Arnold Woods - SF Mock Woodmen
 

First of all, congrats to Trace for a very commendable job managing his team to the Sandbox Mock Draft league championship.  He drafted well, then managed his team well.  Although only separated by about 150 points in the end, his team was really much better than their final score and mine was not really as good as the final score.  On a self aggrandizing note, I will point out that--before the season began--we were asked to answer several questions, including which of the other teams we would like to swap teams with.  My response:

"If I could swap teams with someone, it probably would be with the Long Gandhi.com team. Their hitters are the types I like. Their pitching picks were a little riskier, but could pay off huge."

What I meant by that was that Trace's team had hitters with good OBPs that didn't strike out a whole lot (with a few exceptions) and he drafted some pitchers (Wood, Vazquez, Morris) with huge upsides.  In the end, it was Trace's pitching that was the difference between our teams.

The Draft:

With the last pick in the 1st round of the draft, I was certain that the top level of pitchers (Pedro, Unit, Maddux, Mussina, & Brown) would be gone by the time I drafted.  So I went into the draft figuring that I would pick the best hitters and hope for some pitching gems in the middle and later rounds.  While I had a momentary glimmer of hope that Maddux would reach me (he was picked right before me), I set about picking the best hitters early in the draft.  From my 4 years experience in Sandbox leagues, I knew hitters with good OBPs and low strikeout percentages were ideal (heck, that is true in MLB as well), so that was what I was shooting for.  Guys who get on-base are likely to be scoring and knocking in runs and generally doing well in many Sandbox scoring categories, like the ones I drafted:  Bonds (.419 OBP lifetime), Helton (.416), Olerud (.404), Larry Walker (.396), Garciaparra (.381), Rolen (.375), Eric Young (.365), Luis Gonzalez (.363).  Although these OBP numbers include 2001, these are all veterans, who had similar numbers coming into this year.  Though several exceeded expectations, such as Bonds and LuisGonzalez, you can't go too wrong in the Sandbox game when you draft for OBP.  Other than losing Garciaparra for much of the year, the hitters I drafted did pretty much what I was expecting of them.

Where I went wrong in the draft was the pitchers I drafted.  Kile, Zito, and Percival met expectations, though Zito did not do so until the second half of the season.  However, I failed on Livan Hernandez, Jeff D'Amico, Jeff Weaver, Curt Leskanic, Ryan Kohlmeier, and Carl Pavano, and I gave up on Jarrod Washburn long before he became effective.  With the exception of Hernandez, all were young pitchers that I thought had the potential for break-through seasons.  My pitching was in shambles from the beginning and was ultimately my downfall.

The Season:

My only position player draft disaster was catcher, where I had drafted Hundley and Petrick.  I rectified this by picking up Lo Duca as a free agent early on.  At the time, I merely thought I was picking up a catcher on a hot streak.  Little did I know that he would end the year as the number one catcher in Sandbox.  Luck sometimes does play a factor in things.  Other than trading Berkman for Ichiro Suzuki early on and trying out various shortstops in place of the injured Nomar, my position players pretty much stayed set for the rest of the year.

On the pitching end, I also picked up John Burkett and Jose Mesa early on in the season, again thinking they were probably only good for the hot streak each was then on.  Once again, luck smiled on me and both helped stabilize my poorly drafted pitching staff.  I picked up Hideo Nomo as well when Trace dropped him, and though inconsistent, he largely did better than many others that I ran through my staff during the year.  For my 5th SP slot, I tried virtually every pitcher who encountered a hot streak, in the hopes that lightning would continue to strike, including Michilak, Jason Johnson, Josh Towers, Duckworth, Hermanson, Valdes, and Dempster.  None worked well.  I got Andy Ashby in the Berkman trade with Trace and he promptly got injured.  Finally in June, I traded Ichiro, Eric Young, and Dempster to get Brad Penny, Biggio, and Paul O'Neill.  I made the deal largely to get Penny, and though he did not finish as well as he started, he proved to be better than the riff raff I had been running in and out of my line-up trying to find something that worked.

However, while I was searching for the right pitching, Trace was actually finding the right pitching.  In addition to his better draft of pitchers, he plucked Mark Muldar and Wade Miller off the waiver wire early on.  That gave him a virtually unbeatable rotation of Wood, Morris, Vazquez, Muldar, and Miller.  As any Sandbox veteran will tell you, SP is the key to winning.  And quite frankly, Trace did a much better job than I in finding the gems in the rough.

The Finish:

Although I briefly took over first in the standings late in the season, I did so by accumulating 10-15 more games at SP than Trace had at the time.  So it wasn't long before he was back in first for good.  We ended the year with nearly identical numbers from our relief pitchers.  My hitters had a phenomenal season, scoring 5377 fantasy points.  That was almost 350 points higher than the next highest total.  Unfortunately for me, it was Trace with the next highest total.  Trace was a good 500 points above the next highest hitter totals.  As I said, starting pitching was my downfall.  Although my SPs got better as the year went on, Trace's SPs outscored mine by 500 points and that made all the difference.

I began this post season commentary by noting that Trace's team was better than it showed and mine was not as good as it finished.  With regard to my team, I say that because of Bonds, Luis Gonzalez, and Burkett mostly.  None of these three could have been expected to put up career years this late in their careers.  Lo Duca exceeded expectations as well, but he is young and break-out seasons do occur.  It remains to be seen if this was, in fact, a break-out season for Lo Duca or a one year anomaly.  Trace's team, on the other hand, suffered through disappointing seasons from Carlos Delgado, and Vlad Guerrero, at least as far as expectations went.  Vidro and Alou missed time due to injuries.  And Trace lost Pudge Rodriguez for the rest of the season, shortly after trading Bobby Abreu to get him.  In reality, I think the hitters on my team and Trace's team could have been expected to end up fairly evenly, instead of the 350 points ahead that I was.  Therefore, Trace's team should have finished about 500 points ahead of me based on just the starting pitchers.

In sum, Trace beat me because he did the better job identifying and drafting or picking up SPs.  I don't fault my draft strategy of picking the best hitters and hoping to find good mid and late round pitching draft picks or free agents (once the season began), I just did a poor job of actually executing it.  With a nearly identical strategy, Trace did a great job of executing it and deservedly won the league.  Congrats to him again.