One of the most popular questions I get on Twitter is something along the lines of “Was just offered player X for player Y. Should I take it?” And I always do my best to answer, but the reality is analyzing a trade without a ton of context is really tough.

Where are you in the standings? Are you building for this year or next? Who else is on your roster? Are there other offers out there? Without answers to these questions, and quite a few others, any answer I give requires an asterisk: warning – trade advice woefully short of information. But, like I said, I still try to answer, so I thought I would provide some color on how I analyze ottoneu trades when presented without context.

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Last week, I sent out a tweet (Follow me! @chadyoung) asking readers & ottoneu enthusiasts what they wanted to see in this space this week. Amidst a handful of “should I trade this guy for that guy” responses, came this:

‏@ChikeErokwu: How/when do you know you’re a contender for the year? Is there a point/date benchmark? I’d like to see a story about that.

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Those of us who write for Rotographs know that inspiration is all around us. I have all sorts of places I often look for something to write about, including ongoing ottoneu auctions, recent call-ups, and more.

But nothing “inspires” me more than players whose struggles are sinking my fantasy teams. And this morning, I am writing an article looking at fly ball distance, inspired by Jay Bruce.

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Maybe I am alone in this, but it feels like MI is painfully thin in ottoneu leagues this year. I know MI is always a bit shallow, but this year just seems like we’ve taken things to another level. I have no explanation for that but, particularly in the original league, it seems our auctions of late have been a litany of MI we know provide almost no fantasy value (mixed in with the regular dose of reliever-chasing).

And one of the players on that list is currently the most auctioned player in all of ottoneu – Brandon Crawford. For those of you looking to add a MI – replacing an injured Jose Reyes, grabbing a backup to fill in a game or two here and there, or just desperate for games played at the position – Crawford’s torrid spring and only-slightly-cooler start look awfully appealing right now, don’t they?

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Forty man rosters make for a very different (fantasy) ballgame than many other (fantasy) ballgames. The other day, in a Roto Riteup, Zach Sanders passed along Jeff Zimmerman’s reminder that cold weather favors pitchers, and that April is cold (compared to July, anyway), and that therefore you can be a bit more liberal with your pitchers now than you can be in a few months.

Around the same time, I was giving ottoneu player Joe Pytleski seemingly contradictory advice on twitter. But I assure you, I agree with Jeff, and the discrepancy can be explained.

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Another year has begun and, as always, ottoneu players are actively working the free agent pool, searching for that missing piece that can put them over the top. Or maybe we are all just busy trying to find replacements for those guys we really didn’t want but got stuck with at the auction.

With the auction-wire red hot right now, I thought I’d take a look at the six players who are in the most active auctions at the moment.

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We’ve started bold prediction week for 2013, and it sounds like the readers really want BOLD predictions. Of course there is always a trade-off – don’t go bold enough, and you are just stating what we already know; go too bold and you will likely be wrong and your predictions will have no fantasy value.

But the fans want bold and I like to please the fans, so I am going to go big here. Does that mean I will likely fall short of the four predictions I made last year that were either right or at least close to right? Probably. But I’m swinging for the fences anyway.

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A couple weeks ago, I covered C, 1B, 2B, and SS. Since then, I have also shared my rankings spreadsheet. Today, we cover 3B, OF, SP, and RP.

The lessons are going to remain pretty similar – guys with high walk rates rank higher, guys with a lot of speed rank lower – and will extend to the pitching sphere nicely – closers lose some value, guys projected for close to 20 wins lose some value, pitchers who keep the ball in the yard gain value. But it is still informative to look position by position and see where the differences manifest.

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Back when we launched FG+ earlier this year, I included a table that put dollar values on players for year one and future year ottoneu leagues. Since then, I have mentioned a few times that I wanted to refresh those values with new projections.

Well, I have auctions coming up the next two weekends and finally got my act together to get my spreadsheets in shape; today, I release them into the wild!

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Over the last few days, my compatriots four of my compatriots have begun presenting you with an extremely valuable draft tool: consensus positional rankings. But for those of you who play ottoneu, things differ a bit, especially if you are in a 4×4 or Points League.

Starting today, I am going to take a look at those rankings and let you know where ottoneu players should take a different stance.

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