NL Finish

I also finished 5th in my NL league. Here the problems were much more difficult to pinpoint.

I'd certainly been better off letting Mike Adams go for $19 or Austin Kearns for $23. In the first case, closers had typically gone for more than $20. Heck Looper went for $24 the year before. I saw an opportunity to get a cheaper closer as a few teams did not have one still with only Brandon Lyon and Jose Mesa available. If I had known neither of them would break $20, I'd have let Adams go. I did throw out Turnbow for $1 at the end, when everyone was going for that, but another team went $2 and I had nothing left.

As I usually do, I sat out the high bidding on hitters figuring a slew of good players would fall into the high teens. That didn't happen unless you consider Ryan Klesko at $17 and Kenny Loften at $18 that type of player. At the time, most of the most attractive hitters were gone and going for $30+, and I had just lost out on Brad Wilkerson for $30. (Yes I took him to $29, and, yes, my season could have been worse if I did get him.)

I decided to get Kearns, a player I had hoped to get for low teens as a player who could have a breakout $25+ year. He did hit a career-high in HR and RBI, but not exactly the way I had projected. Nevermind, the month spent in AAA!

With the slew of AL pitchers making their way to the shortened NL line-ups, I targeted Tim Hudson as the most likely to approach Pedro's dominance in the ratios at a 25% discount. Huddy had been very good in those categories as an A. What I didn't forsee was his new found ability to pitch to contact! (Or whatever it was that saw his WHIP move to the 1.40 range.) He did repeat his 2nd half dominance, though, and I retained him because of it despite offers for him.

I was also on the wrong end of a couple of trades. Prior to season's start, I dealt Chad Tracy for Hee Seop Choi and Jason Nix. If I had known Tracy would set a professional high in HR while qualifying in the OF, I'd have kept him, but at the time, I saw it as a trade of HR/RBI for AVG. Heck, he nearly hit more HR in 2005 than he had in his entire professional careeer combined! (27 vs 32) Don't forget the hype surrounding Conor Jackson and the Glaus signing. Both left Tracy with nowhere to play. Or hindsight-aided, nowhere he had played before as a professional

I used Felipe Lopez in a bail trade and received Adam Everett, Jerry Hairston and Larry Walker. If other players hadn't been included, I would have won this, but unfortunately, is notYahoo! so I had to include two other active hitters. One, Kenny Kelly, worked perfectly. The other did not. JJ Hardy went on a "tear" and hit .289 with 8 HR after I dealt him and his .179 AVG. I eventually dealt Walker for a $2 Ryan Church but that was just some lipstick on a pig.

Some breakout surprises were Chase Utley, who is arguably the top NL Roto 2B, and Jorge Sosa who, despite my thoughts of him as a closer, turned out to be a much better SP while breathing the Leo Mazzone air.

I also benefited from all the pre-draft talk about Ryan Howard being blocked by Thome and grabbed him #6. He was just too good to pass-up at that point. His 21 HR were the 2nd most hit on my team after Utley. (Jason Lane finished with 25, but I dealt him when he had 17.) I did select Matt Cain at #13, too. So in my ever-aware of bail trading, I feel good going forward. ( I also acquired Jeremy Hermida in an off-season deal involving Jeromy Burnitz.)

With only three breakout surprises, my weak, but money-finishing, performance can be partly explained. However, no one decision or player can account for a disappointing season.