Clayton has spelled it out as clear as day, and you still don’t see that Papelbon isn’t as valuable of a player as Matt Kemp (MLB.com has Pap at $24 and Kemp at $26).
Kemp will give you great numbers in all 5 categories, and Papelbon will give you one category, with good but minimally significant contributions in other categories.
Think about it: If your team pitches 1400 innings collectively, which it would in a competetive league, Papelbon will pitch about 5% of your team’s innings. How much of an impact can he have in the categories other than saves?
A top starter would pitch about 15% of your team’s innings, being a much bigger factor (and contributor) in ERA, K, W, and WHIP than Paps. That’s 3 more categories than Papelbon. One top starting pitcher alone will eat up a lower rated closer’s mediocre peripherals. Make that 5 starting pitchers and 3 setup men, and one closer’s stats (other than his saves contributed) are nearly undetectable when added.

Compare Papelbon to Kemp….Kemp is one of 9 bats in a lineup….meaning he accounts for about 11% of your offense’s playing time, whereas Papelbon accounts for about 5% of your IP. So anything Kemp does automatically has more of an effect on your team’s offense than something Papelbon does has an effect on your pitching (except for those saves, which any closer could provide). That goes for any bat. So wouldn’t you rather have a good bat and a bad closer who at least gets you saves? Plus, it’s not even a guarantee that a late closer will even have a bad ERA.

BTW, why do you assume that just because I take Papelbon, I can’t grab a Heath Bell or Frank Fransisco later? If I take Papelbon and you take Webb, I am going to hammer you in WHIP, ERA, and saves, assuning all the rest of our pitchers are the same. Even last year when Webb had a fluky 22 wins, Papelbon put up $2 more in value!

The problem with your comparisons is, you are not comparing similar valued players. If Pedroia and Kinsler are falling to the 50th pick, then it’s not the closer that is overvalued. It’s the 15 non-closers that went ahead of Kinsler and Pedroia that shouldn’t have that are overvalued.

It’s not a difficult transition from $ values to draft picks.

I’m also not sure why you’re pulling out auction values while discussing a draft. It’s a completely different entity. You can have Papelbon for $27 and Jenks for $21 in an auction this year. I’ll take Lindstrom for $6 and Bell for $2. With my extra $30, I can outright buy Tim Lincecum. I’m not sure, but I think Lincecum, Lindstrom, and Bell are going to combine for more value than Papelbon and Jenks. I think I just beat you in four out of five pitching categories with my $38. Heck, saves are fickle enough that I may have beaten you in all five.

Papelbon for $27? Or would you rather have Kinsler, Pedroia, Manny, Webb, or Halladay? Lidge for $24? Or would you rather have Markakis, Roberts, Haren, or Oswalt? Fuentes for $14? Or would you rather have Billingsley, Shields, Felix, or Pena? In an auction, it doesn’t really matter beyond that because you should be able to afford all the guys like Bell, Devine, Hanrahan, Francisco, Ray, Sherrill, Balfour, Percival, Wheeler, Swisher, Escobar, Sandoval, Dukes, etc. who are a couple dollars.

Is my team going to be better with Kinsler, Haren, Billingsley, Bell, Devine, and Francisco or with Papelbon, Lidge, Fuentes, Polanco, Snell, and Cook? My three lesser regarded players only contribute significantly to one category and have a decent shot at bettering your three expensive players in that very category. On the flip side, there’s little doubt that Kinsler outperforms Polanco across the board and that Haren and Billingsley will absolutely dominate Snell and Cook. We spent the same amount of money and I’m beating you by a significant margin in at least 9 categories. What happens if Bell, Devine, and Francisco all lose their jobs? Nothing has changed. I’m still significantly beating you in 9 categories.

Above replacement closers available on the waiver wire in my 12 team league in 2008;

Salomon Torres, $6
Dan Wheeler, $5
John Rauch, $1

That’s the least of any position! You can set the bar wherever you want, but no matter what, closer is the most scarce position of all (maybe catcher in “normal times”).

It doesn’t matter that the drop from top closer to bottom closer is bigger than than the other positions. I’m not suggesting you take a $22 closer ahead of a $40 outfielder. I’m suggesting that you take a $22 closer ahead of a $21 OF. Therefore the drop is bigger. Papelbon outproduced Abreu last year. That was not hard to predict. If you took Abreu ahead of Papelbon, you made a mistake. Plain and simple.

Even if you assume you can “hit” with a late closer with a guy like Brian Wilson ($6), let’s look at the hitters that produced +/- $2 of him.

Ryan Theriot
Corey Hart
Randy Winn
Bengie Molina
Mike Aviles
Orlando Cabrera
Placido Polanco
Chris Snyder
Conor Jackson
Hunter Pence
Chris Young
Chone Figgins
Mike Jacobs
Miguel Tejada
Cristian Guzman
Adam LaRoche
Willie Harris
Kazuo Matsui
Jerry Hairston
Shin-Soo Choo
Adrian Beltre
Ray Durham
Garrett Atkins
Yunel Escobar

How many of those guys were available late or on the waiver wire? Every position is covered multiple times. And that’s not even counting guys like Ludwick or Quentin or Huff that were $30 better than Wilson and $20 better than Lidge, who was the best of the possible late round closers. No matter where you set the bar, you can do better with position players on the waiver wire than you can with closers. Why? Because there’s more of them.

Yet another argument: It is MUCH easier to make up for the low closer’s lack of production in other categories than it is to make up for having Lyle Overbay at first base.

Does your league have holds? If so, go strong in the holds category (this is all if the closers are all gone early) but target setup men who pitch behind closers who have shaky job security. You can pick up vulture saves this way, and you even have the chance of one or two becoming the closer. Here are some setup men I would target if your league has holds:

Dan Wheeler
Jon Rauch
Fernando Rodney
Jose Ceda
Tyler Walker

there are plenty more…. these are guys who could pick up a good number of saves, but don’t possess the “closer” label, so their value is not inflated and they can be had much later. If your league doesn’t have holds, just keep a close eye on closer situations and be ready to make a waiver move….

I agree with Clayton though….don’t take a “closer” too high who probably won’t end up with any more saves than the guy who will take over when they lose their job or get injured (Lyon, Qualls, Percival, etc).