Oak's Corner: Spring News

With less than two weeks until the season starts, we're now entering the part of spring training where injury news starts to matter, as it can affect a player's readiness for the start of the season, and stats start to matter for guys battling for jobs. Let's take a look at some of those situations and how they could affect all the big drafts coming up the next two weekends.

Marcus Stroman put some fear in his fans and fantasy owners with news that he was battling inflammation in his throwing shoulder early in the spring. That's not what you want to hear about a starting pitcher, and his draft stock began to tumble, which I saw first hand when he dropped to the 202nd pick in my Great Fantasy Baseball Invitational league. His ADP had been about 130 in early drafts but has now settled in at about pick 145 as the recent news has gotten better. Stroman won't start Opening Day, but it now sounds like he's feeling good and he could still appear in the Blue Jays first series of the year.

Stroman is probably my favorite pitcher in baseball to watch (along with Sonny Gray) as I love the fire with which he competes. But this is a fantasy baseball site and we have to put that aside and project what we will get this year. Stroman had an excellent bounce back campaign in 2017, sporting a 3.09 over 201 innings while winning 13 games. But, a closer look reveals some concerns, as he strikeout rate remains low at 7.34 K/9, and his walks jumped up to 2.78 BB/9. His ERA in 2016 was a bloated 4.37, but a look at his FIP's indicates that his two seasons weren't that similar, as they check in at 3.71 and 3.90 respectively. While he doesn't punch many guys out, I love Stroman's ground ball profile, as he has induced more than 60 percent ground balls in each of the last two seasons. The lack of K's limits his chances of becoming a fantasy ace, but the ground balls induced with his sinking fastball give him a nice floor, even if his WHIP is likely to be a little elevated as a result. I like the 145 ADP more than his price before the injury, but I'd still prefer him as my third starting pitcher rather than my second, especially if I have a couple of risky starters in the first eight rounds and I need to have a couple of high-end strikeout guys to consider him. I believe he'll be solid again in 2017, but I'm expecting an ERA more in the 3.60 to 3.70 range, especially in the hitter-stacked AL East.

Zack Greinke is often difficult to figure out, but this spring has ramped that up to another level. After a recent spring start where Greinke was throwing his fastball in the mid-80s, he indicated that every year he's, "a little nervous that it's not going to be there," which is concerning, but mitigated by the fact that apparently he worries about that every year. In his most recent start, when the velocity was being clocked in the low-90s, he left with a groin injury after one inning. The groin injury appears to be minor, but now we have no idea whether his velocity is back or he just aired it out for an inning, nor do we have a timeframe beyond him missing his next spring start.

Greinke has obviously started to slip a bit in drafts with the spring developments, after sitting around the mid-40s ADP for most of the draft season. So what do we do with him now? Drafting pitchers who stay healthy is hard enough, so taking one who's already having issues is a tough risk to start with, especially as early as Greinke gets drafted. Of course, anyone who got Carlos Carrasco at a discount due to his spring soreness last year reaped a huge benefit. I'd love to see Greinke make a start before my NFBC Main Event next weekend, but without some positive news or reports, I'm likely going elsewhere for now, and he'd have to slip to the point where it would be worth a risk for me to grab him. As he showed last year, he's great when healthy, and the humidor being installed at Chase Field should boost his value, but there's currently too much unknown for me to spend a top five pick on him. I tend to be risk averse in the early rounds (I know some very good players who disagree with that stance), as there are plenty of good players I'm happy to grab instead.

A lot of spring chatter among fantasy players has centered upon what the heck to do with the Rockies outfield/first base situation and how the playing time will get split up. This was even before Carlos Gonzalez re-upped with the squad. This situation is important in drafts and shouldn't be ignored, considering the immense boost playing half your games in Coors Field provides. Someone is going to end up as a value in that situation, but who? There was initial excitement over Ryan McMahon in February after a report came out in a local Denver paper indicating that he was the top first baseman on the depth chart, but after Gonzalez signed, there's a chance that McMahon will start the year in the minors.

Charlie Blackmon is obviously going to play every day, so that leaves left field, right field and first base to be divvied up between McMahon (if he makes the 25-man), Gonzalez, Ian Desmond, Gerardo Parra and David Dahl. If you are a Raimel Tapia truther, he could be tossed into that mix, too, but while the Rockies seem to like him, I think he's currently a step behind the rest of that group. Adding to the problem from a platoon aspect is that Desmond is the only right-handed hitter of the whole group, even when you include Tapia. It's possible that the Rockies send down both McMahon and Dahl to let them play every day in Triple-A, especially after Dahl missed the entire 2017 season. My best guess to start the season is that Gonzalez and Desmond play full-time due to their contracts and veteran status, and have six weeks or so to prove they can keep the young guys at bay.

In terms of drafts, I think Cargo is very underpriced (302 ADP since March 1), as his current price tag makes it so that he goes late enough that you can use him based on location (all Coors games) or whether he is facing multiple lefties (his 2017 OPS versus lefties left a lot to be desired at .561) in a certain game. His overall poor state line in 2016 hides the fact that his second half was very good, as he hit .314 with a .921 OPS. His hard hit rate looks average at 31.9 percent on the season, but again, the second half number looks a lot better at 36.4 percent. He was a different hitter in the second half and actually possesses significant upside for an extremely cheap price. He's a definite target for me at his current price tag and the one guy in that Rockies outfield chaos who I want in drafts.

Offensive Targets at ADP

I badly wanted to start this section with Yoenis Cespedes at his current 93 ADP, but after he missed time this week and got a cortisone shot in his wrist, I'm reminded of why his ADP is that high. Instead I'm looking outside the Top 150 for some names I'll attempt to grab later in drafts.

Matt Carpenter (ADP 190): Last year at this time, Carpenter was a top-75 pick coming off a 21-homer year (in only 129 games) where he hit .271 and was eligible at three infield spots in most leagues. Carpenter did hit 23 homers in 2017 and scored 91 runs, but his average tanked to .241 as he battled shoulder injuries for a good part of the year. On the downside, Carpenter holds only first base eligibility this year, but first base is not the deepest of spots this year. Carpenter has a career .321 BABIP, but that number checked in at .274 in 2017, due to a combo of increasing his fly ball rate as well as some poor luck.

Diving deeper into Carp's season sees an exceptional 42.2 percent hard hit rate to go along with a career high 50.8 percent fly ball. I love that combination for boosting his home runs in 2018, but, as he has said in spring training, he probably got a bit too aggressive with selling out for home runs and is working on hitting more line drives, which he did at a 26.2 percent clip in 2016. I can't fathom Carpenter not boosting the average a significant amount if he continues to hit the ball that hard, especially since his strikeout rate, while not elite at 20 percent, isn't something that should keep him from hitting for average. More than anything, I love this year's price on Carp at more than 100 spots off from where he was taken last year. He's a corner infielder target for me at that price (although I'm still concerned about the shoulder issues) and I'd be stunned if he didn't return a profit on it.

Matt Chapman (ADP 284): Way deeper down the board lies the starting third baseman for my Oakland A's, Matt Chapman. Let me get this out of the way: Chapman isn't going to hit for average, as he strikes out too much and hits too many fly balls for that to be a thing. But Chapman does have pop, and at pick 284, he presents a nice value for a team looking for power that late. He hit 36 bombs across Double and Triple-A in 2016 and followed that with 30 homers in 2017 across Triple-A and MLB. In the 84 games after his call-up to Oakland, Chapman hit 14 homers in 84 games and displayed a strong 36 percent hard hit rate. He has a history of double digit walk rates in the minors, so while he strikes out way too much (28.2 percent in MLB), he does have a discerning eye.

The key component for Chapman, considering how late he goes, is that he comes with an absolutely elite glove. I truly believe he's going to win multiple Gold Gloves in his career, and while that doesn't help out roto categories, it will keep him in the lineup during slumps, which is huge, not only for his counting cats, but also for his stability in the lineup. I don't love that it appears he might hit eighth to start the season, but if he's hitting homers regularly, that will change quickly.

Joe Panik ADP (387): Sure, Panik is boring, but late in a deep draft, I have zero problem with boring. When other people are trying to take a closer in waiting or a pitching prospect, I love getting a player who could be an asset all season long. Panik had a bit of buzz entering 2016 after he hit .312 in 100 games as a rookie with the Giants in 2015. He suffered through a concussion in 2016 that greatly dimmed his star with a .239 season. He then bounced back nicely in 2017 with a .288 average over 138 games while hitting 10 homers.

As my drafts have increased closer to the season starting, I've noticed how difficult it is to find batting average assets late, and finding one at a middle infield spot this late can be important. With his 26 percent hard hit rate, Panik is never going to hit a bunch of homers, especially with a nasty home park, but he did sport a strong 21.9 percent line drive rate in 2017. When you combine that with his miniscule career 9.7 percent strikeout rate, he provides a solid batting average floor. He should start the season hitting leadoff (at least against righties), and with the middle of the Giants order greatly improved from 2017, he has a chance to score a solid number of runs, too. Getting a middle infielder with plus batting average and runs this deep into a draft is gold, and I'll grab Panik as my middle infielder in as many spots as possible.