Actually, in this game it's not the worst thing in the world to start after the first round.
The first round is a maximum of only 5 games, so there are fewer points available than in a 7 game series, and if your opponents pick all or mostly players from teams that are eliminated in the first round, given the fact that they can only change 4 of them (assuming that they still have all of their trades available), while you can pick a team of all players who have advanced, it's not such a handicap to start late.
