This will be my first year trying out fantasy baseball. I have played Fantasy Football for around 5 years now. I watch Baseball, and know a good deal about it, although I havent ever did a draft or even played fantasy, so going to give it a shot.
where the best place to play for free? That is actuallycompetitive? I heard ESPN and MLB are both decent. But anything else would be great!.. also any advice on drafting order? I heard to get a 1B or SS (heavy hitter) first, or opt for a Catcher this year (2012) since they arent as deep.
yahoo is a good place to start, espn is good. if you want a competitive league you might try joining an existing league that someone has an opening where 1 owner isn't coming back. the biggest problems with the popular sites is many owners will draft 15 teams then abandon most. teams and leagues are always been advertised, look around and find a good league. do a couple mock drafts before the real thing. Your catcher advice was incorrect. there will be plenty of draft guides and info on who should get drafted where coming out in the next month.
Try googling free fantasy baseball and you'll find plenty of sites out there. My best advice is to look at a lot of information. Don't get cought up in following the cheat sheet of the first magazine you buy or the first website you visit. Every place you visit will tell you different information. Basically i try to get an overview and go from there. It is helpful to have tier system when drafting. The first few rounds i plan to draft the best player available while not doubling up at a position, but sometimes a player will fall further than he should. Dont be afraid to take him. If you have a glut of talent at one position, there is usually someone out there who is weak at that same one. Position scarcity comes into play and this is where a tier system can come in handy. Lets say you need a 2B and a SS. If there are multiple players in the top remaining tier at 2B and only 1 at 3B(in the same tier), take the 3B. A 2B could still be there at your next pick. Mock drafts are a good place to get a feel of how the drafting procedure works. Hope this is some help.
fast dogs wrote:yahoo is a good place to start, espn is good. if you want a competitive league you might try joining an existing league that someone has an opening where 1 owner isn't coming back. the biggest problems with the popular sites is many owners will draft 15 teams then abandon most. teams and leagues are always been advertised, look around and find a good league. do a couple mock drafts before the real thing. Your catcher advice was incorrect. there will be plenty of draft guides and info on who should get drafted where coming out in the next month.
I agree. Keep your eyes open in the classified section for an existing league with standard settings (5x5) to give yourself a good introduction.
I would make sure that the draft is in later to mid march. Yahoo runs mock drafts all day once they open up. It will give you some practice and a chance to get familiar with the draft software (assuming that your league will be run there). Also frequent the Leftover forum. There will be a lot of good talk and tips there.
Yahoo public leagues can be fun, but they often are abandoned by owners by the all star break.
The classified section here is a great resource. If are serious about sticking with a league, try to find a league that is established and is looking for a couple of owners to fill itself up for the year.
"I do not think baseball of today is any better than it was 30 years ago... I still think Radbourne is the greatest of the pitchers." John Sullivan 1914-Old athletes never change.
I think ESPN is the best, by far. But this topic brings out strong opinions in some, so don't be surprised if others vehemently disagree with me.
I agree with the other posters here who have said that you should look on the bulletin boards here on the Cafe for a previously established league that is looking for one more owner. Just joining the public leagues with 9-15 other random people is a waste of time, as most will abandon the league within a month or two.
ESPN and Yahoo are both good, and each has features I like. For a new player, I think the match-up ratings feature on Yahoo would be really helpful, so maybe lean that way if you get to pick. Essentially, yahoo rates the matchup for all pitchers and hitters every day, out of five stars. Obviously it's not always spot on, but I found it really helpful in my first year because they're looking at factors I never would have considered.
Anyone interested in starting a new league for seasoned beginners on MLB you can do a paid league and split 12 ways would be about $15 each, which give you free access to Gameday Audio. Anyone interested, post back and we can figure it out.
I would say stick with Yahoo! Thats where I started and its always been easy to use and a pretty good layout. As for your first time stick with a Rotisserie league and 5X5 along with 10-12 teams and not too many positions so the player pool wont have to be that deep.
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by Koontzy » Wed Jan 11, 2012 1:53 am 
