Reviewing the 2011 Fantasy Baseball Season

Our league's regular season is winding down.  Looks like my team, "Boomer's Wallbangers", will end up with a nice 12-8 record, but only good for 5th out of 10 teams, just missing the top four for the playoffs.  This despite having the third highest total points.  Such are the vagaries of head-to-head.  I thought it would be a good time to review the season. In this post, let's look at how the players I drafted worked out.  Here were my initial thoughts, but today, naturally, they are different.  As a reminder, this was an automated draft, so the computer, and pre-season rankings, made many of the decisions.  Though a lot of the As and Giants pitchers picks came from me.  (Those I remember "bumping up" I'll put in italics).  I'll rate them on a scale of "bust", "disappointing", "o.k.", "good", and "awesome".  "RY" is shorthand for "Ranking (at that position) for the Year".  "RM" is for the past month.  For example, Evan Longoria is ranked, by our points, as the 6th best third basemen for the entire year.

1. Evan Longoria.  RY 6th.  Disappointing.  But RM is 3rd, he's bouncing back at the end of this year.
2. Troy Tulowitsky RY 1st.  A good pick.
3. Josh Hamilton  RY 32nd.  Disappointing.
4. Nelson Cruz  RY 17th.  Slightly disappointing
5. Jose Reyes.  RY 4th.  A good, possibly awesome pick.
6. Jayson Werth RY 38th.  I dropped him at the All-Star Break - IMO, a bust.  I'm surprised that his ranking is not lower!
7. Michael Young.  RY hard to tell cause he's played all over, but I'd rank his year as awesome.  His RY at 3B is 2nd.
8. Zack Greinke.  RY 29th.  Disappointing start of the year, but he'd coming on now.
9 Chris Young (the outfielder)  RY 16th.  He was excellent the start of the year, but has been dismal the past couple of months.  (I dropped him a while ago.)  So I'd say an o.k. pick.
10. Max Scherzer RY 31st.  A good pick.
11. Kelly Johnson.  RY 13th.  He was awful for me the first 6 weeks, I dropped him.  He had a slight revival but has reverted to lousy and has been dropped by a couple of other owners.  A bust.
12. Joe Nathan   Largely a Bust.
13. Tim Hudson.  A good pick.  I ended up trading him for Todd Helton.
14. Jonathan Sanchez.  Luckily, I traded him, plus Elvis Andrus, for Justin Verlander.  So he helped me, but objectively he's a bust.
15. Brian Roberts a complete bust
16. Andrew Bailey   o.k.
17. Trevor Cahill.  good first half, awful 2nd half.  Hard to rate
18. Madison Bumgartner.  This was a good pick.  Unfortunately, in one of my big mistakes this year, I dropped him while he was struggling (and so was my team) and was slow to pick him back up.
19. Tsuyoshi Nishioka a bust.  Of course, at this stage in the draft, you don't expect everybody to pan out, you are just hoping for a positive.  Not here.
20. Denard Span.  He was o.k., then hurt for the season.  Disappointing.
21. Gio Gonzales.  This was a great pick, until after the All-Star break.  But still good overall.
22. Kurt Suzuki.  RY 15th,  Meh.  I went through a lot of random catchers this year.
23. Austin Jackson.  He was instantly traded for Ike Davis.  Who played well for a couple of months and was then out for the year.  So, I'd say disappointing (if you count him as Ike Davis)
24. Wade Davis.  He was dropped fairly soon.  o.k.
25. Logan Morrison.  RY around 50.  This was a great pick.  Until Florida dumped him.
26. Michael Pineda  RY 24th.  A great pick.
27. Kila Ka'aihue  A bust.


There were a few awesomes and good picks, but, overall, there were too many busts in this draft.  But I feel good that man of the italic picks worked out well.

Warren Buffet Editorial "Stop Coddling the Super-Rich"

Warren Buffet wrote an editorial for the Sunday New York Times.  I agree with a lot of it.  Progressive talk radio (the two shows I listened to yesterday) was all thrilled with it as a repudiation of Republican policies.  And, in limited ways, it is.

As background, and painting in overly broad strokes, Democrats have called for repealing the Bush tax cuts for the rich, those making more than $250,000 a year.  Republicans point out that many of those taxpayers are running small businesses, (the Wall Street Journal found that about half of that tax income came from small businesses) and increasing their taxes would hurt job creation.  I agree that further burdens on small business would be a mistake in this weak economy.  To me, the obvious fix is to write the tax laws so that the increased taxes fall only on rich individuals, not those running small businesses.  To my knowledge, nobody in power has proposed any such thing, and maybe it would be difficult to write such a law defining exactly what is a "small business" without loopholes.

As an alternative, I like Buffett's proposals.  They should please Democrats by raising the tax burden on the rich, should please Republicans by lessening the impact on small businesses, and they should please everybody by raising tax income to cut the deficit.

Many of the "mega-rich" make their money by investments, and the long term capital gains tax rate is a special low rate of 15%.  Perhaps this rate should be raised.  But there are arguments that we should encourage long-term investments.

By contrast, short-term capital gains are, in general, taxed as normal income, up to ~35%.  But there is a carried interest loophole for investment bankers that allows them to treat much of this short term gain as long term.  Closing this loophole would raise 4 billion a year.

Now, the UK has a similar lower rate.  Not sure if there is any purpose to it.  Barring some explanation of why it is needed, it should be repealed.  Buffett argues for their repeal, and I think he would know if there were any good reason for the special low rate to exist.  Republicans blocked this reform during the recent debt crisis.

Now, 4 billion a year is a nice start, but it ain't much in the grand scheme of our deficit.  So Buffett adds proposals for two new tax levels, at 1 million and 10 million.  Sounds good, and at these higher income levels they would be less likely to adversely affect any small businesses.  He is not very specific about the new levels.  I saw one estimate that this could cut the deficit by 3%.  Still not much, but it's something.

Before Democrats crow over their vindication from Buffett, they should read the entire editorial.  (emphasis mine)

Job one for the 12 is to pare down some future promises that even a rich America can’t fulfill. Big money must be saved here. The 12 should then turn to the issue of revenues. 

Even I know that 3% is a small reduction in the deficit, and Buffett is far smarter than me.  He clearly states that cutting entitlements is essential.

Paul Krugman Deliberately Misleads, Again and Again

I already have a blog post entitled "Paul Krugman Deliberately Misleads, Again".  So this post must be named "Again and Again"

In a recent blog, Krugman argues that there was no growth miracle under Reagan, and there was one under Clinton.  But he cherry picks the dates over which growth is measured.  It's trivial to debunk with a one minute Google search.

To see some real data, go to the excellent Trading Economics web site and look for US GDP growth.  Select 1973 in the Date Selection gizmo.  You should see this:



Judge for yourself the GDP growth during the Reagan and Clinton growth periods.  Looks pretty equal to me.  But Krugman includes the years of recession in the average.  There was a long and deep recession included in the Reagan totals, and a short and shallow recession in the Clinton total.  So of course the averaged growth rate over the entire period would be higher under Clinton.

In addition, for two of these years of the long recession, 1979 and 1980, which are included in the Reagan totals, Reagan wasn't even in office.  This is obvious BS.  (And kudos to Greg Mankiw for pointing it out)

Jon Carroll messes up

Jon Carroll, in a June 8 column, blasts Sarah Palin's comments on Paul Revere as embarrassing and garbled.  Others have been even less charitable.  When I first heard her comments, I thought the same thing.  But it turns out that she had the facts more or less correct.

BLOCK (the interviewer): So you think basically, on the whole, Sarah Palin got her history right.
Prof. ALLISON (the guest): Well, yeah, she did.

And this was a couple of days before Jon Carroll's column.  Now, maybe there is a lead time, and he wasn't aware of the NPR interview when the article was written.  However, it is now nearly a week later and he should apologize.

BTW, for an interesting take on Paul Revere as "not much of a hero", read The Fort by Bernard Cornwell.

New York Times cannot bring themselves to really criticize the Democrats

In today's editorial, "Passive in the Senate", the New York Times rightly criticizes the Democrat led US Senate for "not  producing a budget proposal in more than two years".  Last Wednesday, the Senate voted down the controversial Paul Ryan budget plan, 57 to 40.  They also voted down two other Republican plans.  For completeness, they then voted down President Obama's own budget, 97 to 0!.  A complete waste of time, staged for politics.

But, does the Times really criticize the Democrats in the Senate?  The following terms are used.

"deflect attention", "toxic plan", "outrageous", "extreme", "destructive".

However, as you probably suspect, these terms are all applied to the Republicans.

The editorial does criticize the Senate for being reactive, unoriginal, fearful, "play-it-safe", etc.  But it's quickly diluted by the Times defending the Democrat actions, as in these sections:

These political considerations should not be minimized. With only a three-vote majority, Democrats, led by Harry Reid, are understandably fearful about losing the Senate next year and have decided that treading water is better than taking a showy but risky dive.

and

It is fine — and important — to attack Mr. Ryan’s destructive Medicare plan, and such criticism seems to be remarkably effective among swing voters, as we saw in last week’s Democratic victory in a special election in western New York.

Even the criticism is based on political motivations.  The Times isn't criticizing the Senate Democrats for letting the country roll uncontrolled into a fiscal ditch, the criticism is completely political:  their passivity loses the Democratic momentum, and empowers the Republicans.

But if Democrats are ever going to regain the momentum in the national conversation, they have to stand for something. Standing pat gives Republicans huge openings to move the debate to the right. 

Democrats avoided passing appropriations bills last year for similar reasons, and that failure almost led to a government shutdown this year when Republicans exploited it. 

In other words, the Times is not particularly upset that the lack of Senate vision and leadership is hurting the country.  They are just upset that it is hurting the Democrats.

One other section of the editorial is very troubling.  It complains that the Senate is "hobbled", in part because "Its members are not elected from the carefully drawn partisan districts that in most years are a House luxury".  Sounds like the writer is in favor of Gerrymandering.  That way Democrats would have secure seats and could "get things done" without worrying about the will of the people.  Just like Tom Friedman admires China's ability to get things done.

I agree with the editorial that revenues must be increased, and that health care costs must be trimmed.  But we have a representative government that is supposed to handle that, not some all-powerful entrenched oligarchy and political class.  :-)  Irony intended, we do have a powerful entrenched political class, but Gerrymandering makes it even more entrenched.

Fantasy Baseball 2011 April Review

My team, "Boomer's Wallbangers", is off to a decent 2-1 start.  I thought I'd look at which players have been "surprises".  I'll define "steals" as players who are significantly over-performing their Average Draft Position (ADP), and 'disappointments" as those who have been under-performing.  Based on our H2H league's point system, the "steals" are listed below.  High numbers are good, meaning either lots of points, or they were drafted late.  A "-" for ADP means that, in the average ESPN league, these players were not drafted.


Catchers        Pts    ADP
Russel Martin    81     -   ("-" means undrafted)
Nick Hundley     69     -
Alex Avila       67     -


1B
Ike Davis        89    210


2B
Howie Kendrick   91    146
Neil Walker      80    166
Brian Roberts    70    150
D Espinosa       68    -
F Sanchez        67    -


3B
P. Polanco       84    203
Chipper Jones    73    202
Ryan Roberts     72     -
A Callapso       64     -


SS
Starlin Castro   82    151
A Cabrera        76    218
M Izturis        68     -
Angel Sanchez    68     -
Jed Lowrie       66     -


OF
Lance Berkman    99    204
Jonny Gomes      94     -
Jeff Francoeur   93     -
Alex Gordon      87     -
Sam Fuld         78     -
C. Maybin        73     -
B Boesch         73     -


SP
James Shields   100    204
K Lohse          96     -
A. Harang        82     -
M Harrison       82     -
I Kennedy        82    210
Randy Wolf       81    228
Josh Tomlin      80     -
J Masterson      79     -
A Ogando         79     -
AJ Burnett       76    211
J DeLaRosa       75    224
M Pineda         75    225
B Beachy         75     -
B McCarthy       73     -

Now, for the disappointments.  In many cases, these players are currently on the DL (marked with a *) or have spent much time on the DL.  Low numbers are bad - not many points or drafted early.


Catchers        Pts    ADP
Joe Mauer*      18     25
V Martinez*     46     43


1B
Adrian Gonzales 68     11
Adam Dunn       44     38


2B
Dustin Pedroia  69     28
Dan Uggla       65     34


3B
Evan Longoria*   1     5
R Zimmerman*    32    22


SS
Hanley Ramirez  43    2.5
Derek Jeter     45    56
Jimmy Rollins   56    64




OF
Carl Crawford   40     4
Josh Hamilton*  36    18
CarGo           61    11
Nelson Cruz     80    27
Matt Holliday   72    17
Jayson Werth    64    47




SP
Chris Carpenter 60    47
Tommy Hanson    61    49
Ubaldo Jimenez  24    47
F Liriano       14    86



Some thoughts.  Remember that these numbers are for less than one month of play, so this is still a small sample size.  That said...

First base has by far the fewest surprises.  Good place to spend an early draft pick if you want a solid pick, neither good nor bad.  In effect, at 1B, it's "reliable", you get what you pay for.  By contrast, catchers have the most surprises, both steals and disappointments.  IMO, catcher is not worth spending a high round draft pick, as you might be disappointed by an injury, and there seem to always be good steal catchers available for cheap.  Shortstop is also a spot where there seem to be many surprises.  Second base is kind of "medium".  Less surprises than at SS, but still some.  For catcher and middle infield, draft as best you can, but it is important to remain active with trades or on the waiver wire.

Third base and outfield have reasonably few surprises.  Remember that outfield has three times as many total players, so 6 "steals" is more like 2 steals at another position.   Most of the disappointments are due to injuries.  So, in general, you seem to get what you pay for here.

Starting pitcher is interesting.  There are a lot of positive "steals", pitchers who are doing far better than their ADP.  But relatively few "disappointments".  So, if you spend on a top-flite pitcher, you generally get what you pay for.  But plenty of bargains are there to be had.  Again, this is a key area to remain active with trade and on the waiver wire.

Will the New York Times make up their mind?

In late March, the New York Times ran an article saying that GE was using "aggressive...lobbying" and "innovative accounting" to avoid paying US taxes, and even claim a tax refund of billions.  There is some dispute as to the accuracy of the claims, but it's true that GE is taking advantage of tax laws to lower their tax burden.  Whether this is "fiduciary responsibility" or "exploiting loopholes" is debatable.

In today's editorials, the Times, as one would expect, blast Paul Ryan's budget proposal.  They blast it several times, including implicating it in any impending government shutdown, but I'm focusing on that one editorial.  I agree with the editorial that "serious deficit reduction requires everything to be on the table, including tax increases", something Ryan does not envision.  And Ryan dodges the whole third rail of Social Security.  However, the Times goes on to say (italics mine)

The Republican plan calls only for tax simplification. It would get rid of loopholes and reduce rates in a way that would not raise overall revenues but would invariably cut the tax bill of wealthy taxpayers for whom lower rates are more valuable than assorted loopholes.

The Times cannot run an article complaining that tax loopholes let GE get away with paying no taxes, then, just a couple of weeks later, run an editorial that belittles the value of loopholes.  This is intellectual dishonesty.

Instead of blanket condemnation of Ryan's proposals, how about "we like getting rid of the loopholes. but lets increase his top rate from 25% to X%", and actually propose something concrete and constructive.

A couple of the more conservative Times columnists offer a more balanced evaluation of the Ryan proposal, Ross Douhat and David Brooks.