Battle of the Fantasy Gods Expert League Draft: Rounds 8-15

I'll take Joe Nathan here and be happy with it. He has looked great early in spring training with a fastball in the low 90's that could increase as he continues to build his arm strength. Billy Wagner came back from Tommy John Surgery to have a dominant 2010 season. I don't see a reason the Nathan can't do the same.

I knew that there would be a run on mid-tier third basemen before long and at this point, knowing there would be 22 picks before I was up again, I had to go ahead and grab Mark Reynolds here. While I think both Casey McGehee and Michael Young are fine picks, Reynolds has the most upside of the group. I'm not counting on much AVG, obviously, but a healthy Reynolds should crack 35-40 homers, drive in 90-plus and steal a hand-full of bases. It's harder to find that type of power upside as the draft goes on.

This is the risky part about drafting so early in the spring. While Ozzie Guillen claims to favor Matt Thornton for the closer's role on the south side, nothing has been set in stone just yet. If he is named the closer, Thornton is certainly a top 10 pre-season closer. If not, I'll get the strikeouts and ERA/WHIP, but at a heavy cost. My money says he closes this year and my pick is justified.

I really do not like Grady Sizemore in this round. His knee injury could very likely bother him on and off all season -- or even for the rest of his career. A lot of his value came with the stolen bases, which don't occur so often if one is dealing with knee pain.

At this point I had only two starting pitchers, Jon Lester and Francisco Liriano. I like what I saw from Colby Lewis last season and think he has a chance to improve upon his 2010 2.9 BB/9 this season. Some may be deterred by the low .275 BABIP, but consider the fact that he allowed a low 17.2 percent line drive rate.

While I'm not going to tout Vladimir Guerrero as a single digit round pick, I'm more than happy to plug in his offensive numbers at a round 12 value. At this point in the draft, he doesn't need to hit .300 with 29 homers and 115 RBI to have value.

While there's nothing sexy about Vernon wells, the guy has been a good hitter when healthy. Leaving the Toronto turf behind him should help with that aspect of his game in 2011. As my third outfielder in a 14 team league, I'm fine with the pick.

The J.J. Hardy pick caught me off guard a bit here. Not so much because I think Hardy will have a bad year, but because of the round he went in.

I couldn't be happier to get Hanrahan, my third closer with pick 194 in the draft. He has the closer's role already, he has top-notch strikeout ability and improving control/command.

I was waiting for the right time to grab Mike Aviles and I fee lucky that he lasted this long. My team is in need of some help in the AVG department and I believe Aviles will provide that along with double digit home runs and steals. He might even gain third base eligibility sometime in April, which ill make him even more valuable.

Trevor Cahill lasted until pick 207. Goes to show what we all think of him this season.

I'll be going over rounds 16-22 tomorrow and then finishing up through round 28 in the following post.