Feature: Latino Fantasy Baseball. Gary Sheffield Made Me Do This.

Latinos dominate professional baseball more than any other sport in America, so what would happen if there was an entire team made up of Latinos? For almost a decade, Machochip contributing editor Alex Ferreyra has been playing fantasy baseball and with this season threatening to blend in with the last, he’s adding a twist to make it more memorable–he’s only allowed to pick Latino players. He’ll chronicle the results for us here.
It all started with a single quote.

I called it years ago. What I called is that you’re going to see more black faces, but there ain’t no English going to be coming out. … [It's about] being able to tell [Latin players] what to do — being able to control them…

That’s baseball player Gary Sheffield in a GQ interview last year during a conversation about African-American players in Major League Baseball. His statements were released in the middle of the season, so by the time it ended, there was little left of the controversy. Why do I bring it up now?

Well, after playing fantasy sports for about nine years, I’ve seen it all. I’ve won leagues and I’ve ended up in last place; I’ve picked up sleepers who have gone on to have amazing years and I’ve gambled first round bets who ended up on the DL the first week of the season. I even paid for my dog’s adoption fees from my fantasy football winnings. To keep it interesting, I need a new piece of the puzzle. So when I happened to come across the quote again as I was thinking about this year’s draft, my mind hit upon an idea–If it’s supposedly so easy for real baseball GMs to deal with Latino players, what about fantasy GMs?
What if I drafted a fantasy baseball team strictly made up of Latino players?
Think about it, not in terms of race, but in terms of strategy as I did. Some people draft a bulk of their players from their favorite team. Is this any different? Could I win a highly competitive league—which I define as a league where no more than two of the 12 teams stop playing halfway through the season—using a drafting system so narrow that almost 70% of the players would be unavailable to me? “What?” my league commissioner asked me after I told him my plans in secrecy. “You can’t win doing that. Baseball’s about diversity and the purity of the game, not about race.” I guess he didn’t read the Sheffield interview.
The more I thought about it, I became convinced this strategy could only help me. First of all, one of my biggest weaknesses is adding and dropping players. A lot of players. It’s because of me that they instituted the three moves a week limit. So when a player starts to blow up, he automatically gets vetted through my system. Also, when I’m drafting, it will allow me to narrow my focus to the players I can pick up. When it’s the sixth round and I have to decide between Corey Hart or Francisco Rodriguez, the decision will be a lot easier.
Once I decided to do this, I realized I needed a sounding board to prepare for the draft. I couldn’t ask any of my league mates. Knowing them, if I spilled the beans about my experiment, they’d draft and hijack players so I’d have to trade for them at exorbitant prices. (Johan Santana for Alex Rios and David Ortiz, for example). So I went to the web searching for answers. Unfortunately, I could only come up with the usual draft kits I use every year.
To be fair, this was a pretty specific line of questions I had, so I went to fellow blogger and baseball writer Rob Iracane. He blogs over at Walk Off Walk, but most people know him as the Deadtern over at Deadspin. Rob has the three qualities I was looking for in a source—he knows his stuff, has no connection to my league and was willing to talk to me about baseball in terms of racial scope. Surprisingly, no matter what Obama (or Sheff) may tell us, people just aren’t ready to talk about race in the open, even as it relates to America’s pasttime. Luckily for me, Rob was. After a few back-and-forths, he was able to help me out with my draft strategies.

If you are drafting the outfield positions separately, grab Carlos Beltran early. He’s the only top ten centerfielder who happens to fit your Latino requirement. Second base is sparse as well but you should be able to grab Robinson Cano in later rounds.

With this nugget of information, I decided early to cop out on the idea. Ok, not exactly, but I did decide to allow one non-Latino onto my team. A sort of fantasy baseball Affirmative Action—because even the best-laid plans of fantasy baseball players can go awry. Just because I want Cano in the third round, doesn’t mean I’m going to get him there. So I will use this player as a negotiation tool. To make it fair, his stats will not be used on my team. If all the second basemen—a shallow pool of hitting talent to begin with, even without subtracting the Spanish surnames—start going, I can’t end up letting a .245 hitting middle infielder sink my team. I’m going to to trade for the right one. After that, Rob’s second piece of advice was to go after the Dominicans.

You could make a solid lineup with David Ortiz at first, Robbie Cano at second, Hanley Ramirez at short, Alex Rodriguez at third, Manny Ramirez in left field, Vladimir Guerrero in right field, and Pedro Martinez and Francisco Liriano as your pitchers. I can’t think of a centerfielder or a catcher but you catch my drift. Not the best fielding team but certainly a power-hitting team. Take that, Cuba!

Luckily, I’m not part of one of those nerdlinger teams that counts fielding percentages as a stat. I’m also not waiting for the next Cuban pitching phenom to accidentally “get lost” and defect during a pitching exhibition in Panama so I can pick him.
After talking to Rob, I had somewhat of a strategy pegged: Try to pick up Beltran early, (because nothing can be easy, my league decided to make the outfield positions separate—left, center and right—and not grouped), and err towards the side of the Dominicans. Oh, and don’t hit the racial panic button too early. Lord knows how fucked up things can get when that happens. So with that in mind, I sat down at my laptop, chips and beverage at my side and drafted “Sheff’s All Stars.”
C Bengie Molina
1B Carlos Guillén
2B Plácido Polanco
SS Hanley Ramírez
3B Adrián Béltre
CF Willy Taveras
LF Carlos Lee
RF Álex Ríos
UTIL Shane Victorino
UTIL Bobby Abreu
BN
Freddy Sánchez 2B
Evan Longoria 3B
Justin Morneau 1B
SP Carlos Zambrano
SP Pedro Martínez
SP Yovani Gallardo
RP Rafael Soriano
SP Oliver Pérez
SP Bronson Arroyo
SP Matt Garza
I was surprised to have Hanley Ramirez drop to fourth (where I picked), so I scooped him up right away. It kind of shifted my outlook because I thought I’d have Reyes and, thus, the stolen bases stat locked up. In any case, Beltran wasn’t there when the draft snaked back around, so I couldn’t have him anyway. I decided to go with power and speed, with Lee and Rios as my next picks. I think that my center fielder Willy Tavares will give me the steals, and my other players can pick up the slack with the bat (although Willy’s no slouch there either, playing for the Rockies at Coors). My panic button was hit when I saw that Justin Morneau was available in the fifth round when he’s 2nd/3rd round talent. Even though he’s a first baseman, and that position is bountiful, I couldn’t leave him out there for someone else. As much as I love social experimentation, I love winning, too. I think I made the right choice using my out there.
I may have waited too long for pitching, but in between first-rounder Johan Santana and my pick of Zambrano, there aren’t too many top-tier Latino pitchers. Given my pieces are solid, I think I can make a move for either Fausto Carmona or Francisco Liriano with Morneau as the bait. (Update: Yeah, I need to make this move sooner than later thanks to injuries to Zambrano and Martinez… thanks for nothing, jerks.)
Where do you think I’ll exceed expectations? Where do you think I’ll falter? I’d like to hear from you, so send me your emails. I’ll be back every Tuesday to fill you in on whether my experiment is turning out to be “berry berry good to me,” or just leaving me $100 poorer.