I get a ton of questions each day on Twitter (@baseballguys). Sometimes the 140 characters that you’re limited to on Twitter just ain’t enough, so I frequently try and pull out the old mailbag to answer some questions. Here are some pertinent ones dealing with players I frequently receive questions about.
Think Michael Brantley has the best risk/reward in the draft? (ADP 80-90) especially in leagues that count Ks?
-- @eight0eightsI
I simply cannot buy into that statement, at all. Brantley is a great talent and if full healthy, in a format such as this one, he’s going in the top-50 player, easily (he only struck out 51 times last season while going 15/15). He might even be a top-30 player. However, he’s not healthy. Coming back from shoulder surgery, Brantley has just started to appear in a Spring Training games. There is some hope that he might be able to play on Opening Day, but that seems like a pretty tough pill to swallow at this point. The bottom line is that Brantley is coming back from surgery, hasn’t had a normal offseason and we just don’t know how his body will respond once he starts playing. It’s simply not fair to expect him to be “Michael Brantley” in April, and it’s unclear how long it will take him to get back to what he was.
Can Joe Kelly be trusted?
-- @tvluck22
Not even close. The Red Sox will start David Price, Rick Porcello, Clay Buchholz and Eduardo Rodriguez (when healthy). Since ERod won’t be ready for Opening Day because of his knee, it seems likely that Kelly will begin the year in the starting rotation. Once Rodriguez is healthy though, it could be Kelly, Roenis Elias, Steven Wright or Henry Owens as the 5th starter. Kelly has looked solid this spring, and there is no doubt he has a nice arm, but he also has numbers that paint him as worse than a league average performer: 3.82 ERA, 1.38 WHIP, 6.43 K/9, 3.33 BB/9. His arm is better than his performance, always has been.
Late in draft, I had a Trevor Story or Jedd Gyorko decision, obviously Story right?
-- @Razzle11Grinds
With the Cardinals bringing in Ruben Tejada to play shortstop any hype for Gyorko has dissipated. Sure, grab Story. BUT – let’s not get nuts with Story. (1) We don’t know how much time Jose Reyes will miss. It could be 10 games, 20, 50, 100. We have no idea. (2) When eligible, it’s nearly impossible to think that Reyes won’t be starting at shortstop for the Rockies. (3) Story isn’t ready to be a star. He has the skills to be a 15/15 type of performer once fully developed, but he’s not there yet. (4) Baseball America listed Story as the 8th best prospect in the Rockies organization. Not 8th in baseball, not 8th at his position, but 8th with his team. He’s not an elite talent. (5) Story often loses balance in his swing, he can expand his strike zone too much, struggles with breaking pitches and he also can get too aggressive and swing too hard. He's not a finished product yet.
Follow this link to check out the entire Player Profile Series.
Juan Nicasio or Tyler Glasnow for the end of my bench?
-- @ bryanshisler
Honestly, neither.
Nicasio has 24 strikeouts in 15 spring innings with a 0.00 ERA and 1.00 WHIP. He pitches for the Pirates who have resurrected the careers of many arms. I get it. But who is Nicasio? He’s a soon to be 30 year old who has never been very effective. He throws hard, he can hit 95 mph on the gun, but his career ratios blow chunks (4.88 ERA, 1.47 WHIP). Yes, he pitched for the Rockies for four years and that has hurt him, but look at his road numbers: 4.48 ERA, 1.51 WHIP, .349 wOBA. He’s not good. He also made one start last season for the Dodgers throwing 58.1 total innings and in 2014 he tossed 129.1 frames throwing into doubt how many frames he could toss this season even if he starts (at this point it’s not even clear that he will start as the team has Jeff Locke and Ryan Vogelsong looking like rotation options). He’s also never figured out the walk with a 3.42 per nine career mark. I would take Glasnow who is way more talented. Don’t know when we will see him either, which is why I led off answering the question by saying “neither.”
I look at Stephen Vogt and see him as a top-10 catcher last year in every category that matters. What am I missing?
-- @FranqJohnson
Vogt had an elbow chip removed this offseason. He’s still not even able to get behind the dish in a game so it’s unclear if he will even be able to start the season on time. There’s also the fact that at 31 years of age he’s just about at the end of his prime physical years despite only having one season in the bigs with a full workload. There is also the absolute tank job that he offered in the second half last season when he hit .228 with a .285 OBP and .362 SLG. Did he wear down? Was he unable to adjust to what pitchers were doing to him as they figured out his weaknesses with the extended workload last season?
I’m not going to say Vogt can’t be a top-10 catcher, he certainly can, but there are a lot of yellow flags flying.
Byron Buxton still worth hanging onto in a 12 team mixed league? He doesn’t seem to be having a good spring.
-- @thomasa56
I don’t get questions like this one. Why did you draft a guy two weeks ago and you’re already willing to cut him now? If you didn’t have any confidence in the player to begin with, why did you bother rostering him?
Second, no one should be basing their opinion on a player based on 26 at-bats in Spring Training. I’m not going to say I feel all rosie about Buxton who has dealt with the flu and has posted a .574 OPS this spring, but I’m also not going to panic on one of the top handful of talents coming into the league this season. Make no mistake, Buxton is an elite talent. He may not be ready, it’s possible he could be demoted, but he’s also got the talent to hit 15 homers while stealing 40 bases. Can’t think you’re going to be able to find a talent like that on the waiver-wire.
* Note: I drafted Buxton this past weekend in Tout Wars and don’t regret it for a second (for the report on my team click on the Tout Wars link).
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 6 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).