Month: February 2020

2020 Backyard Draft Order and Results

Shane McCannLeave a comment

HEY YA’LL

I forgot to post the draft order cuz I have jobs and stuff so here it is. You’re drafting to fill out your roster, with Devon being the exception with what we agreed on.

Round 1

  1. Rojo – Evan White, 1B, Seattle
  2. Greg (via Lobman) – Kumar Rocker, SP, Vanderbilt
  3. Shane – Yoshitomo Tsutsugo, LF, Tampa Bay
  4. Brian – Tarik Skubal, SP, Detroit
  5. Mikey T – Jeter Downs, SS, Boston
  6. Sean – Joe Musgrove, SP, Pittsburgh
  7. Devon – Aaron Civale, SP, Cleveland
  8. Ryan – Noelvi Marte, SS, Seattle
  9. Greg – Archie Bradley, RP, Arizona
  10. Doch – Adrian Houser, SP/RP, Milwaukee

Round 2

  1. Rojo – Kwang-Hyun Kim, SP, STL
  2. Lobman – Nico Hoerner, SS, Chicago
  3. Shane – Shogo Akiyama, OF, Cincinnati
  4. Brian – James Karinchak, RP, Cleveland
  5. Mikey T – Brailyn Márquez, SP, ChC
  6. Sean – Nick Anderson, RP, Tampa Bay
  7. Devon – Sean Murphy, C, Oakland
  8. Ryan – Jackson Rutledge, P, Washington
  9. Greg – Austin Hays, OF, Baltimore
  10. Doch – Brady Singer, P, Kansas City

Round 3

  1. Rojo – Jarren Durran, OF, Boston
  2. Lobman – Carlos Rodon, P, CWS
  3. Shane  – Asa Lacy, P, Texas A&M
  4. Brian – Aaron Bracho, 2B, Cleveland
  5. Mikey T – Aristides Aquino, OF, Cincinnati
  6. Sean – Nick Solak, 2B, Texas
  7. Devon – CJ Cron, 1B, Detroit
  8. Ryan – Luis Matos, OF, SF
  9. Lobman (via Greg) – Michael Fulmer, SP, Detoit
  10. Doch – Kris Bubic, P, Kansas City

Round 4

  1. Lobman – Keone Kela, RP, Pittsburgh
  2. Mikey T – Alex Verdugo, OF, Boston
  3. Sean – Chris Archer, SP, Pittsburgh
  4. Devon – Ryan Mountcastle, 1B, Baltimore
  5. Ryan – Luisangel Acuña, SS, Texas
  6. Doch – Domingo Santana, OF, Cleveland

Round 5

  1. Mikey T – Dellin Betances, RP, NY Mets
  2. Devon – Daniel Lynch, SP, Kansas City
  3. Devon – Mike Fiers, SP, Oakland
  4. Devon – Miguel Cabrera, 1B, Detroit
2020 Backyard Draft Order and Results

HEY LOOK, MORE RESULTS!

Shane McCannLeave a comment

YAAAAAAY!

Finally, the last bit of pre-draft business is in the books. The results of the ballot from part 2 are in.

business-expansion

Roster Expansion

Rosters will expand by a total of 5 players, bringing the total up to a nice even 40.

Approved and added were 3 bench slots and 2 minor league required slots.

This brings final roster construction to 22 starters, 6 bench and 12 minors.

We will have a draft to fill out the rosters after rights players are claimed/returned. I have heard from everyone but one (Greg) on claiming your players. Please do so kinda sorta quick-ish so we can get moving.

Everyone should be at 35 players (unless otherwise approved) NOT INCLUDING THOSE RIGHTS PLAYERS. Drop enough to get there. There are currently three of you who need to make changes. If you’re not sure, it’s probably you.

new-ownership

The Roster Formerly Known As The Point-Loma/Mission Valley/Some Other Sunny San Diego Reference X-Rayz

Unanimously approved, the method to allow Devon (yay, he’s actually here) to gut Odom’s roster is a go. He can get the roster as low as 30 players, and draft in slot until filled.

That’s all ya filthy animals. We’ll get the draft scheduled during what I’m sure will be a spirited conversation in the chat. Looking like starting either Sunday or next Wednesday could be options. WE SHALL DISCUSS.

-Shane (The Left Brain)

HEY LOOK, MORE RESULTS!

2020 Backyard Referendum Results (Pt.1)

Shane McCannLeave a comment

THE RESULTS ARE IN!

download

Here are the results from this weekend’s voting in no particular order:

 

Complete Games

They are here to stay. In a 6-3 vote in favor of keeping them. Sorry, T, it looks like one more year.

Prize Money

Also voted down 6-3. This year is free for us thanks to yours truly being obnoxious on Twitter. After this year it’s $8 a person, unless we want to explore other things NEXT OFFSEASON.

Roster Adds

This was unanimous in favor of making adds 9-0. As for the QUANTITY of adds, that will be in the next vote.

Minor League Proposal

If we are being technical, it passed 7-2 in favor of The Brain’s proposal. Because a couple of you are dicks and they were identical proposals….

 

ANYWAY, with all that said, we will move into PHASE TWO.

2213

OBVIOUSLY, the amount of roster adds will be HOTLY contested. How hot remains to be seen. As of now, there are three different proposals.

  • Doch’s Proposal:

There will be the removal of the 2B/SS and 1B/3B slots and replaced with a INF                     slot. Two bench slots will be added. This brings total roster size to 26 (21 starters                 and 5 bench) plus the 10 minors leaguers.

  • The Brain’s Proposal:

There will be five total roster spots added. Two will be bench and three for minors. This will bring roster to 22 starters, 5 bench and 13 minor leaguers.

This does not preclude anyone from making further suggestions. I want to keep this moving though and if anyone has anything else to add, do so by the end of business on Wednesday the 19th.

Concerning The New Owner

The new owner (my brother) taking over for Odom’s is FULLY AWARE of the team’s state (“pure ass” is the sentiment) but is willing to take on the challenge all the same. There has been some chatter on letting him scour the wire in advance of the draft or giving him the first handful of picks. I personally am against ANYTHING like this. I didn’t get any special treatment when I took over Cliff’s team and Doch didn’t either.

But I am not a heartless person. I have an idea I’d to put out there as some sort of middle ground with what’s been discussed and what I’d like.

Under my proposal, Devon will be allowed to shrink the roster to as little as 30 players (he’s at 36 right now) and he will be allowed to draft IN HIS SLOT (7th) until the max is met, whatever that ends up being. He will be given access to his team prior to drafting and can trade pre-draft.

An example. Say we approve three slots for a total roster size of 38. He drops 3 guys and that gets him to 33, and he decides he wants one of the rights players, so he’s at 34. He can then draft 4 players. This is restricted to just him since it’s a dumpster fire of a team.

If anyone has opposition to this and has alternatives, I’d like to hear them.

 

-Left Brain

2020 Backyard Referendum Results (Pt.1)

CONTEXT

dochneyLeave a comment

I agreed with what lobman had previously written on the blog about minors. So to make sure everyone gets a little context, here is what lobman and “the Brain” (ironic) have written about this before.

Minors

  • The Minor League system will be self policed by Fantrax. You will be required to roster 10 minor leaguers that fall under the rookie max of 130 at-bats or 50 innings pitched, as it always has been.
  • Under our system, you can still keep your “high minors” players. However, since Fantrax does not allow us to automatically police them, to accrue stats, you would need to move the player to your active roster and replace him with an eligible player to your minor league stable. This will likely mean dropping a Major League player. Alternately, the player may stay in your minor league system, but not accrue stats. You can do this to your liking as needed. This is the “taxi” system discussed in the chat.

There you guys have it. CONTEXT.

You’re welcome Mike Lobman.

CONTEXT

2020 Ballot Proposals

Shane McCannLeave a comment

HELLO PEOPLE OF THE BACKYARD

This post is merely intended to completely spell out the co-commissioner’s stance on our minor league system. Speaking of which, at Lobman’s recommendation, WE should have a name. Co-commissioners is long and ugly. Might I suggest…

THE BRAIN (BRANE…Brian and Shane…GET IT???)

It’s a delightful portmanteau that is clearly an epitome of the regime to date. Brilliant, yet, constantly ruined plans by our underlings.

WITH THAT SAID, this is our revised proposition:

Minors

  • The Minor League system will be self policed by Fantrax. You will be required to roster 10 minor leaguers that fall under the rookie max of 130 at-bats or 50 innings pitched, as it always has been.
  • Under our system, you can still keep your “high minors” players. However, since Fantrax does not allow us to automatically police them, to accrue stats, you would need to move the player to your active roster and replace him with an eligible player to your minor league stable. This will likely mean dropping a Major League player. Alternately, the player may stay in your minor league system, but not accrue stats. You can do this to your liking as needed. This is the “taxi” system discussed in the chat.

We at The Brain feel that this is a very fair compromise to our original plan. We don’t lose high minors being a thing while still using a nice benefit of Fantrax to help automatically enforce minors.

Changing Pitching Category

  • For simplicity: Do we want to keep complete games or not? If there is a general consensus to replace them, we can dive further into specifics. If it’s something we generally do not want to do, why go insane debating what to replace it with if only like 3 people even want to?

Cash Prize

  • Sticking with the theme of simplicity: Do we want to explore a cash prize? Specifics can be discussed at a later date.

Doch’s Proposals:

  • Add 2 roster spots to bring bench to 5.
  • Remove the corner infield and middle infield slots and make just 1 INF slot. This move gives us 21 starters and 5 bench spots.
  • Minors players are eligible to be in minor league slots until rookie limits have been passed. “Taxi System” as noted above.

Other Business

  • There will be a separate vote on the amount of roster additions since there are widely varying opinions. I’ve heard 3 or 5, a compromise of 4, and even one saying 1.
  • There will be a draft. The length of the draft will be however many roster additions we agree on, minus any rights players being kept; i.e. we vote for 4 slots, I keep all 3 rights players, I only get 1 pick.
  • Order is to be determined based on reverse order of final standings from the playoff bracket and the remaining 4 teams go into the draft lottery as voted on during the off season before our previous commissioner departed and we agreed on. We’ll do that once the above is settled right away so we can allow some time to schedule the draft and allow pick trading as such a thing is desired.
  • Rosters MUST be compliant as of the old system prior to drafting regardless. You should have 35 players on your roster only. We will discuss actual keeping of rights players once the amount on roster slots opened up is decided. They’ve been removed for now for simplicity.

I’ll give us a day or two to digest and possibly counter. Sometime Saturday night I’ll send out an email with the ballot questions so stay on top of life and send it back ASAP so we can get 2020 moving.

THERE WILL BE AN ADDITIONAL VOTE ON THE COMPLETE GAMES THING. Because how things go may shape your opinion on complete games, I will leave that off THIS BALLOT. For the love of me and all that is good in this world, I want this read by this weekend and if anyone has another idea they want added NOW IS THE TIME.

That is all.

2020 Ballot Proposals

A Reasoned Response – Comments to the McCann-Smith Platform

mikelobmanLeave a comment

So here we are.. In February  with no certain home to play on, 9 owners, uncertain scoring categories, scandals, suspensions, manager firings, global climate crisis.. ETC. We do, however, have a new commish group who are tasked with putting forth a new path for the league. Its been rocky(ish), but I feel like we do need to set some dialogue. I’m taking it upon myself to begin the conversation between the remaining owners and the commish(s) to help fine tune the details this week, so we may hit the ground running as the season gets closer. Please everyone try to digest the platform the commissioners (can we get a nickname for this duo?) put out there, and maybe take some of my responses and comments as a starting point for you to figure on what you feel is the best way forward. We set a deadline of TOMORROW (2/11/20) for comments, but maybe we need to push to the end of the week if we get enough discussion going. So here goes:

 

  • Switching To Fantrax: The platform switch has been long overdue. Fantrax is the industry standard when it comes to serious fantasy leagues. There’s no matching their player pool and dynasty customization options. There is a cost associated with it; both in actual money (after our initial free year, it’ll come down to about 8 bucks an owner per season), and in the slight annoyance of learning something new. But all in all they’ve fixed up the app and it looks good – it basically has everything we’re used to with ESPN; so it should be a fairly painless switch.  Most importantly – it eliminates the need to self police the minors system if we adopt the other changes we are suggesting below.

The Lobman Response:

In my opinion, switching to Fantrax ABSOLUTELY suits this league. ESPN has done us no favors throughout the years, especially when we’ve pushed past all of that site’s capabilities. We are a very forward thinking (at times) league, and in my research the only site available that could conceivably track what we manually operate would be Fantrax. To me, I FULLY SUPPORT this move.

 

  • Elimination of High Minors/Rights Minor Leaguers: (NOTE – This does not mean you lose your high minors guys and rights guys! Keep reading!) Basically we keep the 10 minors slots we’re all used to, but they are all designated for players without a major league appearance (“low minors”) – This fits in perfectly with the Fantrax switch because Fantrax can automatically police that sort of system perfectly. It would be much like when you have a player on the IL and he comes back. Essentially when a player makes an appearance in the big leagues, the system would prevent you from making any other moves until you fix your roster and either bump the minors guy up to your majors bench or drop him. So what happens to the rights guys? Well Fantrax basically has everyone – so you can now just pop them into your minors slots if you care to keep them. OK, what about your high minors guys?

The Lobman Response:

In my opinion, we need to debate this further. Not in the toxic shitbag style we typically debate things, but the only way I see this is eliminating high minors spots eliminates a value of a handful of players in our league. There was a reason we looked to create this minor league player tiers, because it added an extra type of strategy to our league. Players who would ordinarily have 0.0% value to any league had a TON of value to us as a whole. Maybe we don’t care now, or maybe even Fantrax can’t give us what we want (according to the discussion last night). I quite liked the idea of picking up a rookie to fit a set of criteria in our roster structure. IF we had to choose between the low/high minors tier system, I’d almost say scrap the low minors, and just allow all minor leaguers to be usable up to 130/50. Just my opinion.

(PLEASE NOTE: this will have to be discussed even further, because of limitations/abilities of Fantrax. The Commissioners will have to explain in greater detail ON THIS BLOG to articulate what exactly we’re looking at here in terms of options. Not on GroupMe).

 

  • Roster Expansion: Five bench spots will be added to our rosters. All owners are welcome to use these slots for any high minors players they wish to keep, or to just add regular major leaguers in the draft.

 The Lobman Response:

For me, 5 spots is just too much. If the league is all about this number, I could probably get myself to accept this to an extent, but (like what Doch said last night), I could see this getting really screwy. I’m not gonna say there’s major holes to be exploited here, but essentially we’re taking away another guardrail and we have no idea what will happen. Maybe I’m overly cautious, but like with a change to a different site, man there are a lot of unknowns. I’d say splitting the difference (in the spirit of the MLB) and adding 3 spots might be a decent compromise.

 

  • Roster Expansion Draft: There will be a draft. Owners may select any player in Fantrax’s system that they need to fill out their new roster size including the five extra major league spots and the ten minor league (formerly called “low minors”) spots. Your draft ends when your roster is full and compliant.

The Lobman Response:

I think this kind of falls in line with #3. I mean, lets just say that a 3 round draft to add spots (if need be) would be something we’ve done in the past with rights players. I think more discussion on the whole topic needs to be had before we decide on a draft of sorts.

 

  • Elimination of Complete Games: This doesn’t give us much joy, because we think the “boutique stats” are part of what makes this league so fun – but if one considers the current situation in MLB honestly, pitchers are being handled differently and complete games are going the way of the Dodo Bird. I realize we have been operating in an environment wherein walks were not considered for quite some time now, but the time for WHIP has arrived. It’s an incredibly common stat that is considered in nearly every player ranking system for fantasy baseball. While we realize this will be advantageous for some sorts of pitchers and disadvantageous for others – we believe all owners in this league have the skill and knowledge to be able to adjust swimmingly. Speaking of owners…

The Lobman Response:

This is something I wanted to discuss most of all. Here are my feelings.. The CG is a very imperfect stat category in today’s fantasy baseball. Obviously, its infrequent and not indicative of a great pitcher more times than now. Here’s the thing though: I think the chat gets a little extra buzz when a pitcher (especially some random) gets through 7 2/3 and under 90 pitches. It’s a category that you can’t plan for, which runs (KIND OF) in line with triples albeit less frequent. There’s a symmetry with what we have now in our scoring structure. It’s generally why we originally set it up as we did. Six counting stats and one percentage stat on each side. I’m not here advocating for keeping this because it helps me the most (Because it obviously doesn’t), but I just don’t see a better option that is an OBVIOUS upgrade over what we have. We’re not here to make wholesale category changes for the sake of making changes. The idea is to improve the league, not just tweak what isn’t exactly a problem. If we want to have a discussion of modernizing our category (and adding WHIP which I fucking hate), I would be agreeable to killing K’s and adding K/9 to a BB/9 which is more preferable than WHIP to me. That might make more sense in the end, but again its not a change I really don’t think needs to be made.

 

  • New Owner: Just between your two commissioners, there are three prospective new owners: Devon McCann (Shane’s Brother), Guy Pollioni, and Jim Cartnick (Both friends of Brian). All three have previous experience playing with us in fantasy leagues and would make fine additions to the backyard. If there are no other names put forward and no other objections, the commissioners will give the above people the chance to look over Odom’s roster and the rest of the league and decide if they wish to join the Backyard. They will be asked in the order we have listed them. If Devon Takes it, we are good, if he opts not to, we move on to Guy, if he opts out, we go to Jim. If all three refuse to take over the dumpster fire, we call Figs. Just kidding.

The Lobman Response:

I have 0 opinion on who gets into the league. I trust you guys to vet these potential owners enough to let them know how awful we all are. The only thing I’ll say is this: The MUST understand the team they’re getting themselves into. Odom was fucking crazy, but he was masterful with his strategy. There are pieces to work with here, but the new owner really has to understand that there’s a very good change he gets stomped for almost 2 seasons while he shapes his team. To me, go nuts guys… Get your man.

 I would say maybe a way to incentivize an owner taking a team is to allow them to have a 3-5 player first picks at the FA list once the rosters are fully and correctly populated. This will at least let the new owner put his initial first stamp on his team.

 

  • Cash Prize: This is another one that we approach tentatively because this league will ALWAYS be all about pride and talking shit at the end of the day; but frankly, with the amount of time most of us put into this league, kicking in the price of a beer and a sandwich would not be unreasonable. Getting that trophy along with some cash money would be a lovely way to cap off a hard won victory. We’d suggest 20 bucks an owner. For our free-Fantrax 2020, that pot of $200 would go completely to the champion, but in 2021 and beyond, the previous year’s champion would not have to pay anything the following year, and the 180 bucks collected from the other 9 owners would be divided as follows: $80 to cover league costs and $100 to the champion. Hopefully we all have Venmo by this point; it would make these fees really easy to collect and the winner’s prize easy to pay out.

The Lobman Response:

Sure. 20 bucks per owner won’t kill anyone. I think we either need a new trophy for the changeover, or we need to get the trophy and add the nameplates that were DEFINITELY not ordered and put on the past few years. The free Fantrax year will allow us to spend 200 bucks on this, or I guess whatever we’ll just give 100 bucks to the winner, 20 to the runner-up, then 80 for next year’s league. I don’t know. I do completely agree with Greg that I don’t want this to turn into a money league. I also don’t mind tossing 20 bucks to help contribute to improving the league.

 

We humbly put forth the above plans for your consideration. We don’t have to put a GODDAMN thing to a vote, but perhaps we will in some cases when we get a better sense of how the league feels. Bottom line: We’re really excited about our potential move to the massive player pool of Fantrax, the expansion of rosters, and drafting some new guys. The league has the potential to run very smoothly this year without the hassle of counting high minors ABs and IPs and checking when rights players are added.  No self-policing also means no more draconian penalties. Adopt our changes and let Fantrax do the work for you. Pitchers and catchers will be reporting before we know it. Let’s rock and roll.

The Lobman Response:

I know the commish(s) are going to do what they feel would be best for the league. I also know that everyone has a different interpretation of what’s an improvement over previous years. Now that we have the commish thing settled, I think the order of operation needs to be:

 Fantrax or ESPN (I THINK we chose Fantrax officially?)

  • Rule changes (a THOROUGH addendum process with POSSIBLE amendments and negotiation)
  • New Owner
  • Draft (If applicable)

I wouldn’t combine or deviate from this order, because one thing needs to happen before the next occurs. I’m sure I have more to add to this, but I wanted to address all of this specifically before we go to the next steps.

 

 

-Lobman

 

A Reasoned Response – Comments to the McCann-Smith Platform

The Smith-McCann Platform

barnegatbananaslugsLeave a comment

Smith-McCann Platform:

 

  1. Switching To Fantrax: The platform switch has been long overdue. Fantrax is the industry standard when it comes to serious fantasy leagues. There’s no matching their player pool and dynasty customization options. There is a cost associated with it; both in actual money (after our initial free year, it’ll come down to about 8 bucks an owner per season), and in the slight annoyance of learning something new. But all in all they’ve fixed up the app and it looks good – it basically has everything we’re used to with ESPN; so it should be a fairly painless switch.  Most importantly – it eliminates the need to self police the minors system if we adopt the other changes we are suggesting below.
  2. Elimination of High Minors/Rights Minor Leaguers: (NOTE – This does not mean you lose your high minors guys and rights guys! Keep reading!) Basically we keep the 10 minors slots we’re all used to, but they are all designated for players without a major league appearance (“low minors”) – This fits in perfectly with the Fantrax switch because Fantrax can automatically police that sort of system perfectly. It would be much like when you have a player on the IL and he comes back. Essentially when a player makes an appearance in the big leagues, the system would prevent you from making any other moves until you fix your roster and either bump the minors guy up to your majors bench or drop him. So what happens to the rights guys? Well Fantrax basically has everyone – so you can now just pop them into your minors slots if you care to keep them. OK, what about your high minors guys?
  3. Roster Expansion: Five bench spots will be added to our rosters. All owners are welcome to use these slots for any high minors players they wish to keep, or to just add regular major leaguers in the draft.
  4. Roster Expansion Draft: There will be a draft. Owners may select any player in Fantrax’s system that they need to fill out their new roster size including the five extra major league spots and the ten minor league (formerly called “low minors”) spots. Your draft ends when your roster is full and compliant.
  5. Elimination of Complete Games: This doesn’t give us much joy, because we think the “boutique stats” are part of what makes this league so fun – but if one considers the current situation in MLB honestly, pitchers are being handled differently and complete games are going the way of the Dodo Bird. I realize we have been operating in an environment wherein walks were not considered for quite some time now, but the time for WHIP has arrived. It’s an incredibly common stat that is considered in nearly every player ranking system for fantasy baseball. While we realize this will be advantageous for some sorts of pitchers and disadvantageous for others – we believe all owners in this league have the skill and knowledge to be able to adjust swimmingly. Speaking of owners…
  6. New Owner: Just between your two commissioners, there are three prospective new owners: Devon McCann (Shane’s Brother), Guy Pollioni, and Jim Cartnick (Both friends of Brian). All three have previous experience playing with us in fantasy leagues and would make fine additions to the backyard. If there are no other names put forward and no other objections, the commissioners will give the above people the chance to look over Odom’s roster and the rest of the league and decide if they wish to join the Backyard. They will be asked in the order we have listed them. If Devon Takes it, we are good, if he opts not to, we move on to Guy, if he opts out, we go to Jim. If all three refuse to take over the dumpster fire, we call Figs. Just kidding.
  7. Cash Prize: This is another one that we approach tentatively because this league will ALWAYS be all about pride and talking shit at the end of the day; but frankly, with the amount of time most of us put into this league, kicking in the price of a beer and a sandwich would not be unreasonable. Getting that trophy along with some cash money would be a lovely way to cap off a hard won victory. We’d suggest 20 bucks an owner. For our free-Fantrax 2020, that pot of $200 would go completely to the champion, but in 2021 and beyond, the previous year’s champion would not have to pay anything the following year, and the 180 bucks collected from the other 9 owners would be divided as follows: $80 to cover league costs and $100 to the champion. Hopefully we all have Venmo by this point; it would make these fees really easy to collect and the winner’s prize easy to pay out.

 

We humbly put forth the above plans for your consideration. We don’t have to put a GODDAMN thing to a vote, but perhaps we will in some cases when we get a better sense of how the league feels. Bottom line: We’re really excited about our potential move to the massive player pool of Fantrax, the expansion of rosters, and drafting some new guys. The league has the potential to run very smoothly this year without the hassle of counting high minors ABs and IPs and checking when rights players are added.  No self-policing also means no more draconian penalties. Adopt our changes and let Fantrax do the work for you. Pitchers and catchers will be reporting before we know it. Let’s rock and roll.

 

Hugs and Kisses,

 

-Shane & Brian

The Smith-McCann Platform