Fantasy Baseball Advice: Determining Keeper Value

Fantasy Baseball Advice

There are basically three types of fantasy baseball leagues. We have re-draft leagues, keeper leagues, and dynasty leagues. A re-draft league is one in which you start fresh each season. The entire player pool is available (in an AL only or NL only league, only players from that league are available). A keeper league means you are allowed to keep a certain number of players on your roster from the prior season. That may be as small as one player or up to any amount, but not everyone. In a dynasty league, you keep everyone. The only additions during your draft will be players who are free agents and those that were just drafted by MLB teams. 

The most common type of league is a re-draft league, but my favorite is a keeper league. It just adds more strategy to the game, especially if you allow draft pick trading in season. I play in one league in which we have the rule of threes. You are allowed to keep three players, drafted after the third round, for three years. This way the best players are always available (in theory). I also play in another league in which we have 40-man rosters, 18 teams, and we can keep up to 25 players each season (15 major leaguers and 10 minor leaguers). This just shows you the huge variance in keeper leagues.

Quick Link: For those of you that are in a fantasy auction league, make sure you check out my Fantasy Baseball Auction Strategy. This fantasy league format is becoming more and more popular, some would even say it’s the only way to play Fantasy Baseball now.

How to Determine Keeper Value 

One of the most difficult or challenging things I must do each season is determining who to keep, and who to throw back into the pile. The first thing we must decide is, what if any, is the penalty for keeping a player. If there is no penalty, the choices are easy, just keep the three best players according to your rankings. If there is a tie between two players, I always lean towards a pitcher or an outfielder. The reason for this is simple, in most leagues we start five OFs and nine Ps. That’s at least 60 OFs and 108 Ps that will be drafted and that’s before we consider the utility position and reserves. Those positions dry up quickly and since we have to start so many, there will also be a greater chance of injury there. The penalty in most leagues usually involves the loss of a draft pick. Sometimes it’s the same round that the player was drafted in, or there could be some penalty given for keeping a player (if drafted in the ninth-round, you can keep him, but it costs you your eight-round pick, a one round penalty or something along those lines).

In any kind of league that is not an auction, there are really two ways of going about this. First, you can just keep the best players you have regardless of the penalty, or you look for the best value in your keepers. How do you determine such value? Well, this is where mock drafts or finding a site that has average draft positions (ADP) for all players comes in handy.

If you take part in enough mocks, you will have an idea of where most players will be drafted. If you use ADPs, the same is true. You will need to make adjustments to those, especially in home leagues, however. First off, you need to remember that during mocks, some people are using them to test a strategy that they may or may not use in their real draft. They may test out what their team looks like if they draft two catchers early, or not draft a catcher until the last round, or really any strategy that strikes their fancy. Mocks are a useful tool, but to truly trust them, you need to participate in quite a few of them.

Average draft position works much the same way as mocks in that when you call up a list, make sure that they are using as many drafts as possible and that those drafts are as close to the rules that your league uses as possible. If your ADP is only using 10 drafts, well, you won’t get a truly accurate accounting for where those players will be drafted. Personally, I like at least 25 drafts, and I want those drafts to have taken place as close to the current date as possible. Information changes all the time, so getting draft ADPs from early February won’t really help all that much.

Remember that in your home league, where you’re just playing with your friends, family, co-workers or whomever, players on the home teams tend to be taken earlier than they should. So, if you live in New York, you’re likely playing against other Yankee or Met fans, and they might take an Aaron Hicks or Michael Conforto earlier because they are a fan of the team or player. It’s not how you should play, but it happens all the time, so you need to make those adjustments also.

Now that we have determined how to measure value, we need to make our decisions on whom to keep. I’m rarely if ever keeping my best players because there just is no value there. If I drafted Nolan Arenado, yes, I’d like to keep him, but I don’t want it to cost my first-round pick. Why should I keep him there when I might be able to draft him again and keep other players instead? I tend to look at my entire roster and write down players that I like and believe I have several rounds or better than where they will actually be drafted. In my home league, I am keeping Trevor Bauer (22), Jean Segura (13), and Eduardo Rodriguez (21) over Khris Davis (4). You can make the argument that Davis is the best fantasy player of this quartet, but I’m not getting much value there. At best Davis would be drafted in the third-round, just not enough value in keeping him as Bauer is being drafted before the fifth-round, Segura before the tenth and Rodriguez a few rounds later. That’s how I would approach defining value in a keeper league.

In an auction league, it’s very similar. You’re using sheets to determine the average price of a player in as many leagues as possible. Mocks won’t really help as when a player is thrown out will change his price in many leagues, but if you can get a price sheet from a site you trust, then you will have an idea of value once again. There is little reason to keep a player who will cost you $50 if that’s pretty much what he’s going for in auctions regardless of how good he is. Look at your cheaper players that you know can help your team. One thing to keep in mind, however, is inflation. In keeper auction leagues prices tend to be a little higher on player in the auction, about 15% or so, so keep this in mind when determining who you will and won’t keep. Good luck in your drafts.