So, yeah: I came 3rd place. That’s cool! I didn’t win, so it’s not that cool, but it still feels good. In our league there are a lot of sharp folks whom I respect. Given the sheer number of leagues in Tout Wars now it’s easy to accuse the talent pool of being diluted. It’s also easy to defend it as being not diluted, seeing as I directly participate and thus have an incentive to save face, but nevertheless. It’s a solid crop of talent.

Additionally, I am categorically bad at 15-team leagues (thus, it feels good to do moderately well at something you’re bad at). For 15-teamers you must have that encyclopedic knowledge of the player pool. It is imperative to minimize mistakes because they cannot be rectified as easily through waivers. You know what it takes to develop that encyclopedic knowledge? Time. You know who doesn’t have time? Parents of toddlers. Or people with full-time jobs outside of fantasy baseball. More than half my opponents do fantasy baseball full-time! How can I possibly compete?

Rather than make excuses, I wanted to prove to myself I, indeed, could compete. Read the rest of this entry »

While the Mets and Braves are in the midst of the second game of a doubleheader as I type this, the American League stats are in the books. So although many fantasy leagues still haven’t been decided yet, I have taken home my third overall Tout Wars league and second AL Tout Wars league championship. Check out the final standings:

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This is my fourth year in the 15-team mixed league auction, with batting average replaced by on-base percentage (OBP). No one tracks these things closely (except for Josiah Tindor), but I’ll be the first to admit I’ve fared quite poorly in this league. If my memory serves me correctly, I finished 14th, 8th, and 15th. That’s… pretty bad! Embarrassing, even. I expected to perform badly in my first year — I have never quite gotten the grasp of 15-team leagues, with 12 teams being the sweet spot for me, and I had never played in an OBP league before. In 2022, with a year under my belt, it went better but it still wasn’t great.

Last year, though, was an unmitigated disaster. It was time to face the facts: I simply hadn’t devoted enough time and attention to fantasy baseball. My daughter was born during the 2020 season, so before the 2021 season she was still small and decidedly less of a rascal, which allowed me to prepare as I normally would. But as she has gotten older I have found myself with less and less free time. I thought I could simply ride the momentum of my existing knowledge of the player pool. To some extent, it worked; the 2022 season wasn’t so bad, although it was my first losing (overall negative ROI) year since 2011. That should’ve been enough of a red flag. 2023 was somehow worse and, frankly, downright humiliating.

I told myself, not again. Read the rest of this entry »

The Draft & Auction Recap episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Justin Mason

Strategy Section

• TGFBI
  • What is TGFBI?
  • KDS Selections
  • Draft plan & execution
  • Freddie Freeman as a 1st rounder
  • Nico Hoerner as a draft linchpin
  • Relief Pitcher darts at the end of drafts
  • How much risk to take on, and when?
  • TGFBI Average Draft Position trends
• Auctions
  • Differences between snake drafts and auctions
  • What is it like to draft against?
    • Ariel Cohen
    • Justin Mason
  • Adjusting draft strategy based on other owners’ tendencies
  • Coming to auction tables with market values
  • Hitter / Pitcher % Split
  • How to handle Ronald Acuna Jr. in auctions?
  • Online vs. in-person auctions
  • 12-team vs. 15-team auctions
• LABR Mixed Auction Recap
  • Justin
    • Stars & Scrubs hitting
    • Low cost pitching
    • Late game / low valued injury darts
    • 3 Closers
  • Ariel
    • Big catcher spending
    • High value starting pitching
    • How to make up for the loss of Devin Williams
  • Trading leagues vs. non-trading leagues
• Tout Mixed Auction Recap
• Drafting as a proxy for a team’s owner
• Tout Head to Head Recap
  • Do you need to follow the market’s Hitter / Pitcher % split in points leagues?
  • Nominating catchers early on
  • Salvador Perez’s value
  • Factoring in the HTH playoff format into player valuation

Read the rest of this entry »

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Every year, fantasy analysts from around the country gather for a collection of leagues called Tout Wars. This year was the 27th season of Tout Wars. This year, I was in the 15-team mixed auction league where I finished second last season, losing the lead on the last day to Bret Sayre of Baseball Prospectus. 

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This past Saturday morning, I hopped on the NYC subway for the quick trip to Hotel Edison to participate in the annual Tout Wars live auction. It’s one of the most exciting days of the year, and it’s always bittersweet when it’s over, knowing that I’ll have to wait an entire year to auction with these lads again.

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My 11th season as an AL Tout Wars participant has concluded and it was once again an extremely frustrating season. I knew that my auction resulted in a high risk/high reward roster, but not only did my high risk guys not work out, many others failed to as well. For those of you who want to refresh your memories with some background information on my auction, check out my initial recap. Let’s start with the final standings.

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The 2023 Bold Predictions episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Michael Govier

NFBC & Tout Wars experience

Strategy Section

• First few weeks strategy
  • How to use FAAB in the first few weeks of the season
  • How to know who to drop/cut a player from your roster?
• What to do with demoted or injured players?
  • Vaughn Grissom
  • Luis Severino

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The 2023 season marks my fifth year in Tout Wars. My tenure to date can be characterized graciously as mediocre; I accomplished a head-to-head semifinals appearance (a benched Kole Calhoun home run away from a finals appearance) in my 2019 debut but succeeded it with consecutive ghastly, basement-dwelling finishes and last year’s extremely turbulent middle-of-the-pack showing.

Entering my third year of the 15-team 5-by-5 roto mixed league auction (salary draft) with on-base percentage (OBP), I feel like I’ve finally found my footing. I had little enthusiasm for fantasy baseball in its pandemic-shortened 2020 season, and the 2021 season was my first after my daughter was born. Needless to say I had (and still have) a lot less time (and sleep) to prepare than I did in my glory days. And having freshly moved from 12-team head-to-head to 15-team OBP, playing a new format against a high level of talent, I got absolutely clobbered. Last year marked my second in 15-team OBP, and it went a little better.

I vowed to do better this year, despite the impositions—my performance last year gave me a faint glimmer of hope that I could—but that, of course, remains TBD. Truthfully, I have less time than ever before. But I don’t want that to be an excuse. I just knew I’d have to be more focused at the draft table. I think I was. I’ll get to all of that shortly.

First, a review of last season:
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The 2023 Draft Recap episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.

Guest: Steve Cozzolino

The Great Fantasy Baseball Invitational (TGFBI)

• Steve’s TGFBI Draft Board – Team 9
• Reuven’s TGFBI Draft Board – Team 8
• Ariel’s TGFBI Draft Board – Team 8
• General snake draft strategy
• KDS Strategy
• First five rounds strategy
• Saves strategy
• Steals strategy
• Catcher strategy
• Easiest draft decisions
• Toughest draft decisions

LABR Mixed Auction

• Ariel’s LABR Draft Board
• Altering strategy based on knowing how the other competitors draft
• General auction strategy for a 12 team mixed league
• Shohei Ohtani at $26 as Ariel’s most expensive player
• Saves strategy in a 12 team mixed league
• How to pull off obtaining so many value bargains in an auction

Read the rest of this entry »

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