Lockdown Dynasty League: Knuckleballs

[KnuckleBalls]

Awesome experience being in a startup Dynasty draft. With 20 owners and the wide array of strategies it was Not what I expected going in. Being my first Dynasty League, and getting the 19th pick I decided to let things fall into place before deciding on my path. Was hoping to get a power/speed guy at 19 but soon realized that was going to be impossible. Was very happy to get a young masher in Yordan as a consolation prize in the 1st. Wanting to have an edge in pitching it was a no-brainer for me to take DeGram after Walker Buehler was gone. Slightly tempted to go Flaherty but think DeGrom should give me #1 pitcher value for 4 or 5 years at least. The wait coming back to round 3 was just Agonizing as 40 picks is a looooooong time. I felt that I needed a power/speed guy and even with the age decided on Marte. Blake Snell was a bit of a risk because of injury but at 27, one I feel pretty good about.
At this point it became pretty apparent that my path would be "win now" with the hope of a 3-5 year window. The young guys were flying off so fast I thought I better choose a definitive path or risk being in "no-mans" land. I did make sure my top minors picks were guys who could contribute this year and I did that with Howard and Hilliard.
Did I go too far with win now and sacrifice my future, I think so. But, I think we will have a shortened season and an asterisk next to a title wouldn't bother me a bit.

What do you guys think?

C Carson Kelly
1B Paul Goldschmidt
2B Tommy La Stella
3B Eduardo Escobar
SS Jean Segura
MI Mauricio Dubon
CI Edwin Encarnacion
OF Whit Merrifield
OF Starling Marte
OF Hunter Dozier
OF Nick Markakis
OF Mark Canha
UT Yordan Alvarez
UT Albert Pujols

P Jacob DeGrom
P Clayton Kershaw
P Blake Snell
P James Paxton
P Sandy Alcantara
P Seth Lugo
P Drew Pomeranz
P Hector Neris
P Rich Hill

RESERVES

RSV 1B OF Garrett Cooper
RSV 2B SS OF Chris Taylor
RSV 1B OF Dominic Smith
RSV P Elesier Hernandez
RSV P Austin Voth
RSV P Rafael Montero
RSV SS Jose Iglesias

MINORS

1 Spencer Howard Phi
2 Sam Hilliard Colorado
3 James Karinchak Tribe
4 Khalil Lee KC
5 Diego Cartaya LAD
6 Benyamin Bailey Chisox
7 Roberto Campos Det
8 Julio Carrera Col
9 Kyle Isbel KC
10 Noah Song Bos
11 Colin Barber Hou
12 Andrew Knizner StL
13 Yasel Antuna Nats
14 Lolo Sanchez Pit
15 Brainer Bonaci Bos
16 Chih-Jung Liu Bos
17 Luis Barrera Oak
18 Elio Prada Balt
19 Luis Garcia SS Phi
20 Braylin Minier SS Reds
21 Seth Johnson P TB
22 Logan Allen Tribe
23 Wander Javier Min
24 Ryan Jensen
25 Jose Marmolejos Sea

[Teenwolf]

Awesome experience being in a startup Dynasty draft. With 20 owners and the wide array of strategies it was Not what I expected going in. Being my first Dynasty League, and getting the 19th pick I decided to let things fall into place before deciding on my path. Was hoping to get a power/speed guy at 19 but soon realized that was going to be impossible. Was very happy to get a young masher in Yordan as a consolation prize in the 1st. Wanting to have an edge in pitching it was a no-brainer for me to take DeGram after Walker Buehler was gone. Slightly tempted to go Flaherty but think DeGrom should give me #1 pitcher value for 4 or 5 years at least. The wait coming back to round 3 was just Agonizing as 40 picks is a looooooong time. I felt that I needed a power/speed guy and even with the age decided on Marte. Blake Snell was a bit of a risk because of injury but at 27, one I feel pretty good about.
At this point it became pretty apparent that my path would be "win now" with the hope of a 3-5 year window. The young guys were flying off so fast I thought I better choose a definitive path or risk being in "no-mans" land. I did make sure my top minors picks were guys who could contribute this year and I did that with Howard and Hilliard.
Did I go too far with win now and sacrifice my future, I think so. But, I think we will have a shortened season and an asterisk next to a title wouldn't bother me a bit.

What do you guys think?

C Carson Kelly
1B Paul Goldschmidt
2B Tommy La Stella
3B Eduardo Escobar
SS Jean Segura
MI Mauricio Dubon
CI Edwin Encarnacion
OF Whit Merrifield
OF Starling Marte
OF Hunter Dozier
OF Nick Markakis
OF Mark Canha
UT Yordan Alvarez
UT Albert Pujols

P Jacob DeGrom
P Clayton Kershaw
P Blake Snell
P James Paxton
P Sandy Alcantara
P Seth Lugo
P Drew Pomeranz
P Hector Neris
P Rich Hill

RESERVES

RSV 1B OF Garrett Cooper
RSV 2B SS OF Chris Taylor
RSV 1B OF Dominic Smith
RSV P Elesier Hernandez
RSV P Austin Voth
RSV P Rafael Montero
RSV SS Jose Iglesias

MINORS

1 Spencer Howard Phi
2 Sam Hilliard Colorado
3 James Karinchak Tribe
4 Khalil Lee KC
5 Diego Cartaya LAD
6 Benyamin Bailey Chisox
7 Roberto Campos Det
8 Julio Carrera Col
9 Kyle Isbel KC
10 Noah Song Bos
11 Colin Barber Hou
12 Andrew Knizner StL
13 Yasel Antuna Nats
14 Lolo Sanchez Pit
15 Brainer Bonaci Bos
16 Chih-Jung Liu Bos
17 Luis Barrera Oak
18 Elio Prada Balt
19 Luis Garcia SS Phi
20 Braylin Minier SS Reds
21 Seth Johnson P TB
22 Logan Allen Tribe
23 Wander Javier Min
24 Ryan Jensen
25 Jose Marmolejos Sea

It's definitely a win-now team, as you say. The offense has some nice pieces, but a few of them are on the decline, specifically Goldschmidt, Merrifield, and Segura, all 3 with vanishing speed. You'll need some luck and some vets to figure out ways to slow their declines to compete on offense. If they hold up, your win-now strategy could get you into the money the first couple of years. If not, 32-34 yr old bats with some track record and starting jobs will still hold trade value to rebuild. Yordan Alvarez was someone I really wanted at 10th, but like you say, it's tough to grab a first round bat that doesn't include some SB's, given the scarcity of them these days, so I went with Jose Ramirez at 10th. Alvarez will also benefit from the NL adopting DH after 2021 (I think), as he will no longer be limited in NL parks. Also really like Mark Canha's high OBP profile, and tons of HR last year. Late career breakouts are hard to size up, but the BB rate gives him a high floor, and I think he'll be a strong piece for a few more years.

The pitching is really strong. As I mentioned in other team summaries, I personally think that right now is a great time to invest in veteran pitchers with health issues, as the extra possible year off could do wonders for these arms. Kershaw, Paxton, and Snell all qualify as guys that I think will benefit from the extra time off. Maybe my theory is misguided, but if I'm right that these pitchers will largely come back stronger from the added time off, then these arms are great investments. Added to Degrom, that's a dominant group of pitchers. The relievers are great too, but largely only have 1 year of having figured it out. But all 3 are guys I quite liked, so you should have a really strong staff immediately whenever we get baseball back. Karinchak is likely to be a 4th dominant reliever. Very nice.

The farm I'm less familiar with many of the guys. Hilliard is a nice boom/bust guy. Old for a prospect, and Colorado hitters are so tough to judge, but he could be a monster, and provide the stolen bases needed to offset the loss from your older hitters. Some other guys I heard big praise on through rd. 7, but after that point I hadn't heard much about any of them. Although in fairness, those are largely much later picks. What are your favourite prospecting resources?

[KnuckleBalls]

Thanks Teenwolf. I really appreciate the thoughtful response. In addition to being "nudged" into a win now strategy I felt pretty early on that pitching value was good early on. Historically I have shied away from lots of early pitching and especially young pitching for the same reasons most of us do. But in the last several years I have kind of changed my tune. I'm finding in my keeper leagues that elite pitching is very very scarce. I think that stuck in my head for this dynasty draft and it seemed every time I came up the pitching value far outweighed the hitting. Such a gamble given the volatility of the position so we shalll see. My 15 man keeper leagues are 7 and 8 minors deep so I rarely dip into pool like this. I'll admit I didn't know very much about many of my mid to late minors. I just figured I'd go really young and hope a few hit when my window gets slammed shut on my fingers.

Am a Rotowire subscriber and love Rich Wilson at prospect 361. Being an old timer with a stupid sense of humor, him and tim appeal to me and they have some decent analysis. Used Fantrax Dynasty rankings throughout this draft and by how guys went off the board I suspect many other used that ranking list as well. Love Fangraphs and Milb and of course MLB prospects because that seems to be a popular ranking for owners to use.

With how deep the minors go in this league and seeing as I missed out on most of the top 100 I thought I'd make a point of trying to lock down catcher for the future. Like Knizler to take over for Yadi and 361 was very high on Cartaya. Hopefully I get lucky and won't have to think about catchers for a while. Wanted to also take a chance on some older prospects who tend not to be ranked high but had a chance to get playing time this year or next(Isbel, Marmolejos). Why not rather than throwing darts at too many 17 and 18 yr olds.

One of the interesting things I look forward to is seeing the waiver wire when some of these prospects start losing eligibility. With only a 7 man bench I see some really tough decisions for us all in the near future. Again, thanks.
7

[KnuckleBalls]

What about your favorites?

[Hornsby]

I think that you might be one of the teams with a legitimate starting player at every offensive player position. Granted, a few are long in the tooth, but they won't hurt you in a league this deep. Good power, decent speed, and no drags on OBP that I can see. You'll have a few guys that'll retire/fall off a cliff in the next season or two, but that won't be a concern for this year.

Pitching should be dominant, 4 exceptional starters and maybe 5 with Hill likely to pitch when the season starts. You'll probably be lagging behind in solds, but that's something you can address during the season as surprise set-up guys start appearing. Just have to be aggressive in the FAAB arena.

Not crazy about your minor league guys, other than Howard. Everyone else is a crapshoot, as is the case with all of us at this point. Rick and Rob might be further ahead of us in the prospect arena, but I've seen guys you never heard of succeed, and big bonus baby's fail.

This is a team that's set to be in the money, with a legit chance to win it all, IMO. Favorite players are DeGrom Kershaw, and Snell...

[KnuckleBalls]

Appreciate the feedback Hornsby. Agree with everything you say. Hoping the window is open a bit longer than this and next as the guys retiring shouldn't be too difficult to replace.

[wombat104]

I'll echo the comments of the others, no doubt this team is built for now with no discernible warts so you should be competing for the next couple years. Outside of your top 5 or so minors I'm not that familiar with them. If you have some holes that pop up, I'm not sure outside of Howard you have the capital to fill them but who knows which ones will flash to improve that. Pitching will be scary good for your window and should outlast your hitting so you can probably flip them to facilitate your rebuild after your window.

We had different strategies/thoughts so I can't recall an instance where you selected a guy that I was hoping would fall back to me.

[Ken]

Pitching will be scary good for your window

I'll start off by saying I like this team and wish I had gone more all in like Knuckleballs did. Lots of players I wish I had taken and he did a great job.

That said, I do have some concerns on the pitching - Kershaw, Snell, Paxton, and Hill make up a huge part of the rotation, and I'm not very confident in them becoming or staying healthy. Would anyone be surprised if 2-3 of them were out for extended periods? Howard helps, but after that I'd be concerned about having a staff that can just stay on the field. I like all of those pitchers individually (maybe outside of Hill), but I'm not sure I'd package them together, the risk is so high that multiple will be out.