We Have Winners! Derek VanRiper Takes Tout Wars Mixed Auction

Derek VanRiper is now a three-time champion in Tout Wars Mixed Auction, previously winning in 2014 and 2020. He was in second place at the All Star Break, trailing Scott Engel, but broke away from the pack in the second half, benefitting from trades that landed him Shohei Ohtani (pitcher), Gerrit Cole, and Framber Valdez. He traded away Aaron Judge, Paul Goldschmidt, and Alex Bregman!

Two Days, Four Auctions! Tout Wars Weekend is complete.

Check out the Draft Sheets here:

Tout Wars AL (Draft Sheet: Click here)

Mike Podhorzer writes about his auction.

Jason Collette on his auction.

Ryan Bloomfield’s review of his AL team is here.

Patrick Davitt and Doug Dennis talked at length about Tout AL and Doug’s weird strategy on the BaseballHQ Radio pod.

Patrick Davitt pivots to his own team at baseballhq.com ($)

Tout Wars Mixed Auction (Draft Sheet: Click here).

Alex Chamberlain’s recap.

Eric Karabell wrote about the auction for ESPN+($).

Scott Pianowski’s piece is here.

Scott Engel on his draft is here.

Zach Steinhorn’s draft review can be found here.

Scott Swanay’s team review is here.

Tout Wars NL (Draft Sheet: Click here)

Tristan Cockcroft wrote about his auction for ESPN+($).

Grey Albright hates his team enough to like it.

Tout Wars Head to Head (Draft Sheet: Click here)

Dan Strafford’s pod is here.

Ariel Cohen and Chris Welsh talk about the auction on The Beat the Shift podcast.

Todd Zola and Clay Link talk about Clay’s auction.

The more traditional spreadsheets are linked to in the sidebar later now.

Tout Wars Weekend is Coming! Here’s how to follow all the drafts.

For the third year in a row the Touts are gathering for a virtual Tout Weekend. No party at Foleys, no hanging out at the Stewart Hotel and SiriusXM talking baseball with friends. No intense, fast-paced in-person auctions led by savvy auctioneers pushing the pace ever forward.

For the third year in a row the Touts will be gathering in a draft room at Fantrax, some of them connected on a Zoom call, putting their teams together from the four corners of the US, from Florida to Hawaii, from Maine to the Columbia Valley. Here’s how you can follow along (note that the moderator will need to admit you to the public Zoom Rooms, which might take a moment):

Tout Wars AL (Saturday March 19, 2022 10 AM ET)

Radio broadcast on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports
Public Zoom Room can be accessed at 896 5031 8894, hosted by Tim McLeod and Eric Cross.
Draft Sheet: Click here

Tout Wars Mixed Auction (Saturday March 19, 2022 4 PM ET)

Radio broadcast on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports (The Lawr Michaels Zen and Now Award winner will be announced on SiriusXM in the 15 minute block before the auction starts)
Public Zoom Room can be accessed at 864 7710 5666, hosted by Clay Link.
Draft Sheet: Click here

Tout Wars NL (Sunday March 20, 2022 10 AM ET)

Radio broadcast on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports
Public Zoom Room can be accessed at 895 0366 4657, hosted by Derek VanRiper.
Draft Sheet: Click here

Tout Wars Head to Head (Sunday March 20, 2022 4 PM ET)

Radio broadcast on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports
Public Zoom Room can be accessed at 853 3504 2173, hosted by Adam Howe and Shelly Verougstraete.
Draft Sheet: Click here

This Year’s Touts!

With one exception, this year’s Tout Wars leagues are filled. See who’s playing who on the Touts 2022 page.

This year’s Tout Wars Draft and Hold league kicks off on March 1st. We’ll have a link to monitor the slow draft once we begin.

Tout Wars Draft 12 league also kicks off on March 1st, starting at noon, covered by the Rotowire show with Jeff Erickson and Todd Zola on SiriusXM fantasy sports radio.

Tout Wars Draft 15 league will take place on March 8 at 8pm, covered by Colton and the Wolfman on SiriusXM.

This year’s live auctions, on Tout Wars weekend, will be remote again, alas. They take place on March 19 (AL at 10am, Mixed Auction at 3pm) and 20 (NL at 10am and H2H at 3pm). More details the week before Tout Weekend.

Some other announcements:

Head to Head will again play by CBS Sports H2H Points scoring system, as selected by 2021 winner Frank Stampfl. Unsurprising if you know who Frank works for.

To address the mess of major league free agents because of the lockout, who may or may not have signed by draft day in the AL-only and NL-only leagues, the Touts in those leagues may roster anyone on a major league roster of their respective league, as usual. But in 2022, while they may also draft free agents, any free agents who then go on to sign in the other league may be kept active accumulating stats even as they play. In prior years those players would have had to be released. While the extra talent is going to dilute the draft day pool if the labor issues aren’t solved soon, allowing the stats of the talent acquired to accumulate seemed the fairest way to deal with the issue for all involved.

Finally, this year Tout Wars is acknowledging that for a variety of reasons, some temporary and some permanent, some Touts need partners. We’re now accepting proposals from Touts in some cases, if there is a good reason and both partners meet Tout Wars’ eligibility standards. In the future you’re likely to see more partnered teams than just Colton and the Wolfman in Tout AL. Once we go back to live events, however, with the grandfathered exception of the Colton/Wolf team, only one of the partners will be allowed to sit at the table during the auction.

The Touts: In their own write (or radio, or podcast)

Each year we publish links to the Touts writings and ruminations about what happened in the season that just ended. Here they are for 2021:

Draft and Hold: Michael Stein |

NL: Fred Zinkie | Phil Hertz |

Mixed Auction: Zach Steinhorn |

Head to Head: Frank Stampfl |

Tout Wars Mixed Auction 2020 Champion, Derek VanRiper

On August 23rd Derek VanRiper was 1.5 points behind Bret Sayre in the Tout Mixed Auction standings. One week later, despite having only the second best record on the week, DVR was in first by 15.5 over Eric Karabell. With a month left to go VanRiper was in the driver seat.

Tout Mixed Auction chat and draft board links here.

Follow the draft grid here. The reserve rounds are on this Google Sheet.

SiriusXM is covering it on Channel 619.

And what follows is a transcript of the chat with Jason Collette.

[Mar 14, 2:50 PM] JasonCollette: I think it’s all set — back in my hotel now
[Mar 14, 3:02 PM] JasonCollette: Joel……are you ready?
[Mar 14, 3:03 PM] JasonCollette: I SAID, ARE YOU READY????!!!!!!!
[Mar 14, 3:04 PM] DVR: LOL
[Mar 14, 3:04 PM] DVR: I got my five minutes of backwards walking in, I’m ready!
[Mar 14, 3:05 PM] rotoman: Doesn’t look like Joel’s ready!
[Mar 14, 3:05 PM] JasonCollette: Peter — do I need admin access or anything or just chat in here?
[Mar 14, 3:05 PM] DVR: Counting on you, Joel!
[Mar 14, 3:05 PM] rotoman: You can just chat and that works fine for chatting.
[Mar 14, 3:06 PM] JasonCollette: but what if I want to block DVR?
[Mar 14, 3:06 PM] JasonCollette: I mean, that guy annoys me
[Mar 14, 3:06 PM] JasonCollette: wait – is this not private? Shit
[Mar 14, 3:06 PM] JasonCollette: 🙂

Continue reading “Tout Mixed Auction chat and draft board links here.”

End Of Season Round Ups: The Touts Describe What Happened

TOUT MIXED AUCTION: Sayre | Hershey | Flowers | Steinhorn | Zimmerman | Melchior |

TOUT AL: Davitt |

TOUT NL: Hertz |

BaseballHQ did a five part series featuring Brent Hershey, Patrick Davitt, and Phil Hertz in the final weeks of their respective (Mixed Auc, AL, NL). Read them here. Part one | two | three | four | five.

TOUT MIXED DRAFT: White | Short |