Cold Hard Look X Mr. Hinkelman

[Schwks]

Sometimes it is good to look at other peoples' mistakes as well as successes in order to assess your own weaknesses. Everyone who follows fantasy sports now must know of the Hinkelman story, and it will go down in fantasy lore...both for the unbelievable feat, and the man behind it.



This year has been one to forget for LH. He currently is in 405th place overall and 15th in his league, Vegas #8. He had the 13th pick:



Cabrera

Upton

Jeter

Beckham

Beckett



LE and I both fell into the Justin Upton trap. J Upside this year was more like J "return 9th round value" Side. Beckham, I believe was going 6-7th rounds. Yes he had 3b eligibility , but wasnt his upside kind of Casey Blakish? Beckett was bad luck and Jeter was somewhat of a gamble to go this high on Jeter who had an outlier year, in otherwise generally downward numbers.



Overall, this 5 was not awful, and probably would be doable to overcome.



Peavy

Berkman

B Wilson

N Morgan

Jurjens



Morgan has returned 40 some odd SBs, but his runs and avg have not been there. Wilson is a top 5 closer. Again, not awful, but Peavy was useless, Berkman a lower tier 1b option.



Sheets

Lowe

Barmes

Niemanm

Maybin



Niemann was a hit for 3 1/2 months. Other 4 guys were basically unusable. I think at this point, with this many misses, the season was unsalvageable...too many holes to fill.



20-30 was LH's best 10, producing

Uribe, Penny who was good for awhile, Overbay and best pick Gregg, Mark Ellis



LH's did not fae well on FAAB pickups. HIs successes were Cecil, Blanton, C Johnson, Carlos Ruiz, Betemit....not bad but many of LH's FAAB successes came long after the fat lady sang.



His big expenditures were trying to fill second c spot: C Snyder at 155



Here are my lessons taken:



1) LH took 6 SPs in top 16 rounds. Peavy, JJ, Sheets were all significant inj risks (JJ has rotator tendinitis in ST) WHen building staff in top half of draft ...I think you need to look for relative health guarrantees



2) Second catcher is not that important. I think finding filler to produce until you can pounce on someone decent is doable. Decent guys generally do become available. Even in this league, Carlos Ruiz was available for $11. Dont go budget busting on a 2nd C



3) The big 5 rookies/newbie types on draft day were: McCutchen, CarGo, Beckham, Heyward, Wieters. Drafting slightly unknown, unproven guys...the purpose is to gamble to get excess value for the draft pick. Other then CarGo, a huge hit, none of the other guys really exceeded their slots and Wieters, Beckham, Heyward probably did not return fair value