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razzball-draft-in-y-roto-arcade-leagueAndy Behrens of Yahoo! Roto Arcade invited Razzball into their 16-team mixed league that they are christening a ‘Pro-Am’ since 9 of the players are fantasy bloggers and 7 are avid players from Fantasy Baseball Cafe boards and Y! Roto Arcade commenters.

Andy posted all the rosters as well as some Q&A over in this post.  It’s a good read.  Some post-draft thoughts:

  • 16-team drafts take FOREVER if you’re picking on one of the ends.  We were 14th.  Luckily, Grey and I tag-teamed it and kept ourselves entertained with a running commentary on the picks.
  • You either have to be a little more flexible in 16 team leagues or be willing to accept bad value.  We ended up following our BRAN Strategy but had to improvise when Peavy and Webb failed to reach us with the 46th pick (3rd round).  We ended up mirroring my FantasyPros911 NL-only draft from a week ago and going Catcher crazy.  McCann was at the top of both our catcher lists and we liked him better than settling for Haren.  We ended up snagging Pablo Sandoval (C-eligible in Y! leagues) in the 8th round as we were incredulous that he was still available (guys like Napoli were coming off the board by the 10th round).
  • These guys were middle infielder crazy:  Furcal in the 4th.  Figgins, Tulo, and Uggla in the 5th.  Cano, Jeter, and Michael Young in the 6th.  You get the idea.  Never thought twice about waiting it out.  Like Kelly Johnson in the 9th round (122nd pick).  Freddy Sanchez (19th round) and Elvis Andrus (20th round) should chip in for AVG and SB respectively.
  • Outfield dries up quick in a league this big.  You know it’s bad when you’re forced to draft Frenchy in the 17th round.  But Beltran/McLouth/Maybin/Lewis are a solid first four and felt Rasmus in round 22 (something like pick #340) is a nice upside play.
  • Not loving our pitching staff.  I like our Shields/Cain/Cueto troika less than my 12-team NL of Volquez/Cain/Scherzer.  I hope Carmona doesn’t make me look bad for championing him in the 16th round.  At least our relief situation is solid with Lidge, Francisco, and Devine (edit: doh!).