what's more important in fantasy baseball, Pitching or Hitting?

Question

in fantasy baseball

Answer 1

Unless there is some extreme bias to pitching in the league scoring system, it is always hitting. Productive, consistent hitters are much harder to find on the waiver wire after the draft is over, but good pitching will always be available. However, this only applies to starting pitchers. I would try to draft a couple stud closers within the first eight rounds since those are a lot harder to acquire mid-season. Saves will be on the waiver wire throughout the season, but along with them high WHIP and ERA. I didn't draft any starting pitchers until the last six rounds of my draft last year and I was able to win my league just on hitting and my closers alone while finding good starting pitchers on the waiver wire who were on good runs during the season. The only starting pitcher worth taking in the early rounds is Santana.

Answer 2

It depends on the categories. However, assuming you mean standard 5x5 leagues, I would focus on the offensive stats first. While it is truly a balancing act and you want good pitching too, pitchers are harder to rely on from season to season (more inconsistent, more injury prone). For example, Jake Peavy had a great year two years ago, last year he had a hard time getting a win (although he didn't pitch bad). Other examples from the last two years would be Brad Lidge (I saw several people draft him in the 2nd or 3rd rounds last year and the got burned) and Mariano Rivera. That said, I'll usually try to take an "elite" starting pitcher in about the fourth or fifth round (someone like a Chris Carpenter- he was still around in many leagues last year) and a solid reliever right after that. You may not need great pitching, but you do need decent pitching. However, while you can usually piece something together with pitchers throughout the season, it is very hard to do with batters. OK, Hanley Ramirez was an exception last year......

Answer 3

Now, here is the correct answer.

Hitting is more important. Now here's why.

You can pick up elite pitching during the course of a season, and you can not pick up elite hitting. After thousands of yahoo drafts last season the following top pitchers were all not drafted or drafted VERY LATE... Jered Weaver, Fransico Liriano, Justin Verlander, Otsuka, Saito, Hamels. These guys had SIGNIFIGANT fantasy impact last year. When Liriano was healthy he was as good as #1 Johan Santana. You CAN NOT pick up a hitter during the year even close to #1 Albert Pujols.

Pitching is overall, very inconsistent. Halladay will give you great #'s or he'll be on the DL all year.... it is 50/50.

But guess what....
Hitters Hit.

Answer 4

It depends on what your league settings are. Ideally, they should be balanced with hitting being just as important as pitching, though that can be pretty hard to do. Generally though, I would have to say that there are more good hitters than there are good pitchers, so a really good pitcher is more valuable than a really good hitter. However, pitchers can be amazing one year, and totally off the next. They are much more up and down than most hitters, so ultimately you'll have to just make your best prediction and hope for the best.

Answer 5

I would say hitting. There are many more catogories for hitting in a head to head league. Pitchers only really count for wins, strikeouts, walks, and runs allowed. Hitters count for hits, average, at bats, home runs, doubles, triples, and RBIs. However, good pitching is harder to come by because now a days there are so many great hitters. I would worry though because every day you can drop pitchers that are not starting and pick up pitchers who are!

Answer 6

Pitchers have a lot of categories that count for them. there are many great starting pitchers on the market and I would not risk a first round pick on a pitcher unless he might have 20 wins or something. Pitchers only pitch every five days while hitters bat almost everyday.

Answer 7

Usually pitching. Bad hitting can hurt your BA, and make your other categories weaker, but it's easier to bench or replace a bad hitter than a bad pitcher. There are way more good hitters out there.

Bad pitching can kill your wins, ERA and ratio, (3 categories!) and when a pitcher goes bad it really hurts big time. If you can't get the innings you need to qualify in ERA and ratio you will lose.

Answer 8

Hitting definitely. I won a league last year when i didnt draft a pitcher until round 6. My first five picks were david wright, carl crawford, chase utley, ryan howard, and grady sizemore. Of course that was the luckiest draft i ever participated in but stuff happens. lol. They hitters play every day, whereas pitchers only pitch once every five games.

Answer 9

Hitting. Hitters play every day thus creating good numbers every day. Pitchers don't play every day. Although a hitters slump can quickly ruin your team. A bad pitching performance may have the same affect since that pitcher does not play everyday thus alloing more time to compensate. I suggest you find a good consistant hitter.

Answer 10

Actually, both are equally important however hitters are more consistent and easier to predict, for that reason most "experts" pick hitters for about 8 rounds before they pick their first pitcher. Obviously, if something ridiculous happens like Santana falling to the second round, you take him. Thats just the rule of thumb.