I was randomly selected to pick last....numero eleven-o. But in a Snake-draft this gave me back to back picks throughout the night and I actually don't mind that.
Overall I think I did okay but only if the words "sophomore slump" don't get applied to several of my players. Second year players are going to have big roles on this club....Matt Wieters, Andrew McCutcheon, Gordon Beckham, Tommy Hanson, David Price, Dexter Fowler, and Chris Davis. Also young players Justin Upton, Asdrubal Cabrera, and Chris Perez will be playing roles of varying importance. One rookie thrown in to boot, Julio Borbon.
Picking 11th and 12th I led off by getting two of the better sticks on the board....Mark Teixeira and Evan Longoria. That should produce close to 70 HR, 220 RBI, a very solid dose of OBP, and around 200 runs. I nearly chose Matt Kemp here and I've had Kemp on my squad in other seasons....but I had other guys in mind for steals later on and Kemp's marginal OBP kept me from choosing him. I was disappointed that Joe Mauer went off the board prior to my pick....I had hoped to nab him.
Adam Dunn was drafted to be another power/OBP source and Yunel Escobar should be a solid 4.5 category contributor as a shortstop. McCutcheon has been scorching all spring and played well last year. If he steps up and combines with Weiters and Upton as young players emerging as stars then I should be pretty solid across the board offensively. (Magglio Ordonez having a big comeback season would be heaven-sent as well.....we'll see what Maggs can bring to the table) Borbon and Fowler were speed choices in case I'm hurting for steals at some point. Also, if I'm not, having speed guys to trade later is always a good thing.
On the pitching front.....in addition to Hanson and Price, I was able to get Jon Lester, John Lackey, Francisco Liriano, and Kevin Slowey. There was quite a concerted run at starting pitching in the first few rounds....so many big names went off the board early. I jumped in to get Lester at least a round or two earlier then I would have normally planned. In the bullpen, I ended up with Brian Wilson, Bobby Jenks, and Chris Perez. So three guys chasing "saves". Wilson was electric last year and should help the rate-stats a bit if he can duplicate it. Bullpen work is so up and down from year-to-year though that we'll just have to see. Jenks has one foot on the banana peel most of the time....but he ought to post 30 saves I'll bet. Perez is replacing Kerry Wood for a couple of months if he can keep the gig. I'll ride him for a while and see if I can pick up another closer on the cheap somewhere as clubs start making changes.
It should be another fun season. I'm in 3 leagues this year. Two that I care about and one new one that I could tell on draft night that the majority of the league is ambivalent about. Its at ESPN.com....I'll just try to have some fun with it.
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