I’m old. At least that is what my kids keep telling me. Sometimes the mirror tells me that too. I was thinking about replacing the kids, but I kind of like the mirror. Nonetheless, this week’s column isn’t about me aging, but instead about how the game of fantasy baseball has turned, and about the import of your fantasy draft.
Wait, a column about the draft two months into the season? Yep, you got that right. Now is a great time to look back at your draft, look at the free agents acquired thus far, and begin to reconstruct what you have done right, and wrong, thus far this season. No, this is not the time to give up, but there is no better time than the present to begin at least thinking about next year.
First off, no matter how much you prepared this year, I’m betting that it wasn’t enough. Years ago, (see, I am old), we used to rely on outdated magazines and the USA Today’s very small typed stuff about every team in order to formulate a draft plan. There was no real Internet, no Baseball or Sports Weekly, and no current or accurate information. Baseball Digest was a happening publication, and train travel was state of the art. OK, train travel wasn’t really state of the art, but you get the idea.
Back then, it was possible to recover from a poor draft because, let’s be honest, most everyone had poor drafts. Quite often, the reasonably good rookies weren’t taken, as the old magazines couldn’t possibly anticipate who would be called up. Guys like Jair Jurrjens, and Edinson Volquez who had the proverbial "cup of coffee" last year, wouldn’t likely make headlines in the magazines.
Today, we know how they did last year in the minors, what pitches they throw, and even what they had for breakfast the day before their outing two years ago last June. It’s really amazing what is available on line today, and this information has evened up the playing field, so to speak. A fantasy player can sit at his or her computer for a couple of weeks and have as much useable information as someone who has watched fifty games during that same period.
This long preamble has a point, really. You can no longer rely on the free agent pool to make up for an average or below average draft. Your competition has improved too much to allow you to sit back and pluck guys off the wire that are going to be huge contributors. To illustrate this point, I will use the National Fantasy Baseball Championship (NFBC) League, Las Vegas #9, as an example.
Vegas League 9 has fifteen managers, and many of these managers are well known either in the fantasy industry, or in the NFBC. Among others, this league includes $100,000.00 2006 NFBC overall Champion David DiDonato, RotoWire’s Jeff Erickson, Fanball’s Seth Trachtmen, frequent cashers Ron Kraus, Jim Ferrari, and Chris Hill, and "Stump the Schwab" favorite Scott Jenstad. Oh, some guy named Buster is also in this league. Worth noting, as of this writing, none of these eight owners are in first or second place in the league. It’s a tough league, no question.
No fantasy owner leaves the draft with a perfect team and each owner relies on the waiver wire to augment his/her team, or to fill holes. The problem with the proliferation of information available on the Internet is that the waiver wire just isn’t as deep as it was ten years ago, five years ago, or even a couple of seasons back.
Thus far this season, Las Vegas 9 owners have made 189 waiver transactions. A look at the top ten pick ups (by FAAB spent) illustrates that the wire isn’t what it used to be. Parenthetically, each team has 1,000 FAAB to spend on players throughout the year. Each of the top ten most expensive players, with their corresponding FAAB, is listed below.
Max Scherzer – 615
Jeff Clement – 275
John Danks – 275
David Riske – 205
Andy Sonnastine – 171
Ryan Franklin – 162
Dana Eveland – 150
Jayson Nix – 116
Greg Smith – 111
Nick Adenhart – 110
Scherzer is great, but may be out of a job very shortly. Clement just got sent down. Danks has three wins and a good ERA, but two of those wins came before he was picked up. Riske has one total save this season. Sonnastine was picked up, cut, and then picked up again. The 171 FAAB spent on Andy was this past week, so it is far too early to tell if he will be worth the FAAB. Franklin hasn’t yet contributed to his NFBC team. Eveland has been solid, if unspectacular. Nix is out of the majors. Smith has been erratic, but may keep some of his value. Adenhart was subsequently cut by his NFBC team.
There have been some solid pick ups. Todd Wellemeyer has emerged as a solid starter. Micah Owings (95 FAAB) has pitched well. Tim Redding (86) has been good, too. Braden Looper (33) has contributed, as have Ryan Dempster (27) and John Lannon (17). With all, though, no one expects this to continue.
On offense, Ryan Ludwick (21) and Emil Brown (5) have been simply fantastic. Eric Hinske (22) has helped, as has Blake DeWitt (14). Wladimir Balentien (6) might emerge as an offensive force before the year is done.
To give you a better idea, this is the best team I could put together from the players picked up thus far in Las Vegas 9.
C Jason Kendall (54)
C Miguel Olivio (15)
1b Eric Hinske
2b Mark Grudzielanek (13)
3b Blake DeWitt
SS Bobby Crosby (45)
CI Jose Castillo (1)
MI Clint Barmes (3)
OF Ryan Ludwick
OF Emil Brown
OF Wladimir Balentien
OF Matt Stairs (38)
OF Fred Lewis (41)
DH Dmitri Young (107)
P Todd Wellemeyer
P Micah Owings
P Tim Redding
P Braden Looper
P Ryan Dempster
P John Lannon
P Max Scherzer
P Greg Smith
P Ryan Franklin
It’s obviously not pretty. The point illustrated is that if you are in a deep league, you really cannot expect to improve markedly from the waiver wire.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t continue to try to find the diamond in the rough. Just don’t expect miracles.
Best of luck.
Buster