YEAR 2000 INAUGURAL MILLENNIUM LEAGUE DRAFT

A little background to begin.  The Millennium League is a simulation baseball league using Dynasty League Online Baseball as its platform.  Dynasty League Baseball is from the designers of the classic baseball board game Pursue the Pennant.  This is the inaugural year of the league.  There are 24 teams in the league from all across the United States, with one team being managed from the UK.  The kicking off point is the year 2000.  All players are eligible to be drafted.  Teams draft 30 players per squad and keep 20 from year-to-year.  Draft is serpentine.  The Baltimore Stouts draft in the 11th spot, meaning in odd number rounds they have the 11th pick, and in even number rounds they select 14th.  Drafting began on Tuesday, May 27, 2014.  I will recap the individual rounds here.  For complete draft results, please visit the league draft page.

ROUND 1 RECAP

#1 Pick Overall

Top of the draft went pretty much as expected.  First four picks go Alex Rodriguez, Randy Johnson, Barry Bonds and Pedro Martinez.  Hard to argue with any of those.  First "surprise" came with the 10th pick when the Pittsburgh Crawfords selected Bernie Williams.  Obviously Bernie Williams is an excellent player, but his 2000 was nothing special, and he only has a couple more "good" years left in him.  To each his own I guess.

Another head scratcher was Mark McGwire by the St. Louis Sliders with the 22nd selection.  Home team pick maybe?  McGwire played in only 89 games in 2000 (albeit with a 1.229 OPS), then another 97 in 2001 before retiring.

2000 NL MVP

The best picks in my estimation were Vlad Guerrero by the Atlanta Stonecutters at 15, Chipper Jones at 18 by the Seattle Lightning, and Jeff Kent to the Arizona Apaches at pick 20.  Kent was MVP in 2000 and has a decided positional advantage at 2B among his peers in this draft.  Guerrero has an OPS above 1.0 for three of the next four years BEFORE winning the MVP award in 2004.  Chipper, coming off his MVP in 1999, has an OPS above 1.0 for four of the next nine years, only dropping below .900 once in that span.

It will be interesting to see how teams come back in round two.  If a team selected a pitcher in round one, will they try to load up their rotation in the second round with another?  Will a team select a couple bashers to stack their lineup?  We shall see.