'll see this. They're going very close to each other. Is there any argument to be made that Freeman should go ahead of goldchmip. I've always kind of tried to make the argument Freddy Freeman. And last year, you know, I had Freddy Freeman rank to have Joey Vado, and a lot of you know

you guys were giving me a bunch of crap for that. Obviously, no one saw Joey Vado regressing the way that he did last year. The power parts completely fell off. But I still think that Freddy Freeman has the talent to go out there and hit three hundred with forty homers. He's never done it. I think he has the talent to do it. What changes in St. Louis for gold Schmidt? What changes this year another year with all the young bats in Atlanta around Freeman? Well, the thing both lineups

are very good. I think the Cardinals lineup is is good as well. I think I would give give the advantage to the Braves. I think there's a little bit more depth in that lineup, essentially at the top. I mean they have Josh Donaldson, Uh, they have Ronald Kunian, whether it's entering c RT leading off or a Kunia, and then they have Ozialbis, so it's a little bit

more depth. They have Nick mar Caicus. I do like the Cardinals line up, but when Freddy Freeman, he's always been uh, he's always been a great hitter to a to a fault at times like last year thirty two percent line drive rate, and you know that takes away from his ability to hit home runs. He only hit twenty three home runs last year, but the year before that hit twenty eight home runs in a hundred and seventeen games. So that's why I still think that he

has that upside. The past three years he's been three or two batting average are better. I still think he has that upside to have a three D batting average, you know, thirty five to forty home run season. I'm tempted. You know, I didn't do it. I'm just gonna put Freddie Freeman over Goldchman. I always want to do it, and then like people talk me out of it, I'm

just gonna. I'm just gonna. So. So I think you look at their lines from last year, they're they're very similar, like they're they're very Goldchmate doesn't really steal bases anymore either that it's decreased from thirty eight thirty two to eighteen to seven over the past three years. Freddie Freeman had more bases last he gives you eight to ten now the last three years eight ten. Gold Schmidt had

ten more home runs UM. The runs were basically even r b I s. You give a fourteen more to Freeman UM averages twenty point difference UH in favor of Freeman O bps were basically exactly the same babbits, which I thought it was interesting, exactly the same Goldchman walks a little bit more but also strikes out a little bit more. Gold Schmidt also had a higher hard hit rate forties seven percent. I think it was four sexson change UM forty six and change compared to Freddie Freeman's

forty two so very good marks. They're very similar. I mean they're very similar guys. To me, it's preference. You can't even use you worry about the change of scenery. Get that in the second. You can't even care. With the injuries to Freddie Freeman anyway. For the hundred sixty two games last year, every single game he was out there, so I wouldn't say you can't worry about it. It

was risk injuries. At two out of the last three years, man a hundred fifty eight games, hundred sixty two games, but the other two years eighteen the year before that one sixty two. So it's like those are fluke injuries. Though. You know, we did get some warning signs from Paul gold Schmidth last year, especially early on. I mean through the first two months of the year. Remember what we were talking about Greg the human or got him? Yeah?

Was it that, or you know, was it the fact that, Okay, Paul gold schmid is you know, he's past the age of thirty. Now we're starting to see a little bit of a decline. He's two years older than Freeman. We'll say this. From June one on was amazing, Like if you ball low, that was the guys that was in June first on three thirty four twenty six oh two

uh of slugging percentage. That's a one thousand, twenty one o p s over the you know, from June one on we had a forty eight percent hard hit rate, a twenty four and a half home run to five ball ratio. So look, you worry a little bit about the change of scenery, even with the humid or I do think the change from Chase Fields at the St. Louis is a slight negative park shift here for Goldschmidt, and you know not everyone just automatically changed his teams

and it's amazing right away. No. I mentioned Mike Mustakis yesterday he went to a better hitter's ballpark from Kaufman Stadium to Miller Park. He didn't adjust right away. That's Carlo Stanton. He changed the leagues to be right away in those two situations. I didn't look next year. I always think it's a big transition to Yankee stadiums, the Yankees rather in New York. Mustakis in season you go to that personal stuff. I think it'll be much better.

This don't go wrong with these guys. I like free, Well, can you bring it down at first base when we come back next? On your BFFs Daily rohdo dot Com learn from the game's best DFS players. We don't just give you advice. We play every day, all major sports, all year round. We never stopped industry leading DFS tools and custom projections, and now the Daily rohdo dot com optimizer in minutes, build an optimized line up for cash games and tourneys. Learn from the game's best DBS players

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guys that he can rely on. Week A six and nine am Eastern on the Fantasy Sports networking on your popular podcast, providers that We're back here, Fantasy Best Friends Forever, Fantasy Sports Radio Never gold Schmidt Freeman, your top two first baseman off the board this year twenty nineteen Fantasy Baseball drafts. No real issue with that. It's hard, man. It's like I was saying Jean Carlos stands in New York.

I always try to give players a year of transition before jumping in on them when to go to the Akeies. I never want a Yankee in their first year ever with the team. Ever, it's a good thing. Um, you know, I think it's one of the rare exceptions, to be honest with you, But Luke boy, it's not like making the money. Gian Carlos and there had the expectations of John Carlos then to be fair. Um, Mike we stocking. We talked about the personal stuff. I think being traded

in the middle of the year is tough. Like I think expecting them to provide the power and be as comfortable as they were their previous location. I think it's hard a lot to ask for. So that doesn't bother me or scare me away at all. In this case for gold Schmidt. St Louis is not New York. We've seen a lot of free agents and a lot of UM trades happened with St. Louis where a guy got UM sent over there and performed very well in their first year. So I'm not really scared off by the

change of scenery to St. Louis. You could also use the contract year with Paul gold Schmidt as fodder of some sort. I think it's very close. He's not one of the last year contract yeah, so I think he's had to prove a lot, and in this market he knows that, like he needs to really have a great year in order to make money or make a lot of money. So it's not that the Cardinals lineup is bad. Here's the thing. If I said, if I told you to set a date Greg for when, when does Tyler

O'Neill take over for Dexter Fowler in the outfield. What would you say, why is Dexter Fowler starting for the Cardinals and not Tyler O'Neill Because he makes money, that's why. Well, yeah, bench last year because he sucked. He's protected about fifth right now according to rosteries. Yeah, I mean they make him. I would look a lot better with Tyler O'Neill in there. Yeah, So ultimately he just makes so much money that they have to give another shot. You know, at the top

of you got Carpenter, pulled the young Goldschmidt Ozuna. It's a nice first four, and you have Yudia Molina, who's always undervalued. Great hit here, I get Tyler O'Neil in there. Sorry, Dexter Fowler, you're out. So anyway you want to rank Freeman first, I'm not gonna argue with you. I don't. I don't want to put this is the table for this. I think it's very close. I really do. When it comes to those first Baseman verse, Let's say, Aaron Judge, what do you how do you love Aaron Judges? Here,

I really do. I'm taking Aaron Judge. He has he has he runs. These guys don't the power. The power upside is definitely. I've seen the bad especially, it's not going to completely crater like, but you're gonna be like Leaves. He'll be where he needs to be matching with these guys, No, I mean his his ZOBP is absolutely the eyes will be there. You know, we judge about Harper verse over this one. These guys, what do you think. I mean, Harper and Stanton are both kind of in the same range. Um, well,

this is what you talk with the outfielders. If you need five outfielders, I think I probably lean to the outfielders. If you don't you need three outfielders, I think it's a duffer question. Even even in a points league, I would go with the first basement over Stanton just because he strikes out so much. Like you're gonna lose points for the strikeouts. He's gonna be well us probably strikeout

percentage there with Jiancarlo Stanton and with Goldsman Freeman. Uh, look, you just know that you're gonna get the good plate discipline. You're not gonna get that many strikeouts you're gonna get, You're gonna get walks, You're gonna get a bunch of doubles too. So if I'm comparing gold Schmidt and Freeman to a guy like Stanton in leagues, I would lean with them. What about Roto you need five outfielders again, I'm gonna leave. There's a change for you for What

about Harper? If he signs in Philly? In that ballpark? I think if Harper goes to Philly, he's back into the first round, which it's all but a given that he's gonna go there. I know we've got some reports that like Harper is interested in San Francisco, he wants to play on the West Coast. That's what it comes down to. He wants to be close to Vegas. I think he does. Dude, we thought so. If that was the case, he would have signed already. Greg. I don't

think why why hasn't he signed with Philly? He wants to be on the West Coast? No, no, no, no, no, no, that's not it. What is it? Harper wants the most money. He wants to be the highest paid free agent of all time in any sport. He had to wait for a childo to sign first to guarantee that which Harper will sign any day, alright, so then he should have signed yesterday afternoon. That if he will sign any day, boards will get the best offers now, and he'll get

wherever the most money is whether. I don't think it'll be San Francisco. I think would be Philly. It makes some sense. I mean he might Why would San Francisco even be in on him? Makes no sense. He might make three one million dollars right Like, it's gonna be something petty like that. And I don't think it has anything to do with location anymore. I used to think that with Machada, who really wanted to be in the East Coast Beerne near Ish to Florida. Didn't happened. So whatever,

Bryce Harper verse these guys. If I'm just looking at it, he has higher upside, also has lower downs I agree with that's the that's the biggest difference, because what his upside is is that m VP season where he hits over three hundred, and he hits forty plus home runs and drives in a hundred RBI. Especially in Philly. It's a great hitter's ballpark, and it's gonna be a great lineup two with the addition of Bryce Harper. If he ends up there too, so it's amazing. I mean his

downside is Look, last year he had forty nine. The batting average fluctuates every single year for Bryce Harper to last year because guys are more consistent. Was three nineteen year before that to forty three before that, three thirty before that to seventy three. So it does absolutely fluctuate. Now, the o p P for Harper has been pretty consistente last year, year before three, seventy three year before that, and during his MVP season four sixty on base percentage.

How do you feel about position scarcity? Because I'm not usually big on position scarcity. I feel like this you're kind of becoming a slave to position scarcity. Just to hear myself talking about it in Rhodo, outfield drives up so fast. Can you really not take an outfielder in your first look? I think you gotta get one at least in your first three rounds, because if you go through your first three rounds and you get to the fourth round and like Tommy fam is your first outfielder

and a five outfielder league. As much as we love Tommy Fam, I don't really love Tommy fam is my first outfielder in a five outfield league, Like, honestly, the cut off to me for like, who would I who's the last person I would want as my starting outfielder in a Rhodo draft. The cut off is probably Sally Marte, Rise Hoskins, even even that's pushing it, like Ris Hoskins. Like, I like Hoskins too, But do you feel comfortable with him as your outfield one in a five outfield to league? Greg,

do you feel comfortable with that exactly? Or starting first? Most most predicaments, you're not going to get that. And if that's the case, like Charlie Blackman is going to pick six, he's basically the last outfielder. If you want to include whit Maryfield in this group, he's the last outfielder going in the second round, which basically tells me, I want to get one of my first two outfielders

in the first two rounds in a Roto draft. Now, so you've been saying you wanted a starting picture in an outfild first kind of becoming I'm kind of becoming a slave to the position scarcity. But I think in rodo you gotta do it? Man? Like outfield drives up so Fast in their first basement, and I like later on, so let's keep let's keep it going here great. I don't know. I don't. I don't know. I don't want

to be a slave to that. I want to think the best picture player available, and I think that I think I might lean Goldchmitten Freeman over Harper to be honestly, like, here, would you pull would you pull Charlie Blackman up the board to take them over one of these first basements just so you get an outfielder? Absolutely not. I don't think I would either, Absolutely not. But I think it's a good question. Charlie Blackman this year, why, I don't know.

Because it's Colorado. I don't know. He's still great. I feel like there are a lot of people that agree with you too. I agree. I agree with myself. I agree there are a lot of people that agree with me. Yeah, I don't. I don't. I don't like when things like this happen. It's weird. Greg is with the people. He scored a hundred and nineteen runs last year. Admittedly, it was a weird year for Charlie Blackman. It was a

weird year. I owned him last year. It felt like he would never like as good as I wanted him to be, right, but he still hit the RBIs you knew we were going to take a step back. He had a hundred and four RBI into two seventeen as a leadoff hitter. That was never gonna happen again. Seventy probably a little bit low. And you know your second round pick, you probably want at least a d r B. I to the guy with home runs sole basis, he' still gonna give you, you know, twelve to fifteen over

a hundred runs for sure in that lineup. To like about Charlie Blackman, I guess to look into him more, to be honest with you, But I just wonder if the average continues to drop. Right, we've seen it now. We've seen it drop here pretty substantially last year. I know the Babbitt is kind of telling Kate his career larn to look up what his expected batting average was. I would be great. Did you could do that so he was at his expected batting average? You're not. It's

great to be fair expected. Like on Baseball Savant with their stat cast data, everybody's expected batting averages average, it was to seventy seven last year is expected. Even in the years where he hit well over three hundred, it was to expected seventeen expected batting average. Yeah, you know, I just and that's probably they're taking the course field effect into it. Maybe if he was in a different ballpark, that's what is batting average. Listen, Blackman a second round,

there's something wrong with it. I just would rather have gold schmidten framing over him, you know, listen, in our all, in our auction, right if we had a good price on black Man, I'm not gonna say we shouldn't draft him. Now. I've been going to pick twenty six in the month of February, whereas free Men and Goldschmidt are going picks eighteen and twenty respectively. Who's around who else is around black Man? So around black Men you have really just pictures.

It's uh, well, Stanton's going three picks earlier, and then it's Nolah Kluber, Garrett Cole and then Ben Intendia. I'm not doing that. I mean, we'll save it for the outfield preview. But and he biceps, I'm interested. Everyone's expecting him to like take this huge power jump. His hard hit right late rate last year was garbage. Yeah, I know that black. I know he's gonna lead off, so the runs are gonna be there. It's a great line up with Boston. I get it. But if you I guess, look,

you draft ben INTENDI waiting for it to happen. It reminds me of Yellow. So look, if you trust it, if you think he's gonna turn into like Yellow and he has the ability to pay off that first round value, then those are the people who are drafting ben Intendia in the in the second third round on that turn.

But me personally, he hasn't done enough and he struggles against lefties, and the battle ball data was not great last year for me with ben Into So I'm not one of these people who are buying on him as a second third round pick. Okay said, all right, continue on the first basement. And the guy that I know you absolutely love is Anthony Rizzo. Well, Greg, how much you're gonna make me spend on him in the auction this year? Zero dollars? What he what if he has

second base eligibility? Greg, I'm good. Yeah. Michael Florio myself spend thirty nine dollars last year mixed league AUX. Let's be fair. Because he has second base eligibility. Let's be fair. We're all in on the idea. It wasn't just me. Come on, man, I feel like I was in on the idea. But I said a cat, and we just went over that cat like four bucks. We're gonna ge him for the thirty five. If he goes higher than that and we're out, then I kept going, I was

gonna be over forty. Though it made you feel better, it probably doesn't. Um. Yeah, so you have had any rizzo, so actually let me go to you for this. What's the next tier? I do have an a Rizzo next up, and it's tier Um, this is tier two. It's three through eleven, which in a DP, these guys really go anywhere from round three to seven, so it's kind of like the early to mid rounds. It's Anthony Rizzo, Cody Bellinger, Rehese Hoskins, Joey Vado, jose A bray You, Daniel Murphy,

Matt Carpenter, Matt Olsen, and Jeseus Aglare. I'm gonna put a retaskin the head of Cody Balones. Why did hete Coali Belinger? I don't hate Cody Boner. You don't love Coali Belinger when my announceis of Anthony Rizzo. First, Craig kind of more interested now and thing, but I mean my whole thing with with Anthony Rizzo and people. You've heard people make this argument before. Greg is you can get the like of his production from Jose bray you three rounds later, you get Jose I braw you in

the sixth round. These are steamer projections for both of these guys. Anthony Rizzo tight one thirty Homer's runs n two r BI, seven stolen bases a bray You two eighty eight Homeowner's eight runs scored ninety three RBI to two stone basis. So really you're paying three rounds difference in price tag for sixteen additional runs and five stone basis. That's the biggest difference. I haven't called us the Frankings yet,

but Franking's frank Rankings. Frank's yeah. I mean you try it now and seven last song anywhere I'm going to continue. You know, I'll do that pusure. I mean, you haven't really been saying franking, so I kind of blame you was away from you know what what's up? As part of like my Patreon. You should be my Paul Hayman, like you should be my mouthpiece, Like you should spit

promos for my Patreon. The Raining Defension. Good at that. Well, I didn't really I guess I didn't really win anything last year in baseball, won my Great Fantasy Baseball Invitational League, fourth World All. Anthony Rizzo. Um, he's steady production. Like you set your watch to, you know, to seventy two eighty thirty home run Granddads. That was our thing last year. It's like, every time we look up, it's Anthony Rizzo

RBI groundouts. He's good at it. He's gonna give you ninety plus runs, ninety plus RBIs, he's gonna give you like five stolen bases. It's fine Anthony Rizzo, but I'm I'm not really going to spend the third round price tag when I get Jose Brady three rounds later. Yeah, I agree. It's just it's just very boring this year. I mean you you like you said you said a clock for he actually was down in home runs last

He always he's always a slow starter, slow starter. Remember last year, in the first month he was just god awful. Oh enough, Frank, I you told me every day, every single time, and you made us spend thirty nine dollars on this guy. So Anny Rizzo right now is going five off the board. Um in NFBC E leaves who's going around him? In March and April last year, one home run sucked. I was I lived through it. Man. Not very good Anthony Rizzo. In the month of February.

His NFBC a DP is pick thirty five. So in the twelve team league at the end of the third round, in a fifteen team league, he's smacked daddy in the middle of the third round, third round pick. Who's going around him? More starting pitchers here, Trevor Bauer, Lis Severino, Carlos carrasco Walker Bueller, and then you kind of get

into the Starling Marte, Reese Hoskins group. Those are the hitters available, and Hoskins is gonna give you first base and outfield eligibility like that, so that helps told guy, and then Starling Marte. You know what you're getting from him from the outfield position, Homer's stolen bases, good batting average. He Cody Bellinger. I went into this a little bit

last week with with Andy Singleton. We were doing Cody Bellinger verse Reese Hoskins debate, and this kind of comes back to that, right, Yes, Sam just comes back to with Cody Bellinger using more prospect pedigree, using more of like outside factors to kind of just trusting that, Okay, you know, he's a twenty three year old guy who's okay, he failed last year. He didn't move up to expectations.

He went from thirty nine to home runs to twenty five, But just trusting the fact that he had the pedigree and then he's gonna get better. That's what you have to do when you look at a guy like Cody Bellinger. And maybe I make it too hard on myself, but you know, there were things that I didn't like last year. For example, you know when he first got called up two years ago and hit thirty nine home runs, he

was very good against left handed pitching. Remember I sat here last year and I said, I actually thought Cody Balinger had the ability to be better than Aaron Judge. You were alone on that, though, because I trusted what I saw from the splits in his first season that he held his own against lefties. Last year, he regressed in a major way to batting average ops against left handed pitching. So that has me a little bit worried.

You know, if I'm using a third round price tag, you know, third fourth round price tag on Cody Bellinger and if he's gonna struggle against lefties on a team like the Dodgers, I don't really ever think that they're going to platoon him. But if there's a team that's ever gonna like, all right, we'll give you a day off against a tough lefty, it's the Ds because you know they have that luxury they you know they have they have a wealth of riches on their team. They

have a lot of depth on their teams. So those things worried me. I'm also looking more into this, uh this season, Greg infield fly ball rate, his infield flyball rate. You know, he has this huge uppercut swing. We know that he's trying to lift the ball a lot. He's trying to hit a lot of home runs. So his infield flyball rate last year goes up over sixteen per cent. Six of his bad at balls were automatic outs. You know, I want guys that are not going to hit infield

fly balls. That's something I tried to ignore last year with Raphael Devers, and if you looked at his minor league career, it was every single year with the guy like Devor's, he hit a ton of infield fly balls. Those are guaranteed outs. What happened last year at the major league level, you guessed it. He had a ton of infield fly balls, So they were warning signs last year with Thunders struggled against lefties and he had these

infield fly balls, which are basically guaranteed outs. Average I'll give you my projection from when we get back from the break average down O b P down that up. I think he was down across the board, very nervous by Coney Belligier. Really interest for me this year your fantasy projections. We come at the Fantasy Sports Network is hitting you from all angles with the best fantasy sports em betting analysis. You can catch the latest programming on

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seven nine to join the Fantasy Sports Network. Back with You, Fantasy best Friends Forever, Fantasy Sports radier now so sold just making my bachelor party right, Frank and I was having issues. We're trying to make it work. Um, I really wanted I'm doing it Fort Lauder Down. Do you know you've heard my conversation that Drew dique mine. Indeed, and I really wanted a certain hotel that Drew told

me to stay at. But the weekend I wanted was between two weekends in July, which I was talking about this with you yesterday and when my buddies can't come one weekend but can come to the other weekend. But the hotel I wanted that Drew recommended is not available for that week and he can come. So I'm just like, all right and go to a different hotel. Obviously it's

playing at other hotels. This stuff sounds So I just dressed now because I don't want to be selfish and just be like that guy, like she's an hotel of my buddy, Like this is what you recommended. Like I really liked it. It looked cool. I was all in on it because I had like a beach that had a beach, a pool bar. Yeah, you probably shouldn't exclude your buddy, I agree with you. And Judy was like all about that. She's like, it's a hotel really more

important than your friend, Like it's stupid. What is your bachelor party? Right? That was my flash. That was my fla. It's like it's my but it's it's my time to be selfish, you know. Like that was that's wherever my mind was. Would they do the same thing for me? Like I don't know, so I don't know what to do. So the reason that they were sold out this hotel. It was because it's like a bunch of conventions in Fort Laurie. It's a big invention of some sort. Do

you know what kind of convention? No idea. So my dad, my dad, Um, it's like some married up members or some sort. So we called the hotel and he's like, hey, so online there's no rooms, but you know, I'm I'm attending the convention and he oh, big, Rob, So we we got three rooms at the hotel. I wanted it

for the weekend. I wanted because now attending the convention, I tell you, like that story, I really hope it's like some crazy one, some crazy oh man, I hope it's like a dragon ball Z conventions to like hate anime and like any cartoons. Oh, it's a cartoon convention. It's a bunch of people walking around like suits and stuff, and you're so hammered that you can't tell if it's reality or not. How about that. I'm good. I mean conventions like it could be anything. There's a bunch of

crazy stuff out there. Greg, you almost almost close that. That was that was close. Okay, back to the first basement out of Cody Bellinger, Well, he said, you would give us a projections for Cody Bellinger Again, Uh, look, my projections are conservative. I do that on purpose. I make them conservative for every player, but Cody Bellinger. I have that two home runs, eighty runs scored, ninety r

BI and ten stone basis, it's not bad. He gives you a little bit of everything, doesn't completely kill your batting average. Uh. You know, it's obviously very hard to project to project the batting average. But you know he's been around, you know, to sixty last year, to sixty seven in his first year, So maybe two fifty five is a little bit unfair. Maybe he's closer to to sixty.

But the home runs have fluctuated, the runs, r B, I s. You know, he lost twenty one RBIs from from Uh this only basis, he's gonna give you ten to fifteen, So that's not bad. He's a great athlete, that's for sure. He walks a lot, so for points leagues, that helps help mitigate the strikeouts a little bit. He does hit the ball hard over a hard hit rate in each of his first two seasons. The home run the fly ball ratio dropped big content last year. So can he be a guy that potentially pays off first

round value. If he hits you know, to seventy with thirty five home runs and a hundred rbi with with ten fifteen stolen basis. Yeah, if he does that, he's likely you know, a first round pick next year. Unfortunately for me, he does that, he's probably gonna be on someone else's team. It just feels not really an active target of man. It just feels like he's the kind of guy that a lot the players are going ahead of him do what he does. Maybe not the fourteen

on bases, but everything else seems replicable to me. It depends which guy you trust more. Do you try the Cody Bellinger fromen or do you think he gets closer? Back to the seventeen again in seventeen took the league by storn thirty nine home runs in a hundred and thirty two games. Amazing. That's amazing, amazing. So we know

that the talent is there in the bat. How much did he play a hundred fifty games is outside the realm of possibility, Greg for him, thirty five to forty homers with hundred r bis and fifteen stolen basis, that's not undoable. Let me throw that sable for Cody balance for you. In twenty seventeen, when he came up, he ultimately supplanted Adrian Gonzalez starting first baseman, played first base every day. Right. I think we're gonna move him back

ahead of reasons. Oh man, Right, he's gonna basically played first replaced Adrian Gonzalez and played first base every day. Right. Last year with the emergency maxim on c he kind of came up and moved around a lot, but a lot of center field, and that's where we're projecting him to start this year for the Dodgers. He's gonna play the off field for sure, and I've read center field. Do you think it's gonna take a bit of a toll on it? Do you think maybe that's hard to

the reason we're seeing the client? Maybe that affect him, you know what's up? But on on on Baseball Reference, you could look up players splits by position that they played. They can do that on fan grafts til you might be able to. But I'll pull that up for you anyway. With the Dodgers, yeah, they do. No, he's not gonna play center field because I have aj Polloig. So he's projected to I don't, I don't center or whatever. He's projected to play right field. This is on Rosster resource

and back clean up. Look, there's gonna be a ton of RBI opportunities too, because you look at the first three in this order, Aleck Seeger, Justin Turner just ahead of Balinger, and then behind him he has Munty Taylor, Jock Peterson. The averages were basically the same most three. I mean, that's that's great. Averages to sixty the first baseman last year to sixty three as a center fielder.

So what do I know? Oh, he did not get to hit the pinch hitter though as a first baseman last year he hit with an os as center fielder, which was next up the most games that he played with seventy one. Uh, he hit to sixty three with an eight oh seven. So really not that difference, Not not that different said that. Sorry, okay, anyway, so about you said you're being too hard on him, I don't

think so. You said you just flipped him with This always reminds me of my analysis of Javier Bias last year, where I us looked at it statistically and didn't really take the fact that like he always had this upside inside of that because of like his prospect pedigree and what he did in the past, and you know, these

huge expectations. This is a little bit different because I mean, you're not getting Bellinger at the same price we're getting bias last year because we're getting in the middle rounds. Do you still have to use a third fourth round five tag on Bellinger? Which there's just a hard guy for me to figure out this year any singletons, I said, I'm making it too hard than than I should be. Maybe I am. I don't you are, I don't. I'm not just agreeing agree with I just agree. Let you

get Let's get to Reese Hoskins here. You keep flipping back and forth between Bellinger. You know, I like rees Skins a lot, and I what are my targets this year? Am I crazy? Is she? Are you crazy? Part of the reason why I don't know if Hoskins is a target of mine is because it's kind of similar to the Jose Bray you and Anthony Rizzo situation. Greg. I don't see a huge difference between Reese Hoskins and Matt Olsen this year, and you're getting Reese Hoskins in the

third round and shout out to Michael Florido. He was making this argument against me last year, and I didn't really see it. I know, Rees Hoskins hit more home runs than than Olsen did last year, but I'm doing I'm joining the club, Mike, I'm joining you this season. I don't really think that their their projection is all that different. You look at their Steamer projections. They have Reese Hoskins two nine four hoskinins, three more home runs,

six more runs scored, five more RBI. And how about this great Hoskins a d P the NFBC is thirty nine. Guess where Matt Olson is one? So look you're getting him seventy five picks later, and you're getting pretty similar stats. Man. I'm a big believer in medals, and so I think that's what's kind of holding me back from going all in on Reese Hoskins, just because they know where I can get Matt Olson, whether it's you know, six, seventh, eighth round this year, um, and I'll take that chance

on like trying to get him later on. Rich Hoskins also, oddly enough, has a split of his own last year one eight six. This isn't just last year. In his major league career, one eight six seven three ops against left east. He's a right handed batter, Craig, Why did he suck against left It's weird. It's a weird reverse split. Uh. That's in his career as a major league to this point. Um. And But the thing is he was much better against

lefties in the minors. So to me, what that says is at some point he should get better against left handed pitching at the major league level, which ultimately will raise his overall batting average. Because one eight six against lefties is very bad. That's just not gonna get it done. So if he just raises his his average against lefties too, let's say to twenty greg and his overall batting average is coming up to to sixty instead of you know,

the two forty nine. So he just you know, if he if he does a little bit better against left ease, then you know that batting average overall is coming up. I do like the fact that, like Bellinger he does he's gonna have dual eligibility. He does adverse base eligibility to start the season, but he will get it because he's gonna start there um And how about this Gray. I looked into this his his splits by where he backed the line up last year. He bad at second

a lot because he he walks a ton. It's great plate discipline, which is obviously good for points leagues, it's good for O B P leagues. In one four games batting second, he had seven three ps. In forty five games batting fourth with a one thousand, twenty one o p s. He's projected to back fourth right now, so I think that helps him and the fact that he's gonna have more you know, he's gonna have more RBI opportunities with if Bryce Harper joins this line Bryce Harper,

doesn't you get my cutch in that lineup? JT. Real Muto. It's a good lineup. I'll go as far as to say it's a great line up. But you're right annoyingly so that if you just pull up Madelson's stats, it's like they're really not that far offman, We're just kind of similar. And what Matt Olsen made it so much progress last year overall as a basketball player, like against Lee's and seventeen greg one six, seven and fifty eight against lefties, Matt Olson scares you off. That's part of

the reason why I was working him last year. He was gonna struggle against against lefties to fifty one batting average. He brought you know, he brought his batting average from one all the way up to fifty one. The ops wasn't great, he didn't he had for much more power against right He's he only had seven oh one ops

against lefties. But at least if I can see that he's making contact and making a conscious effort to raise batting average against lefties and bring it up to fifty one, that tells me he can hold his own against lefties and he's gonna be in the lineup every day. Roster resource, I think they do great work. Sometimes I think they're a little bit too quick to pull to pull the trigger when it comes to UH platoons. They have Matt Olson as a platoon. He played a hundred and sixty

two games last year. He played every single game. He wasn't a platoon player last year, and he proved himself against lefties. Why would he be a platoon player this year? For Mark Canna, of all people, it's not gonna happen. Matt Olson is going to play every day. He was one of seven players who played a hundred and sixty two games last year made improvements against lefties, decreased his strikeout rate by three percent. Greg slightly improved his walks,

lowered his pole percentage by seven point five percent. I can't stress this enough. He turned himself more into an all around hitter, started springing the ball to opposite field a little bit, taking what defenses are giving him. You know everyone's talking about this track. Oh, you know, over dramatic shift against left handed batters. So what is he learning to do is learning to take what what what they're giving him. He's going opposite field a little bit more,

He's going to center a little bit more. He was top ten in barrels per played appearance last season nine point four percent. He was top five in both whoba uh no, that was max sorry um, hard hit rate, fantals and fly balls. You know, with that kind of bad a ball data, Greg, it feels like he could have been closer to thirty five runs and he was twenty nine. I understand he plays in Oakland. It's a bigger ballpark. It That lineup is not bad either. I think the home runs go up I think we're closer

to thirty five. I haven't projected, you know, two fifty thirty two home owners, eighty runs, eighty five RBIs give me Matt Olsen man, I'm all in. I'm all in on the Olsen train. It was good. He's got nothing. Also, his expected to the slugging percentage was thirty points higher according to stat Cast, And I tell you that normally these like the expected things are lower. He was a

little bit unlucky last year in the power department. And it's really interesting that Babbitt was two thirty eight and he had a higher batting average he did last year whereas bbit was two. It's like interesting today, really interesting. So the babbit two thirty eight in seventeen. He also hit more flyballs, so we know that hitting more flyballs typically leads to a lower babbit um. And he also you know why the Babbitt was so low, Greg and he had two fifty nine is because he had to

many home runs. Home runs are not because they're not in play the bad That's that's why it looks like us go up. Definitely its last year I have before. I've rejected at thirty two, at thirty two, and people had unrealistic expectations for him last year. They thought, he can, you know, be a forty home run hitter. I think based on the better ball profile. If he was any other ball ballpark, yeah, you probably could expect forty home runs. Because he plays in Oakland, I think thirty three to

thirty five home runs is a safe projection. Reece Hoskins hits a ton of fly balls. The problem with its Hoskins is is hard hit rate was like thirty five percent last year. This is really interesting too. It wasn't great like Matt Olsen was well over seven percent hard hit rate. The guy absolutely mashes the baseball. He also had very extreme splits Frankie at home seven last year. This is Matt Olson away. He added two sixty six home runs were the same fifteen and fourteen guy and

Yankees player. He also got off to a disgusting start as well. Um actually disgusting seven and two sixteen. He's never gonna be a great battie. You're out dot on him. I should be out of Reese Hoskins too. Well, here's the thing. You can can't be out that that positive regression is coming for Reese Hoskins batting average because of what I said about the lefties. If he just improves his batting average against lefties up until two twenty, which is still very bad, but he's been one eight six

in his career. If Reese Hoskins brings the batting average up to to twenty against lefties, his overall batting averages climbing up to to sixty, You're not gonna get a two sixty batting average from attles. So that's the difference. If you think that that Reese Hoskins can make the improvements, get the batting average up to to sixty, hit forty home runs. If he hits forty home runs in Philly in that line up, is probably gonna give you a hundred and ten RBIs like I can easily sell you

on Reese hos Kins. I understand I can sell it. Definitely, I'll be I'll be a salesman. Just did it. Get the batting average up to two sixty. If he hits forty home runs in Philly, which is definitely doable, he's gonna he's gonna drive in a hundred and ten runs. So that's why you're playing in the third round. Price second I get it. It's a much better ballpark than Oakland. So that's that's the difference in ADP. Should it be difference, Probably not. I don't think it should be that that drastic.

And again it's like this is the range in the third fourth round. I mean for Hoskins it works a little bit more because he has the outfield eligibly. You know, I want to grab outfielders early on. That's what I want to do, so Reese Hoskins kind of fits that. But I really do buy the adjustments that Madelson made, lest in the progress that he made being this crew too. I have him in this tier I have at eleven. I had him just behind ad olson Um. He was very the first half. Verse second half he was a

different player. So that was and look, he was never gonna keep that up, but I mean the first half he was, I mean he was, you know, he was one of the ten best sluggers in baseball in the first half of the season. Second half that goes down to seven sixties. So you know, with guys like this, you know, the like the thirty year old breakout players like you kind of you get a little bit worried.

Great ballpark much better ballpark than Oakland. I still think, you know, I think could be still a thirty or thirty five home run guy. You worry a little bit about the batting average. We're gonna be in the middle of the line up. I think A R is very similar to Bett Olsen, but he's also going thirty picks higher, one hour down. Well more to go, whole lot more program next