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Saturday, April 04, 2009

Fantasy Baseball Roundtable: Undraftable players

Posted by Derek Carty at 2:09am

This week's Fantasy Baseball Roundtable was hosted by Adam Ronis at Newsday. The question posed by Adam:
Do you have players that you will absolutely not draft even if they fall far in snake drafts or go cheaply in an auction and if so why? Include examples.

Check it out here. I found it interesting that some of the guys did indeed say that there were otherwise draftable players who they wouldn't draft regardless of circumstance. Obviously, as you can see by my response, I feel differently.

Derek Carty is a 22-year old fantasy baseball analyst residing in New Jersey. In addition to writing for THTF, his work has appeared at Rotoworld (NBC), Sports Illustrated, FOX Sports, and Heater Magazine. In his two years competing in expert leagues, he has won 2 titles with 4 four top three finishes, including a LABR NL title in 2009, making him the youngest person to ever win a major expert league title. Derek is a proud graduate of the MLB Scouting Bureau's Scout Development Program and is a firm believer in the importance of combining stats and scouting. He welcomes questions via e-mail.


Comments

Mark said...

No way I would ever draft Derek Jeter.  Not even in the 24th round.  Go Bosox!

Posted 04/04  at  10:47 AM
Jon said...

As I posted on Newsday site, you seem to be one of the few guys in that group that actually has a clue.  Congratulations.  I wish there was an RSS of specifically your writing at THT.  Is there one that I’m missing?

Thanks…

Posted 04/04  at  12:24 PM
Beanster said...

Maybe I’m old fashioned but each year I do exclude known cheaters, wife/girlfriend abusers or guys who just give me the creeps.

Posted 04/04  at  01:05 PM
Jon said...

Who does that include this year?  Brian Giles?  So you wouldn’t take Giles for $1 in an NL-only league?

Posted 04/04  at  01:11 PM
Derek Carty said...

Jon,
Glad to hear that you liked my answer and will be reading my stuff.  There’s no RSS specifically for me, but I would highly recommend giving the other THT Fantasy writers a chance.  I think we have one of the best teams of writers on the internet, and we’ve only got more good stuff planned for the future.

Posted 04/04  at  03:10 PM
Jon said...

Do you know if there’s a feed for just the fantasy stuff?  I love the writing here, but I can only find one feed:

http://www.hardballtimes.com/Fmain/content/rss_2.0/

And that seems to have everything from the site.

Unfortunately it’s just too much, with 10-20 posts per day.  I wish there was a way to filter it down to just the fantasy stuff, which I can tag differently and read much more religiously.

Posted 04/04  at  03:30 PM
Derek Carty said...

That we can do for you smile

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/rss/fantasy_sum/

Or if that doesn’t work, there’s a link on the side of this page underneath the blurb about Heater and above the Statistics section.  Or on the main page, there’s a “Subscribe to THT” section on the right side with all kinds of RSS options.

Posted 04/04  at  03:33 PM
Jon said...

Awesome, thanks!  Can’t believe I missed all those links…

Posted 04/04  at  03:58 PM
Derek Carty said...

Haha, no problem.

Posted 04/04  at  04:33 PM
jtgodwin said...

Derek,
You said you would not draft Mike Jacobs because of a negitive value.
I have Mike Jacobs on one of my team and plan to use him in a platoon with Jason Giambi. I had planned to use which ever is facing RH starting pitcher. Splits show that both Giambi and Jacobs absolutely mash RH pitching. Your thoughts?

Posted 04/06  at  12:19 PM
Derek Carty said...

jtgodwin,
Here are some splits for Jacobs:
2008
+——-+———-+———-+
| CT% | BABIP | AB/HR |
+——-+———-+———-+
| 70% | 0.250 |  17 |
| 77% | 0.268 |  14 |
+——-+———-+———-+

2007
+——-+———-+———-+
| CT% | BABIP | AB/HR |
+——-+———-+———-+
| 73% | 0.356 |  21 |
| 77% | 0.298 |  27 |
+——-+———-+———-+

2006
+——-+———-+———-+
| CT% | BABIP | AB/HR |
+——-+———-+———-+
| 70% | 0.233 |  44 |
| 79% | 0.313 |  21 |
+——-+———-+———-+

The top line is against LHP and the bottom is against RHP.  It does appear that Jacobs is a better hitter against RHP in terms of contact ability.  His power is better overall as well, although in 2007 it wasn’t.  I would recommend checking out this article I wrote about Jacobs earlier in the off-season, though: http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/fantasy/article/fantasy-fallout-mike-jacobs-traded-to-royals/

While his power is better against RHP than LHP, it is in for a decline regardless.  You’ll likely reap 75-80% of his total HRs by starting him against RHP, but if he only hits 21 or 22 HRs, you’re only going to be getting 16 or 17 of those.

What to do really depends on your league depth, other options, etc, but hopefully this information helps you make a decision.

Posted 04/06  at  05:14 PM
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