Dictionary.com defines the word commission as “the act of committing or entrusting a person, group, etc. with supervisory power or authority.” I’ve been playing and commissioning fantasy baseball for almost 25 years now and have on occasion abused that authority to influence change within my leagues.  Always with the long-term good of the league in mind, I have encouraged owners to adopt a wide variety of incentive structures that have included elaborate prize payouts, keeper contract systems, supplemental minor league drafts, arbitration and inflation offsets, and a few other random gimmicks.  Furthermore, as a regular member of an active, daily fantasy baseball community, I’ve seen countless other versions of these ideas and have had all the common debates about incentives vs. penalties, owner competitiveness vs. engagement, and all the nuances that make for good, healthy ownership and game play.  In short, I’ve kind of seen it all.

I’m now ready to admit defeat.  Despite my best efforts, there are no universals when it comes to motivating every type of owner to engage fully over the course of a long 162 game baseball schedule.  This revelation should be obvious, and perhaps only fellow commissioners will sympathize with this drive to create the perfect league, but it has taken me some time to finally come to grips with this truth.  To be clear, it’s not that some of these ideas haven’t worked (I have years of anecdotal evidence that they can and do), it’s just that they are usually designed to address the symptoms that plague poor leagues rather than the core issue.

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On Tuesday, I described the issues us keeper league owners face in handling “dump” trades, using my current AL-Only keeper league as an example of the madness that began about two weeks ago. One commenter suggested I publish a follow-up summarizing some of the best solutions and outlining the pros and cons of each. Since the post did receive some excellent comments, this is that requested follow-up.

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In 2003 as a wee 21-year-old, I founded a standard 12-team mixed redraft league with a live auction. Ever since, I had toyed with the idea of starting a sister keeper format, but always decided against it. I have rarely played in keeper leagues, joining one many years ago and lasting just one year due to quirky rules I wasn’t a fan of, but am now playing a second year in my current keeper league, an AL-Only format. The last two weeks have just reinforced my opinion that a strong keeper league is extremely difficult to establish and run. The problem has always been handling “dump” trades, the term used for the trading of prospects or quality keepers for better high-priced or unkeepable players, with a bottom tier team serving in the dumper role, while a team fighting for a money spot acting as dumpee.

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Last season I kicked off April with some early trade reviews from the Ottoneu community, and today I’ll do the same, hoping to peek under the hood of some early player perceptions as transactions start to take shape across the fantasy baseball world.

As a quick reminder, Ottoneu is a keeper system by design that shifts the balance just short of traditional dynasty leagues, and offers a variety of scoring systems (including H2H).

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With Ottoneu continuing to grow rapidly, I’d like to dedicate some ink to a few tips I’ve learned along the way.  Entering my ninth season on the popular fantasy sports platform, I’ve outlined a few things that have helped me gain that extra 1% edge, and with the season just now under way, this is a good time to consolidate a few tricks into a quick guide that should benefit new owners and veterans alike.

Resource: What is Ottoneu?

Prioritize Salary Cap Space

Of all the recommendations listed below, I’ve learned to prioritize salary flexibility during the season more than any other strategy over the years.  I’m convinced a smart, active owner can find in-season gold on the waiver wire as players and prospects emerge, so it’s essential to leave yourself some space to shuffle your roster when needed.  But what if you’ve already spent your entire salary cap in the auction? That’s okay, but you’ll want to be conscious of finding opportunities early in the season to free yourself of this roster restriction wherever possible so you have the flexibility to complement your team with mid-season contributions when trades aren’t always an option.  Here are a few specific ideas to help you maximize your Ottoneu salary cap space, which may be even more important for Head-to-Head leagues.

Resource: How to Get Started Playing Ottoneu

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The 2019 season is here.  Let’s get right to it.

1 – Dan Vogelbach will finish with a wOBA higher than Vladimir Guerrero, Jr.

You could say that to date neither Dan Vogelbach nor Vladimir Guererro, Jr. have accomplished anything in the major leagues.  While true, that’s where the comparison ends.  Vogelbach is 26 years old and has less than 150 major league plate appearances on his resume (career 78 wRC+). Vlad, Jr. just turned 20 years old, is the consensus #1 prospect in baseball, and is the son of a beloved Hall of Fame player.

I have absolutely nothing against Vlad, Jr. and am as excited as anyone else to watch him carve out what is likely to be a stunning career with the bat.  However, as I tried to express recently, the expectations are so high here that we may all be setting ourselves up for a little bit of disappointment.  As we are often reminded with even elite prospects, baseball is hard, and the game has a funny way of humbling even the most talented athletes in the world, at least for a time.  Patience will be prudent with Vlad, Jr., but most of us will have none of it.

Vogelbach has posted a minor league slash of .282/.391/.472/.864 over eight seasons, including a .907 OPS in 342 AAA games.  He’s a professional hitter, but up until this point he’s had Nelson Cruz blocking his path to SEA.  That roadblock is now removed, and as of this writing it’s all but certain Vogelbach will get a shot to stick on the Mariners’ roster to begin the season.  From the write up for the 2019 Seattle top prospects:

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Few aspects of fantasy baseball deviate more from the reality of major league baseball more than the speculation of prospects.  Like most aspects of market-based economics, you often have to buy early on limited information if you want to get the best return on investment before the rest of the industry influences supply and demand.  Perception is reality until prospects actually get the chance to contribute (or fail) on a major league field, and the outcome of those small but important samples can swing values wildly in short cycles.

The goal today is to identify up and coming talent well before the masses of most leagues, so here are five prospects primed to see a big increase in value in 2019.  You won’t find these prospects sitting on many Top 100 lists (yet), but you’ll want to at least keep them on your radar as they rise in the future.

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A few years ago I posted an article about designing fantasy league incentives.  While the popularity of customized, add-on incentives is hard to measure across the fantasy community, it’s clear that leagues conceptually understand the potential value of features and rewards that attempt to keep owners engaged over the course of a long baseball season.  In the standard winner-takes-all format of many points leagues, commissioners are often left to mitigate the wreckage of AWOL owners that sell off and check out early, so carrots, even small ones, can help in cross-checking drastic, standings-shaking transactions if designed thoughtfully. But designing the right league incentives is easier said than done because owners are motivated by different values.

The purpose of this article is for you, the reader, to help me design the right incentive structure for the very first 20 team Ottoneu league (more on this soon), an exciting experiment that will dramatically alter the traditional economic model that serves as the foundation of standard 12 team Ottoneu leagues. Your feedback will be critical to building a league that lasts, but the discussion will hopefully be a helpful reference for others attempting to structure leagues that are as engaging as possible.

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Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is the best baseball prospect in the world. He’s better than most recent #1 overall prospects. He’s the best offensive prospect since at least Kris Bryant (ROY + MVP), and many would say you’d have to go back much further to Miggy or even Pujols to get a true comparison. For some scouts he possesses the seemingly impossible combination of both an 80 grade hit tool and an 80 grade power profile. His batter’s box skills have HOF lineage and yet somehow he has done nothing but exceed expectations (batting .402 in AA at age 19 helps). He already has the look and potential of an all-time great.  Best of all, Vlad, Jr. will debut in 2019.

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