I’ve drafted my Razzball Commenter League team (over hundred leagues this year; crazy!), and now I’m ready for the season. All those other drafts — like Tout, Friends & Family, NFBC, yadda-whodoodie — are in the past. They were prep for this draft. This draft is the one that matters, because I’m going against, like, 1200 of youse. And youse are the ones that matter. Well, a few of youse matter more than a few of the other youse. Just assume you are part of the favorable youse. In this league was Tim McLeod from RotoRob, Mike Gianella from Baseball Prospectus, Dalton Del Don from Yahoo, Ryan Carey from Mastersball and from Razzball: Rudy, JayWrong, Sky, JFoH, Tehol, Prospect Mike, JB and yours truly. All of these people make me very thankful (that it wasn’t an in-person draft). I was drafting out of the three-hole (no relation to Tehol; that I know of), and I knew after all those preliminary drafts that I was finally going to take guys that I really, really wanted from my 2015 fantasy baseball rankings (clickbait, snitches!). Well, until around the 4th round. Okay, enough hubbub on the tomfoolery, let’s get to it! Anyway, here’s my RCL draft (5×5, roto, mixed league, 12 team, 5 OFs, etc.):
C: Mike Zunino (21)
1B: Jose Abreu (1)
2B: Anthony Rendon (4)
3B: Nolan Arenado (2)
SS: Xander Bogaerts (9)
MI: Devon Travis (22)
CI: Pablo Sandoval (8)
OF: Starling Marte (3)
OF: Yoenis Cespedes (5)
OF: Oswaldo Arcia (12)
OF: Wil Myers (13)
OF: Lorenzo Cain (18)
UTIL: Billy Burns (24)
Bench: Dexter Fowler (25)
P: Gerrit Cole (6)
P: Carlos Carrasco (7)
P: Hector Rondon (10)
P: Chris Archer (11)
P: Koji Uehara (14)
P: Jenrry Mejia (15)
P: Tyler Clippard (16)
P: James Paxton (17)
P: Carlos Martinez (19)
Bench: Jesse Hahn (20), Bobby Parnell (23)
WHEN YOU GOT THE YAMS! WHAT’S THE YAMS?! YOU GOAT-MOUTHED ANTHONY RENDON!
Yeah, it wasn’t my intention to draft Rendon. Not something I set out to do. This draft happened after it was announced he’d miss the first three weeks. But, at a certain point, I mean, humma-humma, interjection, it was pick 46 overall! I couldn’t stop myself from drafting him. I don’t think he’s gonna be totally fine until May, but five months of Rendon in the 4th round? I’ll take it. I think a lot of times people forget how long the season is. May will be here before we know it and Rendon will be just fine. At least my psychologist says if I keep saying the same thing in different ways, it’ll come true. He’s gonna be fine! I feel so good about this pick! So, so good! Ugh, we’ll see.
HE MANIPULATED BILL CLINTON WITH DESIRES, 24/7, 365 DAYS TIMES TWO. YES, YOU ARENADO.
King Kunta aka The Big Mahoof aka Mayor McCheese aka Schmoopy aka Arenado. Finally. On one of my teams. Bring on games in Coors from May 15th through August 15th. Bring them on. Seriously. Right now. As I said earlier, I wanted to get ‘my guys’ no matter what in this draft, and Arenado was one that I didn’t have yet that I wanted at least once. Abreu was another guy that I really wanted this year. Carrasco, Cole, Marte, Bogaerts, Sandoval, Zunino, Yoenis, Zunino, everyone. I. Love. Them. Douchey. One. Word. Sentences. This has to be my greatest triumph. Beyond winning a lifetime supply of Taco Bell. You didn’t know about that? Yeah, they had a contest to write one of their pithy sauce packet slogans and I won. Old news. So, I’m glad to have a new triumph. I’m going to now move my computer three feet from the wall, so I can do a victory lap. Whew! That was awesome!
WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I WAS WALKING? NOW I RUN THE GAME AND GOT THE WHOLE WORLD TALKIN’ BUT I’M NOT DRAFTING ANYONE I LIKE IN THESE LATER ROUNDS.
There was a run of about ten rounds (10th round to 20th) where I didn’t really want to draft anyone. Not hitters, and not really starters either. I took two outfielders in the middle of that ten round run that are okay, but the whole time one thing kept running through my head, “Grey, if you draft a hitter or a starter, you’re gonna drop them in a league this shallow, take another closer.” You can imagine what it was like having that long, uninteresting sentence running through my head. I saw Khris Davis at one point, and I almost grabbed him, then I thought about how I picked him off waivers last year. Lorenzo Cain, for instance. I like him. He’s supposedly hitting third. He could go 10/30. Cain…Sugar! All of that. Yet, I will likely drop him at some point soon. Instead, I took a bunch of closers, going with quantity over quality on relievers. SAGNOF, after all.
I’M MAD (HE MAD), BUT I AIN’T STRESSIN’. TRUE FRIENDS, ONE QUESTION: WHERE WAS YOU WHEN I WAS WALKIN’?
Some of you might remember I said don’t take a bench hitter, unless it’s an upside flyer. Yeah, well, Billy Burns, snitches! I don’t even know if he’s making the team, going to play if he does, or if he can hit above .220. What I do know, Burns can boogie, and I want some of them cheap, sexy steals mambo-jambo. Plus, I knew Sky would’ve drafted Burns and sometimes you just have to draft a guy to annoy a leaguemate. Remember, when life gets too busy and you don’t have time to make meaningful connections with friends, there’s fantasy. And we don’t just play this fantasy thing to beat our friends, we play it to annoy the hell out of them too. I said that last line and then received a slow clap in a high school cafeteria.
