The Baseball Guru - Fantasy Baseball Insider page 3

Browse our affiliates :-)

Scroll Down to See Entire Page

GURU'S DRAFTING HELP (Cheat Sheets and Mock Drafts!)

Be thorough in your preparation. This means knowing knowing the starting lineups for every team. This way you won't draft a player who's been benched, injured, or worse, retired!
Know what's been going on during the off-season - check out injuries, rehab and projected starting lineups.
Rank the List. Sort all of the players by position. I use a spreadsheet*. Then rank them by their likely performance this year. Don't rely too heavily on last years performance. Look for players coming off of injuries or players who were traded to new teams. Favor young players on their way up over veterans who have memorable names and diminishing talent. Likewise, star players are stars because they keep going and going like the Energizer bunny, so don't make the mistake of skipping a truly GREAT player just to be trendy.

Jump to Draft Strategy

Cheat Sheets
MLB 2007 Season data by Team: mlb2007.xls and by team: mlb2007byteam.xls
Here is the complete list of variables: playerID LG TEAM bats throws FNAME LNAME POSNUM1 POS1 age teamID G OPS SLG AVG OBP AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS SBPCT GIDP HBP SH SF IBB ERA GS W L PCT CG SV IP IPouts HA ER BBA SOA GP HRA SHO WHIP GF BFP HBPA IBBA WP BK RA G1 InnOuts1 PO1 A1 E1 DP1 PB1 FPCT1 POSNUM2 POSNUM3 POSNUM4 POSNUM5 G2 G3 G4 G5
PREVIOUS YEARS:
MLB 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002, and 2001 Season data (batting, pitching and fielding): mlb2006.xls | mlb2005.xls | mlb2004.xls | mlb2003.xls | mlb2002.xls | mlb2001.zip
Batter's Data: bat97.zip | bat98.zip | bat99.zip | bat2000.zip
Batters: The Guru relies on OPS, which is on base average plus slugging average to find talented hitters. The batting data for 1997 and 1998 was sorted using a secret formula (QOP), based on OPS and his likelihood to get at bats. The 1999 data has a new formula (WOPS), replacing QOP, which additionally weights by stolen bases.
Pitcher's Data: pit97.zip | pit98.zip | pit99.zip | pit2000.zip
Pitchers: The Guru relies heavily on two statistics, described below. And, the 1997 and 1998 data sets are sorted using a secret formula (QSO), which brings some sleepers near the top, but that's not to say that they make the safest early round picks. 1999 data doesn't include Quality Starts data, but the Guru ranked the pitchers in order for the draft and provided separate ranks for starters and relievers.
1) QS% - % of games started resulting in a quality start. Pitchers scoring high in this category are the most reliable fantasy point scorers. This stat also leads you to next years sleepers!! Pitchers with high QS% and low IP last year, often become stars the next year.
2) SO% - SO per IP demonstrates a pitchers dominance. Look for relief pitchers with high SO% and lots of Saves or starting pitchers with high SO% and QS%.
More data: Guru's Data Archives

Rookies, Sleepers and Players to Watch
Lenny's 2007 Sleepers Podcasts:
AL Batting AL Pitching
NL Batting NL Pitching

Top 10 Prospects by Team 2007
Top 10 Prospects by Team 2006
Top 10 Prospects by Team 2005
Top 10 Prospects by Team 2004

2008 NL Free Agent Tracker
2008 AL Free Agent Tracker
Elias 2007 Top 50

All Transactions
Analysis
By Player
Players to avoid due to injury - Look for updates as season approaches.
Factoid: The winning percentage of the team a pitcher pitches for correlates higher with a pitcher's wins and winning percentage than any of his individual stats.

Draft Strategy
Should I gamble on players returning from injury? In 2000, Andres Galarraga returned and batted .302 with 28 dingers and 100 RBI , before his injury he batted .305 with 44 HRs and 141 RBI, so there was a drop off, but he was still valuable. Moises Alou returned to bat .355 with 30 HRs and 114 RBI pretty good! The year before the injury he batted .312 with 38 hrs and 124 RBI. As far as pitchers go, Kerry Wood returned after missing what would have been his second year. After a very rocky start, he finished with a 4.80 ERA with 132 K's in 137 IP. If you didn't know any better you might think that's pretty good, but before the injury he was a STUD with a 3.40 ERA and 226 K's in 166.7 IP. So do you take a gamble? Don't expect miracles, but unless the injury proves to be a disaster as with Doc Gooden for example, expect reasonably solid numbers from most of them.
"Points is points!" I hope the meaning isn't lost in poor grammar because it's valuable information. You may not be a fan of a certain player or players of a certain position, but taking the best available point scorer is usually the way to go.
Look for Value. This is the exception to the rule "Points is points." Let's say there are 5 good players at a position and after that the quality really dwindles. You really need to make sure you grab one of those players. The difference in the number of points you lose by taking player number 6 might be worth more than taking the next available point scorer. Be sure to mark your draft sheet with comments to avoid missing out on players from key positions.
Finally, Stick to Your Drafting Strategy. It's easy to get flustered when other people draft the players you want. And, this is why experienced drafters have a real advantage. Be methodical, when a player is drafted simply cross him off of your list. When it's time for your pick take the next best player at that position. There's no sense in getting emotional over one or two players, it'll spoil the rest of your picks.

More Fantasy Insider...
PAGE 1: Main page

PAGE 2: Popular Baseball News and Info Sites, Fantasy Baseball Specialists and Fantasy Leagues to Join