Santana/Peavy, 2 SP strategy - Revisited 5 years later

[The Mighty Men]

SEE END OF THREAD ON P. 3 FOR NEW COMMENTS - VERY INTERESTING STUFF AFTER THIS YEARS MAIN EVENT DRAFTS

I am posting this only to foster discussion and hear comments from all the NFBC experts. I took the plunge. I entered tonight's $125 satellite just to try the Santana/Peavy combination. I KDS'd #13 as my first pick, and got it (before Santana was traded). I thought Santana might be gone, but he made it to 13. So, I bit the bullet and took Peavy and gave it a shot.



C Brian McCann ATL R5 P13 Comment

C Dioner Navarro TB R25 P13 Comment

1B Paul Konerko CHW R6 P3 Comment

2B Placido Polanco DET R11 P13 Comment

2B Kelly Johnson ATL R14 P3 Comment

SS Jason Bartlett TB R18 P3 Comment

3B Mark Reynolds ARI R16 P3 Comment

3B Joe Crede CHW R23 P13 Comment

3B Mike Lamb MIN R29 P13 Comment

OF Corey Hart MIL R3 P13 Comment

OF Chris Young ARI R4 P3 Comment

OF Johnny Damon NYY R7 P13 Comment

OF Josh Hamilton TEX R10 P3 Comment

OF Nate McLouth PIT R15 P13 Comment

OF Bill Hall MIL R19 P13 Comment

OF Jerry Owens CHW R24 P3 Comment

OF Jonny Gomes TB R27 P13 Comment

DH Jim Thome CHW R8 P3 Comment

SP Johan Santana NYM R1 P13 Comment

SP Jake Peavy SD R2 P3 Comment

SP Jeremy Bonderman DET R12 P3 Comment

SP Shaun Marcum TOR R17 P13 Comment

SP Scott Baker MIN R20 P3 Comment

SP Ervin Santana ANA R21 P13 Comment

SP Kevin Slowey MIN R22 P3 Comment

SP Andrew Sonnanstine TB R26 P3 Comment

SP Jonathan Sanchez SF R30 P3 Comment

RP Huston Street OAK R9 P13 Comment

RP Carlos Marmol CHC R13 P13 Comment

RP Jim Hoey BAL R28 P3 Comment



One of the reasons I wanted to try it was just because nearly everybody will say winning the league cannot be done by starting with two pitchers. So, why not give it a go in a $125 satellite. Feel free to flame away at me if you want - I don't care. Even you, Gekko.

[KJ Duke]

With a strong starting staff you shouldve gone after 2-3 high-save cheap closers, i.e., Borowski/ TJones-types, since you can absorb their higher ratios. Instead, you drafted two strong ratio guys (which you didnt have to pay up for) who won't get you nearly enough saves. Other than that, nice job with your staff. On the hitting side, pwr and speed look good but you'll probably finish last in BA and come up short in R's scored.

[The Mighty Men]

Good point on the closers. They went a little faster overall than I expected. Jones (11th) Borowski (12th) Lidge (12th)and even CJ Wilson (13th) went before Marmol.

[rkulaski]

Good value on the rest of your SP. Strong OF. With the strong OF and Santana-Peavy combo, glaring weaknesses are the middle infield and 3B. Without running the numbers, looks like you've got enough speed, but not power on offense. At least you had the guts to take the plunge.

[rkulaski]

Hopefully one of your 3 3B work out. Doesn't sound like C Tracy will be ready by opening day so Reynolds could have all the ABs in the early part of the season.

[The Mighty Men]

Originally posted by Hitless:

Hopefully one of your 3 3B work out. Doesn't sound like C Tracy will be ready by opening day so Reynolds could have all the ABs in the early part of the season. I'm in Chicago, and it appears the Sox will be trading Crede. If he goes to SF, at least he starts, but that offense blows. I think teams are waiting to see how his back is. I read in the paper than he looked good yesterday.

[rkulaski]

Bill Hall could be a great pick in the 19th rd. Hard to imagine he was a 3rd rd pick last year in my league at the main event.

[Dub]

I think if you take the plunge- you dive in deep. You have the best two SPs, but then did not take another starter until R12 and then R17, somewhat lessening the effect of dominating the pitching points.

[Crazy Like a Fox]

Originally posted by The Mighty Men:

I am posting this only to foster discussion and hear comments from all the NFBC experts. I took the plunge. I entered tonight's $125 satellite just to try the Santana/Peavy combination. I KDS'd #13 as my first pick, and got it (before Santana was traded). I thought Santana might be gone, but he made it to 13. So, I bit the bullet and took Peavy and gave it a shot.



C Brian McCann ATL R5 P13 Comment

C Dioner Navarro TB R25 P13 Comment

1B Paul Konerko CHW R6 P3 Comment

2B Placido Polanco DET R11 P13 Comment

2B Kelly Johnson ATL R14 P3 Comment

SS Jason Bartlett TB R18 P3 Comment

3B Mark Reynolds ARI R16 P3 Comment

3B Joe Crede CHW R23 P13 Comment

3B Mike Lamb MIN R29 P13 Comment

OF Corey Hart MIL R3 P13 Comment

OF Chris Young ARI R4 P3 Comment

OF Johnny Damon NYY R7 P13 Comment

OF Josh Hamilton TEX R10 P3 Comment

OF Nate McLouth PIT R15 P13 Comment

OF Bill Hall MIL R19 P13 Comment

OF Jerry Owens CHW R24 P3 Comment

OF Jonny Gomes TB R27 P13 Comment

DH Jim Thome CHW R8 P3 Comment

SP Johan Santana NYM R1 P13 Comment

SP Jake Peavy SD R2 P3 Comment

SP Jeremy Bonderman DET R12 P3 Comment

SP Shaun Marcum TOR R17 P13 Comment

SP Scott Baker MIN R20 P3 Comment

SP Ervin Santana ANA R21 P13 Comment

SP Kevin Slowey MIN R22 P3 Comment

SP Andrew Sonnanstine TB R26 P3 Comment

SP Jonathan Sanchez SF R30 P3 Comment

RP Huston Street OAK R9 P13 Comment

RP Carlos Marmol CHC R13 P13 Comment

RP Jim Hoey BAL R28 P3 Comment



One of the reasons I wanted to try it was just because nearly everybody will say winning the league cannot be done by starting with two pitchers. So, why not give it a go in a $125 satellite. Feel free to flame away at me if you want - I don't care. Even you, Gekko. Wow, not only did you try a strategy that I was thinking about you also picked a lot of pitchers I like late.



I've got many of your pitchers on my Feb. 19th squad. Peavy, Bonderman, Slowey, Ervin Santana.



I think your power might be a little underrated. McCann, Konerko, Reynolds, Hart, Young, Hamilton, Gomes, Thome - ALL 25+ homers.



Stolen bases are fine with K.J., Bartlett, Hart, Young, Damon, McClouth, Owens.



Power could be midpack, stolen bases could be top 5. Pitching as a whole is easily top 2 (if Marmol gets closer job) I think you'll get about 65-67 points in pitching cats. Scour the free agents during the year improving on your offensive deficiencies and you could reasonably get 40-45 points out of that offense. Takes some work though.



I think you did a great job drafting, picking some nice offensive players with upside. Damon returns to form, Hamilton hits 30+ homers, Young hits 30/30 and raises BA, Thome hits 40 homers with 100 rbis, McCann goes for .300-30-100, Navarro proves his last 2 months were no fluke, all things I expect to happen, and you my friend are in the running to take this thing home.



I think, considering you took top 2 picks with pitchers, you recovered admirably.



Your team has a good chance to win and who knows, might even be the favorite.



Excellent draft. Love it.

[Edwards Kings]

I certainly would not consider myself an expert in anything other than vending machine cuisine, but in my opinion, that was a gutsy strategy, even in a $125 league. And you know, you could just pull it off.



We all need a little luck in these things, but if you are targeting 55-60 points out of pitching and 55-60 out of hitting, I could see you needing only a couple of your players to either rebound or continue their growth patterns and you are there.



BA could be a problem for your team overall, but with all due respect to Hitless, I kinda like your MI (little power, little speed, little average). Polanco hits 2 in Detroit (he may or may not), Johnson hits 1 or 2 in Atlanta makes for some nice runs scored.



A little luck with Marmol (who SHOULD close with the Cubbies) and you are even middle of the pack with Saves.



It could work! Good luck.

[The Mighty Men]

Crazy - thanks for your comments. I can objectively say, however, some teams (especially Chris Poulson) had good drafts. I am not the favorite.

[Crazy Like a Fox]

I agree with Edward Kings, it's a gutsy strategy. This may not work in the Main, but in a satellite where the free agent pool is probably more accessible, it could work. I also see BA as a potential cat you want to work on.



I think it's funny that many people who critique a team are so quick to point out deficiencies yet fail to highlight the huge positives.



Your pitching staff is dominant, with some work on offense, I think 110 overall points is attainable and probably good enough to atleast compete in the top 3 if not win the whole thing. Of course, a little luck always plays a part in the spacing in the top 5.



The positive about running a team like this is that you can spend much of the year focusing on tweaking every aspect of your offense and don't need to spend too much attention on your pitching. You might be able to afford to take more chances on free agent hitters where most teams (with a better offense) are more likely to stay put. Gives greater flexibility with team management IMO.



Good luck. Curious to see how you do during the year. Keep us posted.

[Chest Rockwell]

I think you could win with that team. Agree with Kevin on the handling of your closers, big shocker I disagree with Dub and think you took your next pitchers in the right spot.



I think you prove you can put together a solid and balanced squad doing it, but my big question is do they both stay healthy enough? Sure the trackrecords are as good as most, but pitchers are a fickle bunch.

[headhunters]

my take ( and might men is a good friend) 1) he has 4 not 3 3rd basemen- hall is a 3rd basemen. his 3rd basemen will be hall, and crede or reynolds. 2) his infield is "weak' only in the context of - i guess- only the critics get 15 top 5 picks. me, and most others only get 5 top 5 picks. so his infield was obviously drafted later. kj has 15/15 easy- with runs, which jack needed. polanco is .300 with 100 runs, which jack needed. bartlet is 25-30 steal as late pick which jack needed.3) pitching- do the math! if you take satana /peavy and go "all the way" which i assume means you take it earlier- you will win some categories by a wide margin- a waste. plus, your hitting will suck. wins= 18,18,15,12, for his 1st 4 pitchers. that is 63 wins. if he gets 10 from his other 3 that is 93. marmol and a closer should get 7. that is 100. what are we shooting for 150? era, whip k's , same story. steals- he gets 150 without owens hitting the field. i say 280 on the homers- but hey i wouldn't be surprised with 250 or 300. the only thing i mentioned to jack- polanco ended up a wasted pick on b.a. - but jack tried to wait awhile on higher ba guys and got burnt. the thing i took from this- like the chest said- be carefull on ba- hard to get late.

[rkulaski]

Originally posted by headhunters:

my take ( and might men is a good friend) 1) he has 4 not 3 3rd basemen- hall is a 3rd basemen. his 3rd basemen will be hall, and crede or reynolds. 2) his infield is "weak' only in the context of - i guess- only the critics get 15 top 5 picks. me, and most others only get 5 top 5 picks. so his infield was obviously drafted later. kj has 15/15 easy- with runs, which jack needed. polanco is .300 with 100 runs, which jack needed. bartlet is 25-30 steal as late pick which jack needed.3) pitching- do the math! if you take satana /peavy and go "all the way" which i assume means you take it earlier- you will win some categories by a wide margin- a waste. plus, your hitting will suck. wins= 18,18,15,12, for his 1st 4 pitchers. that is 63 wins. if he gets 10 from his other 3 that is 93. marmol and a closer should get 7. that is 100. what are we shooting for 150? era, whip k's , same story. steals- he gets 150 without owens hitting the field. i say 280 on the homers- but hey i wouldn't be surprised with 250 or 300. the only thing i mentioned to jack- polanco ended up a wasted pick on b.a. - but jack tried to wait awhile on higher ba guys and got burnt. the thing i took from this- like the chest said- be carefull on ba- hard to get late. headhunters,



I made a comment above about b hall being a steal in the 19th and forgot to add that yes, that will be his 3B so he's okay there. Every team in a 15-team league will appear somewhat "weak" at one position or another and I thought as a whole, his MI appeared to be one of the weaker spots but you can't fill your entire roster in the first 10 rds. Great points on the MIs. Yes, KJ is solid at 15-15 (I have him at 18hr-12steals). Bartlett is more of a 2 category guy but a very nice source of steals. I still think power and rbis will be the toughest categories but scoring high in pitching will make up for it IMHO. Could i have done any better drafting santana/peavy 1 and 2? Probably not.



[ February 28, 2008, 01:33 PM: Message edited by: Hitless ]

[Raskol]

I was in this draft and was certainly surprised to see this strategy actually tried with money on the line.



Like was posted earlier in this thread, pitchers are a fickle bunch. My squad is the most fickle possible as I'm relying upon Felix and Liriano as my top 2. At least Liriano is in the country now...that's progress.



It was a very interesting draft with some huge surprises, not just the Santana/Peavy combo.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Raskolnikov:



It was a very interesting draft with some huge surprises, not just the Santana/Peavy combo. You mean like one team drafting six catchers?



Okay...Salty will play first......still.....

[headhunters]

and they say there is some dead $ in the satelites- what do they know!

[The Mighty Men]

Originally posted by Atlas:

quote:Originally posted by Raskolnikov:



It was a very interesting draft with some huge surprises, not just the Santana/Peavy combo. You mean like one team drafting six catchers?



Okay...Salty will play first......still..... [/QUOTE]I don't know how I missed that, but wow. At least the team has plenty of drop options.

[Gordon Gekko]

Originally posted by The Mighty Men:



C Brian McCann ATL R5 P13 Comment

C Dioner Navarro TB R25 P13 Comment

1B Paul Konerko CHW R6 P3 Comment

2B Placido Polanco DET R11 P13 Comment

2B Kelly Johnson ATL R14 P3 Comment

SS Jason Bartlett TB R18 P3 Comment

3B Mark Reynolds ARI R16 P3 Comment

3B Joe Crede CHW R23 P13 Comment

3B Mike Lamb MIN R29 P13 Comment

OF Corey Hart MIL R3 P13 Comment

OF Chris Young ARI R4 P3 Comment

OF Johnny Damon NYY R7 P13 Comment

OF Josh Hamilton TEX R10 P3 Comment

OF Nate McLouth PIT R15 P13 Comment

OF Bill Hall MIL R19 P13 Comment

OF Jerry Owens CHW R24 P3 Comment

OF Jonny Gomes TB R27 P13 Comment

DH Jim Thome CHW R8 P3 Comment

SP Johan Santana NYM R1 P13 Comment

SP Jake Peavy SD R2 P3 Comment

SP Jeremy Bonderman DET R12 P3 Comment

SP Shaun Marcum TOR R17 P13 Comment

SP Scott Baker MIN R20 P3 Comment

SP Ervin Santana ANA R21 P13 Comment

SP Kevin Slowey MIN R22 P3 Comment

SP Andrew Sonnanstine TB R26 P3 Comment

SP Jonathan Sanchez SF R30 P3 Comment

RP Huston Street OAK R9 P13 Comment

RP Carlos Marmol CHC R13 P13 Comment

RP Jim Hoey BAL R28 P3 Comment

interesting strategy. for the most part, i think it worked for you. batting average could get ugly though. pitching staff is obviously top heavy, including bonderman. not really a fan of the back-end guys, with the exception of baker, and the loss of tori hunter robbing hitters of hrs/doubles will be felt by the pitching staff more than people realize. hunter has only won 7 gold gloves in a row! still, the 20th round seems good for him.



all in all, a quality team. likely a money team come october. good job!

[NorCalAtlFan]

Not bad at all. I draft 14th coming up here shortly. I might have to think hard about this strategy. You've given me the blueprint, so that's a start.

[Dub]

Originally posted by Chest Rockwell:

I think you could win with that team. Agree with Kevin on the handling of your closers, big shocker I disagree with Dub and think you took your next pitchers in the right spot.



I think you prove you can put together a solid and balanced squad doing it, but my big question is do they both stay healthy enough? Sure the trackrecords are as good as most, but pitchers are a fickle bunch. Let me clarify- i think this is a very good team. I just would have liked to have seen Mighty draft a Hill or Dice K or that category of pitcher in the 7th or 8th.



[ February 28, 2008, 06:42 PM: Message edited by: Dub ]

[Chest Rockwell]

Originally posted by Dub:

quote:Originally posted by Chest Rockwell:

I think you could win with that team. Agree with Kevin on the handling of your closers, big shocker I disagree with Dub and think you took your next pitchers in the right spot.



I think you prove you can put together a solid and balanced squad doing it, but my big question is do they both stay healthy enough? Sure the trackrecords are as good as most, but pitchers are a fickle bunch. Let me clarify- i think this is a very good team. I just would have liked to have seen Mighty draft a Hill or Dice K or that category of pitcher in the 7th or 8th. [/QUOTE]Well Dubya raises an interesting point. He saw you doing it or the strategy as a means to try to dominate those points. I saw it as a means to be strong there still and having the opportunity to build balance. You would not have to yield a lot of picks on pitching later. Good food for thought either way. I just tend to think at this level and in this format attempting to dominate any set of categories is a risky proposition.

[ALL-IN JD]

Maybe im missing something but I will respectfully disagree with the masses. I think the combined ERA of Marcum, Baker, Santana, Sonn, Slowey, etc, will do some serious damage to the ERA that Santana and Peavy will provide you with. I think that after Santana, Peavy and even Bonderman, I might have added in a couple of top flight middle relievers to preserve your ERA and ratio numbers in said of multiple potentially up and down starters.

[The Mighty Men]

Originally posted by fireballs:

Maybe im missing something but I will respectfully disagree with the masses. I think the combined ERA of Marcum, Baker, Santana, Sonn, Slowey, etc, will do some serious damage to the ERA that Santana and Peavy will provide you with. I think that after Santana, Peavy and even Bonderman, I might have added in a couple of top flight middle relievers to preserve your ERA and ratio numbers in said of multiple potentially up and down starters. I'm glad you posted. I'm looking for all opinions people have, whether they like it or not. I'm actually surprised that most of the opinions are more positive than negative. I expected the opposite.



One reason I took several pitchers toward the end was that if one is bad, he gets dumped. Maybe if Santana keeps up his insane home/road split, I start him at home. I have options. I can always pick up some good middle relievers if necessary.