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Players with Similar Projections at Vastly Different ADPs (209 Fantasy Baseball)

Players with Similar Projections at Vastly Different ADPs (209 Fantasy Baseball)

Whether it’s the first pick, the 32nd pick, or the 469th pick, each and every draft pick in your fantasy baseball draft should do one thing and one thing only – return value.

That’s the name of the game. You need to acquire points or stats, but at the end of the year, you can maximize the output from the players by acquiring at market or below market price with a net positive return.

That’s why playing the waiver wire is so important over the course of the season. You should always have a rotating spot at the end of your roster that is just for streaming players or taking chances on players. You ride the wave, hope you find the next breakout. If you don’t, you drop them and go with the next player that pops up.

Those values you find on the wire are free, and can really only net you a positive value.

But finding them in your draft is just as important. While the term “sleepers” in fantasy is really thrown around a lot, we know there really aren’t any true sleepers anymore. We have to take into context the word and the league that we are in when discussing them. With all of the tools that we have at our disposal, it’s hard to find someone who is a sleeper. It’s an SEO term to maximize web traffic if we are being blunt. It’s a smart move because all fantasy players want to get the edge on their opponent. They want to find the next breakout star. They want the “sleeper” that the player in their dynasty league who is only active for the regular season hasn’t heard of.

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The best way to find these values isn’t downloading a PDF with sleepers on it. No, it’s finding who presents the best value in your draft.

If there is a player going in the second round who will provide you great projected stats, but there’s a player going six rounds later who provides similar numbers, you have to go with the player going the latest. They may not have the sexy name or the hype behind them, but hype hasn’t won anyone a fantasy title.

Throughout this article, we are going to highlight some players who have similar projections based off Steamer, but have vastly different ADPs, based on NFBC draft data.

Player A: .245/.308/.398, 17 home runs, 14 stolen bases, 62 runs, 66 RBI, wRC+ 92, ADP 170
Player B: .258/.314/.410, 14 home runs, 13 stolen bases, 60 runs, 49 RBI, wRC+ 96, ADP 299

Based on just the projections, which player do you want? For me, give me Player B all day. You’re getting similar productions – better in a lot of areas – and the trade-off of a few home runs and 17 RBIs (hard to project runs and RBIs, but they are categories, so we’ll include them) is worth the 129-spot difference.

Player A is Harrison Bader. Player B is Cedric Mullins.

Look, Bader has value, but he’s being overvalued right now in fantasy. He’s better defensively and a real-life ballplayer than he is a fantasy player. He’s going to help you in roto and categories leagues, but there’s no reason to take him there when you can wait on Mullins.

Look at the Orioles roster. They are straight up horrible. But that’s all the more reason to like Mullins. He doesn’t have competition for playing time, and he should get to 600 at-bats pretty easily, barring injury. He’s a great late-round pick, and he can provide the value of a guy in the early teens.

Player A: .278/.328/.467, 21 home runs, 1 stolen base, 65 runs, 76 RBI, 111 wRC+, ADP 410
Player B: .257/.329/.439, 22 home runs, 9 stolen bases, 70 runs, 73 RBI, 107 wRC+, ADP 57

Eight stolen bases are valuable, but are they 353 picks of difference valuable? The answer is, of course, no. But Player B will go ahead of Player A 100/100 times for draft season.

And honestly, he should! Based on pedigree, name, and the lineup, definitely. In a dynasty league, it’s a no-brainer. You’d get laughed out of the league if you took Player A first.

But seeing this difference allows me to know it’s OK to wait at second base and go with someone other than Player B in the early rounds.

Player B is Gleyber Torres. He was shot out of a cannon last year, making a big difference for the Yankees. He’s a future All-Star, and a future first- or second-round fantasy pick.

Player A is Wilmer Flores. Yes, that Wilmer Flores. The guy who is most widely known for crying when he thought he was going to be dealt from the Mets.

Flores finally will have his long-awaited opportunity to start, as he’s going to be the everyday second baseman for the Diamondbacks. Heading into drafts, he only has first and third base eligibility, but that will change after a week.

The narrative is that Flores is a lefty crusher, but his career splits actually show that he handles righties just as well as he does lefties.

As for Torres, I can’t buy the power output that he had last year when it was an outlier from his minor league numbers. Sure, Francisco Lindor developed power out of nowhere in the majors, but I’m not there yet with Torres. The other part that hurts his value is hitting consistently in the lower-third of the Yankees lineup. Get him up in the upper-third, and the conversation changes.

Player A: 11 wins, 9 losses, 29 starts, 170 IP, 4.00 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, 9.52 K/9, 3.50 BB/9, 4.07 FIP, ADP 62
Player B: 10 wins, 9 losses, 28 starts, 157 IP, 3.97 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 8.44 K/9, 3.02 BB/9, 4.10 FIP, ADP 285
Player C: 12 wins, 9 losses, 29 starts, 178 IP, 3.97 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 8.64 K/9, 2.51 BB/9, 4.11 FIP, ADP 163.

This one surprised me, because I’m really high on all of these guys. I like Player B’s teammate, Player C, even more, but there’s not as much of a difference of value there.

Player A is Mike Clevinger. Control and command are the only issues with Clevinger, and he should finish as a top 25 pitcher if health goes in his favor.

Player B is Tyler Skaggs. Skaggs and his aforementioned teammate Andrew Heaney (Player C) are two of the most overlooked pitchers heading into draft day. Both have a shot to be top 30 pitchers by the end of the season.

If you’re in a position where you’re in the fifth or sixth round of your draft looking for an SP2, you’re fine to take Clevinger.

However, if you have a need to fill on your offense, you can pass up Clevinger, knowing that you can take Heaney and Skaggs much, much later and get similar production.

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Michael Waterloo is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Michael, check out his archive and follow him @MichaelWaterloo.

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