I have 5th pick and I happen to know Miguel Cabrera is dropping to 5 (crazy right?). If Prince Fielder was on the board coming back in round 2, do you think it would be crazy to grab him and use him at UTIL? I know it seems ridiculous to spend two high picks on two 1Bs, but isn’t Miggy + Fielder just too good to pass up on?

Would you consider Longoria at 5th, and Fielder coming back instead? Or is Miggy at 5 just too good to pass up on?

Keeper options: Cano, CarGo, Fielder, Reyes, Zimmerman, McCutchen, Choo, and J. Upton.

I am in the 2nd year of a 10 team Roto Keeper League with 3 keepers per team (cannot keep players from the 1st 2 rounds of last years draft). I am having trouble choosing 3 of the following 4 based on the round I can keep them:
Cano (keep in the 3rd round)
Wainright (in the 5th round)
Choo (in the 9th)
Posey (in the 18th, I am keeping him for sure based on value)

Also, I was offered the following trade: His 1st round pick (3rd overall) for my 8th round (73rd overall) and keeper rights for Cano.

Thanks for your help

I am currently preparing for a draft in a 4 keeper roto league that just started last year. Its a standard 12 teams, 5X5. We run 1 for all infield positions and 3 in the outfield with 2 utility spots. Pitching is standard. My 4 keepers are cano, david wright, cargo, and justin upton. Also only about half the teams kept a pitcher. I dont really know where I should start with my draft. I’m mainly scared about the 1b spot. Votto, miggy, pujols, fielder, a. gonzalez, adam dunn, morneau, tex, howard, and youkilis all got kept. I have the 7th pick and from rumor hear that morales will get taken before me. Reyes is left for shorts stop but i doubt he will fall to 7th as well since we are technically starting in the 5th round. Any advice on how I should approach the draft with my keepers will help me a ton and also what i should do about my 1b problem. Thanks for your time!

First year of using keepers, so unsure of the inflation that may take place with top players? Thoughts on this – focus on solely value, or keep reasonable priced studs in anticipation of inflation for top talent?

Likely keeping:
Marmol $6
Dunn $12
Delmon Y $6

Which 3 from the following would you keep?
Utley $32
Hughes $2
Longoria $40
Butler $11
Braun $43
Pujols $50
Crawford $34

Thinking: Marmol 6, Dunn 12, Crawford 34, Utley 32, Delmon 6, Longo 40
???
Thanks.

I used last year’s cornerstone combo from you that I found linked on some other baseball site and picking from the #2 spot I ended up with Hanley and then two reaches that people kind of shook their head at, Joey Votto and Ryan Zimmerman.

All I’m saying is I now expect this year’s column to work out just as well for me.

I have the first pick overall and i made a trade for the fifth pick (i gave up my 2nd and 3rd round pick – also got his 8th round) and barring something unforeskin i will draft Pujols at 1 and having spoken to the people drafting 2-4 i anticipate both longoria and tulo to be available at five. which way should i go given that i dont pick again until the end of the fourth round? thanks.

1 auto draft, first 6 rounds: Braun, Wright, Howard (WHAT!), Dread, Kinsler, Ubaldo. Stop it.

@Exactly: Votto, Zimmerman, Pence

@Wilsonian: Robot, Homer, Narveson, Paulino, Espinosa…

@Sean A: Sure, as long as he’s not on the bench. Lose LaRoche…

I just call em like I see em, dawg.

H, R, HR, RBI, SB, AVG, OBPS
W, K, SV, K, ERA, WHIP, KS/9

My team:

C- Napoli
1b- Dunn
2b- Hill
3b- Wright
SS- Andrus
OF- Hamilton
OF- Heyward
OF- Tabata
UTIL- Raburn
UTIL- C. Johnson

SP- Lester
SP- Marcum
SP- Gio
RP- Kimbrel
RP- Hanrahan
P- Cueto
P- E. Jackson

BN- League
BN- R. Soriano
BN- Cecil
BN- Sean Rod
BN-

I’ve got one last bench spot to fill. There are 8 more picks until my last one and I’m having an issue with who to target. Can you rank these guys as to who you would take with that roster (if you can, just rank 5 out of these)?

Homer, Narveson, Paulino, Guthrie, Robot Jones, FraGu, Valencia, Espinosa, Brandon Allen, Pods, Farnsworth, Dotel, Kalish, Chris Carter, Arencibia, Yunel, Bartlett, Harang, Carrasco.

Thanks man, I really appreciate the help with this team.

Votto, Zimmerman, Pence/Choo
Longoria, Howard/Fielder, Pence/Choo
Braun, Howard/Fielder, Reynolds

Thanks, y’all.

A lot of the guys with poor AVG seem to go “fairly” cheap in our auction. Since AVG is all over the place from week to week, could stacking up on HR,R,RBI,SB and forgetting about AVG pay off?

Ohh, and by booting AVG i mean rostering these fellas (Keepers):

Alvarez 10
Bautista 10
Werth 13
Uggla 18
Dunn 21

Also, adding in guys like Alcides Escobar, Bourjous, Borbon for steals.

Any thoughts on the feasibility?

Oh, McGehee and Reynolds are also being kept.

@fitz: If he misses the start of the season, I’ll drop him lower too, but 13 does seem a bit reactionary.

@Ben the M: The Longoria for CarGo one.

@Greytech Drafting: No problem.

@OaktownSteve: Don’t think it’s a bad idea in a deep league doing something like Murphy and Diaz, two guys that do platoon. But I wouldn’t want to bench Snyder or Davis and get sonavabenched left and right.

@royce!: Ha

@Joel: Longoria

@Sean A: If you can’t trade him, is he a bench player?

With the drop off at 3rd and with how high Alvarez seems to be going, i think i may get more out of this strategy, despite that i hate having Util filled predraft and losing the value of who i would draft over Alvarez. But, this way i can analyze my team post draft and fill a need with better knowledge than in the middle of a draft. This is all assuming i can make a trade, people are pretty reluctant to do so in my league soon after the draft.

Your thoughts?

On paper it sounds like a good idea. But unless you are a master of predicting outcomes, you’ll end up getting sonavabenched more often than you’ll probably reap rewards.

IN H2H, I can see you rostering a speed guy on the bench (Davis) to either get a lead in SB in the beginning of the week, or catch up late in the week.

In roto, however, I think it’s more valuable leaving someone in a fixed spot until they prove worthless.

What do you think about doing both the Longo and Cano deals? The Longo owner doesnt want a SP (I tried).

If I do both I end up with this team

Votto
Longo
Cano
Reyes
Kemp
Johnson

+ a 1st and 15th rd pick minus a 5th and 6th rd pick.

To me Longoria is clearly the one you pursue here, even if it ends up giving you worse “value” from the deal

I’d counter Cargo/SP for Longoria. The deal currently on the table seems acceptable, but not optimal as it means one of your keepables walks