Editor’s Note: CubicleGM brings you its first guest post. The Commish has been running fantasy leagues since the relatively early days of fantasy. As a participant in the CubicleGM draft, he asked to write the Overrated/Underrated review and some draft trends. His thoughts are provided below. The Draft Review overview post can be found here. Remember, the draft starts after each team keeps any 5 players they choose. To submit guest posts, email them to cubiclegm [at] cubiclegm [dot] com.
Being in the most competitive league in the country can sometimes put too much pressure on GM’s, but having participated in our league since its inception I thought I’d have been cool as a cucumber. Our league dynamic has changed a little bit, however. Mostly due to playing in a keeper league, everyone in our league is obsessed with young talent. The pressure finally got to me this year as I took Matt Wieters with the 1st overall pick after keepers (51st overall). I’ll leave my reasoning to Baseball Prospectus, but that selection was only part of a couple of trends that occurred on March 8th. Without further ado, I present the inaugural 2009 all under/over-valued fantasy draft picks.
1. Drafting 2nd tier catchers too early-Wieters, or Wiet-Wiets, or Wieties, as he is now known as, was just one example of taking a young, unproven, 2nd-tier catcher way too high. In terms of catching, The 3 M’s lead the charge (McCann, Mauer, Martin) with another M (Victor Martinez) not far behind. After that the drop off is huge, and smart GM’s would’ve waited and snagged a 2nd tier guy much later. In our draft, Wieters went in the 1st round (1st overall), Soto in the 2nd (13th overall), and Ryan Doumit in the 3rd (30th overall). I don’t see any of those players out-producing Jorge Posada (9th round) or Chris Iannetta (10th) by a 7 round margin.
2. Young Pitchers-I can understand wanting to jump on a guy like David Price or Clayton Kershaw. But our league drafted Yovani Gallardo, Joba Chamberlain, Zach Greinke, and John Danks ahead of guys like AJ Burnett, Javier Vazquez, and Derek Lowe. Drafting 1 or 2 young pitchers is a good idea, but filling out your rotation with these types of guys hurts.
3. Closers-As Bill Walton would say “This is unbelllllliiiiiievable!” Joe Nathan went 5th overall. Kerry Wood went 75th. Barring injury (and both have had injuries in the past) these two closers will finish within 50 points of each other. That’s less than a point per pick difference. Unless Kyra Sedgwick or Jeff Shaw is available, wait on the Kerry Woods and Chad Qualls of the world to fill out your pen.
Undervalued
1. Aging outfielders-Bobby Abreu, Judas Damon, and Socialist Ordonez were late-round steals that will put up more points than Tacoby Bellsbury, Hunter Pence, and Chris. B. Free. Sorry, I just pulled a huge Chris Berman right there and used all my funny labels. Anyways, after you get a top-tier OF don’t hesitate to wait on this deep position and take aging players. Remember, defense doesn’t count in fantasy baseball.
2. “Win starters”-every team needs its share of Ryan Dempsters, Tim Hudsons (RIP Huddy), Mark Buehrles, and Chin-ming I love Wangs on their staff, but letting them slip too far in the draft occurred this year. I understand that for every Buehrle there is an Andy Pettitte waiting on the waiver wire, but in these tough economic times security does matter.
3. Shin-Soo Choo. Is it Choo, or is the Soo part of his last name too? And is it just me or does it sound like I’m sneezing whenever I say his name, but Choo deserves his own category for being undrafted in our league. UNDRAFTED! After the Talented Mr. Frodo and I pimped his name all during the draft, he went undrafted. I implore every reader of this blog to refer to Mr. Choo as “The Big Sneeze” from now on. I’m hoping by the end of the year he has “Sneeze” on the back of his jersey.
So there you have it, a couple of tips from the Commish to give you a sense of what trends are happening in competitive leagues. Stay away from closers and catchers and repeat after me; It is OK to have players over 35 years old on your roster. If only I listened to my own advice.
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