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Back last January, I had one of those fantasy baseball epiphanies — you know, the kind you get when you are driving or in the shower or mowing the lawn and “bingo” — regarding my strategy in the League of Alternative Baseball Reality (LABR), the National League version.
I did some research on Pedro Martinez during his peak years, and compared those numbers to those of Clayton Kershaw, and the totals were amazingly similar. So, since in his heyday, Pedro commanded a salary of near $50, I decided to try this same path, only with Kershaw at a somewhat more modestly priced $40.
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I made my throw-out bid in the throw-back league when the time came in early March, heard crickets, and the plan was, shall we say, “on.”
Since I blew a lot of my budget on Kershaw, I tried to be patient and shop carefully. In fact I bagged closer altogether, figuring that at some point the job would change and I would have a chance to buy saves via FAAB, or that I could trade something for said commodity.
Truth is, none of this worked particularly well from the start. Kershaw is pitching well, but he started slow enough, and after a couple of starts, I lost Brandon McCarthy for the season.
Even with that, my team had mediocre pitching (save strikeouts) and hitting (all around), but I did make the right move in drafting Chris Heston for my reserve team, which did help give some trading depth at starting pitcher.
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Still, losing points in saves (when I thought my pitching would dominate except for that category) got to be too much, so I did swap Gio Gonzalez for Jason Grilli, and then Lucas Duda for Hector Rondon, and then I started getting trolls for Kershaw.
Now, because my season-long plan was to go with the Dodger southpaw, all queries were rebuffed because well, if you invoke a strategy, you will never know if it works or not if you don’t follow through. Right?
Then Martin Prado went on the DL. And Marcell Ozuna was sent down. And Kolten Wong got bonked on the noggin. And Josh Harrison ripped up his body. And Jason Grilli went away till 2016. (That’s 21.4% of my roster out of the picture.)
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During the throes of the above noted transaction travails, Derek Van Ripper offered me Yasiel Puig and Alex Wood for Kershaw, and that is truly too good a pair of players to reject by rote. Since I knew Lenny Melnick wanted a starter (he had asked about Kershaw with the earlier wave) I figured I could convert Wood to Gregory Polanco, while moving Patrick Cobrin, on whom I have been sitting, into the permanent starter slot owned by Kershaw and let the chips fall.
After those moves, I set my post-break roster for the first time. Only 10 members of my Opening Day 23-man starting lineup (43%) were there.
Truth is, I am not real optimistic that this team will do anything exciting, but it is a new half, I have a full roster, and I do have Harrison, Ozuna, and Prado who should be back at some time.
As for the Kershaw strategy, while I am curious how that would work, maybe another time. Because in 2015, you gotta do what you gotta do.
Lawr Michaels writes regularly for Mastersball.com, ShandlerPark.com, and here every Saturday. Follow him on Twitter.
