RotoWire's AL LABR Team

• By: Chris Liss
• On: 3/7/2010 2:34:00 AM

Related: Chris Liss 


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I assembled our AL LABR team Saturday night. It's a 12-team AL-only 5x 5 $260 auction with 2 C, 1 1B, 1 2B, 1 3B, 1 SS, I CI, 1 MI, 5 OF, 1 U, 9 P.

Here's my team:

Pos	Player	$
C	Joe Mauer	30
C	Jarrod Saltalamacchia	7
1B	Kendry Morales	27
2B	Dustin Pedroia	29
3B	Brandon Inge	8
SS	Derek Jeter	25
CI	Casey Kotchman	6
MI	Alex Gonzalez	3
OF	Grady Sizemore	29
OF	Austin Jackson	6
OF	Ryan Sweeney	10
OF	Desmond Jennings	5
OF	Michael Brantley	5
U	Hideki Matsui	11
P	Scott Baker	16
P	David Price	12
P	Ervin Santana	6
P	Erik Bedard	6
P	Gio Gonzalez	4
P	Ricky Romero	3
P	Jake Westbrook	2
P	Jeremy Guthrie	2
P	Jeremy Hellickson	1
R	Brandon Snyder	0
R	Dustin Ackley	0
R	Danny Valencia	0
R	Scot Shields	0
R	J.J. Putz	0
R	Ryan Strieby	0

A couple notes:

You might notice the dollars add up to $253, instead of $260, i.e., I left $7 on the table. While I was initially beside myself because of this - I could have bought Jon Lester instead of Scott Baker, for example - it's actually wasn't like that. I had a good deal of money left for the end game, I wanted to get certain players (Ricky Romero, Gio Gonzalez and Austin Jackson), and I thought they would cost about $20 collectively. They wound up costing $13 - hence the difference of $7. Had I known I'd get them that cheap, obviously, I would have spent more money early. But I'm not sure how I could have known that.

My plan was to be strong at catcher, middle infielder and get a couple power hitters, and I accomplished that. I also wanted a bunch of young, upside pitchers, and I got that, too. The only area I fell short was missing out on closers, but other owners hoarded them, so there are a bunch of people in a similar boat, and it shouldn't be too hard to trade for saves.

I also took some gambles on Michael Brantley, Jeremy Hellickson and Desmond Jennings whose playing time is uncertain as well as Erik Bedard who's not due back until May. Still, I expected them collectively to earn more than the $17 I paid for them.

The key to this team is the development of the young pitchers (Price, Gonzalez and Romero) - I like all three, but they're all high risk, too.