SPECIAL REPORT: 2014's extreme rebound

candidates
Did BJ Upton kill your fantasy team in 2013? How about CC Sabathia? Ryan Braun? Josh
Hamilton?

That was last year. It's time to let it go.

It's all too common to hold a grudge against players who under-performed the prior year. But
our new research shows that this kind of emotional reaction can actually be detrimental. Why?
Because of recency bias.

We all have the tendency to place greater emphasis on more recent events. We remember the
damage done by the Uptons and Sabathias, and we vow not to make the mistake of rostering
them again. As a result, the value of those players at the draft table plummets so far that they
become bargains.

This isnt just a theory. We have been studying this for the past several years, and have the
data to back it up.

Recency bias quantified

Here is our methodology: We've compared Average Draft Position (ADP) data year-over-year,
and identifed last year's goats as those whose ADP has fallen at least 80 spots from the
prior year.

The results? Over the past three years, as many as 79% of our "goats" returned more value
than their new, depressed ADP supported. That's an actionable percentage play!

With that kind of evidence staring at us, we all need to learn to forgive the players who broke
our hearts in 2013. In other words...

That was last year. It's time to let it go.

What about 2014?

What can we do to further increase our odds of selecting strong rebound candidates? Using
the rest of BaseballHQ.coms analytic arsenal, we can identify some best bets from this
years eXtreme Regression Drafting (XRD) candidates:
 2014 2013 DELTA
==== ==== =====
Josh Johnson 300 121 -179
Yovani Gallardo 257 81 -176
B.J. Upton 207 39 -168
Melky Cabrera 275 111 -164
Ian Kennedy 273 118 -155
Mike Moustakas 285 145 -140
R.A. Dickey 219 80 -139
Jake Peavy 264 126 -138
CC Sabathia 205 70 -135
Adam LaRoche 266 132 -134
John Axford 278 145 -133
Ryan Howard 215 91 -124
Jimmy Rollins 182 63 -119
Miguel Montero 223 105 -118
Billy Butler 148 40 -108
Will Middlebrooks 222 116 -106
Michael Bourn 191 87 -104
Victor Martinez 177 74 -103
Aramis Ramirez 157 57 -100
Johnny Cueto 185 85 -100
Dan Haren 260 163 -97
Dayan Viciedo 299 209 -90
Fernando Rodney 197 109 -88
Erick Aybar 217 129 -88
Tim Lincecum 240 153 -87
Emilio Bonifacio 286 199 -87
Starlin Castro 121 36 -85
Austin Jackson 161 78 -83
David Freese 272 191 -81
Derek Jeter 297 217 -80

(ADP data courtesy of the National Fantasy Baseball Championship)

From the above list, the following five players are our "best bets" to post a strong rebound
season in 2014:

Billy Butler (DH, KC)

Key metrics: Hard contact
The upside: Our hard contact index (HctX) is a metric that combines two of the most critical
elements for hitters: how often a hitter makes contact, and how often they hit the ball hard.
From 2010-12, we had nearly 1800 AB worth of data on Butler that was incredibly consistent,
showing his HctX skill as some 31% above the league average. In 2013, that number fell to
11% above league average. There was some nonsense going on in KC last year: the entire
team started out hitting poorly, hitting coaches changed multiple times, etc. We don't know
exactly what caused Butler's production to plummet. But we have those 1800 AB worth of
evidence that he's better than he showed in 2013, which makes him a great candidate to get
back to the 20 HR, .300 BA hitter he was before 2013.

Starlin Castro (SS, CHC)

Key metrics: age, contact rate
The upside: Castro had demonstrated strong plate skills in his first 2+ years in Chicago: a
high contact rate (ct%) set a nice floor for his batting average by ensuring a lot of balls in
play, and a ground-ball tilt to those balls in play allowed him to use his speed to leg out base
hits. He didn't walk much, but that was a forgivable wart on an otherwise-appealing skill set.

But in 2013, that contact skill deserted him, as his career-worst 81% ct% (meaning he struck
out in 19% of his AB) was just too many strikeouts for a hitter with his pedestrian power
skills. Still, after 1500+ career AB at that previous contact rate, with no apparent health issues
and still at a pre-peak age, we can reasonably expect to see some recovery in that area, thus
driving a BA rebound in 2014. And once that BA (and OBP) climb, that will mean more
opportunities to rebuild his SB total. Throw in some latent power skills that could add a few HR
to his usual 10-12 total, and there is a good chance for across-the-board improvement for
Castro in 2014. The bottom line here is that you just can't give up on a 24-year old.

Ian Kennedy (SP, SD)

Key metrics: hr/f, ballpark factors
The upside: Kennedy clearly isn't as good as he looked in 2011, when he went 21-4 with a
2.88 ERA. But now the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction. In 2013 he was
done in by a classic combination of pitcher problems: too many walks and too many HR. The
control problems were odd, as they flew in the face of the gains he had made in that area in
the previous years. Those problems may be mechanical or physical, and it's hard to know for
sure whether he can correct them in 2014. But we can feel better about his HR problems.
They were fueled by poor fortune in terms of HRs per fly ball. Even if he were still in Arizona,
we would expect some regression in his HR rate. But he is in San Diego, which gives us even
more confidence that he can keep the ball in that park. That alone is enough for us to predict
a return to a sub-4.00 ERA. And if the walks get back under control, sub-3.50 is within reach.

CC Sabathia (SP, NYY)

Key metrics: expected ERA
The upside: In the interest of transparency, we should point out that we have been predicting
Sabathia's demise for some time now: the combination of his high innings counts and body
 type have long raised concerns about his durability. On the surface, then, 2013's collapse
looks like we were finally proven right.

The problem, though, is that this collapse wasn't as bad as it looked. Our metric for Expected
ERA (xERA), which measures what ERA a pitcher "deserved" based on his underlying skills,
indicates that Sabathia's 2013 ERA was a full run higher than it should have been. The
tendency is to look at those factors that we pointed to for years - his age, workload, body type
- and say that 2013 was the beginning of the end for Sabathia. But his underlying skills say
that it wasn't, and his significant weight loss this offseason may enhance his rebound
potential. These factors combine to create an opportunity to turn a nice profit on Sabathia in
2014.

BJ Upton (OF, ATL)

Key metrics: hit rate, line drive rate, contact rate
The upside: Absolutely everything went wrong for Upton last year. We don't totally know why:
there was a nagging groin issue early in the year that may have thrown him into some bad
habits at the plate, and once he went into a tailspin he couldn't get out of it. What we do know
is that Upton was a remarkably consistent player from 2010-12: he was automatic for a .240
BA with 20+ HR and 35 SB. Comparing his component skills from those three years with 2013,
a few things stand out:

His hit rate (h%) on balls in play fell from a norm of 31% to 27%.
Despite that, his line-drive rate (LD%) held steady. Most base hits come on line drives,
so this underscores the fact that Upton was getting unlucky: Balls that normally turned into
base hits for him from 2010-12 turned into outs in 2013.
Upton's strikeout rate did jump to an alarming level in 2013. But that problem was a
lot worse in the 2nd half, when the snowball had already picked up steam and his playing
time became erratic.

Without any lingering injury concern, still at a peak age, and with a well-established prior
track record, it's entirely reasonable to give Upton a complete mulligan on 2013. And since the
ADP says he is going more than 150 picks later than last year, you don't need anything near a
full recovery in order to turn a tidy profit on this investment.

Conclusion

The above analysis is intended to provide just a taste of what BaseballHQ.com has to offer.
This article has just scratched the surface of our analytic arsenal, the toolbag that allows you
to understand every player's skill set. But if you don't have time for that, no problem: our
writers do the heavy lifting for you, providing top-notch analysis every day from now through
season's end. And our interactive tool set tailors our volumes of data to your specific league
structure. Oh, and we have the best subscriber forums anywhere, maintaining a level of
discussion that will consistently astound you.

Join us. It's the best decision you can make this year. We look forward to having you as a
subscriber.

Ray Murphy
co-General Manager, BaseballHQ.com