2011 All Sleeper Team

Sleepers are always the hot topic when it comes to fantasy sports. It must be something about the desire to outsmart your opponents and look like an expert. Either way, I will help you attain that feeling by choosing my top sleeper picks at every position. For the sake of the article I will go fairly deep with these sleepers and try to avoid the obvious picks. It takes the fun out of sleepers if you just pick the same ones as everyone else. Besides, if you are in a competitive league the obvious picks will be gone anyway.

C- John Buck- This is the guy to grab when it’s the last round of your draft and you realize you forgot to draft a catcher. The Mauers and Poseys of the world don’t come cheap, so if you miss out on one of them you’ll need to formulate a backup plan. Buck hit 20 homeruns last year, that’s not something you find often from the catcher position. It’s worth gambling that he does it again when the guy goes undrafted in many leagues.

1B- Brandon Belt- I thought this was going to be too obvious of a pick, but the fact that Belt is only owned in 10% of Yahoo leagues led me to pick him here. Belt probably won’t open the season with the big club for service time reasons, but should be there by the end of April. The 23-year-old rookie brings good power potential and should even kick in some stolen bases. The last Giants rookie to come up with some hype worked out pretty well, so it’s well worth trying out again.

2B- Ryan Theriot- Theriot got off to a great start last season, but faded hard as the season progressed. He’ll offer nothing in the power department, but the 20 steals are nice for a guy who is only owned in 22% of leagues and has dual 2B and SS eligibility. Much of his value hinges on his place in the batting order, though it seems Tony LaRussa is set to bat him leadoff, making him a solid value pick.

SS- Alcides Escobar- Can I just use Theriot for this spot too? No, that would be cheating. Many have pointed out how painfully shallow Shortstop is this season after the top two of Hanley Ramirez and Troy Tulowitzki. Much like catchers, many owners can quickly find themselves without a reliable option at short. If this happens to you, Escobar is a great example of the post-hype sleeper. Escobar was pumped up for his speed potential, but did little running while batting 8^th for the Brewers last season. The change of scenery to Kansas City and its lesser talent pool should lead to an easier route to the top of the lineup and a second chance at fantasy value.

3B- Mike Moustakas- As opposed to shortstop, third base is actually fairly rich with late game bargains. I went for one that only the more patient owners should go for (or those in keeper leagues). There hasn’t been much definitive news as to when the Royals will plan to start the Moustakas era, but it will be worth the wait. That is, unless he pulls an Alex Gordon and flops hard. Speaking of Gordon…

OF- Alex Gordon- Stop if you’ve heard this one before. It would be perfectly reasonable to refuse to be lured into owning Gordon again, we’ve been burned before. So what’s going to be different this time? Well, Gordon is having a great spring. Not into spring training stats? Well you can remember his superstar pedigree as a prospect and that he’s now entering his age 27 season, the age many players break out. Still not buying it? Then draft somebody else.

SP- Brandon McCarthy- More so than any other position, starting pitchers are analyzed mercilessly to find the best sleepers. As it is, you have to get deep to find any real sleepers in the starting pitching market. Jeremy Hellickson? Jordan Zimmerman? Taken long ago by anybody with a clue. That leads me to my deep pick, Brandon McCarthy. You may remember him from his days of hype when he was still with the White Sox. Years later McCarthy has struggled to make his mark in the majors. However, he has been officially named as the A’s fifth starter, and his new home stadium is very forgiving of pitchers. He has also displayed impeccable control this spring with a 20/1 K/BB ratio. Sometimes you have to take a chance to find the hidden gems.

RP- Don’t be stupid. Just don’t waste an early draft pick with an “elite” closer. This is what the waiver wire is for.

The Allure of Bars

People all around yet more alone than ever. Am I more than a piece of furniture, only there for the aesthetics? What are people to a bar but part of the scenery, just something you come to expect to see there. Only good until you siphon all of the precious, green fuel out of them. The cacophonous sound lead to an excuse not to think. Why else would we habitate such inhospitable places unless our brain functions were being intentionally inhibited? The alcohol only serves to speed up this consensual retardation.

              Given this lower form of mental existence, does it ever matter if she looks my way? Even simple eye contact might be enough to validate my right to exist. But she just looks straight through. The only eye contact you can expect is your own reflection, gleaming off the knife.

Mass Effect Review

The current generation of console gaming has seen no shortage of space shooters. Between Halo, Gears of War, Crysis and many others the market is saturated. So then what makes Mass Effect stand out from the competition?

One way it separates itself from the pack is the level of detail in the game. This applies to both the plot of the game and the technical aspects. The story revolves around the protagonist, Commander John Sheppard, chasing a rogue galactic official around the galaxy to protect the world as we know it. Not groundbreaking material in and of itself, but the level of detail in the characters and the dialogue is what can suck gamers into this game. Much of this is accomplished by the choices the player has in the dialogue. The player is sporadically given choices in Commander Sheppard’s dialogue. These choices sometimes just allow for further customization of the character of Sheppard, as they affect the “morality” of the character. For example, choosing to insult someone will raise your “Renegade” level while being more polite raises your “Paragon” level. This scale affects future dialogue and story choices. The various alien races also help immerse the player, as they are all unique and detailed in the appearance and speaking habits.

Speaking of the appearances of the characters, the game really does look fantastic. The character models all help to breathe life into the experience. Combined with the above average (especially be video game standards) voice acting it brings the game to life. Special notice should go out to Seth Green’s appearance as the pilot known as Joker.

While the game does look great, it unfortunately does not run great. The framerate drops throughout the game, causing it to lag and run slow at times. There are other random technical issues that can ruin the flow of the game, such as your character getting stuck in the environment, forcing the gamer to re-start the game. For a game that is so polished in other areas it really is surprising to see such rudimentary problems like these persist.

Then comes another problem, and unfortunately it’s a big one- the gameplay. Mass Effect plays like a blend between a third-person shooter with cover based strategy and an RPG. The characters level up to increase health and stats, and also feature character specific abilities and magics to use. The combat seems to be meant to incorporate all of these abilities, magic and character commands, but the temptation is great to just play it as a straight shooter. While there is some merit in combining these two genres, it ultimately just feels convoluted and ill-defined.

Despite that, the worst aspect of the gameplay is the vehicle portions of the game. The vehicle handling is among the worst in any modern game, as it feels like Sheppard had one too many drinks before his trip. The controls are herky jerky, and the weapons on the vehicle can be difficult to aim. This is another seemingly easy problem to fix, which makes it all the more frustrating to deal with.

These drawbacks are what keeps Mass Effect from entering the Halo and Gears of War tier of action games. Those games feature some of the tightest and fine-tuned gameplay experiences around. Mass Effect may have greater story-telling potential, but until it can fix its own problems it will never realize its true potential. Perhaps the sequel has fixed these problems.

Score: 7.5/10