Last Friday night, ZoneBlitz participated in it’s second fantasy draft, an auction format ($200 cap) draft for a league in its second year of existence.   Last year, we blew a big chunk of our budget early on two star running backs–Joseph Addai and Steven Jackson.  Looked like a sound move early in the season, as Addai carried the team, while Jackson got off to a slow start.  However, we hit a mid-season slump, and ended up dumping Steven Jackson before the trade deadline for Clinton Portis & Javon Walker – a deal in which one league member ridiculed the other owner for bending over, which ended up working out in no one’s favor (they were out of it already, and it certainly didn’t help us at season’s end).

So this year, our goal was not to blow our budget on so few guys, and and it worked out–kind of.  Not really 100% sure on the order we got these guys, but here goes:

QB Drew Brees – $31 – Obviously we would have liked to have matched up Brady with our first league, but he went for north of $50 if our memory is correct–and we got our #2 QB for considerably less.

WR Marques Colston – $40 – When Colston came up was when we first started to get the idea that another owner basically had the same idea we did–which was later confirmed, as we both stayed out of the bidding on a lot of guys, and ended up in a few bidding wars through the night.  This was the first, but fortunately we came out ahead.

WR Andre Johnson – $36 – Wasn’t necessarily our top choice to be the #2 WR, but the prices were a little too high on some of our other guys.  If Johnson & Schaub can stay healthy, he should have a solid year, as the Texans finally have a few other offensive pieces to match with him.

Those were our first three guys–and (the way the league runs the draft board) left us with about $80 to complete the roster–so not as much as we’d hoped, maybe, but still better than last year.

The rest of the guys are in a random order:

RB Thomas Jones – $16 – With Brett Favre on board, teams will have to respect the deep pass, hopefully freeing up Jones.  Considering what he was able to do last year with Pennington/Clemens, $16 was a good value.

RB Kevin Smith – $23 – Another guy that we got in a bidding war on, and we probably overpaid but a guy we felt we needed to have, given our RB strategy–by the time Smith came up, he was one of the few guys we have pegged as starters who should get the majority of his team’s carries left.  Fortunately, it was late enough in the draft that overpaying didn’t hurt us too much.

WR Lee Evans – $17 – Another guy who matches up with our first team, and a guy that if he can play a little more consistently, will provide great value.

TE Vernon Davis – $3 – Davis is a guy that I had actually (finally) taken off my boards this year, given Mike Martz’s inability to use TEs in the past–but then we saw the Bears game last week, and they were using him downfield, so we thought we would at least bid him up.  For $3, could be a steal–if Martz remembers he has him.

K Nate Kaeding – $3 – He was a late pickup, and we don’t really like spending $3 on a kicker, but we had it.  No need to have leftover money.

Colts Defense – $2 – Again, would prefer not to spend on a defense, but we sniped them from another owner, who only had $1 left, which is always fun.  Wouldn’t have spent $3 on them, though.

RB Ahmad Bradshaw – $1 – Personally, I’m not real high on Bradshaw this year – but for $1, he’s worth a shot, for the inevitable Brandon Jacobs injury.

WR Jabar Gaffney – $4 – Another pick to mirror our other league, and provide some insurance if Lee Evans disappears.  Nice pickup for $4.

RB Ray Rice – $12 – Another rookie RB, another bidding war, another possibly overpaid spot–but if some of the rumors surrounding Willis McGahee are true, $12 would be well worth it.

TE Dustin Keller – $1 – After Jason Witten went for $17 (much to the auctioneer’s chagrin), Keller was actually the TE we targeted, given Brett Favre’s love of throwing to them in the red zone.  We snagged Davis earlier for $3, but for now we’re willing to carry a backup TE–especially for a buck.

WR Robert Meachem – $7 – Mirrors our other team, and is a guy we still like, despite early reports that the Saints might still go with Devery Henderson in the starting role.  If he continues to drop passes, Meachem will move into a starting role quickly.

RB Kevin Jones – $3 – Someone ridiculed this pick–but Jones showed a little bit of life against San Francisco, and the Bears are going to need RB help, with a rookie in there trying to protect & take the pressure off Kyle Orton.

WR – Ted Ginn, Jr. – $1 – Not someone we’re real high on, but someone has to catch a couple passes in Miami, don’t they?

So tell us what you think of ZoneBlitz team #2.

We’ll hopefully post a link to team #3 (which was a team I let Yahoo autodraft, based on my list) later on today.