I’m not sure why I haven’t posted a fantasy baseball update in a while. Perhaps because I was busy with real life, perhaps because my teams were excelling and didn’t care, or perhaps cuz I just wasn’t making any moves.

Well, I just made some moves – so I shall use this time and medium for my cop-out post for today.

Friends League:

This team went from being my pride and joy to just plain looking fugly. Here is is:

C – Geovany Soto
1B – Mark Teixeira
2B – Brian Roberts
3B – David Wright
SS – Stephen Drew
MI – Aaron Hill
CI – Ryan Zimmerman
OF – Michael Bourn
OF – Alex Rios
OF – Alfonso Soriano
U – Mark Reynolds

SP – Carlos Zambrano
SP – Ben Sheets
SP – Matt Cain
SP – Felix Hernandez
SP – Jeremy Bonderman
RP – Brad Lidge
RP – Brian Fuentes

B – Dustin McGowan, SP
B – Micah Owings, SP
B – Daniel Cabrera, SP
B – Jeff Francoeur,OF

Let’s see – in the past month, I’ve dropped a slumping Frenchie from the lineup to keep Bourn in for his steals (even though this further killed my average – but hey at least he’s slightly picking it up as of late), dropped Broxton and Rafael Soriano outright (Soriano is gonna be replaced by John Smoltz as the closer anyways), and picked up Fuentes and Cabrera. Slim pickins for closers in this league, so I make due with Fuentes I suppose.

Note: I have owned Cabrera every year for as long as I can remember, and every year he has shown flashes of brilliances which leads to the annual “Daniel Cabrera Is Breaking Out” conversation. Well, perhaps it really is legit now. He’s not striking out as many guys anymore, but nor is he walking as many, and he’s definitely getting outs – and in the AL East at that. The time is now.

Another Note: Geovany Soto is the truth. He is well on his way to earning Fantasy MVP honors for not only my teams, but I’m sure a multitude of others as well.

Lastly, and shamefully, I have fallen to third place with 66.0 points. The leader has created a cushion for himself with 89.0 – but alas, the season is young.

Office League:

I’m proud to say that I can still call this my Office League, as my internship has now turned into an actual paid position, so hoo-ray for that. On with it:

C – Geovany Soto
1B – Mark Teixeira
2B – Rickie Weeks
3B – Aramis Ramirez
SS – Hanley Ramirez
OF – Jeff Francoeur
OF – Adam Dunn
OF – Ichiro Suzuki
U – David Murphy

SP – Tim Lincecum
SP – Ben Sheets
SP – Scott Kazmir
SP – Ervin Santana
RP – Joakim Soria
RP – Brad Lidge
RP – Joey Devine
RP – Joba Chamberlain

B – Homer Bailey, SP
B – Daniel Cabrera, SP
B – John Danks, SP
B – Dana Eveland, SP
B – Max Scherzer, RP
B – Eric Gagne, RP
B – Justin Upton, OF
B – Aaron Hill, 2B

DL – Rafael Furcal, SS
DL – Chris Young, SP

Wow – this has been revamped. Gallardo out for the year (seemingly) – dropped. Cla Meredith, Butler, Gomez worthless – dropped. Just picked up David Murphy to fill in the util spot for a slumping Justin Upton while Furcal comes back. Murphy might be legit, as he has been getting a substantial amount of at-bats (on pace for 644 as of writing) and has produced. Also picked up a resurging Weeks to mix and match with Aaron Hill.

Joba is getting promoted so I kept around a demoted Mad Max to shore up the bullpen. Gagne is injured slash worthless, so I picked up Joey Devine for the peripherals and decent K totals in the meantime. John Danks has been solid for a few weeks now, and Eveland is a new addition who I was surprised was even available. Should be solid for here on out.

Still atop the standings with 100.5 points, 2nd place a distant 83.0 – however things may not bode well for the future, as I had been ahead even more comfortably well above 110 points while the rest of the pack was in the 70′s – oh well… can’t be perfect for 162 games.

Although I’m typing this one up on a Monday morning, expect these little updates to happen on Sundays more often than not. It seemed a bit odd to start posting about the overwhelming powerhouses that are my fantasy baseball teams while play was still happening mid-Sunday.

But here we are, Monday morning and my two main teams (I forgot to draft my Yahoo team so it was auto-drafted – the unwanted stepchild) are sitting atop their respective leagues. What better time to show off than now?

To preface, I am currently playing in one friends league and one office league. Here are the specs:

Friends League:

• 5×5 rotisserie format
• 11 teams
• C, 1B, 2B, SS, 3B, MI, CI, OF, OF, OF, U, SP, SP, SP, SP, SP, RP, RP, B, B, B, B, DL
• Weekly roster management
• Weekly waiver processing (oh man… more on this one later)

And here’s the squad:

C – Geovany Soto
1B – Mark Teixeira
2B – Brian Roberts
3B – David Wright
SS – Stephen Drew
MI – Aaron Hill
CI – Ryan Zimmerman
OF – Jeff Francoeur
OF – Alex Rios
OF – Alfonso Soriano
U – Michael Bourn

SP – Carlos Zambrano
SP – Ben Sheets
SP – Matt Cain
SP – Felix Hernandez
SP – Jeremy Bonderman
RP – Brad Lidge
RP – Jonathan Broxton

B – Dustin McGowan, SP
B – Micah Owings, SP
B – Heath Bell, RP
B – Mark Reynolds, 3B

DL – Rafael Soriano, RP

Pretty solid, no? The squad currently moved into 1st place with 78.50 points, ahead of 2nd place by 2.00 points. Just won Reynolds (the new Ryan Braun?) and Owings in our weekly waiver sweepstakes. Near the top in most categories. Failing in batting average and saves (thanks, injured closers)

Office League

• 5×5 rotisserie format
• 12 teams
• C, 1B, 2B, SS, 3B, OF, OF, OF, U, SP, SP, SP, SP, RP, RP, RP, RP, B, B, B, B, B, B, B
• Daily roster management

And here’s the squad:

C – Geovany Soto
1B – Mark Teixeira
2B – Aaron Hill
3B – Aramis Ramirez
SS – Hanley Ramirez
OF – Jeff Francoeur
OF – Adam Dunn
OF – Ichiro Suzuki
U – Rafael Furcal

SP – Tim Lincecum
SP – Ben Sheets
SP – Scott Kazmir
SP – Chris Young
RP – Joakim Soria
RP – Brad Lidge
RP – Eric Gagne
RP – Joba Chamberlain

B – Yovani Gallardo, SP
B – Daniel Cabrera, SP
B – Andy Sonnanstine, SP
B – Ervin Santana, SP
B – Cla Meredith, RP
B – Rick Ankiel, OF
B – Billy Butler, 1B
B – Justin Upton, OF
B – Carlos Gomez, OF

Lots going on in this league. Its a bit interesting having 4 starting RP’s. Luckily, Soria and the Kansas City Royals are off to a surprising start and Gagne is settling down. I drafted way too many hitters in this league and can’t get any of them in the lineup. Thinking of getting Gomez in there for some steals since Dunn ain’t hitting a lick to start the year. Regardless, I’m way atop the standings with 96.50 points (was over 100 previously all season) to the 2nd place team’s 79.50.

So far, so good in fantasy land. Just had to get this intro out of the way so I can bring you updates as the season goes on, since you all obviously care about my fantasy teams/knowledge.

Sorry guys – I just had to do this. Fantasy sports stories are the new poker stories.

Easter Sunday was perhaps the most beautiful day of 2008 thus far in Southern California. Rather than spend the day outdoors playing in the sun, I was happily entrenched on the computer and in the books, studying for my upcoming fantasy baseball draft.

Although I got a late start on my study sesh, I pride myself in getting the most out of my resources and using them all efficiently. Standard draft advice aside, here are some strategies I use that have been successful for me:

1. Choose a good fantasy baseball draft magazine

This one is fairly simple. Magazines can definitely help steer you in the right direction, giving you some nice sleeper lists, bust lists, mock drafts (and analysis for the picks), stat projections, and player rankings.

There are tons of different magazines out there, so make sure you find one that has all of these components. Some mags tend to skip on extraneous analysis on say a mock draft, but you can’t go wrong with having more information and another voice pleading their case.

Make sure you select a magazine that is as updated as possible and has reasonable projections. Normally, I select a few players that I already feel strongly about and see how they stack up against the mag’s projections. To gauge how updated the magazine is, be up the offseason moves and see whether or not the involved players are on their respective new teams.

2. Use Baseball Prospectus

Deciphering the stats within Baseball Prospectus can be a fairly daunting task. Luckily for you, I already wrote a blog outlining the most important things for us fantasy nerds to know, and how to use them to your advantage. BP is scary good and tends to be right about a lot of things. Right before the draft, I like to make a list of names I already picked out as potential studs and breakouts out of BP and write their relevant stats as to why I deemed them as such. Just another reference tool to check as I draft.

3. Show up to the draft early

This applies more to online drafts. If you arrive to an in-person draft early, you’re just forced to make awkward small talk and will most likely get suckered into helping the host set up shop. Online however, you can go through the pre-ranked player lists and add all of your sleepers to your draft queue, as well as names you are going for in general. This saves you time during the draft as you don’t have to go through list after list looking for a particular name. Furthermore, if the system happens to lag or you get booted off, you won’t be too adversely affected if the computer has to pick in your absence, as you will at least be getting a player you wanted anyways.

4. Don’t get caught in pre-ranked hype

Every website or magazine you read has their own pre-rankings for players. Many of the rankings are fairly accurate and can more or less gauge when a player should be selected based on popular consensus. However, these pre-rankings can get outdated and fail to account for promotions, demotions, injuries, etc…

Furthermore, its necessary to take matters into your own hands and have your own thoughts about players. When I draft, I already have set prejudices and feelings about certain players. If you do enough of your own research and are convinced that, say, Michael Bourn is gonna break out and steal 50 bases, then dig a little deeper down the pre-ranked list and bump him up. Don’t be afraid to pick players out of the pre-ranked order. Be confident and value players yourself, using pre-rankings only as a gauge.

5. Know and diversify your internet resources

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket by relying solely on the projections of one website where you draft or one magazine that you bought. Look into various sources (ESPN, Yahoo, CBS Sportsline, magazines, etc…) and compare players across the board. Sticking to only one or two sources gets you too caught up in those authors’ thinking. Opening up a new tab in your web browser and loading up another website for a fresh perspective is always a good thing.

Hopefully some of that was helpful to whoever read it. Obviously there are countless other things to keep in mind that magazines and websites devote entire sections to, but those are 5 strategies I use to fine tune and give myself that extra edge. Tune in tomorrow (or hell, maybe later tonight if I’m bored) to see what this draft results this magic yields for yours truly!

For me, the baseball season doesn’t start with Spring Training like for so many aficionados of our national pastime. For me, it all begins when my copy of Baseball Prospectus comes in the mail.

Yes, Amazon Super Saver Shipping took long enough, but it has finally delivered Baseball Prospectus 2008 to my front door. After countless (fine, maybe only like 5 or 6) nights of asserting my nerdiness and falling asleep analyzing statistics and projections, my analysis of the Tome/Bible/(insert sacred writing synonym here). I am officially ready for the baseball season.

For the uninitiated, Baseball Prospectus is a (fairly) advanced tool for statistical interpretation of baseball. It has become increasingly popular in our post-Moneyball world, and many a privy fantasy baseball GM has used such analytical tools to their benefit.

Granted, the Tome provides above and beyond the statistics any normal fantasy player would need. It is written more from an analytical scouting perspective than your standard fantasy preview magazine making random stat projections for the upcoming year. However, there are many stats in here that can help us common folk out.

The Tome utilizes two things called the Breakout and Improve rates, which are the odds that a player’s statistics will improve 20% or at all respectively. This tool is used for both hitters and pitchers. It’s definitely fun to look at an already established player like David Wright or someone and still see them with high rates, envisioning what other greatness they might accomplish this season.

For hitters, I also like to look at the EqAVG, which tries to translate batting averages from other leagues (such as various levels of the minors or overseas leagues) into what they would be in the majors. To me, this is a crucial tool in evaluating the incoming rookie class or any other prospect who gets called up. There are plenty of guys who hit .360 with 30+ homeruns in the minors only to fail to reach anywhere near such numbers in their careers ever again. Hell, I might be able to push the Mendoza line in the rookie leagues, but I sure as hell will never get a major league hit.

For pitchers, I’m a big fan of the BABIP and STUFF statistics. BABIP refers to the batting average of balls in play. Many pitchers suffer from either extreme bad or good luck. If you see a spike in BABIP one year, odds are it will stabilize to around .290-.300 as it is for most pitchers. This definitely helps me try to understand the previous year’s pitching stats and determine what was a fluke year or who had bad luck. The STUFF statistic is a mathematical formula for rating a pitcher’s demonstrated skills depending on his age. Once again, a good tool for evaluating rookies, mid-season call-ups, or any other prospects.

There is a multitude of other statistics and rating methods within the pages of the Tome. Personally, I use the aforementioned ones. I highly suggest you check out this fine source of information for yourselves.  DO IT!!!