Fantasy Baseball Today - 03/23 Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Live Mock Draft!

Episode Date: March 23, 2017

Another H2H Categories mock, this time with OBP and quality starts instead of batting average and wins, and one more twist to the roster limits ... One owner took a SP with each of his first four picks. Find out what he did to compensate in the hitting categories ... We of course debate the value of steals, when to reach for them and how your SP approach changes in this format. Plus which players gain or lose value when OBP replaces batting average? ... Email us at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

And we are drafting. We are doing another head-to-head categories mock draft. But I did this for Heath. O-B-P instead of average, quality starts instead of wins. Heath, you must be excited about that. Well, this is a good test for the For the People draft, which we haven't set a date for that, have we? No, we haven't. Go ahead.

Why don't you set a date right now? Because Tuesday night, right, is the podcast league next Wednesday? Should we just do Thursday? We should do Thursday. I agree. Let's just do Thursday next week. 8 p.m. Perfect.

Do not sign up if you can't make it on that date. Winners will be announced on Monday. Yes, we'll announce all the winners for both podcast leagues on Monday, so get excited for that. I've made a rules change, too, I didn't tell you about yet. Can I tell you on the air? You want to tell me right now? Yeah. Go for it.

It's for the people. It's for the people. Right. So we need to get more people involved. No. But we don't want to make it bigger. we're going to leave it as a 14 team league, but we're going to lessen the number of teams controlled by people on the podcast

by having a team creth and a team scam. Love it. Love it. That's good stuff. So we get 12 listeners in. I pretty sure last year was a 16 team league, but we'll discuss that on another podcast. We got a 12-to-head categories mock draft.

OBP instead of batting average, quality starts instead of wins. I'm going to start the clock on the last. the draft in just a second here. We've got 10 listeners. I got kicked out of the draft by Chris Towers. He was mad about, yeah, he was mad about my Americans beating his Puerto Rican team. So he said, Adam, do not draft. You made too many mistakes last time while you were on the air.

It was a good point. So I took myself out. I'm just going to moderate. Chris has the third pick. Heath has the ninth pick. Now, one thing I did in this draft, though, is I made it five starting pitchers and two relief pitchers instead of just seven or eight pitcher spots. And the reason I did that is because I just don't want this entire podcast to be about the, you know, rostering nothing but relief pitchers

and winning three or five pitching categories. We can talk about that tomorrow in our mailbag show. I'd rather just see kind of draft value here. And let's get started and I'll stop talking. Let's get it going here. Ryan, one of our listeners, I'm just going to use first names. Ryan is on the clock with the first pick, 45 seconds on the clock for each pick. And the first thing I want to ask you guys, the top three have been set in stone more or less in our drafts. Trout and then either Betts and then Al Tuvei or Altuvei and Betts. Trout goes off the board number one. Should those top three, and Chris, you have the third pick, so I guess this will be important.

Should those top three be set in stone with some order of Trout, Betts, Alto. I think you can make a case for Aronado. I think you can make a case for Gulch. Have you watched the WBC or I don't can't hit anymore? He looks bad. He looks awful. Let's get him back to course field quickly. But, you know, the combination of power and speed that you get with Betts and Altuve is really what makes them stand out.

I think Paul Goldschman's probably not getting his due in regards to that because the reason Betts and Altuve are in that range is because of the power speed combination and Goldschmidt's right there with both of them. but I have the third pick Betts just went I will be going without Tuvei he's the odds on favorite to win the batting title and give you

what 50 combined home run and stolen bases And Adam Azer has worked his way back into the draft TJ Not happy DJ didn't show up

for pick number two I have a theory that Adam didn't invite anyone named TJ No he didn't invite anyone I am just Bailey TJ and then 10 Adam

I'm emailing TJ right now. TJ, you're probably listening to this podcast. You are late to the draft. I selected mookie bets for you. The one thing about Al-Tuve, I want to bring up, though, he's been hitting third. And last year when Al-Tuve hit third, he didn't steal as many bases. So are you concerned about that? If he hits third all year and runs less because of it, he might be 110 run 110 RBI guy.

Okay. So, no. Also, it was weird. I think his, you know, he probably would have had a better steal numbers. His percentages were down when he batted third, which I think is probably just fluky. I'll look up the exact numbers. What do we got going on in the draft, guys? Normal, normal, normal, trout, bets, Altuve, Aeronado, and Goldschmidt.

I'm curious how far Kershaw is going to fall. Well, Goldschmidt 5 is not necessarily normal. We've been seeing him more like 7 or 8. So he goes ahead of Chris Bryant, who by the way, I think on fantasy pros, Chris Brian is like two or three. So, yeah, I mean, but we have no problem with that, right? I mean, Jim Leland, I guess, would have a problem with that. He thinks Goldschmidt sucks, apparently. Well, Jim Leland would have taken Eric Cosmer.

Yeah. I mean, Eric Cosmer looks like a baseball player. Ethan, I've been saying it all week. If you put Paul Goldschman and Eric Cosmer next to each other. Well, and Puerto Rico wanted no part of Eric Cosmer last night. I mean, they hit him. They hit him. They walked him twice.

You're mad at how pretty he is. All right, let's see what we got here. We got Trout, Betts, Altuve, Aronado, Goldschmidt, Kirshmint, Kershaw, 6, Chris Bryant, 7. Three out of the league, by the way. Five starting pitchers, two relievers. I know I mentioned that. One, D.H., one catcher. First, second, third, base short.

Chris Bryant goes seventh after Kershaw Mani Machado goes eighth Yesterday in a draft I took Machado Oh Heath you're on the clock I guess you're going to take Donaldson or Rizzo Ooh This is tough for me because I like Rizzo a lot But I

I don't see any reason to Not take Donaldson Donaldson is down to number 10 In ADP right now at Fantasy Pros He's down to number 10 at CBS He's down to number 11 at NFBC. I don't understand that. I took Donaldson yesterday, 9th or 10th in our draft.

The big thing for me here is I take Donaldson at 9. I feel fairly confident that Votto is coming back to me next round. And then I've got elite on the corner end field. If I take Rizzo, there's no third basement that's coming back to make me feel good about it. But I'm just one, like, he's behind Bryce Harper now. And I get that Josh Donaldson has the cap injured. Which is fine now, I think. He's back, right?

Yeah, like that, I don't understand. Like, Bryce Harper is riskier than Josh Donaldson. He has more upside, but Josh Donaldson has scored 120 plus runs in two straight years. 35 plus homers. He stole seven last year. He's stolen at least six and three straight. Well, and like, so yesterday, I'll just recap what's going on here after Heath's, took Donaldson, it was Rizzo, then Bryce Harper, and Shane, who has the 12th overall pick.

Shane took Charlie Blackman, and he's on the clock with the first pick of round two. Yesterday, I took Machado over Donaldson in a Roto League. And then in the second round, I could have taken Correa. But obviously, like Heath was saying, you're not getting an elite third baseman in the second round. You have to wait until the next group of third baseman, which is kind of a while, unless you're taking Carpenter and playing him at third. So that was kind of interesting. Like, I could have gone Donaldson, Correa.

Instead, I went Machado and Scherzer. I'm not sure I regret it. I had been saying that I was moving Machado ahead of Donaldson in my mind, just because of the calf injuries because he is the oldest one of those elite hitters because he had calf injuries last year. But it's something to think about. You might be able to get Seeger or Correa in the second round if you go with Donaldson instead of Manny Machado.

All right, Miguel Cabrera is the first pick of round two. And Heath's plan has already been foiled. Yep. Joey Votto. Well, why? Okay, so Joey Vado goes 14th overall. Trey Turner, 15th overall, and Heath, you're on the clock. Why not take Eben Encarnacion?

I don't understand why Incarnation doesn't get the respect of Cabrera and Votto. I think there's a little bit of concern about age. There's a little bit of concern about... It's the same age. He's the same age as Cabrera, and I think... a year and a half older than Vada? Him not being in the Rogers Center. Maybe the second concern.

He won't be in quite as good of offense. I wouldn't expect him to have quite as many RBI opportunities. All right. I'm going to take Carl's Korea. He took Correa. It could be the best offense in the AL. I know. I don't get it.

He hit over 40 home runs. I think he finished better than, I'll tell you right now. In this head-to-head categories format, I'll give you the top first baseman from last year. year. And year after year, Encarnacion is a top five first baseman, which is very impressive at that position. You know, I am looking back already at my first pick. I made a mistake. Oh, by taking Altuve? Yeah. I should have taken Goldschmidt. Here were the top first baseman last year in this head-to-head categories format. Goldschmidt,

who was the number eight overall player. And then Miguel Cabrera, Joey Vado, Edwin Encarnacion were 15th, 16th, and 17. They were basically the same. And Daniel, Daniel, Murphy, too, at 19, and then Will Myers was actually 20. Let's go back to the draft here. After Correa, we've got Bumgarner off the board before Scherzer and Corey Seeger. Chris, you'll be up in a few picks. So you took Al-Tube third overall. What was your mistake?

Well, it's an on-base percentage, Leigham. I kind of hadn't considered that. Goldschmidt is very likely to have a higher-on-base percentage than Al-Tuve. Alt-Uve did start walking more. I think he almost doubled his walk rate last season. season, but he still only had a $3.96 on base percentage despite winning a batting title. So that's the concern is that if he's more of a 310 batting average guy, which is very much within the realm of possibility, you're probably looking at a 360 batting on base percentage.

Okay. Interesting. Max Scherzer goes. And Scher looks like right now Scherzer is slated to pitch the third game of the season for the Nationals. Strasbourg is going to pitch their first game. We have so far in the second round Cabrera, Vado, Trey Turner. Trey Turner, that would be 15th overall. Then Karea, Bumgarner, Seeger, Scherzer, and Edwin and Carnacione. That's okay. What about Trey Turner, guys?

Is that too early for him, 15th overall? I know that we're giving him a little bit of a boost because he's going to be shortstop eligible. I don't expect him to be as good as Carlos Correa or Corey Seeker. So I can't see taking him ahead of those two. Okay. I mean, it's possible that he is, but I don't think it's the most likely outcome. I don't know that he necessarily has more upside than those two if everything goes right for all three players.

It's just, it's about those stolen bases. Like if he can be a 60 steel guy, that can cover up for a lot of flaws. And I know the Babbip was inflated last season, I think it was 381. but he was a 370 Babbup guy in the minor. So he's probably like a 350 or 360 Babbib true talent player. But on base percentage league here, does that downgrade Trey Turner? I think it does a little bit. It downgrades a guy like Altuvae a little bit.

Correa and Seeger both walk a decent amount, so I think it doesn't downgrade them, and it could be enough to push them. But if Turner can steal 50 or 60 bases, that that goes a long way for making up for it, especially if he's a 300 batting average guy. All right, we are on to the ninth pick of round two. Actually, let me just tell you all what happened.

We had an auto pick of Edwin-Encarnacion, and Frank, who made the pick, he said, no, no. Are we going to have another auto pick? Chris Sale is the next auto pick. Man, come on, guys. You got to step up your game here. So Frank said, no, he didn't want him. And so I backed out the pick.

and instead of Encarnacio, he took Freddie Freeman with the 20th overall pick. Are your head spinning right now? Yeah, I don't want to take Freddie Freeman in the third round, so I'm not excited about taking him in the second. Folks like Freddie Freeman. Go get you Edwin and Carnacion now, Chris, and you don't have to feel bad about passing on Goulchmen. Yeah, that's probably the way I need to go. I mean, the reason I feel bad about Goltzman is not on base percentage. Encarnacion, not a huge on base guy, but yeah.

All right, so Chris just took Al-Tuvé and Encarnaciel with his first. two picks. That puts TJ on the clock, and TJ, who has a funny team name that I can't say because it's inappropriate, has not gotten back to me. Why can't you say it? You think? No. No. I mean, he's a basketball player. Yeah, but it's inappropriate. So I think I'm going to be drafting for TJ. It looks like I now have the second overall pick, and I took bets in the first round. Wow. Yeah. Funny how that works out, huh?

Yeah, thank you, Chris. I'm sorry, your plan was foiled. I'm going to take Daniel Murphy here. and probably grab a... I was going to say I was going to grab a pitcher with my next pick, but I'm looking at A.J. Pollock, he's in my queue. I need some steel. Well, no, I have bets. So, um, bets and Daniel Murphy for me to start things off.

We've got the Mike Trout owner, Ryan, with the next two picks here. Is A.J. Pollock the only player in your queue? Well, yeah, but that's because I wasn't expecting to draft. But let's see some other guys I'd consider here early in the third round. I have bets. And Chris, you can talk this out, too. I have Betz and I have Murphy. You have Encarnaciona and Altuve.

So Pollack would make sense for you. You don't have an outfielder. And could use... I mean, we could always use steals, right? Even though we both have a steals guy in the first round. Francisco Lindorra goes with the last pick of round two. We got Dozier and Canoe on the board. We got Springer, who has three steals this spring, by the way.

Interesting. Braun, Cruz, Darling Marte. Ooh. See, if I take Marte here, and I get Betts and Marte with my two outfielers, I'm done. I don't need an outfielder for a while, and I'm good with steals. Yeah, that's not a bad outcome there. But Marte is probably much worse than an OBP league, right? Because he doesn't walk.

Yeah, he actually, I want to say he's probably a better OBP guy than his walk rate would lead you to believe, because he's routinely among the league leaders in hip-pe. pitch. I do think we're getting just a little bit, 2016, Scott White, with the OB-Port P portion of this league. It's still just one category. Sure. But what I was saying earlier in talking about Goldschmidt versus Betts and Al-Tube is he's a power speed guy as well. And he should have a significant edge in on base. Guess who's back, everybody? T.J. joins the draft. I'm sitting there getting ready to make a pick. Nobody wants me in this draft. He took no assistance. Underguard.

Oh, you can draft for Frank. He's been autoed. Or Portella. Yeah, I don't know. We'll get everybody a chance. All right, so let's recap the last three picks. After I took Daniel Murphy, how about this turn from Ryan, who has Mike Trout with the first pick? He went Francisco Indoor and Robinson Canoe.

Some really good outfielders out there, some really good starting pitchers. And I also am going to make a comment about starting pitchers. Chris just took George Springer. Over A.J. Pollock. That put me in a really tough situation. I have Springer ranked ahead of Pollock. And Springer actually started walking a ton last season, especially once he got moved into the leadoff spot.

Finished with a career high, 80 walks last season. I know he's going to say, but unbased percentage is still going to matter, and this is a situation where I think Springer is more valuable in this format as a result. All right. I want to be another team to pick for, Adam. Make a pick. Okay, let's restart the clock here on Freaky Ziki's team.

Who does Freaky have on his team? He's got Noon Aeronado and Chris Sale, so let's just give me Jay Pollock. It's something I was going to say. I thought I had the second overall pick, and I took bets, and then I took Daniel Murphy in a points league, in a head-to-head points league with that third pick, I probably would have taken Corey Kluber. I think I would have gone pitcher there. It turns out that T.J. joined the draft and took Noah's Cinderguard. And I think in a Categories league, though, when you're starting to see at this point,

Marte, Pollock come off the board. Could be more steals guys that are off the board by the time you make your next pick in the fourth round. I'm going to skip the pitcher here, wait it out until the fourth of the fifth round to grab a, you know, a pretty good starting pitcher is going to be there. Could be a de Grom, could be Darvish, could be. could be Strasbourg, whatever. And I'm going to focus more on getting the hitting categories, getting the steals, getting the on-base percentage, something like that.

That's a little more scarce. I feel like you guys agree with that? Yeah, yeah. I will probably take a pitcher in the fourth round just because of where I'm positioned, but I can even see waiting until the fifth in this format. I am really, like I like the fact that I started off with Donaldson and Korea, but that kind of leaves me in a pretty big hole, as far as stolen bases go.

All right, yeah, and Marte is off the board. That was what I was hoping was going to save me. The third round is this. Canoe, Cindergarde, Springer, A.J. Pollack, Bogarts, who, you know, would not be surprised if he stole 20 bases. He says he wants to steal 20 bases this year. He's got speed. Corey Klobber, Starling Marte.

Heath is actually on deck, and Mike is picking now. Mike has Mani Machado and Madison Bumgarner. So let's see what Mike does. He takes Brian Dozier. So this is another owner that does not have steals. Heath is on the clock with Donaldson and Correa. You've got Braun on the board. He can steal some bags.

You got Nelson Cruz, Stanton, Cespitus. I mean, I know you're not high on him. You kind of hate him, but Jonathan V.R. wouldn't be a bad pick here. Yeah, I've not taken John. He walks a ton. But he's already got a third base of banana short stuff. up. Okay.

I'm, you know, I just said that I wasn't going to take a pitcher until the fourth round, but after that run on everybody in my queue, I'm going to take Jake Areetta. Okay. Why, just curious, why Areeta over Lester or Quedo? I don't believe that Arenda just lost his ability to throw strikes in the second half last year. I believe he has more upside than those two, and I think if you look at the peripherals, it looks like Lester.

All of the Cubs pitchers have a little bit of the club's pitchers have a little bit of the second half last year. little bit of regression coming. I feel like Lester has as much as anybody. Heath, how do you feel about the fact that you don't have an outfielder yet? This is so weird. I was getting ready to take Brian Dozier, too, so I wasn't going to have an outfielder here. This is not my typical strategy, but it's just the way, I guess it's another example of I don't have a set strategy going into the draft, and in this particular instance, the outfielers are going slightly earlier than I think they should. I would guess that's going to change very quickly. All right, the next two picks after Arelletta were

you, Darvish and Matt Carpenter? and now Ryan Braun with the last pick of round three. Through three rounds, Kershaw, Bumgarner, Scherzer, Sale, Kluber. That's five plus Arelletta, Cindergarde, and Darvish. Eight pitchers are off the board. And now Lester is the first pick of round four. Nine pitchers are off the board. Chris does not have one of them, which is not a surprise.

By the way, everybody's in the draft room. Everybody's drafting, I believe, so that's good. John Carlos Stanton comes off the board. This is where we see that group of outfielders, the Braun, Stanton. I just, I guys don't really understand why Nelson Cruz goes after Braun and Stanton. I would take him ahead of them. Stage isn't. That's really all of this.

Well, what would you do? It's the risk of drafting a 37-year-old. Jonathan V.R. goes, and now Heath is on the clock with Donaldson, Correa, and Areeta. Is there a Steels guy out there right now? No, I'm not going to take one right now. There's some steals guys that I will take later in the draft. That's something I'm going to have to just dedicate a couple of roster spots to. I don't really love, but it's the way this draft is gone.

I do have Braun and Stanton ahead of Nelson Cruz, but I'm very happy to take him here in the fourth round. Okay. So you guys think those three are all pretty similar? Braun Cruz, Stanton? Yes, and it is ageism, because if you just look at what they've done the last two years, they're not very similar and else the Cruz is much better than the other two. Yeah.

Right. Yeah, I have Cesspides and McCutcheon right around that tier. You got to be worried about McCutcheon. Like, he looks terrible. I don't know. He's had a couple of good games. No. He hits singles.

He would have been a better MVP choice than Marcus Stroman. No, he wouldn't have. I'm not that. I'm not that worried about it. I just, I still don't buy that he's just done at 30. And if you're really that worried about Andrew McCutcheon after this eight-game sample size, then you better be moving Eric Cosmer way up your rankings. You could have taken Gregory – no.

You could have taken Gregory Polanco, by the way. I know that would have seemed a little early in round four. You took Cruz. But I think now the Cruz is off the board. There's no JD Martinez now. There's no Ian Desmond. Cespitus is a logical next outfielder to go. By the way, the next few picks have been Jose Obrayu, pretty early for him.

Jacob de Grom and Johnny Quedo. Polanco is going to go earlier in this roto or categories format. Yeah, I've got cargo as my number one outfield right now. But you need steals. So wouldn't you go away from your rankings to get the category? I'm not going to start reaching for steals yet. All right. Now, let's talk about...

Do you have the numbers available showing how much better Polanco was than McCutcheon last year? I can. Yeah. We've discussed this. Basically, Gregory Polanco's career year was a little bit better than Andrew McCutcheon's terrible year. And I get that Polanco's on the upswain and showed the breakout in the first half. Yeah, I'm just, I'm not convinced that Polanco is just already better than McCutche. That's fine.

I won't argue it. I think people know where we stand on that. Jacob de Grom, Johnny Quato, Stephen Strasper, people taking their starting pitchers. What do you think, Keith, Chris is on the clock, he's on deck. Let me ask you, what do you think of Jose Abraeu? And then I've got some advice for people in this format that it's something I did yesterday that you should do today. Are you going to make your pick? Oh, this is me?

Crap. Yeah, four seconds. All right then. What do you think of Jose Abraeu going in the middle of the fourth round? I think it's way too early. Not necessarily because, like, there's four first basemen there between Abraeu, Will Myers, Chris Davis, Carlos Santiana. And I think you could craft an intelligent argument that says Abrae is going to be the best of them. It's not what I believe, but I just don't know why in the fourth round you would take a Brayu

when Will Myers, Chris Davis, and Carlos Santana are going to be available later in the draft. I don't think you can craft an intelligent argument that says he's going to be a lot better than all three of them. Okay. Sorry, I'm trying to pick here. I'm really in a tough spot. You know what? Forget it. I'm taking Polanco. Yeah, so this gives Freaky Ziki, Aronado, Pollack, Polanco. and Chris Sale.

Filling up that outfield early. I'm going to make my pick, but we do have to talk about a very interesting strategy that's developing with one of our pickers. Okay. Dorn's Dingerers. Who? Has zero hitters. Ooh. He has Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, Corey Klover, and Johnny Quoito.

God, I hate this strategy. I don't hate it. I don't. I've been thinking about doing a mock draft like that just to see what happens. like just kind of inverting my starting pitch, my pitching and hitting strategies. Any time you can go against everything that Chris Towers believes in, I'm kind of for it. Yeah, it's not a bad bet. Trevor's story.

So Chris took story in the fourth round. Interesting. I think that's a perfectly fine spot for him to go. I think he's being overdrafted overall, but that's because I think he's in the 30s. He's 35 overall. I think 45 where I took him is perfectly fine, 46. Well, I would hope that you think it's fine. You could have taken Gene Seguera.

Would you've taken Segar if you didn't have Al Tuve and Springer? We don't know how many... Springer has three steals in the spring. I think it's pretty encouraging. We don't know how many steals he's going to get. But if you needed steals, would you have taken Segara over Story? No. I just...

I still... I don't know. I think Gene Seguer is probably more of like a 280, 12 home. former guy, and that just, that feels like a reach for just okay stolen base potential. This is the strategy that I want people to do in this type of league as we have after story, we have Carlos Gonzalez and Justin Verlander to finish round four, and round five begins with Kyle Seeger and Gary Sanchez. First catcher off the board, right?

Oh, yeah. Wow, how about that? Oh, I got to put, yeah, I think Posey and Lou Croyd need to go right now. Oh, you took McCutcheon. You took McCutcheon over Cespitis? Is Cestepidus still available? I have him one spot ahead of Cespitas, so yeah. I think I have him one spot ahead of Cespitas, too.

Well, what about in a batting average league? Because I can see McCutcheon being better in an OBP League, which this is. Would you have Cesspitus over McCutcheon in a batting average league? I have McCutcheon ranked ahead of Cespitas in both. Cespitas doesn't exactly have a super long track record. of hitting for batting average. He's been in the 280 range over the last couple years. I guess it was more that McCutcheon is probably more valuable in OVP than McCutcheon is in batting average, that this would be a stronger format for him with his walks potential.

Yes. I'm not sure it's a stronger format. I think it's a strong format, but I don't buy that McCutcheon's lost his ability to hit for batting average either. He was a consistent 300 hitter for nearly a decade. So what I was going to say was this. When you get to the point of like round four, if you've missed out on your steals guys, if the core of your team is like a pitcher and two hitters and they just don't steal bases,

you need to start putting guys in your queue. You need to put Gene Cigar in your queue. You need to put D. Gordon in your queue. You need to put Will Myers in your queue. You need to put, let's see, Billy Hamilton in your queue. You need to put Jose Ramirez in your queue, even though you're not going to take him for,

a little while. And you can't let this group run out, or you're just going to be, especially in a league with shallower rosters where a guy like Gerard Dyson, if he steals a bunch of bases, but doesn't give you anything else, that's okay in a five out of the league. In a three out of the league, it's a little bit more dicey. Dee Gordon and Will Myers were, by the way, the last two picks. So so far, round five is Seeger, Gary Sanchez, Andrew McCutcheon to Chris, Buster Posey to the team I've inherited.

Chris Archer, Will Myers, and D. Gordon. Chris, I'm going to let Heath think about his next pick. He's on deck. I don't know how I feel about Kyle Seeger this year. I've always liked Kyle Seeger as like a seventh or eighth round pick because he's always, he's the same hitter every year. And he's very consistent. Seeing him go in the fifth round feels a little early to me.

What do you think about that with Seeger? Yeah, it depends on how much you buy his improvements from last year. he did take a step forward. He was actually just like a model of consistency every year before last year, but he would cut his strikeout rate. You know, the batting average was 278, which is a career high. In the prime of his career, I think you can expect him to sustain some of that improvement. And if he's a 30 homer guy with 100 RBI and 90 runs, yeah, he's probably worth taking there.

It's just, it is an outlier for his career. It's just not a big enough one that I'm skeptical of it, especially because he got really unlucky early in the season, and I think from May on was one of the best hitters in baseball. Well, okay. But I want to see, so the owner that took him was Ryan. I want to see he has the first overall picks, so he had the first pick around five.

He's not drafting again for 24 more picks. By the way, the catchers all come off the board, those top three catchers all off the board in round five. Sanchez 1, Posey, 2, and Luke Roy 3. I'll catch everybody up on round 5. I want to see which third baseman are available for Ryan. I imagine Bregman's going to get drafted before that. I imagine Beltray probably going to get drafted before that.

One of the best players on the board right now. First, we still have Gene Sugura and Rugnett-Odor. And we have good second baseman. We have Hanley Ramirez and Carlos Santana. I might be a little early for them. But we do have Beltrae and Bregman. And shortstop, Seguera is clearly the best. By the way, did it let Ms. Diaz go before?

Yeah, he did. He went before Gene Seguer. Now Gene Segarra is off the board. All right, let's talk about round five. And you can give me your thoughts. Round five was Seeger, Sanchez, McCutcheon, Posey, Archer, Myers, D. Gordon, Christian Yelich, Chris Davis with a C. C.Ris Davis, the Heath.

Jonathan Lucroy, Aledmus Diaz and Cole Hamels. Kind of an interesting round. Diaz is probably the one that stands out to me. I would guess we all have him in the 60-ish range, like late 60s though. I think I'm actually the low guy on, especially in this format.

I think he'll be better in points, and I believe I have him near 80, which is still like 40 spots higher than his ADP. Yeah. Yeah, so that's one where we all really like Aladmus Diaz at the value you can. typically get him, but this was probably a little bit of a reach. Now, I want to look at the team that drafted D. Gordon.

Because if you draft D. Gordon, you probably shouldn't have... If you draft him in the... What was that, the fifth round? Well, you guys tell me. So he's got... He had Chris Bryant, Corey Seeger. It's a great start. Starling Marte and Jacob de Grom.

And then Seth took D. Gordon. Did he need to take a Steele's... Is D. Gordon just a Steel Specialist, or is he going to have just like a really good year and be fine there? I think he definitely has the potential to have a very good year. Not, what, 3.30 like he hit in 2015, but I don't buy that he's a 260-ish hitter either. I think he probably settles in as a 290 guy. But the LBP's not going to be. The LBP's not going to be great for Gordon, right?

No. I would expect he's going to score a bunch of runs, too. My point is... Yeah, that was the thing is last year he actually scored runs at about a hundred run clip. The Marlins should have a good. good enough lineup. And that was with him having a bad year. My point is, though, you already have Starling Marte.

Do you take D. Gordon there? Yeah, it was a reach, I think. Okay. I mean, he's in, he doesn't have to worry about steals again in the rest of the draft. That's true. That's a nice little luxury. Okay, now look, round six is interesting because Billy Hamilton's off the board to Heath Cummings, but round six, Gene Seguerah, David Price.

Okay. Kenley Jansen, first closer off. the board. And Heath Cummings took Billy Hamilton, then Carlos Martinez, Kyle Hendrix, and Rugnett Odor. That's a nice value. That's a good door in the fourth round a couple days ago. He goes in the middle of the six.

He deserves to fall on an OBP League. That's true. He'll only have about 15 to 20 more walks than me this season. Yo, an assessment. Finally he went. Geez. Yeah, great pick there in round six. I think I'm on the clock here.

Chris, or Heath, why don't you talk about why you took Billy Hamilton in this spot in round six? Well, because my other four hitters are Chris Davis, Josh Donaldson, Carlos Correa, and Nelson Cruz. I have plenty of dongs there. I was just completely devoid of steals. I don't necessarily like Hamilton quite that early, especially over Jose Batista or Adam Jones. But if you're going to do it, this is the type of team you do it on. Can I give you another reason why? Why? Because I was going to take him if you hadn't.

Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. You get them in most of our drafts. I've taken Billy Hamilton in most of our drafts, yeah. It is really freeing to be here in these middle-round picks and to not need steals. Like the team I just drafted for, A.J. Pollock and Gregory Polanco, I don't need steals. I took Carlos Carrasco as a second pitcher to pair with Chris Sale. And I don't know how many great hit. Like, Cespitas was a really good value there.

I don't know how many great hitters we have on the board right now. Oh, Alex Bregman. Man, maybe it should take a him. Now, I already Veronado. Bregman, Trumbo, Frasier, Kinsler, Adam Jones, Hanley, Jose Bautista, and then the injured guys, J.D. Martinez. Like, we've kind of reached a drop-off and hitter. Not everybody, but generally speaking. So pitchers, great value of pitchers right now into round six.

First of all, almost all of the closers are on the board. Secondly, we have Granky, we have Tanaka, we have Duffy, Garrett Cole, Kentana. Chris, you still worried about Danny Duffy? I've never said I'm worried. I said I'm monitoring. Okay. You have downgraded him.

No. Oh, okay. By the way, the owner who took Kyle Seeger with the first pick of round five could have taken Alex Bregman if he wanted to. He just took J.D. Martinez. Let's recap round six. That was the last pick of round six. Round six was

Segura, Price Kenley Jansen Billy Hamilton Carlos Martinez Opening day starter for the Cardinals Kyle Hendrix Rognette O'Dore Yohanna Cespitus

Carlos Carrasco Adrian Beltrade of Chris Rick Porcelo and J.D. Martinez Scott White would not be happy about that J.D. Martinez pick. Why?

I think it's fine there. I think that's enough of a downgrade. I had him as the 40th overall player in this format before the injury. There's no guarantee the injury is going to keep him out to start the season yet. So I think three-round downgrade's fine. First pick of round seven is a role this Chapman. Now, how are you going to approach closer in a league like this? You need five

starting pitchers and two relievers. Well, with the way that you have artificially downgraded all closers, I am going to wait until probably five or six or six or six. seven, maybe eight of them have been taken, and then I'm going to take two of them. I would guess with my ninth and tenth round picks. Okay. And we have Kyle Schwerber off the board. Chris takes Jose Baltista. I don't know.

My offense is hilariously stacked, which makes sense. I haven't picked a pitcher yet, but it's pretty ridiculous. How do you guys feel about Zach Granky now? Pretty much okay. I think he's going for enough of a discount based on last year's struggles. I am. And his spring struggles? Yeah, I'm pretty much okay with where he's going.

Okay. I'm going to take Hanley Ramirez for this team. He needs a first baseman. There are only two first baseman left that I feel comfortable with as my starter, and that would be Hanley Ramirez and Carlos Santana. If I didn't take Hanley there with the fourth pick of round seven, there's no guarantee that I get Hanley or Santana in round eight. So I think the seventh round feels a little early to me for Hanley Ramirez.

I think Chris probably disagrees. I disagree. Yeah, I think it's too early. Yeah, but you know what? You don't want to be left out completely at the position. I don't want Hosmer or Pujols or Napoli or... Ooh, Greg Bird. Greg Bird, two homers yesterday, guys. What do you think?

I wrote about him. It's weird because it's such an outlier from his minor league career, the power that he's shown both this spring and in his first stint with the Yankees. but he played in pretty much bad power environments every single season in his minor leagues. I was actually reading that on fan graphs today. And he's got a swing and an approach at the plate that's tailor-made for Yankee Stadium. He hits a ton of fly balls, even going back to the minors. He's always been someone who hits about twice as many fly balls as ground balls.

And he's a pretty heavy pull hitter as well. Okay. Yeah, Greg Bird. I mean, it's exciting just at least to know that he's healthy. Yes. I think he's probably moved up to, what, the 12th round range? Is that where he went yesterday? That was in the Roto League that we did?

Yeah. I mean, is he going to be better than Eric Hosmer? Is Greg Bird going to be better than Hosmer? You know, I was looking at Samarik Hosmer numbers yesterday. He's one of the guys that really needs to buy into this swing for the, for the, for the sky approach, because he hits the ball hard. There's no question that when he makes contact,

he is one of the best hitters in baseball. It's just he hits the ball really hard right into the ground, right at infielders who are waiting for it. And he's got a 50 plus percent ground ball rate. If he could just get the fly ball rate to 40 percent, Eric Hosmer could absolutely be a star. And I think Hosmer can be a valuable fantasy player.

I'll recap round seven in a bit. If he just goes back to what he's been in the past, like last year was the home run year for him, right? Hosmer hit 25, a career high. But if he's a 300 hitter with 18 home runs and you get him in like the 14th round, he's going to help your batting average so much. He'll drive in some runs. You know, he could drive in 90 runs.

Like look what he, look what Hosmer did in 2015. He batted 297 with 18 home runs and 93 RBI's seven steals. And he actually did just find. It wasn't a much better Royals line. Than this year? Yes. But still, I mean... I don't know why.

Alex Gordon was better. They had been Zobrhus. Well, they had Zobras for like a month and a half. Let me get back. Let's get back to the draft. We don't want to veer off into that. Lorenzo Cain had a career year. All right, round seven is in the books.

A Rollis Chapman, Kyle Schwerber, Jose Baltista, Hanley Ramirez, Alex Bregman, Anthony Rendon. Mark Trumbo. I like Trumbo in round seven. What do you guys think? Oh, yeah. I could not figure out why he was still there, and I was getting ready to take him. I think he probably should have gone around earlier.

Garrett Cole. Evan Gaddis to Heath to play catcher. Zach Britton, Masahiro Tanaka, Jose Kentana. Ian Kinsler is the first pick of round eight. How about the second pick of round eight, James Paxton? And is Granky still? James Paxton going ahead of Granky, Head of Kipel.

I was going to take Paxton if he made it back to me. A head of Granky? Yeah, probably. Wow, he takes Salazar. So Granky's still on the board. Interesting. No, there's some good starting pitcher options left. And with Trumbo gone,

we are, we still have Chris Davis on the board with a K. We have Matt Kamp, we have Adam Jones. Yeah, a lot of Ks. We still have some pop Sino Got Michael Franco You have these three third base Oh Todd Frazier

Still there Evan Longoria So we still have some home run power As we are in round eight Round eight looks like this so far Kinsler Paxton Carlos Santana Danny Salazar

And here is Andrew Benintendi Off the board with a fifth pick of round eight 89th overall Three outfielder league OBP League What do you think about Ben and Tendi in this category's league in Route 8?

I think he will probably walk a decent amount and hit for a high batting average. I think he's... This is probably not his best format, though. I think if he plays to my expectations, he's going to be equally great in pretty much every possible format. I love his plate discipline. I think he's going to hit for a high batting average. I think he could be very valuable in both on base percentage and batting average formats. All right.

The next pick was Zach Granky, by the way. And here's the team, Dorn's Dinger, the team that drafted all of those pitchers. So let's take a look at what Dorn's Dinger's is going to do. He has three hitters. Now he has four. Will Myers, Rudnett-Odor, Anthony Rendon. Not bad. Chris Davis with a K is his first outfielder.

His pitchers were Kirshaw, Scher, Kluber, and Quato. Interesting. So going with starting pitchers, with your first four picks, Kershaw, Scher, Quato, Kluber. or Kluber Quedo, whatever. And your first four hitters are Will Myers, Rugnett-Odor, Anthony Rendon, and Chris Davis. There's some power speed there for sure. What do you think?

Yeah, there's a lot of risk in his team, in his hitters, at least. You know, there's... I don't think it's a particularly good chance, but there is a chance that Chris Davis's plate discipline just completely fails him and he falls off a cliff. There's a lesser chance of that, with Rognetto Dore. There's a chance of that with Will Myers.

It's certainly not a safe group of offensive players. And this is why I don't like going pitcher-heavy, is that pitchers carry an inherent amount of risk, and then you have to start doubling down on that risk with risky hitters. On the flip side, there is ginormous upside potential with his squad. There's really no doubt he should have the best pitching in the league. and then if Odor just improves a little bit, like most people would guess that he might.

Chris Davis is Chris Davis. He's got the power speed covered. Right, that's the thing. I think he picked smart hitters, right? So again, he picked Will Myers, Rognette Odor, Chris Davis with a K, and who's the other one? I'm sorry, Anthony Rendon. So he's got three guys who will give him some power and some speed.

and Chris Davis with a K who could hit 40 home runs. Well, you've got to talk about Chris Tower's recent pick. Chris Tower's recent pick was what? Danny Duffy? Danny Duffy. First pitcher? Yeah, that's my first pitcher. I took him at 94 overall.

I think that's perfectly fine. He's the ace of your staff. So far, yeah. He's a relief pitcher also. Yeah, that doesn't really help you so much in a category of league. Sure it does. No, it doesn't. Only if you want to...

It's a head-to-head categories league. I'm fine punting saves. All right. Well, then that's not a bad idea. You're on the clock again, by the way. We've said it a bunch of times. I think that's a perfectly fine strategy. Let's recap round eight.

Heath, you can guess who I'm going to take now. That's of course. Hold on, guys. Kinsler, Paxton, Carlos Santana, Danny Salazar, Andrew Benintendi, Granky, Chris Davis, with a K, Matt Kemp. Dallas Kikel to me, Danny Duffy to Chris, Michael Brantley, Todd Frazier. Michael Brantley and Todd Frazier are the last two picks of round eight.

What do you think of Michael Brantley-95 overall? We're getting too excited about Michael Brantley. Are we? He's going up two rounds every draft. Yeah. Would you have taken – I think Adam Jones, you know, you could take him ahead. I think I would have taken Jones. I would have taken Upton.

I would have taken Cain. I would have taken Herrera. All right. Would you take in Jose Ramirez? No. All right. I'm about to make a big time pick here that deserves to be talked about, so let's pay attention to me. The first three picks of round nine are Kenta Maida, Wade Davis, and Chris's second pick, Lance McCullors.

I guess when you see Wade Davis got to be like, you got to start paying attention to the closers. But here we go. I'm on the clock with this team. Where's this stupid team? This would be Buster Posey, Hanley Ramirez, Nolan Aronado, A.J. Pollack,

Gregory Polanco, Chris Sale, Carlos Carrasco, and Dallas Keikle. I need a shortstop. It's Jose Paraza time. Wow. Ninth round,

fourth pick, 100th overall, Jose Paraza. You know something I've thought about is just like taking Paraza and Billy Hamilton and not working.

worrying about stolen bases at all? Yeah. Well, look, I mean... Probably not worried about on-based percentage at all either. I bet you. You know what? This will be a good test, because this is exactly what happened to me

the last time we did this head-to-head categories mock on the air. I was sitting there in like round nine, I think. Maybe round eight, maybe round nine, thinking, do I take Eduardo Nunez or Jose Paraza now? I didn't take either of them because it felt like a reach, and they were both gone by the time we got to my next pick. So I'm going to guess Eduardo Nunez comes off the board by the time I'm up again, which would be, I don't know, like 18 picks, 17 picks or so from when I just selected Paraza.

Malanson off the board. Stephen Piscotti off the board. We don't talk much about Stephen Piscotti. What do you expect from him? This is the pitching heavy team just took Stephen Piscotti. He goes 100 second overall. I don't know why we don't talk more about Stephen Piscotti. I guess it's just because he's so...

He's just solid. Yeah, I think that's what, there's a little bit of boringness to him. Like, last year he just kind of had a perfectly decent season across the board. And he doesn't excel in any one area. He's still just got 900 career plate appearances. So I don't think there's any reason to think we've seen everything he's got. And for a majority, for a majority of his minor league career, he was a guy that struck out 10, 11, 12% of the time.

If we get that type of improved plate appearance, plate appearance? No, discipline. I don't know that he couldn't turn in like a Michael Brantley type season. Well, the stolen bases will never be there. Probably not. So Piscotti, I look at him and with the potential for an improved strikeout rate, I think he could be like post-peak, peak Adrian Beltray,

if that makes sense, like the Red Sox Rangers years. Low strikeout rate, decent, above average power, good run production in a strong lineup. So that's his upside, I think. We're having a closer run here. We've missed a lot of picks, so let me recap what's gone on as we are into round 10. Here's round nine of this head-to-head categories league. It's Kenta Maeda, Wade Davis, Lance McCullors, Jose Paraza, Mark Malanson, Stephen Piscotti, Stephen Mats, Jay Reese Familia, Craig Kimbril to Heath.

Heath said he's going to try to take two So you're on deck, Heath He might try to take another one here Adam Jones He's just His on base percentage is so bad But it's about time to take him 106th overall

Sen Juan O and Evan Longoria Now we go to round 10 Edwin Diaz Ken Giles Close a run Aaron Sanchez is the next pick 111th overall And here comes Heath

Yeah when I took Kimbril I thought man, there's so many closers left, I might not take two here. But now there's really only two or three left in this tier that I want to get one from. And so I'm going to go ahead and take Roberto Osuna. What, instead of Calvin Herrera? Yeah, I've got Osuna ranked higher. Oh, okay.

I just didn't want, you know, I thought that, I hope that wasn't like Scott White bullying you. He wears blue. Not taking him. He wears blue. All right. Listen, Scott and I worked out our differences yesterday after the podcast. I had to show him the Fantasy Pros rankings where he was higher on all the Braves than the industry consensus. Is it true?

Yes. Except for he's lower on Inder and Sierra. Okay. Calvin Herrera off the board. I'm higher on the three main Marlins than the industry consensus, I think. I think I'm going to move DeGordon down a little bit. I really don't think I'm higher on the Yankee. except for Dini.

You were just saying that Greg Byrd was going to be better than Eric Cosmer. I asked if Greg Byrd was going to be better than Eric Cosmer. I think that's perfectly reasonable. He is the star of spring trading, by the way. Jose Ramirez goes off the board. Now, that's the team, Dong's Dinger's. That's the team, Dorn's Dingers, excuse me. I made that more inappropriate than it had to be.

That's the team that... It's a reference to a movie, Adam. Roger Dorn? Yes. Did I tell you about when I made my fiancé watch Major League with me? Did she not like it? She liked it, but it was the day before the first spring training game. And I said, you know what?

I'm watching Major League. Oh, damn it. Alex Colomey went. So I guess I'm taking Cody Allen here, who I don't like taking it much. But so day before spring training, I'm watching Major League. So I make her watch it with me. She's enjoying it enough. Jake Taylor calls his shot.

And you know he's about to square around a bun. Willie Bays Hayes leads off from second base. The drama's picking up. The music comes in. The crowd goes nuts. Lou Brown is smiling. I look over. Allie is sound asleep.

Yeah, it happens with my wife every time we watch any movie. Yeah, I waited too late at night to start the movie. She completely fell asleep right before the climax of the movie. Unbelievable. Actually, speaking of, you know what TV show I'm excited for? What's that? I don't know what it's called, but it's the one where Hank Azaria plays like a like a baseball announcer

who gets drunk that looks fantastic I'm on board all right I saw a preview for it let's talk about this draft here round 10 looked like this as you see these closers go off the board

Diaz Giles Aaron Sanchez Ozuna Ozuna to Heath Justin Turner Justin Turner man like 113th overall good bad great terrible normal what you think value

Yeah, I like it. Calvin Herrera, Jose Ramirez, Alex Colomey, Cody Allen, Eduardo Nunez, right after my pick. So I guess I could have gotten Nunez. But I rather have brought up. I need a stolen basis. Eric Hosmer and Ian Desmond. I'm just going to say there's no chance I would have gotten Jose Paraza, 117th overall. No way.

Everybody was focused on closers. Shut up, Chris. Wow. Chris is on the clock. Look, you're just lucky I'd let you back in this draft. Wilson Contreras, Felix Hernandez. Let's look at Chris Towers team. Wilson Contreras and Felix were the last two picks.

Edwin and Carnacione, Jose Altoove, Adrian Beltrae, Trevor Story. Woo, nice. Springer, McCutcheon, Batista. Nice. Eduardo Nunez at his utility. Wow. And two pitchers. Three pitchers now.

Three pitchers. Lance McCullors, Danny Duffy, and Rich Hill. You got some strikeout potential. Not bad. Oh, I'm up. How about that? So, we're done with that elite tier of closers. What does my team need, guys?

I don't even know my team name. That's why I'm having so much trouble. Freaky Ziki. I need a third outfielder. He's second baseman. and you need some pitching. Okay, so let's take care of that right now. Second base.

Use some power. You've got a lot of stolen bases. Use some power, you say, eh? All right, then let's look at Outfield. That's where we get power. I've only really got one guy, I would say, is a good bet to hit more than 25 home runs. Miguel Seno.

He hits for power. He walks. Yeah, he does walk. Might have like a 320 on base percentage. Your team is currently tied. for next to last in home runs. That's good to know. Miguel Seno, you're on my team.

Not exactly the pick I wanted to make there, but, you know. All right, this will be our last round. This is round 11 when we'll recap our teams. We've had Wilson Contreras, Felix Renanhas, Felix Renanhas, Rich Hill, and Miguel Seno. Who do you think will have a better year? Rich Hill or Kenta Maida? In total fantasy points, I would say Maeda.

Yeah, I think. Maida has a better chance to be better. Rich Hill has a better chance to be a lot better, if that makes sense. I want to say this about Maeda. Before the All-Star break, Maida was 8 and 6, 295 ERA. He had 107 strikeouts, only 82 hits allowed in 103 and 2-thirds innings, and only 10 home runs allowed. Maida was awesome.

And then, you know, he struggled after the All-Star break, 425 ERA, strikeout per inning still good, but he was only throwing like five innings in a lot of starts during the last two months. I think it was really the adjustment of going to pitching every five days instead of every six days. If he, because he was working on getting stronger in the off season, if that pays off and Maeda can go deeper into games, Chris, you've been kind of talking about this for a while. He's got like borderline ace potential? Yeah, he is actually, you know, I've been writing about pitch. a lot lately. He's kind of the opposite of someone like Vince Velasquez. Velasquez has an incredible

fastball. The results were amazing on it last season. And his breaking pitches were just kind of okay. Maeda has a couple of his slider is really good. His changeup, I think, is pretty good. And the rest of his arsenal's not very good. But you know, you can get by with one or two really good pitches and some kind of borderline stuff. The issue for me isn't his talent level. It's like you said, can he get through a full season consistently while pitching at a high level? Yeah, exactly. But we're going to recap the first 11 rounds now. I'm going to pause the draft here.

And just going to let everybody know we're going to pick it back up. So we've done 11 picks of this 12-te-to-head categories league. And let's take a look at some of the most recent picks. And that is after Rich Hill, I took Sinole, Julio Taran, David Robertson, Tony, Watson, Marcus Stroman, DJ LaMayhew, Michael Franco, Ben Zobrist. First of all, real quick, Heath, did Marcus Stroman change your mind at all with his MVP performance in the World Baseball Classic? Did he move up your rankings? Will he? He moved up my rankings multiple times throughout the night. He moved up my rankings when,

and people were saying he did this last year. He didn't do it every start last year. He shimmied quite a bit. He added some more shimmies. Last night, and so Chris and I decided that each time he shimmied, we move up one spot in our rankings. I moved him up five spots when he yelled profanities into the opposing team's dugouts. What about when he dropped an F-bomb on Carlos Beltron from the dugout? And then I moved him up an additional 10 spots when I saw the picture on Twitter of his dad who was apparently a bodybuilder. Oh, about that. Well, let's look at Chris Towers team.

Chris had the third pick in this draft, and his infield is tremendous. Encarnacion, Jose Al Tuve, Adrian Beltrae, Trevor Story. His outfield is also very good. I'm not going to name it in order of how he drafted them. I'm going to name it in the order of his best outfielder. Springer, Batista, McCutcheon. And his utility is Eduardo Nunez, which is a steals guy. So you've got Altuve and you've got Springer and you've got Nunez to give you some steals.

Hopefully Springer steals more than nine. So where is Chris Little Week? Well, he waited a while at starting pitcher. he took Lance McCullors as his first. Danny Duffy, or did you take Duffy? Duffy was my first. Duffy was his first, Lance McCullors, and Rich Hill. So, Chris, may or may not have a relief pitcher,

depending on what he wants to do with Danny Duffy. How do you feel about your team right now? This is the plan. This is what's going to, this is how I'm going to sink or swim this season. If I'm not right on a couple of these pitchers, I'm going to look like a big, dumb idiot. The problem with this is Chris is currently, dead last by a huge margin in whip, and next to last an ERA,

and he has more pitcher spots to fill than everyone else, and they're going to be worse pitchers. Yeah, the projections are not as high on these pitchers as your boy Chris is. But aren't you concerned about – I hope you don't do this in every league, because it's a little risky. You know? It's risky. Yeah.

All right. It's a high-variance strategy, Adam, and I'm playing in a lot of leagues. so I can get away with a high-varying strategy. We'll see. Let's go to the team that I was drafting for. I started out drafting for the number two overall pick. He joined the league. So then I went to the number four overall pick.

And Buster Posey, fifth round. Fifth round was good for Sanchez, Posey, and Luke Croy. All the catchers went there. Hanley Ramirez, no second baseman right now, but you know that's a position I'm fine waiting on. There are still Padroia, Kipnis, Devin Travis left. I'll probably take Kipnis soon. No one, Aeronado.

Jose Parraza for the steals And then the outfield is AJ Pollack, Gregory Polanco, and Miguel Suno. So yeah, I did need that power and hopefully Suno will give it to me without being terrible. If Suno's bad, I'm going to struggle with home runs.

No question. Chris Sale, Carlos Carrasco, Dallas Keikle, Chris Sale, Carrasco, Keikle, and Cody Allen. So all of my pitchers have a hard C sound in either their first or the last name. That's something I look for when I build the pitching staff.

Let's go to Heath's team. Heath had the ninth overall pick. Evan Gaddis, Cirrus Davis, DJ LaMayhew, Josh Donaldson, Carlos Correa. Not bad. Nelson Cruz and Billy Hamilton. Dongs for days. Do you think you have enough speed?

Do you think Hamilton is enough? I will be taking either Lorenzo Cain or Odeville Herrera with my next pick. Okay. So that will get me an additional 20 to 25 steals. I'm currently projected to be second in steals. So, yeah, I think after I take one of those two, I'll be fine. Then it's time to build the pitching stuff. Jake Areeta and Danny Salazar are his starting pitchers,

and Craig Kimball and Roberto Osuna are his closers, his relievers. Okay. So who are some pitchers you're going to be targeting? I'm going to get the draft started again. Who are some pictures you're going to be targeting? And you can tell me, it doesn't matter. It's just a mock. Well, I would

The problem is The top pitchers of my cue Will probably be taken In the next round And so I'm going to hope That maybe one of Aaron Nola Carlos Rodon Vince Velasquez

Make it back to me I wouldn't mind A guy that probably falls too far Because he's not very sexy Maybe he's sexy I'm not going to determine that But Tanner Roark He

People like the long He can really help you out in wins. He can really help you out in Whip. He can really help you out in the ERA. He's not going to do much for you in the strikeout department, but that's okay. Yeah, he is someone who definitely doesn't get a lot of love from some of the more saber-metrically minded folk. But the two years that we've seen him as a full-time starter, he's more than held his own, despite the mid-length strikeout rates. And seems like a really good dude, too.

And he pitched for Team USA. Exactly. But he does a very good job of limiting hard contact. All right, guys. I think we can be done. Let's just take one last look at that team that went starting pitcher-heavy with Kershaw, Scherzer, Kluber, and Quedo as his first four picks. He did a really nice job with the power speed combos.

Will Myers, Rugnett-Odor, Anthony Rendon, Kris Davis, Jose Ramirez, Steve. Steven Piscotti. Wow, I really hate, and David Robertson. I hated the strategy, but now I kind of like it more. I think he did a good job. Yeah, it's not bad. Well done, Dorn.

Thank you for listening, everybody. We're back tomorrow with a mailbag. Some draft advice for you as we get into a very big weekend. Hope you enjoyed the show. And know the results will not be available online. See you later.