FIREMANE’s FANTASTIC ADVICE

WHO AM I? WHY AM I HERE?

Okay, all the advice may not be fantastic, but it will be advice about fantasy baseball, and I never met a pun I didn’t like. But before we get to any advice, I must pause for some shameless self-promotion. Actually I read somewhere that when offering advice it is important to let the reader know how much of an expert you are before starting. So …

I do not profess to be any sort of Fantasy baseball god. I have no secret powers. I don’t work at the league office. I don’t watch 240 hours of baseball a week, (though having been a Braves fan since 1970, I do catch a fair number of games on TBS). I’m just another one of a million fantasy baseball fans with opinions to share.

I first jumped into fantasy sports back in the 70s, creating my own form of solitaire baseball, using two decks of regular playing cards. In the 80s, I played the Sports Illustrated baseball board game, which was based on actual major league stats and was obviously a big jump up from my creation. I played an entire 162 game schedule for half the national league (solitaire) over a couple of years, keeping the stats from each game in a notebook. When I got my first computer, the first program I ever wrote for myself was a simple data collector for my baseball stats from the SI Baseball game.

My first experience with on-line Fantasy baseball came in 2000. I had found Sandbox when looking for tools to run a March Madness basketball pool, and started playing some of their on-line arcade games. (It was very annoying when they replaced the classic arcade clones like Sandman). Anyway, when baseball season arrived, I decided I’d give Heavy Hitters a go.

That first year, I didn’t delve into the Full Count leagues, but I did take the time to go peruse the rules and I lurked in the Locker Room from time to time, picking up insight into the various (and often divergent) opinions on running a full team. In the meantime, I was doing really awful with my HH team. But, as the year progressed, I continued to learn what worked and what didn’t. At the All-Star break, my HH team was ranked somewhere around 25,000. But, in the second half of the season, I managed to climb the rankings, and actually finished around 5,000^th.

In 2001, I decided that in addition to Heavy Hitters I would try a Full Count League. Since HH is based on Fantasy Points, I decided to jump into an FP league. I figured I’d have to learn handling a pitching staff from scratch, but I was pretty confident in my knowledge of hitters, (at least as far as Sandbox FPs were concerned). But, I was late in jumping in, so I ended up joining a random league the 2^nd or 3^rd week of the season. It was a multi-list draft, and I was bright enough to go thru and re-rank the players. As those of you with experience know, the first few weeks of the season can lead to WILD skews for many players. Only 4 other guys in the league did this, and the 5 that didn’t dumped their teams almost immediately.

I got lucky enough to get Pedro with my first pick! As I expected, I ended up with a solid offense built primarily around a top-flight outfield. It’s been too long, but IIRC it was something like Bonds, Giles, Abreu and maybe Higginson or Salmon. As I feared, my early days of managing my pitching were abysmal. After three weeks my SP average was under 10, (which is really depressing when you’ve got Pedro on your staff).

Then luck struck hard. A guy wanted Pedro and offered Randy Johnson. They were the core of a 10 player deal. I actually benched all my starting pitchers except Unit and Lieber for a while. My SP average came up, and I started learning what worked (for me) and what didn’t. The guy with Pedro was running away with the league until Pedro got hurt. Then he just folded up tent and left.

I eventually picked up Buerhle and Mulder from the wire to go with Unit and Lieber, and a cast of dozens handling my #5 spot. By the All Star break there were only three of us left. After the trade deadline, it was pretty much just me, as I had pulled away and won the league by over 500 points.

During 2001, I also picked up two dead teams. One was a 7^th place team in an 8-team keeper FP league. Believe it or not, that team also had Unit as its ace. I picked up Burkett and other solid pitchers from the wire. Unfortunately, the offense was dreadfully bad for an 8-team league. By year’s end, I had climbed to second place, but there were only two of us left. I ended up only 200 points behind the league champ.

The second dead team I picked up was in 9^th out of 10 teams, in another FP keeper league. When I got it, my outfield was already 60 games behind schedule for games played. I learned a lot about making up lost games playing that team. I slowly climbed up the rankings, but this was an active league, and was much tougher than my other leagues. Right before the trade deadline, (just before Pedro was scheduled to come back), one of the top teams made a trade to get Pedro. It was, in my opinion, not so much a gutsy move, as more of a throwing in the towel for that season, and preparing for 2002. Unfortunately, Pedro trades tend to bring out strong opinions, and the 2^nd place team waived his team and left, (sigh). Ultimately, I don’t think it would have mattered, as the 1^st place team was in solid position to hold onto the lead he had before the meltdown.

By the end of the season, I had climbed all the way to 4^th place, (though at least one position was due to the guy dumping and leaving). But I did manage to cut an 800 point deficit on the league winner to only about 500 in half a season. In heavy hitters in 2001, I climbed as high as 5^th in the nation about 1/3 of the way through the season, and stayed in the top 25 for most of the year. I had a late season swoon, and eventually ended up 101^st, (so I didn’t get a tee shirt).

In 2002, I was invited into the “Ship of Fouls” league, a 12-team FP league consisting of Forum Regulars. The invite was based on my contributions in the locker room during 2001, where I had started contributing in with my overly long, stat-laden posts. I got my first chance for a slow live draft, (though I did participate in a mock draft before the real one), with the SOF league. So, for the first time I got to put some of my draft day theories to the test. All in all I felt my draft went very well, and afterward I provided my personal views on the draft as a whole. I’ll eventually post my analysis, and add comments at the end of the year to see where I was right and where I missed the boat.

In any event, this is a fairly short, and only moderately impressive resume. But at least you know to whom you’re listening to at this point. While any advice I may offer may be questionable, or down right wrong, it WILL be based on thought and research. And I have no qualms presenting opposing views, so as my site grows, feel free to make contributions as you see fit.