New to CBS H2H League: Strategy Advice?

[Redlegs]

Hi, please help with any advice if you have experience with the CBS H2H leagues.

I'm in a 10 team redraft league drafting this Saturday.

The categories are more detailed than what I'm used to in Yahoo. Also on CBS the team getting the most overall points gets one win for that week, where in yahoo i'm used to having a record that accounts for winning/losing in each stat, i.e. a 5-5 record for a week in which you won five categories and lost five categories.

Also, I joined a league with weekly roster moves, not daily, so teams can't add/drop pitchers all the time, which I'd prefer they didn't.

I'll post the roster restrictions and stats:

Roster Restrictions - Head to Head Leagues
Position Weekly
Lineup
Catcher (C) 1
First Basemen (1B) 1
Second Basemen (2B) 1
Third Basemen (3B) 1
Shortstops (SS) 1
Outfielders (OF) 3
Utility (U) 1
Starting Pitchers (SP) 5
Relief Pitchers (RP) 2
Bench 5

Scoring Categories
Batting Category Point Value
Single 1 point
Double 2 points
Triple 3 points
Home Run 4 points
RBI 1 point
Run 1 point
Base on Balls 1 point
Stolen Base 2 points
Strikeout -.5 point
Caught Stealing -1 point
Hit by Pitch 1 point

Pitching Category Point Value
Win 7 points
Save 5 points
Shutout 5 points
Strikeout 1 point
Base on Balls -1 point
Inning Pitched 3 points
Hits Allowed -1 point
Earned Runs -2 points
Blown Save -2 points
Loss -5 points

My strategy as of now is to focus on offense, particularly power hitters that don't strike out too much. For pitching, I'm going to wait after my offense is established, and get maybe 1-2 pitchers out of the first ten picks. I see some good value pitchers in the middle rounds and will focus on the ones with good k's and decent whips and eras.

Some specific questions/comments:

What do I make of speed guys on offense? The speed guys i'm interested in also have good pop, so i won't be focusing on one dimensional speed guys. looks to me speed isn't particularly rewarded in this scoring system. 2pts per sb and 3 for triples but triples don't happen often. The power guys score roughly as many runs, so that's a wash.

Also, it looks like closers are not much of a commodity as you can only start 2. I think i'll draft two good ones with a decent third also for the bench in case he has more games that week or better matchups.

I also have to consider guys that walk a lot as walks are a point apiece, but I'm well aware that a lot of players who walk alot also strike out alot like Dunn for example.

So if anyone has some experience with this scoring system, I'd much appreciate some advice. Thanks in advance

[HasteTheDay]

I'v played CBS H2H for the past 6-7 yrs. It's ridiculously easy if you know what you're doing.

They're constantly changing the settings from year to you, this season the most though.

Guys who steal, and don't K all too ofter are pretty valuable.

1B hit. - 1pt
SB - 2pt
Run - 1pt

If you can just achieve that alone, that's 28 pts for a 7 game week. Which is very good for whichever position. Note, that's just a minimum. A guy like Ichiro who will go 3-4 on a given day with a bag or 2, maybe an RBI or so, and you have an extremely productive game. I'd much rather have that type player than a Dunn who will go 1-4 HR/3Ks for 4.5 pts.

Last year there was no point deduction for K's. Which made ANY guy who hit bombs a great asset. Now those good days, can turn to mediocre/bad days more than not. Especially since there are weekly rosters, and not daily. You'll have to play your HR/K player no matter who he faces, which will rarely result into a week over 30 pts.

2 start, inning eating, high K guys are absolute GOLD. Lincecum will hit a few weeks with 50-65pts. Which is just completely absurd. Pending on your style, seeing Johan, Lincecum, CC go 1-2-3 off the board, isn't too bizarre are all.

They're making you grab, and start 2 RP's each week, so i'm DEFINITELY waiting to the latter rounds to pick up a couple middle of the road guys. Let the other fools go after Papelbon/Nathan/Mariano/F-Rod/ect in the early-middle rounds.


Just keep in mind how streaky hitters are. You're 1st round hitter will net you 10-15 points a few weeks out of the year, then explode for 30-40. Every 3-4 weeks when a top 5 SP gets his 2 starts, he's going to give you a shot to win right off the bat. If one of those SP's fall to you, I highly suggest you take it. For when you get caught in the cross fire and end up going AGAINST a Halladay/Webb/Hamels/Santanta/Linecum/ect, you'll wish you would of when you fight out those guys are capable of making up close to 1/4-1/5 of a score sometimes.


Good luck on your new venture. It's a lot of fun!

[Redlegs]

Haste, thanks a ton for the advice.

Wow, not the style i've been used to, no wonder cc and johan go at the end of the first and top of second round in the mock drafts, and speed guys being alot more valuable is different to me too.

i'll adjust my drafting strategy accordingly. the league is full so i find out my draft position as early as thursday according to the regulations.

thanks again, i'm going to get an ace in the first few rounds and make sure i get some good speed guys.

Much appreciated.!

[Redlegs]

any more responses are appreciated, i'll help where i can in response.

thanks again in advance.

[mtxdevil]

Sort of off topic... I can't for the life of my find where to change my league's draft time. Am I blind?

[hot4tx]

I would setup a spreadsheet with all of your projections on it and then have a column that calculates projected points based on your scoring. Do some positional rankings using the projected points, then use these positional rankings to alter your overall rankings. For example if you project one 3B to score 40 more points then another 3B he should definitely be ranked ahead of the 2nd guy (assuming all things equal, age, potential, etc), even if conventional 5x5 or scoring leagues rank the 2nd guy higher. I'd draft based on both the altered overall rankings and the positional rankings.

As an overall strategy I agree with focusing on hitters early. That doesn't mean you can't take a SP or even a RP if they fall far enough to be good value, but focus on hitters. Next I'd try to get 1-2 solid SP and 2-3 solid RPs. Don't draft all of your SPs and wait for endgame RPs. Assuming this is weekly change league, you can end up with a small rotation of "keeper" SPs and the rest of them you can add/drop weekly looking at matchups and 2-start pitchers. The more bench spaces you have for SPs the better, as you can't plug in backup hitters when your hitter has a day off, so you won't get much use out of them.

You will have to look ahead to the next week to pick up the good matchups and 2-starts and if others in your league employ the same strategy you may have to look two weeks ahead to grab the best 2-start pitchers.

Lastly if you get some SP/RPs that are starters yet you can slot into your RP slot they can be pretty valuable when they have 2 starts that week.