By Ryan Main
Conley wins his 2nd Shooter Cup! It was a long time between titles, but you made it exciting by choosing not to trade some final keepers for depth. It’s a very tough choice that far down the road as you want the cup (and cash), but you also want to be able to compete at a high level the next season. Larry and Carey also put up very good seasons and almost pulled off the win. I always enjoy looking at the teams at season’s end to see if there were keeper level players that could have benefited another team’s keeper set. To that end…here’s your top keepers from 2013 and how they rank against each other…(not that Paul cares).
How were these rankings created? You really don’t care about that, so fine…I won’t waste your time with all the detail. If you need the background, refer to the 2011 story (https://obfbl.com/2012/01/11/keeper-rankings-part-1/). I will give you one piece of information, and that is the origin of the rankings used…given that it’s still early, only a few decent sites have rankings for 2014 updated so far. Each site was given a weight in the composite ranking based on their reputation (ESPN = 35%, CBS Mock Draft = 20%, RotoChamp = 15%, Fantasy Assembly Keeper Rankings = 10%, Fantasy Assembly Standard Rankings = 10%, Rotoworld mid-season 2014 projections = 10%)
• CBS Mock Draft (http://fantasynews.cbssports.com/fantasybaseball/story/24286694/draft-prep-offseason-headtohead-mock)
• RotoChamp (http://www.rotochamp.com/baseball/PlayerRankings.aspx)
• Fantasy Assembly Keeper Rankings (http://fantasyassembly.com/2013/11/10/top-100-players-for-dynasty-leagues/)
• Fantasy Assembly Standard Rankings (http://fantasyassembly.com/2013/12/09/top-204-for-2014/)
• Rotoworld mid-season 2014 projections (http://www.rotoworld.com/articles/mlb/43717/2/2014-top-300-overall)
From here, I entered the nerdery and crunched some numbers, resulting in your keeper rankings…hope you enjoy (yes, we know Paul…you don’t enjoy…so quit reading already)!
B-Ham made the top 200!! There’s a lot riding on his last year of RK eligibility…should be interesting to see if he pans out or fizzles down the Rajai Davis path. Looks like Baller still hasn’t noticed that he’s supposed to improve his keeper rank from year to year, but on the bright side, he did lower the average age of his team, and if we remove Dickey, he owns one of the youngest sets of keepers in the league. While the changes haven’t shown up in the ranking score, Baller was very active in 2013 and looks to be on a path in the right direction…I expect to see his rank go up quickly in the years to come.
After dealing all his keepers last season, Chris went from having an old folk’s home full of keepers to the 2nd youngest set in the league. This year, Chris has multiple high-end RK’s, as well as his own pick in the RK draft to solidify his future. In addition, Chris was able to get lucky foresee the breakout of several young keepers in Jose Fernandez and Dominic Brown. Couple that with picking up Reyes via trade, and Chris is on his way to a good set of studs…should be interesting to see what moves he makes this year.
Cheese owns the 3rd youngest set of keepers in the league. He took a hit after trading most of his assets early for Cole Hamels, but still managed to make a few more trades last year and caught lightening with Michael Wacha, who will be one of the most talked about and watched young pitchers in the league in 2014 (time to sell high?). There’s some tough breaks on the RK side as Sano seems to be a week away from opting to have Tommy John surgery and Singleton would rather camp out on first with some buddies and a blunt than put his MLB career in the spotlight. Cheese has a team that I think could easily outperform its current ranking, but will need Segura, Donaldson and others to repeat or even improve upon their breakout seasons.
Ouch…Carey pushed with all he had to win the 2013 shooter cup, but not only came up short for the 2nd season in a row, but also moved out a ton of talent in the effort. With a pocket full of cash, I’m sure Carey has no regrets, but we all know he wants the cup more than ever now. There’s a solid core here and the age isn’t a concern, but Carey will need one heck of a good draft to take a money spot in 2014 as the trade value beyond Trout and Jones is not so great and we clearly know he has no intention of moving either of these guys.
Chris Davis….damn. Who here wishes they’d hit that lottery? Wasn’t it just a year ago that this guy struck out 4 times in a game and then took the mound to pick-up two more K’s? Let’s hope Davis doesn’t regress back to his old ways in 2014. Bobby has set himself up nicely after dealing with the Braun PED disaster. He has an excellent combination of studs and high upside, young keepers….even his RK’s should be reliable in 2014. Looking through Bobby’s roster I’m a bit surprised he’s ranked 8th, but that may be more an indicator of the level of competition in 2014 than anything.
Kim finished in 7th place in 2013 and begins with the 7th ranked, but youngest overall set of keepers. It seems his catcher fetish has carried into 2014 with two in his top 8 and a 3rd just outside. There’s some serious upside to this roster in Hosmer, Heyward and Rizzo. If these three can take another step forward in 2014, Kim’s keepers will look much better, but for now that’s a lot to expect. We should see another year of good progress, but Kim will need to make some moves if he wants to be ready to compete in 2015.
A shooter cup cost Conley as he had to deal some keepers to make his run, but still managed to stay in the top half of the league rankings. We can see that he finished with a ton of depth as he has more players ranked in the top 200 than anybody. No RK’s and a weak backend (is Andrus really a keeper?) will make it very difficult to repeat unless he has a killer draft. There’s also some concern about whether Hanley can play a full schedule or if Beltre can keep his hammy’s from pulling in the Texas heat. It’ll be interesting to see how Fielder adjusts to the same, but I’d love to have these guys hitting back-to-back in my lineup. I don’t see a repeat happening…and I actually doubt he’ll hit the money this year, but it should be close. A focus on re-build would have Conley back in the battle easily the next season.
Some tough decisions here…Kemp has to be frustrating to watch with so much potential, but very little time on the field and less success since he BUSTED out and predicted he’d go 50/50…do you hang on to this guy or sell low? Felix should benefit by the Cano signing and bolstered offense, and Ellsbury to NYY was great news for the Dick Dogs. A solid draft should put Dick Dogs in a money spot, but if he can combine that with some of his typical trades, Dick Dogs has a shot at taking home another cup in 2014.
Do your own write-up…why are you even reading this Paul? Not a trade will be made or a keeper upgraded, and again will fall out of the money.
Leisure Suit Larry almost took down another shooter cup in 2013, but did hit another money finish. Why even collect the entry fee for this guy? Owner of the 2013 AL MVP, who should be back to full health in 2014 and playing his regular position, MCab may either carry this team or be traded to upgrade the weaker backend keepers on this team. Larry seems to be targeting RK’s more than in past years as he’s seen some real potential in Xander Bogaerts, so it’ll be interesting to see if that is simply for trade value or if he’s changed his strategy. Larry will undoubtedly finish in the money and will, as always, be in the running for the cup.
Well nobody can say that Chard didn’t maximize his trade options. Leaving only one other choice for a keeper in the top 200 players, it looks like Chards roster is pretty set. But…where’s Matt Harvey? One of the top pitchers last year, Harvey will be very missed as the Crackheads attempt to win again in 2014 (due to his injury, no site ranked him as top 200 for 2014). I’d say we can expect to see a move or two from the Crackheads as they tend to be very active by the keeper announcements, but will they move Harvey or will they instead move the #1 RK pick that is expected to belong to Byron Buxton? After a quick re-evaluation in 2013, Chard again improved his keeper set, and, while his keepers may not be overall as strong as last year, he still has a substantial amount of flexibility to contend with.
We’ve come a long way baby!! After a steady rebuild, the Blue Balls have finally reached the top of the keeper rankings. If they can only avoid the curse associated with this position, the Blue Balls may finally get the relief they’re looking for…would that be the first time a name change was in order immediately after winning a title? Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The field is stacked this year and there are a lot of questions with this roster. Will Pujols bounce back after working through his injuries or will he continue to decline with age? Will 2013 phenom Puig suffer a sophomore slump? Can Tulowitzki stay healthy? Ryan’s team is bolstered by very strong RK’s in their final year, but will that be enough to carry them to their first Shooter Cup?
Summary:
OBSESSED BALLERS FANTASY BASEBALL LEAGUE 
CBS, ESPN, Rotoworld & RotoChamp, looks like the Assembly is among good company.
The Fantasy Assembly top 200 consolidated keeper rankings come out Saturday.
In the end, you will have assigned 136 confidence points (16+15+14+.
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