Tout Wars FAAB Report: Week of April 9

Welcome to the weekly Tout Wars FAAB report, on its new home right here on the Tout Wars site. Each week, we’ll review the free agent acquisitions from all five leagues, with commentary from a league member, as well as yours truly. We changed the timing of the weekly run to 1 PM ET every Sunday, with the report posted later that afternoon so you’ll have time to digest and apply to your own leagues. In addition, I’ll be joining Lawr Michaels and Justin Mason on the Tout Wars Hour on the FNTSY Network every Sunday at 3:20 PM ET to discuss the results.

You can find the complete list of Tout Warriors here. Everyone starts with 1000 FAAB units, less any penalty incurred by finishing below a designated point in the standings. This is a means of keeping everyone motivated to keep playing all season long. The minimum bid is $0. FAAB units can be traded as well as rebated for players released off the DL.

The report will list all winning bids along with unsuccessful tries and contingencies. This provides the maximum level of information to help gauge interest on the players.

The American and National League only formats are 12-team leagues, as is the new points-based head to head league, The Mixed Auction and Draft each have 15 clubs. All the leagues have four reserves with an unlimited DL, expect the head to head league, which allows six reserves.

The headings above each league are links to publicly accessible sites where you can see standings, roster and a complete review of transactions. The initial auctions and drafts can be found here.

AMERICAN LEAGUE

SUCCESSFUL BIDS

UNAWARDED BIDS

Mike Podhorzer’s Commentary

NATIONAL LEAGUE

SUCCESSFUL BIDS

UNAWARDED BIDS

Brian Walton’s Commentary

Based on Twitter dialogue among several Tout warriors on Sunday afternoon, some league members have not yet adapted to the new Sunday mid-day (or morning depending on your time zone) FAAB deadline. Routines will eventually change, but for this week, just eight of 12 owners placed bids.

Pitching was the primary target. That was not surprising, since as of Saturday night, no hitter who had more than nine at-bats this past week was available on the waiver wire, with most on top being catchers.

Milwaukee’s Matt Albers fetched the most money, $48 from BaseballHQ’s Phil Hertz. With Corey Knebel out for at least six weeks, the dreaded closer by committee was the initial announcement by manager Craig Counsell. Jacob Barnes (who I had acquired earlier for this very opportunity) was given the first shot on Saturday, but was victimized by atrocious defense from his Brew Crew teammates. Maybe Albers will be next, but unless he strikes out the side, his chances are questionable.

Reborn Tyson Ross is back with San Diego and was picked up for $25 by ESPN’s Tristan H. Cockcroft. Tristan, by the way, maintains a valuable resource for all readers, tracking multiple pitching starts in the week ahead. Ross has a tough outing against Houston on Sunday, but Cockcroft will not take that hit. He will get a much more favorable home outing for Ross against the Giants on Friday. This is an example of why Tristan has three NL Tout titles on his resume.

Hertz was also the winning bidder for Mets right-hander Robert Gsellman, at $21. A starter last season, Gsellman is pitching in long relief in 2018, and so far, so good. In four innings over four games, the 24-year old has allowed just two hits, no walks and has fanned an impressive eight.

The lone position player to fetch multiple digits in this week’s bidding was Washington catcher Pedro Severino, going to Lenny Melnick for $11. With Matt Wieters out (not on Melnick’s roster), Severino took the lead role over the weekend and offers better defense than veteran Miguel Montero, who was away from the club for a personal matter. Once Montero returns, we will have to watch how the playing time is doled out by first-year skipper Dave Martinez.

Todd’s Take

I’ll second Brian’s recommendation to check out Tristan’s revamped Forecaster, free on ESPN. Instead of a weekly schedule, Tristan will maintain a rolling schedule for the next 10 days, for both probable pitchers and hitting matchups. There’s a permanent link for each on every ESPN fantasy baseball web page.

I’m still looking to upgrade my hitting, but as you can see by the predominance of reserve catchers in the report, bats were scant this week. I’m sporting the low stack in terms of FAAB, so I’m planning on being aggressive.

MIXED LEAGUE AUCTION

SUCCESSFUL BIDS

UNAWARDED BIDS

Bret Sayre’s Commentary

The biggest takeaway from this week’s FAAB bidding was that there were two unresolved closer situations still in the process of working itself out, and did so to the tune of around 400 units. Los Angeles is the more clear-cut situation, where Middleton looks to be the guy for right now. He already got one save in replacement of Blake Parker, and would have gotten another on Friday if Kole Calhoun hadn’t scored on a wild pitch to raise a three-run lead to a four-run one. Scott Swanay’s bid (215) certainly trumped mine (78) by quite a bit, but my hesitancy comes from the fact that there’s really no telling what Mike Scioscia will be doing here by the end of April. Middleton may be the guy almost guaranteed to get the next save situation, but what happens when he inevitably blows one? In Milwaukee, it’s completely up in the air and both Albers and Jeffress were added this week (making five Brewers’ relievers rostered in this league, amazingly). That number should go down to three by the next run of FAAB. I still think this ends up Jacob Barnes’ job, despite the ugly performance over the weekend, but with Corey Knebel likely to be back before Memorial Day, it’ll be a short-lived prize.

The other two big moves if the week were two west coast hitters, one significantly more well-known than the other. Ohtani, the hitter, had a strong showing last week and is now up to a .389 average and three homers. But more significantly, he started three games in a row. If he’s going to start consistently (except for the day he pitches and the day before), the hitter version of him could hold more value than most of us anticipated. I still think the Angels will slow this down a little when Ian Kinsler returns, as won’t be able to continue playing Luis Valbuena and Albert Pujols every day, but those of us who estimated he’d get around 250-300 at-bats, may surprisingly end up a little light on the estimate. My biggest move was grabbing Valbuena, who has also made the most of his playing time in Kinsler’s absence—hitting .308 with two homers since the second baseman hit the DL. He shouldn’t be near the lineup against lefties, but can still show 25-homer pop against righties. I’ll have to hope my third base position doesn’t go full Spinal Tap drummer on me, as I’ve already lost my starter (Justin Turner) and his replacement (Jedd Gyorko) to the infirmary. Villanueva was the other, but he hasn’t done much outside his magical three-homer game. The Padres should give him a good run at third base to see what they have, but that may require the dispossession of hitless Chase Headley. His upside in a mixed league still remains questionable.

Todd’s Take

Scoop time — one of my Twitter followers has it on good authority Ohtani is pronounced OH-tuh-nee, not oh-TAH-nee.

Either way, I’m not as confident as Bret he’ll be mixed-league worthy. At best, he’ll bat three times a week. If he pitches on Day 1, he’ll hit on Days 2,3 and 4. There will be times a southpaw is scheduled, likely leaving Ohtani on the pine.  I’m sorry, but three, sometimes four games a week won’t get it done.

MIXED DRAFT LEAGUE

SUCCESSFUL BIDS

UNAWARDED BIDS

Todd’s Take

It’s no surprise closers dominated bidding. Some are pointing to the early scuffles of Kenley Jansen and the unfortunate injury to Corey Knebel as proof positive never to pay for saves. OK, that’s fine. However, riddle me this? Who’s closing for the Angels? Or Brewers? You can take your chance on the perceived safe choices, or you can throw darts in FAAB. There’s no right answer.

I’m curious how the Rays will treat Yonny Chirinos. It appears he’s now one of the four regular starters, and not someone paraded out during the bullpen day. As a regular starter, Chirinos is mixed-league worthy, but temper expectations. The 24-year old righty isn’t dominant, but he won’t beat himself.

HEAD TO HEAD MIXED AUCTION

SUCCESSFUL BIDS

UNAWARDED BIDS

Todd’s Take

Still being convinced pitching is the road to victory in this head to head scoring, I’m all in with the Tyler Skaggs bid from Rotowire’s Clay Link. It’s not a play for this week as Skagg’s has just one start, lined up in Texas on Tuesday, not the easiest place to pitch. To me, this is a bet a healthy Skaggs has the break out many expect. So far, so good as he’s whiffed 10 with two walks in 11 stanzas to open the 2018 campaign.