A link to my Tout Wars Review.
A link to my LABR Review.
A link to my FSTA Review.
A link to my SiriusXM Experts League Review.

THE SETUP

The Wreck Room in San Francisco hosted the first Bay Area Roto Fantasy League (thanks Tod). How did the event turn out once the season was complete?

12 team mixed league, 28 rounds

Offense: OBP, HR, RBI, RUNS, SB

Pitching: QS, ERA, WHIP, K, SV
* QS = quality starts

THE DRAFT

Here’s the team I rostered out of the 9th hole. Round in Parenthesis.

C: Matt Wieters (13), Blake Swihart (22)

1B: Miguel Cabrera (1), Mark Trumbo (14)

2B: Robinson Cano (3), Daniel Murphy (21)

3B: Todd Frazier (6), Josh Harrison (23), Pablo Sandoval (28)

SS: Brad Miller (19), Asdrubal Cabrera (25)

OF: Mookie Betts (2), Ryan Braun (4), Christian Yelich (8), Adam Eaton (9), Hanley Ramirez (12), Jayson Werth (24)

SP: Johnny Cueto (5), Tyson Ross (7), Jordan Zimmermann (10), James Shields (15), Yordano Ventura (17), Anibal Sanchez (27)

RP: Dellin Betances (11), Hector Rondon (16), Francisco Rodriguez (18), Carter Capps (20), Joaquin Benoit (26)

Here is an audio review of the Draft.

WHAT WENT RIGHT

You couldn’t have taken four better players to start out a draft, could you? Seriously.

Miggy went .393-38-108-92-0 (remember, this is an OBP league).

Betts went .363-31-113-122-26

Cano went .350-39-103-107-0

Braun went .365-30-91-80-16

Good luck taking four better offensive players than that in the first four rounds.

I took my first arm in Cueto in the 5th round. He performed exactly as I had hoped… which was counter to what pretty much everyone else in the world thought as I was repeatedly berated for thinking that Cueto could be a low end SP1 or an elite SP2. In his first season with the Giants he was a star with 18 wins, five loses and 219.2 innings pitched. He also struck out 198 batter, the second best mark of his career, with a 2.79 ERA and 1.09 WHIP.

Frazier had a soul crushing .302 OBP, but I still say 40 homers, 98 RBI, 89 runs and 15 steals from the third base position you are a stupendous performer.

Yelich nearly went 20/10 with 100 RBI as he posted a .376 OBP.

Eaton posted a solid .362 OBP and the counting numbers were solid including 14 homers and 14 steals, along with 59 RBI and 91 runs scored.

HanRam had a .361 OBP and a hot second half propelled him to a strong 30-111-81 counting category line along with nine steals.

Trumbo had a league average .316 OBP, but as a 14th round cost a guy that goes 47-108-94 is a star.

WHAT WENT WRONG

My pitching staff.

Ross threw 5.1 innings.

Zimmermann tossed 105.1 innings of utter crap (4.87 ERA, 1.37 WHIP over 19 outings).

Shields was the worst starting pitcher in baseball (6-19, 6.77 ERA, 1.58 WHIP, 40 homers allowed).

Ventura was his normal disastrous self going 11-12 with a 4.45 ERA, 1.44 WHIP, too many walks and constant worries about suspensions and blow ups.

The Rondon add screwed me when the Cubs brought into town Aroldis Chapman to close.

Capps blew out his arm.

Benoit didn’t get saves or pitch effectively until the season was old.

TRADES/WAIVERS

I made two huge trades.

DEAL 1: I sent Robinson Cano and Steven Wright out to get back Melvin Upton and Madison Bumgarner on June 12th. This deal ended up being a huge win for me. Wright struggled in the second half with performance and injury, and as the review above showed I was in desperate need of an arm and MadBum brought me exactly when I needed.

DEAL 2: I sent out Mookie Betts to get back Brian Dozier and Felix Hernandez on April 29th. Remember, I needed pitching. Thought I was getting that. Whoops. King Feliz posted a 4.07 ERA, 1.33 WHIP and had 96 strikeouts in just 121.2 innings in the worst effort of his career. At least Dozier went bonkers hitting 39 homers with 88 RBI, 91 runs, 15 steals and a .348 OBP on my squad. From April 29th on here are Betts numbers: 27-99-103-21 with a .373 OBP. That’s right. Deal still worked for me even with Felix struggling so profoundly since Dozier was almost as good as Betts the last five months, and that type of effort out of a second baseman is stupendous.

For how I handled my pitching staff, see the next section. 

 

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CONCLUSION

I finished fifth out of 12 teams. Shocker, yet another mediocre finish. The offense was pretty darn effective, but oh that pitching staff. It was a total battle there folks. How much of a battle? I’m going to post two things in this final section. First, the picture of the standings. Second, I’ll post a picture of all the pitchers I used on my squad this season and what their numbers were in the games that they actually pitched for me. Can’t blame for not giving it the old college try. I certainly battled at every turn.

STANDINGS
*'I'm obviously team S RAY'S TEAM.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MY PITCHING RESULTS