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What's going on, everybody?

Welcome into Fantasy Pros.

This is the Fantasy Baseball podcast.

I'm your host, Joe O'Riko, joined today by a very special guest.

He is Jeff Erickson, a senior editor and co-founder of RotoWire. Jeff,

great to talk with you. We usually do a couple of pods in the preseason. First time we've talked since first pitch Arizona, I believe. I hope you've been doing well. Yeah, doing well, happy to do this. Yeah, it's the first time we've done a pod together. I think we briefly talked on serious xm but you know uh yeah it's just this time of year we're just talking beforehand

just how hectic it is i'm'm going to tout this weekend at an FPC main event next weekend. I've got drafts tonight, tomorrow night, Thursday night before my flight to tout, doing my home league draft from the hotel Sunday night. It's just, it's that time of year. It's fantastic. And I was talking to Justin Mason about probably going to New York for Tout next year, just another trip to break up all this mad scramble in March. You know, I usually get out to Arizona each of the last few years, but it'll be nice to add another trip, which will either be New York or who knows, maybe try my hand at the main event down in Las Vegas one of these days.

Jeff, before we kick it off, what's going on over at Rotowire these days? Now, the draft gets live. We've got a little bit of a new nav bar there, a little bit of a redesign. So it's a different look for people. I haven't checked it out. More tools to help you win your leagues, but you know, fantasy leagues, a lot more to help you on your gaming as well. We're doing promo codes instead of free trials now. So check it out, Roto 15. You can get a free 15% or 15% off any RotoWire subscription. Check us out there. We came out with our latest roundtable rankings, Eric Alterman, Todd Zola, Clay Link, and I, that was one of the things we just did. and we're going to be doing that every Friday right up until the start of the season. So looking forward to a couple more iterations of that. Yeah, definitely go check out Rotowire. Great stuff on the podcast, on the website. Everything that they do is top-notch. Guys, we are going to be talking about bold predictions today. Jeff and I are each going to give you five of them, mixing in some of our guys along the way.

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I think McGonigle is better suited to be a pro this year, to be a major leagher this year.

McGonagle might begin the year in the minors.

It's a better team.

He's got to earn his way onto than the kind of Griffin does with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

But the batting eye is so much better. team he's got to earn his way onto than the kind of griffin does with the pittsburgh pirates but

the batting eye is so much better this swing is so compact griffin's going to strike out a bunch zero

walks six strikeouts going into spring training games at the time of this recording i think griffin's

going to struggle a little bit once he hits major league pitching i could definitely see that that happening, and the price has just gotten ridiculous for Connor Griffin, as you mentioned. Like, if I'm looking online championships over the last week, Connor Griffin's inside the top 140 main event drafts are going, and he's, I think, an eighth round pick or ninth round pick in the latest main event board I saw. The price has gotten crazy. Kevin McGonagall, even if he doesn't start the year with the team, could see him coming up really, really early, giving you maybe 20 and 10 in a best case scenario, hidden for batting average. So I think this one could very well come into play. I like Connor Griffin, but just the price has just gotten so expensive. It has. My first, no, go ahead. I'm sorry. It's also, this is also an endorsement in McGonigal, too. Just look at his, you know, just how he controls the strike zone, get the compact swing, real power here. Defense might be the only concern, but when he plays for the Tigers, and I know they're exhibition games and spring training games, but it still shows a little bit of intent. He's batting leadoff for this team. That shows me, they believe in that bat right now. Yeah, I absolutely agree. Kevin McGonigle has been a huge target over my recent drafts. And with the big drafts coming up, I think I will continue to take him barring any crazy jump in price, but I think Griffin will go substantially higher than McGonigle. So I definitely agree with you there, Jeff. My first prediction, and this one may ruffle some feathers, is about Nick Kurtz. I'm not a huge Nick Kurtz guy this year. My bold prediction is that he will not finish as a top 10 first basement. Just looking at the depth of the position, we now have Raphael Devers over there, Pete Alonzo, Olson, Harper, Ben Rice, technically qualifying still, however you want to classify him, Vinnie Pasquantino, Tyler Soderstrom, Michael Bush. It's a very, very deep position. I didn't even mention my guy here in Toronto, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Nick Kurtz had a phenomenal, phenomenal rookie season. There's no question about it,

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