In this day and age it is extremely easy to find a multitude of projections surrounding a player’s 2012 successes or failures. A jaunt over to FanGraphs or googling a ZIP can provide quick answers. What will a player’s OBA be? How many WAR will he produce?
Different View
Fantasy baseball is sometimes thought of as the ugly step child to sabermetrics. Standard leagues use stats such as batting average, RBI, wins & ERA.
While many look down their noses at these stats, they are still important in the eyes of the average baseball fan.
Mock Drafts have their own set of problems (gaming competitors, trying out strategies, etc.), yet they can still form a consensus to a player’s 2012 seasonal value.
This past week the Fantasy Sports Trade Association conference took place in Las Vegas. Sirius XM invited many of the top fantasy experts and publications to take part in their yearly Mock Draft. The full results can be seen here (.xlsx format). Below are the draft positions of a few Jays bounce back candidates, Adam Lind & Colby Rasmus. Each round of a draft consists of 12 picks.
2012 Sirius XM Experts Draft
- Rasmus 15th Round, in front of OF Austin Jackson, behind Rios
- Lind: 18th Round, in front of 1B Gaby Sanchez, behind Justin Smoak
2011 Sirius XM Results
- Rasmus 6th round, behind Pence, in front of Victorino
- Lind 17th Round, in front of Barton, behind Adam LaRoche
Viewpoint
Expectations have been tempered on Colby but it appears that he hasn’t been completely written off by the Fantasy community. Another experts draft (MDC, November) saw Rasmus come off the board in the 11th round.
Rasmus hovers around Carlos Quentin (pre-trade) in most OF fantasy rankings. Standard statistical predictions include a .250 BA with 20-ish HR.
Predictions on Lind’s 2012 output are similar to 2011, with a similar .250-ish BA and 25 HR
What do you think?
Are the expectations too low, too high or reasonable on both Adam Lind & Colby Rasmus?
