Dynasty League Sleeper

BaseballAmerica.com: College: Top 25 Rankings: 2011 Preseason College Top 25:

"Power: 60. George Springer's lightning-quick bat makes him one of the nation's best power hitters....

Speed: 75. The Huskies have loads of speed and aren't afraid to use it on the basepaths—they ranked second in the nation with 171 stolen bases a year ago. They're also efficient basestealers, as evidenced by their 84 percent success rate in 2010. George Springer and Ferriter are plus-plus runners who always have the green light....

Defense: 65. UConn is very strong up the middle, as George Springer and Ahmed are superb defenders with excellent range..."

Received Baseball America Prospect Handbook 2011 yesterday. Springer is ranked 5th in College Top 100 and his teammate RHP Matt Barnes ranked 7th.

And the first propsect write-up I read was Texas Rangers' #7 prospect, 3B Mike Holt, a UCONN alumni.

UCONN Baseball 2011!

Chat: Chat with Keith Law - SportsNation - ESPN: "Rich (Evanston)


With all the talk of Rendon and the great college pitching crop, does George Springer have a chance to sneak into the top 5, and who might you compare him to based on his tool set?
Klaw (1:27 PM)


I think he has to be a consideration at 1 and at every pick on down from there. His major flaw now is his two-strike approach - he has none - and that can be taught. Impact defender in RF with patience and power who's not that far away? Who doesn't want that?"

ESPN.com Is Ranking Weiters Where?

ESPN.com's Fantasy Baseball Rankings Summit - Fantasy Baseball - ESPN

Nate Ravitz: Top 7 catchers are settled in the room
Mauer, V-Mart, McCann, Posey, Santana, Soto, Montero

Post-hype/still hyped sleeper Matt Wieters is a super value relative to that!

If CarGo falls....

Fantasy Baseball 2011 Mock Draft, Round 1 - Roto Arcade - Fantasy  - Yahoo! Sports:

"5. Carlos Gonzalez(notes), OF, Colorado Rockies – Naysayers strongly emphasize to never pay for a career year, but the axiom simply doesn’t apply to CarGo. Yes, his sub-80 contact percentage suggests his .336 BA from ’10 is unrepeatable, but, even if his totals sag slightly, last year’s No. 1 commodity in Y! leagues will be one of virtual baseball’s most reliable multi-cat bats. An uptick in power is also possible. Keep in mind he’s still just 25. –Brad Evans"

A Sub-80% contact rate implies more than a "sag slightly". If says, CarGo will be closer to Mike Cameron than 2010 Cargo.

FP911: Fantasy Baseball Scout Team for 1/11

The Dirty Dozen: Your Fantasy Baseball Scout Team for 1/11

Interesting list. Notice Juan Francisco mentioned. The Reds blocked him by reworkign Scott Rolen's contract last season which extended him through 2012.

A trade, however, will unleash the next 30+ HR 3B.

Third Time Is The Charm

The Baltimore Prioles have added legitmate offensive production in Derek lee, JJ Hardy and Mark Reynolds. This should have the effect of pushing PECOTA-destroying Matt Wieters away from the clean-up spot and into a much less pressurized line-up spot.

So yeah, I'm up on Wieters this year.

Why Waiting On Closers Works

Pirates to decide on Meek or Hanrahan as closer by spring: "'This is not something that we have to answer right now, but this is something that we want to have an answer to before spring training,' he said. We won't have a competition for the closer ... during spring training. Whoever is our closer, is our closer.'"

Evan meek or Joel Hanrahan will be named the closer entering Spring. Draft the other one.

1st Mock Draft - #5 Pick

I know the presentation is sloppy, but the data is true. I took Longoria, Fielder and then Lee. After that, the whole draft looked undifferentiated.

C Carlos Santana CLE R8 P8 Comment
C J.P. Arencibia TOR R21 P5 Comment
1B Prince Fielder MIL R2 P8 Comment
2B Rickie Weeks MIL R4 P8 Comment
2B Howie Kendrick ANA R14 P8 Comment
SS Reid Brignac TB R22 P8 Comment
3B Evan Longoria TB R1 P5 Comment
3B Adrian Beltre TEX R5 P5 Comment
OF B.J. Upton TB R7 P5 Comment
OF Alfonso Soriano CHC R9 P5 Comment
OF Bobby Abreu ANA R11 P5 Comment
OF Dexter Fowler COL R12 P8 Comment
OF Brett Gardner NYY R15 P5 Comment
DH David Ortiz BOS R13 P5 Comment
SP Cliff Lee PHI R3 P5 Comment
SP Cole Hamels PHI R6 P8 Comment
SP Brandon Morrow TOR R17 P5 Comment
SP Brett Myers HOU R20 P8 Comment
SP Jonathon Niese NYM R23 P5 Comment
RP Heath Bell SD R10 P8 Comment
RP Ryan Franklin STL R16 P8 Comment
RP Joel Hanrahan PIT R18 P8 Comment
RP John Axford MIL R19 P5 Comment

Deeeeeeeeep AL-Only Sleeper

Sam Fuld Is Baseball’s Most Fascinating 4th OF | FanGraphs Baseball

Sam Fuld is a 29-year-old outfielder deemed a prospect in the Matt Garza trade write-ups. At his age, expect him to make the Rays roster this year.

In his favor as a sleeper is a minor league track record of accumulating more walks than strikeouts in his minor league career (66 versus 29 in 2010) and having some speed (21 SBs last year.) That sounds like a good recipe for playing time on the Runnin' Rays.

2011 production? Think Emilio Bonifacio with a better AVG.

How 2011 Fantasy Baseball Drafts Look

Reviewing some early ADP data at Mock Draft Central, I can't help wondering what happened to the second half od the 1st round through the 4th. By that, I mean the number of elite players appear to have dimished.

Robinson Cano is now a 1st rounder? Hanley Ramirez is still #2 overall despite a large drop in production from four season ago?

Low Risk, High Reward Pool for 2011

Listening to the Basbeall America podcast covering the NL Central (skip to 24:00 left for beginning), the Cincinnati Reds were mentioned as team stocked with major league ready prospects blocked everywhere on the major league roster.

Scoop up Chris Heisey, Juan Francisco, Yonder Alonso, Todd Frazier, etc and wait for the trades. All can be full-timers on second division teams.

Also, was that an Up The Academy reference by John Manual when referring to Kevin Brown?

Paid Sources of Fantasy Baseball Prepartion

Right now, I have paid for the Baseball Forecaster from Baseball HQ and Baseball Prospectus 2011(yet to be delivered). I am still deciding if getting Baseball America Prospect Handbook a couple weeks early is worth overpaying to order through BA.

The money isn't the issue as I have enough. Nor is the chance I'll be disappointed in the product. I just loathe paying 7-10 dollars for shipping when I know the USPO charges more an half as much.

Fantasy Baseball Preparation Is Beginning

This week the Fantasy Baseball Roundtable Podcast on Blog Talk Radio returned to its Tuesday evening slot. Amongst the players discussed were Derek Lee, Adrian Gonzalez and Carl Crawford.

The most interesting what Pat DiCaprio's Are You Crazy? He posited that Colorado Rockies CF Dexter Fowler will produce more fantasy value than teammate Carlos Gonzalez.

Then Mike Posner conjectured that if Fowler went 15/40/.280 what would that be?

I answered, "Carl Crawford."

So will Fowler be more valuable than CarGo in 2011? I say he will as CarGo is a 1st rounder and Fowler is going to go in the 9-11th rounds as every team begins to fill out its rosters.

Give me any other 1st rounder ex-Pujols and Fowler over CarGo and the 11th rounder with one or two fantasy flaws.