What did you learn from your mock drafts?

[viper]

here is a topic we can all sink our teeth into.

I'm having my first mock draft tonight on MDC - an NFBC-style 45 second a pick draft. It seems that every time I have a mock draft some new thought pops in my head. It is a simple as "Who the hell is that player and why was he taken?". More often I realize there is some thing/item/piece of information I should have had.

Example are that I now color code my lists. At a draft, it is much quicker to look for a color than a number or letter grade. Top power guys are BLUE, the next level are RED, guys with zero power are BLACK. I actually use a spreadsheet of tiers and there is a small square next to each players name with the appropriate color.

Another example is I always have an alphabetical list of players with some notation indicating where the players can approximately be found on my lists. I can't tell you how often some pitcher was drafted and I have no clue where he was on my lists. You don't have the time to search these things out at the draft.

Anyway, may i suggest that we post these brilliant mock draft insights here so all can gain some new knowledge. I will post mine tonight when it is fresh in my mind. I need to do it quickly as memory is the second then to go as you age. At least there will be one posting.

[viper]

80 minutes for a 15 team 23 round draft. Two didn't show up. The 45 second to pick format is really hectic. It will make the actual longer format seem real slow - and it is actually.

And what I learned:
1. The cross reference list is really needed right now
2. I need to learn where players are located on my list much better especially with hitters. For pitchers, the x-ref list works easier.
3. I need to learn who some of these Japanese guys are. Several filtered high and I drafted them but god knows what they are like. Research is needed.
4. Polanco & DeJesus really are ignored. They were my late MI and UT
5. Some sorted list of projected 25+ Hrs and 15+ SBs would really be helpful. You can exclude tier 1 & 2 players as everyone knows what they do and they go relatively early. But come the middle of the draft, it would be nice to be able to see if any power or speed is left. Next draft I will do SBs only. I think I can handle power but those one-trick ponies are hard to totally remember.
6. 45 seconds is really fast especially when there are auto-drafts going on. You really can miss players
7. If you do a list, make sure it perfectly matches your paper that you may be crossing off. Close isn't good enough. Since I will do three real NFBC drafts on Mock Central, this will be especially important for me.

I didn't have any actual stats on my sheet and just went by my color coding for how players did in power, speed & average. I curious as to how I did. God knows how good or bad my tiers are but with five tiers, I only had one position player pick below my third or middle tier - my second catcher.

[Todd Zola]

3. I need to learn who some of these Japanese guys are. Several filtered high and I drafted them but god knows what they are like. Research is needed.

Start a thread, we'll fill in what we found out from doing projections and profiles.

[uharchmajor]

A few things I must have learned

1. I must be along the lines of thinking here at MB, because I finished in first by MB's projections by 8.5 points. And this was before I became a plat. subscriber.
2. 45 seconds is really fast and look forward to the 2-3 mins I'll have during my league's draft.
3. That mocks do nothing for me to prepare for my type of league (H2H points with 10 keepers).
4. While I may have finished in first (3 bots out of 12 bots), I did not feel prepared as it was during without my spreadsheets.
5. That I still enjoy doing mocks.