Draft Strategy--Help

[polkaman]

Keepers

Thome
A-Rod (SS)
E. Chavez
Brian Giles
Manny
Vernon Wells

Mulder
Oswalt

14 team 5X5 roto league--pretty sophisticated owners
8 keepers per team so the top 112 players will be gone.
Guys like Pierre and Crawford will be kept and I think the top tier of closers will be kept, and probably the top 30 starting pitchers.

How do think I should set up my draft strategy as far as going after speed starting pitchers and closers.

[Arlo]

Speed might be tricky, given your keepers. If Kazuo Matsui is available, he might be a good option; otherwise, I'd try to pick up either speed at 2B or a speed-only OF such as Sanchez.

Closers will probably start going off the board fairly soon. If a great opportunity comes along, you should grab it, but as a game plan, I might plan on looking for lower-tier relievers such as Kolb and Graves and look for SPs first. How to play this probably depends on whether you have daily or weekly lineup changes, though, and on what the other owners are doing.

[Guest]

This is a very good team to start with in a large league.

I would skip any power players no matter how tempting.

I would draft some closers and then starting pitchers.

I would draft speed last and maybe look for a trade.