Either that or they know I'm an easy target, having won one LABR NL league title during that time.LABR was started by John Hunt in 1994 to get industry writers together for AL and NL-only auctions. The debut season included Keith Olbermann, Peter Gammons, Paul White, Danny Sheridan and others. Believe it or not, we did it over the phone with the AL leading off on a 6 1/2 hour phone call. My ear still hurts from that one.
We did LABR over the phone for two years before all flying to Orlando to finally do it live in 1996. We've held live auctions every year since, moving from Orlando to KIssimmee to Tampa, to Washington D.C., back to Tampa, to Phoenix in 2003 and now Tampa again after 16-17 years in Phoenix. USA Today also created a consumer First Pitch Florida seminar around the LABR auctions and more than 100 attendees are here for seminars, live drafts, spring training games and the auctions. It's a fun time.
Shawn and I led a panel this morning on ADPs and introduced a lot of new players to our NFBC ADPs. Maybe we even recruited a few new players.
We finished the AL Auction last night and actually had money for the final 15 rounds. That's uncommon for us in LABR. Here's our team:
C - Francisco Mejia $7
C - Victor Caratini $3
1B - Rhys Hoskins $28 (Shawn HAD to have him)
2B - Gavin Lux $16
SS - Trea Turner $40
3B - Kris Bryant $26
CI - Ryan Healy $1
MI - Mauricio Dubon $8
UT - Yeonis Cespedes $5
OF - Bryce Harper $33
OF - Ian Desmond $5
OF - Austin Riley $5
OF - Yasiel Puig $7
OF - Harold Ramirez $1
P - Walker Buehler $34
P - Madison Bumgarner $13
P - Dustin May $4
P - Mitch Keller $7
P - Joey Lucchesi $6
P - Tony Gonsolin $2
P - Alex Wood $6
P - Kevin Ginkel $2
P - Eric Lauer
Reserves: Sean Newcomb, Kyle Wright, Matt Kemp, Josh Naylor, Seranthony Dominguez Luis Patino
We punted Saves, as did at least one other owner. Getting one to two closers was just too expensive. We'll have to address that during the season as this is a trading league. Our biggest gamble was Puig, who has to sign with an NL team to get any stats in this format. That was risky. That bid made it impossible for us to get a final CI and to get even a potential closer, but we'll see where this leads.
I'll post some dollar values after we finish AL LABR tonight. Enjoy.
