Welcome in everybody to Fantasy Pros. This is the Fantasy Baseball Podcast. It is me, Joey Pa Joe Pisapia and with me back again as my boy, the Welsh, Chris Welsh returning. It's January. You know what that means. It's time to turn the page. We're talking baseball now. We're gonna talk about the top fifty guys and the ranks over Fantasy pros in the ECR. Welsh has done his ranks. I've done mine. It's very early. Guys are still signing.
Carlos Carea could have three or more teams you could try to sign with before the end of the show. But no, he's actually gonna be a twin. It looks like as we're recording this, so Welsh. It's great to see her face. It's great to be back talking baseball with you. Are you ready for twenty twenty three? Baby?
Oh?
Am?
I ready? Are you ready?
Buddy?
I mean I've got the transition, you got the crazy football transition. I've been doing football obviously, but it is full time fantasy fantasy. Joe's on the football side, but now you're coming. You're comeing too, baseball with me. Which I'm excited about, which you were just talking about ranks, and my only anxiety is like, oh my god, I'm
already gonna have to go and change Carlos Korea. And then we just got news broke about Trevor's story as well, having a UCLA ucl surgery UCLA u SEL surgery that's gonna leave him out four to six months, which might push him post All Star breaks. This is another player at also a really garbage position that we're gonna take off the board, really glad.
I updated the Black Book for Carl's Korea a couple hours ago before this I saw now I did. I was like, well, I gotta go do it again, so I'll update this, rewrite some things there, and then this happens. So now I'm gonna have to go back tomorrow and do some more. But I'm gonna I'm just got talk baseball now. Enough of that. More injuries I'm sure to come. But we've got a fresh slate, a new start, and we're gonna talk about the top fifty. We're gonna break
down these tiers. Let's start at the top one through ten, and we're gonna talk about these guys. Give you our opinions here maybe who's too high, who's too low, who should be in the top ten, who's not. Before we do just reminder not only his baseball season open for business here, but it's also open for business and Fantasy pros because the Draft Wizard is now open for business. That's right. You can go there and start doing mock drafts. I got a B plus online yesterday. I did my
first one of the year. I'll take the B plus. It was pretty good. Got a lot of Joe guys.
And now you know, i'd say, do we have it yet where the analysts are on did you love your own draft?
Or you know what? I didn't even see if I'm sure I did. If anybody loves my own drafts, it's me. You're right, I should go back and see who graded me how. But look, you can spend five minutes, ten minutes, three hours go to fantasypros dot com slash draft Wizard. Check it out right now. You can have all the settings you want, and obviously you have more settings available to you when you're a premium member of Fantasy pro So you can go do that. Fantasybros dot Com slash offers.
Go take one of our offers there upgrade six three months of Fantasy Pro. You could do that, but I'm telling you, I love the Draft Wizard. Welsh loves the Draft Wizard. It's a great way to start getting prepared for the season. To go check that out. Let's also check out these top dogs. The consensus number one, it's Trey Turner of the now Philadelphia Phillies. So he has come to Philadelphia. Bryce Harper, we'll see sometime this season.
We'll see Aaron Judge is at the two spot. Julio Rodriguez is at three, Jose Ramirez at four, Ron Laconi at five, Kyle Tucker at six, Juan Soto at seven, Jordan Alvarez or Jordan Alvarez, I have to call him by his name now his number eight, Mookie Betts is nine, and Vlad Guerrero at ten. Welsh, you and I have a different number one. You have Ronald Acunia. So do I let's talk about it, because Trey Turner is up at the top. Why is not Ronald Acunia that guy?
Why is the consensus early on Trey Turner instead?
Well, you know, it's really interesting, and to throw this out as well, just to give some perspective. I know this isn't everything. There's also NFBC Drafts out there, which has really probably created all of the ADP, but it's a different game. It's a little bit of a different game than a lot of the consumer stuff we're going to be playing. I did a sorting of Draft Champions, which is probably a better way to look Draft Champions twenty one drafts have happened so far since December first,
and check this out. Trey Turner is the number one overall player again, so that if you really want to find the consensus, I think we're kind of on the consensus at Fantasy Pros with what's going on over there. But the next four are not the same. Ronald Dacunya is number two over on NFBC on the Draft Champions, Julio's three, Jose Ramirez is four, and Aaron Judge is five.
So I'm bringing that all in to say that I think what you've got with Ronald 'cuoney right now is you've got a little bit of depressed power from last year, and you've also got an injury, and then you're gonna pair that with some crazy performances, and you've got Jose Ramirez, who I think justified to be in this conversation because you're getting elite stolen bases and really consistent production four straight years I think of twenty twenty or even twenty
five to twenty five, and it's at a position that kind of stinks, and you get the stolen bases. Aaron Judge lop off twenty percent of his production and he's still probably one of the number one Fantasy overall players, and he steals, and then Julio Rodriguez with his elite steals, So like, what's the common denominator here? It steals. It's all the steals. So why is Zacunya coming back down when his savant page is as red as red? It's
the red scene. It's still everything it was before. And what did he do in the meantime when the power was a little bit suppressed coming off of injury? Is he just stolen the lead amount of basis? I think he was still fourth in.
Baseball nineteen games, and while that was supposed to be, like he's coming off knee surgery, so maybe this sole base will be down. Literally we talked about everybody thought would be the case, and it wasn't the case. At all Acuni is my one turner two and then I've got Julio three too. So it's funny how we see things in a different light necessarily than the early consensus.
But I mean with a more time removed from that injury. Look, you know, obviously, Coul you have played in the postseason two, so a little bit more tread on the tires, and then you know, maybe some other players coming off injury. But regardless, I'm kind of where you are, Like, I think he is that combination of those things and not a knock on tray turner if you are in a three active outfielder league and the supposed to five. Sure, I can understand that because you get the flexibility of
that too. Plus I like the ballpark factor too, a little bit easier place to hit home runs a Dodger Stadium.
Yeah, And I just want to I want to add like outfield is kind of a big key here as well, and I just want to.
Throw out here, by the way, can we just.
It's one of my big issues that I'm going to be dealing with, but you know, just the thing to add lastly, when we're looking at it, you still had top percent markers even though the power was down fifteen homers, a lot less than you would have wanted to see in normal years. I'm not looking at where his ISO was, I don't have it, but I think his slugging was down. But you've got a top two percent max ev top eight percent in x slug and expected slugging top five
percent and expected wOBA wobacan top five percent. Hard hit was top eight percent.
So like some of them going Wolbacon by the way, great and it's going to be right. I'm dressing up as a swinging strike rate, you.
Dressed up as a baseball, you drive as a baseball drift. It's a big min that's exactly right. But my whole point is is like the the stats weren't exactly there, but all the underlying stuff is still there. With a great team in a great ballpark, the factors are there. I'm still with Ronald Lacunya, and you get him at
a deal. And it's actually kind of why I really love that fourth pick in drafts right now, because it allows you one of elite, these elite players to kind of drop and then you get to make the decision a little bit like maybe you're getting Judge, maybe're getting Hulio, maybe you're getting Acuna. Any of those work Turner and
Ramirez obviously makes sense. But yeah, I think the guy to focus on here is Akunya because you and I have met one and he shows up at five on the consensus rank, and I one one hundred percent believe that will change over the next two or three months and at least two months, and you're going to see him jump up to maybe at three on consensus, but he might not push one.
Real quick too. Kyle Tucker, I think one of the guys is going to benefit some of the most from the shift banning or changing modification whenever you want to call it. Corey Seger another guy too, probably the most guy to be helped from that shift change concept. I look one, so to what seven is a great value? Love this? Jose Ramirez is my early guy for MVP this year. We're go to talk more about that as
we go. Lots to talk about there, because I do think go Tani does get traded this year, so that's going to make things really real lacky and wonky when we get to that point. But look, I don't have much of a problem with the top ten Actually, this is a really solid top ten. I love that my boy Alvarez is in there. I think Glad should be in there. The only question is we get to that next year, the eleventh or twenty. We start with Otani
at eleven. If you're in a league where you get the two players in one, especially in a points league, head to head, oh, Tani's a number one player, period, end of story. Like it's not close, so's.
And that's my pretty adjustment, and that's my problem with it, and that's why my focal point on this group of ten is Showho Tani that we have to talk about him in like four different ways. You got to talk about his hitter only as pitcher, only as dual weekly and dual daily, So dual daily, he's the number one player in every format, points, head to head, roto dynasty, keeper, redraft.
It doesn't matter. He's the number one player. You and I famously last year were obnoxious about Otani and how he didn't win the titles and everything, but it is what it is. He's a number one player in there. Now you take away and he's a dual eligible player in weekly leagues, that's tougher because he's probably primarily a hitter. He's almost just a straight up hitter in that format. And this is where I still think he's inside the top ten. Though I still think even in that format
he's in the top ten. You can make adjustments, you get the pitching edge. As a hitter, he's still an insanely crazy high performer of thirty plus homers, double digitsole and bases. The team is definitely looking to be better. You're gonna have Anthony Rayn dooneback. They brought in Hunter Renfro. Yeah, they just brought some more pieces into maybe offensively help. And then when he's a sole eligible player, which at this point I think is just like Yahoo, maybe there's
another one. This is where that's tough because Otani is probably like between fifteen and twenty at SP at best, and then hitter he's probably you know, he's util lonely. That's the thing that holds him back. If he was like an outfielder, if he was outfield and sp eligible, the weekly would even move up. But only does drop you just a tiny bit. But still as a hitter, he's a top two round player. I just think that you got to focus here because this is the one
player that is not traded equal. And I know like points and head to head changes, but this is a player that can go from number one overall down to even in the late twenties if he's just a pitcher or something like that.
But yeplayer variance depending on you know what where he is. And again, the push I'm making is looking at the division, seeing what the Texas Rangers did this offseason, seeing what the Astros still are, seeing what the Mariners, I still believe are and I think they're the fourth best team in this division at best. And I just don't think that's gonna be good enough at the end of the day.
And I think that's why the early market for Oton's gonna be fastening, because you're gonna looking at teams who can afford to make that kind of move, who have the prospects to get it done, because you could get the most enormous haul for prospects maybe we've ever seen for a guy like shoey Otani, because it's one thing to add a big picture of the deadline. It's a nothing to add a big hitter, it's nothing to add both with one player. It's something we've never seen in
our lifetimes. Happen, and I think it's gonna happen this year because I think the Angels once again are going to be irrelevant when push comes to show.
The interesting thing about that, though, I think there's a lot of different sides to it. Like they've they've made their push, this is the best thing Angels can do with the money that they've spent and screwed up. Also, by the way, well, and that's that's.
What it comes to.
Like they brought in, they traded for renfro and then they bring in Tyler Anderson, and they get rin doone back and they get to trying to put the pieces together. If they don't win, I actually kind of agree if they've done all of that, they really do need to look at themselves and say, can we bring him back? And do we just need to retool this. Here's my only problem. I don't even know if the Mets. I mean, there are other organizations that could have better Hall Mets happened.
I don't know if the Mets, well, I just don't know if they do. I mean, Francisco Alvarez would be the key piece, one of the biggest guys to it, But where else are they going to go, they don't treat well.
Do you think it's a Do you think it's a surprise that they went out and got another catcher, had more catcher depth.
This year with no, I don't mean yeah, well, I mean Alvarez was in the rumored stuff with with one Soto and that never ended up.
Well, well, I mean it is. But I think at the end of the day, the Angels, more than any team, need to restock the organization and they can't let Atani walk. But let me, this is gonna be a topic. I'm sure for many many shows to come, we're gonna talk about this. Let's talk about the rest of the guys eleven through twenty. In the next tier, we've got after Otani eleven, Freddie Freeman at twelve, Bobby Wood Junior, What a great season he had. We were right to be
as bullish as we were. Did it get off to a dubious start? Yes? Did my boy close? You sure? Did?
You?
Sure? Did? Bobby Wood Junior looking fantastic. Corbyn Burns at fourteen, great spot there, followed by Garrett Cole at fifteen, by Trout at sixteen. Bobash had seventeen many Mischado at eighteen, Raphaeld Devers staying put in Boston. That's at nineteen, at Pete a Lonzo at twenty. Again love this. I liked that Burns is ahead. I think that's all the guy that could possibly be on the move this year Burns
and Cole makes sense to me? Is top fifteen? You know me, I don't love these top pitchers going early for them. That's not where I am with well Fantasy baseball right now. But what are your thoughts on those guys there? And what are your thoughts also about Bobby Witt being a top fifteen player this year already in the ranks.
Well, here's a couple things I want to point out. First off, how insane is it that this is maybe one of the first years we've ever seen that you don't see in the consistent rank there's not a pitcher inside the top ten or for twelve. Well, but it's always the thing that happens. I think Roto is going to push these guys up. I have that same order. I've got Burns and Cole, and I've got them not
inside the top twelve. I might have. I mean, I guess technically in a fifteen team, Roto both of them do touch the first round if you're not looking at twelve. But I think that's the general range. I will probably have zero point zero shares of those guys at that cost. I'm going to be predominantly hit or hitter in my drafts, and Bobby Witt at this cost would be someone I'm
one hundred percent taking a look at. The funny thing about it is Wit is going at an insanely different costs than NFBC drafts in the Draft Champions seven, So draft and rank is going to be something really interesting to follow. NFBC drafts also are a lot more upside you're chasing stolen bases, so I'm not I'm not a surprised to see him there, but I got a hard time looking at like Bobby Witt over you know some really key veterans. So seven is way too high over right now?
Do you think that's wrong?
See don't. I don't know if I agree with that right now. Like I'm into Bobby WIT's progression, but I think Bobaschett is underrated right now, and I think that's a really tough pill to swallow, taking Wit over Boshett. If you're looking for consistency, but you got to take your shots in some places either way. Man, I think this is a great spot for when you're looking for twenty five plus stolen bases with an uptick in power,
which Bobby Witt can do. It's just a team context sucks and if you look at where can I get more runs in RBI, if you compare Baschett and Bobby Witt, maybe you get more stolen bases with Bobby. You could easily get more homers with Bishett. But you also have a better run and RBI opportunity with the Blue Jays than you do with the Royals. So I think they're really close. But I'm in with Bobby Witt. No would one hundred percent taken? Would you say it was seventeen sixteen?
He is at thirteen right now?
Or at thirteen okay?
Yes, which I think there's a chance that he might crack top ten at some point because I do think they're gonna look at the stone bases and look at the deficit in that category, and people like you said was gonna push And I don't know if it's wrong, but I love him right where he is right now. I think that's perfect. I'm concerned it's gonna move up. We'll see, we'll see what happened.
Well in the NFBC drafts. His his high pick was five and his low pick was ten, so he never went below ten.
And that's why I believe when people start seeing that that will push up because of the stone bases. And I think that early indicator is one that look, if you're doing early best ball drafts right now, you're getting a value on Bobby wid do it take it now because it ain't gonna be there in six weeks. It's is not going to be there the rest of these guys.
Like I said, another no problems here. I think he did a tremendous value here with these corner guys, with Machado, Devers, and Alonzo at the end of this tier and the tops one in eighteen nineteen to twenty Mike Trout at sixteen. Does that feel right to you?
I mean it feels right in that like I'm gonna take him. I'm going to think in general range one hundred percent. So yeah, I think it's about the general spot. I actually think the like mid second round is pretty sweet. You said those three corner in I mean I think you said Machado Endeavors, but you gotta throw Austin Riley in there as well. You throw him those guys in there. You have Mike Trout, you've got some of those pitchers.
I think the mid second round is really nice. That's also why remember I said I like that fourth pick, maybe even if you want to go five, because then that turnaround, you've got a legit shot at one of those pitchers. You've got a legit shot at one of those corner infielders. Third base is not deep this year. You could theoretically get a Kune at five and then Rafael Devers in the second round. That's a bonker start.
That's a bonker start to your draft. And then you can touch pitching a little bit later.
Well, I think in the season long formats, look, you take whatever one hundred games you can get out of Mike Trout. It's great. You know, you had forty bombs last year and one hundred and eighteen games whatever it was.
But at the same time, those head to head formats, you got to really think long and hard about that because one hundred and eighteen games, thirty six games, fifty three games, one hundred and thirty four games, one hundred and forty games, one hundred and fourteen game, Like I'm literally giving just going backwards here, like those head to head matches where we don't have that premium player. It's
a tough investment. It is a great point though, too, to make as you go into the second tier, these eleven through twenty guys, it's a really good year for salary cap draft formats because there's some really good value here where you don't have to pay for the very top of the board guys. We can get some real premium talent here in this next tier and get like two or three guys supposed to just maybe one of
the big guys there. Next grouping twenty one through thirty, we start with Sandy al Contrac coming off a fantastic season, Cy young Worthy, then Fernando Tettis Junior starting point this year twenty two. Remember that, because it ain't going to be there in a month from now. It's not going
to be there. Fernando Tettis Junior at twenty two, Austin Riley, who you mentioned before, at twenty three, Paul Goldschman at twenty four, then Edwin Diaz at twenty five, going ahead of Jacob de Gram at twenty six, Francisco Lindor twenty seven, who I personally think is being undervalued here at this ranking, Jose Altuve at twenty eight, Michael Harris who had himself a heck of a season at twenty nine, and Dylan Season at thirty. So this is where things start to
open up for interpretation. We gotta start with Tatis junior because this is the wildcard guy. He could be a league winner for you or he could be another year of massive disappointment. I know you are the dice rolland wheeling and deal in high flying Byron Buckston drafting kind of guy. So how do you feel about Fernando Tetis Junior this year?
You know what's a surprise you is I'm probably not gonna have a lot of Tatis, And you are right. I'm a limousine riding jeff Lyon jet Lyon son of a Gun that'll draft the Buckston's and I listen, Tatis's projections are nuts. There are still nuts, and he's gonna miss a month. He's gonna miss a month of the season, and he's still got you know, I think it's like
close to forty homers twenty plus stolen bases. Actually, as we're doing this, fan grafts is down, so I can't look at the Steamer projections or it's down for me and I can't look at it. But he's got really crazy numbers. But I would say something I don't love is miss games off the top of the year. I don't like coming out the gates bad, especially with this Hiven investment. Tatisa is already moving up and those draft champions that I'm citing. His ADP is now eighteen, so
he's now inside the top twenty. His high pick is twelve and his low pick is twenty eight.
I'll tell you there's twenty two again.
No, I agree with you.
We are not going to see that number when we come back into a show next week. I even guarantee you.
Well, you want to know what's crazy about it is I'm pretty he should have no issue with this. He's be able to play spring training and then he'll just be suspended after the fact. You know what.
I know he had like a game surgery left on there too.
I think it's twenty. I think it's like twenty something games left, so he's gonna miss April. He's gonna miss essentially April, but he also had this potentially.
D L stint. You know, like that's what you're missing.
But it's significant enough. I don't like coming out the gates missing that, and that's just something I'm a little against, especially with the high cost when you get if he's out in spring training in less than a month, I'm gonna be on the backfield the first day. My plan is to go to San Diego because I've also got Soto and everybody there now, and i want to see what's going on when he's there and he's looking healthy and he's hitting with Soto and he's crushing on the backfields.
It's going to start to tick up when he's in spring training. Hims, it's gonna tick up. It's going to push first round LEGiT's gonna push the first round, and we're all gonna put blinders on for the first month. This is not going to surprise anybody. The guy that I'm going to probably have more shares of that's in this round and it is my jet flying limousine ride and who is Jacob de grom No, it's crazy, I know it's crazy.
It's gonna make you feel like we should have an intervention right now.
I can't listen to this.
Friends don't let friends draft Jacob de Grom anymore.
Here's my big thing, here's my big thing with him. He is And I'm not saying I'm gonna take because this would have to be like a lad I knew.
You were going to say, I know you held it inside my bones. I knew it.
I'm not going to I'm gonna preface this. We're gonna talk next round. I'm not going to probably have the shares of him in this range because of the cost of my draft strategy, but I'm more likely to take the risk this year because Jacob deGrom win healthy, and that is the caveat. Is the best picture in baseball, the projections through the roof on him, but you can't trust it's a whole new organization, it's a whole new place. You can put a million questions into that as well.
What offensive support does he have versus what he had with the Mets, What defensive support? I think there's a lot in that. But he is statistically the best pitcher in baseball when he's out there, and that's a risk that I'm interested in. Though the caveat is this third round, even though I said it, I'm probably not taking him, probably not taking Tatis or him. And I'm gonna go with a hitter in another.
Sit hasn't thrown a hundred. Look, I don't know. Look, the twenty twenty season was what it was. But I mean, ninety two innings, sixty four innings. We can't. I can't do that. You don't want to know where I have in y rankings. I've got an I bet it's twenty something. Yeah, because I'm just it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's a terrible. Look. Everything you said is right in theory, But I live
in a place called the real world. And in that place, Jacob de Grom does not throw one hundred innings ever. And and uh, not to be fooled of my old pal Nathan Bush, God Rest his soul from West Virginia used to say, don't get fooled by a new paint of coat. Uh yeah, that's right, pain of coat. Because just because now he's wearing a different uniform and he's signed for money and so he made an investment doesn't mean you should. And it's really not be on this
train and it's not me hating him for leaving. I could care less about it. This is business. It's never personal. This is just about I get de Gram as an investment. I told you last year he terrified the heck out of me, and I wasn't wrong.
It's it's it's something you're gonna have to stomach. It's just here's here's the things I have a problem with. Top one percent of k percentage, also top one percent of walk percentage. His expected era was in the top two percent of best in the league.
Ex.
wOBA and Whoba both were in the best three percent of the league. As far as pictures go, he's the best picture out there. So it's a risk best picture not out there when you know what that's and that's a worry right into it.
Pa, Pal, there it was.
I gave you the I think you and I are going to disagreeing a lot of pictures because we're about someone in the round as well. I think we're kind of disagree a lot this year.
I can't wait. This is why I love you, and that's why I love this show so excited. Leading off is how many days away we ninety days away were even there? Probably less now I don't even know. All right, let's get to the next grouping here, thirty one through forty. Randy arose a Rain at thirty one. What a season he had. I remember when he started slow and people wanted to like another guy.
That people wanted to.
Oh my goodness, people losing their mind. Just relax. Nolan Aeronauto at thirty two. Nice value there again. How can I not take Nolan Aeronaudo over Jcob Grom Like those are things I just can't physically do at this point in my life. Aaron Nola at thirty three, Brandon Woodrif, who I do like a lot at thirty four. Are good friend. Eric Cross has some great stats on him
recently too, he was thrown out there. Luis Robert at thirty five, my boy on a huge value, Emmanuel Casse at thirty six, Spencer Striyder thirty seven, who you'll be very proud of me. I am higher on than anybody else ooh even me rankings No, I believe, even because he knows getting that warning whenever I publish my ranking says you are very very high on these on Christian Hobby, aer and Spencers.
I didn't get a warning on my Strader. I have Strider, I believe at sp six.
Let's see where I have him. Okay, maybe you I have Oh my god, I am at six two.
Oh yeah, look at us. We're in the state.
We're friends again. So Strider right where he should be a great value on Luis Robert if he becomes that dude, which I think he can be. Thirty eighth A McClanahan thirty nine hater Marcus Simian at forty. Now, I like mcclanahan's resk more than de Gram's ten picks later, but I just think this is the guy. This is the next guy headed for the next arm surgery. You know, I sat there on the show and leading off last summer and I told everybody ran as soon as he
went past, justin Verlander. What did I tell? I said, everybody go reinvest in Verlander because mcclanahan's not going to make it to finish line. He didn't, and he didn't. But I love the player, I love the talent. The investment's tougher, ten spots less than de Gram. I'm in, but I'm also still very loathing consensus. So sell me on Shane mcclatahan.
Yeah, I mean this is one of my guys. This is one of my big guys this year. And monster reds across the board again, there's another one of those guys you get on a Baseball Savant page and it's just it's the red Sea. There's literally nothing blew across the board from with percentage to walks and everything like that made a big change last year. This is one of the big things that you love to see and
you love to see the success. And really this type of pitch is when you can maintain it, and I'm talking about his change up that he adjusted to is something that's very sustainable. So he lowered his slider usage from the previous year, increased his change up usage this past year, and he started throwing around twenty five percent. What's amazing about it is he upped in this usage change and he predominantly threw the change up. I believe it was to righties and he like never threw it
against lefties. But he had a forty percent with percentage on the change up and the slider, and that upticked his slider percentage when he started using the change up more, which equated to over forty percent of his pitches between change ups. And sliders forty percent with freight on it. His fastball. He also added some horizontal movement so he was able to you know, dink and dunk on the sides of the zone a little bit more. And he's got close to a thirty percent withfth percentage on that.
This is a guy that pounds the zone. The curveball is an what's so amazing about it is like the curveball would seem like the big strikeout pitch, and it gets strikeouts, but it's a great setup pitch. The curveball I absolutely loved to set up. The fastball got better, the change up became elite, and he's got a slider. He's got four four I don't want to call them four plus plus pitches, but these are four pitches that he can pound the zone. He can get big strikeouts
on big wif percentages. And he only put up one hundred and sixty innings last year. So how I look at it is like I think he would for the first half of the year, he was the best pitcher in baseball, and then he tapered off on the second half. It's also like, I mean, he's a young pitcher. His belt,
so I think there's progression on board here. With a great pitch mix, he's getting strikeouts, he also pounds the zone, doesn't have the command issues that some of these other guys do, and every bit of underlining stats work in his favor. Though He's not like Jacob Durrahm in the
one percent or anything like that. But he had a five percent walk rate with a thirty percent k rate, and I think there is more progression on the board for him to be potentially become the number one pitcher in baseball, maybe not this year, but over the next year, three years.
See, you're right. For the first half he was arguably the best pitcher in baseball, if not the best ten and three one seven one ERA. Second half for twenty ERA, yeah, second half certainly far more hittable than he was. The strikeout rate also declined significantly from twelve to seven point six. The K per nine, that's k P nine. And my concern with McClanahan is this, Now, what we saw last
year was that fatigue? Was that an injury that happened that we can get past, or is that the beginning of what could be the next bomb of up Shane mcclanaham arm surgery, and that's why he's outside my top twenty. And I get it why people want to say.
That's your top, not twenty. Of SP's to ground.
Both because I can't get enough out of them. The quality is great I need. I'd rather have slightly lesser quality and get more quantity. That's where I'm at with pitching, and we'll get more about that and we get to our New Year's resolutions for twenty twenty three and talk more about that. But guys like Woodriff I feel more confident in which I know he's missed some time too, you know Nola for his warts. At times in his
career he shows up. You know, if I'm gonna spend on the lead pitcher, col and Burns are those two guys. I do agree with that there's a lot of age and that other tier two when you start to get to the Verlander guys and the Schurzers of the world, like the older group. But boor to come on some of these guys because.
It's interesting and we won't get into it here, but it's interesting to hear you go, you go. You give Woodruff the past, but a young guy who really hasn't had a track record of Klanahan doesn't like.
What I'm worried about was that the precursor, the drop off and the mistime the injury. And I was like, okay, Like are we getting to a point with him? Like because he's so young in this a lot we've seen these young pitchers come up tease, they look great, and then they have the arm surgery, they have the arm issues, and then it kind of declines. Look, Woodroff is probably a bad example of some of those guys, but even like ahead of those guys, and look, I know I'm
going to be much lower than consensus. Like I look at the Kevin Gosmin's and the Minoa's and the Joe musk Groves of the world and Zach Allens and like, I just feel like they're better investments for where they are and in drafts rather than me draft early pitching. I'd rather be locking in these hitters that are in the same I'd rather be having Nolan Aronado, I'd rather be having the guys like who else with Austin Reiley type like those guys that right.
That's where I one hundred percent agree with you. Like I talked up to Grom and hopefully everybody got it in a I would rather probably de Grom in that late third round or late second round, late third round or whatever it was compared to the early top twenty one pick of datis. But I'm not gonna take them. I'm not gonna take pictures most likely in the top three rounds. So what's what's unique about it is Strider and Clanahan are probably gonna be my number one pitching
targets in that late third to fourth round. If you're in head to head, I'm gonna target on those guys. Then I'm gonna wait again, and then I love exactly what you said. Give me deals on Minoa, give me deals on Kevin Gosman, give me Luis Castillo, Zach Gallan. No, that's how I'm gonna.
Build memation Javier this year too. And you know, I'm Harder's guy from a couple of years ago, like this is. So this has been a long time coming here. All right, let's close out the rankings of the top fifty, which is what we came here to do today. Max Schurz are at forty one, Matt Olsen at forty two, Verlander forty three, Cedric mallin steady issue goes at forty four. Liam Hendrix, who again this is gonna change now because of the non Hodgkins lymphoma diagnosis, so obviously that ranking
is going to change. I came just twenty four hours ago. Carlos Ordan forty six, Shane Bieber forty seven, Kyeg Schwarber forty eight, Zach Wieler forty nine, and at least Garcia at fifty. Let's talk about Garcia, another guy who had a fantastic season last year, another guy that's got swinging miss batting average. Obviously can fluctuate, but what he gave you last year was phenomenal from a fantasy perspective, especially
the value he gave you. Is he still a value in this top fifty right now for you?
Yeah? I think that's the great question that you're asking, is is he still the value? Because the one thing that he did that's so unique was what were we doing, Like in pre twenty twenty two were like he can't repeat, Like he had this great season in two thousand, we all thought the.
Power was real. It's just we wondered could he make enough contact to really readelivery exactly?
That wasn't going to maintain well, like it kind of did. He had two fifty.
He was.
He was one of the few twenty five guys in year twenty seven to twenty five better well dude. On the underlining stats, he improved his EV his barrel percentage just hard hit percentage went up by two percent this past year. His XBA went up. His XBA is still not great, but here was. Here's one of the big things why I think you can't pass on a dolls
at this point. Adulas had an expected XBA expected batting average in twenty twenty one of two twenty so like he you know, way overperformed them this past year and XBF two forty four, which was almost in line exactly his batting average. So he's starting to stabilize a little bit, and he's stealing bases and he's hitting home.
That's the difference to man I don't like, is huge different.
I don't like the cost, but I do like a Doulas Garcia, and he belongs in the generator. I gotta tell you, I don't like a lot of these players in this forty through fifty that you listed off. There's not many targets in here for me.
Yeah, I think this is the danger zone, and for me, KYLEE. Schwarber is the biggest one of the danger zone because I think falling into that trap of him repeating what he did last year from a Powers perspective is is difficult. I know it's a good ballpark for Power. I get that. I think this is the guy that missus Bryce Harper hitting behind him and did it hit directly behind him? No, But you have to understand if you're a pro, you're setting up approach as a picture right and you got
Kyleeg Schwarber at the top of the lineup. We also have to see how that Philly line is going to shake out now with Trey Turner too, Like, how does that all work out?
Where is he going to hit three a schwar We're gonna lead off, lead off?
Yeah, exactly. So there's a lot of unknown there for me with Schwarber right now. Yeah, great season, love the player, love the guy personality for days, big fan, But I don't think people will respect enough that what a difference Bryce Harper makes in the lineup when he's in it ways out and it's not a knock on Trey Turner or Reez Hoskins or anybody else in that lineup, But you pitch differently to the top of the order. When you've got Bryce Harper waiting in the three or four spot,
you just do. And I think that's he's gonna see less fast balls this year. He's going to see a little bit different and look, he could very well have overcome that. Schwerro is always a high prospect, high profile guy that were struggles there for many years. He bounced around a little and he had a phenomenal season And I'm not saying he can't repeat it. I'm saying I'm not investing as though he's going to. I think that's.
An interesting point. Looking over at the NFBC info that they've got he has, I would say of the top sixty five players I'm looking at, no one has a bigger top and bottom than Calshold Right now, he's got the thirty nine, a thirty nine high with an a eighty six low. So here's some perspective. Some other guys that are in this generating sures Er has a high of thirty nine and a low of sixty three. Completely different players, sure, but I'm giving you Cedric Mullins high
a forty one low of fifty seven. Jazz chishem high a thirty four to fifty five. No one in that top sixty has remotely is close of a bigger gap between the high and low that they go than Kyle Schwarber. And he is tough. He's a monster in points league, which is going to want to make people push up head to head in rodo you know the batting average stunk and is that going to stabilize? But can the power maintain? There's so I agree with you. There's so
many questions on him that it's a little divisive. He's not the type of player that I want to invest in. I don't think it's a crazy cost right now, but between thirty nine and mid eighties is ridiculous.
I think the cost is also because of what outfield looks like right now, which is rough. Let's be honest, like it is a Once you get past that twenty five thirty, it's becomes a lot of question marks and a lot of guys. So I get it, and I understand why still, you know, in especially the deeper outfield leagues, where you got to make that kind of call and
you got to take the god with the bed. If he hits two to fifteen and then he hits two fifteen, you hope that he hits thirty five bombs or something like that. To expect him to hit forty again, I think is foolish. I think that's not a good practice. But this is just the first look we're doing here. I'm sure we're gonna do many more. This is the top fifteen, a nutshell, our first glance at what the ECR is at Fantasy pros. And you can see that
too fantacybros dot Com slash rankings. Go check them out over on the MLB page. They're there for you. They're up and they're going to be moving all over the place, especially with the Trevor story news that broke right before the show too, about him missing what four to six months? Oh yeah, no big deal, no big really. Well, that's close things out here. On a better note, though, it's twenty twenty three, it's a fresh start, so it's time
for some New Year's resolutions. Welsh, what do you have for us?
Well, this is a I've actually talked about this, you just mentioned it, and my this is a Fantasy Baseball resolution right not.
To let Yeah, enough to do, but I think it's probably better for this shit if you do baseball.
So yeah, we could. We could do some workout videos with Welsh. That'll be fun.
Let's see that. I mean a videos. Let's go, baby, let's.
Go, let's go. I mean from a fantasy baseball perspective, you just mentioned it. My biggest resolution is to not let outfield get away from me. I can't say it enough. I said this actually on CBS not too long ago, like this, I think in my early runs of fantasy baseball drafts and mox and basketball and all of this stuff that I've been doing, is outfield.
Is fool's gold.
It will fool you because you're like, oh, there's so many more players than third base. Everyone's gonna focus on how a stinky second basis, which it is, how third base lacks some depth, which it does. Which starting pitching is gonna get nuts because people are gonna wait, it'll happen. But nothing becomes more of a problem than outfield when you get too confident and you move past it. I've even had drafts already where I've taken two early outfielders
and it still can get kind of bad later. You really have to be cognizant and know where you are in a draft based on outfield, because if you start five, it can get real bad. If you start three. Don't get too confident that, hey, I only start three. It gets away from you quick. And the tier jumps are so big this year that everyone talks about that. Those middle the same positions we talk about every year. Oh, second base, third base. Outfield is not as deep as
you want it to be. You're gonna have to hit on some guys late and just make sure you don't get two behind early.
I would say this too. I think we know this every year. Whenever we think is the deficit ends up being something better than we thought of. This is just the nature of the beast. But it's definitely a deficit early on. You got to look for some of these young players to step up to some of these young prospects. So the guys in Arizona step up. You gotta look for some of the other guys. We're gonna have opportunities or some bounce back guys too, Like does a Michael
Gonfordo bounce back? Do you get guys like Riley Green bouncing guys? I think if those guys you know, play up to their abilities, and all of a sudden the outfield is better. But I will say I could not agree more. Address it early, and address it late, and take some shots on a lot of guys who have potential because you're gonna need that, because it is definitely thin, and for me, you already kind of heard it. I'm fading some of those early big pictures again this year.
I did it last year, it worked out, but I'm doing even more this year. I'm going for those guys that I think are just good return on investments. The guys in Toronto, some of the guys in Seattle, like those pitching staffs, to me, offer some really good rois because they're playing in the lesser markets. Let's be honest, you play for the Yankees, You're Garrett Cole. Everyone's gonna
want drafted early. People still don't give Sandy Alcantra enough credit, or Pablo Lopez for that standpoint, or anybody really, so you start to look around at guys that don't get enough credit. I'm looking for some of those pictures, those workhorse guys, and some of the smaller market teams too, because they get less attention. They deserve a lot more, but I'll tell you right now. Alec Manoa, Joe Musgrove,
Zach Gallon. That is the sweet spot for me. It's gonna be fascinating to see, you know what happens to the top twenty pitchers this year, because last year talk about a complete reshuffling of the board, and this year I think it could be very similar where some of these other names that were used to seeing continue to fade away and make room for more guys like the Striders and Christian Hobviers.
Of the world.
So it's great to be back, Welsh. It's great to see you talk baseball, hang out a little bit. It's good times. Don't forget everybody. Good times. Also waits you over fantasypros dot Com slash Draft Wizard. Go use the draft Wizards. Start prepping right now. Go pick up your Fantasy Black Book twenty twenty three too. It's on Amazon. Welsh wrote a ton of stuff, all the draft strategy for this guy right over here. I love this guy.
You got the book?
The book? Oh yeah, the book is there, my big bald head. But all the great work that Welsh passport, Eric Cross, Mike mayor your own esteemed Mike Mahyor and a host of others all put into it. Great stuff there as always, so that'll do it for us. But the story of the game goes on. We're just getting started here for the Welsh. I'm Joey P. We'll see you next time. Kids, The do