Fantasy Fantasy Team

I know one of the cardinal rules of sports discussion, whether online or in the flesh, is "don't talk about your fantasy team". No one besides you cares. Presumably this rule would hold even more true for fake fantasy teams, where you participate in a mock draft in January because football is only played once a week and you are bored out of your skull, near tears begging for it to be April again, because, darn it, you miss baseball. Ahem. Yes, fantasy baseball, and the no-no about talking about it. However, since no one reads this blog anyway, and I'm just writing it for fun and to give myself a place to ramble on for thousands of words without any consequences, I am going to subject you non-existent readers to an excruciating analysis of my fantasy fantasy team.

To begin with, some background on the fake league. 12 teams, standard 5x5 roto categories, 4 SPs, 4 RPs, one generic P spot, no bench. This is the team I assembled.

C Joe Mauer R5 P4
1B Lance Berkman R3 P4
1B Carlos Pena R6 P9
SS J.J. Hardy R14 P9
3B David Wright R1 P4
OF B.J. Upton R2 P9
OF Corey Hart R7 P4
OF Juan Pierre R12 P9
OF Josh Hamilton R18 P9
SP Erik Bedard R4 P9
SP Tim Lincecum R8 P9
SP Chad Billingsley R13 P4
SP Dustin McGowan R15 P4
SP Andy Pettitte R17 P4
RP Huston Street R9 P4
RP Manuel Corpas R10 P9
RP Carlos Marmol R11 P4
RP Rafael Betancourt R16 P9


As you can see simply by glancing at it, my fake fantasy team is awesome. But no, forcing you to glance at my team and admire its glory is not enough. I must take you through my selections and thoughts for said selections for each and every one of these contributors to my fake fantasy team (which is not only awesome by itself, but draws strength from being named Carl Weathers as well; I pondered naming them Chuck Norris' spawn, but that was a little too much power for them to handle.) Let's begin at the beginning, a very good place to start.

David Wright, 3B
As expected, A-Rod, Hanley Ramirez, and Jose Reyes went 1-2-3. Good work by the people in front of me sticking to the book and making the intelligent selections (sidenote: in the future I resolve to get a top three pick so I can get Ramirez or Reyes; I think the top three is the sweet spot this year because those two are so studly). I made my own by the book, obvious selection here. Wright's awesome, I love getting to pick him here, and I think there's actually another big dropoff after Wright, so maybe the fourth pick isn't so bad after all.

B.J. Upton, 2B
This was a much more difficult pick. Upton had a great year last year without playing full time, so if we could just extrapolate his numbers to 650 PA and upgrade them a tick due to him getting closer to his prime, he would be a great steal here. Unfortunately, he struck out a ton, requiring a .400 BABIP to sustain his .300 average. I don't think there's any way he hits .400 on balls in play again, so I'm expecting a .270 average, best case. He's still got some nice, developing power and great speed, so a 30-30 type year is quite possible. Johan Santana was inexplicably still available here, but I'm convinced I can build a great pitching staff with only midround picks, so I focused on hitting early.

Lance Berkman, OF
I am definitely expecting a bounce back year from Berkman, which will put him back up there with the mid second round power hitters. Upton and Wright both have speed, so I wanted mostly power here. Berkman has that and should hit for a good average. Peavy and Santana were finally taken before here; if either were still available I would have pounced.

Erik Bedard, SP
Bedard struck out an obscene amount of hitters last year, leading the league in K/9 by a sizeable margin. This huge K-rate leaves him only a little behind Santana and Peavy in my mind, with the upside to easily pass either one. It gives him the edge over Brandon Webb, who was taken with the next pick. Had Carlos Guillen, Derek Jeter, or Troy Tulowitzki (the second tier of shortstops) made it to me here, I would have considered taking one of them (in that order).

Joe Mauer, C
This is probably a pick I would like to have back. I really like McCann and Mauer at catcher in some rounds around here, and I think both of them are great candidates for rebound years. But in this draft, Jorge Posada wasn't picked until the end of the tenth round and offers close to the same production, and Geovany Soto wasn't taken until the fifteenth round. Soto hit .349/.418/.648 at AAA last year in close to a full season and then hit .389/.433/.667 in 60 major league PA (small sample size here obviously). So he's my sleeper du jour, and he and Posada offer much better value in their rounds than Mauer here. Oh well.

Carlos Pena, 1B
My team still could use some power, and Pena here supplies it, even though he probably won't hit 46 homers again. 35 with a .270ish batting average is all I'm looking for here. First base is actually something of a shallow position this year, so it's good to get a big bat like Pena there. Otherwise I'd be left hoping Kotchman develops some power this year, which is not a position I want to be in in a 12 team league. (Note: this is very different than being in a 20 team keeper league, where owning Kotchman is nothing to be ashamed of. Do you hear that, Filliam? You can walk with pride, even owning Kotchman.)

Corey Hart, OF
Have to give Emerson some props, here, he extolled Hart's virtues to me a long time ago and I blew him off. But he's definitely a very good fantasy player. Good work, Emerson. Hart went 20-20 this year while hitting .295. He's in a good Brewers offense, and barring injury he'll get more at bats this year than he did last. He has a good minor league track record. One possible cause for concern is his terrible strikeout to walk ratio (3-1 last year) being exploited by pitchers who have faced him more now.

Tim Lincecum, P
Tim Lincecum's arm is going to come flying off this season. He's a terrible injury risk. The Giants suck, he's never going to get any wins. Major league hitters are going to figure out his delivery and motion. If you pick Lincecum, he'll pollute your fantasy team with his bad attitude. In sum, avoid picking Lincecum at all costs. As Bill Simmons would say, let's just move on now.

Huston Street, P
Street is a very solid closer for the A's. He's got good strikeout and walk numbers, a low ERA, and as long as he's still on the A's, he'll have a solid number of save opportunities. He has some health concerns, but I think he's as good a bet as any random closer to stay healthy. Him getting traded to a team where he wouldn't be the closer is of concern, but Beane will probably look to maximize the return on Street. Maximum return would come from a contending team (lots of save opps) desperate for someone to close, which would be a situation better than or equal to Street's current one.

Manuel Corpas, P
Having four relief pitcher spots forces me to take another closer here. Corpas has great groundball ratios, which is important for success in Colorado. Seems solid enough to me.

Carlos Marmol, P
Marmol is being given the closer's job in Chicago through Dempster's switch back to starting. He had 96 K's in 69 innings last year. Enough said. (Except that, yeah, closers were going fast so I needed to draft another to be in good shape.)

Juan Pierre, OF
If Juan Pierre plays leftfield for the Dodgers next year, he'll probably be the worst everday player in baseball. I feel guilty that I'm supporting someone this terrible at real baseball by drafting him to my fantasy team. But Pierre stole 64 bases last year with a good batting average, and this is the twelfth round. At this point he's a steal (pun most definitely intended, as it always is with me). If I end up with Pierre on my real fantasy team, it'll give me a second reason to root for him playing everyday in left for the Dodgers. The first is that Juan Pierre is terrible and will kill the Dodgers out in left.


Chad Billingsley, P
Another hated Dodger on my squad. He really mows down the Padres, too. He's pitched 31 2/3 innings against them with 43 K's, limiting them to a .563 OPS. In the second half last year (as a starter) he had a 3.12 ERA with 83 k's in 92 1/3 innings.

J.J. Hardy, SS
I needed a shortstop and Hardy was the best available. I'm not really sold on the power development, but then, Hardy's ISO (SLG-avg) wasn't particularly out of line for his career. Maybe he'll lose some homers to doubles, and I wouldn't be surprised if his average fell some more, although his BABIP is low for his line drive rates. Expected BABIP is line drive% +.12, but Hardy's BABIP was .280 despite a 20% line drive rate. Plus, as Emerson has noted in the past, he doesn't really strike out all that often. So perhaps there is hope for him to keep hitting .270 yet.

Dustin McGowan, P
See the rationale for Lincecum. Nothing to see here, nothing at all.

Except I do feel like I should explain a little with McGowan. He's got really nasty stuff, an above average K-rate, and he has a great groundball percentage of 55%. More groundballs means less power for opposing batters and fewer home runs allowed.

All right, I suppose this post has dragged on long enough, and my final picks of Rafael Betancourt, Andy Pettitte, and Josh Hamilton were mostly filler. Betancourt is awesome (even if he's a steroids user, which he is, having been suspended for them earlier in his career) and Borowski is not, so it seems likely he'll become the closer at some point. Pettitte is solid, if unspectacular. And Hamilton has a lot of upside.

So that was my fantasy fantasy draft. It was a lot of fun and gave me a good hour of enjoyment, plus all this time I have spent recounting it you. It has been an oasis of baseball in the midst of the desert of the current sports scene, which does not have much baseball going on. Check out mockdraftcentral.com for these excellent fake drafts. Thanks to baseballmusings, baseball-reference, and firstinning for being so awesome with the baseball stats they have.