A Not So Good Draft Strategy

As a sports fan I find sports analysis interesting, but not in an informative way. When I listen to sports analysis, even from the "experts," I can't help but think that all of it is absolute bullshit. Sports analysis is bullshit because it's all opinion and I can form my own opinion on sports things. I do enjoy some people's analysis, but really I just respect their opinion. I find it particularly amusing to listen to the analysts that over analyze the living crap out of sports. So in honor of over analyzing things that don't really matter, let's take a look at my horrible 2016 fantasy baseball draft, best summed up as a heaping pile of burning excrement. All the inside information on my genius strategy on building the worst offense in the league starts here.

First, here's a little background information on my fantasy sports career. I've participated in fantasy sports since 2005 according to Yahoo! Sports, meaning I began playing fantasy sports when I was in high school. However, I have not actively participated in any of the leagues I've been in. By that I mean that I hadn't participated in any live drafts until 2014 when some friends and I tried out a fantasy English Premier League. And in most of the leagues I participated in I lost interest at some point and completely checked out and didn't do anything including updating the roster. So this 2016 baseball season is only the second live draft I've done and I do plan on paying attention to my terrible team all the way to the bitter end of this dreadful campaign. Also, I'm not going through all 30 rounds of the draft because that would take to much time and effort for absolutely no reason because let's be honest here, no one cares. But, without further ado, here's round one!

1st Round

In the first round I had the 6th overall pick and it's really hard to screw up the first round. I saw Clayton Kershaw on the board and wasted no time in selecting the stud left-handed starter. I love Clayton Kershaw, he's one of my favorite people that I've never met. Not only is he one of the best pitchers today and probably all time, but he seems like a really great dude. I remember after the season he won the NL Cy Young award and NL MVP award he was asked how he was going to celebrate and he said he was going to have some friends over to play ping pong and Super Smash Brothers. He sounds just like my group of friends. Needless to say Kershaw was a fantastic pick, posting numbers to earn himself the number one overall spot on the fantasy point leaderboards all the way up until just before the All-Star break when he went on the DL with a back injury. He's been on the DL ever since. That's just bad luck, but nonetheless, my first round pick is a non-factor now.

I love Clayton Kershaw

Despite Kershaw landing on the DL, I don't regret the pick at all because he was performing exactly how I hoped he would putting up dazzling numbers including a ludicrous strikeout to walk ration. Here's a complete list of the first round picks:

1. Mike Trout
2. Bryce Harper
3. Paul Goldschmidt
4. Josh Donaldson
5. Andrew McCutchen
6. Clayton Kershaw
7. Nolan Arenado
8. Carlos Correa
9. Manny Machado
10. Giancarlo Stanton
11. Anthony Rizzo
12. Kris Bryant

Also worth noting, even though Kershaw hasn't pitched since June 26th, he's still ranked number 2 overall in fantasy rankings as of today, August 1st, 2016. That's how good a season he was having up until his back injury.

2nd Round

With the 17th overall pick I took Buster Posey, eligible for both catcher and first base. Posey has been relatively consistent this year, currently ranked 133rd overall in Yahoo! Fantasy sports. However, in retrospect I think I should have looked to get a slugger here. Posey is sitting at 12 homers on the season in the heart of a not so powerful Giant's offense. Players like Nelson Cruz and Ryan Braun (but I'm not a fan of him) were still available, but Posey's consistent performance is always a good thing to have, but I think in the future I should look for more pop in the first position player drafted. Round 2 results:

1. Max Scherzer
2. Miguel Cabrera
3. Jose Altuve
4. Edwin Encarnacion
5. Mookie Betts
6. Jose Abreu
7. Buster Posey
8. Jose Bautista
9. Dee Gordon
10. A.J Pollock
11. Jake Arrieta
12. Charlie Blackmon

3rd Round

With the 30th overall pick in the 3rd round I selected J.D. Martinez with the pop aspect of his game in mind. Martinez was having a pretty good season until he whacked his arm into the outfield wall tracking down a fly ball. At the time of the injury Martinez was hitting .286 with 12 homers, but he's been on the shelf for a long ass time now. So yeah, both my first and third round picks are on the shelf. Still just bad luck as far as my assessment goes.

1. Starling Marte

2. George Springer

3. Xander Bogaerts

4. Joey Votto

5. Madison Bumgarner

6. J.D. Martinez

7. Jose Fernandez

8. Jacob deGrom

9. Chris Sale

10. Ryan Braun

11. Nelson Cruz

12. Matt Harvey (talk about an unfortunate pick for the 2016 season for this guy!)

4th Round

Round four. I think I went off the rails here and made a bad pick. I took Miguel Sano with the 43rd overall pick. I picked Sano hoping for some more power, which Sano has displayed a bit with 15 homers currently, but 15 homers and a .241 average is not worth a fourth round selection. In the future I think I'll stick with taking more proven players with a good track record in the early rounds, make an attempt to get some reliable production. Nothing against Sano, but he doesn't have the track record to expect a certain type of production throughout the season. Not the wisest pick here in my hindsight estimation.

1. Zack Greinke

2. Prince Fielder

3. David Price

4. Carlos Gonzalez

5. Chris Davis

6. Corey Kluber

7. Miguel Sano

8. Adam Jones

9. Justin Upton

10. Yoenis Cespedes

11. Gerrit Cole

12. Kyle Schwarber

5th Round

Onto the 5th round and another injury! With the 54th overall pick I took Lorenzo Cain. Now I think Cain is a great fantasy player because he hits some homers, generally gets a good amount of hits, and he can steal bases. Lots of great fantasy tools! He's been kind of a streaky hitter this year going on some nice runs and then putting forward little offensive production for a stretch of games. Then he got hurt, too! He's back now, but only just recently back from the disabled list. For a decent amount of time My 1st, 3rd, and 5th round draft picks were all sitting on the bench/DL (because each player is only allowed to have two people on the distinguished DL slots otherwise they have to take up a spot on your bench/roster).

1. Felix Hernandez

2. Adrian Gonzalez

3. Todd Frazier

4. Carlos Gomez (another unfortunate draft pick)

5. Noah Syndergaard

6. Lorenzo Cain

7. Robinson Cano

8. Dallas Keuchel

9. Stephen Strasburg

10. Eric Hosmer

11. Jason Heyward

12. Brian Dozier

6th Round

I got really unlucky on this pick when I selected Sonny Gray to bolster my pitching. Gray has been a very good pitcher and the Athletics ace over the past few years. I saw this as a relatively safe bet pick, but holy crap has Sonny Gray had a dreadful season. I don't know if there's something wrong with the dude, but he's been getting hammered almost every single game to the point where I don't start him and always feel reluctant to do so. Gray currently has a 1.52 WHIP and 5.84 ERA which is unbelievably bad for a pitcher of his caliber. At this point I have very little hope that Gray will turn it around because I've been thinking that for months now. I also don't think I should blame myself for this pick because, honestly, who could have seen this dreadful season for Gray?

1. Matt Kemp

2. Jason Kipnis

3. Matt Carpenter

4. Chris Archer

5. Yasiel Puig

6. Carlos Carrasco

7. Sonny Gray

8. Kyle Seager

9. Michael Brantley

10. Adrian Beltre

11. Freddie Freeman

12. Troy Tulowitzki

7th Round

During the 7th round of the draft I went down to the subway station to pick my dad up and unsuccessfully attempted to monitor the draft from my mobile device. So Adam Wainwright was auto-drafted for me in this round. I don't think I would have selected Wainwright here and he had a really bad beginning to his season, but he's been pitching pretty well recently, including picking up a coveted complete game. He could be a very valuable piece for the rest of the season.

1. Johnny Cueto

2. Corey Seager

3. Jon Lester

4. Francisco Lindor

5. David Ortiz

6. Adam Wainwright

7. Jonathan Lucroy

8. Rougned Odor

9. Cole Hamels

10. Danny Salazar

11. Jacoby Ellsbury

12. Albert Pujols

8th Round

Missed this round, too and the computer made another selection I don't think I would have made: Kenley Jansen. Jansen has had a great season, so clearly the computer is a much better drafter than me. I probably would have selected some unproven clown or someone who would have gone on to get an injury.

1. Wade Davis

2. Hunter Pence

3. Craig Kimbrel

4. Tyson Ross

5. Anthony Rendon

6. David Peralta

7. Kenley Jansen

8. Mark Melancon

9. Trevor Rosenthal

10. Ian Kinsler

11. Hanley Ramirez

12. Michael Wacha

9th Round

And I'm back in time to make another ill pick in the form of Ben Revere. Revere has a .209 average during his play time this year! I made this pick in the hopes that Revere would get on base a lot, steal a decent amount of bases, and score a bunch of runs in a pretty good Nationals offense. He proved me right by doing close to jack shit! Another winner selection! I should have stayed out of the draft and let the computer make another selection.

1. Adam Eaton

2. Maikel Franco

3. Francisco Liriano

4. Aroldis Chapman

5. Gregory Polanco

6. Ben Revere

7. Ken Giles

8. Christian Yelich

9. Jeurys Familia

10. Zach Britton

11. Garrett Richards

12. Brett Gardner

10th Round

Here's another boneheaded decision. I went with Addison Russel here. What a bad pick. Russel has hit a good amount of homers for a second baseman and has driven in a bunch of runs because of how potent the Cubs offense has been this year. But he's extremely streaky. He'll go off for a short time, like two or three games, but then he'll hit like .150 for a week. I think this was a bad pick because again, this is a young unproven player with a very limited track record. In the future I think I'm going to alter my strategy and take these types of players much later on in the draft. Even ten rounds in I don't think taking Russel here is worth it.

1. Kole Calhoun

2. Evan Longoria

3. Ian Desmond (talk about a great pick)

4. Cody Allen

5. David Robertson

6. Shin-soo Choo

7. Addison Russel

8. Marcus Stroman

9. Carlos Martinez

10. Salvador Perez

11. Ben Zobrist

12. Jordan Zimmerman

11th Round

I selected shortstop Brandon Crawford in the 11th round with the 126th overall pick. Crawford was coming off a very good offensive year for a shortstop and I'm a fan of him, even though his great defense pays absolutely no dividends in this particular fantasy league. He's currently 315th in the fantasy leader boards, so maybe not the best pick here. Looking over this draft, I think I was drafting more like I was building a real baseball team as opposed to a fantasy baseball team which basically consists of picking stat generating monsters regardless of their other skills/short comings. Another dude I like a lot as a baseball player, but probably could have got someone of his caliber a bit later in the draft. But who knows!

1. Kendrys Morales

2. Hector Rondon

3. Alex Gordon

4. A.J. Ramos

5. Kolten Wong

6. Brandon Crawford
7. Masahiro Tanaka

8. Justin Verlander

9. Brandon Belt

10. Brian McCann

11. Michael Pineda

12. Russell Martin

12th Round

Now here was an ill yielding chance pick. Jorge Soler. Here's a guy I thought might have a breakout season with the Cubs and their very potent looking offense. Not only did Soler get injured and land on the DL, too, but he is having the opposite of a breakout season. The dude has 5 homers and is hitting .223, but I still have him on my team. Probably not worth it since the Soler has had practically no fantasy value. Definite fail pick based on the hopes of a breakout season for a player again without a track record.

1. Randal Grichuk

2. John Lackey

3. Raisel Iglesias

4. Joc Pederson

5. Jake Odorizzi

6. Lucas Duda

7. Jorge Soler

8. Steven Matz

9. Matt Holliday

10. Curtis Granderson

11. Travis d'Arnaud

12. James Shields

13th Round

We're off the rails again! Byung Ho Park! What in the hell was I thinking? I drafted Byung Ho Park here, yet another guy with no track record in the MLB and a guy who I dropped a while ago because he barely gets any hits. Sure he hits a decent amount of homers, but overall there's not much offensive production outside of the long balls. Not to mention that he's no longer even on the Twins because he got sent down to the minors. That's right, the Minnesota Twins sent him down to the minors. If that's not a bad sign, then I don't know what is. Absolutely dreadful pick. But wait, there's more, queue the 14th round!

1. Huston Street

2. Jonathan Papelbon

3. Dexter Fowler

4. Collin McHugh

5. Daniel Murphy

6. Byung Ho Park

7. Francisco Rodriguez

8. Stephen Piscotty

9. Billy Hamilton

10. Jay Bruce

11. Taijuan Walker

12. Trevor Story

14th Round

Look, another dud pick, this time with Shawn Tolleson! Tolleson was relatively good last year as the Rangers' closer and I thought it's good to have closers. To say Tolleson has been smacked around this year is an understatement. He's another player that I dropped quite some time ago and his ERA for my fantasy team was 10.13. Somehow he racked up 11 saves, but he was an overall hindrance to my team's pitching performance for many weeks. That's back to back draft picks that I dropped for bad performance. You could say I have the Midas touch for fantasy drafts.

1. Billy Burns

2. Elvis Andrus

3. Carlos Rodon

4. Yu Darvish

5. Michael Conforto

6. Khris Davis

7. Shawn Tolleson

8. Matt Duffy

9. Corey Dickerson

10. Shelby Miller

11. Glen Perkins

12. Dustin Pedroia

Okay, let's speed this up. Let's take a look at the rest of the draft quickly and you can draw your own conclusions about how bad a fantasy drafter I am, if you're even reading this far into something that has no bearing on anything.

15th Round: Josh Harrison (good player, but not necessarily a good fantasy player)

16th Round: Jason Hammel (so far so good with Hammel, he's having a very good season at the back end of the Cub's rotation)

17th Round: Chris Colabello (had a great year last season, got suspended for PED use early in the year and I dropped him! definitely another dud pick)

18th Round: Dellin Betances (he's the Yankees' closer now after the trades of Andrew Miller and Aroldis Chapman. Also he strikes out a whole bunch of people, so I'd consider this a decent pick)

19th Round: Francisco Cervelli (no power, he's gone cold, not looking like a good fantasy pick)

20th Round: Roberto Osuna (this was a great pick! Osuna is the Blue Jays' closer and he's pretty damn good!)

Seems appropriate about now, especially the football part

Right, this has gone on far too long and is much too silly. Enough of this nonsense. I set out on this path in an effort to show how terribly I drafted for fantasy baseball 2016, but what we got was this crap. Hopefully you didn't waste your time reading this garbage. Have a nice day!