Hilarious Negotiations

It’s the day after Thanksgiving, and we’re all still digesting yesterday’s dinner. You may be wondering why you went back for that third helping of pie. In retrospect, two was enough, wasn’t it.

Let’s keep things light and easy to digest today by celebrating our most hilarious negotiations of the year. I’ll get things started with a scenario from yesterday. The rest of you should share in the comments.

You may recall me mentioning that Chad Young and I co-manage a team in a true dynasty league. It’s 20 teams, 45 players per team, and we can keep 28 each year at no cost. We play on CBS so there is no player universe constraint.

To give you an idea of the depth, we started considering 16-year-old Vladimir Guerrero Jr. for our roster last February, and we eventually picked him off the wire mid-season. We’re probably going to make him our 28th keeper even though the most optimistic timeline puts him three years from the majors. Hell, he’s yet to play a single professional game – he was too young to qualify!

These dynasty formats value age like gold. When a player starts flirting with 30, he’s suddenly only coveted by very win-now oriented rosters. Chad and I have one such win-now team. So when a rival put Melky Cabrera, Hanley Ramirez, and Anibal Sanchez on his trade block, we had to ask about them. Here’s the order of events with (one of) the names removed to protect the innocent.

Me to rival:

We have some interest in Melky, HanRam, and Anibal.

Not sure exactly what you’re looking for so give us some idea of your asking price. We view all 3 as complementary parts.
Rival to me:
The only players of interest on your team would be Kyle Seager and JD Martinez
Forwards message to Chad, saying “Here’s a funny one.” (if I only knew…)
Me to rival:
Well clearly neither Melky, HanRam, nor Anibal warrants a player like Seager or JDM, so I guess we have no common ground. Enjoy the holiday.
Rival to me:
I would love to see a ranking that shows JD Martinez higher than Hanley Ramirez

Mind blown. Mine that is. And Chad’s. I forwarded this to Chad around 3:00 in the afternoon. He tore himself away from family to scoff at 3:30. Then he scoffed again at midnight. The owners in this league are very smart and competitive. We all tend to pinch pennies, but this comment belongs in 2013.

Somehow I managed to suppress my first five reactionary emails to this owner. I eventually settled for a simple “wow” in response. Every evaluation method ranks Martinez above Ramirez. All of them. Not sort of above him, waaaaaaay above him. I don’t think I used enough “a’s” in that “way.”

Is it possible that Ramirez outperforms Martinez? Sure. JDM could fracture his knee in the spring and miss the season. Ramirez could simply have an unexpected renaissance season, hitting 30 home runs and stealing 20 bases. It could happen. It probably won’t. Statistically, the probability of it happening is very small – like winning a hand of hold ’em at a full table with 7-3 off suit (without bluffing).

And we’re not just talking about 2016. Martinez is barely 28. He’s a star source of power. Ramirez is nearly 32 and showing his age. He hasn’t had a full season since 2012. Incidentally, he posted a 106 wRC+ at the time. He had an 89 wRC+ last season. He performed well in limited action during the intervening years.

Martinez, meanwhile, had a 137 wRC+ last year with one of the best hard hit rates in the sport. If you’re crazy enough to like HanRam more next year, would you rather have him for the next five seasons too?

I pulled this example from an industry league. I have to imagine some of you play with a few loony folks. What jaw-dropping comments did Janice from accounting make during the season? Did Joe Plumber quote Robinson Cano in return for his Chase Utley? Share the wealth folks.





You can follow me on twitter @BaseballATeam

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dl80
8 years ago

I don’t like Hanley at all, but Steamer projects he and Martinez as almost equal on offense next year.

Martinez: .273/.330/.486 27 HRs and 4 SB
Ramirez: .284/.345/.475 19 HRs and 8 SB

I play in a replay league, so I don’t know how the points shake out exactly, but that can’t be way off in value. And if the other owner mistakenly thinks Ramirez still SS or 3B eligibility (he got one game there last year), I could see Hanley being more valuable. Not by much, but maybe.

Now, I see no way Ramirez meets that projection. And Martinez probably blows past his projection.

Martinez is a guy that I still don’t understand how he went from a terrible Astro at age 26 to an awesome Tiger at age 27, but so be it. I thought the K/BB problems were permanent.

So I like Martinez less than most, and he’s definitely better than Ramirez.

But if the other owner only uses Steamer and has some mistaken assumptions about eligibilty, it’s not so ridiculous.