In the past few weeks, guests on the Baseball Tonight Podcast with Buster Olney have gone through the exercise of creating their all-time home run derby list. Obvious finalists such as Babe Ruth, Josh Gibson, Ken Griffey Jr., and Mark McGwire have filled the theoretical brackets. As another season’s All-Star break is upon us, we’ll be graced with a few hours of this year’s big boppers attempting to hit baseballs as far as humanly possible. Though it may be a new format, the goal is the same; hit home runs!

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Cold Right Now (CRN) is a weekly Ottoneu feature focused on players being dropped or who should be dropped in Ottoneu leagues. In this feature we will break down players into three sections:

1. Roster Cuts: Analysis of players who have been cut in a high percentage of leagues.
2. Recent Injuries: A look at the implications of recent injuries (not all, just some high-profile ones).
3. Cold Performers: Players with a low P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

This article will typically run once per week and will help fantasy managers keep track of players that need to be given extra attention to improve rosters.

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It can be difficult to remember all these numbers. You hear phrases like “Garrett Crochet‘s four-seam fastball has a 15.7% swinging strike rate this season” or “Batters are chasing Cristopher Sánchez’s cutter 50% of the time!” Doing anything in baseball 50% of the time is typically standout behavior. Still, these quick statistical callouts can be hard to process without the baseline, or the average, ingrained in your mind. Luckily, sweet corners of the internet give us the data we need to process the things all these smart baseball people say without having to constantly hit the “-10 sec” button on our podcast episodes. Read the rest of this entry »

Cold Right Now (CRN) is a weekly Ottoneu feature focused on players being dropped or who should be dropped in Ottoneu leagues. In this feature we will break down players into three sections:

1. Roster Cuts: Analysis of players who have been cut in a high percentage of leagues.
2. Recent Injuries: A look at the implications of recent injuries (not all, just some high-profile ones).
3. Cold Performers: Players with a low P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

This article will typically run once per week and will help fantasy managers keep track of players that need to be given extra attention to improve rosters.

Read the rest of this entry »

The 2024 version of Hot Right Now will typically include three sections:

1. Current Auctions: A closer look at players being auctioned at a high rate.
2. Roster Adds: Analysis of players with high add% changes.
3. Hot Performers: Players with a high P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

The FanGraphs Ottoneu team plans to run this feature weekly, updating fantasy managers on the biggest movers in Ottoneu leagues with an analysis of how these players could or could not help your roster.

As Chad Young has done in previous posts, I am also going to rate each player on the following scale:

• Don’t Bother – This means that even as auctions are started, other teams are adding this player, or he is on a hot streak, I am just not interested in adding this player. I don’t see them being worth a roster spot.
• Don’t Stress – I can see why you would add this player. I can totally understand placing a bid, but I am not super worried about winning this player. I would bid $1 for sure, maybe a bit more, as long as it doesn’t impact my roster at all.
• Don’t Go Crazy – I would like to add this player, but I am not willing to hamper my team to do it. I’ll look for cuts, and if I can clear money to make a big bid without losing players I’ll regret cutting, I will do it.
• Don’t Lose – These players rarely come up but they do, from time-to-time. These are guys that I am willing to make a difficult cut to add. Don’t expect to see this designation used often.

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Striking out is tough. The term is commonly used in everyday life, “striking out”, and it doesn’t refer to something going your way. Some hitters fear the strikeout, some accept it, and others can’t tell you because they’ve never done it. In the past three full seasons (2021-2023) there have only been 16 hitters who accumulated at least 30 plate appearances in each season and struck out less than 10% of the time. David Fletcher accomplished this feat in all three seasons while Willians Astudillo, Luis Arraez, and Nick Madrigal each did it twice.

On the other side of the spectrum, 19 hitters struck out more than 44% in the same time period and under the same qualifier of 30 plate appearances. So which player does it better? Well, it depends on what it is. In this article, I’ll create buckets of players based on their strikeout rates and compare their fantasy statistics.

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The 2024 version of Hot Right Now will typically include three sections:

1. Current Auctions: A closer look at players being auctioned at a high rate.
2. Roster Adds: Analysis of players with high add% changes.
3. Hot Performers: Players with a high P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

The FanGraphs Ottoneu team plans to run this feature weekly, updating fantasy managers on the biggest movers in Ottoneu leagues with an analysis of how these players could or could not help your roster.

As Chad Young has done in previous posts, I am also going to rate each player on the following scale:

• Don’t Bother – This means that even as auctions are started, other teams are adding this player, or he is on a hot streak, I am just not interested in adding this player. I don’t see them being worth a roster spot.
• Don’t Stress – I can see why you would add this player. I can totally understand placing a bid, but I am not super worried about winning this player. I would bid $1 for sure, maybe a bit more, as long as it doesn’t impact my roster at all.
• Don’t Go Crazy – I would like to add this player, but I am not willing to hamper my team to do it. I’ll look for cuts, and if I can clear money to make a big bid without losing players I’ll regret cutting, I will do it.
• Don’t Lose – These players rarely come up but they do, from time-to-time. These are guys that I am willing to make a difficult cut to add. Don’t expect to see this designation used often.

Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to another installment of fastball velocity risers and fallers. For reference, here are a few articles that explain both the process and the importance of increased or decreased velocity when predicting future success:

• Using Game-By-Game Fastball Velocity to Influence SP Sit/Start Decisions by Lucas Kelly
• MLB pitching models should incorporate recency, giving us an intriguing ranks update by Eno Sarris
• Baseball’s ‘Hot Hand’ Is Real by Rob Arthur and Greg Matthews

The data for this article reflects games played through June 19th and only displays Statcast’s four-seam fastball (FF) velocity. 

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Cold Right Now (CRN) is a weekly Ottoneu feature focused on players being dropped or who should be dropped in Ottoneu leagues. In this feature we will break down players into three sections:

1. Roster Cuts: Analysis of players who have been cut in a high percentage of leagues.
2. Recent Injuries: A look at the implications of recent injuries (not all, just some high-profile ones).
3. Cold Performers: Players with a low P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

This article will typically run once per week and will help fantasy managers keep track of players that need to be given extra attention to improve rosters.

Read the rest of this entry »

Fantasy baseball trades are difficult to pull off. Everyone feels like the offer is too one-sided. You either have to be willing to give something up or, you have to be in a more realistic “buyer” versus “seller” type of situation. This is exactly where I find myself, believe it or not, as a buyer. After a few days of clicking, calling, and chat-boxing like Billy Beane, a counter-trade offer has come my way looking like a deal worth taking:
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