Rating the Drafts (revisited)

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 11:11 am

Remember the uproar/fervor in April when the "Rating the Draft" Column came out? You can still find Puffins' fine column at Rating the Draft

I thought it might be interesting now 2/3 of the way through the season to revisit that column and see how this season's leaders are doing in comparison to their respective rated drafts. Here is just a brief look at a few teams (On most teams, I don't know the owner's name to compare to the team name, so I only used the few that I knew).

#1 Doughboys were ranked 148th out of 300 drafts;

#2 CC Desparasos were ranked 78th

#4 Appleton Hayes was ranked 87th

#8 Rototimes was ranked 52nd

In the Las Vegas #2 League (where I know the owners' names and corresponding teams), the first ranked drafted team is presently in 12th place (out of 15) in the league; the second ranked drafted team is sitting in the middle in 8th place, and the third ranked drafted team is in the bottom third at 11th place.

Conversely, the first, second and third place LV League #2 teams (who are each at least 20 points ahead of fourth place) were ranked 5th, 12th and 10th, respectively.

I realize that much has happened since the draft, with injuries, free agent pick ups and the like, however, it certainly seems that ranking drafts based upon the dollar values in auctions is not even close to an accurate method.

Oh, and yes CC, it is slow out here. We need another celebrity trial to keep the 150,000 of us attorneys active. Until then, you are stuck with my posts.

Buster

nydownunder · Post by **nydownunder** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 2:56 am

I would have preferred using projected stats

(avg of 4-5 publications) rather than the auction dollar values. I think the analysis would have had more correlation to actuality.

In addition, I really think steroids put a spanner in things a bit. All these injuries and underperformances this year are no coincidences. I also don't know if this is in fact true, but I would think AVG, HR, K, and ERA are all down this year. With a lot of players/stats coming back to the pack, the normal distribution of these (per team) would be much shorter and fatter. Basically, every little dinger or K means that much more this year, thus the greater possibility of the projections being off.

IMO

[ August 12, 2005, 09:04 AM: Message edited by: nydownunder ]

Spyhunter · Post by **Spyhunter** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 12:06 pm

ummmm NYDOWNUNDER, I agree with projections being off because of Roids this year, but how exactly would an average of 4-5 published $ values be different? Many mags published in December AND even those that might have been up to date didn't discount the Roids factor so the analysis probably would have shown the near the same result!!!

Spy

nydownunder · Post by **nydownunder** » Thu Aug 18, 2005 3:55 am

Originally posted by Spyhunter:

ummmm NYDOWNUNDER, I agree with projections being off because of Roids this year, but how exactly would an average of 4-5 published $ values be different? Many mags published in December AND even those that might have been up to date didn't discount the Roids factor so the analysis probably would have shown the near the same result!!!

Spy Spy, not the $ values, the projected stats. You then stack them and compare them to last year's results and the points obtained with such. Using pure projected stats takes the emotional side of $$$ spent in auctions (ie the premium), which arguable inflated some ordinary players in the analysis referred to above.

King of Queens · Post by **King of Queens** » Fri Aug 19, 2005 12:55 am

And I was ranked first! Current position is somewhere in the 80-90 vicinity.

Oh well...

nydownunder · Post by **nydownunder** » Fri Aug 19, 2005 5:53 am

KoQ

I could see why you would have been rated high from an Auction $ perspective. (And don't forget that such projections don't take into consideration injuries.) If looking at your draft from day one of the season your draft was smoking up to round 15, with some trouble in the late teens, but finishing off with some real gems. I guess Beltre/Bagwell and SP depth is what did your team in.

[ August 19, 2005, 12:06 PM: Message edited by: nydownunder ]

King of Queens · Post by **King of Queens** » Fri Aug 19, 2005 7:10 am

Originally posted by nydownunder:

KoQ

I could see why you would have been rated high from an Auction $ perspective. (And don't forget that such projections don't take into consideration injuries.) If looking at your draft from day one of the season your draft was smoking up to round 15, with some trouble in the late teens, but finishing off with some real gems. I guess Beltre/Bagwell and SP depth is what did your team in. Not to mention my crappy closers. Second year in a row I've gotten burned by the Oakland closer situation. As for Graves, I should have known better...

nydownunder · Post by **nydownunder** » Fri Aug 19, 2005 7:29 am

No excuse on the closers. There was plenty to pick up during the season...and maybe even a couple more with 2 weeks left until the trade deadline, as well as the fact that several closers are ailing or contuing to blow up.

bjoak · Post by **bjoak** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 10:45 am

Yeah, I was near last in those ratings. Good thing they were inaccurate.

In addition, I really think steroids put a spanner in things a bit. All these injuries and underperformances this year are no coincidences. I also don't know if this is in fact true, but I would think AVG, HR, K, and ERA are all down this year. With a lot of players/stats coming back to the pack, the normal distribution of these (per team) would be much shorter and fatter. Basically, every little dinger or K means that much more this year, thus the greater possibility of the projections being off.

I agree that Roids affected things. The number one guy in the NFBC in homers is so aberrant, he's ahead of the number 2 guy by like 20 homers and he still won't have a total anywhere near the top finishers from last year. I think 52 MLB players had more than 25 homers last year. It won't come close by the end of Sept.

I don't get how avg. and homers could both be down while ERA will be down (I assume this really means up, given the context) at the same time. Were you thinking a lot of runs were walked in this year? I think it is clear, starting with Clemens and some of the closers that ERA has improved. Not sure if strikeouts are down, but the ability to limit homers seems to be affecting ERA more than anything else (see Clemens vs. Randy Johnson).

nydownunder · Post by **nydownunder** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 1:04 pm

bjoak

You didn't just say that! If HR's (RBI & Runs) and AVG (Hits, thus RBI's and Runs) are down, then why wouldn't ERA be down as well (ie lower). Hits and Runs are what produce higher ERA's.

...I know, I know, its been a long season.

[ August 23, 2005, 07:05 PM: Message edited by: nydownunder ]

viper · Post by **viper** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 1:23 pm

And BOTH ERA and Whip are down in the NFBC.

The midpoint in ERA last year was 4.194 - this year it's 3.975

The midpoint in WHIP last year was 1.333 - this year it's 1.307

[ August 23, 2005, 07:23 PM: Message edited by: viper ]

bjoak · Post by **bjoak** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 3:10 pm

Here was your comment:

I would think AVG, HR, K, and ERA are all down this year. Clearly the intent seems to be that everything has gone bad. So I took 'down' to mean that, w/r/t ERA. The rest of the paragraph didn't support the idea that ERA would improve. I think it is apparent from my paragraph that I was questioning why you would think ERA had worsened.