It was 2:16pm on a Thursday afternoon. I was sitting on my couch, watching a DVR’d episode of Better Call Saul, when I got the DM that would unknowingly change the course of (the next few hours of) my life. Read the rest of this entry »
I’m a dweller in general. In slow drafts, I am the ultimate dweller. In the past, I would have ten+ tabs open at a given time when my draft slots were approaching: FanGraphs player profiles; RotoGraphs consensus rankings; Brooks Baseball Player Cards; BP’s PITCHf/x leaderboard; Rotoworld player news; the list goes on.
Then, prior to draft season, Jeff, Eno and I worked on these Arsenal Scores so that you can compare pitcher repertoires. You now have a go-to pitcher matrix if you’re dwelling on a cluster of pitchers.
Last week, Jeff Zimmerman furnished this glorious Hitter Analytics post, which provided us with a go-to hitter matrix when we’re dwelling on a cluster of hitters.
After how poorly my first mock draft went, I was more than a little excited to get back out there and try again. Howard Bender is kind enough to keep me in his Mock Draft Army and we held the first MDA mock of the year yesterday evening, with the tweets and hashtags to prove it. I outlined my “bats first, other than catchers” plan (side note: I’ve been tinkering with an acronym for this, calling it the EBEC plan: Early Bats, Except Catchers) on Wednesday and lets see how well I stuck to the plan, as well as what my team looks like.
Rather than split it up into a detailed breakdown of infield, outfield and pitchers like last time, I’ll display the mock in a different format today by highlighting certain picks and let the comment section decide which version they prefer. The full draft board can be found here with my team below.
Team Schwartz/rounds drafted:
C: Travis d’Arnaud/17 1B: Victor Martinez/4 2B: Arismendy Alcantara/18 3B: Josh Donaldson/3 SS: Hanley Ramirez/2 MI: Jean Segura/19 CI: Prince Fielder/6 OF: Mike Trout/1; Mookie Betts/7; Ryan Zimmerman/10; A.J. Pollock/14; Steven Souza/20; Carl Crawford/24 U: Pedro Alvarez/21
With my infield and outfield already covered, let us move to the final piece of the puzzle, my pitching staff. Normally in 12-team mixed league snake drafts I wait on starting pitchers, unless the league has particularly deep rosters. I feel comfortable stream 2-3 starters per week and spend early and often on my hitters. Given the way my offense shaped up, clearly I veered off of my normal plan with semi-disastrous results for my hitters. Regardless of how the team ended up looking, I enjoyed going outside of my comfort zone in this mock draft.
SP — Stephen Strasburg, 37th
I broke my traditional mold early by grabbing Stras in the fourth round. He was the seventh pitcher off the board and two more starters followed within the next four picks. Given how the draft unfolded, I was thankful to lock down an elite starter to anchor my team.
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I didn’t participate in the first RotoGraphs mock draft of 2015. (Check out the full results at Couch Managers.) But I will share my thoughts on it here and there, like now. Other writers did Round 1 and Round 2, and then I posted Round 3. Guess what comes next.
You’re half correct. Unless you’d already deduced the answer from the title. Either way, you’re probably eager to consume what’s coming – at least the tables. I’ll try to give you something else to chew on, though.
In case you may have missed it, I really like fantasy baseball. While it might not be exactly 10 more, I fully intend on getting into as many mock drafts as my free time allows. For now, let’s examine my roster from our draft. I’ll leave the comment section to grade me, though I’ll try to set the context of each pick. I picked at the turn, probably my favorite spot in snake draft formats so if someone is a fifth rounder but you see them as a sixth, it’s basically the same thing for me with back-to-back picks. Rather than bombard you with thousands of words at once, today we’ll look at my infield, with the outfield and pitchers coming in separate posts.
Catcher — Brian McCann, 133rd
I went against my normal trend of waiting on a catcher, especially in single catcher leagues, and grabbed McCann in the 12th round, 133rd overall. Devin Mesoraco went four picks later and given serviceable guys like Evan Gattis and Wilin Rosario went as late at the 16th and 17th round respectively, this pick looks even worse.
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I’m not participating in the first RotoGraphs mock draft of 2015 (which, as you can see, is almost over). Thus, it’s easier for me to critique (read: take jabs at Mike Podhorzer), because, without a team to criticize, I don’t have to worry about retribution. Yeah, that’s right, I’m an impartial observer, and the Pod Squad is in the crosshairs.
Round 3 is on the docket. In case you missed them: other writers’ looks at Round 1 and Round 2.
We are currently in the middle of round 12 in our early 12 team, standard 5×5, 1 catcher mock draft.
Devin Mesoraco was just taken at pick 137. I have him ranked almost 100 slots lower at 231 overall, and that is with a catcher position scarcity adjustment, so either way, I am considering this very early.
Up until this pick, only three other catchers were taken: Brian McCann (12.133), Yan Gomes (8.91), Jonathan Lucroy (8.88) and Buster Posey (3.35)
Below are my catcher rankings using Steamer’s projections (with a few manual adjustments) and Zach Sander’s FVARz approach to fantasy valuation (z-scoring each 5×5 category). Column 2 (zSUM) is the sum of the 5 categorical z-scores. Column 3 (PosAdj) is the zSUM adjusted for position scarcity.
Mock. Yeah. Ing. Yeah. Draft. Yeah.
You can follow our 12 team, standard 5×5 roto mock draft. Else, here is a summary of the first two rounds and our first outfield battle.
My first battle is my self-battle on Zack Greinke. After 63 picks in, I tweeted an image of my rankings, which had Zack Greinke literally all alone at #23 overall. Everyone else in the top 40 were gone by pick 63 except for Greinke and Prince Fielder whom I wound up drafting once pick 6.72 came around.
