It's a 10-team league -- five new owners (including me) and five returning owners. The five returning owners got to keep up to five players from last year, with the stipulation they couldn't keep their first-round draft pick from last season. That means there were still some elite players on the draft board, like Miguel Cabrera, Robinson Cano and Clayton Kershaw. All those guys were first-round picks in this league last year, and therefore could not be "kept" by any of the returning owners.
Nevertheless, some elite guys who were *not* first-round draft picks last year were kept and were not available in this draft. That list of players included Mike Trout, Bryce Harper, Paul Goldschmidt and Andrew McCutchen -- all of whom certainly would have been drafted in the first round had they been available.
I had the 10th pick out of 10, so pretty much all of the real top-flight guys were gone by the time I made my first pick. They were either kept by returning owners, or selected in the nine picks made before mine. I knew I was behind the eight-ball no matter what I did, but I ultimately decided to take Troy Tulowitzki with the 10th overall pick and Jason Kipnis with the 11th. If nothing else, I had my middle infield set, and those positions are traditionally harder to fill than first base or any of the outfield spots.
Without further discussion, here's the team I drafted:
C: Brian McCann
1B: Eric Hosmer
2B: Kipnis
SS: Tulowitzki
3B: Manny Machado
LF: Mark Trumbo
CF: Michael Bourn
RF: Jay Bruce
Util: Mike Napoli
Util: Coco Crisp
BN: Jhonny Peralta
BN: David Freese
BN: Kelly Johnson
SP: Cole Hamels
SP: James Shields
SP: Julio Teheran
SP: Matt Moore
SP: Sonny Gray
SP: Justin Masterson
SP: Chris Tillman
RP: Trevor Rosenthal
RP: Grant Balfour
RP: Tommy Hunter
It should be noted I've already made two roster moves since the draft. Bourn is going to start the season on the DL, so I added another speedy outfielder in Ben Revere, who surprisingly was left undrafted in this league. I think he's a decent sleeper this year. In addition, another owner dropped Chase Headley, so I quickly snapped him up and released Freese, who is coming off a rough year and has had a poor spring.
Much like my other team, I'm taking a chance on Machado getting healthy and returning to form at third base. He's not going to be ready for the start of the season, so I needed a decent backup. Headley was the guy I wanted for that role all along, but somebody drafted him before I could get to him. I settled for Freese, but I was delighted earlier this week to see that Headley became available for nothing. I see him as a reasonable stopgap in the short run.
Have I mentioned yet there's one guy in this league who had Trout, Goldschmidt, McCutchen and Dustin Pedroia as his keepers? And, oh yeah, he drafted Kershaw, Jose Fernandez and Justin Verlander with his first three draft picks. That team is completely stacked, and it's hard not to feel like the rest of us are playing for second.
Me? I'll be lucky to finish in the top half of the league. Maybe next year.
I'm not in any leagues this year and actually a little sad about it. Following basbeball in a city where baseball is not played is not always easy. Sure Cubs/Sox/Reds/Braves games are on occasionally, but it's hard to stay interested for an entire season. Fantasy baseball usually cures that for me. Although even with FB, I tend to fade off the last couple months if it doesn't look like I'm going to finish in the top 3. This team here doesn't look too bad though. The thing with FB is you gotta get that 1 or 2 waiver wire pickups who turn out to be top 20 or 30ish players. There are always those guys. Every season. Usually this could be someone that is dropped stupidly by another team, a call-up or just a random undrafted guy who decides he wants to be a player. Pitching is where this most often happens, but if you can get both a pitcher and hitter who end up being good-great, you've got a great chance at coming out on top.
ReplyDeleteI guess the main problem with this team here is I don't have that one guy who you know is going to be awesome. I'm gonna need a lot of things to go right to stay in the hunt.
ReplyDeleteYeah I can see that. Fantasy baseball is such a crapshoot. I have drafted "sure thing" players for a while... Ryan Braun last year, CC Sabathia AND Matt Cain last year, Cliff Lee two years ago. I know there have been a few others. It seems like I have drafted high/expensive players the last 2-3 years and at least 1-2 of them have had thier worst season in recent memory. In fantasy baseball that's hard to overcome unless you get lucky with a late draft sleeper or waiver wire pickup.
ReplyDeleteAfter one day of the season, this fantasy team sits in first place. I should probably take a screenshot of the standings.
ReplyDelete