Flags Fly Forever Fantasy Baseball Bret Sayre

We're getting all T.S. Eliot on you, because for us, and for fantasy basebal content, April is kind of a dead zone. Rather than overreact to fast and slow starts, we discuss some process points in evaluating your early-season roster and negotiating FAAB at this time of year. We do this through the lens of our own underperforming Main Event team (at what point does "underperforming" just become "bad"? hopefully we won't have to answer this!). 

Also, find out who the player is that was inexplicably dropped in our league and our approach to FAABing for him. That's a tease, my friends!

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.

Hey, it's actual baseball season! After the whirlwind of positional previews and draft discussion, we put a cap on the 2024 draft season by discussing the NFBC Main Event team that Mike and Jon drafted. It was the first time either of us had participated in a Main Event, and we talk about our decision to ante up, our overall strategy, our focused strategy once we knew where we were drafting (7th), and our experience in the draft (fast and furious). 

While our team is off to a, ahem, slow start, we remain optimistic that good things will happen! (Watch this space for updates.)

Before our Main Event discussion, we discuss a couple of players who could prove disappointments--Esteury Ruiz, having been sent down, and Evan Carter, having not yet learned how to hit left-handed pitching (and thus in danger of losing playing time). Beyond these specific players, we are reminded that sometimes real baseball can influence fantasy baseball in unpredictable and inconvenient ways.

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.

We take the occasion of the recent Tout Wars auction weekend to do a deep dive on auctions--what we prefer, how we prepare, and some strategies and advice for those new to the format. We love auctions!

In this episode we discuss:
Why in-person auctions are so fun and rewardingHow preparation and strategy are different than a draftWhy you should have a Plan A and a Plan B (and possibly a Plan C)The risks and rewards of price enforcementHow to handle the endgameThat One Time Mike Had a Perfect AuctionWe also talk about the Tout Wars NL-Only League, where friend of the show Grey Albright of Razzball completely avoided starting pitchers (a gambit attributed to Mike and Doug Dennis that in fact goes back to the early days of fantasy baseball).

We conclude with a discussion of how Mike reallocates values in his bid limits when players get injured (Gerrit Cole, Devin Williams) or suspended (Noelvi Marte). 

All in all, a pretty nerdy episode. You'll love it.

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.

Bit of a mixed bag this week:

We review Mike's Tout Wars Mixed League draft from earlier in the week. (You can see the draft board here: https://www.fantrax.com/fantasy/league/1ojcq64zltc8i9la/draft-results)

We talk (again) about your strategy for drafting starting pitchers, and why Mike generally avoids the "blob" of mid-tier starters.

We also introduce Mike's auction bid limits and discuss how to use them, and how not to use them.

Finally, we talk about the risk of players who have not yet made their MLB debut, focusing in on three names for this draft season: Jackson Chourio, Wyatt Langford, and Jackson Holliday.

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 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.

We talk outfielders this week, and given the size of the position, we did more of a strategy overview than deep dives on indivdual players. It's an interesting year at the position--great, five-category options up top but a fairly long tail of useful players deep into the 200s, and beyond.

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 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.

We step away from our positional previews to discuss the LABR Mixed League draft, which Mike took part in on Tuesday, February 20. We talk about the difference between stand-alone leagues and larger multi-league competitions, strategies for the first four rounds, how to respond to early spring training injury news, building drafts around your starting pitching strategy, what to do when closers get pushed up, and so much more.

(I would like to apologize to Nick Martinez for my unkind comment around the 39-minute mark. I'm sure you're a fun guy.)

(And I would also like to apologize for my sound quality. My microphone decided to go on holiday just before recording.)

The LABR Mixed League draft board can be found here: https://www.rtsports.com/labr-mixed-draft

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 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.