Chronicles of ottoneu: Expert Sellers?

Another week and another innovation at ottoneu headquarters. Now you can browse any ottoneu league you like, right here. A few recommendations include the FanGraphs Staff League, the original ottoneu league, Justin Merry’s league (for you linear weights players, since he’s the scoring system creator and all), and, yes, the Expert’s League. Use the feature to learn a little more about what you should do in your league.

For example. A little ride over to the commissioner’s team page in the Expert’s League can show you what our group of prognosticators decided Brian McCann was worth ($33). Or how many minor leaguers a seasoned ottoneu player owns (zero in this case). Lastly, since Commissioner Chad Young has his Amateur Hour team in seventh place, it can show you what another ottoneu team trying to decide whether to buy or sell looks like.

It’s an interesting team, you might find when you’re looking at his set lineups page. He’s got J.P. Arencibia and Brian McCann, two very good young catchers, both playing right now. And yet he only has 13 games left to play at the position. Is McCann going to be worth $35 next year? Will someone want Arencibia? This is a clear position of surplus for Young.

His team is not that old, though. Sure, he has Vladimir Guerrero ready to head to the bench for good, and of course no minor leaguers, but he also boasts Eric Hosmer, Hunter Pence, Domonic Brown and Mike Moustakas as position players. But the Vlad injury forces him to play Rajai Davis in the outfield. He could use an outfielder if he’s going to go for it this year.

His pitching is strong. Roy Halladay, Jered Weaver, Jeremy Hellickson, Shaun Marcum and Jair Jurrjens are the headliners, but Julio Teheran and Ryan Dempster make for a good bench. If he goes for it, a $10 Marcum might have great trade value without requiring him to sell his top pitching prospect. If he calls it quits on the year, a $43 Roy Halladay may not be keepable, as much of a machine as the Doc is.

The old adage is that “Nobody cares about your fantasy team.” The irony is that you can learn a lot from looking at other people’s fantasy teams. And before we get too up in arms about Chad’s team, we should go softly. He’s about to return from his honeymoon to discover that Guerrero broke his hand. As if returning from a honeymoon wasn’t difficult enough.

Oh, and the offer still stands! Fill an ottoneu league now, and the entire league is free. Contact ottoneu founder Niv Shah if that sounds interesting to you (on twitter or at help @ ottoneu.com).