FAAB-a-geddon, FAAB-a-ganza, whatever you want to call it, has passed, and the results have been breathtaking. I was super aggressive in one of my leagues - only the Main Event in the NFBC. I'll do my best to explain my thinking with the results, and dispense with the preamble otherwise.
AL Tout Wars
This was a really disappointing set of results. I put in a $377 bid on Calhoun and a $173 bid on Lopez and didn't come close with either. Meanwhile, my Dawel Lugo bid wasn't all that efficient, winning $75-to-$33 over Rick Wolf and Glenn Colton. The critical miss was actually last week with Corbin Martin. It's really difficult to find a difference-making starting pitcher - easy to find guys making random starts, but hard to find someone that I'll want to own the rest of the season. I'm holding Matt Manning precisely for that reason.
As for Nick Ramirez, I'm just hoping to steal a win against the Mets later in the week.
NFBC Main Event
Ok, this is where it starts to get real:
This could be a pivotal week for my Main Event chances. I'm competitive within my league, hovering between third and fifth most often in the last couple of weeks, around 100 points in my 15-team league. That's also put me about 100th overall in the Main. But I have been a lot stronger in the pitching categories than the hitting categories, lacking in power recently. That's where Austin Riley comes in. He had 15 homers in Triple-A before his promotion, cut down significantly on his strikeouts, and is generally considered a strong prospect in a good hitting environment. Moreover, I've been starting two from the pool of Brandon Nimmo, Brian Anderson, Brandon Belt and Harrison Bader at an OF spot and my UT slot. He should come in as a pretty significant upgrade if I'm right. If he goes the route of Nate Lowe and Carter Kieboom, then I'm in trouble.
The other reason I decided to go big now, instead of waiting for Yordan Alvarez is that even if I held out this week, I wasn't guaranteed to get him. I had $595 in FAAB remaining before this period, putting me squarely in the middle of the pack. Had I not spent a dollar in FAAB this week, I still would have been behind 3-4 teams in FAAB budget. Meanwhile, I get Riley (and Nicky Lopez) at least one week earlier, perhaps more.
NFBC OC1
I had bids in on the top six players listed here, only to fall short with all of them. The good news here is that I have the second highest budget remaining in the league at $718, with the third place budget at $485. If Alvarez gets the call soon, there's a very good chance I get him. I'm also doing well in this league, so if there's a league where it's not that bad to get shut out, it's this one.
NFBC OC2
On the other hand, this RotoWire Online Championship team hasn't been very good, and in particular hasn't hit very well. So I really wanted to get two hitters from this bunch and did that with Calhoun and Rodgers - though if I had my druthers I would have preferred Riley and Calhoun. Still, this is what I could afford, but the bids weren't optimized very well.
TGFBI
These bids, on the other hand, were optimized pretty well. Yes, I got Mallex Smith after slagging his draft cost this spring. That may seem hypocritical, but I don't think that draft cost should always equal the FAAB equivalent. For one, in FAAB we're often pursuing exact needs instead of finding general value, and that strategy becomes more acute as the season progresses. Also, our inventory is far different - the opportunity cost of taking Mallex Smith in the top 10 rounds of a draft, or in some cases the top 100 picks of a draft, is far greater than marginal FAAB dollars.
This is the only place where I got both Smith and Martin in the FAAB process, though I have Corbin Martin in two keeper leagues and one first-come, first-serve league.
FSTA
I'm working on a longer piece specifically for this league, but the basic summary is that I only had 34% of my FAAB budget left because I bought Chris Paddack in the first FAAB run of the season, and I'm happy with that choice, but it left me short-handed when going after the current player pool. I had bids in for Riley/Calhoun/Rodgers/Lopez/Mercado, but they were "keep 'em honest" bids - and the league was honest. I'm short on saves, and Neshek got his second today against the Rockies - on the off chance that continues to be a thing, maybe I'll get a small windfall.
Mixed LABR
I'm also short on FAAB remaining here, without the benefit of getting Paddack. Nonetheless I'll soldier on, $1 at a time. I've got a couple of trade irons in the mix to address my team's shortcomings, but luckily I have a competitive team already.