Another hypothetical poll

[Guest]

Assume that we projected a player to hit .300 with 30 HR and 30 SB, and this was based off a projection we were very, very comfortable with (crystal ball, stolen book of sports record like in Back to the Future 2, etc).

Also assume his ADP was round 20. There is nothing particularly noteworthy about the player, he's an everyday decent but unspectacular player.

You are comfortable that this information has not escaped out to the public and no one else in your league subscribes.

He is the #5 player on your draft list.

What round do you select him in.

[cwk1963]

If he's the #5 player on my list I take him in the 1st round. Someone with .300 and 30 HR and 30 SB will have a corresponding amount of R and RBI so he might very well be the #1 pick. You're talking Hanley territory and I'm not messing around hoping he comes back to me. Now let me know who your crystal ball says it is .

[msugray]

GaryJ,

I did not select a numerical answer. In this hypothetical situation, the information I would need isn't even sufficient enough to venture a guess.

The ADP of round 20 is meaningless to me here. The ADP numbers I need are the EARLIEST and frequency that the player had been selected within the ADP data.
A player can have a 20th round ADP but could have been drafted as early as the 10th round and maybe has been drafted 15th round or earlier with a 25% frequency.
Armed with that information, I would be willing to take player in 7th-8th round; possibly as early as the 6th if his position were shallowing in the draft. Fellow competitors may laugh at the selection, but my response would be, "I just got my #5 player at pick #100!"

I would not draft the player at full value. I'm willing to take the risk of losing the player to another savvy owner. The reward of finding such a player at a substatial bargain is worth the gamble.

My answer is: One or two rounds prior to the earliest I've seen him drafted with the understanding that it doesn't give me 100% certainty of procurement.

[viper]

essentially this player is Sizemore-esqe with a slightly better average. Since the scenario presented in impossible, I guess you are wondering how much we trust ADP, or better yet, how much we feel our other owners trust it. I for one am not married to ADP. If anything, I am married to my projections. In round one, I am really not getting any true value. However, I might venture as early as round two. Round three would be the latest. All it takes is one other guy having an inkling of his value.

[cwk1963]

essentially this player is Sizemore-esqe with a slightly better average. Since the scenario presented in impossible, I guess you are wondering how much we trust ADP, or better yet, how much we feel our other owners trust it. I for one am not married to ADP. If anything, I am married to my projections. In round one, I am really not getting any true value. However, I might venture as early as round two. Round three would be the latest. All it takes is one other guy having an inkling of his value.

Which is exactly why I don't mess around. If he's 1st round value I take him and stand by my convictions. I understand the point of msugray saying

Fellow competitors may laugh at the selection, but my response would be, "I just got my #5 player at pick #100!"

but imagine how much more they'd laugh if I took him in the 1st round and how much smarter I'd look.

[msugray]

I can't believe owners would cede ALL leverage and opportunity available armed with this information. Player had a 20th round ADP!

Yes, you get a very good player but at par value, abandoning any chance of advantage.

If you draft the player in the first round, he provides first round value. But no advantage is gained against the league. You get this player and someone else gets Sizemore. You're up a few Extra Hits, other team gets 30 homers/30 homeruns and you get 30/30, and on the draft goes. You have this great sleeper and have attained no edge. Just holding your own.

How does one gain statistical advantage during the draft?

If most, if not all, of the owners are knowlegable and competitive, how do you out draft them without finding players at below par value?

If ONE owner sneaks my sleeper, I can live with that.

The opportunity to be advantaged against ALL teams in the league is worth the risk of being disadvanted to ONE team in the league.

I would select player earlier than I had ever seen him selected, but I would absolutely try to leverage the situation.

[Hambowen]

I agree completely with MSU. Selecting him in the first round is throwing away a big advantage you have.

Would I take the risk and go past the highest he was ever selected in a draft? No not at all. I would make sure I took him a round ahead of the highest he ever went just in case.

An example of this was in football this year. I had Aaron Rodgers as my #5 ranked QB and in the top 50 overall. That would have put him in the 4th round. He was going undrafted in lots of leagues and his adp was 12th round or later. I never took him before the 9th round and as late as the 11th round (I was pushing it on that one) and I got him in all 4 leagues. Hell he was not even the first qb I took in any of the 4 leagues. I actually drafted players who were ranked lower on my qb list (still in top 10 however) knowing rodgers would be there when I wanted him and to hedge my bets vs. injury to rodgers or just me being flatout wrong about him. (In this example the numbers are guaranteed)

There was zero reason to take him in the 4th round because his adp was 12th round and if I did I would have gimped my team because I got no value.

I am honestly shocked that people would say take him as the #5 player. It is about building the best team not sticking to projections/rankings.

[cwk1963]

I want Gary to clarify something. When I read about the ADP I took it as around #20 as opposed to round 20 which is what most are taking it as. Obviously, a huge difference. What, exactly, is it? I don't see how an everyday, decent but unspectacular player with an ADP of round 20 could all of a sudden turn out to be a Hanley-esq type player which, I guess, is why I didn't read it as round 20. But, playing along, if it is indeed round 20 and the only way you would have this info is with the MB crystal ball, then I would ammend my answer.

[msugray]

Also assume his ADP was round 20.

It also says "What Round?" above the Poll.

That was what I based my response off.

It is NOT a realistic question, but the general thrust is how people use ADP data versus player projected value.

The consensus from all respondents thus far, regardless the degee of disparity, is that we would acquire the player well ahead of ADP in order to attain the player. The differences lie between the risk of losing the player versus attaining maximum value/profit.

[viper]

I'm willing to take him in the the second or third at the latest rather than someone else totally luck into him. Even at round #2 I have an edge. Waiting is kind of like playing Russian Roulette with a 20 round chamber. Dirty Harry put it best when he said:

You've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya punk?

I'll trust the rest of my drafting skills and take that immediate edge. Thinking more like third round but not a round later.

[viper]

This is really a great question. It would be better if it was the 10th and not 20th round.

[cwk1963]

This is really a great question. It would be better if it was the 10th and not 20th round.

I agree. Not probable or realistic at all. I understand the point of an exercise but I think it should at least be fathomable.

But, being a good boy and playing along, I might go to the 4th -maybe 5th - round. It depends on the position and how close I thought people were getting to him.

[Todd Zola]

Let's start with the extreme, see what we get for answers then we will readjust the question to narrow down the range a bit.

[cubswin]

If a guy has an ADP of 20th round, it would be safe to say that you have very little chance of losing him in at least the first 10 rounds. I would target him in rounds 10-12 if I had the secret info presented and couldn't bear missing out!

[Guest]

Perhaps in retrospect I should have gone with a 10th round ADP but I wanted it to be extreme as some of you have said.

And of course it's realistic, I am telling you flat out the guy WILL hit .300 with 30/30. There's not a single instance where that could ever actually be done. Obviously what I'm curious about is based on the infomation available how much of a discount to value or premium to ADP you'd pay to lock up the stats.

However, I'll re-run with a different ADP.

[da_big_kid_94]

I'm willing to take him in the the second or third at the latest rather than someone else totally luck into him. Even at round #2 I have an edge. Waiting is kind of like playing Russian Roulette with a 20 round chamber. Dirty Harry put it best when he said:

You've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya punk?

I'll trust the rest of my drafting skills and take that immediate edge. Thinking more like third round but not a round later.

Bingo ... it's all relative to your draft/auction. If your league is the anomaly rather than the norm, little solace will be taken from ADP. I chose rounds 6-10.

[AllstonRockCity]

I chose 6-10 as well.

In this example MB is 'guaranteeing' that 300/30/30. We as the drafter are to assume no one else has this knowledge. The players ADP is round 20.

Rounds 6 to 10 would, in this example, fall right into my comfort zone. Its not too early that your wasting this potential advantage and not too late as to risk losing your bargain basement stud. I've always been a split the difference kind of guy. When making real life purchases I tend to avoid the cheapest and most expensive and look at the products in the middle.

I love the hypothetical polls

[roche]

I'm looking at round 3 or 4 depending on where I am in the order of selection i.e the turn.

I can believe in the mastersball prediction (this isn't any different than relying on players that Todd, Jason et al have touted before). What I (and MB) can't ever control is the flow of information. I don't know if any of my league-mates are also on to this breakout player. Again, this is similar to any number of highly-touted prospects. Not everyone at the draft will be aware of this sleeper but someone might and probably does. Drafting a sleeper of this magnitude will practically guarantee a win. Getting greedy and losing a bargain like this is an impardonable sin.

[cwk1963]

I'm looking at round 3 or 4 depending on where I am in the order of selection i.e the turn.

I can believe in the mastersball prediction (this isn't any different than relying on players that Todd, Jason et al have touted before). What I (and MB) can't ever control is the flow of information. I don't know if any of my league-mates are also on to this breakout player. Again, this is similar to any number of highly-touted prospects. Not everyone at the draft will be aware of this sleeper but someone might and probably does. Drafting a sleeper of this magnitude will practically guarantee a win. Getting greedy and losing a bargain like this is an impardonable sin.

BINGO!!!!! Like I said in the other thread, how smart would you feel if someone scooped him up 3 picks ahead of you? And you couldn't even get bragging rights at the end of the season because no one would believe you had him targeted as this good of a player. I think ANYONE would ask you, if you knew he was this good, why'd you wait???

[msugray]

I'm looking at round 3 or 4 depending on where I am in the order of selection i.e the turn.

I can believe in the mastersball prediction (this isn't any different than relying on players that Todd, Jason et al have touted before). What I (and MB) can't ever control is the flow of information. I don't know if any of my league-mates are also on to this breakout player. Again, this is similar to any number of highly-touted prospects. Not everyone at the draft will be aware of this sleeper but someone might and probably does. Drafting a sleeper of this magnitude will practically guarantee a win. Getting greedy and losing a bargain like this is an impardonable sin.

BINGO!!!!! Like I said in the other thread, how smart would you feel if someone scooped him up 3 picks ahead of you? And you couldn't even get bragging rights at the end of the season because no one would believe you had him targeted as this good of a player. I think ANYONE would ask you, if you knew he was this good, why'd you wait???

I guess, this is why GaryJ throws these hypotheticals out there!

If we all played the same, it wouldn't be much fun.

"How smart would you feel if someone scooped him up 3 picks ahead of you?"
My answer: I feel just as smart as I did before he picked him. If he's taking him in the 2nd or 3rd round, he WILL have achieved an advantage against me. However, it's mitigated by the fact that I'm selecting someone else of 2nd/3rd round talent. He wins, but I don't consider it a crushing blow.

My question:
How smart does one feel if they've identified an extremely distorted draft position with respect to stat value and the only advantage they've gained against the league is 10 hr OR 10 SB against any player their competitor will be rostering? Seems like a lost opportunity.

[Todd Zola]

I don't play a lot of poker so this analogy may not be perfect, but what if YOU KNOW there is a 99% chance you have the winning hand? In other words, the chances someone beats your hand is the same as someone in the baseball question taking the player before the ADP says he will.

Would you go all-in right away, trying to scare away that 1% chance of losing, at the risk of taking a smaller pot or would you slow play, increasing the chance of that 1% beating you but also increasing your rake?

[cwk1963]

I don't play a lot of poker so this analogy may not be perfect, but what if YOU KNOW there is a 99% chance you have the winning hand? In other words, the chances someone beats your hand is the same as someone in the baseball question taking the player before the ADP says he will.

Would you go all-in right away, trying to scare away that 1% chance of losing, at the risk of taking a smaller pot or would you slow play, increasing the chance of that 1% beating you but also increasing your rake?

My answer would be if depends on how many cards we've seen and what possibilities exist on the board. The more cards your opponent sees, the better his odds of getting a hand to beat yours. I've seen pocket aces and big slick lose more times than not. That's why the commercial says I've seen Kings bow to aces and straights flushed away. The way I approach the ADP question is the longer it goes, the more nervous I will be because there's a greater chance I can get rivered. This is the reason I said I'd have to take the context of the draft strongly into consideration. I'd have to not only look at the entire player pool but also each position and how they were going off the board.

I generally like to take risks but with something that's a "sure thing", I want to lock in that profit at some point. To me, what I stand to lose by waiting until the 8th or 9th round of a round 10 ADP instead of locking that profit in at round 5 isn't worth it. Some people have been saying well you could have gotten a better player in round 5, etc by holding off until later rounds. I say if you don't get that guy because you waited too late and pushed the envelope your team is now worse off - not that there's no loss at all.

[Hambowen]

You need to take chances. Getting a player of this caliber after the 6th round puts you at a huge advantage assuming you do not screw up the rest.

As far as feeling smart. I feel really smart (and somewhat lucky) when I win my leagues. In my football example if I would have lost Rodgers in 1 of the 4 leagues because I waited too long that would be acceptable considering the advantage I got in those other leagues.

It is really not even much of a gamble if you consider the information presented. If you go for him in rounds 6-8 from all the facts provided you should get him every time. Your trying to win the league and waiting is your best chance at doing that.

[Todd Zola]

Again, the principle is that you can look into the future and realize there is almost no chance at all you can lose. I can't say NO CHANCE as that leads to the obvious slow play. There needs to be a small, tiny chance you can lose to introduce the need to balance take the sure thing versus trying to milk more from the pot. It's obviously an unrealistic scenario.

[cwk1963]

Again, the principle is that you can look into the future and realize there is almost no chance at all you can lose. I can't say NO CHANCE as that leads to the obvious slow play. There needs to be a small, tiny chance you can lose to introduce the need to balance take the sure thing versus trying to milk more from the pot. It's obviously an unrealistic scenario.

Damn...I was hoping we'd get that name after this exercise was finished .

I understand the need to milk more from the pot. This is a 1st round guy and I'm willing to wait until round 5 or 6 on a projected 10th rounder. I guess it comes down to personal risk. I like to take risks but they're calculated risks. That's why I don't wait until round 8 or 9 - that 1% what if factor. If I make the pick in round 6 I set myself up very nicely. If I wait and someone else beats me to it, I've now given away a 1st round talent in the 8th or 9th round. This guy was an integral part of my plan and I now, in effect, have to try to make up top 10 productivity someplace else. Now I'm really behind the 8 ball. It's not as simple as oh well, you're no worse off because you've gotten everyone else at value. Now it's time to play catch up.

[Todd Zola]

Damn...I was hoping we'd get that name after this exercise was finished .

I'll make you a deal.

If you can tell me the exact time the lightning will strike, I'll get the DeLorean and the flux capacitor.

[cwk1963]

Damn...I was hoping we'd get that name after this exercise was finished .

I'll make you a deal.

If you can tell me the exact time the lightning will strike, I'll get the DeLorean and the flux capacitor.

Deal...now where's that damn groundhog.