Posted by sgsmith on 2/16/2013 5:38:00 PM (view original):
Not ready to post my roster, but one bit of information I am ready to divulge is that my rotation is going to SUCK.

Oh, also, "shaky" is likely to be a charitable description of my defense.

I was right about my rotation (didn't take a genius to make that projection), but my defense might end up a solid C+.

My offense I love right now, but that's just in the information vacuum that exists up until we can see each other's rosters and I find out that half of you have offenses that are even better.

I'm about 400 short of the PA total I'd like to have, but right now the slash line looks like this: .343/.432/.547.

bump

My basic strategy was risk aversion.  I wanted to make sure my biggest bids were near-locks to get stud starting pitchers.  I couldn't risk bidding $300+ on the 87-88 Browns and not get Silver King.  So my biggest bids were in the categories with multiple top starting pitching choices.  I would not be bidding high on 2000 Red Sox, Hitting PItchers or or High Win% SPs.  Just too risky.

$260 (4th pick) - Obscenely Low ERAs
I had to get one of the top 7 pitchers, preferably one of the 300+ IP guys.  All along, I thought I was going to get '09 Mathewson, but DCSquires' late $265 bid dropped me to 4th, so I had to take either Bob Gibson or Mordecai Brown.  I was torn, but went with '68 Gibson.  Never really used him before.

$130 (2nd pick) - 198-199 K club
I thought this category would be somewhat overlooked and thought my bid might have a shot at a top pick, although I would've been fine with a top 3 pick.  Mission accomplished.  The only choice was quality ('92 Maddux) or quantity (Gastright).  I didn't need the innings, so I went with Maddux.

$130 (2nd pick) - 1930-59 Good Pitchers
This was another category I wanted a top starter (Hubbell or Cooper).  The bid was almost exactly in between the top bid and the third highest bid.  I ended up with Mort Coooper, which is what I wanted.

$128 (2nd pick) - 300-400 IP Pitchers
This catgoery has a smooth progression from great to average to ok.  I didn't want to end up spending over $100 for 350 IPs of 1.15 whip, so I went the extra few dollars and it was almost the perfect bid.  $142 was the top bid while six people bid between 102 and 126.  Vida Blue was the obvious top choice.  I audibled and chose a favorite of mine, 1924 Dazzy Vance (over '66 Koufax, '05 Waddell, '72 Carlton, ;46 Newhauser).  His K's will help avoid balls hit to my bad defenders.

Well, that's 65% of my budget on 4 starting pitchers.  Their combined stats...
1192 IP, 1.80 ERA, .203 OAV, 0.97 WHIP, 0.29 HR/9

I pretty much blew off the RP categories, fully planning on using my starters to relieve.

$42 (16th pick) - Smoking Southpaws
I wanted one of the top 10-12 picks, and thought I bid high enough, but needed at least a $60-65 bid for top 12.  I was ok with 2012 David Price.  His 1.12 WHIP# is fine as he will pitch mostly out of the bullpen. 

$13 (11th pick) - Soft-Tossing Closers
I ended up bidding $13 on a number of catgories, hoping to get a draft pick around 12-13.  I ended up with pick #11 here and got 123 innings of Greg Minton and his 1.24 whip#.  His HR/9# rate is low (0/36), so he might have some usefullness.

$13 (16th pick) - Beanball RPs
Rod Beck, 1.07 whip# but .73 HR/9.  He's got the lowest whip of my non-starters.  I'll probably use D.Price over Beck.

The other pitchers I have are mopup only.


Since I have over $700 allocated to pitching, you can imagine my hitting will not be that great.

$104 (5th pick) - 400 Hitting OFs
Not sure whay I bid so much here.  I guess I didn't want to get stuck with one of the non full-time players.  But a $33 bid was enough to do that.  I mis-calcuated here.  Anyway, I went with super-awesome leadoff hitter, 1894 Billy Hamilton and his 860 PA/162 of .495 OBP#.

$65 (6th pick) - Hall of Fame 2B
I decided that I can blow off the 2000 SS category and get a SS from the Gold Glove MIF category (not MILF).  So I needed to make sure to get a good 2B.  I assumed I would get Nellie Fox, and that's exactly who I got the good .59 season (384 OBP#).

For the rest of my starting lineup, I bid $13 on eight other hitting categories, hoping to be drafting in the 12-16 range, so I'd get a respectable player who could start.  Here is the rest of my starting lineup...

$13 (16th pick) - Power Hitting Catcher
An extra $5 moves me up from 16th to 9th.  Doh!  I could either take a low offense decent defense guy like 85 Fisk, but I figured I needed the offense and took 1937 Jimmie Foxx (.378 OBP#, .521 SLG#).  

$13 (16th pick) 1B With 19+ Triples
Nothing to get excited about... 1890 Jake Beckley (.317, .369, .517).
 
$13 (13th pick) 30 Years of 360+ Hitters
I planned on getting a good 3B from this category cause I didn't want to start a bad fielding 3B from Hot Potato Corner.  I wanted a good Boggs season, but had to settle for Chippers' 534 PA season.  I was able to get a partial stud Caminiti season (.968 OPS#) from the Hot Potato category, so I'm set at 3B.

$13 (18th pick) Justified Gold Glove MIFs.
Was hoping to get a decent Ozzie Smith, but most were off the board. Settled on '81 Alan Trammell (.346 obp#). 

$13 (16th pick) - All Star Willies
I feel lucky to get 7th best OPS# player with the 16th pick.  Yes, his defense sucks, but I got great defense at 2B (Fox), 3B (Jones), SS (Trammell), CF (Hamilton), so I can live with Stargell.

Mostly my strategy was to hope that everyone else was going to be risk averse. I guessed based on the season 1 bids roughly how much various things would go for, kept well away from categories stacked with dependable players that I expected to end up in crazy 100+ point shootouts (e.g. 300-400ip, obscenely low era, 2000SS, .400 OF, HOF 2B). I made a bid at Silver King but not so extravagant as to be weak elsewhere (in particular my s1 team has no offense because I spent too much on Giudry; didn't really want to make this mistake again), and knowing that there were a handful of useful backups alternatives there assuming that I missed King himself. In the end I was super fortunate to end up with Hudson's IP (and similarly those of Gastright of the 199k club).

I put in a tiny bid for Pedro in the hope that everyone else would stay away, ended up being pretty close but instead picked up the handy consolation prize of Garacapria (which made it very easy to build the rest of an offense). My offense is entirely top-end picks, my pitching is almost entirely the 2x 400ip starters, I have no bullpen but worse things have happend. In hindsight I should have made a more successful grab at one of the Bonds', and bid more on Ballpark, 24th is not so ideal at this point.