Thanks for everyone’s comments on the first NFBC post. There were a lot of good hitters (Damon, C.Guillen, B.Hall, etc.) and closers (M.Rivera, Street, Hoffman) available when we took Carpenter, but we couldn’t pass up on the value of getting him in the 4th. I’ve never had a 1-2 like Santana and Carpenter, it will be fun to find out what that’s like!

Anyway, I finished putting the complete 2007 NFBC Chicago league 4 draft

into my program tonight, generated the projected standings and here’s what we have (Pat and I are team 12):

TM	AVG	R	HR	RBI	SB	W	SV	ERA	SO	WHIP	PTS
13	.2845	1071	270	1062	138	104	44	3.872	1106	1.256	104.5
12	.2755	1041	271	1028	135	83	72	3.615	1076	1.223	95.5
5	.2806	1077	291	1086	109	93	74	4.110	1175	1.316	95.0
6	.2841	1062	242	981	160	96	11	3.844	1075	1.262	90.5
1	.2804	1106	286	1073	101	65	107	3.802	897	1.301	88.5
9	.2865	1149	252	1071	104	84	47	3.819	1022	1.275	88.5
3	.2831	1034	235	955	152	82	92	3.847	1095	1.270	84.5
8	.2911	1059	219	925	147	65	54	3.682	918	1.248	80.5
2	.2765	1041	298	1027	127	90	49	4.058	1156	1.320	77.0
7	.2756	999	267	947	110	108	44	3.811	1256	1.307	74.5
14	.2741	1032	259	967	173	86	62	4.003	1095	1.307	72.5
4	.2860	995	253	1009	90	90	53	3.867	1075	1.275	70.0
11	.2778	1006	280	1044	100	84	106	4.014	964	1.325	63.5
10	.2906	950	220	906	112	69	84	3.936	972	1.306	58.0
15	.2835	1007	224	900	136	64	56	3.879	936	1.265	57.0

(Note that in the complete draft results spreadsheet, an "R" next to the team number indicates that I counted this as a reserve pick and didn’t include the player in the projected stats, so these represent projections for the opening day 23-man roster for each team. Obviously waiver wire and bench players will influence this, but this is still pretty useful for comparing the strength of each team’s draft.)

As expected, we’re right near the top of the league thanks to the expected awesomeness of Santana and Carpenter, plus a lot of sluggers and enough speed and bullpen to get by. The extremely low AVG obviously hurts us, and obviously we’re taking a huge risk on the production of our key youngsters, Chris Young and B.J. Upton. But I’m using the same overall set of projections for everyone, so if the projections equally balance risk and reward for all players, then our upside is pretty high…

What’s particularly encouraging about this is that we are projected for only 1261.2 IP, 10th out of the 15-team league. However, we are projected to lead the league in ERA and WHIP by fairly sizable margins, so we should be able to take some additional risks to rack up more W and K’s without risking our lead in those categories. And there’s the value of those two aces!

 

11:10 p.m. — OK, here’s the story. For those of you who haven’t heard,the East Coast got pummeled by a major snow and ice storm between Thursday and
Friday. So by the time I got to work Friday morning, my flight to Chicago that afternoon had already been cancelled, along with every other flight out of
the three major NYC area airports. After a frantic online, phone call and
AIM search (with Pat’s travel agent), I managed to get on an 8:00 flight this morning. Problem is, it was out
of Islip, the Long
Island regional airport. I got there in plenty of time, but there’s
only one de-icing machine for the entire airport, and as of 10:30 they hadn’t even de-iced the two other planes
scheduled to leave before us. Obviously I wasn’t getting out before noon or maybe even later, so I gritted my teeth, cancelled the flight
and headed home.

I got home just in time for the draft to start at 1:00 p.m. ET, and must give major props to the
NFBC organizers who set up the conference call dial-up for those of us who were
trying to participate remotely. Pat worked the draft on-site, and I texted
suggestions and thoughts to him throughout, while listening to the draft on the
conference call and working the draft on the laptop. It wasn’t ideal, but at
least I was in the game. I had to split after 18 rounds so Pat finished up the
rest with only sporadic input by me. (There were three picks I would have done VERY differently than he did, but I won’t name names. My boy did a fine job flying solo under unexpected circumstances.)

Anyway, we knew it would be unpredictable when Utley went fifth overall,
Holliday went 10th and Hafner (DH only) went 11th. Vladdy was our first choice
but went eighth, so we opted for Cabrera’s four-category upside over
Wright’s additional speed. (Yes, we may regret that later, but you make the best decision based on available information at the time.) It got stranger after that, as Derrek Lee went 15th, far earlier than expected… then our second choice, Teixeira, went right before us.
So with our 18th pick, we had multiple choices we never anticipated being able
to choose from: Santana, Sizemore and Jeter. We love Grady and Jeter, but Santana was too good a
value at that point and we took him.

Meanwhile, Furcal went 29th overall, Oswalt went 34th, K-Rod
went 37th and Nathan went 41st, all of them a few to several picks earlier than expected. We had hoped for Brian Roberts in the fourth
round, but fearing being shut out of prime speed guys altogether, we took him
in the third; Figgins went two picks later. And then there was Cris Carpenter
sitting there in the fourth (49th) so, once again, we felt we had to take the
best available player, one who was at least a round beyond fair value. I’ve never had two big aces before, I wonder what it will be like!

From that point it was a scramble to build out the offense and bullpen,
as can be plainly seen, since we didn’t anticipate taking a starter before the sixth or seventh round and instead we already had two after four rounds. Folks, don’t try this at home. We did have a shot at some speed guys throughout the
next few rounds, but feeling we would have a harder time finding power bats, we
opted for Sheffield and Sexson. And then to compound the
problem, guys like Kinsler, Kendrick and Barfield all went several rounds
earlier than we had anticipated.

By the time the ninth round came around, there was no choice
but to take Chris Young… let’s hope he pans out like last year’s ninth round
speed stab, Corey Patterson! Same deal with Upton in the 15th… let’s hope that
our friend Bill Chastain is right and Upton plays all over the place, enough to
get 30 or so steals. We’re gonna need ‘em. From that point on it was pretty much "best available."

Obviously our batting average is going to be weak, we’re
still short on speed, and a third closer wouldn’t hurt. But compare this team
to what we had last year coming out of the draft, and realize it’s actually not too bad, possibly even pretty good:

* Catchers:

2006: Martin and Barajas

2005: Barrett and Lieberthal

Edge: Martin will give us more steals than Barrett, with
a decent average and some pop. All Barajas has to do is play to be better than
Lieberthal. Even, possibly a slight edge this year.

* Corners:

2006: Sexson, M.Cabrera and Lowell

2005: Thome, Glaus and Encarnacion

Edge: Cabrera will lift this trio to a higher average
than last year, and his handful of steals will make a wash with Encarnacion. A
little less power but otherwise virtually identical. Even.

* Middles:

2006: Roberts, O.Cabrera and DeRosa

2005: Loretta, Jeter and Belliard

Edge: Roberts won’t match Jeter but he’s very solid at worst and I’m banking on a breakout season (.300/18/65/35/110) that could approach what Jeter did last season.
Cabrera is better than either Loretta or Belliard, and DeRosa figures to be
comparable. A lower average from this year’s trio, but more speed and
comparable power. Clear edge to 2005, but only because of Jeter’s greatness… and Roberts could close that gap.

* Outfielders:

2006: Sheffield, Burrell, C.Young,
Hawpe and Hermida (or Griffey)

2005: Guerrero, Sizemore, Swisher, Patterson and Rios

Edge: Obviously a big edge to 2005, particularly in
speed. This year’s quintent all have upside and should be comparable or maybe better in the
power categories, but can’t possibly match last year’s average, speed and run-scoring.

* Utility:

2006: Upton

2005: Sh.Green

Edge: If Upton plays enough he’ll be a major upgrade over Green’s meager season, obviously and
particulary in terms of speed. Let’s hope the super utility role agrees with him.

* Starters:

2006: Santana, Carpenter, Capuano, Jennings and Loaiza (or Nolasco)

2005: Webb, Bonderman, Suppan, Jf.Weaver and Loaiza

Edge: Huge edge to this year. Even if our bottom three
stink again, that can’t be worse than last year’s Unholy Trinity. And it’s
entirely reasonable to think that Santana and Carpenter will far exceed even the
excellence we got from Webb and Bonderman last year. Finally, remember that Capuano is a "List of 12" guy this year who halved his walk rate in ’06 without losing much of his strikeout rate!

* Bullpen:

2006: Gagne, Fuentes, Otsuka and Rauch

2005: K-Rod, Ryan, Shields and Duchscherer

Edge: Huge edge to 2005, although a healthy Gagne could
make this relatively close. And if Chad Cordero gets traded, now we’re on to
something… hey, we can hope can’t we?

* Reserves:

2006: Votto, LaRoche, Pence, Pedroia, Griffey (or Hermida),
Kuo, Nolasco (or Loaiza)

2005: Kendrick, J.Bartlett, N.Logan, Br.Anderson, S.Mori,
G.Mota, Fossum

Edge: Only one of the prospects needs to pan out to match
what we got from Kendrick, and all three of them could secure MLB jobs in short order: LaRoche > Betemit, Pence > Burke/Scott/Biggio/Lane and/or Votto > Hatteberg. If two or more pan out, this will be a huge edge
this year.

So, loooking at it today I don’t think we can win the country but
I didn’t think that after the draft last year either, and we battled to sixth
place. The key, like last year, will be finding value on the free agent wire like
we did with Eric Byrnes, Chuck James and Takashi Saito. I don’t know if we’ll
be as fortunate this year, but if we are, we should be in great shape.

I’ll post projections for our team, and projected standings,
once I get the complete draft results. Thanks for everyone’s comments, I appreciate the feedback. G’night!

–CS

 

* * *

7:35 p.m. ET — The draft is over and I’ve completed our roster below, including our seven reserve picks. Interestingly, while we pursued a very different strategy as last year by virute of the opportunistic Santana/Carpenter picks, the overall strengths and weaknesses of last year’s and this year’s teams are very similar. More commentary on that and other topics to follow later tonight after everyone else here is asleep.

–CS

* * *

4:20 p.m. ET — We’re into the reserve rounds of the NFBC Draft and since I’m not helping out "live" at this point (more on that later), here’s a quick update of our team through the first 18 rounds. Hope you’re all sitting down, since this isn’t the typical Schwartzstops squad:

C – R.Martin, LA (12th round)
C – R.Barajas, PHI (21st)

1B – R.Sexson, SEA (6th)
3B – M.Cabrera, FLO (1st)
CI – M.Lowell, BOS (18th)
2B – B.Roberts, BAL (3rd)
SS – O.Cabrera, ANA (10th)
MI – M.DeRosa (19th)

UT – B.Upton, TB (15th)
OF – G.Sheffield, DET (5th)
OF – C.Young, ARI (9th)
OF – P.Burrell, PHI (11th)
OF – B.Hawpe, COL (13th)
OF – J.Hermida, FLO (17th)

SP – J.Santana, MIN (2nd)
SP – C.Carpenter, STL (4th)
SP – C.Capuano, MIL (14th)
SP – J.Jennings, HOU (20)
SP – R.Nolasco, FLO (26th)
MR – J.Rauch, WSH (23rd)
MR – A.Otsuka, TEX (16th)
CL – E.Gagne, TEX (8th)
CL – B.Fuentes, COL (7th)

Reserves: K.Griffey Jr., CIN (22nd), D.Pedroia, BOS (24th), J.Votto, CIN (25th), H.Pence, HOU (27th), A.LaRoche, LA (28th), H.Kuo, LA (29th) and E.Loaiza, OAK (30th)

(Loaiza may be dead to me, but I guess he’s not dead to Pat!)

That’s right, we took Johan and Carpenter as our top two starters after they both dropped to what we felt was a round or more past their fair value. If rule #1 is don’t overpay for starting pitchers, and rule #2 is "have a plan and stick to it", then rule #3 is take advantage of opportunities when they arise… we felt these were great opportunities that we had to pursue.

Needless to say that had us scramling to assemble an offense, and other than a few low AVG guys and some health risks, we like how this is shaping up. I just got off the phone with DePirro (like I said, more on that later) and our reserve picks are adding great depth.

Full recap coming soon!
–CS

Glad you are all enjoying the projections!

Since you all know I’m a giver, here’s a list of pending 2007-08 free agents. Remember, the "contract year effect" is pretty well-established at this point, so it might not hurt to go the extra $1 on a few of these guys…

Enjoy!
Cory

PLAYER	TEAM	POS	OPTION
Abreu, Bobby	NYY	OF	Club option
Affeldt, Jeremy	COL	LHR
Alfonseca, Antonio	PHI	RHR
Alou, Moises	NYM	RF	Club option
Anderson, Marlon	LAD	2B
Armas, Tony	PIT	RHS	Mutual option
Ausmus, Brad	HOU	C
Bako, Paul	BAL	C
Barajas, Rod	PHI	C	Club option
Barrett, Michael	CHC	C
Benitez, Armando	SF	RHR
Bennett, Gary	STL	C	Mutual option
Benson, Kris	BAL	RHS	Club option
Biggio, Craig	HOU	2B
Blum, Geoff	SD	3B
Bonds, Barry	SF	LF
Boone, Aaron	FLA	3B
Borowski, Joe	CLE	RHS	Club option
Bradley, Milton	OAK	OF
Branyan, Russell	SD	3B
Brocail, Doug	SD	RHS
Buehrle, Mark	CHW	LHS
Byrd, Paul	CLE	RHS	Club option
Byrnes, Eric	ARI	OF
Cairo, Miguel	NYY	2B
Cameron, Mike	SD	OF
Carrasco, Hector	LAA	RHS	Vesting, conditional option
Casey, Sean	DET	1B
Castillo, Luis	MIN	2B
Castro, Ramon	NYM	C
Chacon, Shawn	PIT	RHS
Cirillo, Jeff	MIN	3B
Clark, Brady	MIL	OF
Clark, Tony	ARI	1B
Clayton, Royce	TOR	SS
Clement, Matt	BOS	RHS
Colon, Bartolo	LAA	RHS
Conine, Jeff	CIN	IF
Cordero, Francisco	MIL	RHR
Cormier, Rheal	CIN	LHS	Club, conditional option
Cruz Jr, Jose	SD	OF
DaVanon, Jeffrey	ARI	OF
Dessens, Elmer	LAD	RHR
Dotel, Octavio	KC	RHR	Mutual option
Dunn, Adam	CIN	OF	Club option
Dye, Jermaine	CHW	OF
Easley, Damion	NYM	2B
Eckstein, David	STL	SS
Elarton, Scott	KC	RHS
Erstad, Darin	CHW	1B	Club, conditional option
Eyre, Scott	CHC	LHR	Player option
Feliz, Pedro	SF	3B
Floyd, Cliff	CHC	OF	Club, conditional option
Fogg, Josh	COL	RHS
Fossum, Casey	TB	LHS	Club option
Franco, Julio	NYM	1B
Franklin, Ryan	STL	RHS
Fultz, Aaron	CLE	LHS	Club option
Gagne, Eric	TEX	RHR
Garcia, Freddy	PHI	RHS
Giles, Marcus	SD	2B	Club option
Glavine, Tom	NYM	LHS	Club, conditional option
Gomez, Chris	BAL	SS
Gonzalez, Luis	LAD	OF
Graffanino, Tony	MIL	2B
Green, Shawn	NYM	OF	Mutual option
Grudzielanek, Mark	KC	2B	Conditional option
Guillen, Carlos	DET	SS
Guillen, Jose	SEA	OF	Mutual option
Hatteberg, Scott	CIN	1B	Club, conditional option
Hawkins, LaTroy	COL	RHR	Mutual option
Hernandez, Livan	ARI	RHS
Hernandez, Roberto	CLE	RHS	Club option
Hillenbrand, Shea	LAA	1B	Vesting, conditional option
Hinske, Eric	BOS	1B
Hoffman, Trevor	SD	RHR	Vesting, conditional option
Hunter, Torii	MIN	CF
Isringhausen, Jason	STL	RHS	Club option
Izturis, Cesar	CHC	SS	Club option
Jenkins, Geoff	MIL	OF	Club option
Jennings, Jason	HOU	RHS
Jones, Andruw	ATL	OF
Jones, Todd	DET	RHR
Julio, Jorge	ARI	RHR
Kendall, Jason	OAK	C
Kennedy, Joseph	OAK	LHS
Kent, Jeff	LAD	2B	Vesting, conditional option
Kielty, Bobby	OAK	OF
Kim, Byung-Hyun	COL	RHS
Klesko, Ryan	SF	1B
Koskie, Corey	MIL	3B	Vesting, conditional option
Lamb, Michael	HOU	3B
LaRue, Jason	KC	C
Lawrence, Brian	COL	RHS	Club option
Lieber, Jon	PHI	RHS
Lieberthal, Mike	LAD	C	Club option
Linebrink, Scott	SD	RHR
Lo Duca, Paul	NYM	C
Lofton, Kenny	TEX	OF
Lohse, Kyle	CIN	RHR
Lopez, Javy	COL	C
Lopez, Rodrigo	COL	RHS
Loretta, Mark	HOU	3B
Lowell, Mike	BOS	3B
Mackowiak, Rob	CHW	2B	Club option
Maddux, Greg	SD	RHS	Club option
Mahay, Ron	TEX	LHR
Martin, Tom	COL	LHR	Mutual option
Martinez, Ramon	LAD	2B	Club option
McDonald, John	TOR	SS
Mesa, Jose	DET	RHR
Miceli, Dan	TB	RHS	Club option
Mientkiewicz, Doug	NYY	1B
Millar, Kevin	BAL	1B	Vesting option
Miller, Damian	MIL	C
Miller, Trever	HOU	LHS
Miller, Wade	CHC	RHS
Milton, Eric	CIN	LHS
Mirabelli, Doug	BOS	C
Moeller, Chad	CIN	C
Molina, Jose	LAA	C
Myers, Mike	NYY	LHR
Nathan, Joe	MIN	RHR	Club option
Nixon, Trot	CLE	OF
Norton, Greg	TB	3B	Club option
Nunez, Abraham	PHI	SS	Club option
Ohka, Tomo	TOR	RHS
Oliver, Darren	LAA	LHS	Vesting option
Ortiz, Ramon	MIN	RHS
Ortiz, Russ	SF	RHS
Palmeiro, Orlando	HOU	OF
Park, Chan	NYM	RHS
Patterson, Corey	BAL	OF
Paul, Josh	TB	C
Perez, Neifi	DET	SS
Perez, Odalis	KC	LHS	Club option
Pettitte, Andy	NYY	LHS	Player option
Piazza, Mike	OAK	C
Pineiro, Joel	BOS	RHS	Conditional, mutual option
Posada, Jorge	NYY	C	Player option
Reitsma, Chris	SEA	RHS	Club option
Rincon, Ricardo	STL	LHS
Riske, David	KC	RHR	Club, conditional option
Rivera, Mariano	NYY	RHR
Rodriguez, Ivan	DET	C	Club option
Rogers, Kenny	DET	LHS
Romero, J.C.	BOS	LHR
Rowand, Aaron	PHI	OF
Saenz, Olmedo	LAD	3B
Sanders, Reggie	KC	OF
Schilling, Curt	BOS	RHS
Silva, Carlos	MIN	RHS
Smoltz, John	ATL	RHR
Springer, Russ	STL	RHS
Stewart, Shannon	OAK	OF
Strickland, Scott	SD	RHS
Sturtze, Tanyon	ATL	RHR
Suzuki, Ichiro	SEA	RF
Sweeney, Mark	SF	1B
Sweeney, Mike	KC	DH
Tavarez, Julian	BOS	RHS	Vesting, conditional option
Thomson, John	TOR	RHS
Timlin, Mike	BOS	RHS
Tomko, Brett	LAD	RHS	Mutual option
Torrealba, Yorvit	COL	C
Uribe, Juan	CHW	SS	Club option
Valentin, Javier	CIN	C	Club, conditional option
Valentin, Jose	NYM	SS	Vesting, conditional option
Vazquez, Javier	CHW	RHS
Vizcaino, Luis	NYY	RHS
Vizquel, Omar	SF	SS
Wakefield, Tim	BOS	RHS	Club option
Walker, Todd	SD	2B
Ward, Daryle	CHC	1B	Mutual option
Weaver, Jeff	SEA	RHS
Wells, David	SD	LHS
Wells, Kip	STL	RHS
Westbrook, Jake	CLE	RHS
White, Rondell	MIN	OF	Vesting option
Wickman, Bob	ATL	RHR
Wilkerson, Brad	TEX	OF
Williamson, Scott	BAL	RHR
Wilson, Craig	ATL	OF
Wilson, Preston	STL	OF
Witasick, Jay	OAK	RHR	Club option
Wolf, Randy	LAD	LHS	Vesting, conditional option
Wood, Kerry	CHC	RHS
Woodward, Chris	ATL	SS
Wright, Jaret	BAL	RHS
Young, Michael	TEX	SS	Club option
Zambrano, Carlos	CHC	RHS

Sorry to those of you who have already downloaded and started tinkering around with the original set of projections, but here are new batting and pitching files, updated March 6 with these changes:

* Most importantly, replaced one set of base projections with another… without naming names, let’s just say I took out a set that I didn’t think was realistic and replaced it with another set from a provider who I feel is a little more credible. The revised numbers don’t show a huge difference because these are after all averages, but in a few places they do seem a little more reasonable.

* Took out CS for hitters (a few providers didn’t include it) but added "EYE" (BB/SO) since we care a lot about plate discipline;

* Corrected the projections for both Jose Reyes and both Abraham Nunez, plus a few other minor player_ID mapping tweaks.

Finally, to re-state my response to a few of the comments…

I’m purposefully not providing these in Excel, since I’m effectively giving away something our partners and other providers charge for, so this is out of respect to them and their products. However, as mentioned before, I can’t stop someone from trasferring them into Excel and then circulating them via some other means, right?

Thanks for the great response to this and for listening to the show, I hope this helps everyone get their draft strategy ready!

Thanks,
Cory

I’ve been promising these for weeks, and the time has come… combined average projections from five of the biggest providers in the business. Out of respect to them and all of our partners, I won’t say who, but trust me you’ve heard me talking about all of them on the show in the past. A few caveats:

* These are not "my" projections, they are merely averages of the projections provided by these sources. So if you don’t like one projection or another, I don’t wanna hear about it!

* Also don’t blame me if some of the names on the list seem a little odd. Why bother with a projection for Jeromy Burnitz or Matt Herges? Hey, they’re on the list, I average ‘em up and pass ‘em on.

* And, some of the position/role assignments might not be entirely reliable, so don’t use this list to determine position eligibility. I’ll be using this strictly for stats, nothing more. (The team/league assignments, however, should be accurate as of February 27, when I last updated that part of the spreadsheet.)

* To my eye, these projections seem a little conservative on the whole, although an average projection that calls for 49 homers for Ryan Howard can’t be all that conservative!

* The number of projections averaged for each player is provided… obviously those with 5 projections are likely to be more predictive than those with 1 or 2.

* A couple of the projection systems provide stats for the player on a "what if" basis… if this guy played in the Majors this year, what would he do? Other systems are based on what they guy will do… so again, these should be discounted for younger players and those who are less likely to appear in the Majors this year. Chip Cannon could hit 24 homers this year, according to these projections, but that doesn’t mean he’ll be in the Majors to do it.

* The OBP value for hitters is not exacting, since not all of the sources provided the HBP and SF values needed to calculate it. In case anyone cares, I calculated it as ((H+BB)/(AB+BB))*1.05, tacking on the five percent increase as a proxy for HBP and SF. But who cares, it’s the BB vs. SO ratio we care about anyway.

* Similarly, not all sources projected saves… as we know those are based more on opportunity than anything else. Focus on WHIP and K/BB for potential (and actual) closers.

* Finally, remember that any projection is a living them and is heavily dependent on a player’s health and opportunity as much as their performance record. Bernie Williams is projected for 321 at-bats, but he’s got to find a job first.

HERE THEY ARE!! Right-click and "save as" to download batting and pitching… one file for each, saved as .pdf’s. Enjoy!

CS