Episode 316: Main Event Victory Lap

We did it! In our very first try at the NFBC Main Event, we finished 121st out of 855 entries, which sounds mildly impressive at best. But more to the point, we won our league, completing a dramatic reversal of our early-season misfortunes (well documented in earlier episodes). After briefly patting ourselves on the back, we look at the 2024 season through the lens of our draft, our waiver pickups, and our in-season management. We make some overall observations about the strange run environment of 2024, and the particular quirks of the Main Event competition. 

Mike mentions his excellent BP article from June, "Even Rutherford B. Hayes Made History," which you can find here: https://www.baseballprospectus.com/fantasy/article/91878/even-rutherford-b-hayes-made-history/

Thanks, everyone, for listening during the 2024 fantasy season! We will have some fun podcasts over the next few months (hopefully with a few Very Special Guests) before we get back to our positional previews for 2025 in January.

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy" or visit our Twitter feed @baseballpro. 

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Twitter @FlagsFlyBP. The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund.

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:19):
Welcome to episode three sixteen of Flags Fly Forever, a
Baseball Perspective fantasy baseball podcast on Mike Jianella and with
me as always is John Haklan. John, how are you well.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
I'm in my office here and there are seven extremely
rambunctious five week old kittens who may or may not
interrupt the show. So that's how I am. That's wow.

Speaker 1 (00:46):
The state of affairs, your your commitment, your commitment to
an homage of the Detroit Tigers today is amazing.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
That that was. That was a pro move there.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
Wait, thank you.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Shifted to baseball. I'm great. How are you, Mike?

Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm okay, although I'm watching the Mets as we're recording this.
The Mets have gone from being up three to two
to down five to three in Game two of the
wild Card round, so I'm not particularly happy. Although a
week ago, you know, I was wondering if to make
the playoffs, so you just kind of got to roll
with it in October. And that's actually another good segue.

(01:22):
So we're going to talk tonight mostly about fantasy baseball,
and primarily about our main event team, What happened takeaways.
John and I were talking earlier today about how we think
it's important not to just kind of sweep that under
the rug, like we don't want to enable gays and
say look at us, but we do want to kind
of take what happened to us and hope you can

(01:43):
apply it to some of your leagues and experiences. But
I did want to start with with, you know, kind
of a point about playoff baseball. So you know, as
many of you know by now, and you'll hear this
at the end of the week, the Mets and the
Braves they kind of got stuck in a weird situation where,
you know, they had to play a game one sixty one,

(02:06):
one sixty two after everybody else's season was over. And
it was even weirder because essentially a split meant that
both of them were in and that the Diamondbacks were out,
and that that's what wound up happening. And I'm going
to say, and I think this is kind of a
hot take. I think some people were bothered by this,
And I have two takes. One is that the Mets

(02:29):
are Braves should have won more games if they didn't
want to be in that position, if that makes any sense,
like they're they're the bottom. There were the bottom teams
in the National League, and it's like, well, I mean,
it stinks that you wound up in that position, but
if you had won four or five more games, you
wouldn't have been there. But this ties into my second take,
which is kind of interesting, and this is more of
a question that I haven't heard an answer for, which

(02:50):
is okay, so what if instead of the Mets, it
had been the Phillies, and the Phillies with the record
they had. So what I'm asking is seasons over hurricane
wipes that two games the Phillies who have a bye,
do they have to go to Atlanta in this scenario
and play two games that mean nothing to them and
lose a day off their bye. I guess the answer

(03:13):
is yes. But they did really feel right, So but
that doesn't really feel great, does it.

Speaker 2 (03:20):
It just it was it was fortunate from a pr standpoint.
I guess that the two teams that happened to be
you know, rained out for two games or hurricaned out
were two teams you know, that were scrapping for the
last or two of the three teams that were scrapping
for the last two wildcard spots. So that made it

(03:42):
I mean, that that was sort of making lemonade out
of lemons. I mean, initially, I was pretty annoyed at
the lack of foresight. I mean, we had talked about
this a little bit via text, but obviously they couldn't
know the exact track that the the hurricane would take.
But it seems like there were other options in play

(04:05):
to get those games. If with enough foresight, it could
have made alternative arrangements. And you know, the likeliest, most
feasible would have been to play them at a neutral site.
They didn't do that, and so we got the Monday doubleheader.
But my once that was locked in, I got irrationally

(04:30):
excited about it because it was it was so weird,
and it was you know, the closest thing would be
the game one sixty three is that we used to have. Yeah,
and and the dynamic was weird, and you know the
fact that the gay the first game really was was it,
you know, for the team that wanted and then the second,

(04:51):
you know, the second game was very anticlimactic. But yeah,
it's it's fine. I'm glad it happened this way because
I think, you know, to your point about another scenario
where a team that had no stake in it had
to play these extra games just to determine if the
other team would make it in the playoffs. Would have

(05:11):
been very uncomfortable from a pr standpoint.

Speaker 1 (05:15):
Yeah, if it was a team that was eliminated, it
would have been annoying to that team, but it wouldn't
have mattered it just like, well whatever. And you know
we've had that happen in Major League Baseball in the past,
but I think that would have been the nightmare scenario,
like a team with a buy or you know, even
worse like the Brewers or Padres who were in playing
in that round and have to fly, you know, somewhere

(05:38):
else to play two games that all are meaningless to
them but take away from their own preparation in the
first round. And you kind of hit that out on
the head of something I was thinking, which is I
love those game one sixty threes. And I know Major
League Baseball would never do this, but in that scenario,
it almost seems like the better thing to have done

(05:58):
rather than like send like like a higher seed to
play you know, those games for seeding, is let the
let the Braves and the Diamondbacks play each other in
one game and be like Okay, like in reality that
this is the game, like that this is kind of
the play in game, since we had this unfortunate situation
with the hurricane putting aside, you know what happened, and

(06:19):
you know, just saying it was an act of god,
you know, just don't make a team that's writing in
the playoffs kind of have to go through this charad,
you know, because of what happened. To doing an act
of god, it won't happen. But but I feel like
that's almost the better solution, as an elegant as it
might seem, rather than making a higher seed suffer. This

(06:39):
is all for psypothetical because it didn't play out that way.

Speaker 2 (06:42):
Well, two things, I mean, one one is that and
I don't remember who made this point on Blue Sky,
and I'd written a little bit about kind of climate
change in baseball a couple of years ago on the site.
But strange weather events are going to be more and

(07:03):
not less frequent moving forward. And you know, one of
the ways in which climate change is affecting the baseball
schedule is that, you know, hurricane seasons are longer now,
and I believe they start earlier, and the hurricanes are
are more severe. So on the one hand, you could say, well,

(07:25):
this is a you know, act of god one off
won't happen again. On the other hand, some other weird
weather bullshit is going to happen. And you know, I mean,
I just don't think that MLB is being at all.
We've for you know, progressive about thinking about this. They
just react to things.

Speaker 1 (07:43):
Well, yeah they I mean, you know, we know, like
money is their main consideration. I don't I don't think
they really care that much. You know. The thing I
was thinking about as you were talking about that, where
the wildfires you know, a couple of years ago, and
the smoke and delays due to that, and yeah, sure,
right without running through every single example, these things are
going to happen more, not less. One of the solutions is,

(08:06):
you know, I was texting with Tristan Cockrof at VSPN
about this too. After the season shorter regular season, you know,
had a more runway. But we know, of course that's
that's not going to happen. So so really, I think
a lot of this is just hypothetical pie on the
size sky stuff. I think we both agree the last
day was fun as it actually you know, played out

(08:29):
the way it did, and just just because of the
way the records were set up. I mean, it wasn't
great for the Diamondbacks, but it probably was the best scenario.
I think. One final point before we leave this under
the old like you know, play in game one sixty
three scenario, it would have been a three way tie
between you know, the last three teams and it would

(08:50):
have been that like Club A through C designation. And
we never actually saw this happen. It's a tiebreak that
was in placement ever happened where two games games, three teams,
two teams get in and they kind of get to
pick and choose like whether they want to play twice
or once or be on the road, and you know,
lots of gamesman ship and whatnot. Of course, if that

(09:10):
were the case, I think obviously the Mets well tried
a lot harder to win the second game and just
get into the playoffs and not get into that tiebreaker chaos.

Speaker 2 (09:18):
Right right, And I will say, you know, to shift.
This was the other thing I was going to say
is that in spite of the chaos and the you know,
arguably poor planning from from MLB that first game was
I think maybe the Game of the year certainly in
my you know, given the stakes and just given the

(09:40):
you know, the dramatic turnarounds.

Speaker 1 (09:44):
In the.

Speaker 2 (09:46):
You know, in the win probability during the game. Uh yeah,
I mean I will never forget watching that game. I
mean I watched most of it in a in a
coffee shop where I was nominally trying to get work done,
but not that really wasn't happening. But yeah, it's an
incredible game and very exciting, and especially for the Mets

(10:09):
fans out there, such as yourself.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
But yeah, no, I mean or MVP, well it will be.
I mean as far as segues go, Well, I don't know.
I think it's even as a Mets fan, I think
it's really hard not to give it to show Heo Toani.
And the weird the weird argument there too is that Otani,

(10:34):
like you can say, well, he's going to do it
as a hitter and pitcher, assuming he can you know,
continue pitching an elite level for many, many years. This
is a year to give it to somebody else. I
just really have a hard time looking at that fifty
to fifty season and seeing anyone else do it. And
this is the segue to fantasy, right, so we, you know,

(10:55):
to to kind of not bury the lead. We won
our main event bracket. We did not win the overall.
I'm assuming that everybody listening knows what the main event is.
We don't have to explain it. We came in what
like one hundred and twenty first, twenty first, so we
weren't close, although given where we were after the first
six weeks, I think our modest goal was to get

(11:18):
into the top one hundred. We didn't quite get there.
But between winning our bracket and game to where we got,
we're pretty happy with the outcome. And the segue is
we didn't we didn't draft Otani, the guy chasing us,
who also a bit of a comeback of his own
in the bracket did.

Speaker 2 (11:36):
Yeah, no and that, and I gotta tell you that
is not super fun when you're watching the games and
the stats and knowing the other player as a Tony,
especially about Tany's playing a late game, you know, a
West Coast night game, and just sort of bracing yourself.
And I think we were of the opinion that a

(11:59):
night where Tawny I think one of the Knights in Colorado,
I'm not sure, or maybe the series before I can't remember.
I think he went like three for five with a
steal but no home runs, and I think we were
both like, we'll take it. We'll take it, because steals
were one of the categories where your neck and neck
with this.

Speaker 1 (12:19):
Well. Yeah. The other thing was, you know, he had
a ten RBI game and you know, just just completely
went off. And it's not like he's going to do
that every night, but it's that demoralizing feeling of you know,
he he just felt like a cheat code, like it
seemed at one point that he was gonna shoot to
get to sixty sixty the way he was going at
the end of the season. And you can say it

(12:40):
helped he was playing the Rockies a lot, and that's
certainly true, but you know, lots of player, lots of
players get to in the Anna West get to play
the Rockies a lot, and that's they're not doing that.

Speaker 2 (12:51):
Yeah, And I will say, you know, I was being
facetious when I was saying Lindor was MVP. It would
be nice he had an MVP quality season, but you know,
I f wour here Atani eat him by one point
three war.

Speaker 1 (13:05):
So and that that you know, and that Bison defense,
and it's I get it, like there's a lot to
be said for Lindor's season. He had a great year,
but yeah, it's hard to as much as I'd love
to make the argument for him as as a Mets fan,
it's it's hard to make that argument with too much
of a straight face. But you know, Lindor was was

(13:26):
one of our like main event centerpieces. We didn't take
him in the first round. That was Corbyn Carroll, who
if you've heard this podcast once in the last few months,
you've you've heard us talk plenty about Corbyn Carroll, But
we didn't talk nearly as much about Lindor who, who
we took in the third round, who also got off
to a bad start. And you know, we heard a

(13:49):
couple of hot takes, like not from us, from other
people talking about how he was going to be a disappointment.
I heard a guest on on one of the Rod
to Wire podcasts say, yeah, I was ready to avoid him.
He was a fade. See I told you so, he
can't possibly return better than you know, fifth or sixth
round value now and and and that's just not true.

(14:09):
Like he returned. You know, it looks like in a
fifteen team league like late first round value.

Speaker 2 (14:15):
Hmm, yeah, I don't think. You know, it's it's really
hard to overstate how demoralized we were. I mean, you
can go back, maybe I'll pull some clips from an
April or May podcast and throw them in here, but
you know, we were we were very close to the

(14:35):
we were in the eight hundreds. We were like, you know,
we were on the same screen as the very bottom
team main event in the overall and you know, I
am very I'll just say it. I'm I'm really proud
of how we you know, how we worked throughout the season,

(14:56):
but also I think how we I think, I mean,
it's not a league where you can trade anyway, so
we kind of had what we had. But I don't
I think we both realized that, you know, we liked
more or less, we liked the team we drafted, and
you know, we had to just trust that a lot

(15:18):
of these players, even Corbyn Carroll, were going to come good.

Speaker 1 (15:23):
Yeah, and you know, it's funny, we didn't really everybody
makes mistakes, but we didn't really do anything like wrong.
And some of it was part of the reason off
to the slow start was our plan was to draft
a lot of players. I was a plan per se,
but we drafted a lot of players who were out

(15:44):
at the beginning of the year. They were kind of
no knowns where it's like, Okay, we know Josh low'shert,
we know Jad Martinez signed late, he's not likely to
start with the team. We drafted Kyle Bradish, we know
he's going to start late. He's got an injury, but
we'll hope we'd be back the next month month and
a half. So so that was part of it, Like
part of it was we kind of baked in a

(16:05):
bad start. I think the surprise for us was how
absolutely bad the start was. And some of that was
you know, when you draft a bunch of players who
are hurt or missing and you have you know, Carol
Or Lindor and you know May Machada who also got
off to a slow start, that that's just what you're doing.
You're you're pretty much explaining what's happening there.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
Yeah, but yeah, I mean I take that point. I
sort of think the only player that we were kind
of targeting that we knew wasn't going to start on
time was Blake Snell.

Speaker 1 (16:38):
And yeah, that's true.

Speaker 2 (16:40):
You know, a lot of the rest. I think, you know,
and this is maybe a process thing as well. We
I think maybe, and I think you said this, that
maybe we went one more of these players than we
should have, you know, so we would get to point
in the draft where objectively Josh Lowe was a great

(17:03):
bargain or objectively Kyle Bradish was a great bargain, and
you know, we took those bargains. And I don't know
that any one player would have made a huge difference,
but I think we might have dipped into that pool
a little a little too heavily. I mean, it worked
out okay, you know, as far as winning the league,

(17:23):
but you know it was a reason for that slow start.

Speaker 1 (17:27):
Well well it's the other thing too, which is when
you do that, like every time you take a player
like that, it decreases your mar margin for air everywhere else. Sure,
you know, So for example, like Nolan Gordman, who I
was a big fan of and I probably would have
taken earlier than we actually did, kind of went right
around his his ADP. I was made of an ADP.

(17:48):
It was like his earlier ADP of two o four.
I mean, he was really great for a month, but
you know, we can honestly say he didn't work out.
Our second closer, Jose Alvarado, I mean, he was decent
for a while, but he we took him in the
tenth round. You know, he really didn't work out. I'm
not going to go through like every single one of
these picks, but that's what it is, which is when

(18:10):
when you have a known where it's like, okay, like
we're gonna be missing this player, begetting nothing and there's
a double cost too, right, which is with nearly all
of these players, we weren't going to say with Josh Low,
for example, well, you know it's been two crummy it's
been two weeks he hasn't come out, and you know,
two crummy weeks to start, we're dropping him. It's like, no,

(18:32):
we're pretty committed. We're pretty committed. Like the like the
plan here, and I still haven't like calculated valuations, but
the plan here is to get value out of Low.
The plan was to get value out of Blake Blake's now,
which we didn't. But but I find I find it
really interesting. And this is one of the things like
that I noticed with a lot of my teams this year,

(18:52):
whether it was main event, whether it was toat Wars
where I finished tied for second, whether it was Labor
where I think I finished like fifth or six h
A lot of comebacks, and some of that was just patients.
Something I've noticed from listening to I don't know. I
think I listened to more like I don't want to
say competing, but like other fantasy podcasts than you.

Speaker 2 (19:14):
Do, you definitely do.

Speaker 1 (19:16):
Yeah. So I think the approach on a lot of
these podcasts is this week right, and some of them
it's even like you know this day, and what you're
really hearing a lot is like this player is a
great pickup. You know that this player is a good addition,
this player, add this player, you know, add this starter
stream the starting pitcher. Yes, that's important, and I don't

(19:37):
want to minimize that, but many times the right decision
is to sit on a player. It's not the greatest advice.
That's is the great thing is. It's not the sexiest advice.
It's not the advice you want to hear. It's probably
not the thing that brings like ears to a podcast
or eyes to a website, But in deeper leagues, like
the main event, it's the most sensible course of action.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
Typically, I like the idea that we're gonna, you know,
because our livelihoods don't depend upon this podcast that you know,
next year we should have just this weekly series of
ten minute podcasts where you just you know, go through
a list of players and say, yeah, that's a hold. Yeah,

(20:20):
I would just stick with that player and see what
kind of see what see you know, watches do numbers.

Speaker 1 (20:26):
And we you know, well, you'll be wrong occasionally, because
you know, sometimes there are situations where where you should
pick somebody up or you should take a chance. And
I think that this is sort of the weird balance too, right,
Like we one nice problem that we had in the
main event is our outfield was was pretty loaded, especially
after we got Brandon Nemo early. But could we have

(20:51):
you know, used Lawrence Butler or you know, could could
we have used Jerks and Profile? Like Jerks and Profile
I think would have been a better addition than Nimo.
I'm not you know, going back in time and trying
to you know, ret con our season. I'm just more
pointing out it's always that thing of like generally holding
is a good idea, but but one thing I'd like
to do a little bit better in than main event

(21:13):
next year is and I think we can do it
if we don't have all these you know, injured players
or players who haven't started yet. Is have like a
roster spot or two more of like a stash more
is like okay, let's let's pick up this player and
see what happens. That that's one place where we're stuck
early in the year in particular.

Speaker 2 (21:32):
Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, Roster flexibility was definitely an issue. You know,
everyone listening probably knows that the NFBC contests have seven
bench spots but no il spots, so you really have
to do make tough decisions. And you know, I think

(21:52):
we felt that many weeks, like as you're saying, where
clearly the best or you know, maybe three of the
top five best offensive players available were outfielders, and you
know they they were they were good, and they would
have been good pickups, but there was no way that
they were going to, you know, be in our starting roster.

(22:16):
So we we were forced to well, you know, get
most of our pickups from from infield and catcher spots.

Speaker 1 (22:23):
Noll. The other the other problem too is like you know,
we took Cub Bradish in the twenty sixth round, you know,
off his preseason injury at a really deep discount, and
it was kind of like, well, we're not going to
drop him, like we're we're waiting for the discount. And
you know, same same thing with you know, Niclodolo, like
a little bit higher in the draft, but we're waiting
for the discount. And I think it's okay to do

(22:46):
that with one or two players. And this is the
other side of this too, And this goes back to
kind of the whole rise and grind and daily or
weekly mentality. I having done the main event now I
hear a lot of talk about how you have to
be nimbly, you have to be flexible, have to like
you know, like churn and burn, and that that's true,
but there is a balance. I think the other side

(23:07):
of this is there are players that you can and
should hold on to, like it doesn't necessarily make sense,
both from a fab like budgeting, you know, management perspective
as well as from a roster perspective like Okay, I'm
going to spend five or ten dollars on this one
streamer this week, you know, to to run out there
because he's got a favorable matchup against the White Sox.

(23:30):
Could it work? Sure? Is it the way you want to,
you know, manage your roster and manage your fab Probably not.

Speaker 2 (23:39):
So I want to ask you a question that just
occurred to me. Do you do you feel like.

Speaker 1 (23:45):
The and I we.

Speaker 2 (23:47):
Could easily find this out. I just didn't didn't think
to look before we started recording. But my sense was
that the offense was way way down in April and May,
I'm talking league wide, and then starting around June it
picked up and and maybe was kind of closer to

(24:11):
normal levels or at least sort of whatever we consider
normal and the kind of recent you know, the last
decade or so. Did you feel like that was that
was the case, because there were a lot of stories
in like May and June about the you know, the
historically low offense and it turned out to be a
low year. But I wouldn't. I don't think it ended

(24:31):
up being a historically low year. And you know, I
wonder too how much of our you know that that
some of our players were just you know, sort of
on that part of that phenomenon. Like there are reasons
I think why Carol got off to a slow start,
But you know, Lindor Machado, Schwarber, all of them had

(24:55):
low or semi slows.

Speaker 1 (24:56):
Even even Aaron Judge, who we didn't have. You know,
he had like a like a w RC plus of
like one thirteen, which is funny because that's an above
average start. But if he did that for the whole season,
I think the people who drafted him would have been
pretty annoyed. So, yes, there was a lot of that.
Of course, you know the nature of a weighted metric

(25:18):
is you know, some people obviously had good starts. But
to answer your contextual question, you are absolutely right, and
I feel like you teed me off because I don't
know if you remember, I wrote a piece. I wrote
a couple of pieces. I wrote one piece and I
kind of talk about this every year in early May
called you know, diving into early you know season pitching narratives,

(25:41):
and that piece was talking about the fact that, yes,
pitching was from a pitching perspective. Offense was down in April,
you know if you look at er, but it wasn't.
It was closer to twenty twenty one actually in April
than the twenty twenty two, which was an even better
year for pictures and worst year for hitters and what

(26:05):
wound up your perception is not wrong, Like what wound
up happening is that the hitters eventually caught up. We
had a year and I think I kind of called
this in the article. I kind of nailed it. You know.
It's almost as if I've been doing this for a
long time and I've gotten pretty good at it. But
and I just goes back to not to pat myself
on the back. I think what a lot of people
are looking at today or this week, I'm looking at

(26:26):
the big picture. So I kind of called it where
it's like, well, this is not going to be just
historically low year, and it wasn't. It was really twenty
twenty two, which was a better year, you know, twenty
twenty three for the pictures and a worst year for
the hitters, but it wasn't so far like off the wall.
And then I had this other piece and if the
powers it be at BPR listening, you want to do

(26:47):
one of those like year end best of It was
entitled even Rutherford B. Hayes' main history and the point
of the and commeters disappoint I only mentioned Hayes at
the end of the article, but the point of the
article is or was that just because everybody's saying it's
a dead ball. Offense is way down. It's like, well, no,

(27:09):
not really. Like the thing that's down in baseball is
action average is very low. Strikeouts are very high. They're
just disn't home runs are high, people are even the
clock has made the game faster, but the act there's
still not a lot of action relative to when you
and I were kids, you know, back in dinosaur times.

(27:32):
And that's kind of what it is. And Russell Carlson
wrote a similar, you know, not surprisingly smarter, you know
piece on the website called Batting Average is Dead, and
it was published a day before my piece, and he
kind of made the same point, which is, well, scoring,
which is how you measure offense, isn't down like scoring.
And I went back to nineteen forty seven, and you know,

(27:53):
the first you know, integration, you know, the first year
to me that like stats in baseball are real and
runs per game out of like seventy eight seasons was
thirty second overall, which is above average. Which I think
what people are reacting to is we're not in a
supercharge offensive time. We've seen a lot of those in
recent years and they want more runs, and it's like, well,

(28:17):
maybe I do too, but it's not so low we
have to make that big of an adjustment. So I
got to ask your question. I kind of went off
on a tangent, but yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
I'm gonna link that piece in the show notes. Yeah,
it's good. Yeah, I was thinking about that when I
I was looking at the at least the main event
category category eighty percentile stats for the ten categories, and

(28:49):
I thought, well, in some ways, you know, we are well,
I guess in one specific way, we are, like we
are more like the baseball that you and I grew
up with. And that's but everything else is completely you know,
skewed toward you know, it's more it's still more of
a three true outcomes. It's like three three true outcomes

(29:11):
plus steals is sort of the formula of today's offense.
And yeah, I don't know. I mean I don't I
don't really have you know, I adapt as a follower
of the game. I still enjoy the games, and you know,
I don't want to like be nostalgic for you know,
high contact eighties baseball where everything was judged by batting average.

(29:34):
But at the same time there is the lack of
balls and play. It does make for a different viewing experience.

Speaker 1 (29:40):
It does. Although so there's a couple of things, which
is one, I do agree like that that in some
ways viewing experience is worse. You know, I think to me,
it's the constant pitching changes once the starter comes out.
To me, it makes it worse. And I know I've
talked about this before. The clock fixes one problem as
far as that goes, and that you're not sitting there

(30:01):
for three and a half hours watching the parade of relievers.
But once the Parade of Relievers starts, the game does
get bogged down. And it's like, well, if it's a
two and a half hour game versus a three hour game,
I'm still watching something that's not like the best thing
to watch. I'm just getting through it quickly or more
quickly than I would without the clock. But the other thing,
too is the game is the game itself is definitely better,

(30:25):
Like it's a lot faster at the players are far
more athletic, like they have so much more training, Like
we know all of this. If you go back and
I mentioned this too before the show, you go back
onto YouTube and watch a game from the eighties, it's
so slow compared to now, and the players look so small,
and it just isn't It isn't the same. It isn't

(30:46):
the same thing like it's and I like watching those
games from a nostalgia standpoint, but it's really difficult to
argue with a straight face that the game back then
was better. And it's not just show Hey O Toddy,
Like we're blessed to watch like Aaron Judge, you know,
even and Lin Door and you know soon when he
gets better a little bit better at Ellie Day La Cruz,

(31:06):
Like we're just at a golden time of of these
amazing athletes playing the game. Like I feel like we're
blessed to be watching these players and the time we're
in and the game itself could be better, sure, and
it can always be better. And there's lots of little,
you know, things that you can get nipiggy about, but
it's it's a wonderful time to be a fan of.

(31:26):
You know, major League Baseball can stay out of its
own way.

Speaker 2 (31:30):
Hey, Rob Manford, send us, send us some money. We
we just said nice things about about your game. I
actually did want to talk a little bit about Steeles,
and again to sort of bring it back to our situation,
we drafted, uh, we drafted a few players that I

(31:52):
think we were counting on for Steeles, you know, Corby
and Carroll chief among them, but also Lindor and I'm
kind of looking through the rest of our draft, and
that was really it. I mean, we were hopeful that
low would come back and steal faces, which he mostly
you know he did, but other than Leot Taveres, that

(32:15):
was about it. And steals went up slightly from last year.
But I think we you know, we've we've sort of
found a level. And let me just go back to
my little table here the average steals per roster spot.
So the a that for eightieth percentile, if you wanted

(32:35):
to hit eightieth percentile in the main event, you needed
one hundred and eighty eight steals, which averages to thirteen
point four per roster spot. So how did But the
flip side is that because there are more steals in
the pool, we were able to add some players and eventually,

(32:57):
you know, gain quite a few points in that cat.
So do you think that you know, in the future,
at least going into next year, would you approach steels
the same way that we ended up handling it this year,
or would you try would you pay more attention in
the draft to getting you know, more sort of ten

(33:19):
to twenty Steel players throughout the draft.

Speaker 1 (33:24):
Probably a combination of the two approaches. So I think
we could have paid a little more attention to that
and maybe tried to be like putting aside results for
a second, like Nolan Gorman and Carlos Korea as an example,
Korea worked out where we drafted him, Gorman didn't. But

(33:45):
as far as the Steels go, one of those players,
and I think we talked at the time we drafted Korea.
I think we admitted that we're like, yeah, we're just
taking the value here. We'll worry about the categories and
how they shake out later. And this is a boon
for us everywhere butt Steels, which was on the field
it was I I think, yes, I want to be
a little bit more mindful, particularly because we you know,

(34:08):
like from the two catcher positions and from almost all
your first basemen, you're not getting many steals. So really
that average per position you're mentioning is it's actually higher. Sure,
But then but then the second side of that that
this is the other side of there being more steals,
And I haven't done the breakdown yet. I haven't you know,

(34:28):
gone through my valuations. I'm going to start on that soon.
But players like Victor Robliss, and you know, I'm not
bringing us up just to potter ourselves on the back,
Like he was one of our big additions. And I
think you said at one point, like even more than
Brandon Nemo, who we fab for a ton early. We
got Robless for like eight like probably a thousand dollars budget,
probably a week before, like you know, everybody started picking

(34:51):
him up. He was just our MVP, like he was
in a lot of ways, like he's the guy who
boosted us in the category, you know, not by himself
like Corporn Carrol coming back, and you know, re emersion
was a big help, and Lindor being Lindor was a
big help. But Roblist just was so dynamic when he
was playing. And I still believe because of the influx

(35:12):
of steels in the game, there's still going there's going
to be more pop up players in that category. And
there always have been PAPA players in that category, but
they're gonna be more pop up players in that category.
Than there used to be, So I don't want to
go too far overboard with steels. And somebody else noted
this too, which is I think it might even Fred
Zinky on the road to our podcast, like he noted

(35:33):
that it's still hard to find power on the wire
and with offense, as you noted somewhat down, it's even
harder with steels. I would say it's easy to find it,
but you can find them, like you can pick up
stolen bases, like you can who who else is it?
Xavier Edwards? Like there were a few players like that

(35:53):
that you were able to pick up and plug in.
And yes, they weren't necessarily going to provide you power.
They were they weren't. They weren't five category stars obviously
because they're they're fantasy free agents. But that that kind
of the thing is I'll be a little bit more
more mindful of draft, but I don't want to go
overboard and wind up with a team where I'm like, oh, great,
we're gonna win Steel. We're gonna win Steels, but we're

(36:14):
at best we're mid pack and power because you're you're
not making up that power if you look at our
draft and with the power we got, you know, Kyle Schwerber,
you know, Anthony Santander were like two, you know, big
big additions for us. You're not finding players like that
on the wire. And you know we got Santannain the
eleventh round like that, even with his you know, somewhat

(36:34):
low average, that was a that was a heck of
a pick.

Speaker 2 (36:38):
Yeah, I'm trying to think about players with you know,
meaningful you know, category affecting power that that popped up
on the waiver wire, and I mean, I'm going to
the to the leaderboard to see if I can identify somebody.
But yeah, you know, to your point, I think we

(37:00):
we were much better position having a really strong base
of power and maybe being a little lacking in steels
then than if we're the opposite. And I don't think
that's I think either of us, you know, is we
don't play like that. I like, I don't think we
we would go overboard in steels anyway, but but we

(37:23):
did kind of go overboard in power. And I don't
I don't think I might use that term in quotes
because in a way, you can't you can't have too
much too much power and you know, being able to
you know, have a spot like the roadless spot where
we can pretty much just throw someone in who is
not as zero in power, but is you know, basically

(37:46):
there for the for the steel.

Speaker 1 (37:47):
I think. I think something that's really tough about like
all these like, you know, conversations, is that, yes, we
we went overboard in power, but you know, just in costUS,
who we took in the eighth round didn't work out
due to injure and you know, one more injury, and
all of a sudden it's like, well, like now we
need power, like you know, or now we need this,
or now we need that. And another problem too is

(38:10):
like I don't necessarily know how to solve for what
you're talking about, because the answer really would have been
to take more like steel shots late and steals. To me,
I made this comment to an a piece of earlier this year,
and this one I don't remember off the top of
I had which one it was, but steals are kind

(38:30):
of the new saves. It saves used to be this
this category where people would take a bunch of you know,
players at the back end of the draft thinking I'm
gonna get saves. I'm going to find a clothes They're
going to look into one, it's like, yeah, you might,
but one team out of every team in the league
is going to do that. Everybody else can be throwing
picks away and you're not just going to be throwing

(38:53):
you know. It's not like taking a hitter who okay,
guy wasn't a superstar, but he hit fifteen home runs.
You know, he hit two sixty. He was useful. I
could like, you know, move him in and out of
my lineup. I can eventually cut him when he didn't
work out. If you take a save a guy for saves,
he didn't get saves, and he's a mediocre reliever, you
got absolutely nothing like you you waste a reserve pick.

(39:14):
And yes it's just a reserve pick, but it's more
that opportunity cost. You could have taken a hitter who
wound up being like really good, Like you could have
taken Jackson Merrill, you know, just for example. I'm not
saying you would have taken him, but that's that's kind
of the opportunity Costel steals are kind of the same
thing where it's like, yes, you can, you can take
your shots late, but probably the answer really would have been

(39:36):
to take one or two more versions of Leoti Tavares,
who he's just such a funny player. I think, you know,
we cut him at some point, and I'm sure we
weren't alone, but you look at Leote's numbers at the
end of the season and it's kind of that, like, well, like,
shouldn't we have held on to him and just eventually
you know, waited for those twenty three steals? Like probably not,

(39:59):
but that that's kind of what you're talking about, right
in terms of right, yeah, like the impact player we
wanted was was the player we had at the beginning
of the year in the cabin at least.

Speaker 2 (40:09):
Yeah, And and you know, you you think about a
line like Leot's week by week and it's every week
you're making lineup decisions, and certainly you know we had
strength in the outfield, so it's hard to justify starting
the Otis, but it's it's, uh, Leodi, not li Otis.

(40:33):
Week to week.

Speaker 1 (40:33):
He's not that great.

Speaker 2 (40:35):
And sure you get the twenty three steals at the end,
but how many of those steals did you actually have
on your active roster? You know, you you're probably not
in a great place if you're just committing to Leody
Taveras as a you know, inked in lineup spot that
you're starting every single week, right, and you're a pretty
weak outfield then.

Speaker 1 (40:55):
You're yeah, or you know, if he's your fifth outfielder,
you'd better be really great everywhere else. Or you know,
both your catchers better be like excellent, but not only
the excellent. You probably better have catchers that are were value,
meaning you drafted them late enough and they're bargains where
it's like, Okay, I can live with this this one
player on my roster, but but this is part of

(41:17):
it too, like and this is kind of the difference
like between an overall contest like the main Event and
you know, a standalone league. In a standalone league, if
you're in you know, we were never in this position.
But if you're in first place by ten or fifteen
points and Leota is your worst player and you're throwing
them out there, and you can be like, yeah, I
can live with this. I don't want to tinker. In

(41:38):
a league like the main events, you you kind of
have to tinker unless you just side at some point.
I know we made this decision because of our slow start,
but let's just decide to some point, like well, winning
the bracket is the thing that matters to me is
not I'm realistically not going to finish first. You don't
want to make that decision in May, like that's it's
at that point, that's just a bad decision that you're making,

(41:59):
and you're you're going to lose, lose the overall for sure.

Speaker 2 (42:04):
I think I was. I was holding on holding on
to hope for cashing in the main event a lot
longer than you were. But I think we had both
buy it. You're earlier August.

Speaker 1 (42:16):
Yeah, you're you're not talking about the winning overall like
you're you're talking about finishing. I think it was in
the top thirty, top five, yeah, and and yeah, I yeah,
you sound almost like supremely confident. And I was like, well,
maybe supremely conversorting, Puddy. I think you sounded confident that
we could get there, and I would like perhaps, And
I was like, yeah, I really think everything would completely

(42:38):
have to break right for us for that to happen.
And that's why I kind of made that top one
hundred my goal, because I'm like, well, this is a
modest enough goal, and even that looked far away, and
you know the fact we as close as we did,
and I think at one point we were like one
oh nine or something like that was our high water mark,
and I was like, that's we could get there. Of

(42:59):
course we didn't. And this is a perverse thing too,
like once you give up on on the overall and
try to win your bracket, then you're making decisions that
are hurting you in the overall. Like we we gave
up on saves at some point because we're like, well,
it just doesn't really make sense. We're at almost out
of fab it doesn't make sense to chase the garbage
that's that's out there, you know, just to get a

(43:21):
save or two. If we were going to do obviously.

Speaker 2 (43:25):
Fully give up.

Speaker 1 (43:26):
You know, we had a couple players that we kind
of gave up.

Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yeah, we we like eighty percent gave up. Yeah, no,
it's uh, but I still, you know, I think there
were times I can't remember if this was when we
were talking on the podcast or via text, where you know, you,
I think had said, well, I can see a path

(43:50):
for us to maybe get to third in our league,
and you know, we obviously we exceeded that. I was
always I was always pretty helpful, just based on the
fact that once we got over the slow start, like
we could project much better numbers for our best hitters

(44:11):
going forward, because you know, if we were just even
if we just used their like career numbers or their
their projections being in the season, you know, we were
obviously going to gain some ground offensively, Like once Corbyn
Carrol was over as slump, he was not going to
go back to being a you know, sub two hundred hitter.
And once Manny Machado started hitting, he was not going

(44:32):
back to being a two thirty hitter with no power.

Speaker 1 (44:36):
I think I think less than that. What I a
couple of things I did beyond Carol, who I probably
you know, overestimated his decline. I overestimated the gap that
losing Tristan Cassas would cause, and and some of this,
and this is kind of a good segue, Like, you know,
I mentioned Nimo when we mentioned Roblist, But we picked

(44:59):
up Carlo Santana pretty early, and we kind of it
was great because we didn't get the bad month or
month and a half or whatever it was from him.
And you know, I don't overstate Carlo Santana, but he
had what like twenty home runs for us in about
like two forty, like it was just it was just
one of those like boring, like, oh great, like a
boring we need a first baseman, Like here here's here's

(45:20):
a boring he's not in a place, but we're hoping
for Cassus. But here's this boring first basement who's just
gonna kind of you know, plug away and let us
do what we want to do. And this ties into
the other side of this whole being patient thing, like
we were able to capitalize I think on others, you know,
people's impatients. Like I look at our original roster and

(45:42):
I don't see anybody who we drop that I have
this like on our original roster, but I have this
like tremendous regret about where I'm like, oh no, like
we shouldn't have dropped David Schneider, Like it just didn't
thankfully like play out for us that way. But but
I but I know people who that's how they look
at their their reserve picks, where if somebody is shaky

(46:03):
the first two weeks or as a band star, it's like, well,
it's just a reserve pick. I'll drop him, Like yeah,
I of anything we held out to jose a Brave
too long. We don't need to linger on that too long.
But yeah, we had him like for like what at
least two weeks too long.

Speaker 2 (46:17):
Off the top of your head, how many of our
second half picks, so rounds sixteen to thirty, how many
do you think we're on our roster at the end
of the year.

Speaker 1 (46:27):
Well, I have it in front of me. I mean,
but I can look I can look away and not
count six or okay, well.

Speaker 2 (46:35):
Yeah, JD. Martinez, Ryan Jeffers, Carlos Correa, and Kyle Bradt. No,
not Brady Singer.

Speaker 1 (46:43):
Well, we actually cut Singer the last week.

Speaker 2 (46:45):
So okay, three, that's right. We did cut Singer.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
Yeah, it was he He had a matchup against Atlanta
and we were like, yeah, let's not do that. I
think we would have been better off with him than
you know, with the other the other Brady. But thankfully
it didn't. It didn't matter. Yeah, yeah, so we you know,
just to kind of put a bow on this, we
were in a pretty good position going into the last week,

(47:11):
but it was close. We never we never had the
final week of the season. We were leading the whole time,
except for maybe I think there were like five or
ten minutes early in the week we were like a
point or half a point behind the team who finished
in second. But it was never a comfortable lead. It
was never one of those like, oh, we're ten points
up and we're going to cruise. It was more like,

(47:32):
we're two points up, we're five points up, we're three
points up, and it just kept like fluctuating and fluctuating
and fluctuating, and thankfully in terms of the point totals
the last day, you know, plus the Bunday games with
the Braves and the Mets were boring for us, and
boring when you were heading some good.

Speaker 2 (47:49):
And we even got it. Yeah, we ended up finishing
three and a half points ahead. And I think that
the most our biggest lead during that week was four
points if I remember correct.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
I think I think it was five. But yeah, it was, it.

Speaker 2 (48:01):
Was, Yeah, it was.

Speaker 1 (48:04):
It was short lived.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
Yeah, but uh and and you know we got we
got home runs from from Neimo and of course Lindor
on that first game of the Monday doubleheader. So yeah,
so it ended up Monday. Yeah, like you said, Monday, Well,
Sunday Sunday was pretty stressful. Monday, pretty we were pretty
sure that we were we were.

Speaker 1 (48:26):
Yeah, we the word the realistic worst case, and even
then it wasn't not realistic, but was a tie. And
as it was, it would have would have required. The
most realistic point to lose for us would have been
if the Braves had won that first game and Louis
Severino had a good outing, we would have lost the

(48:48):
area point, not even a great outing, but but a
good one by it like a separate team. And then
the team that we were competing with was right behind
us and whip and if he had flipped that whip
point he had joehan Menez Joe Mennez would have needed
to have pitched two completely clean innings. So what you
probably were talking about was like an extra inning game

(49:08):
where he had to pitch two innings. Just not I mean,
it could have happened, just wasn't very realistic. So the
tie was the best case. And then like the real
nightmare worst case is are two mets in the doubleheader
going like two for twenty and we lose an average point, which, again,

(49:28):
when you're you're doing the nightmare scenarios, you're like, yeah,
this could happen, but you're also like, I don't think
it will. Yeah, don't don't mention this is the guy
in my home league who kind of lost to me
on a nightmare scenario. So they do they do have. Yeah,
he not to go with the whole thing and bore
you with a home league, but he he lost at

(49:49):
the end because it inherited runner off of Clark Schmidt
on a team that wasn't in contention scored and led
to me jumping over another team in e RA. And
that was the entire difference. And so.

Speaker 2 (50:04):
Do you think he listens. He probably doesn't listen.

Speaker 1 (50:06):
He might, he might not. He probably doesn't.

Speaker 2 (50:09):
So didn't he didn't he head out for the evening?

Speaker 1 (50:13):
He went to the movies.

Speaker 2 (50:14):
Yeah, and and he I mean maybe he was checking
his phone very well, you.

Speaker 1 (50:20):
Know it was maybe, but you know he didn't see
what the type though. But you know it was funny
because I said to him, I said, yeah, it looks
like my best case scenario is are tie and he's like,
I don't know. It's like weird stuff happens. And the
thing that really happened was I had Logan Gilbert, and
Logan Gilbert, you know, pitched five and two thirds. There
was like a base runner. He allowed one base runner

(50:40):
before they pulled him. I think it was a hit
and that was that was it, and he didn't give
up an inherited run and that's what could put me
in position to get the points that I got, and
that that was the difference. Like if Logan Gilbert had
just been good, I still, you know, I still lose
the league. So as much as Clerk Schmidt being the catalyst,
it was Gilbert's outing that last day that that you

(51:01):
push me over.

Speaker 2 (51:02):
Which is funny because the person behind us, I think
in e r A right, he did, and to no
hitter into the sixth and you know, my worry was
they keep him in because it's the last start of
the year. Who gives a fuck, let him let him roll?
Yeahs unless once they hit, I was like, they're gonna pull.

Speaker 1 (51:25):
They pulled them immediately. Yeah. So yeah, it's just funny
because I think that team, that team, another team was
ahead of us briefly. I was another team. Oh gosh,
it was the team with Kashanowitz and Canon right, yeah,
there was ahead of us briefly in the r A.
And we were like, oh my god, imagine if we
lose on the last day in a mixed league. Because

(51:45):
of a picture on the White Sox and a picture
on the Angels that nobody talks about on fantasy podcast ever,
and or you know, if they talk about them, it's
like avoid avoid, like don't take these guys. But of
course it's jeff Erickson of Roe to Oars. That's all
politics is local and it's USh on that last week
where you're just shooting for points and usually if you're behind,
you're like you're throwing stuff at the wall and seeing

(52:07):
what sticks.

Speaker 2 (52:09):
Ah. Yes, the last last day of a fantasy season.
I'm sure the stories we could tell, we could.

Speaker 1 (52:15):
I mean, we we had fun. I think this was
a this was a good year, and it sounds like
we're going to try again, right Like I, you know,
haven't committed, but it sounds like you and I were
both into this enough and it you know, I don't
want to get too far this, but you know it's
house money, right, like we're exactly well, do it again. Yeah,
I mean I'm not a degenerate. I'm not going to

(52:36):
take all the money and say let's play in you know,
more leagues than we did this year. I know some
people do that, but I think doing one league is fine.

Speaker 2 (52:46):
You know, and this is a thing that you know,
people don't really talk about necessarily or I don't hear
it talked about much with NFBC and particularly the mid event, Like,
it's not cheap. It's it's seventeen hundred and fifty dollars.
And even when you split it two ways, that's that's
a not it's a little.

Speaker 1 (53:03):
It's a little it's it's a little stressful. Yeah, I mean,
it's not like it's not life changing. It's not life changing.
It's not like, well, you know, I guess my kids
will you know, be able to have their medications money
for where I am in my life. But yes, it's
not it's not nothing.

Speaker 2 (53:17):
Yeah, and you know, I realized that for some people
that is, that is a hell of a lot of money.

Speaker 1 (53:23):
Yeah, that's the thing I want to for some and
for some.

Speaker 2 (53:27):
People it's a drop in the bucket. But I think
for for you and I both you know, work, I
guess you'd call us, uh middle class and in some
you know, broadly speaking, it's it's a it's a you know, commitment.
You know, it's a thing we have to uh justify
to our spouses, and you know, it's.

Speaker 1 (53:48):
Of that my spouse overheard me and texted me and
my my oldest for for some reason to say, good
to know you're not a degenerate. I guess that that's
a sign we should either end the podcast or I
should keep my voice down.

Speaker 2 (54:00):
We should we should end the podcast, and you should
keep your voice sound. But I do want to say that,
you know, one of the nice things about winning something
anything like even if we we'd finished third, we would
have made our our buy in back, and I think
having having a little bit to play with and and
you know, at the very least, like, yes, we we

(54:22):
have we don't have to worry about, you know, the
buy in for for next year. And you know, I'm
pretty confident that you know, we we can do well again.
Obviously you know you can never you can never count
on anything. But but yes, this is me committing to

(54:43):
another bite at the Apple next year.

Speaker 1 (54:45):
Yeah, and I think we you know, you never know.
And and a lot of this is as much as
we talk about, you know, how skilled we are, Like
a lot of this is luck, Like a lot of
there's a lot of randomness to this, and you know
you have to be skilled, but you's you know, it's
a whole residue of design blah blah blah. But you
have to, you know, recognize the fact that you can

(55:07):
have a great draft, do everything right, and still finish fifth.
That's just the way. That's the way it goes. And
you know, some years you can have an above average
draft and win because that's also the way it goes.

Speaker 2 (55:19):
Well, on that note, I will say, good year, it
was fun, I'm glad we did this together. And h
then you know, next year, who knows, bigger things are possible.

Speaker 1 (55:33):
Yeah, I one thing I'll say, I'm pretty sure we're
doing it on online again.

Speaker 2 (55:38):
Yeah. Yeah, I'm Vegas is not my favorite place in
the world, but you know, logistically it just it probably well,
I think that's a little impractical.

Speaker 1 (55:50):
To I'm in Pennsylvania, you're you're you know, in Idaho,
and you know, they used to do these drafts in
different locales, Like for me, like we're doing it by myself,
like New York City where they used to do it.
Would be great, but it doesn't say it sounds like
they're just limiting us to Vegas for the in person
made events.

Speaker 2 (56:06):
I think.

Speaker 1 (56:06):
So all right, well, let's take a break or take
our usual breath and we'll come back and wrap up.

(56:38):
Thank you once again for listening to episode three sixteen
of flags Fly Forever, a Baseball Perspectus fantasy baseball podcast.
Don't forget. Just because the season's over doesn't mean the
coverage is. There is great postseason coverage at Baseball Perspectives.
I don't just say this as a company man, I

(56:59):
say this as a fan. Justin clue, great Gold, seeing
Jenny Searle, all of your all your favorite writers are
out there. I'm not mentioning other people because they're not
as good. They're all great. Just the names I see
on the front page right now. Robert Orr.

Speaker 2 (57:17):
Can't forget Robert Orr.

Speaker 1 (57:18):
I didn't forget him. I just didn't see his name.
But thank you for chiming in. Yeah, please continue, you know,
to visit our site, Please continue to subscribe, and of course,
if you like the podcast, rate and review, hopefully with
a good review, not a poor one that that doesn't
really help us. For Mike Janella, for John Haglan, thank

(57:39):
you very much. We'll be back soon. Happy end of
the twenty twenty first season.

Speaker 2 (57:44):
Yes, and we might have some very special guests coming
to a flags Fly Forever episode very soon. So that's
what we call a tease. Good Night, everybody, all right,

(58:04):
think speaking of Johan about mm hmmm mm hmm I

(59:02):
lit ting by