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I was wrong.
I thought the White Sox would be a conglomeration of players making up a horrible team this year.
I was wrong.
The White Sox are actually quite representative of an ok team in a very, very, very bad league.
We are all wrong at some point. Heck, if I go through a day without being wrong once, I don't sleep well at night...Knowing that somehow, my quota of a daily wrong had to have been met SOMETIME during that day.

But, there is being wrong, and there is being wrong for the wrong reason.
I have a friend who is not particularly enamored with Adrian Gonzalez. He feels that way now and he felt that way on draft day.
He had the 12th pick. If you'll remember, his buddy Adrian, was sixth on the NFBC adp List.
He knew that his buddy Adrian would be gone by the time he drafted.
He wasn't and was still available.
He had counted on taking Ryan Braun with that pick. And Braun was still there.
He was faced with the decision of taking the 'Value pick' in Gonzalez, or Braun.
He chose Gonzalez.
On the comeback at pick four in the second round, he wanted either Kinsler or Pedroia, Kinsler was taken, but Pedroia was still available.
But, so was Justin Upton.
Another 'Value pick'.
He took Upton.

I know my friend well. I know that he had planned very well for taking Braun and a top 2b.
Now, he had Gonzalez and Upton.
His draft and mind were topsy turvy.
It's not that Gonzalez and Upton were bad picks. Adp-wise, they were the right picks.
But, 'value picks' are a big misnomer.
My friend was swayed by outside interference.
The need to do the 'right thing' as a group, not the right thing in his own mind.
He was convinced that Braun would have a great fantasy year and that the low adp for him was brought about by those thinking he would be affected by cat calls and name calling.
He wasn't.
He also thought that a Braun-Kinsler/Pedroia start would give him a jump start in five categories.
It would have.

This post is more of a reminder for myself than a lecture on 'Value picks'.
I thought the White Sox would be bad. I was wrong, but of my own convictions.
If we like players, draft them.
Let me repeat, especially for my friend. if we like players, draft them!
Adp is what everybody else thinks as a whole.
Screw 'em.
The whole can be wrong.
They were wrong.
I know the player rater in the NFBC is flawed beyond belief, but let's use it as an easier example.
How many players that were in the top 15 adp before the season is in the top 15 player rater now?
Go ahead, I'll give you a minute.....
Cue the Final Jeopardy music......
The answer is three.
Miguel Cabrera, Carlos Gonzalez, and my friend's lost draft pick, Ryan Braun.
12 of 15 that the whole missed out on.

We can make excuses like 'Trout came out of nowhere', 'Votto got hurt and so did Tulo', blah, blah, blah.
My friend took players that he not only didn't count on drafting, but didn't even care for as players.
I called him the word that no off-season studying, poring through stats, creating lists upon lists, and thinking of the upcoming draft over all else player wants to be called.
A sheep.
My friend is no different than the rest of us. We've all been swayed by something. Some folks say they were swayed by something I posted. I never know how to take that except that I hope they took away the 5% of smart things I say as opposed to the 95% of things that aren't.

We are about to enter the off season. It is here that we start determining our likes and dislikes for next year.
I've already determined some of mine in preparing for a draft that starts in October.
I may be wrong in who I like.
But it'll be MY wrong.
I can't kick Shandler or Zola or Childs in the ass for being wrong for me.
It's my pick and if anybody's ass is gonna get kicked, it'll be mine.
Wait, that didn't come out right.
...my ass...their asses...
Ah Hell, you know what I mean.
I can man up and say I was wrong about the White Sox.
That's easy.
Losing a fantasy season by being swayed by the masses.
That, that is still tough on my buddy.

I've had a PM reply to this post.
In the PM, he asked, What if the Gonzalez and Upton picks had panned out?
Would I have written my post?

Last question first, is there a post I haven't written?

For my buddy, if the Gonzalez and Upton picks had panned out, it would have helped him in the short run.
He may have even won his league.
In the long run though, he becomes worse than the Yahoo Kid. The Yahoo Kid is mostly misguided. But he still has strong ideas about who he wants to take.
Even the Yahoo Kid knows who the masses favor. All he has to do is open up a magazine that has been on the shelf for three months before his draft and he'd know that info.
A sheep is worse than the Yahoo Kid.
A sheep does little or a lot of homework, only to fall in line with adp.
My friend now knows that his year of being a sheep is coming to an end and that next year will be different.
His home work will mean something, because it is HIS home work.
And he will draft off his work.

I have another friend who is a Shandlerite.
There's nothing wrong with being a Shandlerite.
He thinks the world of his methods and always has.
That's great.
But, what if the Forecaster closes up shop and is not printed next year.
Does he do the same?
He likes to say that he has a ShanFan draft. 50% shandler, 50 % Him.
Whether he knows it or not, it is 100% him. Although Shandler lists who he likes and dislikes for a coming season, it does not correlate with adp.
This sort of drafting is not being a sheep.
At least, to me.
It is more or less being influenced by a decision making factor.
A little like taking BABIP and making that a major criteria in your drafting.

I think a lot of NFBC players.
To me, they're the pinnacle of fantasy players.
We've already handed Shandler his ass.
Other writers have had success here.
Other writers have had troubles here too.
If you are reading this, you are probably on par with these writers.
They have the means to put their ideas in a more public forum.
You don't....well unless you call this a public forum....which it is in a lot of ways...but it's not an ESPN or Mastersball or Shandler or Childs sites. just a place for posts.

And believe me, this is more to remind NFBC'ers about how good they are, not to belittle writers.
Writers are reminders.
They remind us of Numerish.
They remind us of stories that have escaped the public eye.
They remind us of the joy of our hobby.
They don't implore you to take a player.
And, they don't call themselves experts, but since they have a public forum, many perceive them as experts.
Really, it's not fair to them.
Some folks think writers have the answers that are in the back of our text books.
They don't.
They're the same as us.
We're all looking for the impossible dream. The perfect fantasy baseball draft.
Everybody in fantasy baseball has a chance for that Impossible Dream.
Everybody.....except for one.
The sheep.