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We're proud to announce that David DiDonato of Johnston, Rhode Island has won the 2006 National Fantasy Baseball Championship title, defeating 329 teams for the $100,000 grand prize. His "Vinnie's Team" scored 2,828.5 points in the overall contest, collecting 85.7 percent of the available points. DiDonato also won $5,000 for winning Las Vegas League 9 with 133 points (88.7% of available points). Congratulations on a great, great season David and enjoy the $105,000 in winnings.



This is the second year that DiDonato has been in the NFBC. Last year his main event team finished third in Las Vegas League 8, but he won the debut Ultimate League to earn $40,000. This year his Bustouts Ultimate League team finished third for another $7,500 in earnings. Congratulations again David.



This marks the third straight year that our NFBC grand champion has drafted alone. I'm not sure what that means, but I guess partners aren't needed in baseball! For the record, LV9 was considered one of our toughest leagues in the competition as it featured three 2005 league champions and the Ultimate League champion, so David earned his mettle there.



Again, congrats on a great, great season David and we'll see you again in Las Vegas in March when you try to defend your title. Until then, enjoy your winnings!



[ October 02, 2006, 10:33 AM: Message edited by: Greg Ambrosius ]

congrats david, i wish i could have made it a bit more intersting(for me atleast) in the last month but your team was AWESOME and uncatchable. enjoy your winnings and look forward to battling you again next year. RT

Thanks for the kind words Greg and Rick. They are very much appreciated. Rick, you gave me all I could handle and as much as I enjoy the competition, I'm glad the season is over. You were gaining on me every day!!

Greg just a note of correction: I didnt win the 2004 WCOFB. I think I placed 5th or 6th.



Thanks again guys.I'm already looking forward to next year. Sign me up for both again Greg!!

Well done, David. I still think that you should have come back to the 2700's and atleast given us a sniff. In any event, it was a pleasure hanging out on the leaderboard this year. Looking forward to the Flamingo in '07.



Greg, Can we get the ticker on the homepage for the countdown to the main event in '07? I love that.

Originally posted by bustouts:

Thanks for the kind words Greg and Rick. They are very much appreciated. Rick, you gave me all I could handle and as much as I enjoy the competition, I'm glad the season is over. You were gaining on me every day!!

Greg just a note of correction: I didnt win the 2004 WCOFB. I think I placed 5th or 6th.



Thanks again guys.I'm already looking forward to next year. Sign me up for both again Greg!! Correction noted. Congrats David. You are signed up and good to go for 2007. Should be a fun year again.

Originally posted by Joe Sambito:

Well done, David. I still think that you should have come back to the 2700's and atleast given us a sniff. In any event, it was a pleasure hanging out on the leaderboard this year. Looking forward to the Flamingo in '07.



Greg, Can we get the ticker on the homepage for the countdown to the main event in '07? I love that. Yup, STATS has been asked to do that already. We'll put the Register link up, the Rules, new Prizes link, Events Schedule and Questions today as well. We just wanted to wait until the 2006 season officially ended and for a time there this weekend it looked like Monday would be a playoff game. Now we're ready for 2007 to begin and that means the Countdown on the home page must begin. I'm on it!!!

Congrats to Vinnie's Team; we're pretty proud of 6th place but the top spot was never in doubt. Very impressive performance, see ya in '07!

Well played and a dominant performance...Congratulations to Vinnie's Team!

Greg- Is this not by far the most one team has dominated the main event. Both in consecutive time in first place and margin of victory?

Congrats, Mr. DiDonato! Well done

Originally posted by Chest Rockwell:

Greg- Is this not by far the most one team has dominated the main event. Both in consecutive time in first place and margin of victory? Definitely. Artie Rastelli took over first place in August of 2004 and was actually tied for first place with Aaron Seefeldt with two days left in the season. He won by 27.5 points. Brian Oldenski won by 70 points last year. David won by 217 points and led since May, I believe. I tried to look up when he first went into the lead, but couldn't find it. Maybe David knows the date.



Statistics of every season can be found by going to STANDINGS and clicking on OVERALL. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and you can find every category for all three NFBC seasons.

Several people have asked to see David's draft and I thought I'd post it since we'll be posting it in our first issue of Fantasy Sports Magazine anyway. David, the large $100,000 check has been sent to your new residence and we'll figure out a way to get a good photo of you holding that check for the cover of our magazine, okay? Smile nice and I'll ship you an NFBC hat and/or shirt!



Here is David's Las Vegas League 9 draft from the fifth hole:



1. Carl Crawford

2. Alfonso Soriano

3. Lance Berkman

4. Randy Johnson

5. Huston Street

6. Barry Bonds

7. Jason Schmidt

8. Jason Varitek

9. Justin Morneau

10. Curt Schilling

11. Jorge Posada

12. Carlos Guillen

13. Shawn Green

14. Wily Mo Pena

15. Francisco Liriano

16. Mike Cameron

17. Pedro Feliz

18. Mike Mussina

19. B.J. Upton

20. Luis A. Gonzalez (Col.)

21. Carl Everett

22. Brandon McCarthy

23. Joey Devine

24. Carl Pavano

25. Frank Thomas

26. Ryan Wagner

27. Corey Koskie

28. Brett Tomko

29. Jeff Bagwell

30. Miguel Batista

David, I think it's safe to say that you hit on your first three picks! Ironically, Ryan Howard went one pick after you took Lance Berkman, but that's nitpicking on my part! You pegged Morneau a round before most folks (congrats) and you pegged Francisco Liriano earlier than most as well. Getting Mike Cameron in the 16th round and Frank Thomas in the 25th round really rounded out a powerful offense.



It's also interesting to note that your team could have been even better with a few breaks. Joey Devine was lights out early in spring training and looked like he was going to be the Braves' closer just before Draft Day. Imagine if that had happened? You also got nothing out of Pavano and McCarthy never really made the White Sox rotation. But Batista in the 30th round was a nice finish.



Congrats on a solid, solid draft. I bet you wouldn't mind the fifth hole again this year, right?

As long as we have the draft boards out today and are talking about last year's NFBC champion, let's take a look at David DiDonato's strategy the day after the main event when he competed in the NFBC Ultimate League Draft. He had the sixth pick in this draft and again led off with Carl Crawford, but this time in the second round he passed on Alfonso Soriano and instead took Miguel Tejada. In the third round Lance Berkman was already gone so he went with Gary Sheffield (Ryan Howard was there!). David led this league for the first five months of the season, but eventually finished third in the Ultimate League behind Eddie Gillis and Shawn Childs.



Here's a look at David's NFBC Ultimate League draft from the sixth spot:



1. Carl Crawford

2. Miguel Tejada

3. Gary Sheffield

4. Roy Halladay

5. Mariano Rivera

6. Vernon Wells

7. Jason Schmidt

8. Scott Rolen

9. Todd Jones

10. Jorge Posada

11. Tim Hudson

12. Chris Shelton

13. Shawn Green

14. Chris Reitsma

15. Carlos Guillen

16. Mike Cameron

17. Mike Mussina

18. Pedro Feliz

19. Ervin Santana

20. Delmon Young

21. Joe Crede

22. Brandon McCarthy

23. Josh Barfield

24. Yadier Molina

25. Ryan Wagner

26. Carl Pavano

27. Ryan Langerhans

28. Junior Spivey

29. Eric Hinske

30. Jerome Williams



I think there are 12 repeats on this team. Great job again David.

I'm still having nightmares on picking Tejada instead of Soriano in the Ultimate. I'm not sure it would have mattered in the standings though. I debated who to pick there and athough I liked Sorianos potential to bounce back from the previous year, I guess I wasnt sold enough to have him in both leagues while Tejada was still around. I never really considered Howard in the third.

My pitching really fell apart in September. It was torture watching a 27 point lead disappear so quickly. I looked back and found that in the last 4or 5 weeks of the season, excluding the last week, I only had 6 wins and 6 saves total. I have to give both Eddie and Shawn credit as they outmanaged me down the stretch!!

To compare my 2 teams, I actually liked my Ultimate draft better. It goes to show you, you never know.

You guys as always did a great job and I am already looking forward to next year.

Thanks for everything.



david

Originally posted by bustouts:

I'm still having nightmares on picking Tejada instead of Soriano in the Ultimate. I'm not sure it would have mattered in the standings though. I debated who to pick there and athough I liked Sorianos potential to bounce back from the previous year, I guess I wasnt sold enough to have him in both leagues while Tejada was still around. I never really considered Howard in the third.

My pitching really fell apart in September. It was torture watching a 27 point lead disappear so quickly. I looked back and found that in the last 4or 5 weeks of the season, excluding the last week, I only had 6 wins and 6 saves total. I have to give both Eddie and Shawn credit as they outmanaged me down the stretch!!

To compare my 2 teams, I actually liked my Ultimate draft better. It goes to show you, you never know.

You guys as always did a great job and I am already looking forward to next year.

Thanks for everything.



david David, I could see in early September you had too many battles on the pitching side to protect. When you choose to fight the save battle and protect era and whip, I thought you might have a freefall in wins if you didn't get the wins. As it turned out, you didn't get any saves either. As you tried again the next week, you fate was set. You were running out of time to react to the loss of wins. My chase was easy. I needed win's and K's. I got the bonus that my pitching was good. On the Eddie side, the steals and the vulture wins the last two weeks won him the league. The last day of the season, I was set up to win. The breaks went his way and I didn't the K's I needed. I guess we all learned something. We all will be a little better because of it. Good luck in the off season trying to spend all the money!! The way I figure it, we have at least a couple of decades left to play this game. I'm sure we will have more war stories to look back on. See you in Vegas!! CC



[ October 14, 2006, 07:23 PM: Message edited by: CC's Desperados ]

you got it Shawn....first few rounds are on me!!

A belated thank you to Joe Sambito , Schwartzstops, Edwards Kings and Moneymaker. Thanks for the kind words guys. They are very much appreciated. It was one of those years when everything fell into place. Kind of like being "in the zone". I'm already looking forward to next year. Have a great off season guys. I will see you in March.



david