....ADP.....

[DOUGHBOYS]

Every year a debate begins on these Boards about ADP. Before ADP, drafters would ask other drafters who went where. In our minds, we wanted the best bargain possible. It is why at 'Live Drafts' we will look at other draft boards to see 'who fell' and who was over drafted.
Since ADP was put out there by the NFBC, its uses have become variant depending on the drafter. Some drafters follow it a lot.
They depend on it.
An example...Justin Verlander.
Lets say a drafter that follows ADP loves Verlander. Verlander's ADP is currently at 46. At that number, Verlander is a top of the fourth round pick. So Joe ADP would formulate a plan to get Verlander in the third.
This thinking is a bit short sighted.
First, Verlander has had off season news. Groin surgery has reduced his number from where his ADP began. A partial number of drafters were bidding on the no surgery Verlander, others after.
There is also a wide variance factor with Verlander that may be tied to that surgery as well. Verlander has gone as high as the second round, as low as the fifth round.
If ADP were to be even more helpful for those that follow it, it would list, not only the total times drafted, it would tell us how many times Verlander was drafted in the second round, how many in the third, how many in the fourth, and how many in the fifth. Instead, it only has his earliest and latest pick.
After news of Cole Hamels and Iwakuma came out, these drafters must do a mental check on how much to penalize these players for possibly missing MLB time on the field.
In effect, their ADP is outdated with one swipe of a RotoWorld pen.

While ADP helps that type of drafter, it may help another even more.
We'll call him the anti-ADP drafter.
This drafter uses ADP as a weapon against those that use it. In his mind, it is not WHERE in a round a player is drafted, it is WHO is drafted.
In this instance, we'll use Matt Moore as an example.
This drafter thinks Matt Moore will be a top 10 pitcher this year. He is sure that Moore will be taken in the third round of drafts in 2015.
He'll look at ADP. But not in the same wy an ADP guy will look at ADP.
He sees that Moore is ADP'ed at 118. He is more concerned about the variance factor. Moore has been taken as early as 62, as late as 164. That gives Moore an ADP of the bottom of the eighth round. He knows that there is another who thinks as highly as Moore as he. Somebody took him in the top of the fifth round.
This drafter is not thinking how much he can cheat the ADP factor of the eighth round. More so, he is thinking that Moore is third round quality and even if taking Moore in the sixth, he wins three rounds of quality.
The ADP drafter would be thinking that this drafter could have had Moore later. He doesn't care.
It is worth it to have Moore pocketed than let him go to another team. Besides, there are only a few players each year that this drafter will feel that way about.

Both of these drafters 'use' ADP. Both approach it a different way.
More information would be beneficial to both of these drafters. A random early and late pick is not enough information. A column should be had for which round and how many times each player was taken in each round.
Also, the timing of the drafts should be taken into effect. The Verlander drafter should be able to find the date of his surgery and eliminate all drafts leading up to that date. Future drafters of Hamels and Iwakuma should be able to do the same for all drafts that started yesterday.
If ADP is to be used, no matter the drafter, all information possible about ADP should be available.

At the Main Event level, I don't think there is a drafter who religiously follows ADP. After doing a few DC drafts, ADP is more in our heads than on site.
The Matt Moore loving drafter will be overjoyed to get Matt Moore in the sixth round. To him, three rounds of quality. And he'll see that Matt Moore was taken in the 10th round of another draft. He'll damn the luck of that drafter in not knowing the wonders of Moore and know that if slow playing Moore, he's probably missed on other gems.

Like most things during the off season, ADP is forgotten once the season begins. Josh Donaldson becomes a nice surprise, not a 26th round pick. Or we criticize ourselves for once again falling into the trap of drafting Brian Roberts.
What round he was taken in is of no consequence. All we know is that he is hurt once again and we can't wait to FAAB his injured ass.

What kind of drafter are you?
If wanting to find out, go to a team already or currently being drafted this year. Then look at ADP. There will be green and red numbers telling us how close we were in ADP to a certain player drafted.
Whether red or green, if most of your numbers are in single digits, ADP is closely followed.
If several players are green, you like to cheat ADP.
If several players are red, ADP is back burnered.
If a few players are red and in double digits, you are a 'who' over 'where' drafter, or anti-ADP guy.

In the end, the draft itself is more important than ADP. The draft may lead us to take a 3B over an OF.
Or a SP over a Closer.
We'll know that we NEED that position more than ADP is telling us to take our Utility hitter. We're harried in that we want to take three players with one pick. The top ADP player. The top player on our list. The top player for roster construction.
This is an example where ADP should lose every time. That player has no business even being a thought.
Who's list is more important? Yours or ADP?
In this case, it is a no-brainer.
ADP is a little dangerous. It is a tool. By the same token, if followed TOO closely, it could turn a drafter into a tool.

[Walla Walla]

I think ADP is more useless this year than any before. In the past it would give you a good idea for the first round. Not this year. Maybe the first 5 or 6. After that all bets are off. I think that's a good thing though. Try and figure out your favorite draft spots now.

[Head 2 Head]

My picks in the early drafts helped build the ADPs and now the sheep are following. I was in 33% of the drafts after six drafts, 30% after ten drafts, 33% after twelve drafts, 20% after thirty. As the number of drafts has picked up the ADP from the early drafters has become gospel. One team doing something odd doesn't set the ADP but I have Kershaw, Darvish, Scherzer, Wainwright, Strausburg, Fernandez, JV, King Felix ...two of them in most drafts. Bungardner as a third.

I have 8 pitchers in 16 rounds, 8 in 14, 7 in 18 (started Kershaw/Scherzer), 7 in 14, 9 in 18, 8 in 19 (three in first five rounds) and three in the first four rounds. My early view on pitching is influencing the ADP of pitchers in general.

One pitcher I have in 21st, 22nd, 23rd and 25th rounds. When I am buying into a player in over half my leagues I am an influence on his ADP.

When I take the same OF in the fifth round in three of my first four drafts I am influencing the ADP on that player.

Eighty percent of the teams are going to finish out of the money and the ADP is influenced four times as much by the twelve losers as the three money winners.

In my only non-DC draft I started with one pitcher in the first six rounds and took my catchers in round 29 & 30. So when I hear the talking heads quoting the NFBC ADP (which is actual money leagues and certainly of more value then mocks) I think they miss the boat on the point that this format (Draft and Hold) without free agents is nothing like the free agent game that everyone not part of the NFBC Draft Championship play.

Most of you don't know me and don't know if I know anything about baseball or numbers or anything that makes my influence on ADP a plus or a minus, but you are following it.

[Deadheadz]

We got a clear message from one of the drafters in the Sunday Night DC Express earlier this evening. He took Billy Hamilton in the 3rd round.

The clear message is: f@*k ADP

[Head 2 Head]

We got a clear message from one of the drafters in the Sunday Night DC Express earlier this evening. He took Billy Hamilton in the 3rd round.

The clear message is: f@*k ADP

After looking at the results in that Draft - my first thought was weak owner pool