2020 Schedule Outliers - NL and AL Central Starting Pitchers

One of the many weird things about the 2020 MLB season was how the schedule was re-done. In case you have forgotten, every team played all 60 of their regular-season games against teams in the same division or corresponding geographical division as them. That resulted in some natural advantages. It seemed pretty obvious at the... Read More

Fantasy Baseball Preseason Injury Updates

Injuries remain commonplace in all sports. Baseball has seen the rate of injury continue to rise over the past few years. In fantasy, if someone is not in the medical field, it is hard to gauge how long a player will be out and whether they need to be replaced in a lineup. Sometimes this... Read More

Top 50 Fantasy Baseball Redraft Prospects for 2021 (Part 2)

Spring Training 2021 is almost here, which means it’s time to start thinking about prospects again. A strong pop-up performance from a rookie or two can have a massive impact on a fantasy manager’s season. If we look back to the truncated 2020 season, we can easily locate a healthy dose of players that had... Read More

Top 50 Fantasy Baseball Redraft Prospects for 2021 (Part 1)

Spring Training 2021 is almost here, which means it’s time to start thinking about prospects again. A strong pop-up performance from a rookie or two can have a massive impact on a fantasy manager’s season. If we look back to the truncated 2020 season, we can easily locate a healthy dose of players that had... Read More

Four Post-Hype Hitters Ready to Break Out

Any high-ranking prospect is saddled with an astronomical amount of hype, both throughout their minor league career and up to the moment they finally reach the Bigs. If the player fails to reach the expectations laid before him, we as fantasy players are quick to cast him aside and move to the next big thing.... Read More

Marcus Semien to the Blue Jays - Fantasy Impact

Toronto may have come up short in the Francisco Lindor sweepstakes earlier this offseason, but they got a new middle infielder last week with the signing of Marcus Semien to a one-year deal. Semien has played exclusively at shortstop throughout his career with Oakland, but he'll likely slide over to second base in Toronto with... Read More

Prospects to Know in 2021 - NL Central

There are many factors and ideas that go into conducting a draft strategy. Are you going to draft pitching early? Are you going to punt steals and focus on home runs and RBI? Which players are you going to reach on and which will you let fall and hope to catch in later rounds? The... Read More

Nolan Arenado to the Cardinals - Fantasy Impact

Well. It finally happened. The day Rockies fans had long dreaded. News broke late Friday night that Colorado had traded their franchise third baseman Nolan Arenado to the St. Louis Cardinals. The five-time All-Star has been the biggest star in the Mile-High City for some time now, as he is in the top-10 career leaderboard... Read More

Digging Into K% Leaders - Christian Yelich

As we discussed in Part 1 focusing on Ketel Marte, it can sometimes be tough to know which way to go with it. There are the very basic stats: batting average, runs batted in, home runs, and maybe on-base percentage, but we know they are not always the most useful in player analyses even if... Read More

Starting Pitchers to Target Late - LIMA Plan

The LIMA (Low Investment Mound Aces) Plan is a long-standing draft strategy that was developed far before 2021 but it seems more applicable now than ever. FSWA Hall of Fame member Ron Shandler developed the strategy around the turn of the millennium due to the heavy emphasis on starting pitching in most drafts, leading him... Read More

Examining The Most Effective Pitches in Baseball

There is just nothing better in sports than Baseball Savant. We can derive almost any insight we want from their pitch-by-pitch dataset. One challenge I wanted to take a crack at was to see if I could find which individual pitches in baseball are most effective regardless of who throws it, just looking at pitch type... Read More

Jameson Taillon to the Yankees - Fantasy Impact

After bolstering their rotation with the signing of Corey Kluber last week, the New York Yankees acquired another starter over the weekend as they shipped off four prospects to the Pittsburgh Pirates for Jameson Taillon. Here's how that deal broke down: Yankees receive: RHP Jameson Taillon Pirates receive: RHP Roansy Contreras, RHP Miguel Yajure, INF Maikol Escotto,... Read More

Starting Pitcher Breakouts Who Will Keep Improving

Playing only 60 games in 2020 was sure to result in some wacky outcomes. The league leaders in innings were barely cracking 80 innings, less than a third of the usual. This resulted in some final pitching lines that certainly would not have remained the same had there been 100 more innings added to the... Read More

Top 440: Early H2H Points League Rankings

Welcome back RotoBallers. Below you will find our early 2021 fantasy baseball H2H points league rankings (top 440). As you may know, head-to-head points formats are typically underserved by fantasy baseball outlets - but this is an area that we at RotoBaller take pride in and specialize in. Throughout the preseason and regular season, we will... Read More

George Springer to Blue Jays - Fantasy Impact

Throughout this year's offseason, we've repeatedly heard about how the Blue Jays were interested in several marquee free agents, but weeks passed with no action. Fans grew frustrated as they watched Francisco Lindor get traded to the Mets and DJ LeMahieu re-sign with the Yankees. Doubt crept into the minds of many observers - perhaps... Read More

2020 Schedule Outliers - AL East Starting Pitchers

One of the major changes MLB teams faced during the 2020 season was the lack of a diverse set of competition. Instead of playing around 20 other teams as they would in a normal season, teams played only nine different opponents in 2020. Additionally, two-thirds of each team’s games came against opponents within their own... Read More

Don't Abandon the Win OR the Quality Start

This is a counter-argument to the post written here by Michael Grennell. In his piece, Michael argues that you should remove the wins and quality starts categories from your fantasy baseball league. You should read his full article before continuing, but I will summarize his arguments here first. This is just a summary and does not... Read More

Top 680: Early Fantasy Baseball Tiered Rankings (January)

Welcome back RotoBallers, and Happy New Year! Below you will find our staff's early 2021 fantasy baseball tiered rankings (top 680) for 5x5 mixed leagues. In case you missed it, you can also see our tiered positional rankings as well. Three our lead fantasy baseball analysts - Nick Mariano, Pierre Camus and JB Branson - have analyzed the MLB offseason moves and are ready to... Read More

Outfielders Ready to Break Out Late

Finding value is crucial on draft day and finding just one or two players in the mid to late rounds in drafts that provide better numbers than projected can give you a significant edge on the competition as you bid for fantasy glory. All too often, we look for the new shiny object in drafts... Read More

2021 Overvalued Draft Picks - Starting Pitchers

I recently finished the grueling process of making my 2021 SP ranks one-by-one. What I did was go rotation-by-rotation and insert every pitcher into my list as I went along, taking a close look at each guy. This led to me having lots of knowledge on the player pool for the 2021 season, and having... Read More

Stat-Based Tips To Build a Strong Fantasy Baseball Roster

As we lead up to the 2021 season, fantasy baseball enthusiasts are sure to read thousands of words about players themselves: who overperformed last year and who is primed for a breakout. All of that is good stuff, and it's very helpful in starting your journey towards winning your league, but it's only half the... Read More

Dynasty First Base Rankings for Fantasy Baseball

As we prepare to flip the calendar to 2021, fantasy baseball managers are poring over MLB free agency news and the latest rankings. That includes our constantly-updated dynasty rankings. We will take an early preseason look at each position with some thoughts on individual player values heading into next season. Today, we start with first... Read More

You Paid What?! Overvalued Players in Auctions

Assuming the 2021 MLB season starts on time, we are on the precipice of fantasy baseball draft season. Spring Training will get underway next month, at which point, drafts roll out in full force. We aren't there quite yet, which makes sense. Many of the biggest free agents remain unsigned; the league is unsure of... Read More

Liam Hendriks to White Sox - Fantasy Impact

After making a big splash last offseason the White Sox with the signing of Yasmani Grandal to a four-year deal, Chicago has done it again as they signed closer Liam Hendriks to a three-year deal. The top closer on the free agent market, Hendriks will head to the South Side after establishing himself as one... Read More

Abandon the Win AND the Quality Start

The Win. One of the cornerstone categories of fantasy baseball since its creation. In recent years, baseball fans and fantasy managers alike have been debating the value of the win and whether or not it's overrated. With this debate, the quality start has become a category that more and more leagues are turning to as... Read More

Stunted Growth: Prospects Who Need More Time

So in 2018 and 2019, I was living the dream as I interned for a Minor League Baseball team, and I was looking forward to coming back in 2020. And then the season was canceled. Obviously, I was disappointed by everything that happened, but while I can shrug off missing a summer of interning and... Read More

Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco to Mets - Fantasy Impact

The MLB Hot Stove has been far too quiet this offseason, outside of the Padres’ couple of days of fun, but the Mets helped heat things up on Thursday trading for Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco. Rumors of the Indians shopping Lindor had been discussed for quite some time, and the Mets have been potential... Read More

David Dahl to the Rangers - Fantasy Impact

It's been a rough journey through the majors so far for David Dahl. The potential has been there for the former 10th overall pick, but he has been plagued by injuries nearly every season. A torn hamstring in 2013 and a lacerated spleen in 2015 cost him time in the minors, a stress fracture in... Read More

A Year to Forget: Players Who Will Rebound in 2021

Happy Holidays everyone! Needless to say, 2020 was quite the crazy year — for any number of reasons. There was a lot that many of us will want to forget, and for quite a few baseball players, the 2020 season is one they'll want everyone to pretend never happened. But hey, it's almost 2021. As... Read More