Dynasty Baseball Rookie Pick 1.03

[CokeAndBacardi]

Who's your top-3 from last year's draft class? We play head-to-head and have standard 5x5 scoring. Our in season rosters consist of 25 MLB players and 10 MiLB players.

[TheOracle]

Zunino is an easy choice just due to the fact that he's close to the majors and positional scarcity. Buxton is a good bet to steal bases at the ML level and he'll almost definitely stick in CF, if your league has a CF spot. Some people are down on Correra, but I think he could be a 30+ HR 3B. I don't think he sticks at short, however.

The guy who jumps out at me, however, is Addison Russell, the Oakland shortstop. He has the tools to stay at SS, quick hands that should produce decent power at the next level, and a very sophisticated approach for a 19 year old.

I'd say:
1. Zunino
2. Russell
3. Correra
4. Buxton

Although if you wanted more of a sure major league guy, you could take Buxton. He will play ML CF and steal bases, at least. I just think Correra has higher upside.

EDIT: There's arguments to be made for Guasman and Zimmer as well, but I don't like them very much.

[CokeAndBacardi]

I have read good things about Zunino as well. However, I already have Salvador Perez and Jesus Montero on my MLB squad and Travis d"Arnaud on my MiLB roster.

Might as well post my squad (we can have up to 25 MLB and 10 MiLB players in season, keep as many or as few players as we want):
C - Perez
1B - Fielder
2B - Kipnis
3B - Moustakas
2B/SS - Josh Rutledge
1B/3B - Freddie Freeman
OF (5 slots) - J.Upton, Heyward, Cespedes, Rasmus, Brantley
UTIL (2 slots) - Jesus Monterno, Domonic Brown
MiLB - Anthony Rendon, Travis d'Arnaud, Javier Baez, Brett Jackson

SP (5-7 slots) - Price, Chapman, Medlen, Samardzija, Pineda, Beachy, Edwin Jackson, Martin Perez, Jacob Turner
RP - Casey Janssen, Carlos Marmol
MiLB - Hultzen, Taillon, Randall Delgado

My biggest pain points are near the back end of my OF/UTIL and towards the back end of my rotation. I feel like my IF and the top starters are more than fine.

I can obviously look at some top end prospects with the 3rd overall pick. I am also trying to get a feel for when guys who should be productive this year will go. Some of these in the FA pool who would be upgrades over guys like Brantley and Brown are De Aza, Andrelton Simmons, Adam Eaton, Sergio Romo, Kyuji Fujikawa, Alex Cobb, etc.. Obviously the upside isn't up there like with the type of prospect I can get with my 2nd pick (15 overall).

It's just very tempting to take a sure-thing starter today rather than wait 4 years on a guy who might be the next Buster Posey or the next Average Joe.

[IHaveAZombiePlan]

This site has IMO a pretty decent ranking of prospects. They did an article where they broke their top 100 prospects down by ETA in the bigs. Can check it out: http://www.deepleagues.com/2013/01/18/top-100-eta/.

Also Aaron Hicks is tearing up Spring Break and looks like he might lock down the CF job. Could take a look at him.

[CokeAndBacardi]

An update in case this helps anyone else...

My keeper deadline is tomorrow (3/20). We can have as many MLB/MiLB players as we want but have to be at 25 MLB and 10 or fewer MiLB by opening day (draft is 3/24). There are 12 teams in the league.

I am planning on keeping all of my batters: Salvador Perez, Fielder, Kipnis, Moustakas, Starlin Castro, Rutledge, Freeman, J.Upton, Heyward, Cespedes, Rasmus, Brantley, Jesus Montero, D.Brown, Rendon, d'Arnaud, Brett Jackson, Gary Brown, Javier Baez

I am planning on keeping the following pitchers: David Price, Chapman, Samardzija, E.Jackson, Medlen, Casey Janssen, Marmol, Pineda (immediately to DL), Beachy (immediately to DL), Hultzen, Taillon, R.Delgado

Drops: Jacob Turner, Martin Perez, Chris Tillman, Nate Eovaldi

With the third overall rookie/FA pick I plan on drafting my highest rate guy out of Buxton, Correa and Russell.

From there on (picks 15, 27 and 39) my plan is to either drop high upside prospects who fall or snag some FA's who can contribute soon.

Some of the top ADP guys this year: Teixeira (strangely dropped yesterday...), De Aza, Frazier, Simmons, Eaton, Lowrie, Gyorko, Beckham, Ludwick, Sergio Romo, Madson, Grilli, Rondon, Pettitte, McCarthy, Cobb, Estrada, Porcello, Fujikawa

Feel free to drop any other advice that might help. I feel pretty confident with my plan but am always open to new ideas. This is my first rookie draft for baseball and I have struggled figuring out the balance between 2015/16 prospects and guys who will improve my 2013 lineup.

[TheOracle]

I wouldn't drop Tillman if you could avoid it.

[CokeAndBacardi]

I wouldn't drop Tillman if you could avoid it.

When I posted that update, I was only planning on dropping a few guys and thought I could do much better than Tillman with my 3rd/4th round rookie/FA picks. I just made a blockbuster 4-for-1 trade and will now be keeping Tillman since he is obviously worth more than a 7th/8th round rookie/FA pick.

The deal was this:

I got: Giancarlo Stanton
I gave: David Price, Jameson Taillon, Danny Hultzen, Josh Rutledge

I don't think that was too much to pay for the best power hitter in all of baseball at 23. Of course Taillon and Hultzen could turn out to be studs but that's a risk I am willing to take. We have 5 OF slots and mine are now Stanton, Justin Upton, Heyward, Cespedes and Rasmus/Brantley.

[CokeAndBacardi]

So the top two guys went with MLB free agents. That has been a trend so far. I opted to go with Jose Fernandez with the first pick and Addison Russell fell to me at 15. I also took Albert Almora at 27.

Here's the draft so far (I'm up again in 4-5 picks):

"Player (First, Last, Position, Team)"
"Todd Frazier, 1B/3B, Reds"
"Sergio Romo, RP, Giants"
"Jose Fernandez, SP, Marlins"
"Jackie Bradley Jr., OF, Red Sox"
"Jedd Gyorko, 2B, Padres"
"Mike Zunino, C, Mariners"
"Byron Buxton, OF, Twins"
"Jason Grilli, P, Pirates"
"Carlos Correa, SS, Astros"
"Yasiel Puig, OF, Dodgers"
"Mark Teixeira, 1B, Yankees"
"Jorge Soler, OF, Cubs"
"Alexei Ramirez, SS, White Sox"
"Yonder Alonso, 1B, Padres"
"Addison Russell, SS, A's"
"Tommy Milone, P, Athletics"
"Dayan Viciedo, OF, White Sox"

"Josh Beckett, P, Dodgers"
"Alejandro De Aza, OF, White Sox"
"Kyle Zimmer, P, Royals"
"Bobby Parnell, P, Mets"
"Andrelton Simmons, SS, Braves"
"Alen Hanson, SS, Pirates"
"Zack Cosart, SS, Reds"
"Michael Cuddyer, OF, Rock Cats"
"Albert Almora, OF, Cubs"
"Brandon McCarthy, P, DBacks"
"Alex Cobb, P, Rays"

"Marco Scuturo, SS, Giants"
Justin Ruggiano
"Oswaldo Arcia, OF, Twins"