Hi Folks, As we move beyond the All Star game, let's reacquaint ourselves with some basics. Like many of you, I take this opportunity to assess my needs in order to better my chances for success. I always say...

It's that time of the year again, Preseason Baseball is underway and we'll be carrying the pitcher box scores here every morning. Please be aware that the early preseason box scores can be deceiving. Pitchers, especially veteran pitchers, sometimes...

Last week we discussed the shift we've seen from pitchers in this post PEDs era. Today we're going to look at what's happening on the offensive side. Like Yin and Yang, what happens on one side must also affect...

2011 Top of the Prospect Class It is at this point every year when I am charged with telling you all about prospects who I think will make in impact in 2011. Last year at this time we talked about...

Thomas Diamond – SP Chicago Cubs Injuries has dimmed the once bright outlook for Thomas Diamond, the 10th overall pick in 2004. Possessed of incredible stuff and a lamentably flawed guidance system, Diamond was derailed by TJS prior to 2007,...

Mike Minor - SP Atlanta Braves The Braves will start Mike Minor against the Astros tomorrow as the left-hander will make his major league debut. The Braves' first round pick last year out of Vanderbilt, Mike signed for $2.42M with...

Brett Lawrie – Second Base Milwaukee Brewers The Brewers Brett Lawrie may already be, at 20 years old, the best second base prospect in the minors, especially from a fantasy standpoint where you can throw out his defensive limitations. Except...

Casey Kelly - Starting Pitcher Boston Red Sox The Red Sox 2008 first round pick wanted to explore his two-way capabilities for a while, but finally arrived at the conclusion himself this past winter that his future was on the...

Drew Storen - P Nationals In my fantasy career, I have, more than once, cut a pitcher during his appearance but I don't know how many pitchers in major league history have been promoted to the majors during a relief...

Eric Young Jr. – 2B/OF Rockies The Rockies recalled Eric Young Jr. on May 1 to replace the injured Brad Hawpe on their roster as the club searches for an answer to the struggles of Clint Barmes. Young has been...

Domonic Brown - OF Phillies Guys like me love guys like this. There's usually a backlash in prospect circles against highly-athletic players. The assumption usually is that that you can't be an elite athlete and and a "baseball player" at...

Tyson Ross - RP Oakland A's It was a mild surprise that Tyson Ross came north with the A's, opening the season in Oakland's bullpen. The A's instructional staff tinkered with his landing area last year and that produced great...

Aroldis Chapman - SP Cincinnati Reds This 21-year-old Cuban defector probably played a pretty big role in many fantasy drafts around the country last month and for many it will be interesting to revisit this spring's distribution in a couple...

If you play in a Rotisserie league and would like to give different weights to each Roto category that you select, you can with our player projections software. Within the Setup|Edit League Settings section, select the Rotisserie scoring option and...

Consistency Factor Consistency Factor: an indicator designed to measure a player's Weekly and/or Daily quality production output using Fantistics Fantasy Production Indicator (FPI). For anyone who has played in a Head to Head league, you probably already know the...

Hi Folks, Welcome to the start of the 2010 season! One of the ways I open a new season is by taking a look back at the previous one. Below is the link to the Historical Fantasy Values and some...

Randall Delgado - RHP Atlanta Braves Prospect junkies are always interested in the latest model off the line of the Braves' pitching factory. Let's talk about 19-year-old Randall Delgado. The 6-3/180 right-hander's stat line below for 2009 may not seem...

Junichi Tazawa - RHP Boston Red Sox The reeling Red Sox recalled right hander Junichi Tazawa from Pawtucket and threw him onto the breach on Friday night against the Yankees in the Bronx. The designation of John Smoltz may be...

This week we deal with some names we haven't covered yet that changed teams at or near the trade deadline this week ... most of whom are headed to Cleveland ... Jason Knapp - RHP Cleveland Indians Not to be...

Deolis Guerra - RHP Minnesota Twins Yes, he's still around ... and he's still only 20. Deolis Guerra came to the Twins in the Johan Santana trade and I talked at the time about how I feel that despite the...

Noted and famed Baseball Statistician Bill James recently opened up on the Steroid controversy.  He takes quite an interesting take on the subject (Cooperstown and the ‘Roids), and his conclusion is diametric to what you would expect from the...

Hi folks, as we all know the second portion of the season is pivotal in our quest to have an admirable finish. I always say that you need two things to win a fantasy championship: Skill & the absence...

Alcides Escobar - Shortstop, Milwaukee Brewers Alcides Escobar, Baseball America's Top Brewers prospect will be playing SS for the World Team in the Futures game coming up in St Louis on July 12th. The 6-1, 175 Venezuela native was signed...

The preliminary rosters for this years Futures Game have been released. Let's start by taking a look at some of the players on the US team that we haven't talked about yet this year... Kyle Drabek - Starting Pitcher Philadelphia...

Every year about this time ... actually a week later than this time ... I recap the first few picks of the MLB First Year Player Draft. And every year I get a few emails saying that these players are...

Jesus Guzman - First Base, San Francisco Giants The Giants purchased the contract of Jesus Guzman from AAA Fresno on May 21st. As they begin their tour of AL parks in this year's interleague play they will likely want to...

Nolan Reimold - Outfielder Baltimore Orioles Adam Jones' hamstring injury and a hot and fast start to the season in AAA conspired to land Nolan Reimold in the majors for his MLB debut on May 14th. A 2nd round pick...

In our continuing series on player recommendations, today we take a look at the pitchers who are deviating from their projected production. I want to start this year's Pitcher segment by saying: historically pitchers have a much more difficult...

Luke Hochevar - SP Kansas City Royals Well, well, well .. Looks whose back .. in a big way. The Royals' 6-5, 205 righty Luke Hochevar has pushed his 2009 record to 5-0 with 8 shutout innings in AAA this...

Brian Matusz - LHP Baltimore Orioles The Orioles landed the best pitcher in last years draft at #4 in Brian Matusz. The 6-4 lefty from the University of San Diego is already physically developed and his pitching skills are highly...

Jarrod Parker - SP Arizona Diamondbacks Jarrod Parker was the 9th overall pick in the 2007 draft and played the entire 2008 season as a teenager in the Midwest League. His 6-1, 180 listing is suspect but Parker generates seemingly...

Deserved Wins:  One of our simplest Sabermetric formulas is Expected or Deserved Wins. We define Deserved Wins as Quality Starts multiplied by a factor of .74.  Typically a pitcher wins 74% of his Quality Starts (a Quality Start as...

Within the player projections software we have a column for player notes where I post a some of the technical indicators that influence our 2009 projections, here's the latest round of analytic notes as we kick off the 2009 campaign....

Second Half Rankings Pitchers Edition (Posted 7/02/08)Every season we come across players who unexplainably perform at higher or lower levels during certain periods of the season.  One possible explanation behind the phenomena: second half "positive trends" are due to...

With the half way point officially upon us, it's a good time to look at the production (rankings) we expect from the top 300 position players in the second half of 2008. Subscribing to the regression to the mean...

As many of you already know, Fantistics uses sabermetric theories to create it's player projections model. These theories are the foundation to our successful forecasting history. One of my favorite forecasting models that we monitor here at Fantistics is...

Within the player projections software we have a column for player notes this season where I post a few of the technical indicators that influence the 2008 projections, here's the latest round of analytic notes. For those new to Fantistics,...

Get your Mock on...our new Mock Draft module may become one of the most addicting fantasy tools that you've ever utilized. Fantasy GMs can now simulate a fantasy draft before draft day while utilizing their specific scoring rules. More...

I was only a week or two into my Lamaze classes in preparation for the birth of my first child, my now 12-year-old daughter Sarah, in the late winter of 1995. As a first-time-parent-to-be who came from a small...

2007 FPI All Stars and Anti-All Stars   Good morning everybody.  With the MLB season drawing to a close, today we will take a look at our own versions of All Star teams.  As our measure we will use our...

As we look to the bullpens for the final week of the regular season, we see one structural change and a lot of static.   Brian Wilson all but assumed the role of primary closer in San Francisco with...

Good morning everyone!   The days are getting shorter and so is the calendar for your fantasy baseball team. There was a little bit of movement at the end of a couple of bullpens since we last spoke in...

The signs of fall are everywhere.   The days are cooler. The leaves here in New England are turning. I am up at 5:30 am to get my kids to school every day. The Patriots are humiliating the Jets....

(Editors note: This is only a sneek peek at this week's entire Prospect Central sent to our members via e-mail. Not a member yet? Visit Insiderbaseball.com today and see what else  you are missing! ) Have you ever noticed...

It is early September and stability reins in major league bullpens … Ok, perhaps “stability” is strong … but there have been no major structural changes this week.   The biggest bullpen news of the week may be the...

Good morning everyone! Today we will continue the recap of players in their contract years in 2007 that we started last week with the hitters. Of the 50 hitters we looked at last week, 13 performed better than we...

(Editors Note: This is a sample sneek peak of Prospect Central this week. Members of Insiderbaseball.com have seen in-depth profiles of over 130 prospects this season and the rest of this week’s report was e-mailed to them this morning....

Hi all … I am traveling to Yankee Stadium for today’s Red Sox/Yankees tilt so this morning’s Closer Look was produced last night. Make sure to check your Daily E-mail Update from Insiderbaseball.com this morning for any last minute...

Every year at some point, I get into a discussion about Contract Year Theory.   I am usually put in the position of having to defend the unpopular position that it is a myth. We hear all the time...

(Editors note: This is a partial preview of Insiderbaseball.com's Prospect Central, emailed to our memebers each week. Not a member yet? Go to Insiderbaseball.com today and join! And tis the season, so make sure you visit Insiderfootball.com before your...

Will Inman – Brewers Starter – Throws Right – 6-0, 200 – 2/6/1987 Will is a very good test case for personal philosophies in regards to pitching prospects. To me he is simply not the type of guy I...

Once again this week we find the closing situations in Major League Baseball to be stable.   The big bullpen news wraps around a return from injury.   Before we get to that however we look to SF where...

Good morning everyone!   A little mail bag this morning but first a couple of things …   Football season is approaching (for some of you quicker than others) and some of you rookies may not know that Insiderfootball.com...

(This is a partial free look at Insiderbaseball.com's Prospect Central report which is e-mailed to our members each Sunday. Members also have access to our entire database of reports this season. Not a member? Go to Insiderbaseball.com and join...

It has been a very quiet week at the back end of baseball’s bullpens.   There was movement in Oakland last night however as Huston Street recorded his first save since coming off the DL last month.  Alan Embree...

Eric Patterson - Cubs Outfield - Bats Left - 5-11, 170 - 4/8/1983 This profile would have looked a lot better if Eric Patterson could play second base. The younger brother of Corey Patterson started the season as a...

A little mailbag this morning .... Dear Sweet Lou, I too am a fellow New Englander, living here in the great state of Connect-eh-cut, in Storrs. I thoroughly enjoy your wit, savvy & journalistic style very much. Keep it up!...

(Editors Note: This is a partial look at the Prospect Central reports that our members recieve via e-mail. Not a member yet? Want some of this great Fantistics insight to help you with your fantasy football season as well?...

The MLB non-waiver trade deadline usually shuffles the deck of at least a couple of rosters and this year it rearranged some bullpens as well.   The trade of Eric Gagne to the Red Sox left the Rangers closer...

It is time to dumpster dive for starts! Want to know how I can tell? Congratulate me, I am now the proud owner of Jesse Litsch! My league has 5 reserves and currently all 5 of my reserves, Carlos Beltran,...

The big news at the end of the bullpen this week comes from Baltimore where closer Chris Ray was felled by a bone spur in his elbow.  He is gone for at least a month it would appear. The...

Today we are going to take a look at some of the players we haven't profiled yet that show up on Baseball America's mid-season Top 25 (or so) prospects. Jacob McGee  - Rays Starter - Throws Left - 6-3,...

A couple of returns highlight this week’s Closer Look.   In Tampa Al Reyes returned from his rotator cuff strain on the first day he was eligible. He returns to the closer’s role in Tampa replacing veteran Gary Glover...

American League 16 Adam Jones SEA OF B+ Official call-up hasn't come yet, but reportedly team just wants him comfortable with RF first. 30 Josh Fields CHW 3B B Has raised AVG 30 points in July and is cutting down...

I have often felt that fantasy baseball presents a good analogy to financial investing. The players of course would be the stocks and our teams would be our portfolios. I know next to nothing about evaluating a stock but I...

(Editors Note: This is not the complete Prospect Central Report that is e-mailed to  Insiderbaseball.com's subscribers today. It is an edited version.) This week my son and I attended the Eastern League (AA) All-Star Fogfest at Dodd Stadium in...

Second Half Rankings Hitters Edition Second Half Rankings Pitchers Edition (Posted 7/07/07) Every season we come across players who unexplainably perform at higher or lower levels during certain periods of the season.  One possible explanation behind the phenomena: second...

  Manny Parra – Brewers Starter – Throws Left – 6-3, 200 – 10/30/1982   Manny caught everyone’s attention on June 25th when he retired 27 straight hitters against the Round Rock Express to record the 8th perfect game...

Injuries and ineffectiveness have shuffled the deck in a couple of MLB bullpens as we take a post-July 4th Closer Look. Devil Ray's closer Al Reyes was placed on the 15-day DL on Wednesday with a "mildly"strained rotator cuff. The...

This week we will pick up some players from the Futures Game rosters that haven’t yet appeared in Prospect Central, and introduce you to a rising young star in the Red Sox System… Keep in mind that our Prospect...

It is dateline Chicago once again as we review the big bullpen news of the week. Ryan Dempster was placed on the 15-day DL on Tuesday with a strained left oblique. With Sweet Lou's alleged "closer in waiting"Angel Guzman also...

My base of minor league operations sits on the banks of the meandering Merrimack River in Manchester New Hampshire. The New Hampshire Fisher Cats are the AA affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays, playing in the Eastern League. Their new...

Felix Pie – Cubs Outfielder – Bats Left – 6-2, 170 – 2/8/1985 2006 pretty much constituted a “Take 2” in Felix Pie’s pro career. After an ankle injury sidelined him for half of the 2005 season the Cubs...

  Power Production (Batter GB/FB Ratio)   Good morning everybody.  Today we are going to revisit some research that we've done on batter Groundball/Flyball (GB/FB) ratios.  Stated simply, hitters with lower GB/FB ratios hit more home runs and have a...

For the first time this season, there no major changes to report in this week’s Closer Look. All of the pitchers who held the primary closer roles for their teams last week at this time are still seated, but...

The Actual Art of the Deal Itself In the first two parts in our series on trading, we talked about how perceptions can skew player values and how you should use that to your advantage. And we offered ideas on...

Jay Bruce – Reds Outfielder – Bats Left – 6-2, 206 – 4/3/1987  The Red’s first round pick in 2005 should be on everyone’s radar by now when considering top offensive prospects. Last year all Jay accomplished was the...

This week’s closer’s report centers around Chicago where I warned you earlier that Lou Piniella was about to start flailing. Sweet Lou is considering moving Ryan Dempster to the starting rotation in the near future and using 25-year-old Angel...

Shaking the Trade Tree In the first part of our series, we talked about how one critical aspect of the trading game is being aware that every player has more than one absolute value. He has, in fact, a different...

Jesse Litsch – Blue Jays Starting Pitcher – Throws Right – 6-1, 175 – 3/9/1985 The 22-year-old right-hander was strong in his MLB debut against the Orioles on May 15th, holding them to 1 earned run on 4 hits...

Pitching Category Mashup (K/BB and QS%)   Good morning everybody.  For today's First Pitch we are going to do something a little off the wall -- and perhaps mathematically unsound - and mash together a couple of key pitching...

Homer Bailey – Reds Starting Pitcher – Throws Right – 6-3, 190 – 5/3/1986 The Reds’ first round pick in 2004 out of La Grange Texas has been considered as one the top pitching prospects in baseball. As a...

There is a power shift in Washington this morning as Jon Rauch takes over the closers role in place of Chad Cordero who has been placed on the bereavement list.   Rauch’s indicators hardly spell c-l-o-s-e-r. This year in...

Good Morning! We are supposed to be preaching patience to you. We are supposed to tell you not to panic and not overvalue what are still some pretty meager statistical samples when we look at our rosters. That is always...

Hunter Pence – Astros Outfielder – Bats Right – 6-4, 210 – 4/13/1983 The Astros finally figured out that Chris Burke was a problem. It just took them a bit longer than the rest of us.  That brings up...

In our continuing series on player recommendations, today we take a look at the pitchers who are deviating from their projected production. Please refer to the Batters article for an explanation of the terms used such as FPI (FPI^ =...

American League 1 Alex Gordon KC 3B A+ He's walking more lately, but just not making enough solid contact. Patience is advised. 2 Delmon Young TAM OF A+ Slow start....707 OPS and 20/4 K/BB suggest a breakout may not come...

This week we start with Tom Gordon heading back to Philly to have his painful right shoulder examined. The Phillies say that Gordon will not be with the team this weekend in San Francisco. We are early in this...

Your fantasy offense is an Army. It is, hopefully, a relentless snowfall of stats that accumulates into major problems for your opponents. However, your pitchers are different. Your pitching staff is instead an orchestra. It is helpful to be aware...

The headline news in the bullpen this week comes from Texas where Eric Gagne was placed on the DL with a strained hip/glut. Akinori Otsuka returns to the closer role which he handled quite well last season, recording 32...

As you can see by yesterday's mailbag article by Lou, we get our fair share of email around here and we try our best to get to all of it and respond. Sometimes we'll respond back through email, through our...

This week we look at some of the hottest prospects around.    Tom Gorzelanny and Adam Lind are in the majors now but the rest of these guys can best be described by Dennis Leary’s first catch phrase …...

An abbreviated look at this week's Prospect Spreadsheet Updates: TOP 50 HITTING PROSPECTS From the AL: 1 Alex Gordon KC 3B A+ - Very slow start, but he did hit his first big-league home run. I don't see Triple-A in...

The big ninth-inning story in baseball right now plays out north of the border in Toronto where primary closer B.J. Ryan came up with an elbow injury.  Jason Frasor is the man for the Jays for now and he...

It's not as if we all need to wear name tags or anything, but there's a certain "getting to know you"atmosphere around most fantasy baseball teams this year. Of course, we know most of the names and the stat lines...

Prospect Central Week #3 Welcome to Prospect Central for Week #3. Today we will look at some players doing it … or not doing it … or sort of doing it, on the MLB level. Today it is a...

Lefty/Righty Match-Ups We all know about the advantage a pitcher has over a batter when the handedness is the same. It's usually tougher for a lefty hitter to hit off a lefty pitcher. The same thing goes for righties. But...

We talk about numbers all the time here ...   They are important to what we do. The key to this whole game we play is to determine which numbers more accurately indicate performance and which numbers more accurately...

Welcome to Prospect Central for Week #2! Today we look at a few prospects who earned a spot on the major league team's Opening Day roster and some that could have, and probably will before the summer is out....

Good morning everyone!   A couple of years ago I asked the publishers for the First Pitch feature to get a couple of chances a week to just free form and rant a little bit. But we now live...

Like Curt Schilling before him on Monday, today's start for Josh Beckett allegedly unveils a revamped and revised edition of the pitcher for 2007. Beckett and new pitching coach John Farrell have apparently hit it off and Farrell has convinced...

Welcome to another season of Prospect Central! Here is where you find breakdowns of Insiderbaseball.com's Top 100 Prospects. Each week you can also check out our Prospect Central Spreadsheet with rankings and updates on our top 50 pitching and hitting...

The Masters of Inconsistency (Player Projections at Risk) Last week we introduced Consistency Factor and it's implications to both Head to Head leagues as well as all Fantasy leagues regardless of their scoring setup. Consistency Factor gives us an...

Runners Stranded Percentage (RS%) Runners Stranded Percentage: Measures the percentage of batters that reach base but do not score (more specifically, are not credited to a pitcher's Earned Runs). The average stranded percentage for starters is .71. Pitchers with...

Expected ERA vs Actual ERA Expected ERA (XERA) depicts a pitcher's "True ERA" as it bases its expectation on factors within a pitcher's control. These factors include Hits, Walks, Home Runs allowed and K's. When you consider the inequity...