Wow to Rizzo 1.7, Upton 2.12 and Marte 3.3 among others.

Yeah, horrible. Wiegert knows his **** but I'm surprised he reached for Braun @23. Shandler is such a dink, like his team so far though.

b2b terrible picks with Street 120 (with Cishek, and other better closers on the board. ha and Perkins goes 12 picks after Street) and part time pinch hitter Willin Rosario @121. I drafted Leonys Martin around 160th last year coming off a really nice 2013, thought he was a steal, he wasn't. Why he went 124 here? no idea.

I can kinda see Street over Perkins if you just want the saves. Not a perfect correlation, but surely the Angels win more games than the Twins. That is, until Street breaks, which he somehow avoided last year.

Speaking of breaking down, if the guy in the 9-hole can keep his players on the field (Miggy, Harper, Prince, Tanaka) he's got a hell of a team. Not a bad strat if it's win or bust I guess.

I was gonna defend 7 rizzo as plausible til I saw besides donaldson this guy reached on everything in the first 7 rounds

Anyway, a very legitimate case can be made for rizzo at 7. Dude was a monster last year, is entering his prime and the Cubs lineup next year projects to be very strong. Obvious downsides: 1. He should have been able to get him with the 2nd rounder 2. The Cubs lineup around him is also very young and variable

Jones at 10 and madbum 13 are so so so bad. Posey 2.12 and freeman 3.1 are absolutely indefensible. This Perri guy has one of the worst teams I've ever seen an 'expert' draft

Expert in quotes for sure. The true experts don't do these penis stroking mocks.

I like Rizzo top 12 as well.

Posey at #26 is definitely a reach... I guess its somewhat more defensible if thats a 2 catcher league, but if its 1 catcher, then ouch.

I hate Freeman there as well. He is a 20 to 25 HR guy with a solid average, but his counting stats are likely to be awful since hes the only MLB hitter in that lineup.
even if he was dead set on a hitter (which is fine) I dont know how he took Freeman over Beltre, Ellsbury, Harper, and even Brantley/Dickerson there. Id even prefer Stras, Kluber, and Darvish over Freeman.

Ya Freeman prob wont be on any of my teams if he goes that early, id prefer the above mentioned and add in Puig who's steamer projection are similar but with higher power upside and more steals.

Rockies "dangling" Blackmon in trade talks now, per Morosi. Possible suitors include Cubs, Rangers, Braves and Orioles. Obviously any move from Coors will hurt a lot, although BAL/TEX wouldn't be awful landing spots. I'd be all over Stubbs if I can get him as my OF5 if he's getting reasonable PT.

Freeman does seem pretty bad the more I look at it too. I agree just take Beltre if you want a CI. I think Ellsbury at 3.10 is a huge steal - I have him in the back half of my top ten outfielders.

2. scherzer

Fantasy wise .. could make as good an argument for him as anyone else. Barring a move to the Yankees (meh team, bad park) or something ridiculous like Coors, he was obviously going to be drafted as a top ten starter or better anyway. So while it gives him a small bump in value this signing isn't terribly interesting.

But looking around the NL East .. my lord. Stick to your values but I'm going to be all over Fister, Gio and Roark in my leagues (assuming one of Zimm or Stras is traded).

http://www.fangraphs.com/depthcharts...tion=Standings

Worst two teams, and everyone but the Nats in the bottom third in offense. Blech.

I'm in a league that keeps five. I'm for sure keeping Miggy, McCutchen, and Bautista. I also have Frazier, Arenado, Machado, Hamels, Kimbrel, and...

...Jose Fernandez.

I was leaning towards Fernandez and Machado for the last two spots, but I think Machado's value is down and I could prob draft him in the first three rounds if I really wanted him.

I disagree completely basically because of everything you went on to say. Scherzer went from somewhere in the 4-8 range depending on your tastes to clearly the #2 pitcher with an argument to be made for #1

Trading off the DH for the pitcher spot, the AL Central for the NL East and mediocre fielding at Comerica for one of the best defensive teams in baseball at Nationals Park (as well as an already really low HR rate)...woof

Ok fair enough. My point was a little self centered as I'm not too big on pitching in the first two rounds. Which is what it will take to get him

He's probably my 2a/2b with Felix right now

I'd keep Arenado for sure, he's like Machado with Coors and knees. After that I don't know, but Fernandez would be last if winning in 2015 is a top priority. He's not due back until mid-season and any minor tightness could easily push that back. There's a good chance Hamels gets moved to a contender, even if not you can't really go wrong with he or Kimbrel. Frazier is fine but unlikely to match last years numbers.

He's in a better spot and it for sure moves him up, but arguement for # 1? C'mon man.

I really like Arenado. I think he's undervalued in my league. Jose Fernadez is tough to let go in a keeper league. I think he's top 5 SP long term.

My main league is a 9 man that only allows 4 keepers. Generally I try to go with 2 bats 2 pitchers, but I'm thinking on keeping all pitchers since I traded a lot of my young prospects for sp to make a championship run last season.

Here's a list of potential keepers I'm thinking about, and the round I would use in order to keep them

MadBum - 3rd round
Scherzer - 2nd round
Sale - 4th round
Hamels - 10th round
DeGrom - 23rd round
Fernandez - 22nd round

Edwin - 2nd round
Bautista - 5th round
Freeman - 8th round

I kept Edwin last season, and that worked quite nicely, but if I wanted to keep him and Scherzer, Edwin would be my first pick and Scherzer would be my 2nd. I'm not completely sold on Scherzer, but him going to the NL East could be pretty big for him.

Sale and MadBum seem like pretty obv must keeps, but I'm not certain on the other two. DeGrom is awesome at the 23rd and he showed a lot of promise the 2nd half of last season. Fernandez is obviously a top talent, but won't be back to last seasons form until the end of the season or even 2016.

Is Bautista a must keep after his resurgence in 2014? He's going into his age 34 season, and put up two pretty awful ones prior to 14. But that Jays offense looks to be the best in the AL East and the Edwin/Bautista combo kept me at the top of the league most of 2014.

In this league, most everyone keeps big names, and doesn't really look ahead to the future. I think my first pick at 1.8 in 14 was Adam Jones, if that gives an idea of what kind of talent is off the board by that point.

Hard to say 100% without being in your league and seeing exactly how the draft plays out, but in a shallow 9-team league I'd keep it simple/stupid and go with your best four guys barring a ridiculous value late in the draft. Fernandez is pretty close to that but with you already having a lot of top-end pitchers and the uncertainty in coming back from TJS, I wouldn't do it.

So I'd just keep E5, Bautista, Scherzer, and one of Bumgarner/Sale (whoever you feel better about).

In terms of keeper value I'd probably rank them

Sale
Bum
Scherzer

It's hard to be 100% sold on a 30 year old sp that just got paid

Everyone is down on Freeman, and for good reason, but he's a huge value in the 8th.

Freeman and Bautista are slam dunks, imo, and I'd keep Sale over Max and Bum as a 4th rounder. I'd need more info to make the 4th selection, but leaning deGrom ATM.

I'd keep the hitters and Sale and Hamels.

Have Sale ever had TJ? I know since he's been in the MLB he hasn't, but did he in college or minors? His throwing mechanics are the only thing that worry me about him. The amount of torque that dude has from his elbow has to be top in the league.

Agree that Freeman in the 8th is a steal, but man, that lineup around him is atrocious and will definitely eat into his rbi's.

No arm surgeries for Sale. I know he's had some elbow issues, including last year, but so far he's come back stronger after every scare. It's worthy of consideration as I think it's fair to say he's more likely to miss significant time than Bum or Scherzer. OTOH you're much more likely to get an impact player in the 2nd round.

I don't think it would be a huge mistake to keep any of the 3 (though Max and Bum are really only around fair value) or cut all 3 loose and keep the lessor, better value arms (deGrom/Hamels or Fernandez if you're more interested in 16). In a keeper league that's really the name of the game anyways. Like you could possibly draft all 3 of your big guns at or better than keeper value in a league this shallow with only 4 keepers.

Assuming scherzer talentwise doesn't fall on a cliff, absolutely

Pitching in the AL in the last 3 years he's finished 3rd, 2nd and 1st in the majors in k/9. In a vacuum his k/9 has nowhere to go but up moving to the NL. Now add in he's going to the east which has 3 of the 9 most strikeout prone teams in the majors, 2 of whom are worse than last year, 1 (barves) barely has an MLB lineup. Even the mets were 15th or so.

By comparison the twins and white sox were both in the top 8 in ks but the indians and royals were both in the bottom 5. Scherzer will flirt with 300 ks and easily beat kershaw in this category

The nationals are a SIGNIFICANTLY better defensive team than the Tigers were. Only 1 starter (Zimmerman I believe) had a .300 or worse BABIP whereas only 2 tigers starters (Sanchez and Porcello) had an under .300 BABIP

Scherzer is a flyball pitcher who now pitches in 4 caverns in the east with 3 outfielders behind him with very decent range as opposed to the ****show that routinely made up the Tigers OF. And he already had a pretty low whip.

Granted it's incredibly unlikely Scherzer beats kershaw in either whip or era, but I would be absolutely floored if Scherzer doesn't set career marks in both (I'm looking at felix's era and whip last year and don't think that's the most unreasonable expectation even with it being a pretty optimistic one) which would put him not particularly far behind kershaw in either. Wins I'm not even gonna bother hazarding to guess