2024 Fantasy Baseball Mock Draft Head-to-Head (H2H) points: Results for the Podcast Listeners League

The Podcast Listeners League, a 12-team Head-to-Head points contest in which Frank Stampfl, Chris Towers and I compete against nine dedicated listeners, is now in its 15th year. And during that time, I've come to learn what it's like to draft against people who hang on your every word. In short, I don't expect to get the players I normally get.

Sure enough, with draft season winding down, I've finally gotten my first share of Kyle Tucker, Trea Turner, Zac Gallen, Aaron Nola, Zach Eflin, Matt McLain, William Contreras, Steven Kwan, Jung-Hoo Lee and, to my great relief, Wyatt Langford (more on him in a bit).

But more important than the actual players, probably, is the build -- i.e., whether I optimized my roster for the format in question. Certainly, that was the justification for the Kwan and Lee picks, both being players whose low strikeout rates do them a great service in this format. To some degree, it was the basis for the Contreras pick as well. Normally, I wait until late to draft a catcher in one-catcher leagues, believing there's upward of 15 who make for quality starting options this year. But when the second-best last year, offering the sort of volume advantage that makes all the difference in this format, lasts beyond Pick 100, it's too big of a gift to pass up.

And that's especially because the lineups are so small. My biggest goal in my Head-to-Head points leagues each year, at least the ones set up according to CBS defaults, is maximize the impact of each of my nine hitter spots. There are only nine, after all, which means every team will have a good player at each spot. You need to key in on the few great ones that can actually set your team apart in a Head-to-Head matchup. It's why I made a point to draft hitters until the separation between hitters became less obvious, which happened at about the Round 4-5 range.

I've been the champion for five of this league's 14 years of existence and will look to defend my title in 2024. Here's who I'll be facing (I've included each person's team name since that's what's listed in the results):

1) Nathan McColloch, To the Winn-dow, to the Wall-ker
2) Ethan Kearns, Strat O'matic Relaxation
3) Zach Hrynowski, The Dirt Dogs of the District
4) Penn Elletson, Pine Tar Incident
5) Chris Towers, My Morning Jack Flaherty (@CTowersCBS)
6) Joey Garibaldi, Sweet Sweet Fantasy Baseball
7) Scott White, White Noise (@CBSScottWhite)
8) Matthew Barile, Gelof my Alonso
9) Aaron Marcus, Petit Fromage
10) Frank Stampfl, BACK TO BUSCH (@Roto_Frank)
11) Craig Gaynier, I'm Just Craig
12) Geoff Rice, Big Beefy Baseball Boys

And here are a few more of my observations from the draft:

• I indeed selected Langford ... at Pick 79, which is about the earliest I would have considered him. You've probably heard me say I'd take Jackson Chourio (who went 10 picks later) ahead of him, but it's a closer call in points leagues, where Langford's potential for walks is more valuable and Chourio's potential for steals is less valuable. It was just as much a diversification pick, though. I have several shares of Chourio already. I had none of Langford until now.
• Drafting Langford 79th is an aggressive move, but I'm generally in favor of taking big swings for high-upside players in shallow leagues like this one, where you can backfill off the waiver wire easily enough if things don't go as planned. Incidentally, that's also my rationale for taking Gerrit Cole at Pick 127, which is about 25 spots higher than I rank him. Rankings aren't one-size-fits-all, and in certain league contexts, the gamble is easier to justify. My hope is that Cole returns from his elbow injury by June.
• I like my team, but I love Nathan McColloch's team (and not just for its name, To the Winn-dow, the the Wall-ker). He already had a big advantage with Ronald Acuna at the start of the draft and then did a great job maximizing the value of each pick while keying in on players well suited for the format (Yandy Diaz, Mitch Keller and Brandon Nimmo stand out). Tough competition there.
• Non-industry folks are less likely to stick to the script, reaching for the players they want most when they feel like someone is on the verge of doing the same. And look, I think there's merit to that in a shallower league, where the penalty for a miss is minimal due to the quality of the alternatives on the waiver wire. In fact, you might say I did it myself with the Langford pick. But just so you have a better idea what to expect in your own draft, I'll note that Bryan Reynolds (Pick 45), Evan Carter (54), Yu Darvish (69), Luis Arraez (78), J.P. Crawford (100) and Jeimer Candelario all went much earlier than we normally see them go. There are probably more examples, but those stood out most to me from the early rounds.
• Two late risers in my starting pitcher rankings based on how good they've looked this spring are Gavin Stone and Jack Flaherty. The one time I was sniped in this draft was for Stone in Round 16 (Pick 185), so I made sure the same didn't happen with Flaherty, drafting him 223rd in Round 19. And it's a good thing I did, because ...
• Boy did we hit starting pitcher hard. I devoted each of my five bench spots to it, wanting to maximize my chances for two-start weeks and favorable matchups during the season, and I guess I wasn't alone. It's why names like Griffin Canning, J.P. France, Louie Varland, Clarke Schmidt and Matt Manning came off the board in the last couple rounds of this purportedly "shallow" league.