Store Brand Production

By Todd Gold ProFantasyBaseball.com Superstar athletes don't like to share the spotlight and most of them eat real Cheetos rather than Cheeze-Puffz. But in fantasy sports you can shop a player around the league or bench him without worrying about the consequences on team chemistry or player morale, and who accumulates your numbers isn't as important as how many. Fantasy baseball uses the STATS of real baseball players, but essentially each one is nothing more than a set of numbers. Associating a name brand with those numbers tends to skew fantasy owners' perceptions of what each set of stats is. For example, before breaking his hand a month before the end of the season, Carlos Lee was having another monster season and carrying fantasy teams. Here was his line: 436 AB, 61 R, 28 HR, 100 RBI, 4 SB, .314 AVG Its no surprise that El Caballo is being snatched up early in drafts this season (ADP: 30.2) Lee put up yet another monster season last year, and is widely expected to do more of the same in 2009. So, if you want excellent production in the OF you can draft Carlos Lee in the 2nd or 3rd round...OR, if your league settings have enough bench spots to justify it, you can platoon two players who have consistently excelled against either left handed or right handed pitching, while struggling against the others. Instead you can address a more shallow position in the early rounds and make up for it by grabbing a solid platoon later. Building a Monster Masher Most league settings do not make a platoon easy or desirable. But a roto league with a lot of bench spots no maximum number of games played for hitters makes this a great way squeeze every bit of production from your players. The downside to this that you have fewer pitchers on your staff, but since you are getting ridiculous production from spots in your lineup without using a high draft pick you can afford to take a bonafide ace or two in the earlier rounds. Normally, I like to wait on all pitchers because they are less predictable/consistent on the whole and there are always a lot of good ones left after round 10. But a lot of good fantasy baseball players do this, so if you are in a tough league where you can platoon your way to offensive dominance you can grab a Jake Peavy or a Brandon Webb type in the 5th or 6th round to compensate for using a smaller staff. Just be sure to work the waiver wire effectively throughout the season and you can overcome utilizing less innings from your pitching staff if they put up incredible ERA and WHIP totals, a high number of K/9. However, the most effective way to platoon is with a postion like 1B and your Util spot with 4 players. James Loney vs RHP: 426 AB, 52 R, 9 HR, 62 RBI, 6 SB, .305 AVG Billy Butler vs LHP: 144 AB, 25 R, 8 HR, 27 RBI, 0 SB, .340 AVG Combined, these two players who are generall drafted in the 16th and 19th rounds produced similar numbers to those of 6th rounder Garret Atkins (is 3B eligibility THAT valuable?). Garret Atkins: 611 AB, 86 R, 21 HR, 99 RBI, 1 SB, .286 AVG Loney/Butler: 570 AB, 77 R, 17 HR, 89 RBI, 6 SB, .315 AVG That is some nice finagling there, but check this out: Carlos Pena vs RHP: 311 AB, 55 R, 23 HR, 75 RBI, 1 SB, .280 AVG Derek Lee vs LHP: 144 AB, 30 R, 6 HR, 27 RBI, 2 SB, .305 AVG Add up Carlos Pena and Derek Lee? Well, basically, you Frankenstein a Carlos Lee. Lee/Pena: 455 AB, 85 R, 29 HR, 102 RBI, 3 SB, .291 AVG Carlos Lee: 436 AB, 61 R, 28 HR, 100 RBI, 4 SB, .314 AVG Both Pena and D. Lee even managed to rack up about the same amount of time on the DL as Carlos Lee. Convenient. If only they played the same position, although they are all eligible at the Util spot. Ingredients Here are several 1B that can be had after the 8th round with severe lefty/right splits and the breakdown of their OPS in 2008 and career totals:

Carlos Pena (TB) ADP: 111.9 (round 9.7) 2008: .654 vs left/.994 vs right (55 R, 23 HR, 75 RBI, .280 AVG against righties) Career: .752 vs left/.894 vs right Durability is a bit of an issue with Pena in addition to his struggles against lefties, as he has never topped 490 ABs in a season. Pena missed time with a fractured finger last season. This is the only reason you can grab him in the 9th round. While healthy, Pena dominates RHPs, his .994 OPS against righties is exactly equal to that of switch-hitting Mark Teixeira's OPS against righties. Billy Butler (KC) ADP: 222.6 (round 19.0) 2008: .958 vs left/.597 vs right (25 R, 8 HR, 27 RBI, .340 AVG against lefties) Career: n/a Butler struggled in the early part of the season and was sent down to AAA Omaha in June and had to battle for playing time with Ross Gload at 1B and a hobbled Jose Guillen at DH in Kansas City upon his return. But, the MVP of the 2006 Futures Game began to hit his stride late in the season. Butler posted a line of .305/.341/.476 after his return to The Show. The .341 OBP is a bit of a concern for Royals fans, as Butler was one of many Royals hitters who couldn't draw a walk to save their life, leading KC to finish last in BB received and OBP. But that is not really a concern in 5x5 fantasy leagues. Butler will be a top tier hitter in a couple of years, right now he is a lefty-mashing specialist with upside. James Loney (LAD) ADP: 188.4 (round 16.2) 2008: .664 vs lefties/.815 vs righties (52 R, 9 HR, 62 RBI, .305 AVG vs righties) Career: .744 vs lefties/.867 vs righties Loney hit a sophomore slump in 2008, after a stellar 96-game rookie campaign in 2007 which saw Loney hit .331/.381/.538 with 15 HR and 67 RBI. Loney was successful against both righties and lefties as a rookie, but the league may have caught up to him in 2008, as he slumped to just a .664 OPS against them last season. A 1st round pick out of high school, Loney dominated his way through the minors and seems poised for a nice rebound in 2009. At the very least he continued to hit well against right handed pitching in a down year last season, at the very least he will be an effective platoon player for your fantasy team, with a chance of breaking out in a big way. Mike Jacobs (KC) ADP: not in top 25 1B drafted 2008: .677 vs lefties/.864 vs righties (54 R, 25 HR, 70 RBI, .257 AVG vs righties) Career: .689 vs lefties/.850 vs righties Jacobs has two big knocks on him as a hitter: 1. he doesn't draw enough walks and 2. he can't hit lefties. Does this present a problem for your fantasy team? Not if you use him only against righties in a league that doesn't count walks. Sure, it will hurt his run total a bit, as will hitting towards the back of KC's lineup, but he will hit for power and drive in a lot of runs and put up a servicable average against right handers. Not bad for one of your last picks. Note: Given more AB, Ryan Shealy is a good candidate to find himself on this list after a productive platoon between Shealy and Jacobs at 1B this season...or back in the minors. I don't understand KC's position that Shealy is not a big league hitter, he sure does hit like one (.301/.354/.603 with 7 HRs in 73 big league September at bats, after smashing 20 HRs in the final 2 months of the minor league season). At some point Jacobs could see a reduction in ABs, sitting against lefties in favor of Shealy, though that doesn't affect this strategy much. Derek Lee (CHC) ADP: 95.0 (round 8.4) 2008: .948 vs lefties/.785 vs righties (30 R, 6 HR, 27 RBI, .305 AVG vs lefties) Career: .923 vs lefties/.846 vs righties Derek Lee has been a high-risk high-reward fantasy player throughout his career. A talented hitter who found his way onto the DL routinely, Lee's dip in production over the last couple of years have hurt Lee's stock to the point where he is taken late enough to be somewhat of a high-upside value pick, even as he turns 33 later this season. Typically Lee hits righties much better than he did in 2008, should that prove to have been a case of an off year rather than a loss of bat speed he could be a nice comeback player, if not, he will still hit well against lefties if he can stay in the lineup. Don't reach for Lee, but if he falls into the 9th or 10th round, he is a good gamble if you have the ability to platoon him. *OPS was used because it is a good overview statistic of a hitters overall production by measuring power and ability to reach base. OPS is On Base% Plus Slugging%. ADP (Average Draft Position ) figures collected from Yahoo! fantasy sports fantasy baseball draft results. Final Thoughts If you can get 2nd and 6th round production in 2 lineup spots from 4 players drafted in the 8th, 9th, 16th and 18th rounds you can afford to use 2 earlier picks on dominant SPs to make up for the fact that you will get fewer innings from your smaller pitching staff. For example, in the Pro Fantasy Baseball Roto league I took Brandon Webb and Roy Halladay in the 5th and 6th rounds knowing that I could use a platoon situation later in the draft to make up for taking pitchers early (which I typically avoid in leagues with smaller benches and weaker competition where good pitchers last longer). I call this strategy Store Brand Production. Savvy consumers like myself know what areas you can get by with very little quality lost on store brand items, and where to smart money goes (in this case, reliable, dominant Starting Pitching...if there is such a thing). They taste the same, so why pay more?