Final Roster Cutdowns for 2009 CAG

In case you are new, CAG is the Chicago American Giants, which is my fantasy baseball team. The name is in tribute to the Negro league team of the same name. This followed another team that was named Royal Monarchs and now a third has popped up in the Black Sox. I think that is a nice gesture on our parts as these teams have never gotten their due in baseball history. This past week involved a flurry of CAG moves that hopefully will put us in a position to win. The front office did not hold back in draft picks or player considerations. Here is a summary of the recent moves:

• Traded Cliff Lee and Joakim Soria for Jose B Reyes – Acquiring a top SS is rare and to snag this top five overall player in a keeper league is rare. Keep in mind that a top roto player like Reyes is very different than in head to head. His value is a bit lower in this case compared to a consistent monster like Pujols. None the less, two top five overall players on one team is priceless. Add to this the fact that we gave up a player we had no intention of keeping in Lee, who was overpriced due to a most likely one shot banner year and Soria, who was tempting but also overpriced for a RP on a turd of a team. All that had to be accounted for was cap room to keep him at what is a high price of $38.
• Traded Brad Lidge for a third round pick – Dumping players you have no intention of keeping? Beyond priceless. With an expansion draft looming for two new teams, it helps to have decent players available when you do not need to keep them. This lure allows you to get something in arguing that the other expansion team may grab them. Our RP strategy is to always wait. Saves are not that important unless you have a Mr. Automatic and MLB teams are very volatile with this position. I ended up with Lidge, Soria and Capps last year and won the league. I made the mistake of keeping Putz in that mix, my only RP keeper last year. See the mistake in that strategy? Wasted cap money that I made up later in the year.
• Traded First round pick for Aramis Ramirez and a fourth round pick - My tenth pick overall was bumped to the fourth round for Ramirez. Always overlooked, ARam will be a top five, maybe top three 3B this year. By far the best player we could have gotten at the ten spot. But wait there is more! We did not just trade straight up. We just moved to the fourth round. This is a great trade.
• Traded Dice-K for Kevin Slowey and a fifth round pick - This was a tough one. I like Dice-K when he is on, but that is about 40% of the time. I probably would have kept him if I could not deal him, but I liked this deal. Slowey is probably on par with Pelfrey’s potential on our team, so he is not a boon, but I will take the chance at $6.

So what did we end up with? Here is the final tally. Remember we can keep between six to ten players with a cap of $200. I prefer to keep more. Why not? The players I get as extra picks at the end of the draft will never touch any of these. I ended up fielding an entire infield plus an outfielder and four pitchers.

• Ryan Braun OF $34 - No brainer. Last year I had qualms, but not anymore. I hate that he moved away from 3B, but so be it.
• Jose B Reyes SS $38 - Considering Drew was the best option I was looking at by draft position or keepers, I am very happy here even with the inconsistency. He has five tool potential in him waiting to be unleashed. The Mets should be much better this year and he needs to be in that mix.
• Aramis Ramirez $18 - $18 for a top five 3B. I consider this a fairly thin position in terms of consistent producers. ARam hits close to .300 with almost 100 RBI per year consistently. Scoreboard.
• Ryan Doumit C $3 - Doumit is up and coming and this is another thin position. I never count on much from C, so his potential is worth the gamble. Even when I had Mauer I was not happy. This position is like TE to me in fantasy.
• Ian Kinsler 2B $27 - Kinsler will finish the season as the top 2B. I just called it. Solid gold.
• Albert Pujols 1B $37 - Pujols rounds out the best infield in both real world and fantasy. He has one more year in him at least.
• Francisco Liriano SP $14 – I railed on him and then kept him. I guess with this thin start at SP, I need some spark.
• Kevin Slowey SP $6 - As said before, I am always willing to give upside a chance. It was either this or make room for “oh my ass hurts” Bedard. I will take Slowey.
• Josh Johnson SP $9 - More upside. When healthy this kid was ridiculous. He looked great in the wrap up last year so I am again giving him a shot.
• James Shields SP $14 - I have a man crush on this guy. He is the ace of that young staff and will be of mine as well. I see 15+ wins and 200+ Ks from Shields.

All this comes to exactly $200 for CAG. Couple with that two extra early round picks and you have a very solid start. CAG will be looking to repeat and feels that we maneuvered a great lineup in the keeper limitations to start off. What are your thoughts?

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