Fantasy Baseball Breakout Hitters for 2023

It's draft season! That means it's time to start locking down the players we want in the middle and later rounds of the draft. Everybody wants to find those breakout players that smash their draft value by several rounds, so that's the goal of what we're trying to do here today. I've already covered my... Read More

2023 Fantasy Baseball Draft Guide - Strategy, Tips and Targets by Jon Anderson

Welcome to my 2023 draft guide! In this piece, I try my best to give you all of the biggest lessons I learned in my draft preparation. I have put tons and tons of hours into fantasy baseball research this offseason, and I learned a lot in the process. I can't tell you everything here,... Read More

Multi-Position Bench Bats Worth Rostering In 2023 Fantasy Baseball

Player position in fantasy baseball should by no means be a primary factor in drafting a player. It matters at the margins to be sure, but it should never be anything other than a secondary consideration. Now that we have the qualifier sentences done, we're going to get really serious about what position players play.... Read More

"My Guys" For 2023 - Jon Anderson's 5 Favorite Fantasy Baseball Players to Draft

It's my third year of writing up the "My Guys" post right here on RotoBaller. Each year, I give my five favorite fantasy baseball players to draft, all things being considered. Last year, here is who I ended up with: Willy Adames Pete Alonso Eduardo Rodriguez Andrew Heaney Max Kepler I would call that a... Read More

5 Bounce-Back Infielder Candidates In 2023 Fantasy Baseball

One of the best ways to get ahead in your fantasy baseball draft is to take advantage of the players who are falling in ADP unnecessarily. Baseball is a funny game, and it doesn't take a whole lot to generate a down year for a player. The bigger sample is always better than the smaller... Read More

Starting Pitcher "Stuff" Improvers - The Biggest In-Season Risers

I wrote a post concerning "stuff" metrics a few weeks back. In that post, which you can read here, I went over in short detail what exactly we're talking about. You should read that post first before continuing to get what we're talking about. These are newer metrics and not everybody is familiar, but they... Read More

Mike Yastrzemski (OF, SFG) - 2023 Fantasy Baseball Draft Values

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~pick 400 CURRENT ADP: ~430 overall ANALYSIS: Things went horribly for Yastrzemski last year, as he had the worst year of his young career by far, slashing .214/.305/.392. His career line now sits at .242/.326/.465 - so that itself is enough reason to believe in a bounce-back campaign is on the... Read More

Carlos Santana (1B, PIT) - 2023 Fantasy Baseball Draft Values

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~pick 450 CURRENT ADP: ~540 overall ANALYSIS: I'm beating the "shift ban" drum here, but Santana is set to benefit from that as the league shifted on him in nearly all of his PAs as a lefty last year. The Pirates saw an opportunity there and scooped him up, and PNC... Read More

Keep It Simple, Stupid - Finding Homers and Strikeouts Throughout the Draft

Rotisserie fantasy baseball is a complex game. The best players give equal attention to each category, build balanced teams, and then prune their teams effectively throughout the year. Not everybody has the time for that though - and it's a lot easier said than done. Sometimes we can do just fine focusing in on the... Read More

Three Picks At Each Position - Expensive, Value and Cheap Players for Fantasy Baseball

If I had the time and approval, I could come here every single day and give you hard-hitting data analysis. We could learn all kinds of stuff and do all kinds of speculating and projecting, getting very into the granular data. I do that from time to time on here, but I'm not so egg-headed... Read More

Exploring Stuff Metrics for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

In the days of Statcast, we have new metrics hitting the line every year. There are so many different things we can do with the publically available data that comes out of the Statcast system. One thing a lot of people have done is begin to isolate pitcher performance only by the movement details of the... Read More

Ryan McMahon (3B, COL) - 2023 Fantasy Baseball Draft Values

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~pick 190 CURRENT ADP: ~210 overall ANALYSIS: The shine of his potential upside has dimmed considerably due to another season of not putting up great numbers after being a top-hitting prospect in the Rockies organization. We all get very excited for the Rockies' top hitters, so it's easy to overdraft them... Read More

Ramon Laureano (OF, OAK) - 2023 Fantasy Baseball Draft Values

BALLER MOVE: Draft target ~pick 200 CURRENT ADP: ~215 overall ANALYSIS: Over the last two seasons, among hitters with at least 650 at-bats, only a dozen hitters have averaged a homer and a steal every 30 at-bats or less. A homer and steal every 30 at-bats would get you roughly to an 18-homer, 18-steal season.... Read More

Pitchers With Fastball Velocity in The Tank - Potential Fantasy Baseball Risers

One of the ways a pitcher can have a breakout season is by gaining velocity. We see this quite often. A pitcher will find a way to add velocity to their pitches (mainly their fastball), which makes that primary pitch a bit more effective and enhances their offspeed pitches as well by separating the two... Read More

ADP Fallers to Buy for Fantasy Baseball - 2023 ADP Comparisons

"Buy low, sell high." The age-old advice. Simple but powerful. It is perfectly applicable in the fantasy baseball world as well, so that is what we're talking about today. I am going to explore the players that have seen the biggest drops in their ADP when comparing 2022 to 2023. Now, there are plenty of... Read More

Analyzing Pitcher Fly Ball Data for Fantasy Baseball 2023

Pitchers don't have much of a say about what happens after a pitch they throw is put into play. There is a ton of randomness that occurs after a hitter makes contact with a ball, and that makes a lot of pitching statistics hard to trust. Getting ahead of this gives us an advantage. We... Read More

Analyzing the MLB Rookies - 2023 Fantasy Baseball Prospects

One great way to win your fantasy league is to get your hands on the MLB rookie of the year. Julio Rodriguez and Michael Harris II were two of the biggest keys to success last year, as they went on to return first-round value after being very cheap to acquire on your fantasy team. There... Read More

Pitchers To Downgrade? Analyzing the Shift, Ground Ball Data and Rule Changes

One of the biggest things people are talking about and studying for the 2023 MLB season is what effect the changes to the rules about shifting will have on the game. I myself talked about that on the hitting side earlier this offseason, you can read that analysis here. Today, I want to get into... Read More

Who is the No. 1 Overall Pick for 2023 Fantasy Baseball? Making The Case For Jose Ramirez

It's officially fantasy baseball draft season, so we're starting where it makes the most sense to start - Round One! We're here talking about who should be taken with the #1 overall pick, and I am making the case for my favorite pick - Jose Ramirez. Let's get going!Be sure to check all of our... Read More

Breakout Pitchers for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

Finding breakout starting pitchers is one of the most important things we have to do in order to win fantasy baseball leagues every season. In most leagues, an individual starting pitcher has more of an impact on a fantasy team than an individual hitter since they are throwing a higher percentage of your team's total... Read More

Known-Skill Starting Pitcher Rankings - Predicting Future Stats for Fantasy Baseball

There is a lot of guesswork that goes into fantasy baseball. This is especially true when we're talking about starting pitchers. And all of this despite the fact that we have more metrics than we can even count about pitchers. You will see a ton of talk this year about fancy advanced pitch metrics. Spin,... Read More

Injury Agnostic SP Rankings for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

It's hard to project injuries. Therefore, it's hard to project how many innings a pitcher will throw in a given year. Am I rocking any boats yet? Sure, Jacob deGrom is more likely to hit the IL this year than Gerrit Cole. There's no questioning that, and that should matter when you are drafting your... Read More

Where Are The Stats? In Which Rounds to Target Hitter Stats for Fantasy Baseball

If you're drafting a fantasy baseball team in a rotisserie-style league, how you attack the different categories is almost just as important as what players you draft. There are five standard categories: Runs Home Runs RBI Stolen Bases Batting Average You can put together a team that laps the field in home runs but still... Read More

Jon Anderson's Early Starting Pitcher Tiers & Rankings for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

Welcome back RotoBallers to my early 2023 fantasy baseball rankings and projections series! We are finishing it up today with starting pitcher. I have been through all of the hitting positions already, so check those out at the links below. Catcher First Base Second Base Shortstop Third Base Outfield I went for an even 100... Read More

Jon Anderson's Early Outfield Tiers & Rankings for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

Welcome back RotoBallers to my early 2023 fantasy baseball rankings and projections series! Today, we are covering the outfield, and it's a monster! Here is what we've done so far: Catcher First Base Second Base Shortstop Third Base I am putting my top 80 or so outfielders into this, so we'd better get started.  Be... Read More

Fantasy Baseball Hitters That Could Benefit Most From the Shift Ban

Major League Baseball is making some big changes ahead of the 2023 season. One of the most significant is the banning of the shift. You can read more about that here, but here's a quick summary from that article: "With all four infielders needing to be on the dirt, the days of the four-outfielder setup... Read More

Predicting Pitcher K-BB% Breakouts For Fantasy Baseball 2023

You will not read an article from me about fantasy baseball starting pitchers that does not talk a ton about the strikeout-to-walk ratio (K-BB%). It is the most important and most predictive statistic out there for evaluating pitchers. The way to win a fantasy league is to have a few breakout players on your team.... Read More

Using Hitter Projections to Identify Probable Improvers for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

Hey everyone, it's Jon Anderson back again! I have recently finished my season-long hitter projection system, so now the fun begins! I will be writing at least a few pieces here that look at what the projections are telling us. This is my first year doing a projection system, so I don't exactly have a... Read More

Early Draft Takeaways: Fantasy Baseball 2023

In the spirit of the holidays, I wanted to give you all a little gift. And the gift I will give you is way too early fantasy baseball ADP analysis. It is not even Christmas as I write this, so this is strange territory. We are at least two months away from what any normal... Read More

The Toughest Players to Rank for 2023 Fantasy Baseball

The name of the game in fantasy baseball is projections. If you ever hear anybody telling you to "draft with your gut" or "listen to your instincts" – run. It's a numbers game, we need to use numbers. Your gut has no say in the matter other than digesting the potato chips you ate while... Read More