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slant.gif (102 bytes) From the Desk of the Commish

Commish

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January, 2012

2012 Draft Day Preview

You have questions.  I have answers.

How does this year's auction class compare to others?

If you've been saving your money for years in anticipation of the 2012 auction, I have some bad news for you:

2003: 2006.9
2004: 2210.3
2005: 2155.9
2006: 1903.2
2007: 1858.0
2008: 1522.4
2009: 1239.8
2010: 1475.4
2011: 1230.1
2012: 995.3

Those are the yearly VORP totals of the 50 players in the auction.  The cream of this year's crop includes Lance Berkman (.301/.412/.547, 31 HR), Ian Kinsler (.255/.355/.477, 32 HR), David Ortiz (.309/.398/.554, 29 HR), Mark Teixeira (.248/.341/.494, 39 HR), Mike Napoli (.320/.414/.631, 30 HR) and Josh Willingham (.246/.332/.477, 29 HR).

Beyond those six, there is a big drop-off to the second tier, which includes Jeff Francoeur (.285/.329/.476, 20 HR), Nick Markakis (.284/.351/.406, 15 HR) and Andre Ethier (.292/.368/.421, 11 HR).

In terms of pitching, there are only four free agent pitchers with 200+ innings this season: C.C. Sabathia, C.J. Wilson, Carl Pavano and Brett Myers.  Derek Lowe (187 IP), Ryan Vogelsong (180 IP), Brandon McCarthy (171 IP), Jason Hammel (170 IP) and Bartolo Colon (164 IP) will also be in the auction.

Not only is this year's auction class the weakest in league history, but it isn't even top-heavy with impact players.  Here are the total combined VORP's of the top ten free agents (by VORP) since 2003:

2003: 729.6
2004: 680.8
2005: 762.0
2006: 621.8
2007: 654.2
2008: 579.5
2009: 524.4
2010: 582.9
2011: 488.3
2012: 415.6

What about the draft class?

As some on the league forum have already pointed out, this year's draft class may be stronger than the auction class -- at least in terms of players a team would want to keep beyond 2012.  Among the hitters with value in 2012 and/or beyond are Vladimir Guerrero, Daniel Murphy, Cody Ross, Placido Polanco, Grady Sizemore, Magglio Ordonez, Daric Barton and Justin Morneau.

On the pitching side, A.J. Burnett, Erik Bedard, Clayton Richard, Huston Street, Brian Wilson, Jon Garland, Jon Rauch and Joe Nathan are all likely to be selected in the first ten rounds of the draft.

How much money is out there this year?

Perhaps not surprisingly, given that there are so few star players on the free agent market, it stands to reason that this is because there are so many star players on our rosters that we are already paying big bucks to retain.  This theory holds up, given that there is less money to be spent on free agents in 2012 than in any other year in league history:

Year Total cash available # of free agents needed Cash per player $ spent in auction
2003 $557.1m 360 $1.55m $328.5m (59%)
2004 $606.2m 343 $1.77m $363.5m (60%)
2005 $498.2m 292 $1.71m $318m (64%)
2006 $621.3m 327 $1.90m $341.5m (55%)
2007 $569.0m 296 $1.92m $364.5m (64%)
2008 $595.5m 320 $1.86m $324.0m (54%)
2009 $543.3m 292 $1.86m $289.5m (53%)
2010 $417.5m 261 $1.60m $289.5m (69%)
2011 $472.9m 295 $1.60m $269.0m (57%)
2012 $361.0m 267 $1.35m TBD

This winter, TEN teams have less than $10 million in available spending cash.  This is great news for any team that is looking to add a $10 million free agent, as there will hardly be any competition.  Of course, all it takes is one other owner with deep pockets to drive up the price on any player.

Which teams will be spending all this money?

John Duel has spent the past several years telling anyone and everyone who would listen that he's been planning for the 2012 season ever since we passed that deplorable "sticky penalty" rule.  With $33.7 million in spending money, the Pads lead the league in that category.  Incredibly, the defending champion Atlanta Fire Ants rank #2, with $30.5 million available.  (Hardly seems fair, does it?)

South Carolina ($30.4MM), New Milford ($29.3MM), St. Louis ($22.2MM) and -- gack! -- Allentown ($22MM) will also be big spenders.  In case your belly isn't queasy enough looking at that list, keep in mind that Allentown only needs 8 players on their 35-man roster.  That average of $2.8MM per player ranks only the Granite State Lightning and Los Altos Undertakers.  Of course, the Lightning only have room for three more players, so they can't do too much damage.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Cleveland Rocks have just $1.4MM to play with, and need to fill 8 roster spots.  That's an average of just $200K per player.  Kansas ($3.8MM for 11 spots), Niagara ($4.4MM for 13 spots), Bear Country ($4.8MM for 8 spots), Villanova ($6MM for 4 spots) and Mississippi ($7.7MM for 14 spots) are in a similar predicament.

The Jamboree's ranking at the bottom of this list is even more depressing, given that they own the #1 pick of the draft.  Unfortunately, they can't even afford to make a pick in the $5MM rounds, and aren't likely to make a pick at $3MM, either.  In effect, this gives the #1 pick of the draft to the Allentown Ridgebacks...who are currently favored to win the BDBL championship in 2012.

Yes, my friends, life isn't fair.  Especially in the BDBL.

How does the Class of 2013 look at this point?

Three words: save your money.

Thanks to our two-year rule for Type H free agents, most of the big names from the free agent class of 2010 will be free agents at the end of this season.  This includes the biggest fish in the pond, Roy Halladay.  2013 could very well be known as the "Year of the Pitcher."  Aside from Halladay, the Class of '13 will also include Wandy Rodriguez, Jonathan Sanchez, Chris Carpenter, Ted Lilly, Ryan Dempster, Zack Greinke, Hiroki Kurodo, Javier Vazquez, Mike Adams, Brandon Morrow, Jake Peavy, Mariano Rivera, Anibal Sanchez, Gavin Floyd, Dan Haren and Jered Weaver.  WOW!

Offensively, the class isn't nearly as impressive.  It includes mostly aging vets on the wrong side of 35, such as Todd Helton, Ichiro Suzuki and Derek Jeter.  But there are also some solid younger players in the class as well, such as B.J. Upton, Jason Kubel, Ben Zobrist, Matt Holliday, Hunter Pence, Delmon Young, Carl Crawford, Carlos Beltran, Victor Martinez, Adrian Beltre, Mike Morse and Nelson Cruz.