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During his last few years with the Chicago Cubs, new Miami Marlins starting pitcher Carlos Zambrano made headlines for his temper tantrums more than his work on the mound, but the change of scenery will bring Big Z back to relevancy in 2012.

Zambrano is an interesting name for fantasy managers every season. On one hand, he knows how to strike batters out and is a solid veteran; on the other hand, he can be a monster headache with all his random outbursts and foot-in-mouth type of comments.

That being said, the Marlins didn’t go out and acquire the former Cubs hurler without thinking they can control the big man. Who better to control Big Z than manager Ozzie Guillen, right? Exactly.

While I don’t expect Zambrano to pull any more of his usual outbursts during his first year on a new team, if he tries that stuff with Guillen, he’s going to get an earful and then some. There’s no way the new Marlins skipper is going to put up with temper tantrums from anyone but himself.

Zambrano had his worst season in MLB in 2011, and he still posted a 6.2 strikeouts-per-nine-innings ratio. The native Venezuelan is a proven strikeout producer, and he’s a guy I’ve seen go either in the last round of drafts or undrafted in many fantasy leagues.

The newest Miami Marlin is only two seasons removed from a double-digit win year in 2010. Oh, and over his 11 seasons in the big leagues, Big Z strikes out an average of almost eight batters per nine innings.

If you’re sitting there questioning whether or not this former Cubbie is motivated, he’s actually spent the offseason working out according to the Miami Herald. Yes, you read that right: Carlos Zambrano has been working out!

The Herald stated that Zambrano has dropped an estimated two or three pants sizes since we last saw him take the mound. In fact, Big Z told reporter Clark Spencer that the only reason he didn’t keep shedding the weight was because his wife said he was beginning to look ill.

“She says I don’t look good, like I have cancer” the starting pitcher told Spencer.

I’m sure there have been plenty of managers who have been burned by this guy in recent seasons, but you can’t write off a proven veteran who boasts a career average of almost 200 Ks a year.

While I wouldn’t advocate drafting Big Z in, say, the 14th round of your draft or anything, he’ll be available in the final round most likely, and that’s a steal.

Now your league mates aren’t going to pat you on the back or scold you for taking their potential pick when you draft Zambrano, but you’ll have them kicking themselves later in the year when the Marlins hurler becomes one of your biggest strikeout producers.

While the congratulations are nice, it’s much more fun to watch your fellow managers wonder why they didn’t pick Big Z when they had the chance.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

One of the more important storylines in baseball this spring training is the health and bounce-back ability of San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey. If you recall, Posey was the roadblock who got steamrolled last season in a home-plate collision with the Florida Marlins’ Scott Cousins, which resulted in Posey’s season-ending surgery to repair a broken bone and three torn ankle ligaments.

Prior to that high-speed, high-profile collision, Posey was following up his 2010 NL Rookie of the Year campaign with a respectable sophomore season. In the 45 games played before he went down, he was batting .284 with four home runs and 21 runs batted in. Though his numbers did not exactly jump off the computer screen, Posey’s presence in the lineup far exceeds raw statistics. As the team’s cleanup hitter, he provides a legitimate right-handed bat to a famished Giants offense that ranked dead last in the league in runs scored.

The Giants sorely missed Posey’s production in the heart of the order. His replacements, Hector Sanchez, Chris Stewart and Eli Whiteside, combined for a .200 batting average in 2011. They were often clogging up the eight-hole in the batting order, and it forced manager Bruce Bochy to play “eeny, meeny, miny, mo” when filling out the rest of the lineup.

Needless to say, with Posey’s bat, the Giants could have at least squeaked into the playoffs as the NL wild card last year. And with him back to full strength this spring training, San Francisco has high aspirations in returning to the postseason this October. While the Giants are pinning the team’s success in 2012 on their slugging catcher, more importantly, the return of Posey bodes well for fantasy baseball owners. After all, there is a dearth of solid contributors at the catcher position throughout the MLB. Though Posey is only entering his third season, and has only 160 career games under his belt, the soon-to-be 25-year-old is still considered one of the game’s elite catchers—despite missing two-thirds of last season.

In fact, most fantasy baseball projections still forecast Posey as a top-five catcher. ESPN.com ranks him as the fifth-best catcher available, squeezed between Matt Wieters and Alex Aliva, and FantasyBaseballTools.com slots him in the top tier of catchers that includes Carlos Santana, Brian McCann and Mike Napoli. NYTimes.com, however, projects Posey to be the sixth-best catcher in 2012, behind Joe Mauer and ahead of Miguel Montero.

What does this all mean? Well, for one, the battle to be one of the top-five catchers in the majors is a tight one. Mauer, of course, is a lock, albeit only when he’s not on the disabled list. Unfortunately, his history of injuries prevents him from being a sure-fire top-five pick. In years past, Mauer could have been considered as a genuine first-round selection in some fantasy drafts. Now, it’s a tough call to predict a) how healthy he’ll be, and b) how many starts at first base he’ll draw.

The consensus is that Santana, McCann and Napoli will all be nabbed within the first four rounds. Assuming a regular 5×5 rotisserie league, Yahoo! Sports projects Posey to be a late sixth-round pick in its fantasy baseball mock draft. Solid estimates for his 2012 stats, according to NYTimes.com, include a .292 batting average with 16 home runs and 70 runs driven in—very similar to his 2010 Rookie of the Year résumé (.305/18/67). 

Those numbers are respectable, especially for a catcher. The only caveat is Posey’s own return to full health. True, it’s only spring training, but Posey has sparingly demonstrated his baserunning, as well as the endurance to catch a full nine innings on consecutive days. “He’s not there,” acknowledged Bochy. But there’s still time, obviously.

Fantasy owners, however, should be cautious assuming Posey will bounce back so quickly. Though he is a naturally gifted hitter who could probably sport a .300 batting average with one leg, Posey will have to get up to speed in his all-around game to be considered a higher pick on the fantasy draft board. Furthermore, in order to ensure that Posey performs at the offensive level he is capable of, San Francisco needs to make sure that he is protected throughout the batting order. According to the Giants lineup projected by Rotochamp.com, first baseman Aubrey Huff could potentially bat behind Posey, in the fifth spot in the order, followed by Brandon Belt.

Huff trudged through a World-Series-hangover-laden 2011 season, finishing with a terrible .246 batting average, 12 home runs and 59 runs batted in. He also scored an abysmal 45 runs, his lowest output since 2001. Belt, meanwhile, experienced one of those tortuous rookie seasons last year, staggering to a .225 batting average, with nine homers and 18 runs driven in, in 63 games played.

Yikes. Not the kind of protection one would hope for Posey.

Could Bochy consider moving the Giants’ only other bona fide hitter, Pablo Sandoval, to the five hole? Or bat Sandoval fourth and Posey third? If not, then look for a significant number of intentional walks for the right-handed-hitting Posey, as both Belt and Huff are left-handed hitters behind him. That certainly won’t boost Posey’s fantasy numbers all that quickly. Additionally, if new Giants leadoff man Angel Pagan is unable to set the table effectively at the top of the order, Posey may struggle to find himself in run-scoring opportunities.

Without a doubt, however, the question will be whether fantasy owners would want to gamble and pick up Posey earlier in the draft, ahead of other catchers like McCann or Wieters. McCann is a perennial All-Star, who has slugged over 20 home runs in five of the past six seasons, and over 40 extra base hits in six straight seasons. Furthermore, he posts a .286 career batting average. Though he gets plenty of rest in Atlanta—not starting in more than 133 games in each of the past three seasons—for the sake of this analysis, Posey is still the lesser picker.

Meanwhile, Wieters is the likely candidate to slip from his career season in 2011. His 22 home runs and 50 extra base hits were quite impressive, as was the fact that he scored more runs (72) than he drove in (68). Well, maybe not impressive so much as interesting. But if Posey is as healthy as he can be throughout 2012, it’s possible that he could outperform Wieters. The Baltimore Orioles are equally as likely to not scare their opponents offensively.

Can Posey be ranked higher than Wieters?

A good catcher is hard to find for owners, both real and fantasy. Picking up Posey in the late fourth round or fifth round would not be the worst idea in the world, considering that other positions have way more depth and are less predictable (starting pitchers).

Make no mistake about it: If Posey is given a clean bill of health heading out of spring training, fantasy owners might come away with a steal in their league drafts by picking him higher than projected.

Follow me on Twitter: @nathanieljue

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

With so much going on in the shortened NBA season and the NFL playoffs kicking off, it’s easy to get one’s mind off of baseball. The smart fantasy baseball manager, however, is paying close attention to the MLB and planning accordingly.

With any fantasy sport, it’s easy to get caught up in the household names, but it’s important to never forget the stats (especially in fantasy baseball). So without any more introduction, here are the five most important stats to key in on when drafting in the months to come.

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When drafting a fantasy team, there is one thing that you should be your number one priority—consistency. You need that factor to carry your team from day one.

Slumps are inevitable, but you need the players who post strong enough stretches to smooth out the rocky streaks.

Miguel Cabrera, Albert Pujols and Ryan Braun to name a few are prime examples of this kind of consistency.

Sometimes you have to come to the realization that your early round pick is either falling fast and you need to salvage his value during a trade, or that the hot streak your stud is on might be the perfect time to sell high as their value will only plummet.

It is never easy to part ways with a player that you took high in the draft, but sometimes you have to know when to bite the bullet.

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2011 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers Include Blue Jays Slugging Second Baseman

Coming into the 2010 season, few second basemen were as highly regarded in fantasy circles as Toronto Blue Jays second baseman Aaron Hill, and with good reason. He was fresh off a breakout campaign in which he hit .286 with 36 home runs and 108 RBI, as well as scoring an impressive 103 runs. 

However, things quickly hit the skids for Hill last season, as his batting average was barely above the Mendoza line, and his runs scored and on-base percentage were both at career low levels. He still hit 26 home runs, but the .205 average forced many a wary owner to cut Hill loose, and he enters 2011 as a mid-draft pickup in most leagues, if not later than that. 

So, what do we make of Hill’s sudden inability to get on base? Was it just an outlier season, an exception to the rule, or the start of something much more frightening for owners? 

Given Hill’s anemic batting average on balls in play last season, which was just .196, there are indicators that perhaps he was the victim of the worst luck baseball had seen last year. He was finding a lot of gloves, and because of that, his average bottomed out. 

Will Hill hit .300? No; even in his breakout campaign of 2009, Hill hit .286, and he’s never hit .300 in the big leagues. 

But, given his terrible BABIP and the fact that there was nothing really wrong with the second baseman’s swing, you can bet he’ll deliver another fantastic season in 2011, and with second base so thin this year, he’s well worth the risk. 

Expect an average in the .280 range and between 25 and 30 home runs from Hill, as he bounces back from what was a miserable campaign. 

For more baseball news, check out MLB Predictions 2011: Division Winners and Breakout Stars to Watch. 

We’re barely 24 hours away from the start of the 2011 fantasy baseball season, and that means it’s time to take a look at some potential sleepers!

A sleeper is a player picked well beneath where his level of potential production dictates he should be taken. It doesn’t mean just late-round players who could result in high production, but guys who have slipped beyond where they should in most drafts. 

We’re giving you some of the players who could easily wind up being forgotten, overlooked, or undervalued by your league, the players whose production could easily outdo their meager draft position. 

From rookies like Pedro Alvarez or J.P. Arencibia to veterans like Scott Baker or Aaron Hill, these are the low-risk, high-reward players who could mean the difference between a league championship and a finish in the middle of the pack. 

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Fantasy drafts boil down to one of four things: sleepers, value plays, studs and over-hyped players, the latter of course being the worst. There is nothing more detrimental than reaching for a player too early just because BBTN (Baseball Tonight) talked about a player until they were red in the face.

We also have the players who break out the year before, only to fall flat on their face the next season—yes, I’m talking to you, Mark Reynolds.

Knowing which players to avoid is key to having a successful draft day and it is my honor to guide you down the right path.

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Sleepers, sleepers, sleepers. Everyone has their own list of just who they think can come out of nowhere and carry your fantasy team to a championship.

All fantasy enthusiasts have their own definition of what a sleeper is. To me, a sleeper is someone who falls in drafts—not necessarily someone who is an unheard of player. Those no-names who become stars are few and far between. Players who will give you early round value, but are selected later in drafts, are the real key to success.

Finding these type of players is key to a successful fantasy season. There is an abundance of these players, and it is my job to bring these names front and center.

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To combat my ignorance the first time I played fantasy baseball, I did what anyone does when they need answers: consulted the Internet. This was 2005—the Industrial Age for the web—so fantasy commentary was just starting to percolate “back then”; it wasn’t as obvious where to go for information.

What I couldn’t get my head around was a concept I kept reading about—this concept of Value. Only experience could help answer questions like:  

“Should I reach for this pitcher, that won’t go for a few rounds, because he’s supposed to have a breakout season?”

“Should I take this proven third baseman in the fifth round, or wait until the thirteenth and take the guy that is supposed to be a HUGE sleeper?”

“Should I take this pitcher a little early since all the talent after him is in a lower value tier?”

These are (/should be) the conundrums running through a manager’s head on draft day and unless we attended each team’s Spring Training, we look to fantasy writers for insight.

Anyway, long story short, after exhaustively reading the experts and averaging rankings, (I was entering a keeper league that had three seasons under its belt.) the experts had Jason Schmidt ranked the highest of the available players. He was my first pick of the expansion draft.

Some of you just looked at your screen like I made an offhand child pornography joke. Yes, Jason Schmidt. The guy who dropped 18 W, 251 K, 3.20 ERA and 1.08 WHIP in 2004 and then followed up with a tepid 12 W, 165 K, 4.40 ERA and 1.42 WHIP in 2005—the year I took him. Ouch. (Who knows why he had the decline. It’s not like there have been substance abuse problems in baseball; I’m sure he just forgot to train in the offseason.)

So what did I learn, besides the concept of value and that drugs are bad? Take an expert’s opinion with a microscopic grain of salt.

You are dealing with one person who has to know the workings of 30 teams and countless prospects. When I mentioned my Schmidt pick to a buddy, a huge Giants fan, he burst out laughing. He wasn’t fooled; he knew the Giants had been playing with house money and that Schmidt was set for a regression. And my buddy didn’t play fantasy baseball.

Experts know they’re often throwing darts at the wall; they’ll always let you know once in a while that “Hey, I’m just one opinion, one voice; it’s worth what it cost you” and so on. But the problem is that often we don’t notice our favorite fantasy writer, despite his solid jokes, perpetual hangover, alleged womanizing and pop culture references, is not correct enough. His good writing blurs the fact that he’s not that good a fantasy analyst—at least no better than other writers, or even your own eyeballs.

So here’s what we’ll do: We’ll implement the Fantasy Pundit Accountability Act. We’ll have a fantasy league of fantasy writers. You don’t need to worry about drafting anyone, but every month or so, we’ll examine the big names in fantasy writing and compare how they’re doing against their preseason picks. And, perhaps, add a little “color commentary,” if you will. 

Basic preseason rankings, (Top 25’s) from writer to writer, are rarely that different. The area of contention is when, despite common opinion, we’re told about Boom Guy or Bust Guy. We’re told their value isn’t what it seems. It’s when a writer implores us to take Andrew McCutchen before, say, Carl Crawford or after Torii Hunter. It’s when writers create such a debilitatingly persuasive argument, we have to draft Boom Guy or we’ll be positive our season is ruined. And it’s when they dissect Bust Guy’s splits so convincingly that we stare at the manager who ends up drafting him like he ate something from under the couch.

Because as Boom Guy kills our roster by playing like he spent the offseason bathing in a pool of chocolate syrup and Bust Guy looks like his offseason was spent in a pool of creatine (or related substance), we remember our source and wonder if it’s a federal offense to mail dog poop. (It is.) And, conversely, if Boom Guy plays like the stud he was supposed to be, we wonder if it’d be weird to email a screenshot of our league standings. (It would be.)

It’s a writer’s Sleeper/Busts, Breakout/Regression, Get/Get-Away lists that make or break a season. 

That’s what we’ll compare and examine. Something like this:

Bold predictions are what end up making a winning season; that’s why we look to the experts—their insights on which players will or won’t have that sacred Value.

Let’s see who’s getting it right. We’ll compile the major writers’ predictions in the next installment.

Stay tuned.

[Suggest a fantasy writer for review or a new field in the ratings system in the comments below or send Caleb an email. Become a Fan to avoid missing installments of the Fantasy Pundit Accountability Act.]

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

With Adam Wainwright done for the year, it raises an interesting question for fantasy owners. What happens if you were unfortunate enough to have Wainwright on your team? Or for that matter if one of your top pitchers gets hurt and will miss most of the season? Here are some options to consider that might get overlooked in your draft that you could steal in the late rounds.

Ted Lilly and Hiroki Kuroda may not be able to produce as many wins as a pitcher like Wainwright, but their upsides are still worth the risk, especially if you can steal them in the later rounds. Kuroda lowered his WHIP last season and finished in the top 20 for pitchers in that category. Also, each season with the Dodgers, Kuroda’s strikeout rates have increased. That paired with a Dodgers offense on the rebound could increase his win totals and give you a solid starter.

Ted Lilly adjusted well after being traded to the Dodgers last season. Lilly won seven starts after the trade for the Dodgers and similar to Kuroda, he has a reputation for a low WHIP. The same argument can be made that an improved Dodger offense could help increase his wins. Also, Lilly is going to be the Dodgers’ number three starter, giving him better pitching match-ups than he got last season with the Cubs.

Jake Peavy is another pitcher to look to steal in the late rounds, as most people will overlook him because of his high O-Rank. Most people will shy away because Peavy is coming off shoulder surgery last season, but all reports from White Sox camp are that Peavy is looking like he could be ready to open the season. Worst case senario, he misses a couple of starts. But with an improved White Sox offense and the benefits of pitching out of the five slot in the rotation, Peavy should be able to pick up more wins than people would expect. Also, if Peavy can return close to his old form, look for high strike out numbers this year.

Johan Santana is another pitcher coming back from injury that people might shy away from. Santana won’t be back until mid-June, but if you’re in a league with two or three DL spots, it might be worth drafting him, putting him on the DL and picking up a filler pitcher until he gets back. With the exception of Philadelphia, Santana won’t face much competition or many hitter-friendly parks in his own division, and if Reyes and Beltran can stay healthy and Bay can return to old form, look for the Mets to pick up more wins this season and give Santana more run support, something he has lacked the past couple seasons.

By Trey Nelson

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Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com