It is Fantasy Time

We had our fantasy baseball draft yesterday. It is always a great afternoon for all of us. As we have had the same league for quite sometime with just a few changes it is a day that we look forward to. This year we had a few folks who have moved or were away so we to facilitate this did a live draft on ESPN. Traditionally we have done a manual draft so this was a difference. i have come to the conclusion I am against live drafts. Not a fan of time limits, and with a time limit we do not have as much time to talk and joke in between picks that everyone makes.

For us half the fun was telling our friend Andy ( isn't there one guy in every league that gets abused the most) that all of his picks are " less than good."

So that is a lesson learned for next year. We do not do the regular ESPN leagues, too many players, but instead go with a league that has just 9 offensive players in the lineup at a time.

I won our league last year, drafting King Felix and Zach Grienke as my fourth and fifth starting pitchers did not hurt. As keepers I chose to keep Longoria, Kemp and Utley but had to release Adrian Gonzales, Jimmy Rollins, Pablo Sandoval, Mariano Rivera among others. So how did the draft go. Our league, to me, looks very balanced. One never knows how these things will work out.

A couple of fellows went with the pitching now strategy, one ended up with Verlander, Grienke and Lester, that will be tough to beat. I tend to think that I am good at identifying pitchers and matchups during the season so I decided to draft pitching a little later. I took Felix again in the first round but then waited a bit. However pre draft I had mapped out several pitchers I thought would be undervalued in the draft that I could pick up late. I did well getting those pitchers for the most part. The danger in that however is these are pitchers I specifically believe will carry me to value from my pitchers, if this does not work it will be prep work that did not work. Of course injuries and a multitude of other factors can change the game. However Tommy Hansen, Ricky Nolasco, Gavin Floyd and Matt Garza all had peripherals that indicate that they can be strong this year. Lets hope so. I took Aroldis Chapman in the 24th round, I am not sure if he will be good this year, but on the off chance he is as good as he " could " be he was worth a shot.

Hopefully this season will go well..we shall see