By limiting the draft to players who were available at the end of last year we would be severly limiting the rebuilding efforts of teams at the bottom of the league. The structured amount of draft dollars is the best way to get the good, young talent onto the teams that need them, rather than allowing players to be picked up via the fluid and often ambiguous timing of the waiver wire.
Teams who finished in the bottom half of the league should have a significant advantage in acquiring young talent. Players like LaPorta, Wieters, and Gamel (and that's just prospects named Matt!) should all go to the teams that need young talent - not the teams lucky enough to notice their appearance on the waiver wire or fortunate enough to get a trade for the top spot waiver position right before a call up.
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I just realized JRoss already has Gamel - so how about Matt Walker or Matt Ramirez also.
What about people who traded waiver spots at the end of last year in anticipation of using their new higher spot on one of these players? Do we get draft money for our waivers, or is that just too bad for us? (ie I traded Saito to get ahead of Steve in waivers...would not have done that if all the players not in the game were going to be drafted prior to hitting the waiver wire)
I never said this plan would be 100% fair, clearly, it isnt. However, that's the point - it should be very difficult for top teams to get young talent.
I understand your point about how you might have made different decisions last year without this idea - but don't you think this idea helps foster more competative balance? And isnt that worth a couple of unfortunate incidents of unfairness to the top teams? (I also made trades to move up my waiver position at the end of the year).
I think the risk is higher for the bottom teams in your idea. They need players, not empty spots that might not even accumulate into players. The top teams can afford to have a spot open and wait on a player who isn't in the system yet. What if I am in 15th place and my minor league player gets hurt? In our old system, that player staying down another year wouldnt matter. With your idea, I have lost my draft dollars, players I could have gotten with those draft dollars and possible future talent in my hurt and now unavailable player. Also, if I were a bottom team, I would rather see a top team be forced to trade a player or 2 for a top waiver spot than spend draft dollars to get that talent.
Another way of looking at your idea.....Right now, I think it is hard for the top teams to get good talent. Any and all talent available in the preseason this year goes to the bottom teams (unless they trade their money away) which is fine with me. So, you are proposing that adding more talent to the preseason draft equates to making young talent harder to come by for the better teams? I would have to disagree and say that a deeper talent pool in the preseason just means that the better teams will get some of that talent.
Wait a minute.... we're only drafting players from the league last year? We've ALWAYS included new guys... for example a couple years back I got DiceK. While I dont believe in giving rights to someone for a full year, they should be able to get the person if they are in teh system at the start of the year just like every other year............ Otherwise I'm really getting screwed
I have to say I agree with Zach here. Kyle: I'm pretty sure guys like DiceK, who will certainly be on a major league roster at the start of the season will be included in the draft. I think the players in question (and rightly so) are those that aren't giong to make it to the bigs until midway through the season or later. Foreign player who will be starting from day one will be available to be drafted.
Right... what I'm saying is that anyone in the yahoo system at the start of the year should be in the draft... sending them to free agents isn't fair to those of us higher in the draft... that's ALWAYS been our roster policy though... whoever is in the system is legal to draft
note that the ones that come in 2+ months into the season aren't usually in the yahoo league at the start of the season, they are added by yahoo as the season goes on. Why are we worrying about this anyway... is the draft before the yahoo league starts up again?
Kyle's point raises a dangerous problem: I would definitely consider drafting a player that may or may not make the Yahoo pool, I have little to lose and a lot to gain. Whereas a team that is rebuilding cannot afford to waste their draft dollars.
For example, say I choose to name Matt Wieters in an auction - how are we to determine what happens? Clearly he will be on a major league team this year (and probably early), but what if he isnt in the Yahoo system until he gets called up (let's say the latest is April)?
With our current system a bottom team might not want to outbid me, on the high probability that Wieters starts the season in the minors and isn't added to the Yahoo pool.
It is this specific reason why I suggested allowing players to be retained outside of the Yahoo system.
Perhaps a more just way of doing this would be to allow any player to be drafted, but only the bottom 5 teams can keep a player if he isn't in the Yahoo system. We could even say that if the player isnt in the pool by (April 15? May?) then the player is lost.
I'm just trying to think outside the box to help the competitive balance because I think the pool of available players is pretty weak.
And in response to Zach's comment that this idea is more high risk for bottom teams - that's crazy. Bottom teams are the ones that can afford to gamble because the marginal value of every roster spot is lower (because the overall talent level is lower).
How can the top teams afford to have a player that isnt in the system (and thus not contributing)? The top teams are competing for this year! I wouldnt want to draft someone like Trevor Cahill because his status is undetermined and the possibility of him contributing to a title run this year is minimal. Whereas a bottom level team can afford to stash him for 6 months to see if he comes up and has a Lincecum/Volquez/Billingsly/Weaver like debut.
Zach sais "I think it is hard for the top teams to get good talent. Any and all talent available in the preseason this year goes to the bottom teams"
Im making one simple point - other than a few Japanese imports expected to have Kuroda-like impacts (maybe a little better) and a couple of tenuous closer situations that could be capitalized on, what decent players are we drafting? The LaPorta's, Cahill's, Wieters etc of the world (the only available players with any significant chance to become top-level talent)SHOULD NOT end up on teams that are in contention this year (unless they are traded for at high costs).
One final point - this would be much simpler if Yahoo merely added players who had any MLB experience to the pool, or if there was a logical method to the addition of players to the pool, but there isnt. I picked up Tim Lincecum MONTHS before he made his debut, he was added to the Yahoo system before his debut - I only got him because I was crazy enough to search the Yahoo system for the top 100 prospects. Zach added Clay Bucholtz in a similar fashion.
Personally I think we should have a five round straight draft of non yahoo minor leaugers. By the way, the day long auction for each player is going to be a clusterfuck. With all the owners and co-owners we now have, there has to be a uniform date at least one representative from each team can make. If not, there's always larry the surrogate. He's a pro.
At this point I just want an answer to 1 question as I understand this is ALL speculation....
What is the current policy for THIS year's draft?
Aka, if they are in the yahoo system at the start of the season (like it has been) OR if we are restricting to those who were in the system at the end of last year.
Kyle - current rule is this: On the day of the draft, whoever is in the yahoo system and not on someones team is eligable to be drafted.
And in response to Lance's comments (and btw, im not upset or mad, just enjoying some preseason fantasy baseball banter)
You said "How can the top teams afford to have a player that isnt in the system (and thus not contributing)? ". We all carry players already that we dont play. I had buchholz the whole year and it didnt affect me. You held Bedard the whole year in hopes that he gets better. Thats no different than holding an empty spot for a minor leaguer. So, in response, not only can the top teams afford to hold onto empty spots, we already kinda do.
I agree when you say the top teams should not have access to the top prospects. I am arguing that adding these players to the draft actually does make them available to the top teams.
Instead of arguing more, here are some more ideas (i dont necessarily agree with them) to let the bottom teams have the young talent:
* Reorganize waivers at the beginning of the new season. Last place gets 1st waiver on up to the first place team getting the last waiver
* Have a snake draft of the minor league players for the bottom half of the league. If a top teams wants in, he has to trade for one of the draft spots
*Allow bottom 1/2 of the league to hold more players than the top half during the year
* Start doing a league where you keep 1/2 your team at the end of the season and we redraft the rest
** OR, we just stay like we are. Look at JRoss(Longoria, Price, Kershaw) and Kyle(Bruce, Scherzer, Morrow) that is some good talent and in a few years these players will be dominant...our current system allows for a team to accumulate talent if that is their goal. I think we should stick with it.
Zach - you said the current rule is "On the day of the draft, whoever is in the yahoo system and not on someones team is eligable to be drafted"
I dont think the Yahoo system will be available on the day of the draft.
why are we drafting so early then?
And only 1 of 2 options I see for helping the bottom half would really "help" right imo....
1) redo waivers each year
2) allow bottom half to keep 1 extra spot... not on yahoo...
and being in last I really dont like #2. #1 sounds great.
Several things:
1. Perhaps the available players are the one's with Yahoo pages?
2. I am all for a waiver-wire re-do or allowing additional roster spots outside of Yahoo for bottom teams
3. I like our day-long draft concept. I havent had any work to do today (everyone can thank me for so adequately securing the Homeland later) and I only count about 25-30 players worth drafting. And we definitely have 25 days to draft.
I said on the day of the draft assuming that the draft was one day long and that it would be taking place after fantasy baseball registration begins. Im pretty sure the system was available in the day of the draft last year.
it was zach. that i know.
Kyle, don't freak out. Leagues opened last year on the first of february. That said, the availability of the player you wanted was a calculated gamble. Yahoo has never exhibited logical behavior on this subject.
As far as the logistics of the auction are concerned, any rational bidder will wait until almost midnight before submitting a bid. After all, what would be the point of bidding early? Doing so only ups the price since the bidding will end at a fixed time independent of the pace of the bidding. This will result in a mass of owners submitting bids at nearly the same time, creating the aforementioned clusterfuck.
well my "midnight" is after all yours so since I have the most points I can easily outbid where I want......
If you don't catch the sarcasm in this post on a serious thread... sigh.
And conner... I just don't want to get the first pick out of all the rejects from last year... the draft is a chance for me to get the first and best out of who is going to be there this year... yes I have my eyes set on a gamble... but it doesn't mean that I loose if he doesn't pan out.....
so, i haven't been able to check this for like 2 days and all of a sudden there's 23 comments on a post!
i want to respond to a couple of points:
1st, zach did not pick up clay buchholz by searching for each of the top 100 (which i do about once a month); he saw something on baseball tonight and saw that he was a f.a. and nabbed him, while i had been searching for him all year but apparently hadn't searched in over a week at that point. not bitter at all...
second, lance's proposal does create more risk for bottom teams. but, as a "risk professional," i can tell you that risk is opportunity (this is the slogan of the Society of Actuaries!). risk here involves not just the probability of loss, but also the probability of gain. a lower team should aim to increase the variance in future results, because the mean of this distribution is low. if a lower team aims to solidify his position, he will hurt his chances of improvement. if he takes chances, he could do terrible or he could do a lot better; it seems that this latter choice gives him the best chance at winning the league.
the risk attached to these players that may or may not enter the player pool this year will lower their value in an auction, and if a lower team takes a risk on several of these players and it pays off across the board, this team will likely be 1 to 2 years away from being in the better half of the league (any team in this league is capable of adding 3-5 top players and solidifying a spot in the top half, imo).
personally, i like lance's idea. we can keep track of it on the spreadsheet that i constantly e-mail to the league. however, implementing it this year would require a consensus due to the impact on last year's strategy that zach correctly points out.
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