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If 17 ABs is enough for you to make any kind of a decision, this guy is probably not the right guy for you. There are very few players who will ever avoid a 3/17 run (or worse), tbh, but Baez in particular has shown he's prone to very hot and very cold streaks.

Feels too early to be making any kind of definitive statements on anybody. At least @TomBradysCollegeRoommate is owning his own bias. We could all stand to do that.

On #1, in-season expiring position eligibility really makes injury impact matter way too much. If you're incapable of moving a guy out from his current position to cover another injury spot, and then can't move him back later after your injured guy comes back... that stinks and can create ugly choices an owner should not have to make. Count me on the list of those who really dislike this idea. On #2 - depends on your league's style. If you really want a highly competitive league and are willing to lose a 20 year (!!!) colleague to do it.. well, that's a league call. But not e

Not sure I've ever heard anybody suggest before that pitchers age "better" than hitters. Can you provide something to back that up?

Oh man, this is good stuff. Nice work!

Bold predictions, or "most likely results" for the season?

I'm on the other side. I'd rather take Darvish, who is 4 years younger. Verlander's 2016 was a beautiful return after a lost 2014 and a short (and devoid-of-Ks) 2015, but relying on that again for his age 34 season feels pretty risky, too. And on Ks, Verlander has averaged 8.5 K/9 for his career and only made it to 10 twice - 10.0 in 2016, and before that 10.1 all the way back in 2009. Darvish has never had less than a 10.4 season and has averaged 11.3 for his career. Verlander tosses a lot of innings and that can reduce the K gap, but that age 34 number starts to put some more

Props to @taobballfor kicking a lot of offseason a** to prop this thread together. I've just read through it and am so glad to see baseball coming back, and with it, it means I get to read more excellent contributions from the RW baseball forum posters, who collectively form a great group of information providers and thought-provokers. Can't wait for April!

How can anybody who watched baseball in the 80s not have added Charlie Kerfeld to this list yet?

Can I join your league? C'mon now. You make it sound like he made a crappy panic trade. Lincecum and Panda (basically a pair of 4th/5th rounders) in exchange for a consensus top-3 pick is a very reasonable value trade, and that's assuming that Lincecum is actually in fine shape.

For what it's worth - and I didn't see the whole game, just the highlights on the MLB channel today - but Tim was showing the inverted W at foot-down on the Goldschmidt HR and the Roberts double today (the two pitches they showed him throwing). I don't know if that's the case with the rest of his pitches, but it may be worth looking at him more for this. It wouldn't make him any less effective a pitcher, but it's potentiially a sign if his mechanics are off from his usual.

Owning Lincecum has come to mean riding out a cold streak midseason. He's still elite, but he requires patience. For what it's worth, on the subject of his mechanics and whether they are good or not good, an ESPN article on the rise of Tommy John surgeries contains the following quote: "If a team can win in the interim, like the Giants have done with Tim Lincecum and his radically tilted delivery -- which critics view as a time bomb -- it's managed to get its money's worth. "That's exactly the theory," concedes Astros pitching coach Doug Brocail. "It works until it doesn't." Would I still