Compiler v.1.2 Plus New YouTube Tutorial Importing Holds, Quality Starts Projections

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I promised an update to the fantasy baseball projections, ADP and depth charts earlier today on our Facebook page, and it got done this afternoon, so you are now free to update your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler. Same method as before, go to the update tab in the Compiler and hit Update Projections.

Ah, but there is more to the story which is why it took me an extra nine hours to post about the update. You’ll be particularly interested in this part if your league uses Holds or Quality Starts as a scoring category.

Last week member prnichols7807 asked why Holds are available at Razzball.com in the Steamer-Razzball projections on their website, but not in the Steamer-Razzball projections available in the Cheatsheet Compiler (and here). Good question. I learned that Razzball adds the Holds projections, and Quality Starts too, and they want to keep those proprietary.

No problem, of course. I can understand that, because Holds and QS are not as commonly projected as other stats, so if you want them you need to visit Razzball to get them. However, that doesn’t help us get them in the Cheatsheet Compiler to incorporate into our cheatsheets for leagues that use Holds, Quality Starts, or both, does it? The answer: Projection Pal. We can use Projection Pal to import just the Holds and QS into the Compiler, and add them to our existing Steamer projections.

The question then of course is how to do that, which inspired me to create a new YouTube tutorial on exactly that. The video shows all the steps from copying the projections off the website, pasting them into Projection Pal, getting them into the Cheatsheet Compiler, adding them to the existing Steamer projections, and creating our new cheatsheets for a 6X6 league (standard 5X5 plus OBP and Holds, and QS instead of Wins).

These videos are time consuming to produce but I can understand they are more helpful than reading instructions. I hope you find this one helpful.

As a further addendum to this story, when I first ran the Holds projections through the Cheatsheet Compiler, relievers with Holds were overvalued quite a bit. I made some adjustments to Compiler version 1.1, and uploaded version 1.2 to our download page with a new feature.

Similar to the “Stockpile Closers” feature already in the Compiler, there is now a “Stockpile Holds” feature on the roto adjust tab that forces relievers projected with a base level of holds into the draftable player pool. That change, plus an appropriate adjustment to the holds value as discussed in the video, spits out the projected best setup men in baseball at reasonable dollar values relative to closers and other positions.

The time to do one update plus another nine hours later, we have updated projections, a new version of the Cheatsheet Compiler and a new YouTube video. Yep, that is a full day, and I’m calling it a night. Enjoy!

Draft Buddy 1.2 Fixes Missing Players in Drop-downs

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As you may have noticed in the comments of my prior post, member bigcntry7879 told me that some players in Draft Buddy were not appearing in the available drop-downs. Specifically, players very early in the lists sorted alphabetically, like Adrian Beltre or Adam Wainwright, were missing.

Related to this, if you managed to select these players by other means, then their team was not appearing properly, and instead throwing a miserable looking #REF error.

What was happening is the hidden worksheet in Draft Buddy that creates all the alphabetical players lists by position during setup, was not counting down far enough to catch these players. It is a bit complex, the steps, and no need to get too deep into the technical details, but the important thing is, Draft Buddy 1.1 needed a fix.

Now available from our download page, Draft Buddy version 1.2. You can simply go there, download it and use it going forward, replacing version 1.1 if you already downloaded that previously.

If you already did a fair amount of work in version 1.1 and don’t want to replace it, it is possible to fix the problem yourself following a few steps. I’ll try to detail them here:

1. Open Draft Buddy and unhide the sheet titled “Sheet1″ using Format > Sheet > Unhide.*

2. There is a lot of data here, but across the top row there are some formulas that sort of go in a pattern starting with cell S1. The S1 formula is this:

=COUNT(S3:S1001)+COUNTIF(S3:S1001,"AddHitter*")

A similar formula is repeated in cells X1, AC1, AH1, etc. for each hitter position, and then a slightly changed formula for pitchers in cells BX1 and CC1.

For the hitters formula in cell S1, we are going to change it from the above to this:

=COUNT(S3:S1021)+COUNTIF(S3:S1021,"AddHitter*")

That is it, just two characters, changing “1001″ to “1021″.

3. Copy the formula in cell S1 (CTRL-C) and paste it (CTRL-V) in each of the similar cells for each hitter position, X1, AC1, AH1, AM1, AR1, AW1, BB1, BG1 and BL1.

4. The pitchers formula in cell BX1 was this:

=COUNT(BX3:BX1001)+COUNTIF(BX3:BX1001,"AddPitcher*")

Change it to this:

=COUNT(BX3:BX1051)+COUNTIF(BX3:BX1051,"AddPitcher*")

In this case we changed “1001″ to “1051″.

5. Copy the formula in cell BX1 and paste it in cell CC1.

6. Since you’ve already done work in Draft Buddy, such as inputting keepers, draft pick trades or maybe even some draft picks, you do not want to lose this work. Go to the setup tab and make sure to uncheck the “Clear Keepers and Draft Picks During Setup” option.

7. Now open your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler, and go back to Draft Buddy and click the Setup Draft Buddy button. Buddy will recreate the drop-downs and they should now include all the players at each position.

* method for unhiding sheets will vary in different versions of Microsoft Excel

Zeile Projections Update To The Update

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It is a tricky business relying on fantasy baseball projections from other sources, and trying to stay up to date all the time, especially when they have a seemingly random update schedule. After finalizing the update yesterday for the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy, I woke up this morning and, after noticing one small mistake I wanted to correct, I checked the Zeile consensus projections over at FantasyPros and they updated them again, late last night, after our last update. Darn it.

It is the weekend and many of you might be drafting today or tomorrow, so lets get everyone up to date with the latest projections, even though it is difficult to decipher exactly what changed from the last version to the current version. Okay, as of typing this I updated the Zeile projections again. You’ll see even if you already hit Update Projections after yesterday’s update (Friday ~ 7:00pm Eastern), the Compiler will tell you once again this morning (Saturday ~ 8:00am) that there is an update available.

As for the small mistake, I noticed in the Cheatsheet Compiler that Reid Brignac was still on his old team, Tampa Bay, even though I know I switched him in our depth charts weeks ago. I finally realized the issue.

The Compiler update pages I create were pulling the team and position information from the Zeile projections instead of the depth charts. Zeile still shows Brignac on Tampa. Steamer, by the way, shows him as a free agent. You’ll notice this on his player page where each of those projections are shown below his historic season stats.

Now I am pulling the team and position data from the right spot, our depth charts, so the Compiler properly shows his current team, the Colorado Rockies, after running the aforementioned update. This would apply to any other player who switched teams recently where our projection source haven’t quite caught up yet.

Fantasy Baseball Projections, ADP and Depth Chart Update

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That took some time – longer than I expected (per usual) – but the projections, average draft position and depth charts are now updated for the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy. Open your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler, go to the update tab, make sure the Zeile (FantasyPros) option is selected for projections source, and click Update Projections.

No update to the Steamer-Razzball projections this week, only the Zeile projections. I updated the ADP from all three of our sources, FantasyPros, Mock Draft Central and National Fantasy Baseball Championship. Thanks once again to each of our partners for their contributions to the CC/DB.

I also ran through every team to update our depth charts too. In terms of other online features, the projections update creates new updated player rankings for our cheatsheets and player pages, like Bryce Harper.

We had some questions the last few days about the projections, including a discussion on our Facebook page when member smackie1970 noticed there are way too many at-bats going to the Tampa Bay shortstops. Make sure to check that out to understand the reasoning behind it.

Commenting on a previous blog post, member prnichols7807 asked why Holds (and I noticed, Quality Starts too) aren’t included in our Steamer-Razzball projections when they are over at Razzball. It seems that Razzball adds those to Steamer, and they want to keep them proprietary, which is certainly understandable considering HLD and QS are not as commonly projected by fantasy baseball prognosticators across the inter webs. My suggestion if you really want these in your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler would be to do so using Projection Pal. If I have time then I will revisit that topic next week to show how I would do it.

Okay, that is it for the update. Have a good one, and good luck if your draft is on this weekend.

Status Update

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I am working on an update this morning to the projections, ADP, depth charts, etc., so hang tight and we’ll see how long this takes me. I’ll post back, plus announce on Twitter and Facebook, when it is ready.

Another Update, Plus Baseball Player Rankings

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A new week and yet another update for the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy. The Zeile Consensus Projections and ADP each received an update, which you can obtain by simply opening your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler, going to the update tab, and hitting the Update Projections button, making sure you are asking for the Zeile (FantasyPros) projections from the available drop-down.

Don’t have the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy yet? They are free, including updates from now to Opening Day. All you need to do is register a member account (or login with your old one and renew access) and go to the download page to get the CC/DB, fantasy baseball version for 2013. Testimonials and/or donations to help pay for our web hosting and time are appreciated.

The CC/DB is in Microsoft Excel, which is software that some of you maybe don’t have on your computer, or don’t use currently or very often, or don’t care to try. I’ve tried to make the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy as user-friendly as possible, but it is within the confines of Excel which isn’t everyone’s idea of a good time. As a (former) accountant, it was a natural for me, but I understand some reluctance or even frustration using a Microsoft product.

Overall
Rank
Player
 Team 5X5 ADP
1
Ryan Braun, OF
 MIL $46 1.01
2
Miguel Cabrera, 3B
 DET $46 1.02
3
Mike Trout, OF
 LAA $44 1.03
4
Robinson Cano, 2B
 NYY $36 1.07
5
Matt Kemp, OF
 LAD $35 1.04
6
Albert Pujols, DH|1B
 LAA $35 1.06
7
Clayton Kershaw, SP
 LAD $33 2.02

To help bridge the gap by providing something beneficial to non-Excel users, I posted new player ranking pages on the website. Print and go, with the old pencil and paper draft method. Nothing wrong with that, and you are certain to not spill beer on your laptop at the draft. The rankings are based on standard 5X5 roto scoring with a typical $260 salary cap (i.e. same format as you see in outdated magazines on the racks at the book store), pulled from the Cheatsheet Compiler. There are overall rankings and rankings by position. I’ll update these each time we update the projections in the Compiler.

I hope you find that helpful. Feedback is welcome either here in the blog comments, or on Twitter or Facebook.

Big Baseball Update To End The Week

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Where did the week go? Better question: Why do I find myself asking that same question every week?

Not to worry, I’m not expecting an answer to either question, but I do have good news in that we are going to finish the week just like it started, with an update to the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy.

This time the update is to both sets of fantasy baseball projections – Steamer-Razzball and Zeile – plus the average draft position (ADP) data from all three sources – FantasyPros, Mock Draft Central and NFBC. Our depth charts are still in good shape, except the Chicago Cubs who got missed last time, so they got updated.

Since we have two sets of projections to update, and the Cheatsheet Compiler only does them one at a time, here are the steps you should follow, keeping in mind that from the default download file, Zeile projections are in Site A and Steamer projections are in Site B.

1. Update Steamer. Go to the update tab in the Compiler and change the Projections source drop-down to “Steamer-Razzball”. Click the Update Projections button.

2. Move Steamer. After you just updated, Steamer overwrote the prior projections in Site A. Lets move them to Site B so we don’t lose them from the Zeile update. Go to the update tab in the Compiler and near the top of the tab click the Move to Site B button.

3. Update Zeile. Repeat step 1 but change the Projections source drop-down to “Zeile (FantasyPros)”.

After that you are up to date.

For some added reading on the projections we are using in the Cheatsheet Compiler, check out Where Steamer and ZIPS Disagree by Dave Cameron over at FanGraphs. Then read Jared Cross’ response at the Steamer Projections Blog and adjustments made to Steamer as a result (and which led to the above noted update).

Longtime Draft Buddy member, BeanTown, did some sleuthing to find out if projections that are averages of a bunch of single sets of projections tended to be more or less accurate in general than single sets of projections. He found this article by Wil Larson over at FanGraphs, and mentioned similar findings from sabermetrician (is that a word?) Tom Tango. The findings? Average projections are good for hitters, but less good for pitchers. Interesting.

From that, BeanTown asked me how he could set the allocation keys in the Cheatsheet Compiler to use Zeile projections for hitters, and Steamer projections for pitchers. No problem I told him. Here is how:

1. First, set the default allocation on the setup tab to 100% Zeile (Site A). That we will use for hitters.

2. Then, go to the pitchers tab and do you notice just above the spreadsheet but below the toolbars a “+” sign. Click that and it will unhide some columns. In the yellow column under “Non-Default % Key” you can put a different allocation key for an individual player. Unless you’ve changed it, “8″ should be the 100% Steamer (Site B) key. Put 8 for the first player, copy it, and paste it all the way down for all players on the pitchers tab.

3. Hit Compile Cheatsheets.

After step 3, the cheatsheets are now generated based on Zeile for hitters, Steamer for pitchers. Hopefully that provides the best of both worlds.

Big Baseball Update To Start The Week

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Okay, I know it is Tuesday, but that was supposed to be the lead headline yesterday on the website. It was a marathon session to get as much updated as possible for the fantasy baseball Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy since our prior update, last week.

I noticed the Zeile Consensus Projections from FantasyPros got updated over the weekend, plus our depth charts were getting a bit stale. So I started first thing Monday morning updating those projections, all of our depth charts (except the Chicago Cubs – nothing personal, there was no new roster info on them from our stats provider), and the Average Draft Position data from each of our sources, Mock Draft Central, FantasyPros and National Fantasy Baseball Championship.

That sounds like a pretty good update, right? I thought so, and I had that all finished Monday afternoon. You should have heard about it then (and if you clicked the “Check for Update” button in the Cheatsheet Compiler it would have told you there was an update).

However… before I announced the update, I got tinkering around with some of our pages on the website. Mainly the player pages, like this one for Joey Votto, or if you prefer a pitcher, how about David Price. I added player rankings, by position and overall, to the players pages. The rankings are highlighted in the upper-right, and also there is a short rankings box below the stats and projections showing not only the player’s ranking, but the players ranked right around that player.

I was pretty happy with the results. Then I continued tinkering on some of the formatting of our tables to give them a sharper look and feel. By the time all of this tinkering got done, it was late, I was tired, so I figured I would start first thing Tuesday properly announcing the update.

Lo and behold, this morning I wake up and FantasyPros updated the Zeile projections again, so back to work I go. And it was quite an update. For those who like deep, deep fantasy baseball projections, you should like this. The number of hitter projections expanded from 407 players to a whopping 702. On the pitchers side, they increased from 283 to 690.

Finally my day and half journey is finished so I can announce the projections update. Open your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler, make sure on the update tab the projection source is set to Zeile (FantasyPros), and hit Update Projections. This will also bring in updated ADP and depth charts. The latest download file – make sure you are updated to version 1.1 – includes this latest update.

Have fun prepping for your fantasy drafts.

Projection Pal Now Available

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Projection Pal is now available from our Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy download page.

The purpose of Pal is to help import other fantasy baseball projections into the Cheatsheet Compiler, but keep in mind it is completely optional. If you are happy using the projections already included in the Compiler – Zeile or Steamer – then you do not need to use Pal. Check the demo video for a tutorial on how it works.

As an added bonus, there is also a separate copy of Pal with projections from CBS. I included the top 50 at catcher and each infield position, top 100 outfielders, top 150 starting pitchers and top 100 relievers. For that file you simply need to download, open it (and the Compiler) and hit the “Copy to Compiler” button on each of the hitters Raw and pitchers Raw tabs.

Projections and ADP Update Ready for the Cheatsheet Compiler

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I posted this morning on our Facebook page and Twitter account that I was going to work on updating the fantasy baseball projections, Average Draft Position (ADP) and depth charts today for the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy. That took some time, but the update is ready!

Both sets of projections, the Zeile Consensus Projections from FantasyPros, and the Steamer-Razzball projections from Steamer Projections Blog, were updated. Plus, I updated ADP from each of Mock Draft Central, FantasyPros and National Fantasy Baseball Championship.

I ran out of time to do the depth charts, so if a few people could look through them and let me know if there are any glaring changes that should be made, I’d appreciate it.

As a result of this update, we now have much deeper Zeile projections. Previously, I grabbed the Excel export file from FantasyPros, but member mjfhokie noticed that didn’t include the complete Zeile projections. Now I’m pulling them direct from FantasyPros’ API, resulting in much deeper projections. Our Zeile import used to include projections for 245 hitters and 181 pitchers, but is now at 358 hitters and 249 pitchers. Good stuff!

Note since this is a projections update, you do not need to download the Cheatsheet Compiler again. You can get the new data using the built in features. To update both sets of projections, perform the following steps:

1. Open your copy of the Cheatsheet Compiler, go to the update tab, and use the drop-down to choose Steamer-Razzball projections. Click the Update Projections button. You should see an indication that Steamer projections now are in Site A.

2. After that runs through the update, go back to the update tab and click the Move to Site B button, which will do just what it sounds like. It moves the now updated Steamer projections from section A to B on each of the hitters and pitchers tabs.

3. Now change the drop-down from Steamer-Razzball to Zeile (FantasyPros). Click the Update Projections button again.

4. Your ADP is already updated from the above steps. If you want to switch to a different source for your ADP, go to the adp tab, change the drop-down, and click the Update ADP button.

One final note that I did make some very minor changes to the Compiler and Draft Buddy download files, even though I didn’t change the version number. In the Compiler, the Check for Update button didn’t work properly. I fixed that.

In Draft Buddy, I noticed a problem on my Mac that threw an error near the end of the Setup Draft Buddy process. This was a curious one that happened because while running one macro (Setup Draft Buddy), Buddy tried to run another macro (recalculate the by pos tab), but ended up getting bungled up because the first task didn’t think the second task finished fast enough. I never noticed this issue on my PC, only the Mac.

Like I said, these are very minor issues, but if you do notice them and want to download a fresh copy of the Compiler or Draft Buddy, then you can certainly do that.

Enjoy the update, and again, let me know if you notice any significant depth chart changes that should be made, particularly those impacting the starting lineup, rotation and closers as shown on our summary depth chart in the Compiler.