With the world in total panic and fear with the evergrowing spread of the COVID-19 virus worldwide and the ever depressing news of sports leagues being shut down for who knows how long, I thought it’d be fun to do a more fun post about my 2020 fantasy baseball team (it could well as be a 2020/2021 fantasy team considering when the seasons will start). As the winner of my league last year with my potent offensive duo of Bellinger and Rendon along with my staff aces Shane Bieber and Mike Clevinger leading the way, I felt the extra pressure going into this draft. Last year I had drafted awfully. I will be brutally honest my first three picks: Corey Kluber (out most of the year with a fractured right forearm), Jose Ramirez (went from a consensus top 10 player to completely stinking the entire first half), and Paul Goldschmidt (first year of his slow decline from superstar status to good player) was not the way to go. Luckily due to A LOT of team retooling and some savvy buy low pickups (Pete Alonso, Domingo German), I was able to turn it around and win it all in the playoffs.
But I did not want that again this year. That’s why this draft felt much more serious and nervous than last year. I had a plan in mind that I was dying to execute and which I have a good feeling is going to work this season. The first thing I did when analyzing how I was going to approach this, was by doing an extensive run-through of point leaders from last year and then noticing trends and commonalities among them. The first thing I realized was that the top starting pitchers made lots more points than the top hitters did. On-base machine Alex Bregman topped the hitter points leaderboard with 603 points making for a fantastic player. But fellow teammate of last year, Gerrit Cole, came in at 734 points an entire 131 points more than A-Breg. After comparing numbers more and more I realized that starting pitchers might be the solution for winning back to back times and thus that’s the way I went.
Below is a screenshot of my all-new 2020 fantasy baseball team:
Pitching: And there you have it. The starting rotation of my dreams that I methodically planned in the hopes of dominating other teams. The trio of newly christened Yankee ace Gerrit Cole, reigning Cy Young winner Justin Verlander, and World Series MVP Stephen Strasburg if all healthy could be a menacing three-headed monster. The depth behind it is almost just as good. A maybe finally healthy Mike Clevinger has the promise to be one of the best pitchers in the league when on the mound and not in the operation room. Zack Greinke remains on a still dominant Houston team that should provide him the same amount of support that made him so dominant last year in a resurgent year for the grizzled veteran. Near the end of the rotation, the combo of reestablished Cincinnati staff ace Sonny Gray and a solid lefty in Eduardo Rodriguez who will now lead a Chris Sale-less Boston rotation should bring lots of needed points support and add an extra layer of depth to this stacked rotation. My one wild card starter who I am extremely excited to see blossom into a great pitcher this year is Zac Gallen. After being traded to Arizona at the deadline last year from the Marlins, Gallen showed the stuff in a limited amount of innings that could get any scout raving about. Now in a full year with a job in the rotation, he looks as if he can truly take that next leap to be a bonafide ace. The relief corps is shallow indeed with so far Nats closer Sean Doolittle holding the only spot. I will be sure to go for another reliever in time when an attractive one on the market shows, but for now, I will only be going with one closer. The final two spots are more of a revolving door for players than it is a permanent spot for players. Kenta Maeda has the talent to stay in the pitching corps if he really does flourish in a Twins uniform against weak AL central bats, but Mike Fiers will likely be out after a couple of starts. What’s expected instead, is that I will keep their spots open for “spot starters.” Overall, I am thrilled with this staff of arms. There is some big-time firepower here who will be the faces and heart of this team if I am to repeat as champion.
Hitting: Now comes the tougher part. I won’t try to gloss over the fact that my hitters are definitely somewhat weak. When I decided to invest most of my resources and top picks in starting pitching, I knew the tradeoff would be having to work with a weaker offense. There are guys on this team who I know will be a sure source of points like George Springer, Josh Donaldson, Manny Machado, and Josh Bell. Those are some the essential parts of this hitting that I will need to continue to do their thing at the plate to at least moderately compensate for the pitching, but there are also those who I have very high hopes on and those are your top prospects, bounceback candidates, and guys who were very undervalued in the draft due to some deficiency. Young top 20 prospects who now all have starting jobs on big-league teams all come with the promise of possible breakout superstardom like Gavin Lux, Vlad Guerrero Jr, and Austin Riley. It’s wild cards like them, that if they get going can really make this team a superpower that can steamroll opponents. The rest of the team is nothing really eye-popping with solid point producers in Jorge Polanco, Eduardo Escobar, Trey Mancini, and Yasmani Grandal there to be some reliable sources of points. Now, Andrew McCutchen and Brandon Nimmo are very high risk-high reward bets. McCutchen, who showed flashes of brilliance on a new contract with Philly got injured in the first month of 2019 and never recovered. Now with him back in a pretty loaded Phillies lineup, he has the chance to be that big-time hitter once again he has shown he can be. But that’s not without saying that it’s very likely he could also be back on the shelf and I’m going to be back looking for a replacement. Nimmo is a very similar case. After a great 2018 as the Mets starting centerfielder, he followed it up with a brutal, beaten up 2019. The hope is he can once again hit that stride on a Mets team with the starting job regained. Now obviously I will be scouring the market as well as trade options in order to find some underrated gems and add them to bolster it even more because even one breakout guy could be so helpful to a team like mine that’s always in need of offensive firepower.
Well, I finally executed my plan I was so adamant about carrying out and now I just have to wait and see how they do. And the waiting part is now going to be even more excruciating with the season in flux for an unknown amount of time. But whenever this season does begin I’ll be ready to take down those who stand against this new team and the pitching that will carry it far.