14 teams, 12 keepers

[DJBeasties]

This is more of a general strategy question, but I am interested in hearing people's feedback. When you go into a draft where nearly everyone in the top 150 is rostered and you have $100 left of your $260, how do you attack it?

I know what I normally do, but just looking for others lines of thought. I know it's situation dependent and all, but what would you do? Assume you have a B+/A- keeper list too.

[Sour Masher]

I'm in a very similiar league and we keep 15, so the talent pool is often thin, but even keeping 15, with contracts expiring every year, there is always a few elite talents.

My general strategy is to identify my biggest weakness going into the auction and get one of the premier talents at that/those positions, even if I spend most of my money doing it. I typically get said player or players early in the auction, and for much of the auction I'm one of the brokest guys; then I sit back while everyone else gets what they need and many get even broker than I am, then I fill out my roster with quality, low priced, ideally high upside players. It is important to this strategy to not go so overboard in getting your one or two premier talents that you don't have some funds left to be a player in the end game.

With a dearth of talent in the auction, perhaps there isn't a star level talent at a position of need. In such a case, I will wait until one of the best players at any position stalls out at what I consider below inflation value and I grab him. Then I spend to get solid players at positions of need and try to trade with someone post auction or into the season to address my surplus/deficit.

[MagSeven]

I agree with SM. In our NL only, the value shows up in early call-outs while the midpoint of the draft sees a lot of mid-priced players going over value. If you can fill your need(s) early, you shouldn't have any problem sitting back and cherry picking later. That is assuming that you don't spend the time drinking a lot.

[Porcello]

My general strategy is to identify my biggest weakness going into the auction and get one of the premier talents at that/those positions, even if I spend most of my money doing it. I typically get said player or players early in the auction, and for much of the auction I'm one of the brokest guys; then I sit back while everyone else gets what they need and many get even broker than I am, then I fill out my roster with quality, low priced, ideally high upside players. It is important to this strategy to not go so overboard in getting your one or two premier talents that you don't have some funds left to be a player in the end game.

With a dearth of talent in the auction, perhaps there isn't a star level talent at a position of need. In such a case, I will wait until one of the best players at any position stalls out at what I consider below inflation value and I grab him. Then I spend to get solid players at positions of need and try to trade with someone post auction or into the season to address my surplus/deficit.

Yep. I just had the keeper portion of our 12 team mixed auction. I had A Gone, R Weeks, and R Zimm penciled in the infield. That's it though. I paid top $ for Han Ram and Longoria and made sure to get 3 closers. The rest of my keepers were Cruz, Heyward, Werth, Verlander, and J Weaver. I surrounded those guys with an army of $1-$5 mixed players.

In the meantime the owners that waited out the initial surge of elite players paid $20 for Beckett, $18 for Billy Butler, $24 for Kendrick, and the worst I saw was $25 for Hart. Blargh.

[DJBeasties]

Here are the top 20 or so guys by R$ in the player pool. As you can see, it's largely wiped.

Young Michael 35 TEX DH 53 23
Phillips Brandon 30 CIN 2B 4 21
Crawford Carl 30 BOS OF 7o 21
Wright David 29 NYM 3B 5 20
Zimmerman Ryan 27 WAS 3B 5 20
Rodriguez Alex 36 NYY 3B 5 19
Ramirez Aramis 33 MIL 3B 5 18
Jeter Derek 37 NYY SS 6 17
Suzuki Ichiro 38 SEA OF o9 17
Hunter Torii 36 LAA OF o9 17
Francoeur Jeff 28 KC OF o9 16
Markakis Nick 28 BAL OF o9 16
Prado Martin 28 ATL OF 7o5 15
Werth Jayson 32 WAS OF o9 15
Mayberry John 28 PHI OF o87 14
Berkman Lance 36 STL 1B o93 14
De Aza Alejandro 27 CHW OF o9 14
Cespedes Yoenis 26 OAK OF 8 14
Fowler Dexter 26 COL OF 8o 13
Wieters Matt 25 BAL C 2 13