Javier Báez : The Cubs 2B came up big Saturday, knocking in four runs to cap an improbable comeback from an eight run deficit.  On the year, Baez is hitting a seemingly sad .191 through Saturday.  Harp about that to your league-mates and then steal a budding superstar right under their noses.  Leaving the .191 average aside (held down by a sub .200 BABIP which will never hold), Baez has 14 RBI, 11 runs and 4 dingers in 14 games.  Those are some HUGE counting numbers.  Moreover, all of the (admittedly early) advanced metrics show growth:  BB rate up from 6 to 11%; K rate down from 28 to 24%; contact rate up from 69 to 72%; hard hit rate up from 32 to 44%; opposite field hitting up from 22 to 27%; flyball rate up from 37 to 44% and line drive rate up from 15 to 28%.  Bottom line here is this is a superstar in the making.  I have him on every team but one in which I could possibly roster him and I am upset about missing out in that one.  You get the point.       

Jurickson Profar :  Profar went 2-3 with 2 runs and 2 BB in Saturday’s Rangers win.   With all of the injuries in Texas (DeShields, Odor, Andrus), Profar will play every day.  While I hesitate to get too excited because he has been hurt often (and because I saw him be lazy in a spring training game a few years ago while trying to make a team which annoyed me), there are reasons for fantasy baseball optimism.  First, he will soon be eligible at many positions.  Second, in the last three games (thur-sat), Profar is 5-12 with an additional 3 BB.  Third, he is just 25 years old and enters the season with 800 plate appearances under his belt – a prescription for a jump to the next level according to the Rules of Engagement that Fantasy Alarm President Rick Wolf and I live by in fantasy baseball management.  Buy!

Mike Moustakas :   While the Royals may be bad (actually they are), they would be worse had the Moose not swam upstream to return home (yes, a moose/salmon mixed metaphor – a roto first).  Mike Moustakas hit his third bomb of the season Saturday.  Thus far on the young campaign, the Moose is hitting .327 with 3 dingers, 9 RBI and 9 runs.  That is pretty darn good.  Oh, and when you add in that the Moose has kept the same contact rate as he posted last year (meaning that he is not trying to do too much to carry a weak team), you have an undervalued player who could still be obtained relatively cheaply because of his late signing and because the Royals are, well, bad. 

Brad Hand :  The Friar closer faced four batters, struck out four batters and registered his sixth save Saturday night.  Remember when Hand blew up in a couple of early outings?  Remember when people overreacted?  Yeah, do not do that.  Two weeks into the season, Hand is once again Hand – 2.00 ERA; 1.11 WHIP and 14K in 9 IP.  Buy with confidence.  Need more proof?  Ok, his groundball rate is way up (53%) and his swinging strike rate continues to climb (now over 14%).  Again, I say buy with confidence.   

Nick Pivetta :   Last week we wrote: “Nick Pivetta twirled 5.2 shutout innings this week, striking out nine and walking none.  Yes, it was the Marlins but those strikeouts count in your fantasy stats just as much as if they were the Astros.  Pivetta is likely on your waiver wire.  He should not be.  Yes, he had a hideously ugly 6.02 ERA last year (the reason he is likely on your wire).  However, smart owners who dig deeper will see a pitcher who was incredibly unlucky with a .336 BABIP and a 63% strand rate.  They will also see an xFIP that is almost two full runs less than his ERA at 4.26.  Bottom line – this is an underrated young pitcher who averages close to 95 mph and who has induced 13.5% swinging strikes in the early going.  We invested in NL LABR and will continue to grab up shares off the waiver wire.  I suggest you do the same.”  I hope you listened.  All Pivetta did was go out and twirl seven strong innings, giving up two runs, five hits, and most importantly, striking out seven, while walking none.   Yes, I know it is early, but I am stoked by the 11+% swinging strike rate, the 44% ground ball rate and the miniscule 20% hard hit rate.

And now, the moment you have been waiting for -- Schultz Says:

“Schultz has often said that roto-experts spend an ordinate amount of time erratically pontificating about what will happen in the future. Which rookies will blossom? What youngsters will breakout? Which veterans will Joey Bats? Clearly, no roto-player has ever learned the lesson of Snow White as they keep asking their roto-guru to tell them "who's the fairest in the land?" For all of the effort spent predicting the unpredictable, roto-wonks spend very little time discussing the rules of the roto-game. If your league hasn't had a meltdown trying to figure out how to handle something that no one saw coming or how to account for one roto-owner whining that the rules don't prevent them from doing the [insert derogatory term] thing they would like to do, you haven't been playing the roto-game correctly.

The 2018 conundrum that has yet to be fittingly answered is how do you solve a problem like Shohei Ohtani ? Since our rotisserie godfathers split up the league for a home run contest, there's never been a credible two-way player that has raised the issue. Unless you play with an extremely progressive group of obsessives, no league has ever counted an infielder's mop-up inning at the end of a 20-2 rout or any of Mike Hampton's 16 home runs. Moreover, since online stat sites have automated the entire process, every league is somewhat beholden to the creativity (or lack thereof) of their stat site provider, having abdicated their governing power to an outside entity. 

Amongst the horrible solutions propounding by the roto-providers were Ohtani the hitter being a different player from Ohtani the pitcher. Unless, they spent two separate draft picks or spent extra auction money, this [insert derogatory term] results in a half-Ohtani owner actively rooting against his own player. Another slightly more reasonable solution has Ohtani simply being eligible as a hitter and a pitcher with his roto-owner choosing each week whether they want to amass the phenom's hitting or pitching stats. Admittedly, this is a practical solution for daily leagues but in weekly leagues, owners are truly deprived the benefit of their two-way superstar. 

Now, lucky readers, Schultz has the solution but it's gonna take a groundswell from the roto-populace to make this work cause roto-sites need to change their programming. In any weekly league, Ohtani should be able to start as both a hitter and a pitcher, however, he takes up two starting spots. If an owner wants to start Ohtani in their utility spot and as a starting pitcher, he should be able to use him in both slots - in non-computer terms, roto-owners should simply be able to write his name down in two different starting spots. The benefit to having Ohtani is that he fills two starting roles but only one roster spot. The reason why this can't work now is that sites either program Ohtani the hitter as a different player than Ohtani the pitcher, thus creating an issue concerning roster size or they simply cannot account for the same player amassing hitting and pitching stats. This should have been the solution all along but alas, to Schultz’s knowledge no site programmed for this commonsense solution.

Schultz (and I really exist) says in closing: Let's make the stat sites work for us.  Roto-Revolution Now!!”

Response:  While I may not be as colorful or as critical when it comes to this issue, I do agree that the best solution is to be able to pay for and then maximize the value