I'm slowly becoming a convert to the idea that fantasy football is the best fantasy sport, but I still like fantasy baseball a lot, so I joined a public league more or less at the last moment (i.e., a couple of hours before the live draft) as the final team. It's a standard 5 x5 league with 10 teams, starting one of each infield position, a corner infielder, a middle infielder, five outfielders, a DH, and ten pitchers, with an innings minimum of 1000.
I had the 7th overall pick, which did not look like a good spot in the first round, as the #7 rated player was Jacoby Ellsbury, who I definitely did not see as being worthy of a first round pick at all. I don't generally draft pitchers early, but I resigned myself to drafting Clayton Kershaw....
However, someone else took Kershaw at #4, which meant that Carlos Gonzalez, Chris Davis, or Paul Goldschmidt would be available! Of the three, I preferred Goldschmidt the most and Davis the least, but all were acceptable. I ended up getting CarGo.
The rest of my picks:
2) Ryan Braun, of - yeah, I don't like cheaters, but didn't this guy used to be considered possibly the best player in baseball?
3) Jose Reyes, ss
4) Shin-Soo Choo, of - let's see, OBP machine, moving to Texas; should score a ton of runs
5) Jose Bautista, of - I'm not expecting his monster years, just a good powerful one
6) Adrian Gonzalez, 1b - even with his drop in power, I was quite happy with this pick
7) Matt Carpenter, 2b - iffy about this one, though
8) Matt Cain, sp - my first pitcher
9) Gio Gonzalez, sp
10) Shelby Miller, sp
11) Wilin Rosario, c - have no idea about him but he's young and he plays in Colorado
12) Brett Lawrie, 3b - not sure I like relying on so many Toronto players
13) Sergio Romo, rp - this might have been too early still for a closer
14) David Robertson, rp
15) Leonys Martin, of - this dude was pretty incredible for steals in the second half of last season (I picked him up off the waiver wire)
16) Jed Lowrie, ss/2b - versatile and decent
17) Adam Lind, 1b - only useable against RHP but I wanted some power on the bench
18) Huston Street, rp - in retrospect, a mistake
19) Steve Cishek, rp - perhaps another mistake
20) Francisco Liriano, sp - speculating here
21) Neftali Perez, rp - feel better about him than Street or Cishek
22) Ben Revere, of - cheap speed
23) Colby Rasmus, of - hopefully won't be a headcase this year
24) Kelly Johnson, 2b, of - should start as Yankees' 3b, so will be quite useful for filling in when others have off-days
25) Adam Dunn, 1b - you never know....
This team should have a ton of power and decent speed, and I expect to do well in most of the hitting categories (other than batting average). The pitching is volatile but should amass lots of Ks with decent ratios.