Hello strangers! After a two-month hiatus, Flags is back. I'm sure the anticipation was not nearly at the level of the follow-up to My Bloody Valentine's epochal 1991 release, Loveless, but Jon tortures that analogy anyway.

We do a general check-in of things at the thirdway point of the season, zeroing on the starting pitching leaderboard, as well as discussing the many call-ups and how one might budget FAAB accordingly should you want to add one. 

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

Instead of a granular, detailed look at the starting pitching tiers, we take a 50,000-foot view of the landscape, identifying three large "chunks" of the draft: the early rounds (1-6), the middle rounds (7-18), and the late rounds (19-end). We tackle some strategic questions, based on the latest ADP data from NFBC Main Event drafts (though what we discuss applies broadly to most leagues). 

We discuss how essential it is, now more than ever, to enter your draft or auction with a plan for starting pitching.

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

Mike and Jon talk about two recent drafts they were in: Mike in the LABR Mixed Draft, and Jon in the WERF draft (one of the leagues in the overal EARTH competition). We make some observations about starters, relievers, and drafting speed. 

Then we get to the second half of our outfield preview, containing a lot of flawed but interesting bats. 

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

We get through the top 2.5 tiers of Mike's outfield rankings, spending a bit of time on the Ronald Acuña Dilemma. Elsewhere, we weigh in on the robust group of promising young outfielders in the five- and four-star tiers (Chourio! Duran! Merrill! Langford! Wood! Butler!), are back in again on Corbin Carroll, hopeful for a J-Rod bounceback, and remain impressed with Yordan Alvarez.

In the top half of the three-star tier, there is considerably more risk, which leads us to sing the praises of "boring" options like Bryan Reynolds and Ian Happ. We are less excited about Pete Crow-Armstrong (though he does come from a pretty impressive high school), and hope that Mike Trout has one more healthy final act in his career, though we are not willing to pay 2025 prices.

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

Finally, a position with some truly elite players! We discuss the relative merits of Gunnar and Elly in the first round, why Francisco Lindor and Trea Turner might be more similar than you think, if CJ Abrams has another level, and other topics du jour at the six.

Plenty of flawed but intriguing options in the three-star tier, and then things fall of pretty quickly at the two-star tier and below. Jon and Mike pour multiple buckets of cold water on Trevor Story and Tyler Fitzgerald, respectively, and while we appreciate that Carlos Correa is still a good hitter, we just wish he would do it for a full (or even most of a) season. 

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

Like a fresh-baked pizza left in the snow, the corner known as third base starts pretty hot but cools down quickly. Do you like cold pizza? Then stick around to hear why we're concerned about Rafael Devers and Royce Lewis, and we're not buying any Nolan Arenado bounceback hype. Mike convinces Jon that Mark Vientos is for real and Jon (maybe) persuades mike about the underrated virtues of Alec Bohm. Jon makes a bold prediction about which Jung brother will be better in 2025 (hint: do you think we'd tease it if it were Josh?).

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

Mike and Jon would never police your keystone decisions (get it? Keystone Cops?) but we do take a deep dive into Mike's tiers at a position that is best described as "globular." Many of the top players are on downward-descending aging curves, and there's a pretty thick middle where you can find many flawed-but-interesting options. 

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.  

After some Very Important Weather Talk we dive into a position with both promise and disappointment (often embodied in the same player). We compare and contrast early-round young bucks Adley Rutschman and Yainer Díaz, debate what might be left in the tank for Sal Perez and J.T. Realmuto, identify an off-brand Cal Raleigh who might be better than the original, and comb through the lower tiers for players who might not totally fill you dread and sadness.

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com. 

Welcome to preview season 2025! We begin our positional previews with a corner that is not just cold, but downright Arctic (at least before cliimate change melted all of the sea ice) past a certain point. We have mild disagreements about Matt Olson and Josh Naylor, and I beef with Fangraphs over their disrespect of the great metropolis of Sacramento, California. We share skepticism about Michael Toglia and Cody Bellinger and dive in the deep water to find some bargains in the one-star tier. 

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.

At last, we have gone through our positional reviews for 2024 (yeah, we skipped relievers, sorry), finishing up with starting pitchers. If aces didn't always ace, they at least held serve (Spencer Strider being the exception, sob). Some nice innings consumers in the next tier down, and the lower tiers had far more misses than hits.

We refer to Mike's review article at BP, which you can find here: https://www.baseballprospectus.com/fantasy/article/95769/2024-mixed-pitcher-valuations-recap/. 

Flags Fly Forever is a Baseball Prospectus podcast. For more fantasy baseball information, visit baseballprospectus.com and click on "Fantasy."

You can find Flags Fly Forever on Bluesky (@flagsflyforever.bsky.social). The hosts of Flags Fly Forever are Mike Gianella(@mikegianella.bsky.social) and Jon Hegglund(@jonhegglund.bsky.social). The producer of Flags Fly Forever is Jon Hegglund. 

Special thanks to the awesome and generous Petite League for permission to use their track "Mets" for the intro and break music. Find their sweet lo-fi indie-pop sounds at petiteleague.com.