What an MLB: The Show Fantasy Draft Can Do For You (Part II) - BenGerman's Blog

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What an MLB: The Show Fantasy Draft Can Do For You (Part II) Stuck

Posted on May 22, 2013 at 04:37 PM.

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Last week, I gave everyone some (hopefully) helpful hints and house rules for an MLB: The Show 2013 fantasy draft. In part one, the article was based entirely around a one user-controlled team fantasy draft. The benefits of just having control over one team include a much faster fantasy draft, absolutely no bias towards the other 29 teams, and a having to bring a certain strategy into the draft if you want to succeed.

However, my personal favorite is the 30 team user-controlled draft. Why? Not only does it give you the ability to really immerse you in your league, but it also balances out the drafting. You�ll have less mistakes from the CPU � such as Bryce Harper always falling to the fourth round, and A prospects lasting a little too long � as well as a much more balanced league. It�s time consuming, sure. But once you finish, there is nothing more gratifying than seeing your drafting skills at work, with each team having individual strengths and weaknesses.

I recently did two mock drafts, and then a third and final one today that I�ll be using for the purposes of the article. Here are some tips and house rules you that might make drafting a better experience.

- First things first: Decide whether or not you want to pick the team you will control before or after the draft. Personally, I picked my team in each of my drafts. This helped familiarize myself with one team specifically.

- Pick five teams to be pro-pitching, and five teams to be pro-hitting. The way I did this was based on ballpark (Padres/Petco = pro-pitching, Phillies/CBP = pro-hitting). Do this however you�d like, as you could just as easily have more teams focus on individual categories than just ten.

- HOUSE RULE #1: This might seem obvious, but never let yourself show any kind of bias towards your own team. I caught myself a few different times leaving a player I liked on the board just so I could draft him. In my final draft, if I ever came across a difficult decision, I�d just turn to a friend and ask their opinion.

- As with the one user-controlled draft, make sure to scout ahead for each team. Always know the next pick with each team as best as you possibly can.

- Remember to take budgets into account. You aren�t going to want to draft a Josh Hamilton or Joey Votto with the Padres or A�s. Try and go younger and cheaper with teams that have smaller budgets.

- Do your best to draft for need, but don�t feel bad about drafting a player for a team just based on talent or skill-level.

- Feel free to trade picks! I had a pen and paper next to me, and traded picks about fifteen different times. Sometimes, a player I wanted for a certain team could wait another ten picks, so I would trade down to a team that would be better off picking early.

- HOUSE RULE #2: Don�t stack talent onto one team, and vets onto another. This is something you have to be careful of, as it�s easy to overlook the age of players when you are drafting them.

- Do at least 30 rounds of the draft. It seems like a lot � and it is � but it�s all worth it once the draft is over. Each team will have an identity, and you will have had a hand in it.

- HOUSE RULE #3: Be patient! The one thing I noticed in my first mock draft was that it was easy to get restless. Take some breaks from the draft, and make sure your head is really in it.

I hope this helps those of you who were thinking about doing a fantasy draft, and deviating from the norm a little bit. Be sure to let me know some results if you have them.