Not Another Jose Quintana Article!

     Even though he’s gone to greener pastures, we had another article queued up…

This one isn’t exactly about how slick Quintana is. Rather, it speaks to the vagaries of Internet Fantasy Baseball. As mentioned awhile back, Fangraphs runs the “Stream, Stream Stream” column for weekly leaguers where they try to identify under-owned, upcoming two-starters. This week’s top pick happens to be Jose Quintana (of course). Where the columnist tends to pick up grief from the commentariat is not so much in the “He Sucks!” department but moreso the “Well, he’s not available in MY league!” peanut gallery.

So check out the headline:

Jose Quintana – 5.2% ESPN/32% Y!/72% own, 36% start CBS

5.2% in ESPN? Really? CBS leagues do tend to be deeper than the other two (a lot of NFBC-clone leagues get run there) but in this world of aggregated information it’s absolutely insane that one service has him owned 14x as often as other. Even more interesting: a service like CBS which is heavy with those NFBC-clone leagues should be less interested in Quintana because QS is not a category in NFBC. Quintana pitches on a team that scores few runs past fourth-in-the-order and thus makes it harder to pick up wins.

No, something else is going on here and I think I know what it is: CBS likely had Quintana ranked higher in its preseason rankings than did ESPN. Sio more CBS leagues rostered him because, hey, he’s the top pitcher on the board in round 15 or because Autodraft slurped him up. Quintana’s been fine, so nobody dropped him. In ESPN, fewer people had him to start with, and there was no compelling reason to pick him up.

It’s amazing, but true. Consider another source for player ratings, Mock Draft Central, and another player, Brandon Moss. Moss had dual OF/1B eligibility this season in every major format. Some stats:

2012, includes Majors and MLEs: 461 AB, .254, 29 HR, 73 RBI, 4 SB, 68 R, .314 OBP, .819 OPS

2013, Majors only: 446 AB, .256, 30 HR, 87 RBI, 4 SB, 73 R, .337 OBP, .859 OPS

Pretty consistent really. The AB are low because his OPS differential is about 250 points between facing righties (mashes) and lefties (mush). Still, if you put him on for another 450 AB in 2014 for his age-30 season to hit .250 with about 30 HR and the occasional steal, no one would laugh at you. 

What’s that worth?

Yahoo O-Rank: #194

Mock Draft Central: Spent March going in 50s and 60s overall. 

So in many Yahoo leagues, with 10 teams and 23-man rosters, he went undrafted. Anybody following MDC took him in the 11th round (10-team league) or the 8th round (14-team league) and figured they got huge value. Mendoza, a closet MDC guy, took him #156 in our league and felt he “had to”. In some sense, he did: My previous pick had been #127 (Jose Abreu) and Moss wasn’t getting by my #161/#168.

Moss is having a good year of course and should set personal bests in HR, RBI, and OBP. Mendoza has since sold him on. But here’s the neatest tidbit of all: Moss remains owned in only 91% of Yahoo leagues. In 9% of leagues, nobody seems to have room for a OF/1B-eligible who has already smashed 17 HR.

Gotta love O-Rank, kids.

Extra Bags, Profane, Blasphemous, Homophobic Edition: Can’t think a manager would get away with this today, but here’s Earl Weaver on Small Ball, via Mendoza:

“Team speed for chrissakes, you get fuckin’ goddamn little fleas on the fuckin’ bases, getting picked off, tryin’ to steal, gettin’ thrown out, takin’ runs away from you. Get them big cocksuckers that can hit the fuckin’ ball out the ballpark and ya can’t make any goddamn mistakes.”

(…and they say the people in today’s game are more outspoken than their forefathers–Ed.)