The final 2009 bid limits that were posted for this player:
AP 4x4: $29 MF 5x5: $29 PK mixed: $30

Very felicitous, Alex. Tom Kephart of Baseball HQ grabbed Rios, and he was one of my toughest competitors for a good half of the season before I started pulling away in late July/early August.

A felicitous glitch, wouldn't you say, Mike?

I've finally gotten around to working out this year's formulas; the 2008 formula applied to the 2009 stats, which we will continue to use until Colin puts the new one in, actually overpays Rios by $2. Because there was a little bit more hitting and quite a bit more running in the AL this year.

He's got a decent chunk of change remaining on his deal. A lot of his value is wrapped up in centerfield defense. He's only 10-20% more productive than the average hitter. And, even adding his baserunning, that's not so good for RF. He's pushed out of CF for Vernon Wells in TOR. That means he's worth more in CHI. Plus, Nobody would take Wells' terrible deal.

Can Lind and Snider play the OF credibly next year? Or will the loss on defense more than make up for any gain offensively if they get a cheap DH?

He keeps the books balanced for Rogers? Heck, how does Michael Bay keep making movies?

Jurgen, there must be something going on that we don't know.

Can Ricciardi please just tender his resignation and put an end to this ordeal?

And I should add that I'm not really sure why Rios slipped to $30 in Sportsline after going for $35 last year. I'd say I'm sorry I didn't say $31, but there was a glitch in the on-line auction and I didn't even see the bidding happen.

It does depend on your league. In mine, the $90-$100 range for pitching seems to be the sweet spot. For my part, I've noticed that for every $1-$2 Cliff Lee there are five or ten Livan Hernandez types who torch your ERA and WHIP before you can even say mercy--or Brett Tomko. For the low dollar hitters, not working out doesn't equal horrific damage inflicted, so I'd sooner take my flyers there (it worked on Hinske, it failed on Monroe, for example) and pay for solid starters, since I find that the under $15 starters to be a hit and miss bunch.

As Mike G says, many paths to the same goal. If you have data on your league trends, that's the most helpful thing in allotting your dollars.

I generally skew more toward hitting as well, though it's more by accident than design. In keeper leagues, part of this stems from the fact that it's easier to luck into a $3 Cliff Lee (like I did last year) than it is to luck into a $2 Alexei Ramirez (like one of my fellow owners did last year). This tends to skew freeze value toward pitchers, and savvier owners will spend for what they need, not based on a split that's more "appropriate" for non-freeze leagues. Looking back at the winners in my league the last three years, each one of them had at least one of these pitchers going into the auction and that helped immensely.