Fantasy Baseball Draft Goals For 5×5 Stat Categories

This is a post for the fantasy baseball drafters who use Excel, Google Docs, or some other war room software that automatically totals a drafted team’s stats while in the middle of a draft.  Or perhaps for those of you who do mock drafts or simulated drafts.

The below grid represents my projected 75% mark in each stat category across 10/12/14/15/16 team ESPN and Yahoo default roster format leagues.

These numbers should only be used directionally.  Please note that each projection source projects to a different league average so your team may look great if using a ‘bullish’ source and look poor if using a ‘bearish’ source.

Personally, I ignore team totals throughout a draft and go by feel in terms of my team’s balance.  While I have had regrettable drafts over the years, I do not recall one that failed because my team was not balanced enough.  If I do happen to have the time and curiosity to do an in-draft litmus test, I just add up the dollar values per category to see which categories are lowest.

Final note:  The differences between ESPN and Yahoo roster formats are much greater for hitters (13 ESPN starting spots vs. 10 in Yahoo) than pitchers (9 pitchers in ESPN vs. 8 pitchers in Yahoo).  In daily leagues, I have found that Yahoo leagues end up with similar innings totals as ESPN leagues, indicating that owners are that much more aggressive in cycling in relievers during SP off days and/or streaming.  So you will find the same targets for ESPN and Yahoo.

CBSSports leagues should match ESPN assuming you use the roster format: C/1B/2B/SS/3B/5 OF/MI/CI/UTIL/9 P.  For NFBC or other 2-catcher leagues, you should add a 2nd catcher’s worth of stats on the offensive side.