I haven't posted anything about the Savvy Vets, my fantasy baseball team, or fantasy baseball in general for awhile. Savvy Vets is in a 10 team league, standard 5X5 H2H rules. We are allowed to keep 3 hitters and 3 pitchers from the previous year. The problem in choosing "Keepers" is that Savvy Vets is thin in top tier players but very deep in 2'nd tier guys. Here's the full roster:
C Brian McCann
1B Paul Konerko
2B Jemile Weeks
3B Chipper Jones
SS Alexei Ramirez
IF Michael Morse
OF Justin Upton
OF Omar Infante
OF Coco Crisp
UT David Ortiz
UT Eric Hosmer
SP CC Sabathia
SP Michael Pineda
SP Ervin Santana
SP Stephen Strasburg
SP Matt Cain
RP Craig Kimbrel
RP Mark Melancon
RP Brad Lidge
P Frank Francisco
P Bobby Parnell
BN Chris Young(OF)
BN Bartolo Colon
BN Madison Bumgarner
BN Derek Holland
BN Bud Norris
DL Jonathan Sanchez
Comments:
Closers are insanely overvalued in this league. Between the RP and P categories, it's possible to have 5 closers in your starting lineup. We have at least 3 managers who hoard closers. If you want to compete in the Saves category, you have to take reliable closers early and often. Many of them are keepers. I tried punting Saves one year and found that the numbers really work against you if you punt any one category.
Justin Upton and CC Sabathia are the 2 obvious keepers here.
I feel like I have to keep Kimbrel because of the severe shortage of closers in the draft.
I've narrowed my options for the final 2 hitters to Paul Konerko, Michael Morse, Brian McCann and Eric Hosmer. Konerko has been one of the steadiest performers in baseball over the last 5 years, but he's starting to get to an age where you expect him to start the declining years of his career. Hosmer is a young stud who could break out or he could have a sophomore slump and have his breakout a year or 2 down the road. Morse had a breakout season last year. Was it a fluke?
Choosing the last pitching keeper has the most players to choose from. Strasburg probably has the highest long term ceiling, but the Nats will probably limit his innings in 2012. Meanwhile, I've got Cain and Bumgarner as sentimental favorites with Pineda and Derek Holland also worthy of consideration. Do I take one of them over Strasburg? Do I take the risk of having to punt Saves and keep one of them over Kimbrel?
What 3 hitters and 3 pitchers would you keep if you were managing Savvy Vets?
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I'm keeping Upton, Hosmer and McCann as my position players. I think Hosmer is the real deal and he should have 1B or 3B eligibilty, shouldn't he? McCann is still a pretty good offensive catcher in a position that doesn't have much offense most years.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the pitchers, I think I would go Sabathia, Pineda and Bum. There is a strong case for Stasburg instead of Bum but I think the Giants will surprise this year and end in the middle of the pack offensively making Bum a 15 game winner pretty easily. Pineda is ready to take off and his trade to the Yankees should make him a 15 game winner as well. The Yankee offense should only help him when it comes to winning ballgames and he strikes out a batter an inning.
It is hard to not hold on to Stasburg so I could understand keeping him instead of either Pineda or Bum.
RBJ basically says what I would say. I agree with this reasoning for the most part.
DeleteStrasburg vs. pitchers, though, you know your league better than we do, but to my thinking, if you keep Bumgarner, most probably you will lose Strasburg in the re-draft, but if you keep Strasburg, you most probably could pick up Bumgarner in the re-draft (barring other Giants fans in your league; I knew there was a Giants fan in one league I had and I drafted knowing I was competing with him for Giants players). Pitchers with great strikeout rates are rare, so CC, Pineda, and Strasburg, I think, is the way to go, along with the possibility you can re-pick Bumgarner later.
Konerko is old, should be able to get him back if you really want him. Morse had a breakout year at age 29, even if it is real, how many more years does he have at 30? Plus Morse is also a 1B, and with Hosmer, you would have two 1B. I think Upton, Hosmer, McCann is the way to go, probably in that order, I would keep the youth, potential, and scarcity of position for McCann.
Closers might be hard to get, but you should still be able to pick up some in the re-draft, they can't hoard more than 3 and that would help you in putting more good starting pitchers out there if they do hoard.
FYI: one metric that I used to good effect in my draft was to focus on high K/BB for pitchers, then focus on the high K/9 pitchers (using stats from prior season). That got me a lot of good starters and relievers for my keeper league.
The guys in this league use their two P slots for closers so the hoarders try to get 5 closers. One guy ended up with 5 closers plus another one he kept on the bench so he had 6! Since at any one time there are only 30 closers and about 1/3 of them are unreliable, you can see that it quickly becomes THE most scarce position.
DeleteYeah, I was just going to go back and include McCann in my list of potential keepers. Catcher is not as thin as it was a few years ago, but it's still pretty thin.
ReplyDeleteI think Pineda could be in for a bit of regression anyway and it's going to be an order of magnitude harder to pitch in the AL East ballparks and against those LH leaning lineups with that short porch in RF in Yankee Stadium.
I could keep CC, Strasburg and Bum and just plan on drafting closers early. I really don't want to punt Saves again. Been there and done that.
Good point about the AL East parks, I didn't think of that. Still, he's young and strikes out more than 9 K/9 and has a high K/BB ratio (which means he should handle good teams too). I still think he'll be more in demand than Bumgarner, particularly with the Yankee offense supporting him, he should pile on the wins.
DeleteBut I don't think you can go wrong with Bumgarner over Pineda, either way.
Speaking of saves, I played in the standard Yahoo league before and I've never had any problems winning by punting Saves. I'm guessing your difficulties result from your league being a H2H. Perhaps you can stall on drafting closers until there is a run on them? Or just grab one you really like early on.
The other commenter noted picking up closers on the waiver wire. That is how I survived and even thrived sometimes in my leagues, by paying close attention to the closer situation and swooping in to grab new closers off the waiver wire. In my first league, I totally screwed up my pre-set draft list and I ended up with one closer drafted and he had already been demoted that season, so I had none really, but I pulled closers off the waiver wire and I think I won the saves category that season. Has that been hard to do for you previously in your league?
I would note that my success in punting varied, there was a season where I got shut out and failed miserably in that category, but most seasons I found myself at least near the top in saves despite punting by jumping the waiver wire a lot (I would monitor the closer situation - there are a number of columns covering that during the season - and would swoop in immediately for changes and sometimes speculated by grabbing a good reliever early - I get good stats in any case - when it looked ripe for a switch).
But again, this was for my league where only seasonal totals mattered, not H2H like your league.
These guys are obsessed with Closers. If you go the waiver wire route, you have to rely on closers in waiting. That's why I had Lidge on my roster. I kept thinking that as some point 'ol Charlie Manuel just wouldn't be able to help himself and would go back to Lidge as his closer. He never did though.
DeleteI agree with RBJ on the hitters. McCann is a good offensive catcher, which are obviously at a premium. It's nice to not have a black hole in the lineup where people are more likely to have one. Upton is a no brainer. I pick Hosmer as sort of a lottery player. Like you said, you have more 2nd tier players and the 3rd hitter keeper is a tough call; might as well go for the high ceiling and take a shot with him.
ReplyDeletePitchers are a lot tougher call. I like the strategy you just mentioned in keeping CC, Strasburg, and Bumgarner. Assuming Bumgarner continues his progression, he's a very good pitcher going against a part of the rotation where most teams generally have a major drop off in talent (although the Giants offensive admittedly can make anyone look like Roy Halladay on any given day) so those three should combine a lot of strikeouts and wins. Also, the turnover for closers is fast enough (injuries, ineffectiveness) that even if you only get 2 or 3 in the draft, you should be able to pick up some waiver wire closers.
I agree with what's been said - Upton is obvious, McCann for positional advantage and I really like Hosmer, had him last year as well. Pitchers are harder but I'd keep Kimbrel. My league was 4X4 and the closer hoarding was out of control. Switched to 5X5 this past year and the K's category changed the dynamics. But if you are already 5X5, having that stud closer who puts up high K numbers to anchor saves is a nice first move. So Sabathia, Kimbrel and Strasburg for me. OGC's point about Bumgarner being available in the re-draft is a good one.
ReplyDeleteI would keep the starters (CC, Cain, Bumgarner) and then Upton, McCann, and either Morse or Hosmer. If there are guys that love closers then let them waste high draft picks to get them while you stock up on SP and key offensive positions. I am in 2 competitive leagues and in one of them, the guy that won last year hasn't had closers for the last few seasons. Through good drafts and good keepers over the years, he was able to dominate with SP and his offense and he regularly won weeks 8-2 or 9-1. He always had at least one loss with S but it also allows him to stock pile great SP and focus on his offense instead of worrying about drafting Jose Valverde with your 5th overall pick.
ReplyDeleteIf you have to fill a RP hole in your roster then just wait till the end of the draft and pick up guys like Romo, Chapman, and Jenkins on LA and watch them contribute to K's, ERA, and Whip just like a closer would. In one league I didn't draft closers but picked up a few that turned into closers like Santos and Walden so you can always get lucky if you pay attention. What did you end up finishing last season Dr. B?
I finished 4'th last year. I won the league championship 2 years ago, finished out of the playoffs in 2010 and finished 4'th in 2011.
DeleteDrB, I am having a hard time posting on your blog except on my I-phone. It keeps locking up for some reason.
ReplyDeleteI have been having problems using the IE browser, it would not allow me to type anything until I pound the key, and even then, maybe 1 out of 3 strokes would show up. I'm fine in Chrome and Safari, luckily, but something is running amuck when I view it in IE. I can even type it up in another IE window (like Gmail), and paste it here, I just can't type anything in this window in IE.
DeleteAnother great feature from the great mind of Bill!
I don't know. I am very non-tech savvy. The format for comments and replies suddenly changed a couple of days ago for no apparent reason. I'll ask my daughter, who helps me with the blog setup, if she did anything to change the comments and reply format.
DeleteYou can reply to specific comments now. Not sure how important that is, people seem to be able to follow pretty well already.
DeleteThat's the weird thing, DrB, I use Blogspot too but cannot find any option to set up replies to comments. I guess I'm using the wrong template!
DeleteBut like you, I am no longer very tech savvy (and I used to be a programmer and system manager!), so I can barely get around the HTML and change the things around, I just used the template that looked good and I switched all the coloring to orange and black, where I could figure out there were color options.
I like this new option to reply to specific comments. Makes it much easier to see what you are replying against. Most probably your daughter didn't do anything, probably whoever created this template that she used updated it to include replying directly to comments.
Yeah, it looks like its an IE problem, I am starting to have problems with other websites entering my comments. If that won't drive most social users to other platforms, I don't know what will.
DeleteI personally like Chrome more anyway, IE tends to explode in memory usage once you have a few tabs open, whereas Chrome creates a separate process for each tab, keeping the size manageable for your PC. When the memory gets up above 300Megs, my system starts to shut down, probably from all the page faults in memory. Safari has the same problem as IE, gets really large, I have four tabs open and it's up to 345Megs now, I better shut something down...
FYI, one down: Angel Pagan signs to avoid arbitration, at $4.85M with minor bonuses for PA that could get him to $5M even.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2012/01/giants-avoid-arbitration-with-angel-pagan.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MlbTradeRumors+%28MLB+Trade+Rumors%29
That leaves six unsigned arbitration-eligible players: Melky Cabrera, Santiago Casilla, Tim Lincecum, Sergio Romo, Pablo Sandoval, and Nate Schierholtz. I would think they would do 2 more of these (Schierholtz and someone else) before the Wednesday deadline to submit, then probably sign all except Lincecum to somewhere in the mid-point between the two figures.
Lincecum, who knows when, his agent likes to play games, I would be encouraged if they can settle before the hearing date, that something longer term might be possible.
Glad to have Pagan taken care of. Hope they knock the others down quick. Timmy will go to the wire.
ReplyDeleteThanks to everybody for being interested enough to help out. It looks like the comments have helped me settle on Upton, Hosmer and McCann as keepers for hitters. The pitching will be tougher with CC being the only slam dunk. I will have to weigh the real value of starters against the inflated value of closers due to the unique characteristics of this league. I know Kimbrel is going awfully high in a lot of mock drafts so far. On the other hand Fredi ran him and Venters into the ground last year. Will that carry over to 2012? Wouln't be the first time a closer flamed out after being over-used in a breakout year.
ReplyDeleteI think you know your league best, DrB, go with your instincts and keep the closer.
DeleteLooking at Kimbrel's monthly stats, he ended with a poor September, worse month for OPS and bad on BABIP, so there was some bad luck involved, but he also walked 7 batters, 2nd high for the season. Numbers very similar to what he did in May, so it probably was random bad luck, as his strikeout rate was still stellar, did not flag at all in September. IP was similar to 2010, so he wasn't used that much more often in terms of IP, and he was in 79 games, 69 the year before, don't seem that big a jump.
He's young and he didn't deteriorate in September, he's probably good to go for 2012, his poorer September looked more related to bad luck with BABIP, and bad luck with homers, he gave up 2, most of any month. His high strikeout rates really obscures any problem he had with BABIP and walks. Heck, having him gives you a 50-70 strikeout head start vs. almost any other closer, so that's a huge advantage, makes keeping him look like the better choice, I didn't realize he's such a strikeout machine. Plus Atlanta looks to be contending again, so he'll get his shot at saves.
If you keep him, I would lean towards keeping Strasburg, though if you are sentimental towards Bumgarner, I don't think you can go wrong doing that either, particularly since they are similar in age (is MadBum younger?) and Strasburg will miss half of 2012 anyway. Pineda wouldn't be bad either, but him moving to NYY does introduce unknown factor of how he'll adjust to greater offenses in AL East, so I do see him as 3rd choice among these three.
I'm leaning toward keeping CC, Strasburg and Kimbrel. Hate to lose all the second tier guys, but I've always been very good at finding good SP in the draft and on the FA market/Waiver Wire. Closers are scarce as hen's teeth in this league and it's really hard to keep up with the vultures waiting out on the Waiver Wire. I'm terrible at finding hitters. Like last year I drafted Adam Dunn early thinking he was a slam dunk for at least 35 HR's. I think I would have won the championship if he has even close to an average year for him. I'll probably look for him late and see if he can bounce back this year.
DeleteYeah, hard to tell with players. What is clear is that Dunn lost it in 2012, his strikeout rate was sooo bad, he was striking out over 40% of his AB, meaning his contact rate was under 60%. His strikeout rate soared.
DeleteThere was indications that was happening in the second half of 2011, but unfortunately, one could not tell at that point if that was an outlier or if it was the start of the end for him, which would be hard to call given his relative youth and near-prime age. And it wasn't like he didn't have bad second halves before, he had one before, almost identical, but much younger. Plus he's a lefty and CHW's home park boosts HR a lot, even if he regressed in any way. Just bad luck.
BTW, looks like the Rockies are intent on acquiring as many gas cans as possible. If Sabes was doing this the howling mob would be already breaking down the glass doors at Willie Mays Plaza. Gotta love it!
ReplyDeleteGoogle chrome seems to work, thanks for the help.
ReplyDeleteDrB, here is an article analyzing Pineda, just more info to help you make your decision: http://www.baseballanalytics.org/baseball-analytics-blog/2012/1/14/pinedas-power-stuff.html
ReplyDeleteOr make it harder, he sounds pretty good based on this article, and you had pretty much settled on CC, Kimbrel, and probably Strasburg...
Thanks for the added info.
Delete