Key Stats: Only Craig Kimbrel had more strikeouts among closers last season than Carlos Marmol. Strikeouts are never the first thing that we think about with relief pitchers, but they might as well be when it comes to draft decisions. Saves are a direct reflection on a team's ability to win close games. As we've seen countless times, bundles of saves can happen from guys like Heath Bell who play on bad teams and Mariano Rivera can go dry on saves if the Yankees are getting blow out wins. Marmol was far from a top tier guy last year in ERA and WHIP, but last season was also well below his career averages. In three of the past five seasons, Marmol has been ranked higher than 117 according to Yahoo. 

Skeptics Say: Marmol was the 202nd overall player last season in fantasy baseball and plays at the most volatile position in the game. Last year there was a point in July that he was taken out of the closers role. In that month, Marmol had more walks than innings pitched. For the season, the contact rate against Marmol was up 10% from where it was in 2010. There are a lot of things that can go wrong with a reliever at this pick and a lot of alternatives to consider later in the draft. 
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Key Stats: If we took Jennings' 63 game output last season and stretched it over a full 162 game schedule we have a rookie that provides us with 26 HR, 113 Runs, 64 RBI and 51 steals. His power and speed have been hyped all through his career in the minors and it seemed that he didn't miss a beat when he made the jumps to the bigs last year. He is the kind of player that makes Rays fans say "Carl who?"

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Key Stats: Cuddyer isn't a stud, but he is a guy I would like to have on my team. He has a career .272 AVG, has a 30 HR and 100 RBI season under his belt, and even contributed double digits in steals last year. Granted the level at which he has done this is inconsistent from year to year, but what makes him more valuable to us is his roster flexibility. Cuddyer is eligible at 1B, 2B, OF. In 2010 he even chipped in 14 games at 3B, so there is a chance we could again see eligibility for him there again too.
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Key Stats: Clay Buchholz did not have the follow up to his breakout 2010 that many were expecting. He did not throw a ball after June 16th, but was close to ready as the Red Sox were collapsing in late September. In eight of his nine last starts, Buchholz gave up three or fewer runs. That's an indication that while he could not deal with the pain in his back, the ability that made him the 52nd overall player in fantasy baseball in 2010 was not far off. 

Skeptics Say: The 2010 season was off to begin with. His FIP and xFIP were about a run off of his ERA. He also has not come close to realizing the strikeout potential that he displayed in the minors (the K/9 is somewhere in the 6 range). So even if he can completely right the ship on last season's back injury and get to the hill 30+ times in 2012, there's no guarantee that he can outperform a top 120 pick in a draft. 
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Key Stats: Jansen set a major league record last year for strikeouts per nine innings (with a minimum of 50 innings pitched) with 16.1. He uses a steady dose of mid 90's fastballs (cutter?) with the occasional slider to get his K's. He pitched better than his already acceptable ERA of 2.85 indicates since all of his ERA litmus tests (FIP, xFIP, tERA and SIERA) are lower than the number they show you on TV. Despite giving up a flyball almost 50% of the time, his HR/FB rate was only 6.5%. He generates a swinging strike more than 16% of the time and can get guys to chase pitches outside the zone.
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Key Stats: Emilio Bonifacio will be eligible at four different positions in fantasy baseball, and who knows might also gain eligible at a fifth (second base). He's going to be 27 years old. He's coming off of a season in which he was ranked in the top 100. And his team has added the 2011 batting champion and might not be done getting better. There's a lot to like here.

Skeptics Say: Bonifacio emerged last season on the strength of a 26-game hitting streak. During that time Bonifacio hit .390, but aside from that he was a .275 hitter. That's still better than every season of his career, but probably not good enough to be a top 100 or even a top 125 pick. Before last year Bonifacio had played in over 100 games only once in parts of four seasons. He's hardly proven after one good year, and now that Jose Reyes is an automatic in the lineup when healthy, Bonifacio won't get much time to overcome any potential trouble he has early in the season.  no comments

Key Stats: After being closer to ordinary in 2010 at Triple-A Tacoma, Ackley took the next step forward in just over two months with Tacoma last year raising his OBP by 83 points over his 2010 cup of coffee in Triple-A. Bad team or not, Ackley deserved to play at the Major League level and held his own in year one. Ackley had a .348 OBP and should only get better as he learns MLB pitching. In a 162-game season, Ackley should get double digits in both home runs and steals.

Skeptics Say: How many runs and RBI can Ackley get in this lineup? Unless Prince Fielder decides to take his talents to The Emerald City (not gonna happen), the league's worst offense won't be getting any external help. In 90 games, he did not reach 40 runs or 40 RBI last year. If we assume that he can't get into 80 in either of those categories, how is he worth a top ten pick at his position as the experts all think in What They're Saying? no comments

Key Stats: In his rookie season Feliz was a closer that notched 40 saves and struck out over a batter per inning, while walking only 2.3 per nine. He did this with a 96 mph fastball that he routinely kept up and in on hitters. His tERA and SIERA were right in line with his actual ERA showing us his ERA was an accurate measure of how he pitched. In the Spring of 2011 the Rangers toyed with the idea of moving him to rotation and started to “stretch him out”. They changed their mind, he flip flopped on what he wanted to do. He went back to the pen…

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