We held our auction on March 21. I broke one of those draft rules by not getting enough sleep the night before. In fact I was totally exhausted. We were away the previous weekend for a Johns Hopkins CTY program for my eldest son who also plays in our league. As such, the weekend was not restfull. The weekend of the draft My two sons and I were camping with the Boy Scouts in Greenbelt National Park and sight- seeing in DC. The draft/auction was being held at my house starting at 1:00 (to give me time to get home). If you have ever camped with the Scouts, you know that the leaders are up very late and get up very early, as is the case with me. So after averaging about 5 to 6 hours of sleep each night all week, I was reduced to about 4 hours a night the two nights leading up to the draft, plus a 3 hour car ride home. I am the commish and keep the auction records (as do a couple of others) and I had to keep asking “how much did he go for?” like was a rookie. I also made several blunders during the draft. I usually am very sharp at this game, but things really got away from me this time. It is a good thing my keeper list was so strong going in. So enough of my excuses, what about the actual auction?
As a way of background, our league allows for a minimum of 3 keepers and a maximum of 7. We have a nine team NL only league with a $260 auction budget and play 5x5 in the traditional 14/9 player format. We also snake draft 4 reserve players at the end of the auction. These players are assigned $5 contracts. We have an in season $325 salary cap, and a $100 FAAB budget. Teams may extend up to 5 players at $5 per season on top of their salary in a long term contract one time only at the end of their second year from their auction. I am the two time defending champion and have won 4 out 5 times.
My strategy to win in fantasy baseball in this format is to think long term (think dynasty) while contending every year. To do this, you need exceptional keepers, and good luck. Good luck only happens when you put yourself in a position to be lucky. I do this by targeting high end prospects and grabbing a few of them each year. As a result of this I got Howard, Pence and Lincecum in their rookie years for $5 each. I also got Hanley for $1 his rookie year, and Broxton the year he went from setup to closer due to Saito’s injury. This year my keepers were Howard $20, Hanley $16, Pence and Lincecum at $15, Josh Johnson at $15, Broxton at $8 and Bruce at $7. That is obviously a powerful keeper list. I also make sure that I am at least as well informed and knowledgeable as anyone in the league. I have bought Shandler’s Baseball Forecaster every year since2002, This year I also bought Baseball Prospectus (Which I have bought a few times before, but not consistently) Baseball America’s Prospect Handbook and the Minor League Baseball Analyst form Shandler’s HQ company. I also have subscribed to Mastersball for the last 5 years. Additionally, I have numerous fantasy baseball theory books. Knowledge is power!
Since our league is on the shallow side I have developed a bit of a stars and scrubs strategy over the years. I have always valued power as well and have even had Ryan Howard and Albert Pujols on the same team. Power hitters usually help in three categories, HR, RBI and Runs. You can target power hitters who maintain a certain level of batting average to help you in a fourth category and just add a base thief or two and you are good to go hitting wise. I have usually tried to get a stud starter a stud closer if I can afford it (Sometimes I punt saves and pick up closers in waiting and stay out of the save cellar that way) and lots of skill among the rest of the arms. The skill pitchers are not necessarily big stat getters and sometimes you can get burned this way. The one time I didn’t win, it was because my pitching staff was weak, and because I was unwilling to pay the price for a top end starter. My opponents have leaned of my love of power and have begun drafting that way. Fortunately, they have not figured it all out yet.
The other thing I do in the draft is target players, particularly young guys who are highly thought of and who may make it to the bigs by year’s end. This is keeping the future in mind. Some of the other guys have caught on to this as well, but still do not have a handle on those guys who are not the “big names.”
For instance Strasburg and Heyward were well known and were not bargains, and I got Chapman late in the auction, but had to win a bidding war with someone who had money and was bidding more against me than for Chapman. This year I targeted Mike Stanton, Drew Storen, Buster Posey or Jason Castro and Pedro Alvarez, keeping Josh Vitters and Chris Heisey in reserve if I didn’t get the above.
There are a couple of ways to run an auction, some auctions you need to be an active bidder on a player, ie. raising, or you are out of the bidding. We run our auction by throwing names out in reverse order from last year’s final standings. However, you don’t have to bid on a player to stay active. The name is thrown out and somebody raises (or not). Anyone can raise, there is no order. When we get to going once, going twice, going three times, ….sold, sometimes a voice from the wilderness jumps in. It is pretty funny. So our auction probably has a different dynamic than others, but it works for us.
Pujols went for a record $48, in the first round. Halladay went to my 14 year old son for $36 as the most expensive pitcher. We live in the Philly area, and eight of us are Phillie fans. So Phils go for a few bucks more than elsewhere. Some of the more interesting names were McCann $21, Dunn $25, Reyes $26, Holiday $42, Wright $41 (one of my targets).
As for my draft, I didn’t get a single player for about 4 or 5 rounds. We had one guy with a lot of money and a lot of great cheap keepers (he may beat me this year). When Wright went over $35, I bailed and went to plan B, AmRam who I got for $23. I bid on Pujols, Holiday, Wright, Reyes($26), Rollins($33) and whiffed. Meanwhile most of the really good OFs were keepers. Utley, Zimmerman, Adrian Gonzalez, Eithier, Kemp, Braun, McCutcheon, Bourn, Votto, Morgan, McLouth, Hart, CB Young, Sandoval, Phillips, Upton, Werth , Tulowitzki and Helton were all keepers. So there wasn’t a whole lot out there. I should have spent a few more bucks on one of the big bats. Watching this happen was a problem, but I made an adjustment and went hard for starters. I let the guys bid heavy on Halladay, Johan, and Hamels to burn some money. Haren, Wainwright, Wandy, Kershaw, Cain, Jimenez and Hanson were the best keepers (I kept Lincecum and J Johnson). I managed to get Nolasco for $20, overspent on Billingsley $24 (as I had money to spend and not much to spend it on), Harang $10, then went high on de la Rosa $17 and Chapman $17 as again I had the money. I lost out on Gallardo $27 but drove his price up. Other guys got Webb $16, Oswalt $15, Dempster $17 and Lilly for $11. I missed the boat on closers as well as they were higher this year than last year and ended up with Broxton by himself. I added one of my targets, Storen for $1 and grabbed closers in waiting, Gregerson and Romo in the reserve draft.
Speculative bats I got were Blanks $12, stole Millidge in the endgame for $3,Seth Smith for $1, Hoffpauir $1, speed guys Castillo $10, Everth Cabrera $12, and catchers Y Molina $8 and my target Castro $1. I wanted Posey, but he went for $8, so plan B Castro for a buck was nice. I also landed Stanton for $1. I am thrilled with this as I think he will be my Howard replacement for next year as Howard’s contract runs out. In the reserve draft I took Heisey and Vitters. One of these was a mistake as I now need to cut one to get a bat in the lineup while I reserve and wait for Stanton’s arrival. My problem is that Heisey will probably get the call, but I missed out on Alvarez, after carrying him last year, and took Vitters in lieu of him. Now I have shown my hand on Vitters, whom no one knew, and vitters will probably not make it until the season’s end. I have too few active hitters, picked at least one too many prospects. I was really not myself. I hope there is no camping trip draft weekend next year.