Folx, I hate to tell you, but there wasn’t much baseball last week. Apparently MLB called upon their own Avengers and paid them screen time to hit balls into the stratosphere as a diversion tactic to the real terrors facing the world: county fair season. Y’all have county fairs where you live? Maybe a better question is, “If you needed a spa or your driveway re-sealed or some chicken on a stick, do you know where you’d go?” Why, you’d go to the county fair! But I digress. With no meaningful stats collected in the last week, you can click my user name up above and find last week’s article with my most recent adds. Nothing really changed since then.
This week, I’m delving into the deeper side of fantasy baseball: What to do to save your team, no matter where you are in the standings. As always, it’s your team and leagues vary — if you know your league has obscure settings that need special treatment, you do you and don’t worry about this advice.
What to do if your team is in:
The bottom quarter — 10th-12th place: I’m assuming we’re talking about 12-team leagues. In Razzchat, Grey and Rudy share “activity” stats from celebrity fantasy sports players in those tout leagues. You wouldn’t believe how many of your favorite imaginary sportsballers don’t look at their team after May. I get the sentiment. I’ve been there too. You’re at the bottom of the league facing great competition. It’s the middle of summer. Daylight wanes. Family trips are coming up and you’re out of internet range for a week in August. Why bother with your team anymore? That’s why I like best ball — there’s no giving up. ENYWHEY. If you’re down in the dumps of the league and yet still trying to dig yourself out of the trench, here’s a bit of advice:
For redraft leagues, take the absolute wildest risks. Dump Nolan Jones entirely. Or trade for him and wait for the August resurgence? You make the call! Add Robbie Ray. Stack your roster with Athletics, free off the waiver wire. Trade all your relievers and punt saves. These are called playing “suboptimally” because you are going to lose anyway. Does it matter if you’re in 11th or 12th place? So if you’re going to be at the bottom, then try any wild risk to turn things around. While this may seem like a dumb strategy to do statistically unlikely things with your team, it’s a tried and true method for DFS players. Years of research show that the “most likely to succeed” lineups for DFS have only a marginal payout rate, whereas the “suboptimal” strategies end up bringing the most winnings home. This is because your opponents are playing “optimally” and mitigating risks, whereas you’re playing with no fear. You’re assuming a 98% chance of losing, so you’re doing the wild things to make that 2% chance of getting into the playoffs happen. If your strategy fails? Oh well. You were going to lose anyway. If it works? Well, now you’re worthy of taking over for one of those tout players that haven’t looked at their team since May.
The middle — 5th to 9th place: How big are your playoffs? I know in my 16-team home league we had NBA-style playoffs that brought 8 teams in with 2-week rounds, so our playoffs started in August. We also had a “no tanking” incentive that awarded the top draft pick in the next year’s draft to the highest-scoring non-playoff team in the second half — you might want to think about that. ENYWHEY. Point is — some of you might be in the playoffs next week, while others might have until September. You do you. For me, the goal is always to just get in the playoffs. If your league takes 4 teams, then you need to have those aggressive approaches to claim a few early August wins. If your league takes, say, 6 teams, then you’re spending August doing things to make a run: finding fresh SP, filling out your bench, and swapping out any starters that aren’t pulling their weight. Things to consider: many a playoff run has been defeated by a starter getting an IP cap in August. Teams rarely announce the IP cap far ahead of time, but we can usually determine an SP’s likelihood of getting a cap based on their previous workload. Guys like Garrett Crochet, Cole Ragans, and Tarik Skubal could find themselves IP capped for two big reasons: 1) they’ve never pitched this much before; 2) they could be trade bait over the next week. Guys like Chris Sale have a lengthy injury history, and he’s starting to approach his IP total over the previous 3 years combined. The debate over whether pitchers are the same Nolan Ryan-esque stallions of yesteryear is moot — your team is playing right now, and your top pitcher going through a Kawhi Leonard-style workload management will kill your team (this is also why I dislike fantasy NBA! Nothing’s better than watching your top draft pick get benched with 30 games to go because of off-season trade value).
Playoff Bound – 1st to 4th place: Congratulations — you’re the best of the pre-All-Star break. You started Jo Adell during the hot streak. You didn’t draft Gerrit Cole in the first round. But like Icarus, you can still fly too close to the sun. You got to the top by being aggressive. but now’s the time to take your foot off the gas, lest you burn out your engine before the championship. This is a controversial statement, of course — right now I hear commenters from around the globe shouting to “dagger” the competition. I’m not saying that you need to sell your all-stars and start a team filled with Minnesota Twins. What I’m saying is that you need to diversify your roster. Some top teams are propelled by outliers, like Aaron Judge or Shohei Ohtani, each of whom are nearly 30% more valuable than the next best player, Gunnar Henderson. Fantasy managers rostering Ohtani felt this acutely last year when our best bud stormed into the all-star break as the talk of the trade deadline, only to feel a twinge in his elbow come August. He sat the rest of the year, and teams lost both a top pitcher and hitter going into the playoffs. How will your top team fare if Ohtani or Judge miss time this year? Are you dragging weights behind you? Guys like Xander Bogaerts, Mike Trout, J.T. Realmuto, and Michael Harris II are certainly talented, but right now, Rudy’s Player Rater shows that they’re — pound for pound — some of the worst roster investments that one can make. Do you need to keep them in the playoffs? Could you trade them this week for a player who might help you? If you’re already eyeing a playoff seed, my recommendation is to take a hard look at some of your famous veterans and see if you can trade them or move on from them — that will position your team for a better playoff run against those aggressive teams that are trying to catch up to you.
Good luck in the second half, all!
