16 Team Mixed HDID - JWRL

[BuckyBuckner]

Same league as wombat104. JWRL is a 16 team mixed league with a few RJ members. Scoring is 6x6 with HR, R, RBI, SB, SLG and OBP for hitters and QS, K/BB, K, ERA, WHIP and Holds + Saves + Relief Wins as the last category.

Here is who I kept going in.

Votto $12C12
G. Sanchez $1B
McCutchen $13C13
Werth $10C11
Pence $12C11
Stanton $5B
J Vazquez $1B
Chacin $1B
League $1B
Hanrahan $1B

Since it was a pretty cheap keeper list and I knew the inflation on hitting was going to be insane I decided to go very heavy on hitting and I attempted to only spend $1 on every pitcher. I came close but broke down towards the end. Here's what I ended up wtih.

C Pena, Brayan(C) KC 1 A
C Snyder, Chris(C) PIT 5 A
1B Votto, Joey(1B) CIN 12 C'12
2B Johnson, Kelly(2B) ARI 28 A
3B Wright, David(3B) NYM 60 A
SS Tulowitzki, Troy(SS) COL 59 A
MI Casilla, Alexi(2B,SS) MIN 4 A
CI Trumbo, Mark(1B) ANA 2 A
OF Ethier, Andre(OF) LA 32 A
OF Pence, Hunter (OF) HOU 12 C'11
OF McCutchen, Andrew(OF) PIT 13 C'13
OF Stanton, Mike(OF) FLA 5 B
OF Werth, Jayson(OF) WAS 10 C'11
DH Scott, Luke(DH) BAL 10 A

Bench Fukudome, Kosuke(OF) CHC 1 A
Bench Sanchez, Gaby(1B) FLA 1 B

P Chacin, Jhoulys(P) COL 1 B
P Dempster, Ryan(P) CHC 8 A
P Francis, Jeff(P) KC 1 A
P Hanrahan, Joel(P) PIT 1 B
P League, Brandon(P) SEA 1 B
P Masset, Nick(P) CIN 1 A
P Mujica, Edward(P) FLA 1 A
P Narveson, Chris(P) MIL 1 A
P Vazquez, Javier(P) FLA 1 B

Bench Collins, Tim(P) KC 1 A
Bench Marshall, Sean(P) CHC 2 A
Bench Tejeda, Robinson(P) KC 1 A

I'm not sure why I felt the need to go after Dempster, I've never owned him before, and I always liked to call him Dumpster. But for some reason I felt it was too cheap of a price, so I went for it.

Then I traded Hunter Pence for Max Scherzer, also a dead contract.

Thoughts?

[Gregg]

Wow. We collect the cheap players to afford the expensive ones. You took that to an art form. $119 on two players! Looks like it will work. You could be tough to beat.

[BuckyBuckner]

The prices were insane. Believe it or not Wright wasn't the most expensive player, Zimmerman went for $61. There were about 10 players that went for over $50. One team kept two players at $56 each and drafted another at $51.

One thing about this league, with the saves+holds+relief wins category, is that just about reliever will help you. I looked at the rosters and one team spent $29 on 4 relievers (K-Rod, Madsen, Gregorson and Betancourt) but I'd rather spend $4 on four relievers like the ones I bought and take the $25 remaining dollars and get a really good hitter. It's fun trolling for good relievers that get you some holds, like I did last year with Hanrahan and League.

[bryanbutler]

my projections have you winning the league far and away, adam. you'll win on offense outright, and your pitching is good in all three ratio categories and good enough in QS/K, which will be enough. and i see you already traded some hitting for pitching, which will help . your competition will be james, rob, steve, matt, amit, and david, in that order (again, by my projections).

this year will see the unseating of LoP, barring something freakish happening - i have them squarely in the middle of the pack.

for me, bar none, my worst auction since i've been doing this (almost 20 years now). was completely distracted, burned out from travel and work meetings last week and then from an eight hour auction on saturday, and just bombed, leaving $19 on the table and my roster rife with holes. ah well, there's no crying in (rotisserie) baseball... i'll finish in the bottom third, almost assuredly, unless i improve enough through trades, FAAB, and luck. time to look at 2012! ...

EDIT: and i'd really, really like to get that relief category changed. it far overvalues middle relievers. and, yes, i should just take advantage of it, but that doesn't change the principle of the thing .

[OaklandA's]

I agree that the offense will be the best in the league, but I'm not as sure about the pitching. I have your team in the lower half in the ratios and QS. I guess there are a lot of variations in the projections for guys like Francis, Narveson, and Vazquez.

[bryanbutler]

I agree that the offense will be the best in the league, but I'm not as sure about the pitching. I have your team in the lower half in the ratios and QS. I guess there are a lot of variations in the projections for guys like Francis, Narveson, and Vazquez.

your post made me dig deeper. found a bug in my code in the ratios. recalculating now...

[bryanbutler]

yeah, that makes a big difference. had the ratios on offense calculated wrong as well. sigh.

still have lords squarely in the middle, and myself in the bottom third, so that stays the same (fortunately for one, not so much for the other!).

but the top looks like james, amit, rob, stephen, ned now.

adam is still near the top in offense (along with james, amit, and stephen), but his pitching isn't enough. looks like ned and ryan battle for the pitching title.

[frae]

still have lords squarely in the middle, and myself in the bottom third, so that stays the same (fortunately for one, not so much for the other!).

I appreciate this I don't play the villain in any other league, but it is fun in this one.

Haven't done any projections, but Adam's team is stacked on offense. If he can piece the pitching staff together or if he is farm players he can trade off to address that he could move up I'd imagine.

For us, I really like our pitching actually. Not so sure about our hitting as we didn't buy any of the studs and spread the money around. I imagine we will fight our way into it. Just one question, bryan, when you do projections do you calculate at all for farm guys that will be up to start the year? Like Freeman will replace Callaspo for us.

[wombat104]

EDIT: and i'd really, really like to get that relief category changed. it far overvalues middle relievers. and, yes, i should just take advantage of it, but that doesn't change the principle of the thing .

Anyone else floored by the bidding on Soria?

[wombat104]

I think others have summed it up, but if you hit on a couple of pichers the offense will carry you. As you already saw I went heavier pitching, in years past I have gone light on pitching but I don't have the skills to find those hidden gems. Loved Casilla at $4.

It will be intersting to see how our two teams do, we both spent early and often but in different ways. I bet ya you could flip Werth to the Nats lover and get 2 or 3 starters in return

[BuckyBuckner]

EDIT: and i'd really, really like to get that relief category changed. it far overvalues middle relievers. and, yes, i should just take advantage of it, but that doesn't change the principle of the thing .

Anyone else floored by the bidding on Soria?

I was floored by the Soria bidding too. Clearly, they just don't understand the category. Which I don't like at all. One year someone cried that when a reliever came in during a tied game and got the win he didn't get any credit so it was voted to add relief wins. Just stupid if you ask me, I didn't vote for it. This logic completely ignores the fact that if he came in during a tied game and got the win he probably didn't give up any runs so he's helping your ERA and possibly your WHIP and maybe he struck out a guy. So you get stats, but people want to see something. It's all about that instant tangible gratification for some.

[bryanbutler]

I appreciate this I don't play the villain in any other league, but it is fun in this one.

i actually think it adds a fun spin to things .

Just one question, bryan, when you do projections do you calculate at all for farm guys that will be up to start the year? Like Freeman will replace Callaspo for us.

no, not currently. and in fact, i don't do a very thorough job of choosing who will be on the active roster on each team. it's too hard to make a comprehensive (and easy to program) roster filling algorithm, so i just do the easy thing and assume folks will pick the player with higher predicted value during the season to fill their slots. but i reject farm players at the outset of the calculation. it might be interesting to just let them fall into the mix - if they are predicted to have more value this season than one of the players you kept or acquired at auction, then include them. maybe i'll go off and do that calculation.

[bryanbutler]

I was floored by the Soria bidding too. Clearly, they just don't understand the category. Which I don't like at all. One year someone cried that when a reliever came in during a tied game and got the win he didn't get any credit so it was voted to add relief wins. Just stupid if you ask me, I didn't vote for it. This logic completely ignores the fact that if he came in during a tied game and got the win he probably didn't give up any runs so he's helping your ERA and possibly your WHIP and maybe he struck out a guy. So you get stats, but people want to see something. It's all about that instant tangible gratification for some.

i just think it's crazy. i like that we use QS instead of W, and that little side-effect is just one we should live with. in my main league, we use Sv+Ho/2-BS, which i think is a much better representation of the value of closers vs. middle relief. and rewards the elite closers (because of the BS, which will hurt the so-so ones).

i was also amazed by the bidding on soria. but i was amazed by a lot of the bidding in the auction (like a deer in the headlights, i was!) so that was just one of many for me...

[BuckyBuckner]

i just think it's crazy. i like that we use QS instead of W, and that little side-effect is just one we should live with. in my main league, we use Sv+Ho/2-BS, which i think is a much better representation of the value of closers vs. middle relief. and rewards the elite closers (because of the BS, which will hurt the so-so ones).

i was also amazed by the bidding on soria. but i was amazed by a lot of the bidding in the auction (like a deer in the headlights, i was!) so that was just one of many for me...

I would like the category to be saves + half a point for a hold.

The Soria bidding kind of made me proud in a silly way since I drafted him for $2 his rookie year and had him the entire time.

[bryanbutler]

I would like the category to be saves + half a point for a hold.

i'd be extremely happy with that - same as my main league but without the BS (which is only a minor modifier anyway).