I drafted in the Main Event of the National Fantasy Baseball Championship yesterday, drafting live in Las Vegas at the Bellagio. I had the 12th pick in this 15-team league. For those of you unfamiliar with the NFBC, it's a series of high-stakes leagues that also tie in to an overall contest besides winning prizes in your individual league. There's no trading allowed, there are weekly free agent moves, and you have the ability to swap your hitters from active-to-reserve for the three weekend games beginning on Friday.

Another unique aspect of the NFBC is how we select our roster spots. We use a Kentucky Derby Style (KDS) selection system, where you have to list your preferences in order how you want to draft, and using a randomized drawing, their computer selects each draft slot using everyone's preferences. I drew the 12th slot, which was my 10th choice. The only slots I liked less were 13-15, and 5-6. In retrospect, I wish I listed 5-6 higher (though through the vagaries of KDS, I might not have gotten either of those spots).

Standard fantasy advice is to know the vagaries of your league, and custom your strategy to best exploit those structural vagaries and league tendencies. Of course, each individual league is a little different, especially if you have new players in your event, but over time some trends have become apparent. The big one that we've exhausted no small amount of bandwidth discussing is the push for elite starting pitching going early in every draft. Because elite starting pitching has gotten more reliable and the degree to which it stands apart has been magnified, not only have teams been more willing to take a starter early, many have pushed to acquire two aces. There are roughly 16-19 pitchers that qualify as aces in my mind, though they don't all perfectly fit into one tier. I break them as:

Tier 0: Clayton Kershaw
Tier 0A: Max Scherzer
Tier 1A: Gerrit Cole, Jake Arrieta, Chris Sale, Madison Bumgarner, Matt Harvey, Jacob deGrom, Stephen Strasburg, Jose Fernandez
Tier 1B: Zack Greinke, David Price, Chris Archer, Corey Kluber, Noah Syndergaard, Carlos Carrasco, Felix Hernandez, Dallas Keuchel

Within the tiers there's very little separation - well, for now, in draft terms, though obviously choosing correctly among them is a pretty big deal. But if I'm trying to take one from that tier, I'm happy with any of them.

The way most NFBC drafts have gone, Kershaw goes within the first four picks, Scherzer goes anywhere from 13-18, and then typically Tier 1A begins around 23-24, with most of 1A and 1B clearing out by the end of the 3rd round (pick 45). You'll notice that none of my first three picks (12, 19, 42) fit neatly into those buckets, especially if I want to either get Scherzer, a Tier 1A pitcher, or get two aces. The beauty of this format is that we know our draft position five days in advance, giving us time to map out a cogent strategy. I viewed three options for tackling the aces:

A) Push up Max Scherzer to the 12th pick overall, passing up an elite hitter such as Miguel Cabrera, Giancarlo Stanton, Jose Altuve or Mookie Betts.

B) Start the run of Tier 1A pitchers at 19 overall if Scherzer doesn't come back, being the first to decide on the third SP drafted, and missing out on a second of a dwindling tier of elite hitters. Frankly, I'm pretty agnostic on choosing from the elite 1A pitchers, though obviously someone has to decide.

C) Take what the draft gives me, without getting out of line with an early pick, take the best available Tier 1B pitcher (assuming the league agrees with me on the 1A pitchers - it's rare, but occasionally Strasburg falls back), and if a second 1B pitcher is available at 4.4 take him. Otherwise, there should still be a pretty darn good hitter, most likely an outfielder, available to me there. If I end up with a hitter, make sure to get a Tier 2 pitcher in the fifth and be willing to take an elite closer early.

Between the NFBC ADP's (Average Draft Position ranks) and various Mock Draft services, I had plenty of chances to mock out all three plans. I felt most comfortable with how my draft progressed by using Strategy C, which shouldn't be too surprising, as I was essentially taking the best available player in each of the first four rounds, rather than "catching up" from passing on said picks. Ultimately, that's the way I went, too. The full results from the draft are at the link below, followed by my picks:

Here's how my draft unfolded:

1.12 - Miguel Cabrera, 1B - Miggy was far-and-away my preference to fall to 12. Had Cabrera been taken earlier, instead of Anthony Rizzo or Giancarlo Stanton, I might have taken the plunge on my "Mad Max" strategy. Instead, Max Scherzer went at 1.15.
2.4 - George Springer, OF - I was one pick away from starting with my ideal setup, Miggy and Jose Altuve. Instead, this was a reasonable fallback to get a combination of power and speed.
3.12 - Chris Archer, SP - Archer was the 17th starting pitcher selected in the draft. My choice was between Archer, Felix Hernandez and Dallas Keuchel. I thought that there was a 50-50 shot I might get Keuchel in the fourth round.
4.4 - J.D. Martinez, OF - I was one stinking spot away from getting Keuchel, but Martinez is one heck of a consolation prize. I have Martinez rated in the top-25 overall, so this is a pretty good return on the 49th pick.

5.12 - Adam Wainwright, SP - Wainwright isn't in Tier 1 because of the lower strikeout rate, but I'm convinced that his arm remains strong and that I should get great ratios from him.

6.4 - Zach Britton, CL - I might have been happier with this pick than anyone else all draft. He was the sixth closer taken, and there was a pretty big run on closers afterward.

7.12 - Adrian Beltre, 3B - Third base drops off in a hurry, and I love the BA stability that Beltre provides.

8.4 - Adam Eaton, OF - I have some misgivings about this pick - there's a lot of OF's in this category that were available, including Michael Brantley, Jacoby Ellsbury and Kole Calhoun. I wanted to get speed, and I was worried some about Ellsbury's wrist injury, so I reversed my preference from one of my earlier drafts between Eaton and Ellsbury. Speed was pushed up in this draft - Ben Revere went in the sixth round, and both Billy Burns and Kevin Pillar went around the 8-9 turn.

9.12 - Huston Street, CL - I was hoping to get one of K-Rod, Papelbon or Ramos here, but this was a reasonable fallback. It was either Street or Drew Storen, and I opted for the job security.

10.4 - Brett Gardner, OF - Again, speed was a consideration, though Gardner doesn't run as frequently as he used to.

11.12 - Yu Darvish, P - Coming out of the break, I knew that I needed more starting pitching help, and while it would be nice to get more immediate help, I wanted to gamble on Darvish's upside because I'm lacking that second ace or second Tier 2 pitcher. I would have taken Jake Odorizzi or Hisashi Iwakuma this round had they not been drafted earlier in the round.

12.4 - D.J. LeMahieu, 2B - Good average, runs and stolen base potential atop the Rockies' lineup most of the time.

13.12 - Alex Gordon, OF - He's always there for me, and I'm not sure why. Part I.

14.4 - John Lackey, P - Part II.

15.12 - Francisco Cervelli, C - I made a point of not taking a catcher earlier, but the consequence of that is sometimes you miss your targets. Welington Castillo went three picks before me, and he would have been perfect. Cervelli is a decent fallback, even if he doesn't hit for the same average as last year.

16.4 - Marcus Semien, SS - I also tried not to push up middle infielders just for the sake of being middle infielders, and felt I timed it really well. Semien should provide double-digit homers and stolen bases, and is a decent bounceback BA candidate.

17.12 - Adam Lind, CR - Cromulent pick, nothing exciting here.

18.4 - Eddie Rosario, OF (UT) - Some fleas, but I like the stolen base potential. He's my sixth outfielder, so I will probably be slotting him in and out of the lineup depending on the Twins' schedule.

19.12 - Jose Berrios, SP - My second stash, perhaps one too many, but I couldn't pass up what I perceived to be good value.

20.4 - Adam Conley, SP - Conley's run started towards the end of last season, but it doesn't hurt that he's been clocked at 96 mph this spring.

21.12 - Kris Medlen, SP - Some risk, but plenty of upside if it works out too. I love the defense behind him.

22.4 - Dioner Navarro, C - One of the last catchers that I wanted as my C2. It was either Navarro or Jason Castro for me.

23.12 - Cory Spangenberg, MI - Wait on middle infielders, peeps. I'm very happy with this one, especially if Spangenberg sticks at the top of the order.

24.4 - Kyle Gibson, SP - Gibson took a nice step up last year, and I think that there's another level left in him.

25.12 - Yangervis Solarte, 1B/3B - I like the flexibility between the two positions, and the early spot in the Padres' batting order.

26.4 - Jon Niese, SP - Searage Magic! And he went five rounds after Juan Nicasio.

27.12 - Eduardo Escobar, SS/OF - More positional flexibility, it was either Escobar or Wilmer Flores.

28.4 - Rubby De La Rosa, SP - I'm not necessarily on De La Rosa, but a lot of smart people that I talk with (Chris Liss, Vlad Sedler to name two) are. I do like his velocity, if not his ballpark.

29.12 - Didi Gregorius, SS - Pure value-taking here - I liked what Gregorius did late, and because I waited to fill middle infield, I thought adding another made sense.

30.4 - Adam Warren, SP/RP - The last two years in the AL East he's had a sub-3.30 ERA and 1.16 or lower WHIP. I don't know how the Cubs will use him, but his skill set is going to play very well in the NL.

I've had a lot more success in the 12-team NFBC format than in the 15-team one, so take this with the appropriate grain of salt. Of all the Main Event teams that I've drafted, this is my favorite. It's more balanced than my earlier results, and strong in the average categories. I think that I avoided the killer average hitter that I've been so prone to selecting in the past (B.J. Upton, Chris Carter, come on down!).

Where am I weakest?

• I have only two closers, though I think both have great job security. Because it's so difficult to carry "stashed" players in the NFBC, I don't have either of their "handcuffs" on my roster, but hey, good luck finding the reliable handcuff to Street anyhow.
• I have two "stashed" players on my roster that won't be active on Opening Day in Darvish and Berrios. That limits some of my FAAB flexibility. I need at least one of them up by mid-May, and of course both of them to be worth the wait.
• I'm trying to get steals from a lot of sources, rather than having a guaranteed rabbit. That hopefully can be addressed on the waiver wire a little bit, however.

Naturally, the RotoWire Draft Tool on the iPad loves my team. As always, it better! It's using my projections! What do you think?