Yu Darvish and the Angels: Fantasy baseball dream team

The Angels are one player away from becoming serious World Series contenders. How would a possible Yu Darvish move to Anaheim impact fantasy?

The smart money is on the Rangers, Astros, Cubs, Yankees or Twins securing the services of Yu Darvish, the best free agent pitcher on the market, but his tweet in January added a mystery team to the mix. That team could be the Angels.

Don’t let recency bias of his two disappointing playoff starts cloud your judgment. Darvish is a fantasy ace with top-5 potential.

Even though he is now in his 30s, he hasn’t lost velocity; his fastball is still sitting 94-95-mph, with no evident deterioration of his seven-pitch repertoire. And he still gets an elite level of swinging strikes.

It is a bold claim that he is the best strikeout pitcher ever, but no other starter in history has a better strikeout rate than the 31-year-old’s 11.04 SO/9 (min 500IP).

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Last season, over 31 starts, he recorded 209 strikeouts with 3.86 ERA and an almost identical (3.83 FIP). He is better than you think.

The biggest swoop of the offseason was the Angels securing the services of two-way phenom Shohei Ohtani. This, in addition to shoring up their infield with Ian Kinsler and Zack Cozart, makes the Angels a contender for postseason baseball.

The biggest red flag surrounding their championship aspirations is their rotation. We don’t know what to expect from Ohtani, but he will likely be limited to fewer than 140 innings.

The trio of Garrett Richards, Matt Shoemaker and Tyler Skaggs combined for fewer than 200 innings last season. Andrew Heaney and Nick Tropeano are both returning from Tommy John surgery, which leaves Parker Bridwell (with his 15% strikeout rate) and the reliever-turned-starter JC Ramirez. It is a very fragile pitching staff.

A top of the rotation ace capable of throwing 200 high-quality innings would push the Angels from postseason hopefuls to serious World Series contenders.

GM Billy Eppler showed impressive skill in securing Ohtani’s services, and the Angels have the money to do the deal and bring Darvish to the west coast.

The two Japanese stars train together in the offseason and Ohtani said it would be great to be on the same team. He also conceded:

"“…would be nervous about everything; it’s a new country, new professional life. There’s a lot to be nervous about”."

Bringing Darvish to Anaheim would benefit Ohtani’s transition to MLB, which would help in real life and fantasy.

Darvish would thrive in the spacious ballpark in Anaheim. In his nine career starts at Angels Stadium he has a 2.39 ERA with 81 strikeouts over 60⅓ innings. And we know he is familiar with the AL West.

Andrelton Simmons is one of the best shortstops in the games, so with the defensive upgrades of Kinsler at second and Cozart at third, all of the Angels’ pitchers will benefit from excellent support from their infield this season.

Although there would be 200 fewer innings to go around if Darvish moved to Anaheim, the other members of the Angels’ rotation would get a fantasy boost. Suddenly there would be less pressure on them and more rest available, perfect for pitchers returning from injury. If I’m drafting Garrett Richards, I want 160 quality innings. I don’t want him being pushed too hard, too early in the year before hitting the DL for the rest of the season.

The Angels are not among the favorites to sign Darvish, but neither were they the favorites to sign Ohtani. And surely he must be tempted to team up with the best player on the planet.

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Wherever Darvish signs will not affect his draft day position too much. He currently has an ADP of around 50, which equates to the 14th starting pitcher off the board. If he moves to Anaheim, I’m pushing him up my rankings and definitely passing over someone like Noah Syndergaard to get Darvish 16 picks later.

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