Madison Bumgarner Expected To Start On Opening Day

Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo all but said that starting pitcher Madison Bumgarner will start on Opening Day. Bumgarner will make his debut with the D-Backs against the Braves at home on March 26. It's not a great matchup for his first start with Arizona, as the Braves have one of the most imposing lineups […]

Mariners Agree With Taijuan Walker

The Seattle Mariners agreed to a one-year, $2 million deal with starting pitcher Taijuan Walker on Wednesday, according to sources. Walker can earn up to $3 million in incentives. The 27-year-old was drafted in the first round by the Mariners in 2010, so this is a homecoming for him. He hasn't been able to stay […]

Jarrod Dyson Has Agreement With Pirates

Free-agent outfielder Jarrod Dyson has reportedly reached an agreement with the Pittsburgh Pirates. The agreement is still pending a physical, but if all goes well, Dyson should be able to join the team for Grapefruit League action very soon. Dyson had 30 stolen bases and batted .230 last year with the Diamondbacks. His base-stealing upside is […]

Bases Loaded Podcast - All Things Fantasy Baseball w/ Chris Towers (CTowersCBS)

Mike Kurland (@Mike_Kurland) and Jorge Montanez (@Roto_Nino) are joined by Chris Towers (@CTowersCBS) of CBS sports and they discuss all things fantasy baseball! Subscribe to the Bases Loaded podcast, part of RotoBaller Radio's Podcast Network. Like and Subscribe to the RotoBaller channel on Youtube to get all our latest podcasts and catch us on iTunes and BlogTalkRadio […]

2020 Dynasty Leagues: Players to Buy (Premium Content)

While redraft owners prepare for draft day, dynasty owners are scouring the trade market. The weeks preceding spring training are optimal to take a chance on young players who have yet to peak or may have question marks surrounding them. Not all buy-low scenarios will pan out as expected, but when playing the long game, […]

2020 NFBC Draft and Hold Strategy - Late-Round Pitching Category Boosters (Premium Content)

All other Premium Tools can be accessed on the premium dashboard. Pitching strategies are challenging to master on draft day. Should you draft two elite starters early and then wait to finish out your rotation? Do you load up on hitting early and devour all the pitchers in the middle rounds? When do you grab […]

2020 NFBC Draft and Hold Strategy - Late-Round Hitting Category Boosters (Premium Content)

All other Premium Tools can be accessed on the premium dashboard. Draft strategies are challenging to master regardless of the league. Should you focus on elite starting pitchers? Do you load up on hitting early and devour all the pitchers in the middle rounds? When do you grab a catcher in two-draft leagues? There are […]

2020 First Base Rankings - H2H Points Leagues

Often regarded as an inferior fantasy baseball format, points leagues offer a different style of boasting over your friends or coworkers similar to that of fantasy football. These setups are typically head-to-head formats for a one-week stretch where the player with the most points gets a win. Easy right? While it's true that roster construction […]

Pitchers Most Impacted By Defense: OAA Fallers

Early in January, Statcast released a full fielding leaderboard of their Outs Above Average (OAA) metric, which had previously been limited to outfielders only. The metric takes into account fielder positioning, reaction time, throw difficulty, and batter speed in order to calculate how likely a play is to become an out. The more unlikely, the […]

Sophomore Hitters Who Should Progress in 2020

We’ve been spoiled. In recent years, players such as Peter Alonso, Yordan Alvarez, Ronald Acuna Jr., and Aaron Judge have all entered the MLB ranks while performing at a high level. But it’s not supposed to be that easy for freshmen players. There are many examples of players starting out modestly in their rookie seasons […]

2020 Catcher Rankings - H2H Points Leagues

Points leagues may seem like a slight variation from traditional 5x5 category scoring leagues, but you must approach draft day with a different strategy if you wish to truly compete. Rankings themselves are a different beast altogether, as category specialists like Mallex Smith and Dee Gordon (stolen bases), Kyle Schwarber and Franmil Reyes (home runs), […]

Introducing EDV - Expected Draft Values for Fantasy Baseball

Last March at RotoBaller, we kicked off a cool fantasy baseball research project, exploring what we're calling Expected Draft Values. This offseason, we’ve refined the approach and our research, and taken things a step forward. We're sharing this concept with the fantasy baseball world now, and hope it's as helpful to you as it's been […]

2020 RotoBaller Fantasy Baseball Mock Draft Reactions

Over the last couple weeks, RotoBaller's roster has grown with several new faces to join our esteemed veteran corps. We figured it would be nice to roll out the welcome wagon with a February fantasy baseball mock draft, putting six "RotoNewbs" with six RotoVets. It was a snake draft hosted on Fantrax, a traditional 5x5 format with […]

Going Full Corbin: Pitchers Who Should Throw Their Best Pitch More

Patrick Corbin has made a case for himself as one of the best pitchers in baseball. He produced 14 wins in 202.0 innings pitched with a 3.25 ERA and 28.5 K%. Corbin wasn’t always this good though. In 2016, his ERA was a pedestrian 5.15 with a mediocre 18.7 K%. Suddenly, Corbin decided to start […]

Analyzing Fly Ball Metrics: 2020 Negative Regression Candidates

Last week, I uncovered a few pitching casualties from the record-setting 2019 season, which saw an unprecedented amount of home runs hit and a "juiced" ball theory come into light. While the use of the defensive shift has caused more players to change their swing into a fly ball-oriented approach, this monumental increase in dingers […]

Wilmer Flores Heading To San Francisco

The San Francisco Giants agreed to a multi-year deal with infielder Wilmer Flores on Tuesday, according to sources familiar with the deal. Flores hit .317/.361/.487 with the Diamondbacks in 2019 and could play either second base or a utility role for the Giants in 2020. He'll be competing with the likes of Mauricio Dubon, Donovan […]

Diamondbacks Sign Jon Jay, Edwin Jackson

The Arizona Diamondbacks signed outfielder Jon Jay and pitcher Edwin Jackson to minor league deals on Monday. Jay will make $1.5 million if he's on the major league roster with another $1.75 million in incentives, according to USA TODAY's Bob Nightengale. The 34-year-old (35 in March) played in just 47 games for the White Sox […]

Twins Could Be Interested In Taijuan Walker

The Minnesota Twins could be interested in signing starting pitcher Taijuan Walker to a minor league deal with an invitation to spring training. The Mariners are also known to be interested in a reunion with the former first-round pick. Walker, 27, has made just four starts over the last two seasons because of Tommy John […]

Biggest Risers and Fallers of 2019 - Relief Pitchers

Welcome back, RotoBallers. I have to admit, I just wrote 3000 words on relief pitchers so forgive me if I get a little brief with the intro and just allow you to jump into the meat. In this article, I look at 10 relievers whose value skyrocketed or plummeted in the 2019 fantasy season, spend […]

Fall Flashes: Arizona Fall League Top Prospect Risers

Every year, some of the best minor league prospects head to Arizona to take part in the Arizona Fall League. It features six teams of prospects, sent by their organizations to get extra game reps against top-flight competition, sometimes including players at higher levels in the minor league system. Given the high level of competition, […]

Mariners Sign Yoshihisa Hirano

The Seattle Mariners signed relief pitcher Yoshihisa Hirano to an undisclosed one-year deal on Thursday, according to general manager Jerry Dipoto. To make room on the roster, left-handed pitcher Ricardo Sanchez was designated for assignment. Hirano, 35, had a 4.75 ERA with 61 strikeouts, 22 walks and one save in 53 innings over 62 relief […]

2020 First Base Rankings - Fantasy Baseball Dynasty Leagues

We're not far from the start of spring training and draft season is almost afoot! In re-draft leagues, a ton of preparation and research goes into building a new squad for 2020. Dynasty owners scoff at this because they already have their core players established. The question then becomes of relative value. Who is still […]

Top 50 Fantasy Baseball Prospects for 2020 Redraft Leagues

Freshmen players played a huge role in Major League Baseball in 2019 and rookies are poised to once again have a strong presence on your fantasy baseball teams in 2020. Rotoballer is here to help you decide which players are deserving of a roster spot as you open up the season with a list of […]

Wilmer Flores' Market Picking Up

The market for free-agent infielder Wilmer Flores is starting to move, according to sources. With the free-agent market for hitters really thinning out at this point in the offseason, Flores is one of the more attractive utility men still available. The 28-year-old had just 265 at-bats with the Diamondbacks in 89 games last year due […]

Early 2020 ADP Reflections - Third Base

When a baseball season ends, the following season can’t come here soon enough for some fans, myself included. We start thinking about what we want to see from some players, which includes letdowns, bounce-backs, and even young prospects. Instead of letting them bounce off the brain walls, let’s put these musings into digits. This includes […]

Diamondbacks Acquiring Starling Marte

The Arizona Diamondbacks have agreed to acquire outfielder Starling Marte from the Pittsburgh Pirates on Monday, according to sources. It's unknown which players the Pirates are receiving in return, so stay tuned for more details on the swap. The rebuilding Bucs have been in the market to trade Marte all offseason, and they have finally […]

Bases Loaded Podcast - First Base Rankings Risers, Fallers and Sleepers

Mike Kurland (@Mike_Kurland) is joined by Jorge Montanez of RotoBaller (@Roto_Nino). They get into their first base rankings risers, fallers and sleepers. Subscribe to the Bases Loaded podcast, part of RotoBaller Radio's Podcast Network. Like and Subscribe to the RotoBaller channel on Youtube to get all our latest podcasts and catch us on iTunes and BlogTalkRadio as well! […]

K-BB% Risers: Five Undervalued Draft Targets

Before I dive into the purpose of this article, I would first like to introduce myself. My name is Michael Simione, also known as @SPStreamer, and this is my first article over here at RotoBaller. For those who don’t know me, my favorite aspect of baseball is, without a doubt, pitching. Most of my articles […]

Diamondbacks Interested In Brian Dozier

The Arizona Diamondbacks are among the teams with interest in second baseman Brian Dozier. Dozier did manage to slug 20 home runs in his first season with Washington, but he hit just .238/.340/.430 and lost playing time late in the season and the postseason. There's still power here, but Dozier swings and misses way too […]

Early Mock Draft Analysis: MLB Mixed Leagues

Don't tell us it's not draft season yet! Truth be told, the RotoBaller crew was already planning a mock draft days after the World Series ended. As it turns out, we decided to wait until some free agent moves were made and settled for a slow draft that began shortly after the Winter Meetings. We […]