{"id":967,"date":"2013-08-26T15:16:05","date_gmt":"2013-08-26T19:16:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/?p=967"},"modified":"2013-08-26T15:16:05","modified_gmt":"2013-08-26T19:16:05","slug":"fantasy-baseball-bests-in-week-21","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/2013\/08\/26\/fantasy-baseball-bests-in-week-21\/","title":{"rendered":"Fantasy Baseball Bests in Week 21"},"content":{"rendered":"

Looking at this week’s top fantasy players, format greatly affects the ordering. In the shallow 5×5 Mixed League<\/a>,\u00a0Adam Wainwright<\/a>\u00a0is a clear MVP, and pitchers occupy 5 of the top 6 slots.
\nWainwright was dominant in two wins, with a 1.12 ERA, 0.750 WHIP, and 20 Ks in 16 IP, earning $59.66 on the week, beating the Cubs and tossing a complete game against the Braves. His was also the top week in the deeper 5×5 NL only<\/a> league, at $40.39, and he was runner-up to\u00a0Will Venable<\/a>\u00a0in the 4×4 NL only<\/a>\u00a0league.
\nMarlins’ rookie star\u00a0Jose Fernandez<\/a>\u00a0had the second-best mixed-league RotoValue at $49.24, as he also won both his starts, and posted a 0.846 WHIP, 0.69 ERA, and 16 Ks in 13 IP.
\nEvan Longoria<\/a>\u00a0edged out\u00a0Max Scherzer<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Jarrod Parker<\/a>\u00a0for the third-best week. Longoria, the only hitter in the top 6, hit .393 with 5 HR, 6 R, and 7 RBI, earning $47.84, just ahead of Scherzer ($47.20; 1.29 ERA, 0.857 WHIP, 15 Ks, 2 W in 14 IP) and Parker ($46.60; 1.06 ERA, 0.941 WHIP, 13 Ks, 2 W in 17 IP).
\nBut while pitchers dominated the shallow 5×5 mixed league, they ranked much lower in the deeper single-league pools, especially in the 4×4 format. This shouldn’t be surprising that starters are relatively more valuable in a 5×5 than a 4×4: because saves and wins are negatively correlated (in plain English, pitchers who get lots of wins don’t get saves, and vice-versa), a pitcher really only helps you in at most 3 categories of a 4×4 league. But add in strikeouts, and a good starter can help a lot in 4 of 5 categories (and this also explains why closers are worth more in 4×4 than 5×5: their strikeout totals are nowhere near top starters’ numbers).
\nIn the deeper 4×4 NL only<\/a>\u00a0league,\u00a0Will Venable<\/a>\u00a0was once again<\/a> NL fantasy MVP, as he hit .355 with 3 HR, 5 R, 6 RBI, and 1 SB to earn $39.09, ahead of Wainwright’s runner-up $37.63 RotoValue, followed by Phillies teammates\u00a0Carlos Ruiz<\/a>\u00a0($36.42; .517, 2 HR, 6 RBI) and\u00a0Darin Ruf<\/a>\u00a0($36.31; .286, 4 HR, 7 RBI).
\nVenable’s stats earned $37.62 in the 5×5 NL<\/a>, second\u00a0behind Wainwright ($40.39).\u00a0Both Ruiz ($36.87) and Ruf ($35.56) scored 5 runs on the week, and so in 5×5 rankings they both fall behind\u00a0Adam Eaton<\/a>\u00a0($36.90; .361, 1 HR, 7 R, 7 RBI, 1 SB), and Ruf also drops behind\u00a0Khris Davis<\/a>\u00a0($36.60; .440, 3 H, 6 R, 6 RBI) into a tie with\u00a0Carlos Beltran<\/a>\u00a0($35.56; .361, 3 HR, 6 R, 6 RBI). Why did Ruiz’s value rise slightly while Ruf’s dropped, even though both scored the same number of runs? Because of positional eligibility – a player is compared to the replacement-level at his position, and replacement level catchers’ value drops in a 5×5 setting compared to outfielders.
\nWainwright easily led NL pitchers in both formats, but in the 4×4 NL<\/a>,\u00a0Jeff Samardzija<\/a>\u00a0earned $34.66 to rank 2nd ahead of\u00a0Jose Fernandez<\/a>\u00a0($33.88). Samardzija won twice with a 1.59 ERA, 0.882 WHIP, and 12 Ks in 17 IP, earning $32.02 in the 5×5 NL<\/a>\u00a0to rank 3rd behind Fernandez, at $34.52 and well behind Wainwright’s $40.39. Wainwright’s 4×4 value was $37.63, as his league-leading 20 Ks did not factor into the valuation there.\u00a0Jonathan Papelbon<\/a>\u00a0had the best NL week among relievers ($30.13 in 4×4, and $22.50 in 5×5), as he notched 2 wins, a save, a 1.00 WHIP, and 4 Ks in 4 scoreless innings to beat out Huston Street ($27.83 in 5×5, $20.78 in 4×4), who had 1 win, 2 saves, 4 Ks, and a 0.75 WHIP in his 4 scoreless innings on the week.
\nIn the AL only leagues,\u00a0Evan Longoria<\/a>\u00a0earned $39.76 to edge out\u00a0Austin Jackson<\/a>\u00a0($39.27; .438, 2 HR, 9 R, 7 RBI) as MVP in the 5×5 AL only<\/a>, and his $43.58 RotoValue bested\u00a0Miguel Cabrera<\/a>\u00a0($42.26; .379, 3 HR, 5 R, 11 RBI) and\u00a0Adam Jones<\/a>\u00a0($42.25; .310, 3 HR, 4 R, 8 RBI, 2 SB) in the 4×4 AL only<\/a> league.
\nMax Scherzer<\/a>\u00a0was the most valuable pitcher in\u00a05×5 AL only<\/a>\u00a0at $35.27, but that ranked him just 5th among all AL players in that format. And when not counting strikeouts, Scherzer dropped to 3rd best pitcher in the 4×4 AL only<\/a> league with a $34.39 RotoValue, behind\u00a0Jarrod Parker<\/a>\u00a0($36.09; 1.06 ERA, 0.941 WHIP, 13 Ks, 2 W in 17 IP) and\u00a0Jon Lester<\/a>\u00a0($35.86; 0.57 ERA, 0.957 WHIP, 9 Ks, 2 W in 15.67 IP).
\nThe AL’s top reliever for the week was again\u00a0Addison Reed<\/a>, who followed up his stellar week 20<\/a> by earning $20.90 in the\u00a05×5 AL only<\/a>\u00a0league and $28.36 in the\u00a04×4 AL only<\/a>\u00a0league after posting 5 saves 4 Ks, and a 0.600 WHIP in 5 scoreless innings. Close behind Reed was the ageless\u00a0Mariano Rivera<\/a>, who earned $27.21 in the 4×4 and $19.16 in the 5×5 with 3 saves, 1 win, 3 Ks, a 1.071 WHIP, and a 0.00 ERA in 4.67 IP.
\nFinally, although\u00a0Will Venable<\/a>\u00a0and Addison Reed<\/a>\u00a0continued their hot streaks,\u00a0despite being even more dominant last week,\u00a0Alfonso Soriano<\/a>\u00a0mostly crashed back to earth, following up an all-around monster week of\u00a0.484, 5 HR, 9 R, 18 RBI, and 2 SB with a less-than-stellar .125, 1 HR, 2 R, 3 RBI, and 1 SB. Soriano’s much weaker stats still had positive value in the deep AL-only formats, earning $7.01 in the 5×5 and $7.23 in the 4×4, but in the much shallower 5×5 mixed league, he had negative value.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Looking at this week’s top fantasy players, format greatly affects the ordering. In the shallow 5×5 Mixed League,\u00a0Adam Wainwright\u00a0is a clear MVP, and pitchers occupy 5 of the top 6 slots. Wainwright was dominant in two wins, with a 1.12 ERA, 0.750 WHIP, and 20 Ks in 16 IP, earning $59.66 on the week, beating… Continue reading Fantasy Baseball Bests in Week 21<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[16,9,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/967"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=967"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/967\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rotovalue.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}