I doth protest?

It's been a long time since I've played Monopoly, but I do enjoy that game. When I played it as a kid, I liked the different playing pieces (the top hat was my favorite), the various cards, and of course the colorful money. Once the game finally started, you could get down to the business of trying to totally dominate your opponents and ultimately monopolize the board.

And what would a game of Monopoly be without the haggling and dealmaking? I think some of my fondest memories of Monopoly are the different trades I made, tried to make, or observed other people make. And naturally, there would be arguments. Perhaps you would try in vain to get someone to accept your offer--or worse, you'd try to talk someone else out of making a deal that you thought would put another player "over the top."

But in Monopoly, at the end of the day each player is the master of his or her own domain. You might be mad that a certain deal is going through, but you can't stop it. (At least those were the house rules I always used.)

Fantasy baseball, on the other hand, is quite different when it comes to trades. Two adults can consent to a deal they both find amiable, but then the rest of the league can submit their protests and vote it down. Apparently, people think this is a good check to have in case two players try to collude or if one player ain't too smart and might ruin the fun for everyone else.

The "Monopoly way" of doing trades always made more sense to me. I mean, yeah, the point is to try and rip off the other guy in Monopoly--or at the very least improve your standing relative to the other players better than the other guy. The only exception to this that I could see (aside from collusion) would be if you cut a deal just to stay alive in the game. But even in that scenario, you're giving yourself an infinitely better chance of winning. (The difference between certain defeat or living to play another turn.)

What I find weird about the "fantasy baseball way" of doing trades is that the system is a tug of war between common-sense competitiveness and an unwritten code of conduct. And really, the unwritten code of conduct seems to always win out.

For example, the perennial UPL powerhouse O.N. Thugs recently saw their 2B go down with an injury. So he scrambled to make a deal for a 2B (trading away James Loney for Orlando Hudson). Strictly from a competitive standpoint, I see a move that my opponent wants to make, and I have it within my means to try and block it. Shouldn't I attempt to do so? If so, then it makes sense for me to cast my vote against the trade--and work to convince other owners to do the same until we kill the deal.

But I probably won't bother to try.

Why? I'm not really sure. My best guess is that it's the unwritten code.

Let's go back to Monopoly. Imagine a 5-player game, and it's fairly early on. Only two of the five players have monopolies, so they're considered the leaders. These two leaders then enter into a deal that will leave both of them with two monopolies (double what they had before). If, hypothetically speaking, the other three players have the option of voting against the deal, shouldn't they vote it down? I would say so. Yet in fantasy baseball, trades that help a strong team are allowed through all the time.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying all trades should be blocked or that anytime a good team tries to make a trade it should be blocked. What I'm saying is that it's weird how the checks and balances of a fantasy baseball trade only go one way. In theory, once two players make a trade, the rest of the league takes a look at it and each owner decides for himself whether the trade is "fair." If it's deemed fair, the trade goes through. If not, it gets nixed. But technically, even if an owner thinks a trade is reasonable, he could protest it for purely strategic reasons. (Yet this almost never happens.)

As for me, early in my first year of fantasy baseball I decided I'd try to stay out of the protest business. I wouldn't mess with anyone else's trades as long as they didn't mess with mine. I think part of my calculus here is that it's fun to make trades, so I didn't want to risk starting a trade-blockade war. But I'm not sure the idea of letting any "reasonable" trade go through helps me from a competitive standpoint. In fact, there are certain players in the league who I should probably protest any trade they make (unless of course I secretly think the trade will hurt their team).

And what makes for a "reasonable" or "fair" trade anyway? I suppose in a non-keeper league certain things can be measured, such as how a player had done in the past and, if relevant, how that player has done so far that year. So in that case, you're trying to estimate how the players involved in the trade will do over the next 2 to 6 months.

But what about a keeper league? Doesn't the fact that you can keep players for the next year (and possibly for 5, 10, or 15 years) drastically change the equation? Isn't it possible you could propose a trade that the majority of owners will see as "obviously unfair to you," only to discover 5 years later that it was unfair to the other guy? (Except for the fact the trade was voted down and never happened. Lucky for the other guy...)

Back when a keeper league was first proposed in the UPL, I made a few comments about how the nature of trades might change. (During that discussion, one thing I neglected to explicitly say was that the restriction on the number of players traded in a season would replace the current system of letting owners or the commish vote on whether or not a trade was "fair." Also, I'm not necessarily advocating a change to that system. I only bring it up for discussion purposes.)

This season we've already had one interesting case where a trade was autovetoed. Back on April 14, Westy's Sluggers wanted to trade way:
Lance Berkman
Matt Holliday

to Phatsnapper for:
Joe Mauer
Elijah Dukes
Jon Lester

A lot of people didn't like the trade, and ultimately the commish vetoed it. (Phatsnapper went into a rage on message board when the deal was autovetoed. But in fairness, Westy's Sluggers didn't seem to mind that the trade was nixed.)

What's interesting is that at the time of the trade, Joe Mauer was on the DL, but he's since come off the DL and gone on the hottest hitting tear of his career. Granted, we all know that Mauer will cool off, but it is possible that this spike in power won't taper off completely. For the next few years, he might hit more homers than he has in the past. He's only 26, and it's possible that he'll continue to develop as a hitter. (And who knows, maybe he is fed up with hearing everyone say that Matt Wieters is "Joe Mauer with Power.") My main point here is that I never would have guessed Mauer would come off the DL and hit like this right away. In that regard, my original assessment of this trade has been proven wrong.

But then again, I wouldn't be surprised if next week Mauer draws another "Go straight to the DL" card. In the meantime, I've got to figure out if it's worth trying to block this Orlando Hudson deal...

The World's Best Illusion

The no-look pass in basketball. The end reverse in football. In sports, as in life, the successful use of an illusion can trick your opponent into seeing one thing when actually something different is happening; and in that moment--if you're the master of the illusion--you have gained the upper hand, if only for a moment.

At a recent gathering of neuroscientists and psychologists, they chose an entry from a Bucknell professor as the world's best illusion. And what was his entry about?

The curveball. (Check it out.)

In it to win it

So we're about a month into the baseball season, and here are the UPL's standings thus far:

Rank		Team	Points	Pts Change	Waiver	Moves
1.		'90 Reds	96	2	2	9
2.		Black Sox	94.5	4.5	6	3
3.		Westy's Sluggers	93.5	1	7	14
4.		Muddy Mush Heads	90.5	3	4	5
5.		O.N. Thugs	82.5	-5.5	5	15
6.		IamJabrone	81.5	-3.5	9	18
7.		IStillSuckCurveballs	78	1	1	4
8.		Cheeseheads	76.5	0.5	8	10
9.		TheJimmyDixLongballs	73.5	-4	3	7
9.		Phatsnapper	73.5	-3	10	17
11.		Benver Droncos	55	2.5	11	10
12.		Hats for Bats	41	1.5	12	14

Just like last year, an early weakness for my team is speed. What's especially frustrating is how far behind I've fallen in this category.

But it's not all bad. As you can see from the above standings, my team is off to a decent start. My points are slightly inflated (perhaps by as much as 5 points) due to my innings pitched running well ahead of the league's allowed pace. But even so, at 91 points my team would still be in the hunt.

The only thing that has surprised me with my team is how well my starting pitching has held up. Every single one of my starters so far is performing as well or better than I had hoped. Some might say I've been lucky in that regard, and that may be true. But I also have to give myself some credit. None of my starters are playing "above their heads." For the most part, I think they all can keep up what they're doing. (Maybe a slight letdown, but not much. Dan Haren can be one of the league's best pitchers. Wandy Rodriguez and Edwin Jackson can remain solid. Ryan Dempster isn't doing as well as he did last year, but this is about what I expected from him. Javier Vazquez is striking people out; and Joe Saunders is the Anti-Vazquez--he'll get the Ws but not the Ks.)

You often hear people say that fantasy baseball, especially a roto league, is a "six-month marathon." But just like in a real marathon, you want to have a good start. A month into the season, I've managed to get off the porch and start running with the big dogs. My team has the potential to be very competitive in every single category except steals. So I'll see what I can do about snagging some more steals without sacrificing my competitiveness in another category.

Here's hoping the '90 Reds are running like a well-oiled machine in June...

Trivia: Throwin' heat

Who was the first Major League pitcher to officially be clocked at over 100mph on the radar gun during a game?

Nick Adenhart - R.I.P.

A projected top 5 pick who slipped all the way to the 14th round because of an injury, Nick Adenhart climbed all the way up the ladder to make it into the big leagues. Sadly, that all came to an end last night.

Is there a curse on MLB pitchers? I mean, yeah, they make up 50% of the league, but they seem to comprise a much higher percentage of the unexpected deaths.

Draft postmortem

So we had the UPL draft yesterday. It was fun as usual, but it was also a reminder of how the more things change, the more they stay the same.

For starters, I showed up to spring training out of shape. Every year I say to myself, "Two weeks before the draft I'm going to start preparing." But what really happens is that my preparation is minimal until I wake up early on draft day and read what I can. I'm kind of like Shaquille O'Neal in the sense that I just play myself into shape. It's probably not until the middle of May that I have a solid grasp of who's who on each team, which farm systems have the top prospects, and how that all applies to the fantasy baseball decisions I should have been making the first six weeks of the season. By that time I've either caught lightning in a bottle and my team is a force to reckon with, or I'm mired in 7th place and posting poor imitations of Weird Al songs on the message board.

In other draft news, Westy and Benver were no-shows again. (And they both were the first to complain about their teams on the message board--again.) Phatsnapper told us how many fantasy leagues he's in--again. ISSC drafted the entire Red Sox roster--again. JimmyDix nearly drafted the entire White Sox roster (and will likely trade for "the ones who got away")--again. C-Lauff took Albert Pujols with his first pick--again. Whenever someone with either unproven talent or a culturally diverse name (or both) was picked, Roland never missed the opportunity to ask, "Who the hell is that?"--again. And I had about half of my picks openly questioned or even mocked--again.

To that last point, that's actually one of my favorite aspects of fantasy baseball. In the real world, it's rather difficult to get honest feedback from people. But in an online draft room or message board about a game, well, people just let it fly; and in that context, I'm all about honest feedback, putdowns, and outright taunting.

Getting back to how I prepare the morning of the draft, I do come up with some lists for each position, but they're not long. In fact, I usually only have a few names of players that "I like" at each position. And by "like," I'm referring to whether or not the value they provide matches up with the round I can draft them in. (For example, last year I scratched Albert Pujols from my 1B choices. Although, I'm not sure which was dumber: Scratching Pujols from my list or reminding you that I did.)

Admittedly, this year was tougher for me to come up with my player rankings. That could be because there were seemingly more injuries to star players, or it could be that the more I learn about fantasy baseball the more I don't know.

I picked 8th in the first round and could have gone in a few different directions. I think Ryan Braun was the highest Y!-rated player still on the board, but I went with Ryan Howard. Before the draft I noticed that Howard's 48 jacks last season cleared the field by 8--and he would be returning this season to a similar situation (same championship-caliber team minus the inconsistent Pat Burrell). Furthermore, I had read that Howard came into spring training in better shape than usual and is focused on getting off to a fast April start (which he hasn't done the past two seasons). This, of course, doesn't mean he'll get off to a fast April start. Heck, it doesn't even mean he'll do as well as last year. But at the end of the day, he's had a great track record for power numbers the past three seasons, and he's a proven winner. I do recognize that his numbers have been dropping and his OBP was relatively low last season, but hey, that's why he's not a top 5 pick.

Rather than give my reasoning for each pick, I'll just show my team here:

C Victor Martinez (1B)
1B Ryan Howard
2B Mike Aviles (SS)
3B Aramis Ramirez
SS Stephen Drew
OF Carlos Beltran
OF Manny Ramirez
OF Justin Upton
Util Milton Bradley
Util Conor Jackson (1B, OF)

SP Dan Haren
SP Javier Vazquez
SP Ryan Dempster
SP Joe Saunders

RP Joe Nathan
RP Brian Wilson
RP Chad Qualls
RP Troy Percival

BN Pablo Sandoval (C, 3B, OF)
BN Ian Stewart (2B, 3B)

Note: Rajai Davis, Eric Byrnes, Wandy Rodriguez, and Dana Eveland have been excluded from the above list in order to make my draft look less sucky.)

Some years I feel pretty good after the draft. If I've accumulated nearly all of my targeted players and have seemingly built a team without any glaring weaknesses, then I'm happy. I don't think I've ever had a draft where I haven't second-guessed a pick immediately afterward, but I have had drafts where I felt that I did really well.

This year it was a mixed bag for me. On offense, I think we've got a great shot at putting up competitive power numbers. But my team is lacking in speed, and the past few champions have been very competitive in steals. I'm less happy with my pitching, but it might turn out okay. I could have done much worse than Haren as my #1 starter and Nathan as my #1 closer. But after those two guys, things get dicey. Maybe I should have reached for Matt Capps and Joakim Soria--especially Soria in a keeper league. Should I have taken Roy Oswalt instead of Vazquez? In hindsight, probably. But Vazquez will have more K's and who knows how he'll do in a new environment. (Plus I'm just now learning that Oswalt has been much healthier the past five seasons than I had realized.)

A few final comments on my team. I do think that I've drafted enough to be dangerous. If my team gets off to a hot start (and let's face it, any team could get off to a hot start), then more options will become available to me in the way of trades and/or knowing what I need to grab from the waiver wire. I also like the versatility of my team. For the infield, I have at least two players with eligibility at each position (C, 1B, 2B, 3B, SS). And with Victor Martinez as my catcher, he'll actually be playing a lot at 1B and DH. So not only will that mean he should tire out less, but his manager has gone on record saying he'll find a way to get Martinez in the lineup every day. (Here's hoping that come September I won't be -30 games at catcher.)

So who do I think had the best draft? Well, after reviewing the tape, I was startled to see the batting lineup of the Black Sox. My best chance at outdoing his offensive production might be to buy him off. But the Black Sox seemed less fortunate on the pitching side. As such, I've got to go with the Thugs. On paper, his team looks the best heading into this season. His starting pitching and bullpen are loaded, and it looks like he'll have enough on offense.

Let the games begin.

The calm before the storm

When I wake up the morning of the fantasy baseball draft, I feel like a kid on Christmas Day ready to rip into all of his presents. Sure, I have some ideas as to what I might get, but there also will be a few surprises along the way.

As I type this post I already feel the adrenaline starting to simmer. Once the draft starts on Saturday morning, I'll have a good adrenaline rush going and the time will fly by.

This year it's a keeper league, so that alters the strategy--and raises the stakes. This draft will be our most important one yet.

As a blogger, most people on the Internet only know me for the words I write. They don't know what I look like or how I act in "real life." This year I've decided to start changing that by posting videos where I share some of my innermost thoughts. As such, today I got together with a few friends who helped me make an amateur music video. It's based on a song that I wrote last night when I couldn't sleep. In this song I express my raw emotions for this upcoming draft. I know this video is not much, but it's the best my friends and I could do on such short notice. I hope you like it...

'Tis the season for giving

In the spirit of Christmas, I figured that it was time to give a gift on this blog. But not just any gift. Yes, you guessed it… it’s time for another prestigious award.

I usually steer clear of politics on this blog, so please forgive me as I give a brief background for this award. Back in 2007, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton launched her campaign to become the first woman elected President of the United States. She began her campaign letting the voters in our great country know that she wanted to have a “conversation” with us. She wanted us, as Americans, to explore ideas together and have an open and honest dialogue.

While Senator Clinton’s campaign for president ultimately fell short, her conversation continues to this day. Last month, President-elect Barack Obama nominated Clinton to be U.S. Secretary of State where she will be able to continue this conversation all around the globe.

The My Baseball Fantasy blog recognizes Senator Hillary Clinton as our country’s soon-to-be top diplomat who, above all else, is committed to the conversation and just so happens to be a lifelong Yankees fan, too. For these reasons, and others, I am proud to unveil the most prestigious award this blog has ever bestowed upon a reader: “The Hillary Clinton Conversation Award.”

The “Hillary Clinton Conversation Award” (or “Hillary” for short) goes to reader who, over the course of the year, adds the most to the baseball conversation on this blog. While this award favors quality over quantity, a poster’s entire body of work (for that year) is considered.

Deciding who would win the Hillary this year was an extremely difficult task. Having never done this before, I first tried various subjective methods to calculate points and kept getting a different winner each time. As such, I was essentially stuck with a four-way tie. With it being Christmas and all, I thought that would actually be a nice story—just give the first-ever Hillary to all four of my readers. But then I thought, “No, this award needs to have some integrity.”

So how to break the tie?

Just when all seemed hopeless, I remembered a post of mine from late July. It was titled, “What if?” In it, I pondered what a regular MLB fan should do if they just so happened to be in the dugout when a bench-clearing brawl breaks out. I was careful not to say too much in the post, because I wanted to see how readers would connect the dots on their own.

In reality, the situation I described in the “What if” post gives the reader only two choices: Stay in the dugout and break from the brotherhood—a dishonor so disgraceful that your entire experience would be wrecked; or save face and go out there and get your butt totally kicked in.

Now some people might say, “I’ll go out there and really hold my own!” Well, not so fast. First off, remember that you’re a regular fan. MLB players are professional athletes, and regular fans are not. Even the journeymen are professional athletes. Just because a guy has a .216 batting average or a 6.83 ERA doesn’t mean you could “hold your own” with them in a fight. You’d get your ass kicked. Badly.

On the other hand, others might say, "I'd just stay in the dugout." Well, okay, you'd only be breaking the most sacred of unwritten sports rules: Protect your teammates.

So as I’m pondering this dilemma, a possible (albeit ugly) solution does come to mind. During these bench-clearing brawls, it’s not just MLB players who join the melee. It’s coaches, too; and some of those guys are really getting up there in years. I then remembered the time a few years back when Don Zimmer charged Pedro Martinez who, in self defense, pushed an already stumbling Zimmer down to the ground. (Martinez caught hell for that in the media, but I honestly always thought Zimmer was lucky that nothing worse happened to him.) In any case, as I was writing the “What if” post I thought to myself, “Well, if I were ever in one of those brawls, my best bet would be to find a guy like Zimmer…”


I finished my post by posing this question to the readers: “My question to you, the regular fan sitting in the dugout, is this: What would you do and why?”

Lo and behold, Chairman Gau gave a concise answer that still managed to touch on all of the major themes that I had been considering. Here are his golden words verbatim:

“I think that I go out there, swinging, and go down in infamy. Maybe go find Don Zimmer or some other old dude.”

So Chairman Gau, with your countless insights into the game of baseball, off-color humor, and willingness to admit that in an MLB brawl your best shot at respectability would be to find Don Zimmer, you have contributed to the conversation on this blog more than any of the other six billion people on this planet. As such, My Baseball Fantasy proudly presents you with "The 2008 Hillary Clinton Conversation Award."

Congratulations, Chairman Gau!