As many of you know, I have been hinting for a few weeks about some changes to the fantasy baseball coverage here at Baseball Prospectus. I had to wait until everything was in order before I could share with you, but after receiving the okay, I’m here to announce a few things that are all meant to enhance our coverage and your experience with us.
First thing is that I am no longer just our fantasy writer, but am now officially the Fantasy Manager–my job, outside of just writing, is to help shape our coverage and provide you with the tools and information you need and want. Whenever there is something or somewhere you think we are lacking, or changes that need to be made, you can reach me via e-mail, Twitter (@Marc_Normandin) or in the comments in any relevant article.
“That’s nice,” you may be saying, as you realize that I’m Fantasy Manager of myself, given our two Fantasy Focus pieces per week, “but what does this mean for me?.” The first order of business in my new role was to tell our fearless leaders that I cannot give you the coverage you deserve or need by myself–while I would love to, it’s just not in the cards, unless you want me to burn out by April. Every major fantasy site has multiple writers with loads of coverage, and it’s our goal to bring you the same, except, of course, with a BP twist. Luckily, Kevin Goldstein and Dave Pease were in agreement with me, as they want to improve our product as much as I do, and so now we have some new contributors to share with you.
First is Craig Brown, who you may know from his work at Royals Authority or the Hardball Times, or even Heater Magazine, where the two of us used to write together. Craig knows his stuff, and when I was given the opportunity to recommend we add an additional writer specifically for fantasy, I knew it had to be him. Craig will assist in regular fantasy coverage alongside me, three times per week on the upcoming fantasy blog. He’s not just here to give you more of the same though, as he brings his own strengths and background to the table. In addition, he will spend some time covering a topic that you have been requesting for months now–Scoresheet. I will also give it a whirl when I can, but think of Craig as your dedicated Scoresheet analyst. He will start writing next week, using Unfiltered until the fantasy blog goes live.
Behind curtain #2, we have even more brand new content for you. The aforementioned Heater Magazine, which is run by John Burnson, is now a partner of Baseball Prospectus. On the most basic level, this means that Heater and BP will share some statistics, with their coverage enhanced by some of our tools such as SIERA, the RBI Opportunity statistic report, WARP, Defensive Efficiency, etc. We will also have access to their deep pool of statistics, which will give us additional angles to work with in our coverage–Craig and I are both familiar with Heater as well, given we wrote there for a few years each, so we will be able to jump right in with that information.
There’s more to it than simple statistic sharing though, as we will also feature a piece of content written by a Heater author daily here at BP, via the fantasy blog. The plan is to give a rundown of players to look at or avoid at all positions over the course of the week, so that way you always have updated information for your roster, rather than having to wait for me to get around to that sort of thing in a twice-per-week column format.
Mondays, Michael Street, who writes on Asian-American sports and culture for Examiner.com, in addition to Heater, will cover 1B, 3B and DH. On Tuesdays, Michael Jong, who you may know from Marlin Maniac as well as my old stomping grounds, Beyond the Box Score, will write about 2B, SS and catchers. Rob McQuown from Baseball Daily Digest and our own Unfiltered will cover Wednesdays, taking a look at outfielders. Thursdays will bring you Lee Panas, author of Detroit Tiger Tales, and our coverage of relievers. Finally, on Fridays, Bill Baer from Crashburn Alley will write about starting pitching, because if there is one thing we lack here at BP, it’s Phillies fans that are also writers.
With the blog live, my role will also switch–I will still write a column, but will also contribute daily to the blog in some way, meaning that we are moving from two fantasy pieces per week to, at minimum, two per day, more on the days when Craig contributes or there is more for me to write about. All of this content will have a unified home along with our fantasy tools such as the PFM and the depth charts on our brand new, forthcoming fantasy page.
I can’t tell you how excited I am to have old friends Craig Brown and John Burnson working alongside me here at Baseball Prospectus to improve our fantasy coverage, but don’t think that we’re resting now that we’ve bulked up. If you have any questions, concerns, or things you would like to see us do, please reach out and tell me so that we can enhance your experience as a reader of Baseball Prospectus. This is going to be a big year for our fantasy coverage with all of the new features and writers we are introducing, and we hope to have you stick around to enjoy all of it. As always, thank you for reading.
Will UTK only be accessible to the Premium or also available tot he Fantasy Package? It is always a benefit to the fantasy sports guys to read the UTK.
Now that's what I'm talking about! It's been difficult to help Marc shape BP's fantasy coverage when there's only been an article or two per week. But at least 10? Tremendous. I would say this is overdue, but at least it's before the season (and my draft). Keep up the (anticipated) good work!
You do great work already, looking ofrward to the future....and the 2010 PECOTA CARDS! Not your lane I know, just wanted to throw that out there though.
For me, PFM was the gateway drug to BP. I have enjoyed both the dynamic statistical analysis and creative writing since becoming a member, but at the core BP is still most valuable to me as a tool to win some decent cake competing in fantasy baseball.
With the disconcerting(and as yet unresolved*) issues regarding PECOTA, this is definitely some most welcome news. Given the late March re-up due on my premium sub, it sounds like I'll get to see some of the product before handing over a pair of 20s. So far though, it sounds like BP is heading in a positive direction and will convince me to stay on through the year rather than walking away cold turkey or dropping to a March/April fix alone.
Just renewed my subscription. (I would have anyway, but hey, this is great.) Some companies trumpet the smallest changes with sayings such as "The best just got better." BP just does it. Thanks!
Last year I found the weekly emails from Heater breaking down playing time by team extraordinarily helpful for fantasy. Will that feature still be available? Will BP send out a regular fantasy email?
Speaking of Scoresheet, I just joined Scoresheet and my draft is in a few days. Is there any experienced scoresheet player willing to give me some tips? It would be much appreciated!
1. Read the rules closely. There are loopholes to be exploited and factors to account for that you otherwise won't know about.
2. Don't forget about defense.
3. OBP, OBP, OBP (plus SLG).
4. Draft more pitchers than you think you need. You'll need them.
I can get fantasy opinions anywhere and everywhere. Now I can get more opinions here, too. Fine. But no big deal.
What BP, as a premier sabrmetric site, particularly could offer is research. What's the typical performance value of home field? Of the platoon advantage? What does 40-degree weather do to offense? 60-degree weather? (do I want to play Kyle Blanks this April or Matt LaPorta?) How many SBs can I expect from a lead-off hitter (2nd base usually unoccupied when he's on) as opposed to a guy batting second? (will find leadoff hitter on 2nd in front of him much more often) How strongly do saves correlate with wins? With run environment?
Goodness knows how many other useful questions you folks could research and answer. (thinking of and typing these took me @ 10 minutes) This is where you could offer fantasy value to me, not particularly offering opinions which I value less than what I get from PECOTA.
What would be amazing is a weekly column with the top 10 over-performing and under-performing players based on things like BABIP or whatever more advanced statistics you have to figure out that sort of thing. Basically, I want to know each week what players are gonna break out and what players are gonna come back to earth so that when I make trades and/or pick up players, I look like a genius and win my league.
There's a reason why BP ranks above the rest in their baseball analysis/coverage. Besides the statistical/mathematical elements of the site, you guys are never complacent; you're always working to better the BP brand and stuff like this can only strengthen the product. Can't wait until this all starts up!
Suggestion - can we call it something other than "Fantasy" so that my filter at work doesn't scream every time I accidentially click the Fantasy link? ;-)
Yes, I should be looking at it from home, but come on, I just received a hot trade offer and need to tools to research it over a "coffee break"....
We need printer friendly cheat sheets to take to our draft. I've used PFM the past couple years, but it is such a pain in the butt to print the PFM reports. Not to mention I have to flip through several sheets of paper to find what I may be looking for. So anyway, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, make some cheat sheets where I can get all the players on one, maybe two pieces of paper. I like the way Marc has been putting the players in tiers. That would be an ideal format I think.
I'll see what I can do about getting this done for you guys. Maybe just a straight list with the stats like Kevin Goldstein's Top 100? Then you can print it out?
One of the things the THT does that I love is the weekly waiver wire for both leagues. After each player they give a recommendation (should be owned in 10 team mixed, 8 team NL only, for example). I'd love to see something along those lines here.
This is great news. Can you please share with us your expected timeline for having SSSIM stats in PFM? The year-long focus will be much appreciated, but less useful if we're unable to leverage the SSSIM calculations based on PECOTA as an important piece of our information base from which to make drafting decisions. And as many here in the comments have pointed out, those drafts are happening right now. Thanks again for your attention to this.
Going to leave this in the other thread too, but I think you and the BP team deserve a public thank you. Your customers pointed out a problem, you recognized the time crunch and made it a priority, and you got it done in short order. And everyone was able to behave like adults throughout the discussion -- even on the Internet. If every business could run like this...
Heater is a great tool for fantasy (and fantasy writers). My only regret is that since Burnson and Co will be here on BP, my best kept secret will be out in the open for all my league competitors to discover. Phooey!
The Heater is a great addition, does that include the box scores they do everyday? Those are very nice. You can get all the scores & stats on one, two sheets of paper.
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Great news, Marc.
Any idea what this means for John's and Rob's contributions to HardballTimes.com? I've enjoyed their writing over there too.