Logically speaking Grey’s strategy of taking no closers til later makes sense. Truly SPs can effect 4 categories more quickly, BUT…

What I’ve found in past seasons and even more so this year both at MDC and in real league drafts is that no one else in the leagues thinks that way. You can sit there and weather the first big closer run or 2–but if you wait, you end up with the scraps from Longshank’s table such as JP Howell and Mike Gonzalez. No one else waits that long and you’ll effectively end up punting saves if you do.

Rudy’s stragedy of getting one solid closer to build around within the first 10 picks or so is what I’ll probably go with. OR at the very least snagging a Soriano and Qualls between say 12 and 16.

“The real knee to the balls is in the comments where they wrote, “Becquey takes James Shields with pick No. 152, and many lament that Shields is off the board.” Why? Because of his mediocre K-rate? “

When Porcello ever reaches 200Ks, I’ll retire myself from any baseball related activity. Period.

For the record, I can make a case that Braun and Kemp are more valuable than Utley since most 2Bs these days are better than 5th OFs…

I don’t understand how some people get, or hold down, jobs at ESPN.

I like their free keeper league service, but I never consider looking to their writers for any advice. Muy pathetic!

My point was just that people are so quick to brand other people idiots just because they disagree over a guy’s value and where to draft him. I reserve the word “idiot” for people who don’t know how to calculate a tip or make change or capitalize.

Those are good pitchers, but not dominating, high strikeout pitchers. Nothing wrong with projecting to be players like that, but not what Karabell is predicting. Baseball America’s 2009 scouting report made many comparisons to Josh Beckett, but Beckett had 9 K/9 in his first minor league season (2000 in 59 1/3 IP at Single-A) and had 13 K/9 in 140 innings at High-A and Double-A at age 21. Porcello is more like the former pitchers mentioned, not Josh Beckett (and his career 8.5 K/9 in the majors versus his 12.3 K/9 in the minors)

re: average — Average is fluky, luck based. A guy is a .220 hitter one year and a .260 hitter the next. See Reynolds’s 2009 as an example.

re: Stewart — He has 30 homer power and 10 steal speed, the average will figure itself out. If you have average drains on your team, trade for Polanco or Coghlan. I’m sure their owner would be happy to move them for just about anything.

re: Shields — As someone who watched him more than I care to admit, he’s an absolute ulcer.

EDIT: Word.

Here’s a case from 2009 using Joe Nathan and Bobby Jenks (who came in about average as a closer).

Nathan had 68.2 IP / 2.10 ERA / 0.94 WHIP / 16 ER / 64 H + BB
Jenks had 53.1 IP / 3.71 ERA / 1.28 WHIP / 22 ER / 68 H + BB

Now, Nathan had 47 saves compared to Jenks’ 29 but let’s factor that out as save totals are fluky. Focus just on ERA / WHIP.

Projected average pitching stats for 12 Team MLB minus one reliever:
1276 IP / 3.64 ERA /1.25 WHIP / 516 ER / 1601 H+BB

Adding Nathan -> 1,344.2 IP / 3.56 ERA /1.239 WHIP
Adding Jenks -> 1,329.1 IP / 3.64 ERA / 1.256 WHIP

I estimate that .06 in team ERA and .013 in team WHIP averages out to about one point in the standings.

This simulation netted .08 in ERA (about 1.3 points) and 0.17 in WHIP (about 1.3 points) better than Jenks. I had Nathan’s ERA/WHIP contribution at .9 and .8 Point Shares whereas Jenks received -0.4 and -0.2 in ERA/WHIP. The difference in ERA matches the above (.9 – -0.4 = 1.3) and WHIP comes in at 1.0 (slightly less than the above exercise).

Now I’ll admit the IP averages I use don’t factor in flighting starters so the average IP might be greater. I also am using hindsight-based rosters so the average ERA/WHIPs are probably higher. But the basic principle still stands. An elite reliever is making a clear difference in ERA/WHIP standings.

Part of the problem may be that the ESPN player rater is tilted toward AVG, speed and saves, so their analysts tend to value the Crawfords, Mauers and Sandovals higher than people who like the slow 30-100-100 guys. People go nuts over Dunn and the 40-90-90, but the poor AVG and lack of speed make him a lot closer to #100 overall than #50, but he gets drafted a lot closer to #50 than #100. Same with Uggla.

I hardly think Stewart is a steal at 120 or 163 (dude is a career .240 hitter…yes he could break out, but rounds 10-14 still have a ton of nice pitchers and closers) but if you do, that’s cool by me. I think Sandoval/Zimmerman/Youk is a coin flip…nothing worth branding someone a fool over. Grey may not like Shields, but I see a guy who logged 600+ innings over the last three seasons and who has a career K/9 of 7+, a career WHIP in the low 1.2s and a career K/BB of 3.70. Yes, some of his numbers are trending in the wrong direction, but he’s 28, so I wouldn’t lose sleep over it. I would much prefer Shields to Stewart in the middle rounds…I don’t think I’m an idiot for having that opinion and I wouldn’t think someone was an idiot for disagreeing.

Here is a direct quote:

“Sure, some look at Porcello’s rookie numbers and aren’t impressed, but 14 wins and 31 starts for a 20-year-old is a really big deal. I love the wise way the Tigers organization dealt with Porcello’s prized right arm, not only by closely monitoring his innings and workload but also telling him how to pitch those innings”

However, after looking at his minor league numbers, it is obvious that he isn’t a strikeout pitcher.

Oh, and look how he finishes the articel:

“Don’t worry, the Carlos Silva-like strikeout rate will never look like this again. This season, I think he can strike out 130 or so hitters, and that number will keep rising each season. I expect Porcello to be an absolute fantasy monster, with 200-K probability, by 2012.”

He had 89 strikeouts in 170 1/3 major league innings last year. Porcello would have to increase his strikeout rates by at least 1 K/9 for the next three years to acquire 200 strikeouts in a year. This is just one of many reasons why Karabell is full of shiz.

http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?name=karabell_eric_baseball

Um, here’s something to think of Karabell, they each had one good year. One hit wonders only last, um, one year.

There are twice daily posts dating back at least 3 years, including 24 different posts of 2010 rankings with projections and commentary for roughly 300 players at every position.. If you really want to you can read about every schmo with a minor league contract and a chance of sniffing the majors someday on this site.

http://razzball.com/2010-fantasy-baseball-rankings/

Therein you will find your facts, stats, and quotes

“Oh, I forgot about Pierre Becquey [pronounced BecKAY like the Piles' song]“, said Berry. “He’s the best Canadian export since Loverboy.”

“I ended up drafting Youkilis and using him as my first baseman, which was smart of me,” said Berry. “Oh, maybe I ended up using him at third base. Oh, I did? I did…”

“You can wait on a first baseman this year because of depth,” said Berry.

“[Ankiel]‘s not a great pressure guy…”

“I [drafted Kemp fourth] because I wanted to make a statement that I like Kemp over Braun this year. That said, I quickly realized what a big mistake that was because I should have taken Utley,” said Berry.

“Didn’t love Crawford [seventh], but I didn’t want one of the first basemen there. I might’ve thought about Lincecum there, but you can’t go wrong with Carl Crawford,” said Ravitz. “I wouldn’t take Fielder or Howard that high.”

“Put [Youkilis'] numbers side-by-side with Teixeira [and they compare favorably],” said Ravitz before actually comparing the two. “He had four fewer runs scored, 12 fewer HRs which is sizable, 28 RBI which is sizable, stole five more bases and hit .013 higher.” Awkward silence follows. Topic change.

“I’m not sure there’s ten better third basemen than Martin Prado.” — Ravitz

“It all depends on how much you believe in the Marco Scutaros of the world,” — Berry

After drafting Carl Crawford in the first round and Mauer in the second, Nate Ravitz felt “enlightened” and said, “[After the first two rounds] I didn’t like the way my team turned out. I found myself chasing power.” Discussion then turned to Ravitz’s third-round selection: Jimmy Rollins.

Trying to talk meaningful stats. Did you have something along those lines to contribute?