[CJFusco]

Our 4th Annual Fantasy Baseball Draft is being held Tuesday night at a local Chili's. Over the past 3 years, we've averaged about 7 GMs per season; this year, it looks like we will have 10-12, making 2007 a very deep draft.

Instead of the traditional 5X5 Rotisserie, we do a 6X6 Rotisserie, adding walks to the offensive categories (we are living in the MONEYBALL era, after all). Over the past couple years we've used Complete Games as the 6th pitching category. I personally think it might be better to use something like Walk/Strikeout ratio, because Complete Games is not really a stat that you can draft for - it comes down to almost complete luck.

I've come in 2nd place all three years in a row. Two out of the three times, the 1st place winner has been a guy that plays Fantasy sports obsessively; he has leagues for NBA, NFL, NASCAR, NHL, Golf, as well as a couple MLB leagues. It is my goal to beat him this year. Last year was especially frustrating because I led the league until late August, when I started to run out of pitching innings.

If I have an advantage going into the draft, it's that the other GMs might put too much emphasis on the player rankings in Sporting News/Lindeys/Street&Smith's, forgetting that the rankings in those guides are ranked by 5X5 rotisserie scoring. If you add walks to the equation, the rankings don't change drastically, but players like Jason Giambi, Barry Bonds, and David Ortiz have increased values (esp. considering that Ortiz qualifies for 1st base in our league instead of just DH/Util.).

Anyhow, here is my dream draft. Obviously I would never in a million years be able to put together a team like this - unless my rivals are all complete morons (they aren't):

C - Joe Mauer
1B - Albert Pujols
2B - Chase Utley
SS - Jose Reyes
3B - Alex Rodriguez
OF - Vladmir Guererro
OF - Alfonso Soriano
OF - Ichiro
Util - David Ortiz
SP - Johan Santana
SP - Roy Halliday
RP - Joe Nathan
RP - Mariano Rivera
P - Chris Carpenter
P - Roy Oswalt
P - Francisco Rodriguez
P - BJ Ryan
P - Billy Wagner
B - Ryan Howard, 1B
B - Chone Figgins, 2B, 3B, OF
B - Miguel Cabrera, 3B
B - Lance Berkman, 1B, OF
B - Manny Ramirez, OF
B - Victor Martinez, C
B - Hanley Ramirez, SS

Obviously, this won't happen. I have a few dark horse picks - Jonathan Papelbon is making the transition from reliever to starter this year, and he could put up 15-17 wins. It seems like Khalil Green of the Padres is due to break out this year, as is Prince Fielder.