The 2012 season could be one of the most-wide open years in recent DTBL history, with a number of teams in position to compete for the title.
Over the next week I will post team overview snippets that include a letter grade for each of the 10 scoring categories for all teams. These grades are based on a combination of three player projection systems, and they rate a team against other DTBL teams.
The projections are the product of hard work from a friend of mine who is much more
proficient than I am at using spreadsheets. He built out full-year projections using Pecota, Zips and a composite set of projections from MLB.com.
Thanks to those of you who responded so quickly with feedback on your draft! Also, as an FYI, unlike a certain league commissioner I didn’t rig these projections to brag about how great my team is
Well into the second full day of the regular season, it appeared the early narrative of the 2012 season would be more of the same from 2011: dominating pitching performances with runs being at a premium. But by the time the first full week was in the books, a different pitching-themed story emerged. Across the league, closers were blowing games like their jobs didn’t depend on it. No one was immune. Even the immortal Mariano Rivera blew his first save opportunity of the season. But for the most part, these games were being blown by closers who had a less than firm grip on the ninth inning job as it was. If this trend continues, expect bullpen changes to be made very soon.
Here are some numbers to illustrate the early struggles of relief pitchers. Since we don’t keep track of blown saves in this league, I’m going to use ERA instead. Last season, the cumulative league ERA was 3.39 for the full year. That’s a very low number which goes to show just how good the pitching was in 2011. But relief pitchers were even better. The league ERA of all relief pitchers was 3.02. In the first week of 2012, the total league ERA is up significantly, 45 points, to 3.84 and the bullpen ERA has increased even more, 53 points, to 3.55. So relief pitchers are largely responsible for this early inflation. I don’t have the stats to prove it, but usually the pitchers are ahead of the hitters this time of year. So it’s possible we could see these numbers go up even more.
Since the only bullpen job that carries significant weight in a fantasy league is that of closer, it will be very interesting to see if some changes are on the way. Most of the closers who have struggled were not on solid ground to begin with. Alfredo Aceves was named the Red Sox closer the day before the opener, following the injury to Andrew Bailey. He proceeded to blow his first two appearances (one save opp, one tied game) and had an infinity ERA/WHIP before picking up a save on Monday. The other prime candidate, Mark Melancon, hasn’t been much better. If neither of these two prove capable, will they move Daniel Bard back to the pen? Sergio Santos also blew his first two save opportunities. Although he was a bit more of an established closer than Aceves, he has to be looking over his shoulder with veteran closer Francisco Cordero in the Blue Jays bullpen as well. Sticking in the AL East, Tampa Bay initially leaned on Joel Peralta to fill in for the injured Kyle Farnsworth, but he has already been replaced by Fernando Rodney.
There is another category of closers who are probably less likely to lose their job after a couple bad outings, but aren’t great bets to finish the year in that role either. These are guys who are almost universally acknowledged to not be the best relief pitcher in their respective bullpens: guys like Chris Perez, Joe Nathan and Jonathan Broxton. Perez could be replaced by Vinnie Pestano at any moment, and that time may be sooner than later if he blows another three run lead like he did on Opening Day. The Rangers bullpen is full of guys with dominating stuff, but at this stage of his career, Nathan is not one of those guys. For a team that fancies itself as one of the World Series favorites, it remains to be seen if they will to continue to use their fourth or fifth best reliever as the closer. Broxton was the obvious candidate to close for the Royals when they lost Joakim Soria to Tommy John surgery, since Broxton has closed before. But on a young, up-and-coming team, it might make more sense to see if someone like Greg Holland or Aaron Crow can do the job. Also, if Broxton does pitch well, he would be an ideal candidate to get traded to a contender later this summer.
Of course, an argument could be made that you don’t necessarily want to have your best relief pitcher as the closer. Depending on how a bullpen is managed, it is quite possible that a set-up guy will pitch in a lot more pressure innings than a closer ever will. The role of protecting a one run lead in the 8th is probably more important than trying to save a three run game in the 9th. I highly recommend checking out this recent article by Jonah Keri where he argues that saves should be replaced by a more meaningful stat for relief pitchers. I think he’s right, but I also think most MLB managers will continue to go with their pre-appointed closer whenever there is a three run game in the 9th inning. So figuring out who that guy will be is still a crucial part of fantasy baseball.
There have been three MLB regular season games played so far, but most teams will get things started Thursday and Friday. Taking a look at the new season, I decided to try something new this year. I had my hands on a relatively fresh copy of 2012 MLB rosters for the baseball simulation game I’ve been playing for years, Out of the Park Baseball. So I decided to put them to good use. I quickly created a DTBL league within OOTP, assigned players to their DTBL teams, then simulated a full 162 game schedule.
Before I get into this too much, I should say up front that this simulation is almost worthless. Just because a team did poorly in this OOTP sim means absolutely nothing about their chances in the upcoming season. The list of reasons why is too long to go through, but here are a few. Since the game is simulating regulation baseball games, only nine batters can be in a team’s lineup at a given time, as opposed to our league which has 14 active batting slots. So depth is far more important in the DTBL. Next, this sim has DTBL players facing nothing but other DTBL players. So there are no weak pitchers for hitters to pad their stats against. Same for pitchers. Finally, IT IS A COMPUTER SIMULATION! As much as I love OOTP and think it is the best baseball sim out there, it can’t possibly perfectly replicate player performance, particularly future performance.
But putting that aside, I just thought this would be a fun thing to do before the season started. I let the AI control all lineup/pitching staff decisions, but turned off all transactions and injuries. So each team consists of 25 players, 14 batters and 11 pitchers. For the most part, I used the Opening Day DTBL rosters, plus a couple of bench pitchers for each team. This meant some injured guys who are going to miss a decent portion of the season didn’t make the cut. Once I had all the rosters set, I immediately simulated the entire season, which took about 5 minutes. Here are the results:
It was a close race most of the season, but the Kings prevailed in the end with a 97-65 record, beating the Jackalope by five games. Honestly, I was hoping my team wouldn’t win this thing because it makes the whole thing look like it was rigged, but I assure you that wasn’t the case. I didn’t create the players, nor did I do any of the managing of my team. The Kings won mostly thanks to the league’s best offense, led by Carlos Gonzalez, Jay Bruce and Ryan Zimmerman. Very few Kings had poor seasons in this sim.
A few other things stuck out. First, the top four teams were the same four who finished at the top of the 2011 DTBL standings, though not in the same order. The Gators had a rough go of it, losing 105 games and finishing in last place by 17 games. They finished last in the league in runs scored and runs allowed, not a good combination.
As for the players, Albert Pujols and Prince Fielder backed up their enormous offseason contracts by finishing first and second in the league in home runs. Pujols was also the league MVP. Cliff Lee won the Cy Young Award thanks to his league leading 17 wins. Not that there were many eligible players to begin with, but Yonder Alonso was named the Rookie of the Year.
If you have a lot of time on your hands, feel free to click through all the stats and info you find from those links above. I’m sure you’ll find some ridiculous AI roster management decisions for your team as well as some inexplicably poor performances from certain players.
Now that I got that out of my system, how about some real baseball? Enjoy the two remaining Opening Days!
For the second consecutive year, the DTBL Draft kicked off with a first round featuring nine straight selections of DTBL rookies with a veteran finishing up the round in the tenth slot. In fact, if you go back one more year, DTBL rookies have occupied the first eight picks of the draft for three straight seasons. The Cougars got things started by selecting a Canadian, third baseman Brett Lawrie. This was one of many newsworthy items from the first half of the draft. Almost one week after the 20th annual DTBL Draft began, we have six rounds in the books.
Although the Cougars have had a rough go of it in recent years, this was the first time they had the first pick in the draft since 2006 when they selected Grady Sizemore. The Cougars obtained the first pick by winning a coin flip, which broke the tie between them and the Gators. Lawrie was certainly projected to be one of the first players taken in this draft, but I think most had assumed the Cougars would take Stephen Strasburg instead. The Cougars decision to go with Lawrie is completely justifiable and understandable though. Lawrie broke onto the scene last summer and hit .293 with nine home runs and seven stolen bases in just 150 MLB at bats. He will fit nicely into the Cougars infield, which was quite thin heading into this draft. While Strasburg could have become their ace for many years to come, the risk was ultimately too high for a team which already has another star pitcher returning from Tommy John surgery this season (Adam Wainwright). Lawrie was the much safer choice.
Without having talked to Marc about this, I suspect his plan in acquiring the second pick in the draft was to add Lawrie and Eric Hosmer to the Mavericks stable of young hitters. But when Strasburg became available, the plan changed. The Mavericks acquired the second pick in the draft from the Gators (along with the 12th overall pick) for Nelson Cruz and Mark Reynolds. The Mavericks used that pick to grab the phenom Strasburg, whose DTBL debut was pushed back a year after missing almost all of last season recovering from Tommy John surgery. Still, he was quite impressive in his September return, compiling a 1.50 ERA, 0.708 WHIP and 24 strike outs in 24 innings pitched. He joins a Mavericks pitching staff that already features Clayton Kershaw. That could be a scary duo for years to come. The Mavericks also possessed their own pick at #3 and used it to select first baseman Eric Hosmer. This was the second straight year that the Mavericks had the second and third picks of the draft. Strasburg and Hosmer were the sixth and seventh players selected in the first round by the Mavs in the past three years. All seven of these players have been very young with tremendous upside, some of which has yet to materialize. More on the Mavericks youth movement in a bit.
The Darkhorses aren’t used to picking so early in the draft, but have to be pleased with what it allowed them to do. With the fourth pick, the Darkhorses selected young starting pitcher Matt Moore. Some have called Moore the left-handed Strasburg. In fact, many believe the potential for those two pitchers is nearly identical. Moore didn’t make his MLB debut until last September, but he made such an immediate impact that he wound up starting a game for the Rays in the postseason. So he has just as many career starts in the postseason as MLB regular season (one each). The Choppers used the fifth pick on yet another fireballing youngster. They selected Michael Pineda, who was the key piece of the biggest offseason MLB trade. The Yankees acquired Pineda from Seattle. Fantasy experts are torn on if this makes Pineda more or less valuable as a fantasy pitcher. On one hand, he is moving from a team that couldn’t score runs to one of the best offensive teams in baseball. But on the other hand, he is leaving pitching friendly Safeco Field to play half his games in the launching pad of Yankee Stadium. Regardless, he is expected to be a star for years to come and gives the Choppers rotation a huge boost.
The next two picks were first basemen. The Demigods selected Freddie Freeman with the sixth pick and the Kings followed by taking Michael Morse. Freeman is quite a bit younger than Morse, who didn’t have his breakout until his late 20s. Freeman will also be a first baseman for years to come, while Morse may find himself in the outfield for the Kings next year. Last year, it was catchers the flew off the board with three going in the first seven picks. This year it was first basemen. Surprisingly, there was not a first baseman selected until the fifth round a year ago, so it was obviously a position of need for several teams this time around.
Perhaps the steal of the first round belonged to the Moonshiners who were able to grab the clear cut number one outfielder available with the eighth pick in the draft. The Moonshiners selected the five-tool Desmond Jennings, a guy they probably would have considered taking if they had the second or third pick in the draft. This is two straight years that things have worked out extremely well for the Moonshiners in the first round. Last year, they wound up trading their pick for Jeff Weaver, who immediately retooled their rotation. Following the Jennings pick, the Naturals took another budding superstar in catcher Jesus Montero. Montero was the key piece going to opposite direction in the Pineda deal. Like Pineda, there is some concern that the ballpark switch could have a negative impact on Montero’s fantasy value. However, he played so few games at Yankee Stadium that it remains to be seen what his true potential will be. Finally, as usual, the defending champions used their first round pick to plug a hole rather than speculating on the future. The Jackalope selected second baseman Howie Kendrick with the last pick of the first round.
A few more interesting facts about the first round. As mentioned, two of the players were traded for each other this offseason (Pineda and Montero). There were two pairs of MLB teammates selected (Strasburg/Morse and Moore/Jennings). And there were a combined six first basemen and starting pitchers selected, with only one player at those positions going in the first round a year ago.
When looking at the players taken in the first round, it struck me that almost all of those guys were extremely highly touted prospects just a couple years ago and not too many of them came out of nowhere. To see if my hunch was correct, I looked at the 2010 Baseball American top prospects list, and was amused by what I found. BA’s top 10 from two years ago featured eight players who have been selected in the first round of the DTBL Draft in 2011 or 2012. Strasburg was #2, Montero #4 and Jennings #6. Last year’s first rounders included Jason Heyward (#1), Mike Stanton (#3), Buster Posey (#7), Pedro Alvarez (#8) and Carlos Santana (#10). The only players from this list who haven’t been picked in the first round are Brian Matusz and Neftali Feliz who were Mavericks draft picks in 2010.
Beyond the first round, there have been some other interesting developments as well. The Mavericks have continued to go young with almost every pick. Here are the ages of their first six picks: 23, 22, 20, 23, 23, 25 (Strasburg, Hosmer, Mike Trout, Dee Gordon, Addison Reed, Jemile Weeks). All six of those players are DTBL rookies. I’ll give credit to the Mavericks for sticking to a plan. We’ll see if it pays off down the road.
The Demigods might be wondering if they made some mistakes with their cuts last December. Six players they cut were selected in the first 31 picks of the draft: Kendrick (#10), Gio Gonzalez (11), Matt Garza (15), Jason Motte (19), Carlos Beltran (27) and Grant Balfour (31). This would seem to mean one of two things: either the Demigods made some poor decisions with their cuts, or they had an incredibly deep team last season. I’m inclined to lean towards the latter. In looking at their keepers, there really aren’t any obvious players who should have been cut. Also, they made those cuts before knowing Gonzalez and Beltran would move to more favorable locations and Balfour would become a closer candidate.
There are plenty of other items I could cover, but I’m going to wrap this up. Hopefully, we’ll complete this draft around this time next week, giving us a little bit of time to prepare for the start of the season. Thanks to everyone for keeping the draft moving at a good pace. Enjoy this incredible weather most of the country is experiencing. And bring on some March Madness!
For the third consecutive year, the Mavericks will have multiple first round picks in the DTBL Draft. And for the second year in a row, they possess two of the first three picks. The Mavericks made a pair of trades this week, continuing their youth movement. In the first, they actually traded away a pick, sending their third round selection to the Naturals in exchange for second baseman Rickie Weeks. They followed that up by acquiring the second and twelfth overall picks in the upcoming draft from the Gators for outfielder Nelson Cruz and third baseman Mark Reynolds.
Assuming they stand pat, when the first round finishes next week, the Mavericks will have made seven first round selections in the three most recent drafts. The first two years have seen mixed results from this strategy, but it is way too early to write it off as a failure. With an opportunity to pick two of the top three players available this year, one would think they have a great opportunity to find a superstar in the making this time around. But of course, there is also an inherent risk in betting on young players.
When I first saw the details of the Mavericks/Gators trade, I thought it was a steal for the Mavericks. Acquiring two of the first twelve picks in a draft is a pretty solid return, and giving up early picks can be a dangerous strategy for a rebuilding team. However, I have come around on this after taking a closer look. A very solid argument could be made that Nelson Cruz is a better player than anyone available in this year’s draft. In fact, most fantasy player rankings I have seen have Cruz listed ahead of everyone who will be in the draft pool. He instantly becomes the Gators best offensive player, and along with Reynolds, should immediately improve what was possibly the worst offensive team in league history last season. The ’11 Gators didn’t have a single player drive in over 85 runs and only Dan Uggla hit more than 25 home runs. Cruz and Reynolds surpassed those numbers in both categories. The Gators couldn’t afford to miss on improving their offense and these two players are much safer bets than anyone they could have drafted. Plus, the Gators have had a string of first round picks that haven’t exactly panned out, so maybe it is just as well not to have to worry about a continuation of that trend this year.
It wouldn’t make much sense for me to predict who the Mavericks will take with all of their early picks, but I think it is safe to assume they will go with more youngsters. I also feel confident in predicting they will not select a catcher with a top three pick for the third consecutive season. The re-acquisition of Weeks was an interesting move as well. When healthy, he is one of the most productive middle infielders, which was a major area of weakness for the Mavericks last year. Weeks was a first round pick by the Mavericks back in 2006 and spent three years with the club before he was released in ’08. His best season came with the Naturals in 2010 when he hit 29 home runs and drove in 83, obliterating his previous career highs. Last season was cut short due to an injury, but he still hit 19 home runs. The Mavericks will probably be the hardest team to predict for the upcoming season. They have the potential to be the league’s most improved team. They have an interesting situation with two relief pitchers already on the roster who are expected to be starters (Neftali Feliz and Daniel Bard), so they could potentially go with a seven man rotation. However, if that doesn’t pan out and the early draft picks don’t work out either, it could be another long year. I don’t think any other team has a wider gap between their potential ceiling and floor.
As for the Naturals, Weeks was expendable because they have two other quality middle infielders in Troy Tulowitzki and Asdrubal Cabrera. They will have plenty of opportunities to address second base in the draft. Generally speaking, they don’t have too many holes to fill, so the extra draft pick can be used to build depth at pretty much any position they would like. The Naturals should be a title contender for the fourth straight year.
My goal is to have the draft pool posted in the next couple days. I’m looking at one week from tonight, Thursday March 8, as the potential start date of the 2012 DTBL Draft. It’s hard to believe we have reached another milestone. This will be the 20th DTBL Draft.
Earlier today, the Baseball Writers Association of America did what they normally do and awarded the National League MVP to the best player from one of the best teams rather than giving it to a player on a mediocre team with possibly the better overall statistics. Meanwhile, DTBL members did what they normally do and voted stats over team placement. Champion Jackalope outfielder Ryan Braun won the NL MVP, but Demigods outfielder Matt Kemp is the 2011 DTBL Most Valuable Player.
In 2011, Matt Kemp was the textbook definition of a five category star. He was among the league leaders in all five categories. He led the league with 126 runs batted in. His .324 batting average ranked seventh, 39 home runs was third, fourth in runs scored with 115 and was third in stolen bases with 40. He was only one home run shy of reaching the esteemed 40/40 Club (home runs and stolen bases).
Probably the most under-reported story line of the ’11 season was Kemp’s attempt to become the first MLB triple crown winner in 44 years. I’m not sure exactly why that was the case. It was probably a combination of the Dodgers irrelevance, the thrilling late season playoff races, and my own personal theory: the advancement of sabermetrics in baseball. The three triple crown categories just don’t hold the same significance they once did, especially batting average. Whatever the reason, Kemp wound up falling a little short as Braun edged him out for the NL batting title. He was not particularly close to winning the DTBL triple crown though with several AL batters, in addition to Braun, having higher averages.
The Demigods were one of the league’s pleasant surprises this year, jumping from last place in 2010 to a fifth place finish. In particular, their offense was light years better than last year’s squad. They finished with 43 batting points, which was second behind only the Naturals. Kemp was clearly the main reason for that. He led the team in all five categories (tied with Ichiro in stolen bases). A first round pick back in 2008, Kemp has been a significant fixture in the Demigods’ lineup the last four seasons. But he easily exceeded career highs in every category this year.
The MVP voting was very interesting. Even though there were a lot of compelling candidates, Kemp won the award fairly easily. He received eight first place votes, one second and one fourth, for a total of 90 points. NL MVP Braun came in second with a single first place vote and 63 points. Kemp and Braun were the only two players to appear on all ten ballots. Finishing third was Darkhorses outfielder Jacoby Ellsbury with 47 points. Then there was a bit of a gap. Choppers outfielder Curtis Granderson came in fourth. He received the final first place vote, but only appeared on half the ballots and accumulated 20 points. Naturals first baseman Miguel Cabrera came in fifth, and finally, Rookie of the Year winner and Choppers outfielder Jose Bautista finished sixth.
As alluded to earlier, DTBL MVP usually seems to take on a different meaning than AL and NL MVP. The baseball writers clearly put a premium on the success (or lack there of) of a player’s team. However, team success rarely seems to matter in the DTBL vote. This is very apparent by the opposite results of the NL MVP and DTBL MVP votes, despite the fact that Braun played for the DTBL Champions. Personally, I think it makes sense for the DTBL award to be all about the stats. After all, that’s what fantasy baseball is all about. Meanwhile, another MLB MVP debate popped up with Justin Verlander winning the AL MVP. Obviously, that debate doesn’t occur in this league since we don’t make pitchers eligible for the MVP award. It’s actually kind of interesting because pitchers are really more valuable in fantasy baseball than they are in the real game since they account for exactly half of the league’s points, despite fewer pitchers than batters appearing on active rosters at any given time. An argument could be made that the DTBL Cy Young winner is really more valuable than the DTBL MVP in most seasons. But the main reason why I don’t make pitchers eligible for the MVP is because they have their own award. Perhaps the MVP should be called something else to stop this debate (the Babe Ruth Award?). Anyway, I digress…. I just found these MVP discussions to be especially interesting this year.
Roster cuts will be due very soon, so you might want to start figuring out who you are going to keep. In the mean time, have a Happy Thanksgiving!
It was a great year for pitchers as a whole, but one hurler was head and shoulders above the rest. In the least surprising news of the off-season, Kevin’s Kings ace Justin Verlander has unanimously won the 2011 DTBL Cy Young Award, to go along with the American League Cy Young Award which he unanimously won earlier this week.
2011 was an amazing, record-setting year for Verlander. He got off to a hot start, highlighted by his second career no-hitter against Toronto in May. He continued to win games start after start and finished the season with 24 victories, tying the DTBL single season record. John Smoltz won 24 games for the Cougars back in 1996 and Randy Johnson equaled that mark for the Kings in 2002. Since that ’02 season, no pitcher had won more than 22 games in a season. In addition to wins, Verlander also led the league in WHIP at 0.920 and 250 strike outs. That WHIP ratio comes in as the sixth lowest single season value in DTBL history. His 2.40 ERA was pretty good too.
Verlander was almost solely responsible for the Kings tying for the second most pitching points in the league. Only one other King won more than 10 games (Max Scherzer), yet the team wound up leading the league in that category. Verlander accounted for almost 20% of the team’s strike outs as well. The Kings picked Verlander in the third round of the 2009 draft after he had spent two seasons with the Demigods. The Demigods let him go after a very disappointing season in 2008. In his three seasons with the Kings, he has won at least 18 games in each campaign. In fact, he has reached that 18 win mark in four of his five DTBL seasons. He’ll need just 13 wins next year to reach 100 for his career. It has been an impressive early career for Verlander, but 2011 was by far his best year yet.
The Cy Young voting results were not surprising, but very interesting none-the-less. Unanimous decisions for awards are fairly common, but rarely do you see complete agreement in both of the top two spots. Verlander received all ten of the first place votes for the maximum 100 points, while the young Mavericks lefty Clayton Kershaw received all ten of the second place votes for 70 total points. Kershaw, the National League Cy Young winner, won 21 games and was right with Verlander in the other categories. Kershaw had the league’s best ERA at 2.28 and finished second to Verlander in wins, WHIP (0.977) and strike outs (248). These two were clearly the best two pitchers in the league in 2011. Although not quite unanimous, Roy Halladay was the clear choice for third place. He earned eight third place votes with the other two going to his Jackalope and Phillies teammate Cliff Lee. Halladay earned 46 points. Lee finished fourth in the vote with 26 points. There was a bit of a gap following the pair of Jackalope. Former Jackalope, current Moonshiner Jered Weaver finished fifth with eight points. Halladay, Lee and Weaver had numbers which would have made them likely Cy Young winners in many seasons, but not this one.
Click here to view the full 2011 DTBL Cy Young voting results.
I’m going to take this time to mention that I never got around to writing that third piece of my season recap, which was supposed to be a statistical look at how much pitchers dominated the 2011 season. Hopefully, I’ll take the time at some point this winter to delve into this, because after glancing at some of the numbers, it is quite apparent that pitching has never been better than it was this year (in the DTBL, that is). All of the players mentioned above played a huge part in this.
The final award, the Most Valuable Player, will be named next Tuesday. There are plenty of strong candidates for that award as well.
Going into this year’s draft, the 2011 DTBL rookie class was not highly touted. To make matters worse, several of the top youngsters picked in that draft proceeded to have very disappointing and/or injury-plagued seasons. However, the rookie class turned out to be rather deep with a bunch of players taken after the first round easily exceeding expectations. In the end, it was a “veteran” who won the 2011 DTBL Rookie of the Year Award. The honor went to Choppers outfielder Jose Bautista.
2011 was Jose Bautista’s eighth MLB season, but the first season in which he appeared on a DTBL roster, making him eligible for this award. From 2004-2009, Bautista was little more than a platoon/role player in the outfield and at third base with virtually no fantasy value. But in 2010, he broke out in a big way, slugging 54 home runs with 124 RBIs. Those numbers immediately made him one of the most sought after players in this year’s draft. The Choppers felt very fortunate to pick him up with the fourth pick in the draft. Although he entered this season with many wondering if 2010 was a fluke, he did not disappoint. He hit 43 home runs with 103 RBIs and 105 runs scored. His .302 batting average surpassed his previous single season high by more than 40 points. So while ’10 was his true breakout season, ’11 was the year he became a complete hitter and a legitimate superstar. He managed to lead the DTBL in home runs in his very first season. Finishing the season at age 30 made Bautista a very unusual “rookie”, but he is not the oldest DTBL ROY winner. I believe that distinction belongs to Andres Galarraga who won the league’s first Rookie of the Year Award in 1994 at the age of 33.
Bautista was a huge part of a vastly improved Choppers squad. Although they finished the season in sixth place, the Choppers were in the hunt until the final month of the season and were much more competitive than they have been in recent years. That is largely due to the significant power boost provided by Bautista and Curtis Granderson. The slugging duo finished first and second in the league in home runs. Both figure to be strong candidates for the MVP Award, which will be announced next week. The Choppers finished in the top half of the league in all five offensive categories, a year after finishing in the bottom half in all except batting average.
The depth of this year’s rookie class is very apparent after taking a glance at the award’s voting results. American League Rookie of the Year Jeremy Hellickson was on the DTBL ballot as well, but did not receive a single vote. Bautista won the award by garnering 7 of the 10 first place votes and a total of 87 points. The runner up was Bautista’s Choppers teammate, relief pitcher Craig Kimbrel. Kimbrel saved 46 games with a 2.10 ERA, 1.039 WHIP and an extremely impressive 127 strike outs. He was named the National League Rookie of the Year earlier this week. Kimbrel was a third round pick by the Choppers. Since they traded away their second round pick, all the Choppers first two picks wound up doing was finish first and second in the DTBL ROY vote. Kimbrel received the other three first place votes and accumulated 75 points. Another closer came in third, the Jackalope’s John Axford, who matched Kimbrel’s 46 save total. The only pitcher with more saves than these two DTBL rookies was Jose Valverde. Axford received enough votes to get 37 points. His Jackalope teammate, slugging outfielder Mike Stanton, finished fourth. Stanton’s 34 home runs gave the champions just the kind of power threat they needed. Just like the Choppers, the Jackalope struck gold in the first couple rounds of the draft. Stanton was a first round selection and Axford was picked in the second round. Rounding out the top five was yet another closer, the Moonshiners’ Drew Storen. Storen saved 43 games. The Kimbrel/Axford/Storen combination is about as good of a set of rookie closers as you will ever see.
You’ve heard all about the champion Jackalope. Now it’s time to take a look back at the 2011 season for the other nine teams. I’ve grouped them into three categories: the good, the bad and the ugly. These groups don’t necessarily relate to the order of finish, but how competitive the teams were compared to expectations. The three teams I identified as “good” all finished higher in the standings than they did a year ago and should feel like they are headed in the right direction. “Bad” isn’t really the right word for the second group, because two of the three teams actually finished near the top of the standings. Disappointing is a better way to describe them. Finally, the teams that fall into the “ugly” category would probably like to pretend 2011 never happened.
THE GOOD
Mike’s Moonshiners
The quickest team out of the gate, the Moonshiners led the league for a good part of the first quarter of the season. They stumbled a bit in early summer and never really recovered, finishing in third place. However, that was up two spots from a year ago and was their best finish since 2008. The improvement was almost entirely due to the pitching staff, which received a huge boost from the Jackalope trade which brought them ace pitcher and Cy Young candidate Jared Weaver. While I already mentioned how beneficial that trade was to the Jackalope, the impact was similar for the Moonshiners. Weaver turned their average pitching staff into one of the league’s best. He finished in the top five of the league in ERA, WHIP and wins. Meanwhile, the offense was carried by slugging first baseman Prince Fielder (38 HR, 120 RBI) and 30/30 man Ian Kinsler (32 HR, 30 SB). Now that the pitching staff has been fixed, the Moonshiners will look to improve their offense going into 2012. With the Jackalope winning their first title this year, the Moonshiners are now the longest tenured DTBL team without a title. They figure to have a good chance to change that next year.
Dom’s Demigods
The biggest jump in the standings was made by the Demigods. After finishing dead last a year ago, they managed to move into the top half of the standings with a fifth place finish in 2011. This is despite the fact that they got almost nothing out of their first overall pick (Buster Posey); same with his catching partner Joe Mauer. The rest of the offense was surprisingly good though, finishing in the top five in every category and leading the league in batting average. The indisputable MVP of the team was Matt Kemp, who hit .324 with 39 HR, 126 RBI, 115 R, 40 SB. He led the league in RBIs and was the only player to appear on the league leaderboard in all five categories. He even flirted with the NL Triple Crown until the final week of the season. The pitching staff was a bit of a disappointment, but overall, the Demigods appear to be headed in the right direction.
Charlie’s Thunder Choppers
Although they only wound up finishing one spot higher than a year ago (6th, up from 7th), this was a much better year for the Choppers. They were a title contender in the second half of the season for the first time in five years. They wound up finishing 16 1/2 points out of first, cutting almost half the deficit from a year ago (32 points). As I documented in an article a couple months ago, it was some recent first round draft picks that helped pump some more juice into the Choppers offense. Jose Bautista and Curtis Granderson finished first and second in the league in home runs (43 and 41 respectively). Both are strong MVP candidates, while Bautista is even eligible for the DTBL Rookie of the Year award. Granderson led the league with 136 runs scored, the highest total since 2007. The Choppers boast another strong ROY candidate in closer Craig Kimbrel who saved 46 games in his first full MLB season. If the Choppers can add one or two more elite starting pitchers, they are another team to watch in 2012.
THE BAD
Nick’s Naturals
Okay, I admit it isn’t really fair to put the Naturals in a category labeled as “bad”, because they were definitely not that. But a defending champion almost always has its sights set on repeating, and the Naturals weren’t quite able to do that this year, finishing a distant second. In some ways, this Naturals team was every bit as good as the one that tied for title last year, but the Jackalope were just a little better. The Naturals were unable to repeat their amazing feat of 50 batting points from a year ago, but still led the league with 45. They figured they would need to get more out of their pitching staff though. Unfortunately for them, that didn’t really happen. Newly acquired Zack Greinke was solid, but he, along with the rest of the staff, didn’t have a truly spectacular season. Still, the Naturals shouldn’t regret their Greinke/Howard trade, because the pitching would have been worse without Greinke. Miguel Cabrera and Joey Votto led the league’s best offense. Cabrera won the batting title with a .344 average. Overall, there is nothing for the Naturals to be ashamed of this year. They were as close as one half point behind the Jackalope in late August. They figure to be right back in the title hunt again next year.
Kevin’s Kings
Again, this wasn’t a “bad” season for the Kings. They finished exactly where they did a year ago, in fourth place. However, this time fourth place meant 15 points back and not really a serious contender down the stretch. Last year, they were in the hunt right until the end and finished just five points behind the co-champions. Other than place of finish, there was virtually nothing in common between the 2010 and 2011 Kings. This year’s squad had a below average offense and one of the league’s best pitching staffs. It was just the opposite in ’10. The main reason for the pitching upswing was one man: Justin Verlander. Verlander tied a DTBL single season record with 24 wins. He also led the league in WHIP (0.920) and strike outs (250). Really, he’s the only Kings pitcher who sticks out as having an impressive year, yet they managed to garner 40 pitching points. On offense, it was an underwhelming and injury plagued season for almost all of the Kings stars. Jose Reyes bounced back to being one of the league’s elite players, but he too couldn’t stay healthy. It is hard to say where this franchise is headed. Without Verlander’s monster year, they could have finished near the bottom of the standings this year. On the other hand, had a few key guys stayed healthy, they may have been in the hunt until the end.
Marc’s Mavericks
Now this is the one team in this group where the “bad” label probably applies. For the second straight year, the Mavericks finished in eighth place. But this isn’t a franchise that typically goes through long rebuilding processes. Last year, they were completely wrecked by injuries and essentially gave up with a couple months to play. This year, they had some injuries, but that wasn’t the biggest problem. Disappointing seasons from almost all of their young players gave them little hope of competing. They have had five first round picks the past two years, and I would call several of them major disappointments at this point. Carlos Santana and Matt Wieters had decent seasons at a weak offensive position, but the jury is still out on them. Gordon Beckham and Jayson Heward have been huge busts so far. The only Maverick who really stood out as having a tremendous 2011 season was Clayton Kershaw. Kerhsaw led the league in ERA (2.28) and was just behind Verlander in WHIP (0.977), wins (21) and strike outs (248). It should definitely come down to those two for the Cy Young award. The Mavericks really need to hit some home runs with their early picks in next year’s draft because the last two years have been rather forgettable.
THE UGLY
David’s Darkhorses
The Darkhorses set a standard of excellence in winning four consecutive DTBL championships from 2006-2010. This year, not only did they fail to meet that standard, but they wound up with the worst finish in league history for a defending champion, finishing a distant seventh. They won those four titles by having the most balanced team in the league, usually finishing first or second in both batting and pitching. This year, they somehow managed to fall to the middle of the pack in both areas. Injuries were a factor, but not to the extent you would expect for a team that fell apart like this. Below average seasons for most of the roster is the main explanation. I suppose it was bound to happen eventually. On the bright side, Jacoby Ellsbury turned himself into one of the best fantasy players with a 32 HR, 39 SB season while hitting .321. His Red Sox teammate Adrian Gonzalez had another solid year for the Darkhorses, but dropped off a bit in the second half. One major problem with the pitching staff was the criminally bad run support Tim Lincecum received. He only won 13 games despite putting up his usual dominating numbers in the other categories. James Shields and Chris Carpenter also won fewer games than you would expect from their other numbers. I’ll chalk this up as a worst-case scenario season for the Darkhorses. Surely, things will go better next year.
Greg’s Gators
I should point out that until the final day of the season, it appeared the Gators, and possibly the Cougars as well, were going to break the DTBL record for fewest total points in the 10 team era. Fortunately for them, both teams picked up a point or two in the final day and avoided this place in history. They wound up tied for ninth place with a putrid 21 total points, one clear of the record low mark of 20 by Tim’s Titans in 1999.
While the Gators did avoid that distinction, they managed to set a different low water mark. Their six batting points are the fewest ever in the 10 team era (since ’98, batting or pitching). Only a couple stolen bases prevented them from finishing dead last in all five offensive categories. Sadly, they were in last by a fairly wide margin in most categories. They are going to have a tough time finding enough players worthy of keeping. About the only offensive player who put up keeper-worthy numbers was Dan Uggla, and even he only hit .233. The pitching staff was a little better, mostly thanks to C.C. Sabathia. Injuries to Jair Jurrjens and Josh Johnson prevented them from having a pretty respectable staff. Overall, there is a lot of work to do for this squad. I think 2011 was clearly the worst season in franchise history.
Kelly’s Cougars
I think Kelly clearly had more important things on her mind this year, which caused her to not put a lot of time and effort into her team. I’m not sure it would have mattered though. Much as was the case with the White Sox, Adam Dunn almost single-handedly ruined the Cougars season. Nobody had a particularly good season either though. Josh Hamilton fought through injuries, and other key players were simply inconsistent. The pitching staff was especially poor, though that can be partly blamed on the loss of staff ace Adam Wainwright to Tommy John surgery before the season even started. This will be chalked up as a forgettable year for the Cougars. Perhaps with some bounce back years from their key players, 2012 should be better.
Two bold moves in March may have changed the course of history for one franchise. Over the past several seasons, Jay’s Jackalope have had the league’s best starting pitching staff. If you put together a list of the top ten starting pitchers over the past three years, the list would probably contain all five primary starters from the ’09-’10 Jackalope. However, a below-average offense kept them from being a serious championship contender in those seasons. So the Jackalope decided to do something about that. Two premier starting pitchers were traded away for one of the game’s biggest sluggers and a coveted draft pick which turned into another young slugger. These two moves, along with a couple other sly draft picks, directly led to a near perfect season. Jay’s Jackalope are the 2011 Dream Team Baseball League Champions.
Entering the 2011 season, the Jackalope were the longest tenured DTBL franchise without a championship. They entered the league as an expansion team in 1998 and had some immediate success, finishing a very respectable sixth. Since then, no franchise has had more ups and downs than this one. In 2002, they finished in second place, but fell all the way to ninth the following season and tenth the year after that. They made it back up to second again in 2006, but plummeted to last place again the next year. It has been a steady climb to the top since then. Last season, they finished in third place, but were just three points behind the co-champions. In retrospect, the disaster of ’07 may have been the turning point for the franchise. It allowed them to draft Ryan Braun with the first pick of the 2008 draft, giving them a second legitimate star on offense to compliment Albert Pujols. Hunter Pence was their second pick in ’08 too, a draft which, by the way, Jay did not take part in due to an overseas deployment. So a little bit of credit is also due to my friend Jeff who filled in for Jay in both the ’08 and ’10 drafts.
While it was that 2008 draft which got things moving in the right direction, it was the two moves made this past March that turned the Jackalope into champions. In the middle of the first round of the 2011 DTBL Draft, the Jackalope made two enormous trades within minutes of each other. First, they dealt stud starting pitcher, and eventual Cy Young candidate, Jered Weaver and a fifth round pick to the Moonshiners for the sixth overall pick in the draft. This trade came to be when a young slugging outfielder named Mike Stanton happened to slip through the first five picks of the draft. The Jackalope immediately used the acquired pick to grab Stanton, giving them a much needed power boost. But they were hardly done improving their team in that area. They traded another one of their elite pitchers, Zack Greinke, to the Naturals for a proven power source in first baseman Ryan Howard. These two trades should go down as two of the best win/win trades this league has ever seen, but I’ll get to that some more when I review the Moonshiners and Naturals seasons. These three teams all managed to improve themselves, and the result was a top three finish for each.
With two newly created holes in the rotation, the Jackalope had little concern because the staff still figured to be as good as any in the league considering Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee and Felix Hernandez were still around. But someone had to fill those two open slots, and boy did the Jackalope hit home runs with those selections. They picked three starting pitchers in the draft, and all three wound up being major contributors. Steady Shaun Marcum was the third round selection and stuck with the Jackalope rotation all season. Then they picked Jhoulys Chacin in the sixth round. Chacin proceeded to have an All-Star caliber first half. But the biggest steal of the 2011 DTBL Draft came when the Jackalope selected Ian Kennedy in the eleventh round. This NL Cy Young candidate won 21 games, but amazingly, the Jackalope had nowhere to put him for the first half of the season, so only 11 of those wins were recorded to his Jackalope stat line.
Despite trading away Weaver and Greinke, the Jackalope somehow wound up with a better rotation in 2011 than the incredible crew from 2010. They set a new DTBL record with a team total of 49 pitching points. They finished in first place in every pitching category except wins, which they probably would have won as well had the Kings not been working with an extra starting pitcher in a RP slot. So obviously it wasn’t just the starting pitching that was good. The bullpen led the league in saves, thanks mostly to John Axford and Heath Bell. Even Ryan Madson (10th round pick) added an unexpected 32 saves. Axford’s 46 saves were the second most in the league. It is hard to pick the best starting pitcher for the Jackalope since they were all so good. Halladay was second in the league in ERA at 2.35, and won 19 games (3rd in league). Lee was right behind Halladay in ERA (2.40), but had more strike outs (238, 3rd in league).
It didn’t take much of an offense to ride along with that pitching staff for a title run, and honestly the Jackalope offense wasn’t spectacular. They finished with 32 batting points, good for fourth in the league. But that was a big step up from the past few years and was the Jackalope’s highest total since ’08. The key to winning the title was to have a respectable offense, instead of one of the league’s worst like they were in ’09 and ’10. They finished in the middle of the pack in every offensive category except stolen bases, which they finished on top. As usual, the Jackalope offense was led by Pujols, but it was actually a bit of a down year by his standards. He failed to drive in 100 for the first time in his career (98 DTBL RBIs). He hit .300 with a team high 37 home runs, despite missing time with a broken wrist. Actually, the offense was really led by Braun who had a MVP caliber season. Braun hit .332 and made it to the 30/30 club with 33 home runs and stolen bases. He drove in 111 and scored 109 times. In addition to those two, the two players acquired via the March trades (Stanton and Howard) hit 30+ home runs as well (33 for Howard, 34 for Stanton). Meanwhile, the Jackalope’s other first round pick, outfielder Michael Bourn, paid dividends too, leading the league with 61 stolen bases. Basically, every draft pick the Jackalope made this year turned to gold.
It was pretty smooth sailing for the Jackalope. After the usual April/May fluctuation of the standings, the Jackalope had a firm grasp on first place by Memorial Day and never gave it up. The Naturals made a nice run in August, at one time closing the gap to 1/2 point. But the Jackalope remained steady in September while the Naturals went on a bit of a slide. The Jackalope finished the season with 81 points and a 10 1/2 point margin of victory. It was the largest margin of victory since 2008, and quite a contrast from 2010 when the top four teams finished within five points of each other. There were a lot of tight races further down the standings, but I will get to that in my next article.
As mentioned, this was the first DTBL championship for the Jackalope, leaving the Moonshiners and Demigods as the only active franchises without a title. It ended an amazing four year title run for the Darkhorses, who remain tied with the Kings for the most championships.
This was part one of what will be a three part review of the 2011 season. In part two, which will hopefully come later this weekend, I will recap the season for the other nine franchises, covering what went right and what went wrong for each. Finally, next week, I will delve into the numbers to show what a truly remarkable, and record breaking, season this was. All year, I have been writing about what a pitching dominated season this has been. But I want to gather some numbers to prove it. Here is a bit of a preview.
