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Why I Hate New People In Expert Drafts

This past Saturday, the SportsofBoston Friends and Family League had it’s first annual draft. Made up of our writers, readers, and friends, it was a very intense draft with every expert in the draft room picking out their destiny for the next six months of their lives……..until we got to round two.

One of the best parts of a draft is running your mouth at anybody who makes a stupid pick. With these situations, it happens usually when somebody reaches for a player they covet or if it is a player on their hometown team. I am guilty of this last year when I drafted Alex Gordon in round 10 (no worries, I still won the league). So usually, I am a tad bit more forgiving in these situations. As the second round approached, I was anxiously waiting for Atlanta 1B Mark Teixeira. You know the feeling. Your heart pounds, you start to shake, you don’t even think about the player because you believe that telepathically another owner will pick up your thoughts and snatch him right from under your nose.

Round two starts and Alfonso Soriano goes off the board. I am seven agonizing picks away from Tex Mex, my contract year slugger. Ryan Braun and David Ortiz go next. I am shaking, I have Teixeira highlighted and ready to be taken, hopefully the next owner doesn’t catch wind of this.

Then it happens. No, it is not what you are thinking, Teixiera is still available, he has not been drafted. I am safe for at least another pick. However, my anger is now in full swing and we are only minutes into our 25 round draft. This owner, lets just call him “Pick 9″ (obviously because of his overall draft number), has taken a third baseman. This pathetic excuse for a baseball fan has chosen Adrian Beltre of the Seattle Mariners. Yahoo! had Beltre ranked as the 118th best player on the board and this man stretched and took him 112 spots ahead of his rank.

Beltre last season had 26 HR, 99 RBI, 87 R, and a .276 AVG. Certainly not a terrible season. Does this warrant a top 20 pick? Absolutely not! I don’t know who this owner is, but I do know for a fact that this team was not auto drafted, I know he was there in the flesh to draft his team. The only logical explanation for this choice? Simple, this man is an idiot.

What business he has in this league is uncertain to me. In the second round at his position he could have had Grady Sizemore, Mark Teixeira, Carl Crawford, Vlad Guerrero, and the list goes on and on. In a league full of people who know what they are doing, this guy sticks out like a sore thumb. I thought the requirements for membership in this league were at the very least the basic grasp of baseball knowledge. When this sort of thing happens, yeah sure, players will fall down a spot and are more likely to land on your team but, there is no fun in that. If everything was that easy then these leagues wouldn’t be fun. The point of a league of experts is to challenge yourself and prove you are the best in a tough field of 12.

This guy is new. This is why I hate new guys. They throw off the balance of expertise and make the game not fun. You know the type, they draft only familiar names, they don’t know any player past round 10, they pick guys mostly on their home team, they don’t study the numbers, etc. This would not be a problem with me if this guy wanted to be in a default public league with others who had no clue about the game. This league is full of baseball minds who have a clue and for this guy to infect us with his lack of knowledge makes me sick.

Am I being over dramatic? I don’t think so. Imagine if you had the same group of people who played basketball with each other every Saturday. Then one day one of your guys cant make it and you just find a replacement to fill in the spot. The replacement says he knows what he is doing and has the basic understanding of the game, so you don’t see a problem. Then he gets out there and he cant shoot, dribble, set picks, play defense, etc. What is the game now? That’s right, NOT FUN.

This won’t put a damper on the season though. I will take satisfaction in seeing this man make stupid mistake after stupid mistake. In case you were all wondering, the answer is yes, I did get Mark Teixieira.