For me, 2012 was a bummer
of a year from a Rotisserie/fantasy perspective.
For the first time since
2008, I didn't win a single one of my leagues. Even worse, I tanked in both of
the expert leagues I play in: the CBS Analysts A.L.-only League and Tout Wars.
Today, I'll start by
flagellating myself in Tout Wars.
2012 Roto Think Tank,
N.L.-Only Tout Wars
#
|
Player
|
$
|
Sal
|
+/-
|
AVG
SAL
|
|
C
|
$11
|
$21
|
-10
|
$21
|
||
C
|
Yasmani Grandal
|
$9
|
$1
|
8
|
$1
|
|
1B
|
Aubrey Huff
|
$0
|
$10
|
-10
|
$11
|
|
2B
|
Orlando Hudson
|
$1
|
$6
|
-5
|
$5
|
|
SS
|
Rafael Furcal
|
$14
|
$10
|
4
|
$4
|
|
3B
|
Placido Polanco
|
$4
|
$12
|
-8
|
$8
|
|
CO
|
Scott Rolen
|
$6
|
$12
|
-6
|
$7
|
|
MI
|
Stephen Drew
|
$0
|
$9
|
-9
|
$10
|
|
OF
|
Yonder Alonso
|
$13
|
$11
|
2
|
$11
|
|
OF
|
Jason Bay
|
$2
|
$13
|
-11
|
$12
|
|
OF
|
Michael Bourn
|
$28
|
$29
|
-1
|
$29
|
|
OF
|
David DeJesus
|
$14
|
$9
|
5
|
$7
|
|
OF
|
Carlos Quentin
|
$11
|
$9
|
2
|
$11
|
|
UT
|
Bryce Harper
|
$24
|
$4
|
20
|
$6
|
|
P
|
Roy Halladay
|
$10
|
$29
|
-19
|
$30
|
|
P
|
Cole Hamels
|
$26
|
$23
|
3
|
$23
|
|
P
|
Jon Papelbon
|
$22
|
$19
|
3
|
$19
|
|
P
|
Carlos Marmol
|
$8
|
$15
|
-7
|
$15
|
|
P
|
Chad Billingsley
|
$11
|
$6
|
5
|
$8
|
|
P
|
Edwin Jackson
|
$12
|
$6
|
6
|
$6
|
|
P
|
Dillon Gee
|
$7
|
$3
|
4
|
$2
|
|
P
|
Antonio Bastardo
|
$4
|
$2
|
2
|
$2
|
|
P
|
Henry Rodriguez
|
$2
|
$1
|
1
|
$1
|
|
Total
|
$241
|
$260
|
-19
|
$254
|
||
Needless to say, it did not
work out well. Buying a $241 team isn't going to win you any titles even if all
of your free agent pick-ups and your trades work out, and I certainly didn't do
well in that regard either. But this team didn't lose because of lost
opportunities once the season was underway; this team was destined to lose at
the draft.
I went into this auction
the way I go into every auction: with an emphasis on pricing as opposed to
philosophy. While some owners to try target categories or certain types of
players through a tiered approach, I simply try to buy the best team possible
based on what the market is willing to give.
Coming into this auction, I
suspected it was possible that I might wind up spending more on pitching than
the $80-85 per team that auction-format Rotisserie teams spend on pitching.
Tout Wars typically spends even less (about $75-80 per team) and while I do try
to adjust my pitching bids downward, I decided it didn't make sense to push the
best pitchers so far down that I was letting another owner get Clayton Kershaw for $25.
The result is the
imbalanced team you see above. I spent $156 on offense and $104 on pitching.
And the pitching staff turned out to be quite good...even with the bath I took
on Halladay. Billingsley and Jackson did about what I expected them to do and
were the mild bargains I thought they would be. My hunch was dead on about Gee; obviously, his numbers would have been even better had he stayed healthy.
The challenge with the team
I bought wasn't the pitching, though, it was coaxing enough points out of the
offense to be competitive.
I wasn't naive. I knew this
coming out of the auction, as you can read in my recap here. I had purchased an old, rickety team, and
while I did buy 12 everyday players (if you include injured Drew and Quentin),
I needed nearly all of them to stay healthy, stay productive and keep their
jobs.
In the best case scenario,
Drew and Quentin were going to come back in May, the ancient infielders and Bay
were all going to bounce back to 2010 levels, and Alonso was going to be
serviceable. But I knew that all of that wasn't going to happen. Realistically, what I was hoping for was that some of these things
would happen and that there wouldn't be too many worst-case scenarios playing
out on my team. In this mid-range level of expectations, my hope was that
Harper would come up at the All-Star break and put up $8-10 worth of stats in
the second half.
Line A: 4811 AB, 1245 H,
590 R, 119 HR, 577 RBI, 121 SB, .259 BA
Line B: 5206 AB, 1452 H,
785 R, 141 HR, 648 RBI, 127 SB, .279 BA
Line A was what these
hitters produced in 2011. Line B was what these hitters produced in 2010. As I
noted in my recap, 2011 doesn't include Harper or Grandal and 2010 doesn't
include either one of those hitters or Alonso.
Line A would have produced
a 23.5 point offense in 2011's context. Line B would have produced a 35 point offense in 2010's context.
And that's what I thought I
needed to have a realistic shot to win: a 35-point offense to go along with a top shelf pitching staff.
Ninety-five points might not be enough, but drafting a 90+ point team would
have put me in position to make marginal improvements during the season that
might have allowed me to win.
Instead, the worst-case
scenario happened. Bay, Drew, Hudson, and Huff all crashed and burned, while Rolen and Polanco weren't much better. DeJesus and Alonso did what they
were supposed to do (yes, I know you mixed league readers are wistfully shaking your heads at us N.L.-only masochists), but when you have six of your 14 hitters fail you need
more than just mild wins on earnings versus salary. Along those lines, Harper
was terrific - and produced far more value than I thought he would - but
overall the offense earned a paltry $138. You don't need to crack
into the dollar valuation formulas to know that this sucks royally.
(For the record, I bought a
19-point offense).
Oddly enough, though, the
season didn't really feel lost until Halladay got hurt. Up until that point, it
seemed like I still had an outside chance. I had traded McCann for Carlos Ruiz and Nick
Hundley to Todd Zola before the season even started and Ruiz's performance made
that deal look like a coup. Then Harper was called up super early and it looked
like I was in a decent position. On the day Halladay went down in late May, I had 80 points
and was only eight points out of first. I was soft in the power categories but across
the board it looked like I might have a chance to compete.
The Halladay injury put me
in a position where I had to trade for pitching and I spent the rest of the
season zigging and zagging, robbing Peter to pay Paul ad infinitum. I'm not
going to waste your time going through every sad/pathetic move I made, but after
attempting to build up my offense with an ill-advised blow-the-budget FAAB bid
on Alex Presley, I wound up deciding to dump power in an ill-advised attempt to maximize my
pitching points.
Almost every move I made
after the Ruiz trade didn't go well. Emilio Bonifacio got hurt and my
opportunity to maximize stolen bases disappeared. Jon Niese and Matt Cain were
both solid but not enough to make up for Halladay's injury and then sudden
ineffectiveness. And my offense continued to sink into the swamp. And there was
plenty of bad luck. Dillon Gee's injury didn't impact me because I flipped him
to Phil Hertz...but I also tossed him Paul Maholm right before Maholm went on
that ridiculous run.
So another year, another
failure in Tout Wars. There was some bad luck but I simply have to do better.
No excuses on my end.
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