What's up, friends, and welcome into Fantasy Pros, the Fantasy Baseball Podcast. I'm Chris Welsh. That's Joe Rico, and today we're talking about projections. Who love these players or players that projections are loving. We're looking at some of the bigger projections out there, from ATC to steamer to the bat, and we are going to look at some players that really pop. We've got ten players that projections love this year,
Joe Rico. And whether you love projections or not, I guess that's a whole nother sticky situation across the board. And it is always funny when some of these major systems will aggressively disagree, even in like a positive way where a guy really pops. But we're going to talk about some of these guys today and how much does projections weigh into your valuation on players.
It's become a huge part of the process over the last couple of years. I feel like every year that goes by, I rely less on my own observations and more on the data. You know, as much as I watch a ton of games and I go through this stuff constantly like you do, like we all do, there's only so much you can do. And when you rely on the numbers, especially for the rates stats, I find you're not going to be better at projecting batting average.
Or er or whip or things like that.
Then the systems are you can make adjustments for things like playing time if you think a guy is going to have a bigger role than expected. But I've come to really rely on them, especially for those rates stats over the last couple of years.
Yeah, And whether you put one hundred percent valuation into projections or I wouldn't say put zero, I definitely think a good way to, you know, use projections at the minimalist point is as a reference point and go and you know, okay, this is where this guy is. Maybe it's a confirmation by you know, it's confirming something you're already feeling about a specific player. But going through kind of seeing some using these as the tool in your tool belt is the best approach to it. At worst.
If you're not beholden to the projections and we're not focusing on once one again, we are going to be poking through a couple of them, finding some of these players that jump out to you before we get to it. Though, we've been talking about a giveaway, and we are ready to announce the winner of the Billy Wagner autograph Baseball giveaway. That winner is Superman Chee Chee. That's right, just like
you guys all thought, Superman Chee Chee. Please get in touch with our customer support agents at mail bag at Fantasypros dot com with your mailing address, proof of your subscription to the Fantasy Pros MiLB YouTube channel and we will get that shipped out to you again. The winner. What an all time name to give an announcement and not laugh. Superman Chee Chee. Congratulations, my friend. We are not done though. It's time for a brand new giveaway.
This one is great. We are giving away a John Smoltz signed Braves jersey, how about that, courtesy of our friends over at Pristine Auction dot com. All you've got to do, just like Superman Chee Chee did, to enter, is make sure you're subscribe to the Fantasy Pros YouTube channel right now. Drop a comment below on this video, maybe a player in projections that you love, and that's it. We'll be announcing a lucky winner right here on the channel.
So make sure you turn on notifications so you know when the next videos are up and you can claim your prize. Let's get to it. Let's talk about these players that projections love. Number one is a big name and has gotten a lot of push on this channel, mister Joe Rico. But ATC really pops this player. He is Garrett Crochet. So we're gonna be focusing on ATC projections for this one A three two one era one hundred and fifty two innings. That's a key number there,
with the second highest K per nine among starting pitchers. Now, why this projection really pops, You know, because you can go and you can look at like war and whatever you want, but he has the second highest K per nine among all starting pitchers. The next level of why this is so important, why the projections love this show, is that he's really not projected at any more innings. We saw Garret Croche, I think it was one hundred and forty six last year. They're only projecting him at
one hundred and fifty two. I said, So this projection pops even more if he beats that projected inning marker he I talked with Ariol about. This would become essentially like the number two or number three overall starting pitcher in fantasy, because he would lead the league in projected strikeouts if he had one hundred and seventy innings, he would be over everybody. Right now, Garrett Crochet really really
pops in ATC. The only thing that doesn't pop here are the projected innings, and that might be playing it too low. So what do you think about Garrett Crochet and these ATC projections?
Yeah, so the first thing that people should know about projections as a whole is that they tend to aim for a fiftieth percentile outcome. There is one projection system we're going to talk about later today that's a little bit more optimistic, but generally speaking, their aiming for the middle the road. So I understand why they're a little more cautious on Crochet's innings. That being said, I think that when you're looking at like Steamers one seventy, that's
probably where he's probably going to get to. The White Sox did everything they could to keep him healthy last year, and I think that you can project a twenty to twenty five inning jump pretty easily if you're looking at player raiders and if you put in ATC's projections, like into the Fangrass player Raider. Then Crochet comes out as the number six starting pitcher, and that's in one hundred and fifty two innings. If you jack that up by twenty innings, I imagine he would be somewhere in the
SP three or four range. I doubt he would reach Scoble and Schemes on a projection standpoint.
But we did a ton of pitching.
Shows last week and the last one was myself with Nick Pollock and Inosaurus, and Nick has Garrett Crochet's number two starting pitcher ahead of Paul Skin, so there's a lot of love for him. I have him at number four, Welsh. I think you got him top five, and there's a good reason for it. He's absolutely brilliant, especially coming from the left side with his size. I think Crochet could be the number one starting pitcher and I wouldn't be so prize by it at all.
Yeah, I've got him at number four in my SPS, and obviously you and I are always battling to get him in MOX. We've been done one in a little bit. But yeah, I think the You're right, Like, these are median averages, so they're usually not on the high end. And to see what and how Crochet really pops on ATC Knowing that you could just bump up the innings a little bit, he becomes one of the most valuable
pitchers in baseball. There's a confirmation to it. You know ATC is you know, either been one or two in the most accurate projection systems across the board. But also last season told you plenty that you know what you need to know about Gerrett Croche thirty five percent k percentage and expected ERA that was under three the number this year. Era estimators can be a little bit tough in projections, but you're still given a very, very favorable number.
So you want to talk about a player that pops in projections, it's Garrett Crochet, and he's even a little hidden just by one number that's on there. Let's move to number two. We're going to go to a hitter and now we're going to over to the projection system that won number one most accurate according to Fantasy Pros in twenty twenty four, the bat X. We're going to go to oneal cruise, oneal cruise. Why are we talking
about him? He's you know, mid fifties and whatnot. Well, most of the systems have him in this like low twenty ish range, you know, like twenty two homers, twenty one stolen bases, something in there. But the bat X is very aggressive, so much so it's increases across the board, and you don't necessarily see that, especially from a guy that had a you know, a pretty like solid season. I think that defied some expectations, but we're talking increases
across the board. Twenty eight homer projection, twenty three stolen base projection, eighty six run, eighty four rbi. These are all like well over last year numbers, and he's towing the line. If you were to meet those bat X projections to being close to a thirty twenty five guy, that you could seeing if that offense is even a little bit more positive, maybe he's pushing one hundred runs, hundred rbi. I mean, those are the type of things that make you a first round talent. That X is
very very positive on O'Neal Cruz. What do you think there, Joe Rico.
So the bad X is higher on him because it incorporates the stat cast data, which is just ridiculous for O'Neil Cruz, like he had a fifteen percent barrel rate, nearly sixteen fifty five percent hard hit rate, and I don't think those get captured in the majority of the systems, Like even in Just the Bat, I don't think it gets captured. But the bad X Derek does incorporate the
stat cast data. I understand it, and I understand wanting to be optimistic about O'Neil Cruz, but I'm not sure that the power is necessarily going to translate to in game thirty home run potential. The launch angle is not necessarily ideal. I I'd like it if he raised the ball a little bit more. And there's also the strikeouts, like fifteen percent swinging strike rate, he had a twenty nine percent s wake out rate. And there's also the lineup around him, which is not that great. Spencer Horwitz
got hurt. So I think I am more of a pessimist on O'Neil Cruz. I understand the reasons for optimism, but I think the projections being even what they are, he's probably somebody that I'm staying away from a lot of the time.
O'Neill is always a guy that I'm trying to invest in. The cost gets a little bit higher than what you want, but I'm very much for this. I actually thought we were going to see a bigger power out boost last year over the speed, and he fell short of I think I had even put like a futures bet on twenty four point five I think was on the home run total, and we didn't quite get there. So you're not wrong about the launch angle. I just I do think that is something that is going to be rectifiable.
One of the reasons that you know he may have that kind of lower approach could be that he was trying to make more contact. That's the big thing that nobody thought. I don't know Cruise was going to be able to do. He had two fifty nine last season with an expected batting average higher. This is why striking out thirty percent of the time, So you know something will have to give at some point. It's monstrous, monstrous
contact numbers. I have some optimism that the strikeout numbers can come down, the quality of contact can get the ball in the air a little bit more. He finished the year with a two seventy seven. This is post All Star break, a two seventy seven average, really really strong push to the second half of the season where you also saw the strikeouts dip down, the homers dip down a little bit, and he stole more bases, but
it's some of the biggest contact in the world. I love bat X incorporating some of the stat cast data in here and projections love him. I love him. I think the floor is set you at twenty twenty. You know, do you want to pay high prices? But I think the ceiling again for a median system, the ceiling is putting you in at like almost a twenty five to twenty five, maybe a thirty twenty five. But again, these
are our feelings about it. At the end of the day, the projections on the bat X love Oneio Cruz number three. Let's go to another starting pitcher. I'm gonna go to Steamer, the always optimistic Steamer, Mister Joe Rico. How about Chris Sale. Chris Sale obviously at a phenomenon onece IM there's plenty to be optimistic about. Rankings have kind of been all over the board on him and like where they feel
putting him in different tiers. But Steamer is very, very highly aggressive on him, actually has him as the only fourteen win pitcher among starting pitchers. He's only one a three point zero seven ERA and an over eleven K per nine in again a probably highly aggressive one hundred and eighty six innings. To mind you his stats, his stat line projection on Steamer, it's like just points off of what you're looking at Schooble in schemes. So Steamer is telling you that Chris Sale is a huge value
at what round three, round four, something like that. Projections absolutely love Chris Sale, but do you do the Arico projections love him.
I really like him.
I have him at number nine, but I'd think those innings projections are a little bit lofty one hundred and eighty seven, one hundred and eighty two from another system, I think that he should probably be more in that zips to ATC one one fifty four kind of territory. I think Eno said he had him projected for one fifty six. We can't just ignore all of the injuries that have happened throughout the course of his career. Last year was a healthy season, but he didn't finish the season healthy.
If you guys remember, he had to miss that playoff game against the Mets.
I don't think that that's a huge concern but when you're getting to his age and now is he thirty seven yet? No, he's gonna oh sorry, no, he's me thirty six in actually later this month.
So at that stage of your career, you never really know.
What's going to happen to a guy, especially somebody who has the series of injuries that Sale has had. That being said, I think a lot of them were more on the fluky side. It's not like he had two Tommy John's or something like that. So I think he can still go out there and be effective. But I think if you're drafting him, you might want to bank in that there's probably going to be some kind of eye stint at some point. And I don't think he's
going to push two hundred innings. I think that he's probably somewhere in that one fifty range, and that should still be very valuable, especially on a on a team like the Braves that should be in line for a big bounce back as a Hoole this year.
Yeah, And I think one of the things it's funny, because you know, we talked about Crochet in ATC kind of limiting and mitigating down the value on based on the innings. Chris sales value is pushed up definitely by this high projected innings. To be fair, this is only a little bit more than he had last year because he did have one hundred and seventy seven innings. Pitch won the Cy young. This team is going to need him. They're highly competitive, they're going to be playing down the stretch.
But it's not to say that, you know, due to age and due to some injury history, that that is still being optimistic. I'd probably agree. I think you can maybe even split the middle between these one forty one fifties in the one to seventy, call it one sixty, and he's still a pretty good value. But I think you know, wherever you are on Steamer, it's very, very
highly agree. Strikeout numbers as well, would you like to see and he had the highest strikeout rate over the last four years this past season a thirty two percent walk rate was low under three era, so again the era may be a bit high, and there's a lot of support offensively on this Chris Sale is loved by the Steamer projections, whether you love him or not. Number four on this list, we are going to go back
to ATC. It's going to be a lower name. It tried to vary the discussion about who projections love is as an open can there Joe, because it's like, you know, I could go and look and be like, oh man, they love this. You know, this guy who's getting fifteen numbers and fifteen stolen bases projections love this guy, and people might look and be like, that's not really love. Well, this is love ATC loves some Xavier Edwards. Xavier Edwards with the Marlins projected with a two point eighty one
batting average, you'll love it. There's one category, thirty six stolen bases. That's a lot of stolen bases. I believe that was in the top ten or maybe even the top five of projected stolen bases and a sub fifteen percent k percentage. Seventy runs I'll throw out there as well, is nothing to you know, nothing to yell about or anything like that. Like it's still good. It's not great, it's not horrible, but seventy runs pretty good. That for the most part is a two and a half category player.
But Xavier Edwards has been moving up I think a lot of boards in general. He definitely speaks to the late stolen base thing that you can do. It's high batting average. He's going to hit at the top of the lineup. And also, god knows what the Marlins are going to do with moving players out there. What do you think does ATC love Xavier Edwards enough or is it a little too much?
I think it's probably about right. I think the numbers are about right, but I feel like the draft room price is not at this point, Like there was a draft done. The NFBC lets you filter by like specific dates and you can look at specific drafts. He went fifty fifth overall in a draft on March second. I don't think that that's the regular but there's also plenty of dots here inside of the top one hundred picks.
And I honestly don't really understand the hype to that degree. Like, yes, he's a bit of a boost in the batting average department, and the stolen bases are going to be great, but the power stats really do concern me. When you're getting a guy who maybe could hit one or two home runs, he's projected from the various systems for anywhere from two to about five or six. You could end up with a Louis a Rise type player there, albeit with more speed.
But if you're factoring in the Marlins lineup in there as well, so you have to kind of just essentially figure you're getting nothing in the counting stats. He's projected for like forty RBI and sixty to seventy runs. I understand taking him if you are in a build where you've taken Kyle Schwarber early, you've taken Petalonzo early, you want to try and build up some of that batting average and stolen base depth back. But I feel like
he is somebody. If I'm taking him, I feel like I've kind of messed up earlier in the draft, the same way with Luis a Rise, and to a lesser extent, at Jacob Wilson, like somebody that's just such a specific category target. Wilson's going late enough that it doesn't really matter. But if Edwards keeps pushing and he's a top one hundred ADP, I think that that's crazy town for me.
Well, I think part of it is because of the love on the projection side, And I talked with Ariol about Xavier Edwards too. Thinks he's a smashing deal. I will say that, like I think Batting average is something that you know, there was a time where we were all kind of anti batting. You can get rid of that, and then now it's something that I'm chasing a little bit.
I mean, batting average is like clearly going as Homer's equate to more run in RBI, batting average is going to equate to better RBI run stolen based situations in general, that it's just not something that I want to completely throw to the side. Stolen bases is not something we need to chase as much anymore, but it still has its value, especially when you can get it late to
that degree. And I will tell you runs runs is another category that I kind of find myself falling behind on that him covering that does does make him a little bit more I think of a personal target. But to your point, he shows out in these systems, he's moving up even more for the class of people that are like, I'm not gonna worry about stolen bases, and then post one hundred, now I'm gonna worry about it.
And why don't I get the guy that I'm gonna tell you this, thirty six stolen bases looks aggressive, but just as a reminder, the guy still thirty one bases in two hundred and sixty five at bats last season, so it's not unheard of to think that he could go fifty. This is what Xavier Edwards does, and he has a really good underlying hit tool. It's funny he was a Padre. I was at his pro debut out here in Peoria, and it's the same thing always. He does not strike out. He puts the bat on the ball.
He has like a projected sub fifteen percent k percentage. He's going to get on base because he walks, so it's gonna give him more opportunities to steal. But then the valuation thing that you're bringing up, Joe is the bigger question. Is he worth inside the top one hundred? Probably not. He's a two and a half category at best three category player and a little bit of an albut or a big albatross as far as Homer's an RBI go. But the projections love him and that's why he is moving on up.
Like he might be a slightly better version of Bryce ter Rang but it's kind of the same deal.
You're getting a ton of speed, you're getting a.
Better batting average with Edwards, but a worse lineup, So that's kind of the same type of bil I think those like a ria Is to Rang Edwards.
I think they're all kind of cut from the same cloth.
Yeah, I don't disagree with that. And really, if like someone wanted to push Edwards up aggressively, getting a Bryce Terrang later might be good, but he didn't pop here coming in at number five. We're going to go back into the pitching market here, talk about I think a very popular pitcher out here, and we're going to look at the bat. This is also Derek Cardi system. He's got the bat and the bat X bad X obviously
is more of a hitting one. He doesn't have a pitching side to that that is just under the bat. And we're going to talk about Philly's starting pitcher, Christopher Sanchez. He is being projected with the twelfth most wins, third in the league in or twelve wins I'm sorry, third in the league and wins. It ended up having him to be like ninety, you know, as they project them out, it's like couple with fourteen, couple with thirteen, and then
at twelve, so very aggressive win projection. A three point eighty three ra which is very nice and top thirty war among all starting pitchers and aggressive aggressive innings. I think it's over one hundred and eighty. The big thing that pops up when you look at ranks and you look at values is Christopher Sanchez is probably and they're
not the only one. I think ATC has it pretty aggressive as far as war as well, except the bat is a little bit more in the counting side on the ra on the win front, there's not a lot of strikeouts that are projected. But he has added a cutter or he's adding a cutter in this year that a lot field. This could up that strikeout range and if that does, it changes the whole scope of it. And Chris Sanchez is being drafted. I don't have his
ADP in front of me. Maybe you have it, Joe, but I want to say it's like, it's definitely outside the top forty and it might be outside the top fifty. But many projects systems we're just specifically picking on the bat really love Christopher Sanchez. So what do you think?
So all pitchers on the NFBC this also includes relievers in there, but he's the sixty seventh pitcher off the board overall, I can't imagine.
So that's probably like forty five at SP something like that. So outside the top forty.
Which I think is gold, absolute gold, I'll take him every time that he's still sitting there. He's a great stabilizer if you've taken some guys who are maybe the highest strikeout riskier types earlier in the draft, if you've taken a Blake Snell, if you've taken a Dyllan c Saidjaob de Gram. I think that Sanchez is a really nice pairing who's a really safe innings guy. That era should be very safe. The change up and the cutter,
even with the slider, was really good. But adding a cutter to go along with the change up and that slider, I think should be really really good for him.
Innings aren't any kind of concern.
The only concern with Sanchez is that you're not getting a ton of strikeouts. He's probably going to be somewhere in the twenty ish percent range. Maybe he can push up to twenty two as long as you've taken care that though, I think that there are not many better options in this range, not just for pitchers but for any players going around pick one seventy to one eighty than Chris Sanchez.
He's one of my favorite targets this year.
Yeah, and I think what's so nice about this is projections have him popping. His cost is still pretty low. And also you know that when you talk about that median side of the projection, I just want to point out, like, you know, three eight ERA or whatever, like he's beat that two straight years. You know you had a three three two ERA this past season. Doesn't walk a lot, doesn't strike out a lot. Maybe he's kind of wu ish, but he's going after WU and there's some higher strikeout potential.
So Chris Sanchez pops on many of these systems. Specifically, just picked out the bat because of the wins because again I think ATC was a little bit lower, but he pops on both of those systems. So a late target for you guys, especially if you're going to pay attention to these projections. We got more coming up, but first I want to tell you guys about the Draft Assistant. Use the Draft Assistant to make the best decisions during
your fantasy drafts this season. It connects directly to your draft and provides both real time pick suggestions and estimations on which players might get taken before your next pick. The Draft Assistant fully integrates your customized cheat sheets and suggests picks based on your rankings, team build, ADP and other factors. Experience a smarter way to draft a Fantasypros
dot Com slash assistant or on the MLB Draft Wizard app. Again, Fantasypros dot Com slash Assistant do it today make drafting a little bit easier, and you can also set those up. You could have, like you know, a Welshin Arico rank build to help you as far as it's going. If you want to see what way. I can't imagine what our ranks would look like together, but there's probably It'll definitely want you to draft Errett Crochet. I'll tell you that I don't know about the others. So there's actually
another guy in this list. We'll talk about that. I think you and I both agree on all right, some of these names are going to get kind of fun. There's some big names any here with some big questions, and this one is right there. We are going to go to Steamer for number six. Luise Robert. I did an episode on In This League with Ario Cohen talking about projections and I picked on Luise Robert because he
pops on their system. He pops on a lot of systems coming off of a really bad batting average year, but none like Steamer where after that season with the White Sox and they're not going to build in a presumed trade. He has projected twenty nine homers, twenty seven stolen bases, eighty four run and eighty four RBI. Believe the average is back into the two forty range. These are all boosts off of last year. He did steal
a bunch of bases. Even in the bad contact that Luise Robert made, he still put up like a season that was paired with just you know, garbage batting average. Most of these systems decently like it because they are looking over a couple years, but again, none like Steamer. And he's going post seventy five in some instances. I think he's outside the top one hundred. There's some big, big counting stats. He's kind of the anti like what
you looked at with Xavier Edwards. You're like, man, he covers these three categories that are a little bit tougher, but then he's in albatross. But he's got that safety. Luis Robert is like, these are monster numbers across the board, but the volatility is wild with Luis Robert here. So what do you think about Robert and the Steamer projection.
He's not somebody that I generally like to land on. It's not that I'm like super ant.
You don't like thirty thirty.
That's the thing.
If he hits the projection, if you just put him into a player raider, he's projected higher. If you're using Steamer, he's projected better than Tascar Hernandez, better than Anthony Santander, better than Brian, better than Wyatt Langford and James Wood and Breton Doyle and a lot of others. But I'm not sure how much I really buy it, Like the whole three year waiting thing. I know we have to do it.
We have to.
We can't just look at the most recent sample size and ignore everything else. But when you look at the situation in Chicago, Luis Robert down the stretch last season did not seem like he cared about playing baseball.
It was atrocious. It was really bad.
And I've heard that talking point of all like last year they were historically bad, Like nothing's changed, if anything, they've gotten worse. So is Luis Robert gonna all of a sudden be like invigorated to play baseball again for the projected fifty two win White Sox. I don't know about that. So I think from that standpoint, we have to worry a little bit because, like as somebody who had him in a couple of leagues last year, he was getting dropped like he wasn't even just somebody you benched,
like he was droppable down the stretch. If he's still in the White Sox, then it's gonna be a bit hard for me personally to invest the projections. I understand, because they're capturing twenty twenty three, and if he played a full season last year, you know you're probably looking at twenty something homers and thirty something steals. Like the raw talent is there, but there's been a lot of injuries over the years. He's only surpassed that over one
hundred game mark one time in twenty twenty three. Last year he hit it exactly on, so I guess you can count that if you want, but there's a lot of risk here from a number of standpoints. He started striking out like crazy last year thirty three percent of the time. The swinging strike rate was very high as well, seventeen and a half percent. There are reasons to be concerned here. If I hear that Luis Robert gets traded to the Phillies or something, or get traded to.
The Astros or whoever, or Atlanta.
Atlanta, Like, I am going to be a lot more interested as of right now. He's not somebody that I'm that interested in, but I understand it based on the projections for sure.
Yeah, I mean to point out like prior to last year he had hit two sixty four higher the previous two seasons. He came off of a thirty eight twenty season. There's an argument to be said to be said, especially when you do wait over a couple of years, that last year might have been more of the outlier. The strikeout rate was absurd, but it was rising the previous
year as well. He kind of bounces around in how well he barrels, and I think it does speak to maybe a little bit more the mental game and like what where was his involvement? Will he check back out? I do think last year was a little bit different. Spent a lot of time in the rookie ball and
trying to build back up. But you know he's an injury away, which he's proven to have that from maybe you know, losing interest again and you know, another twenty straight games of losing from losing interest in playing, and he'd have to be traded to kind of keep that. But at the end of the day, there's some loud counting stats that are out there. If the batting average comes back to where it's been, I don't think there's a question of this being a value. I don't, I
really don't. And I think there's quite a few guys that the next guy we're going to talk about as well. You know, games played to their production is always kind of the big the big question, Luis Robert. As long as the batting average is there, we're going to be okay, let's go to the next guy. This guy, this is the first time we're looking at the it's the we call it oopsie, right, that's how it's spelled. This is the oopsie projection. This is a new one that is
on over on fangraphs. And we are going to talk about Mike Trout. Yes, Mike Trout, who is a major question to everybody you know, he's off of list for some people, he's undraftable. He can't stay healthy this year. You know, he's obviously had a lot of time to recoup. He's going to be playing right field. We'll see if there's even some dh He changed up some of his routine in the off season to try to keep that back healthy. We'll see, you know, if some butts with
Mike Trout. But there is no system that is more aggressive on Mike Trout this year than the Oopsie projection system. And you had kind of mention they're a little bit more Pollyanna on it, which I think is okay because Mike Trout is going outside the top one hundred. Yet Oopsie projects him at a two sixty seven batting average, thirty two homers, ten stolen bases, eighty five runs, and
one hundred and twenty games played. And really probably the only thing that gets anybody like scoffing is one hundred and twenty games, none of those other numbers, because Mike Trout he's incredible when he's out there. I mean, the batting average sunk a little bit last year, but he was off to some crazy home run out But we don't know how he'll run, even though Ron Washington loves to run, we don't know that with his health, and we just don't know how many games are going to
go out there. But I find it hard to avoid Mike Trout outside the top one hundred, not just because of this projection system, but I do think that even in one hundred games, with Trout's ability, he can still kind of overcome that he can be a value at one hundred, even if he plays on the low end. But blah, blah blah, what do you think? I mean, I can talk as positive that came about Mike Trout here, but we know at the end of the day what
we're going to be able to argue against. What do you think of Oopsie's projection on Mike Trout?
So I really like Jordan Rosenbloom. I want to say this first off, I really like Jordan. He's a really smart guy.
But this always leads to a really really positive comment. You're going to I like Jordan as well, by the way, but I'm going to keep with the positive go.
Ahead, But I think the projections are a little too rosy, not just for Mike Trout. I think they're a little bit too Rosy in general, Like I think Aaron Judge is projected for fifty nine home runs. Fifty home runs, like, that's not a fiftieth percentile projection.
It's just not.
And I think that that's where some people will get caught up and seeing the different projections and then being like, oh my god, look at Mike Trout on Oopsy or look at whoever on Oopsy, And I think it's a little bit ambitious sometimes, whether we're talking about the games played, we're talking about the raid stats, the raw numbers, like, I think all of it is is a bit too optimistic. But that being said, if Mike Trout plays one hundred and twenty games, this is probably roughly what the line
is going to look like. I think the main problem with me with the Oopsy Trout projection is the games played. And it's not just Jordan there because Steamer's got him for one twenty, Zips has him for one twenty, but I think expecting that at this point is probably not two wise. He's combined for one hundred and twenty games over the last couple of seasons combined. I don't know that I want him to run like Ron Washington likes
to run. Generally speaking, Trout stole six bases over twenty nine games last year.
I don't want him to run.
At this point, I'll happily sacrifice the stolen bases to keep Mike Trout healthy. If the give off is ten or twelve steals and then I have to sacrifice fifty games because of that, like, I'll just take the extra games. But I think he's still somebody that I have some interest in. It's hard to be completely out on him. He's the hitter version of Jacob de Grom. If things do go right for him, that he could be a
first round player. But I think that the odds of it happening for Mike Trout at this point are very low. I think the Angels lineup is a bit better than people might think. But at the same time, Trout is fairly expensive still, and if you're playing like underdog best balls, he's even more expensive. People are more pushing him up in points league. So I have a couple of shares. I have a couple of shares where it was like tenth, eleventh round and a fifteen teamer, and at that point, okay,
I'll take a chance on him. But for the average player. I think that he's he's a lot riskier, Like if you're playing in one league this season, if you're just in one fantasy league, I don't know that i'd want to recommend taking Mike Trout.
Yeah.
The only thing I disagree with is I kind of feel like you're either just enter out like you can't. I mean, obviously you can't. I don't want to speak in exacts, but like, for the most part, you are either like, well, these projections are so great, and his cost now is it's so low that like the only thing that will defeat this is him having like fifty games played, you know, fifty games played destroys that. But if he does play one hundred, the one hundred baseline,
I'm gonna I'm gonna beat the value of this. And the other end is like he'll just never play. It doesn't matter. I don't want him. It's kind of the Jacob de Grom thing. It's like you're either in or you're out. At the end of the day. The projection doesn't do a lot for me, you know, because it's like the question is not about his talent when he's out there, it's about him being out there. That's its
exact same argument as Jacob de Grom. It's not the question of his production, it's a question of him being out there. Can he stay out there? Can the weight loss that Trout did whatever swing to try to keep the bat going playing in right field? Will any of those things do anything? Maybe the best part about it, though, is it is the lowest cost that it's ever been. And if you're looking for any confirmation to that feeling, Oopsie is a projection that is telling you, hey, these
are Taoscar numbers. These are essentially Taoscar, Hernandez numbers. You're getting Taoscar's going around like the fifties, and Trout's going outside the top one hundred. Sometimes later he gets pushed up. Maybe it's a question, but the Oopsie projection absolutely loves Mike Trout. Going back to ATC, we're gonna talk about a rookie Dylan Cruz. It is tough to find rookies that are like heavily projected well in any projection system.
Years and years ago, I remember rookie Vladimir Guerrero was projected like the highest batting average. But it's more often than non projections are going to really underplay and then everybody gets really mad. That is not the case here with this rookie Dylan Cruz, who is still technically prospect eligible on ATC. The batting average doesn't jump out to you. It's two forty four, but he is essentially projected for a fifteen thirty season fifteen homers, twenty eight stolen bases,
sixty nine runs, and sixty one RBI. There's some variants in there where he's hitting in the order. He hit lead off a ton for Washington when he was up. We'll see where that goes this season. But a few notches positive here or there. You're now talking about a guy that is fifteen thirty. Maybe he pushes eighty runs and the value is exponentially high. Again, this is a guy that's outside the one twenty five. I'm not looking at it right now. Depends on the ADP you're looking at.
But this is guy well outside the top one hundred that is heavily, heavily projected on ATC for a very strong season, and that maybe leads to some more upside. What do you think about ATC's projection on Dylan.
Cruz feels about right.
The number is getting more expensive if I just sort by the last two weeks for Dylan Cruz, the ADP is one fifteen, so he is starting to rise a little bit and and I understand it. He's the guy that I've landed on a few times, more so earlier in draft season when it was one forty one to fifty price. Now I think I'd probably still buy in, but definitely more appealing a couple rounds later.
Do you think fifteen thirty, Like, does a fifteen thirty season put you as a guy that should be top one hundred, Like, what's the marker that is making him too expensive based on his stat line?
I think when you're looking at the batting average projections, when you're looking at the counting stats, if that's getting inside of the top one hundred, and there's some systems that are calling for And again, like projections for young guys are usually a little bit off. Prospects don't usually get captured fully because there's just not as much data.
But I think with Dylan Cruz, if he ends up going like let's say that price goes up and he's going exactly a pick one hundred, and then I'm taking any of these systems at face value, that means I'm not getting seventy RBI. That means that I might get seventy runs, fifteen homers, twenty some odds deals with a batting average that's not going to hurt or help me. I think in the one fifty range, I really like them.
I think that that's where you take a chance on the upside, pushing top one hundred when there are a couple categories that do worry me a little bit. I don't think the lineup is amazing. I think it's I think it's a good lineup, but I think there are still some questions. I think that he's somebody that if the price continues to jump up, I'm going to probably stay away. But you probably won't see him jump up quite as much in other formats like let me just
pull up the Fantasy pros Consensus ADP. It's probably lower because a lot of the time, if you're talking about NFBC leagues, people are shooting for upside. So I'm going to pull it up here, Chris, I'm going to talk for a quick second.
Well, I was gonna say, I think, well, I think a lot with a lot of those one system can bring it down. But Dylan Cruz still suffers from, you know, some potential potholes if you will, like you know, slider chasing and stuff like that as far as where his batting average is going to go. But do want to point out he only two eighteen last year had an expected batting average of two point fifty three, so that two fifty range, obviously projections are laying a little bit lower.
If you get to the two fifty two sixty range. That's a difference between Dylan Cruz being outside the top one hundred and probably being a top seventy five player.
So by our consensus ADP, it's one thirty three, and I think that's that's a good price. Than that, I get a little bit worried, but that is I think a good range. If you're getting him in the ninth round or even the eighth round of a fifteen teamer, or if you're talking about like the eleventh round of a twelve teamer, I think that's a really good price.
Room two more players here, and we are gonna we got one hitter and one pitcher. This is another hitter. I think you and I can both agree on. This is a very early early bounce back guy. For me, and I think you are with it. We are going to go to Steamer projections and we're going to look at Toronto Blue Jays Bobaschhett, Bobachett coming off of clearly
just a bad season. I tend to think, and I gotta be careful about it, because there's a couple guys that I've looked at and it's like, man, the seasons were so bad, they feel more Those feel more outlier based on the skill set than it does the new norm little bit Luise Robert, but definitely in my mind it has been Bobaschett. Some projections obviously have some bounce backs, but the most aggressive has been Steamer projecting him almost at a two to eighty average, two seventy nine, twenty
one homers, eleven stolen in eighty six runs. It's fair to say if he goes twenty ten with that high batting average and those runs, he is going to more than recoup the value. The question is going to be, you know, Steamer gets a little Pollyanna, maybe like how oopsie is you're talking about? You know, is this a little bit overplayed because some of the other atc in the bat I think are playing it down a little bit because some of the skill sets have changed on
Boba Schett. But I'm buying back in. I know you're buying back in. What do you think of Steamer's twenty ten eighty six runs and a two eighty average projection?
Love it as a whole, but I'm not buying into the speed anymore. I think the speed is not gone. But if you look at like the stat cast sprint speed, he's below the fiftieth percentile, and that's something that has been trending in the wrong direction for a couple of years. He's still twenty five bases in his breakout season, then every year's progressively gone down. I think that you can probably count on him for a handful of steals, whether it's five or eight or four or nine, like it's
gonna be somewhere in that range. If he gets the double digits, I'd be pretty surprised. But I think the adding average is a huge, huge bounce back potential to go along with the big power. We saw him hit a ball out of the stadium yesterday spring training. I don't want to read too much into it. I'm not even sure who was on the mound, so you never know in spring training, but it's a positive sign. I think that he's not a guy who is a risk
from a profile standpoint. The injuries are a little bit concerning, but we're talking about a guy who's twenty five has even turned twenty six years old.
You know, he's twenty six years old. Excuse me, who was a fantasy star for three seasons.
He has a bad, injury plagued year, and now the price has gone down by like ten rounds. That's an easy buyback for me. I am a Blue Jays fan. You guys know this, but leaving the Homer bias at the door, I still think, Bobah, that's a great pick this year.
Yeah, there's some dramatic things that changed again that feel, and it could be the start of a completely offset skill set, you know, where everything is changing. But like, he was essentially like a nine barrel percent guy his entire career and then it dipped down to four percent. To me, that's kind of an anomaly. The hard hit rate has kind of had a steady drop, but it
still didn't go to some crazy, crazy worrisome range. The k's stayed the same, the walk stayed the same, and one of the weirdest things is he has always hit lefties well. As a matter of fact, up until this past season, he had never hit under two sixty against left handed pitchers. He hit one sixty this past season, one sixty, one hundred points lower than he had ever
done in his entire career. So I think there's a couple elements you can take a look at with Bobashet and you can say this probably isn't going to hold. By the way, almost seventy point difference in his lower babbit than his career babbit and almost one hundred points year over year, So there's some bad luck in there.
Maybe things don't change, but it's a really good buybacked potential projections are there, and maybe it's because of three year averages, but I love the Steamer projection on Bobaschet and he's a risk worth taking that low. The final one, we are gonna go back to Oopsy and this is just a fun one that I found here. It is a You're not eagle, never guess the guy that I was going to put on this list, because we've had
some big names here. It's a starting pitcher with the New York Mets, Clay Holmes, who is going to be his starting pitcher this year. Oopsy has him projected as the eleventh lowest ra among starting pitchers at three to two. I will say there might be some convolutedness in it because it's got him pitching a whole lot of it hasn't projected for like twenty three starts, but then pitching
some relief games. He is set to stretch out to be a starter this year, Yet the projection also has him three So I said three two ERA one hundred and sixty four innings with a nine to three to two k per nine. The reason why this is relative is this is one of those guys that is free ninety nine. This is a free guy in most drafts that is not being drafted. Oopsy is absolutely through the roof.
They're kind of giving him the Michael kingtree. So what do you think here, mister Joe Rico on Clay Holmes.
That's the thing is the Michael King comps. And I understand it like reliever going to starter, But Michael King is one of the better pitchers in baseball, and I don't think that Clay Holmes is going to get there this year. I'm intrigued about the change up, he needs another pitch. Just having two pitches as a starter is
not going to really fly. But if you're looking at the projections and the innings in particular, like the last three years for clay homes, like Clockwork sixty three, sixty three, sixty three innings, you know Zips has them for one seventy three Oopsy won sixty four. Those are massive jumps.
And also when they're not talking about any change in strikeout rate, like they're projecting Oopsy a twenty three point eight percent strikeout rate coming from a twenty five percent strikeout rate, I think that that's a little bit bold to expect that he's going to have an innings jump of one hundred while maintaining the same strikeout rate, maybe boosting the walk right up a little bit, and also
giving you a three to eer like. I think that we're probably hoping for a little bit too much, and he might be one of the guys this year that gets overhyped and then he'll get pushed up a lot, like because like you said, the price right now is non existent. People start to see he's adding a kick change and he has a couple of good spring outings and then he's shooting.
Up ten rounds.
That's where I get concerned right now. And this rangery's going no problem at all taking a chance. I've done it myself a couple times this year. But as people start to get more excited, as people start to start watching these shows and getting back into the spring training routine, I feel like the hype train is going to leave the station before Clay Holmes is actually fully ready to be an elite starter.
I think next year will be a big year.
If Clay Holmes is able to get to like one twenty one to thirty this year with success, and then next year he can jump to one sixty one seventy, That's kind of what I'm looking for here.
Well, I'm not sure his ADP is ever going to jump to a range that's going to make him not draftable, so he might be worth the shot he I mean, it's not like Michael King. You know, I was very, very very heavy on Michael King last year, and he kept going up and up and up, and obviously now he's you know, inside that top fifty range. If Clay Holmes jumps into a really you know, if he starts, if people are deciding between like Sandy al Contra and Clay Holmes. Okay, but at this point he is a
bit free. The comparisons are interesting his slider and sweeper. A four mile proer differential between those two pitches both generated a thirty eight percent or higher wiff rates. So you've got two different slider types that you're throwing for
really really really high wiff rates. The fastball is not going to tick and it didn't strike out or the sinker he threw so thirteen percent K pitch, so it's a setup pitch to those others, which, by the way, slider thirty nine percent K percentage, sweeper forty three percent. And I think that throwing in maybe a change up addition, that's where the Michael King coomps start to come into play. Maybe just a good dart throw. Projections really love him. Will we all love him at the end of the year.
I don't know, but the projections sure do. Friends. Those are ten players that Projections absolutely love, and we didn't just pick on one. We talked about a bunch of different projection systems hitters, and if you have identified a guy that Projections absolutely love that we didn't hit, drop it below in the comments, Let's see who we've got because there are deeper plays. It becomes more the definition of like, what's really love? What is rue? What does
love have to do with it? Well, you guys, let us know some of your favorite players based on projections below, and go and check us out over on Fantasy Pros because not only do we have the Draft Assistant fantasypros dot Com slash Assistant, but we've also got the draft kit that is out so you can check the draft day cheat sheets. Piece of P has got one, I've got mine, Rico, I imagine you either have yours up or it'll be there soon. Bogman. We got lots and
lots of great information there. You can check out the ECR, the ADP, and all of our data. Plus get down to drafting not only with the assistant, but get in with the mock Draft simulator. You can perform mocks in minutes, multiple five six, probably in an hour, set it to your league settings, customize it, and you can even have friends joined. So check it out today by sinking your go over at Fantasy Pros. That is it, my friends. Thank you guys for hanging out with us. As always,
make sure you subscribe to the YouTube channel. Go and win that John Smoltz autograph baseball for Joe Rico. I'm Chris Welsh. We'll talk to you next time right here on Fantasy Pros MLB.
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