Peel me a grape man

One of my biggest pet peeves in fantasy sports revolves around trading. I genuinely hate to be contacted for trades. Surprisingly, it isn’t that I am not open to a trade at any point in the season. In fact, I fondly adhere to the belief that a smart manager will trade any player if it helps their team, regardless of how awe inspiring the numbers they put up each week might be.

But therein lies the rub…no one ever even tries to make a fair offer. Every single trade offer I get starts with me giving up my best player for some smuck I wouldn’t play under any circumstances. I understand the theory of starting low to see if the manager is interested in a trade (or even getting the lucky chance when the manager you want to trade with is an idiot), but if you want to make a trade I firmly believe you should never start by insulting the opposing managers intelligence by making a trade offer so pathetically one side that they would have to be completely brain dead to accept it.

When managers initiate a trade with the low ball tactic, I tend to take the advice of the great jazz song Peel me a Grape. Once you insult my intelligence with a ridicules first offer, if you want a player from me, no matter how useless that player might be, you are going to have to go to extra-ordinary lengths to get it.

Peel me a grape, crush me some ice
Skin me a peach, save the fuzz for my pillow
Talk to me nice, talk to me nice
You've got to wine me and dine me

Don't try to fool me, bejewel me
Either amuse me or lose me
I'm getting hungry, peel me a grape

Lyrics from Peel Me a Grape
Written by David Frishberg

Instead of the low ball tactic, I recommend making offers to other managers which you yourself might actually accept. Sure we all want to be on the end of that great one-sided trade, but how often does that really happen? I assure you, my friends, it is rare. Consequently, treat trading as a way of fixing a problem with your team, not like it’s the freaking lottery. Make fair offers, and you will always get what you want in the end. That being said you don’t ever give away the kitchen sink. If a manager won’t make a fair trade or asks for more than you can safely give up, find someone else.

Managing Your Bench

It is probably too early (or too late) to start talking about this, since this problem usually emerges around midseason, but this year seems to be full of players with injuries and poor play. It happens every season. No matter how well you draft, one or more of the players who you were counting on as an integral part in your fantasy machine will go down. Hopefully, it will only be for a short time, and it won’t be someone who is irreplaceable like your first round pick. But it is something you should expect and prepare for.

If you were smart you drafted a couple backups and stashed on your bench. If not, you’ve have some work ahead of you. Regardless of where you fall in terms of preparation, it is important to start the season with a solid bench strategy. All leagues allow for bench space, but who you keep on your bench can be the key to your season. The more limited the bench space you have, the more difficult your decisions are going to become.

So what makes the ideal bench player in fantasy baseball? In truth, that depends a great deal. In a perfect world you would want to have the best player possible to replace any star player who might go down. Unfortunately, a GM rarely has one good stud player per position, let alone extras, which means that the bigger the guy who goes down the harder he is to replace. With that in mind, you should expect that your bench players are a step down from your starters, but it doesn’t have to be a drop to the bottom of the barrel.

If you use your bench properly, you should be able to fill holes in your roster with a solid replacement. In order to ensure that you come out on top after a downturn or injury you need to practice one or all of the following bench strategies:

1) Stockpiling guys who can help you in the most positions: Multi-position players can be the most valuable bench men in baseball because they can be slotted into several positions, and especially if they in positions that are traditionally weak. Someone like Yunel Escobar who can play second, shortstop and third base, or Kevin Youkilis who qualifies at 1st, and 3^rd, or Ty Wiggington who qualifies for 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd base are very good choices. If you can’t find a good multi-position player, then grab a player who you can slot into the position where you expect to have trouble. It is also important to consider whether these players can help you in lean areas, like stolen bases. If you have a second baseman on your bench who steals a lot, then slipping him in when you starter isn’t playing can to provide your team with steals. This is especially good in deep leagues where it is difficult to find free agent replacements.

2) Stockpiling the best player possible: This strategy works best during the draft, where you would fill out your roster and then just take the very best player available. Whoever he is will have trade value and can be slotted into a lineup if you need him. These guys are only valuable if other managers don’t have some better on their bench and no one comparable is a free agent. Value increases when another manager needs a substitute badly (so keep an eye on injuries affecting the other teams in your league).

3) Stockpiling guys who possess skills in short supply: Sometimes this might be a position, like catchers or outfielders this year. But don’t limit yourself by position; players who are superior quality at one category like base stealers or closers also make excellent choices. If you can’t use them, someone else probably can. But when it comes to closers, you should expect at least one of the top guys to go down at some point during the season, which makes replacements incredibly valuable. Although this kind of stockpiling is focused on acquiring trade bait, having a few one category guys on the bench you can add at the right moment could add a crucial boost to your stats.

4) Stockpiling players you know other managers will desperately want: This is a constricting and risky strategy. The idea is to grab players who you know other managers might want. This only works if you have a GM in your league that is a rabid fan of one specific team. The more the GM wants the hometown hero, then the more valuable that player becomes. Home- town fans often act irrationally when it comes to getting their favorite players. But the problem with this strategy is that if you can’t trade the hometown hero, then you just wasted a roster spot unless you can actually use him.

All of these strategies have some merit, and which one will work best for you will be based mostly on personal choice. What you need to remember is that fantasy baseball is about planning. If you plan well enough, then you will always be able to manage any single (and most multiple) problem as it appears. The only exception to this rule is if your team’s success depends on a single player, because then the loss is the harder to circumvent.

Planning for problems can be tough, but it can make the difference between being in contention at the end of the season and finishing at the bottom of the league. If you didn't include this contingency in your draft, then it is a good idea to start scouring the free agent list for players who went undrafted or poorly starting players who might get dropped by an impatient manager. The sooner you build your bench, the better. The free agent list is a great place to find replacements, but a little forethought about who is sitting on your bench can go a long way.

Managing Your Season: Active Managing & Keeping an eye on Prospects

Although I still think it is too early to be making any big moves in your fantasy league (in case you missed my earlier post, you should make any drastic moves until after a least at month, just to give players and teams a chance to set their season in order—unless of course a player gets a season ending injury, at which time you will have to find a replacement), there are a few things you need to be doing to help your team in the future.

The most important thing you need to do for fantasy success is that you must keep an eye on your team and actively track your players. This means that you need to find out how your players are doing by checking the Yahoo news blurbs and also going to a baseball news website (I prefer ESPN and MLB.com, both of which I check daily). Yahoo and ESPN do a good job providing information about players during the course of the season, but I have found they are both a little slow and leave the same info listed as a new item for extended periods. Because you always want to know what is happening at this moment, rather than a few days from now. The earlier you have information, the sooner you can act upon it. The best case for this can be found with injuries. Nothing is more annoying than finding out after the game has started that your star player has an injury and will not be playing in the current game, while a perfectly good player who is playing wastes away on your bench and hits a grand slam.

The second thing you should do is keep an eye on future prospects. There are always a handful of players going on the DL, getting benched for poor play, or getting themselves into trouble and being benched. Now, I am not going to give you a list of prospects because you can get that from any of the experts, and frankly they have a lot more time to hunt the minor leagues than I do. Heck, we don’t even have a minor league team in close proximity to Atlanta. There is one is Rome, but it isn’t easy to get to one of their games (especially since tickets to the Braves are so cheap and the stadium is within walking distance to my house). But what I will do is direct you to a great website to find out important information about prospects in the minors. Minor League Baseball dot com (http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/index.jsp) is the website in question. Like MLB.com, it provides information about minor league teams and players. Since it is run by MLB, they focus a lot of their attention on the players identified as the best prospects waiting to be called up to the big leagues. This slant gives you an easy way to keep an eye on up and coming players, but more importantly they sometimes give better clues that a player is about to be called up than the Majors focused media. In fact, I knew about Longoria being called up on Friday, April 11^th, because of MiLB, while Yahoo and ESPN did not run the information until Saturday, April 12^th. That crucial jump in time gave me an edge over my competition and made it possible for me to pick him up in most of my fantasy leagues.

And now, although I said I wouldn’t give a list, I am going to do so anyways. I compiled this list of prospects from several expert lists (so I apologize for any crossovers).

Hitters
Jay Bruce, OF, Triple-A (Reds) - 11/33, 5 R, 1 HR, 5 RBI, 2 SB
Colby Rasmus, OF, Triple-A (Cardinals) - 8/35, 5 R, 1 HR, 2 RBI, 1 SB
Fernando Martinez, OF, Double-A (Mets) - 7/31, 6 R, 1 HR, 2 RBI, 1 SB
Cameron Maybin, OF, Double-A (Marlins) - 9/23, 4 R, 2 HR, 4 RBI, 3 SB
Andrew McCutchen, OF, Triple-A (Pirates) - 6/31, 6 R, 2 HR, 6 RBI, 1 SB
Matt LaPorta, OF, Double-A (Brewers) - 5/22, 3 R, 1 HR, 5 RBI, 0 SB
Brandon Wood, 3B, Triple-A (Angels) - 8/36, 5 R, 3 HR, 4 RBI, 0 SB
Carlos Gonzalez, OF, Triple-A (A's) - 7/24, 4 R, 1 HR, 1 RBI, 0 SB
Chase Headley, 3B/OF, Triple-A (Padres) - 5/27, 2 R, 0 HR, 2 RBI, 0 SB
Elvis Andrus, SS, Double-A (Rangers) - 10/29, 2 R, 0 HR, 5 RBI, 1 SB (and 3 CS)
Matt Antonelli, 2B, Triple-A (Padres) - 5/21, 4 R, 0 HR, 2 RBI, 1 SB
Ian Stewart, 3B, Triple-A (Rockies) - 10/34, 7 R, 2 HR, 8 RBI, 2 SB
Jose Tabata, OF, Double-A (Yankees) - 7/28, 1 R, 0 HR, 3 RBI, 3 SB
Reid Brignac, SS, Triple-A (Rays) - 7/30, 7 R, 1 HR, 2 RBI, 0 SB

Pitchers
Clayton Kershaw, SP, Double-A (Dodgers) - 3.38 ERA, 8.0 IP, 4 BB, 12 K
Jake McGee, SP, Double-A (Rays) - 2.25 ERA, 8.0 IP, 4 BB, 11 K.
Homer Bailey, SP, Triple-A (Reds) - 0.71 ERA, 12.2 IP, 2 BB, 9 K (not really unknown)
Gio Gonzalez, SP, Triple-A (A's) - 3.00 ERA, 3.0 IP, 2 BB, 3
Nick Adenhart, SP, Triple-A (Angels) - 0.82 ERA, 11.0 IP, 5 BB, 8 K
Max Scherzer, SP, Triple-A (Diamondbacks) - 0.00 ERA, 5.0 IP, 2 BB, 7 K
Luke Hochevar, SP, Triple-A (Royals) - 3.97 ERA, 11.1 IP, 4 BB, 7 K

This short list should give you a small group of players to start watching, although there are many more out there (especially at pitcher). The great thing about prospects is it gives you insight into another level of Major League Baseball; it gives you a head start in terms of finding good players before they reach the BIGs; and, it gives you a chance to tell people that you’ve been watching guys like Braun and Longoria since they were in the minors.

What wins the Championship: The Draft or In Season Manuevering

For a great many of the people who participate in fantasy baseball, the draft represents the highest point in the season, an climactic end to hours or weeks of preparation and research. But is the draft really that important? The guys at the Fantasy 411 suggest that while one can’t win a league on draft day it is possible to lose one. While I understand their reasoning, as a historian I know an assertion like that needs intrinsic evidence to support the conclusion. In the hope of achieving this goal, I want to analyze some past leagues I played in to see how critical the draft was for a championship season.

Now before you start thinking that here I go again celebrating my past successes I should point out that I have never one a fantasy baseball league. I have come close, several times actually, but in the end I just couldn’t make it into the winner’s circle. Now that we established I am a loser, let’s take a look at how badly I lost and try to figure out whether the draft got the winner where he ended up.

For this article, I have three winning fantasy baseball teams in a league from the past three years. I have been playing in this league for the past 4 years. It is a competitive league of friends and family who live for no other purpose than to destroy each other in fantasy baseball. While we may get one or two managers who fall out before the season ends, most are active throughout the season, scouring the wires and looking for ways to screw over their competitors. Since this league goes from year to year, we have added and subtracted managers at various times, but the league format remains (12 teams, 5x5 rotisserie, 21-player teams).

Let’s start first with the 2005 League. This was my second year in the league and the first time I went into the draft really trying to win. My first year was not bad, with enough high points and trash talking to make me come back. Sadly, my team the Knights came in right in the middle of the pack at 6^th, which means we won’t even bother trying to figure out how I got there. But if we look at the winning team, The Alexander Hamiltons, the first thing we notice is that the manager of the team made a lot of moves: thirty to be exact. The number two man made 65 moves. Simultaneously, the two teams at the bottom made virtually no moves. In fact, I think I remember that both dropped out part way into the season for personal reasons, leaving their teams to languish.

2005 league standings

For a great many of the people who participate in fantasy baseball, the draft represents the highest point in the season, an climactic end to hours or weeks of preparation and research. But is the draft really that important? The guys at the Fantasy 411 suggest that while one can’t win a league on draft day it is possible to lose one. While I understand their reasoning, as a historian I know an assertion like that needs intrinsic evidence to support the conclusion. In the hope of achieving this goal, I want to analyze some past leagues I played in to see how critical the draft was for a championship season.

Now before you start thinking that here I go again celebrating my past successes I should point out that I have never one a fantasy baseball league. I have come close, several times actually, but in the end I just couldn’t make it into the winner’s circle. Now that we established I am a loser, let’s take a look at how badly I lost and try to figure out whether the draft got the winner where he ended up.

For this article, I have three winning fantasy baseball teams in a league from the past three years. I have been playing in this league for the past 4 years. It is a competitive league of friends and family who live for no other purpose than to destroy each other in fantasy baseball. While we may get one or two managers who fall out before the season ends, most are active throughout the season, scouring the wires and looking for ways to screw over their competitors. Since this league goes from year to year, we have added and subtracted managers at various times, but the league format remains (12 teams, 5x5 rotisserie, 21-player teams).

Let’s start first with the 2005 League. This was my second year in the league and the first time I went into the draft really trying to win. My first year was not bad, with enough high points and trash talking to make me come back. Sadly, my team the Knights came in right in the middle of the pack at 6^th, which means we won’t even bother trying to figure out how I got there. But if we look at the winning team, The Alexander Hamiltons, the first thing we notice is that the manager of the team made a lot of moves: thirty to be exact. The number two man made 65 moves. Simultaneously, the two teams at the bottom made virtually no moves. In fact, I think I remember that both dropped out part way into the season for personal reasons, leaving their teams to languish.

2005 Winning Draft (6^th pick)

When you look at the draft for the 2005 season, the winning team had a pretty good draft. He took 6 straight hitters before grabbing a closer and a pitcher, then went back to hitters. Most of his pitchers came from the middle to late rounds, a standard draft practice. But what is really revealing is that more than half of his draft picks (15 to be exact) were not be on his final roster.

2005 winning roster

With the winner of 2005 keeping 11 players on this team from the draft and having 15 drafted men either traded or dropped, it appears that two things made this success possible: 1) a solid draft where the first 6 guys provided value to the team either in production or as part of a trade. 2) the willingness to move players (including the first pick) in order to improve the team.

2006 League standings

In 2006, I actually placed higher than I have ever done before: 4^th place. While I was still in the middle, a new GM and team (The Big Jew Hitting Crew) took the top spot in our league. This as one of our most actively years. Not a single manager bailed on his team, shockingly this included the guys at the bottom who were essentially out of the race by the June. The championship came down to the final game, and the winner only won by 0.5 pts. That being said, the two top teams were active throughout the season, with the winner making 28 moves to 2^nd place team’s 55 moves. I really interesting event to point out is that the guy in third place only made 2 moves, which means he kept his draft team almost completely intact (a rare feat in my opinion).

2006 Wining Draft (1^st pick)

When looking at the winning team’s draft in 2006, it is obvious the GM drafted well, albeit heavily focused on New York Yankees. He picked up his first pitcher in the 3^rd round, and then two closers with the 4^th and 5^th picks. He went back to hitters for two more picks, but then grabbed a 3^rd closer. This pattern was repeated two more times, then he seemed to just fill in whatever gaps he had. This is a very usual draft strategy. While people often grab 1 pitcher (and usually a starter at that) in the first 4 rounds, it is rare to see someone grab 3 closers in the first 5 rounds. Yet despite the unorthodox nature of his draft, it seemed to work since he won the league.

2006 Winning roster

The winning team in 2006 really seems to add further evidence to what occurred in 2005. The GM kept only 1 more man from the draft than he dropped. That’s right, he dropped or traded 12 drafted players, while keeping 13. Again, this adds further support to the previous conclusions: A solid draft sets the core of the team, but then calculated moves are needed to fill in the gaps.

2007 standings

In 2007 I remained firmly entrenched in the middle of the pack. I would love to actually win this league, but it never seems to happen. In fact, a trend has begun to emerge. For one week at the start of the season, I always hold the top spot. Then I fall to the middle and never shift upward again more than one spot. Another important trend to point out is that in each year the winner won the championship by less than 2 points.

The winner in 2007, Ho Fo-Sho, actually was at the bottom of the pack last year, which gives me hope that someday I might break free of the middle. Although most of the GMs made 30 or more moves in the season, the wining team only made 16 moves.

2007 Winning Draft (4^th pick)

The wining team in 2007 had a good draft, but he had a very unusual draft strategy. In the first 5 picks, he took 2 starting pitchers. In the first 10 picks, he had 5 pitchers (1 of which was a closer). With so many pitchers taken in the early stages of the draft, he should have had a week hitting squad; but let’s not forget he won. What is interesting is that he kept more of the people he drafted than he traded or dropped (the first to do so in this sampling). Even more interesting, he kept exactly 8 hitters and 8 pitchers, which means he selected a solid core for his team at the draft, and then used moves to square away any weak areas.

2007 Winning Final roster

Is it a coincidence that despite what would appear to be a terrible draft, the 2007 team was the most successful team in the study? The team kept more players on its team than any other winner, while making the fewest moves for a winner. Perhaps this team was one of the best drafted in the grouping. When the 2007 draft is scrutinized deeper, the most apparent thing besides the fact that he took a lot of pitchers in the early rounds of the draft is that he seemed to be focusing on grabbing solid players in scarce positions. Last year it was hard to find a quality OF. Yet, his first 2 picks were OF. Another scarce position was 2^nd base; his 5^th pick. 1^st base had a lot more good players, which explains why he was able to pick up Prince Fielder in the 5^th round. Fielder was a bit of a stretch though, because no one could have known he would have such a great year.

All of this offers a lot to consider, but clearly the most obvious lesson here is that the most important thing a GM can do for success is stay active. Every one of the winning team made moves to adjust their team and fill in weaknesses during the course of the season. So while the draft may set the core players on the team, you still need to engage in trades and the waiver wire pick ups in order to secure the Championship.

The first week has ended

With the first week coming to an end, I want to offer a few points to consider.

1) Dont cry over spilled milk: So you had an awesome draft. You got that star player in the perfect round. Everything seemed to be going your way. And then he throws a couple pitches (can anyone say Putz?) or none (yes, Mike Hampton, I am looking squarely at you) or takes one swing, and then goes immediately on the DL. Unless the experts immediately start suggesting he will never play again, dont get too concerned. Just put him on the DL and find a replacement, preferably his replacement if no one else is available on the wire. It is way too early in the season to worry about a hurt player. Remember: there is still a lot of baseball to be played, injuries this early in the season usually work themselves out pretty quickly.

This takes me to my next point...
2) It aint over till it is over: So your star players are sucking at the plate or on the mound. Dont freak out and start dropping players who are known for years of solid play just because they are getting a slow start. Unless a player is hurt so bad they can never play again or tell the press they hate baseball (or their team) and have no intention of being productive, you have to be patient and let your stars get into their groove. Besides, it is still pretty cold in northern cities, much colder than anything these guys saw in spring training, which means at the very least they are still getting used to the change. So relax, and dont do anything stupid: like dropping a known star for someone hot at the moment or making a hasty trade--YOU WILL REGRET IT IN A FEW WEEKS.

And finally, this leads to my third point....
3) Dont count your chickens before they hatch: It has been just over one week. While I would like to say that you are guaranteed to win your league just because you are in first place today, in reality what happens in the first weeks really means nothing. it can be a precursor to things to come, but just like spring training it is too small of a sample set to make accurate predictions. Maybe every guy on your team gets started quick and then slumps. Maybe they have been lucky enough to start against teams that suck or start slow or whatever. Remember: the first week means nothing. There is still an incredibly long season ahead of us. Start looking at the players on your team to assess to see why they are doing so well. If they are early starters and late slumpers, your early success might be short lived...

I am going to try to post 2-3 times a week now that the season is underway, but it is really hard to spend time with my family, manage my teams, and work. If I cant keep the schedule going, I may have to just post on sundays.

Good luck this week in your leagues, unless of course you are in one of my leagues.