Expensive in 2010 Todd Helton

Todd Helton rebounded from a career worst year in 2008 to hit his best batting average since 2004, mashed 38 doubles and led the Rockies to the postseason for the second time in three years.

The problem? He's going to be too expensive in 2010.

Entering his age-36 season, Helton produced his lowest amount of walks drawn in a full season since 1999. His Coors' driven average has helped keep up his value but his on-base percentage lagged in the last season. The .416 OBP was his second lowest over a full season and his home/road split in on-base percentage was only a difference of 13 points (.409 to .422). Combine that with hitting just 5 of his 15 home runs in the second half of the season and a 62 point drop in slugging percentage and teams should expect a player profile along the lines of James Loney than the slugger Helton was for a sustained amount of his career.

For as impressive as Helton's consistency has been, take a look at these facts from 2009 before you consider drafting him as your first basemen or your corner infielder:

• 29 players, which still includes two free agents, hit more home runs than Helton last year.
• 18 scored more runs.
• 20 driven in more runs.

Yes Helton hit for one of the best averages of all first basemen but he benefited from a, tops for first basemen, .355 Batting Average on Balls in Play. He also ties Albert Pujols for a career on-base percentage at .427: my guess is that will change for the worse on Helton's part.

Luckily for the Rockies, as well as simulation and scoresheet league members, Helton's defense has been outstanding and can likely be relied on to have another great season.

Old Guys

While doing research tonight, I found an interesting note in the fan projections on Fangraphs for Billy Butler that prompted me to go check out his current ADP. Interestingly enough, while I agree with Butler's possible breakout this year, I found it quite depressing to see Lance Berkman, a fantasy stalwart for the past few years begin his decent into "old guy" rounds.

While exceptions like Manny Ramirez still exist in the early rounds, most of your 34ish and older crowd slowly start to drop off in production. A big chunk of these players end up clogging the mid to late rounds with their expected safe production but nagging injury risks. Let's look two of them.

Lance Berkman, ADP 79
Berkman has had an undulating career path, with two distinct power peaks flanked by sharp decreases. Berkman has been a typical all or nothing corner infield candidate, giving one manager a mediocre season followed by a huge breakout, and vice-versa.

One stable piece of production for Lance has been his plate discipline. His walk and strikeouts rate have hovered right around +-2% of his career values from year to year, but we still haven't uncovered any clues surrounding his suddenly superman HR/FB% that seem to creep out every 3 years or so.

Provided Lance is healthy again this year, his production shouldn't continue to decrease in the degree his injury shortened 2009 did. I'd be more optimistic his lands right around his career line, basically repeating his 2008 performance, but without the steals. Until Berkman puts up another year of decrease that is accompanied by a degradation of his plate discipline, I'm not quite a non-beliver yet.

At his price, I think I would prefer to gamble on Berkman than Justin Morneau (ADP 37) since the idea of vertebral stress fractures absolutely frighten me.

Chipper Jones, ADP 101
Chipper has always been a pet project of mine, especially in my local OBP league. Consistently underrated, Chipper provided a huge return on his draft slot until last year's flameout.

Chipper was plagued by the lowest BABIP of his career since a previous shaky campaign in 2004, his worst strikeout rate since 2004, and also experienced his lowest HR/FB% since batted ball data was available in 2002. While most projection system are putting a lot of weight on his 2009 production (and they should) Chipper had posted three straight years where he eclipsed a 1.000 OPS. That has to account for something, outside of his nagging injury concerns.

While I wouldn't be leaning on Chipper for production at 3B, I would select him in the 9th round, in lieu of any of the run of the mill closers available. Even a possible return to the mean of his 2008-2009 could be a great selection, as a corner infield swing candidate paired with a decent low risk average corner infielder. Would I expect more than 20-25 homeruns? Probably not, but it'll definitely be an improvement over the 5th round bust he was last year.

Cheap in 2010: Russell Branyan

2009 may have been a career year for Branyan but a lot of us were wondering why it took so long for him to get the kind of playing time that he did last year. He has a career OPS over .800, a career ISO around .250, and a career BA of .234. Oh, maybe that's why teams have shied away. Still, Branyan stands a chance to return very good value, fantasy and real, to whomever picks him up for 2010.

Before being sidelined by a herniated disk Branyan was on pace to get close to 40 HR last year even though he played half of his games at Safeco Field. He'll never help your team in BA but if somebody signs him to play every day Branyan has the skills to put up Adam Dunn type HR and BA numbers about 150 picks after Dunn typically goes off the board. Branyan certainly has some question marks; he doesn't have a job yet, back injuries tend to be unpredictable, and he's a 34 year old with little regular starting experience; but as a speculative late round pick who could produce second tier 1B numbers he should be on every managers watch list.

RotoSavants Happenings

You can head over to THT for my new Clone Wars article today where I look at Matt Wieters and his top comparable Mark Teixeira.

For Red Sox fans make sure to read FireBrand of the AL as Lee and myself are now writing there. This is why Yawkey Way Academy has since been dormant.

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Draft This, Not That: Choo VS Granderson

I decided to continue last week’s theme of 5-category outfielders (see Nelson Cruz VS Jayson Werth). This week, one player has been overshadowed by his potentially top-5 OF teammate, while the other has been well-known in fantasy circles and was sent to a better, more public team this offseason. However, I believe that Shin-soo Choo will provide better draft value compared to Curtis Granderson.

Granderson had a career-high 30 HR in 2009, and he’s a threat to steal 20 bases. He had an abnormally low BABIP last year (.276), so his average should bounce back in 2010. And of course, he’s now on the Yankees, which has a lot of owners salivating in anticipation. However, the large increase in Granderson’s ADP due to the trade may not be fully justified. Yes, Granderson hit a career high in HR, but he also had a career high in plate appearances and flyball percentage. When you look for major growth in a player’s power, one place to start is his home run to flyball ratio (HR/FB). Granderson’s HR/FB only went up a little, from 12.3 to 12.6, so it’s not like he made leaps and bounds improvements in his ability to hit HR, unless that career-high FB level can be maintained. Overall he should have a good season, especially because of the Yankee lineup... But is it worth the price of where he’s taken in the draft?

Compare Granderson’s ADP to Choo’s. Mock Draft Central and Couch Managers show the same results: Granderson averages in the mid-50s, and Choo averages in the mid-70s. But take a look at MDC’s highest and lowest taken in all their mock drafts.

Granderson: 25 highest, 69 lowest
Choo: 56 highest, 97 lowest

The difference in draft position is clear. So why is Choo the better value? He could potentially put up very similar numbers despite being available two rounds later.

Let’s start with Choo’s better average and OBP (.394). Then consider that Choo’s 2009 SLG (.489) was better than Granderson’s (.453), with Choo hitting a lot of doubles. Choo is going to be 27 at the beginning of the season, so he’s entering his peak (power) hitting years, and there's the old belief that someone who hits a lot of doubles has the potential to turn some of those into HR. The fact that he has a strong LD% over 21.5% for the last two years indicates he’s making strong contact with the ball, and another year of improvement (both in the game and physically), plus a small rise in FB%, could net him 25 HR easy. Choo clearly has the speed to go with his power, as he had 6 triples on top of those doubles. If given the green light to steal more often, 25 SB is easily attainable because he was 20 for 22 last year in SB attempts.

Is Choo going to perfectly equal or best Granderson in every category? Probably not. Granderson will likely have more R and RBI due to the Yankee lineup. But if you’re playing with east coast owners, and especially Yankees fans (really? 25th overall?), then it’s probably best to pass on Granderson’s overvalued draft position and nab the very respectable Choo at your leisure. Choo’s obscurity in Cleveland can only benefit your fantasy team when you can get a 5-category OF much later than other HR/SB combos.