Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Long Term Proposition

OK, so you're 1/3 through the 2010 season and your team sucks.  Maybe you're in the group of us that after 50 games our team hasn't reached double-digit wins or just made it (I do mean "us"...my team in Beer League was a division winner in 2009 and has a whopping 12-39 record this season...17 GB).

While in a typical league, you might just cash out your time and wait for next season.  But - assuming that you plan to come back and give it another shot in 2011 (go "worst to first"!), why put effort into the rest of 2010?

The future.

First - you earn $30,000 per win for your team.  You can use that for contract extensions this season - or grabbing extra prospects if your cash is low - or saving for 2011 player salaries.

Second - First Round draft picks.  Take advantage of your bad record and high weekly transaction position to grab the top draft pick (or whatever one you want) in the recent MLB draft.  We'll probably add those players into the system for the Week 12 transactions.  If you were a bad team in 2009 paying attention, you might have just added Stephen Strasburg to your rotation if you grabbed him last summer.

Third - other callups throughout the season.  Perhaps your team wasn't celebrating Strasmas, but another highly-touted rookie made his debut on June 8.  Since he doesn't exist in the BWB system yet, we'll be adding him for the Week 11 transactions.  Pay attention throughout the season and you may grab some gems.  And even if you don't have the top weekly pick in your league, it can still be worth a try - maybe the worst teams in your league actually have checked out.

Grabbing these new players may end up paying off right away - or not for another year or two - or never at all.  But staying active when you have the advantage of pick position can set you up nicely down the road.

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