Rotoman

Rotoman: I’ve read/heard that you should not draft serpentine fashion in keeper leagues. What is the common practice/method of drafting in keeper leagues that are not auctions.

As far as I’m concerned, the serpentine draft order is the most fair to all teams. For those of you who haven’t heard that term, these are also known as windshield wiper drafts, in which teams pick from 1-10 and then 10-1.

The only reason not to pick in serpentine fashion would be if you were trying to give some edge to the teams that pick earlier in each round. In the American Dreams League we establish a reserve draft (after the 276 AL players have been taken in auction) order based on last year’s standings, with fifth place taking the first reserve, then sixth, then seventh, etc, then fourth through first. And the order stays the same for nine rounds.

Why? Because it gives some slight edge to the teams that didn’t finish in the money the previous year.

In a draft to stock teams, however, the edge to the teams that select earliest in each round would be huge. Keeper league, non-keeper league, I can’t think of a reason why you would want not to go serpentine.

The Roto Times Baseball Player Profile

Follow the chronology:

2/24 The Indians give Sabathia more money than any other pitcher ever with one year of big league experience.

3/4 Sabathia sleeps in an awkward position causing a sore back.

3/8 Sabathia works his first real spring training game (he left a b-game after one inning the week before because of back spasms.

3/9 The Indians are concerned that he weighs 300 pounds (he’s listed at 250).

Look at the picture:

This has disaster written all over it.

Major League Baseball News

The link above is to all of today’s AL team notes, but the one I want to write about goes:

Three of the four players battling for the second base job made the trip to Fort Lauderdale. Quilvio Veras and Carlos Baerga split time at second, while Rey Sanchez started at shortstop. Veras went 0-for-2, Baerga had an infield single and Sanchez singled and grounded into a double play. While interim manager Mike Cubbage said it was way too early to name a winner and that these three will keep competing with Jose Offerman for the starting spot, he’s been impressed with Sanchez, who didn’t sign until Feb. 27. “Sanchez got here late, but he’s been very impressive. He came into camp in very good shape and he’s catching up real fast.” Offerman stayed in City of Palms to work defensively with Nomar Garciaparra.

Why does this make me think that Offerman already has the job? Unless he blows it, of course.

Fort Lauderdale is a three hour drive across Alligator Alley. This is the sort of trip that Carl Everett would skip, no matter what the cost to his rep. It really is amazing that the Orioles get anyone to visit them at all, especially since the Expos and Braves moved north from West Palm.

Rotoman:

Thanks for your help

Okay, I’m not really clear on the implications of your strategy. I was quite sure that Ankiel would not be a major league factor last year, but this year I’m not so sure. If you can get him in the reserve round, by all means do it. I won’t guarantee stardom but if he gets his head together he will have a huge impact. I probably wouldn’t pay cash for that possibility, but if you can get it off the books you certainly should.

As for the other guys: Peavey is a worthwhile risk, but he isn’t likely to make a big impact this year.

If Nic Johnson is Nick Johnson, he’s your guy. The more or less everyday DH on the Yankees may not hit for a huge average but he’s likely to hold his job, hit some homers and drive in a decent number of runs.

Ty Howington, Kelly Johnson, Wily Mo Pena, Brandon Phillips, and Miguel Cabrera won’t be factors this year and probably won’t be factors in 2003. But Carlos Zambrano could get some surprising opportunities in Chicago.

Still, Nick’s your guy.

Blogger is upgrading some sort of hardware and I’m locked out of BLOGGER, so I haven’t been able to update the RotoTouts site with a new team profile.

It’s coming soon. I hope.

Hey Rotoman–Advice question. 12 team, NL only, 5×5, $260 cap.

Do you see this similarly, or am I reading to much into the big cat’s return to Montreal?

Well, the addition of Andres Galarraga has to reduce Lee Stevens’ value, because apart from pinch-hitting there is no place else for le Chat Grande to play. How much? Presumably Stevens won’t play against lefties at all, which would cost him 150 of 500 AB, or about 30 percent.

I thought perhaps Stevens was less productive against lefties, which would mean the reduction in playing time might not hurt him as much as it appeared, but while he only hit 20 percent of his homers against lefties, he did drive in 30 percent of his RBI against them.

So, while I wouldn’t say Stevens’ value drops from $16 to $8, I would say it’s now definitely below $14 (more like $10).

CNNSI.com – Baseball – Cubs closer has ‘severe’ shoulder injury – Thursday March 07, 2002 08:08 PM

It doesn’t look like Tom Gordon is going to make it out of the box this year. While it’s a little soon for the official word from the Cubs, the smart money is that Kyle Farnsworth is going to be the team’s closer.

I wouldn’t dismiss the idea that Jeff Fassero, Courtney Duncan and Carlos Zambrano could all end up in one role or another. Farnsworth throws like a closer but the health of his elbow and his major league experiences so far argue against him stepping in and kicking A from the git go.

I usually agree with you but I’m trying to figure out something I saw at RotoTouts.com. Mike Piazza and Roger Cedeno are both valued at $27.

I know Roger is a base stealing giant but Piazza is arguably the best hitting catcher in baseball (maybe I-Rod, if he weren’t coming off injury) and good hitting catchers are so hard to find. In addition, Piazza will actually have a number of studs hitting around him this year to boost his numbers even higher. I can see a 40 HR 120 RBI year ahead for him. I’d bid $30-31 in a MLB universe and $33-34 in a NL only league. Not that I wouldn’t like to have Cedeno too, but after steals and runs, what do you really have?

Piazza’s earnings the last five years: $48, $25, $26, $30, $22.
Cedeno’s earnings the last five years: $4, $2, $39, $16, $36

Clearly, Piazza is the better hitter, especially considering he plays the tougher position. But I think you’d be more wrong making a larger bid on him than you would on Cedeno, for two reasons:

First, Piazza is a catcher, and catchers get hurt. Piazza has been fabulously durable, but all it takes is one bad tipoff or an errant overswing and Piazza could miss weeks and weeks of playing time.

Second, Piazza’s skills are less rare. While his homers represent a little less than one percent of the marginal pool of home runs taken in fantasy leagues, Cedeno’s steals represent nearly two percent of the marginal steals pool. That means, in very rough terms, that one of Cedeno’s steals is worth two Piazza homers. (I should note that in the pricing formulas I use steals are downgraded about 20 percent, because of strategic factors. I’m not always pleased by this downgrading in a valuation sense, but it does help the prices better reflect what prices players go for in the auction.)

Piazza’s impact in RBI and AVG manage to close the gap, but they don’t really overcome it, at least in deep leagues. In a mixed league situation, where fewer players are taken, the fact that Piazza plays catcher really does give him extra value.

But in strict roto terms, in the last three years Piazza has averaged earnings of $26 per year, while Cedeno has averaged earnings of $30.

Izzy healthy?

There isn’t any reason to freak out, but a little elbow stiffness isn’t a good thing for a pitcher with Isringhausen’s history. He was a good pitcher only in the last month of last season. And the Cards have at least two other pitchers (Veres and Kline) who can close games. And Tony La Russa likes unusual usage patterns.

All are good reasons not to pay a premium to make Isringhausen your closer this year.

Amazon.com: buying info: Stats Player Profiles 2002 (Stats Player Profiles 2002)

I don’t think there is any evidence that players (in general at least) have a tendency to be better in the first half or the second half. But this book has all the available pertinent splits and situational stats on all players who had a reasonable amount of playing time.

It can get frustrating, however, because on players who didn’t see much time last year the splits are not complete. You can find much of the info you seek somewhere online, depending on what you’re looking for, at mlb.com, espn.com, sportsline.com, cnnsi.com or foxsports.com (they own STATS).

But the book has most of it in one place and is way more convenient. (Oh, and if you shop from that link up there I get a small cut.)