Fantasy Baseball Results

Before I go too far into this, Boz, you may want to skim right on past this post and re-read my thoughts on NCAA.

Ok, now that we have that taken care of - time to go back to fantasy.

Ok - so I just wanted to post that pic...but I'm talking about fantasy baseball. This year was a particularly good one for me in the rotisserie leagues, as I proceeded to win 4 of the 5 I participated in - so, if you want to win some money next season and become an internet billionaire with a website/blog that generates as many as 160 hits a week like me - then listen up.

Over the years I've found that by instead of trying to find the best available player at each position of the draft, it's actually better to draft players based on their availability in order to achieve a certain level of statistics that would put you in better position to win the league. Everyone during these drafts are looking for marquee players and rightfully so, but instead of going in without an idea of what you're bidding on, shoot for a few numbers. Using the typical lineup of C, 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, OF, OF, OF, Util in your standard 5x5 league - assume these numbers as for what you're shooting for:

I went into this past season with my trusty Sporting News fantasy guide, which listed every major league player and what their projected season would amount to. I like TSN as my favorite guide, feel free to substitute your personal mag into this slot if you see fit. Now major league ballplayers have tendencies to perform well within their yearly averages, so 'X' out the players you're thinking will bust - circle the ones you feel are going to break out and play the rest as they come. As you select a ballplayer, subtract the numerical values from the above listing. Select your positional starters as closely as you can, and then fill in with utility men and backup players to play when your starters can't.

Obviously you're going to want to get as many 5-Tool players as possible, guys that can score, hit for average and power, and then run a little bit. Guys like Alex Rodriguez, Albert Pujols & Vladimir Guerrero are all going to be top picks because of the level they perform at and numbers they put up, but after those players you need to address all needs - as stolen bases are worth just as many points as HR's are in rotisserie leagues. Now that can be a misleading statistic in a way, because as you'll notice in leagues that power hitters score just as much as the quick guys, and usually power hitters will account for more points (R/AVG/HR/RBI) than the stolen base guys (R/SB) a lot of times - just another reason to seek out the 5-tooled stars.

Few Examples -
Gary Sheffield: 104 R, 34 HR, 123 RBI, 10 SB, .291 AVG
Jason Bay: 110 R, 32 HR, 101 RBI, 21 SB, .306 AVG
Derrick Lee: 120 R, 46 HR, 107 RBI, 15 SB, .335 AVG
David Wright: 99 R, 27 HR, 102 RBI, 17 SB, .306 AVG
Chase Utley: 93 R, 28 HR, 105 RBI, 16 SB, .291 AVG

Whereas, a lot of people tend to lean towards more define numbers related to statistics:

Andruw Jones: 95 R, 51 HR, 128, 5 SB, .263 AVG
Chone Figgins: 113 R, 8 HR, 57 RBI, 62 SB, .290 AVG
Richie Sexton: 99 R, 39 HR, 121 RBI, 1 SB, .263 AVG
Ichiro Suzuki: 111 R, 15 HR, 68 RBI, 33 SB, .303 AVG
Adam Dunn: 107 R, 40 HR, 101 RBI, 4 SB, .247 AVG

There's not a lot of difference in that list of players all taken from the top 50 rated players this past season, but when forming your team I hope that you can see the difference in what the first 5 do for your team as opposed to the second set. If you pull out averages of those statistics and what each player would need to do to help you reach your goal set of numbers shown a little ways up, you'll see that the first set of guys all score well within that range of numbers in all 5 categories, and even stolen bases. If you can leave them in the lineup day-to-day knowing they're going to hit above your destination average of .285, score 100 runs, hit 25 HR's and drive in close to 100 RBI's...all while stealing 10 bases, you really don't have to do much to your team all year except fill in holes on off days.

And I'm not saying Adam Dunn isn't a great fantasy player - he still brings in vital stats to 3 of the 5 categories, but for every Adam Dunn you have to compensate with a Chone Figgins. I've played the compensation game before, and it's a year-long struggle where you try to outdo yourself when one guy starts going into a funk.

Back to how great I am - the following picture is of my yearly statistics in the 4 leagues that I won this year. The results vary from league to league, but for the most part I achieved or got really close to my projected number necessary to win the league. The league respresented by the "1" was a 9 player league which included FM's own staff and friends, the remaining three are represented by 12 members which are winners of mine amongst the Yahoo fantasy baseball circuit.

As you can see, I came out right about where I wanted to in every league, and where I may have faltered a bit I appeared to pick it up elsewhere. It's obvious that I was lacking R's and RBI's in League #2, but an oustanding pitching staff really helped me out in terms of ERA and WHIP to make up for it. In League #3 I damn near swept the offensive categories with the exception of stolen bases, but really had some incredibly average marks in the pitching department - but again, the compensation is very minimal; I'm not exactly doing remotely horrible either.

I could use this time to throw in some pics of the league standings, strategies on switching players midstream and trading to address your needs, but I think for now a post detailing some of the numbers to shoot for in the next season will suffice. Come March when leagues open up again, I'll get back into making up a pre-ranking list and talk strategies as the season progresses. I do realize my long period of time here without a pic to break the seemingly endless amount of text, so at this point I'll just revert back to the "fantasy" part in "fantasy baseball."