(*) MASTER NOTES: Late news at the draft table

I have had three drafts so far this spring. The most recent of those was the Tout Wars Mixed League draft on March 10th. Drafting several weeks before Opening Day can be a very different experience than drafting here in late March or early April.

Consider that Tout Wars draft: March 10th was a Tuesday. I had done all of my preparation over the prior weekend: set up the whole league in Rotolab; flagged some early targets and avoids. I sketched out a few versions of a skeleton draft plan, and kept tweaking right through Tuesday.

One thing I did NOT spend a lot of time doing was reviewing spring news. Sure, the day of the draft was also the day that Marcus Stroman was lost for the year. That was a news item that I needed to account for, but it only took a couple of seconds to zero out his projection. The rest of the news of the day was inconsequential: teams were just starting to play other actual major-league teams rather than college teams, starters were still only going two innings per outing. Other than the Stroman injury, nothing that happened on draft day, or even the couple of days before, was significant enough to affect my draft planning.

For those drafting this weekend, or anytime between now and Opening Day, the story is very different. This late in the spring, there is draft-impacting news every day. More accurately, there is simply a lot of news, and you need to figure out which items are draft-impacting.

I don't mean to make this seem like a problem, though. Really, it's an opportunity. Ideally, you've had all winter to learn the player pool backwards and forwards, and to come up with all of those different iterations of your draft plan. One more time through that same exercise isn't going to help you that much.

Instead, take a look at some of the bigger news items that come out over the last couple of days before your draft, and think through their implications. Here are a couple of examples:

Anthony Rendon has been on the shelf for a couple of weeks with a sprained knee. Initially, he was supposed to be ready for the opener, but that's starting to come into question this week. Still, the news isn't all bad: the diagnosis hasn't changed, he hasn't really suffered any setbacks. He just hasn't healed yet.

Realistically, the Nationals are likely going to roll to the NL East title and can afford to take a long-term view here. That could mean that Rendon starts the season with a back-dated DL stint and misses the first week or so. That's barely of consequence to his potential value. But it could actually create a buying opportunity, if his draft cost drops due to this news. Put some thought into what your max bid might be for Rendon, or consider whether you would pick him if he slides into the 3rd round of your draft instead of fulfilling his 2nd-round ADP.

Chris Sale is another interesting case. He was scheduled to throw a simulated game on Friday, and that will start to illuminate his timetable to return to the White Sox. Current projections are that he may only miss one full turn through the rotation, but he has a few hurdles to clear before that plan firms up. Some mildly disappointing news from this first outing—not an actual setback with the foot, but maybe he doesn't throw as many pitches as planned, or just isn't happy with the outing—might soften his value in upcoming drafts. As Todd Zola said on the First Pitch Forums tour, "We know most pitchers won't make more than 32 starts; they miss a couple along the way. We just know when Sale is missing his."

Rendon and Sale are just examples; you don't even have to agree with my conclusions. There will be more examples of this in the days and hours before you head into your draft. The knee-jerk reaction as these situations come up is to just scrawl "injured/avoid" on your cheat sheet and take them out of your draft plan.

That's certainly the no-risk approach. But in a game where it gets harder and harder to find edges against your competition, going with that knee-jerk reaction may just be closing the door on one of those exploitable edges. Look at these late-breaking news items with an aggressive eye. Certainly, don't bid full value for a pitcher who left his last start holding his throwing elbow. But in situations with more nuance than that, prepare yourself to be ready to react if it seems like everyone else in your league went with the knee-jerk reaction.

And good luck to all at the draft table!

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