Interesting Results from Early Ottoneu Auctions

With the Ottoneu keeper deadline on January 31, it is possible for auctions for established leagues to start as soon as February 1. In practice, they rarely do, but there are a few auctions either underway (slow auctions taking some time to finish up) or completed, and that gives us a chance to learn quite a bit.

Earlier in the offseason, there were some mock auctions and some first-year auctions for new leagues, but those don’t behave like keeper auctions. Now that we have a few keeper auctions, we can start to get a sense of how your keeper drafts – whether they are Ottoneu auctions or drafts in another format – might behave.

I pulled the results of four completed auctions – leagues 13, 100, 1237, and 1720 – to get a sense of what has been happening in established markets. Those four leagues auctioned 686 total players (390 unique players were auctioned, many in more than one of the leagues). Three of the four leagues drafted 174, 184, and 192 players, while one drafted just 136 (multiple teams left the draft with 5+ open spots). So while the average was just 171.5 players drafted, the median was 179 and half the leagues draft 184+.

Of the 390 unique players auctioned, 30 were auctioned in all four leagues, 52 in three leagues, and 102 in three leagues. That means the majority of the players, 206, were auctioned in just one league. That’s already an interesting insight as it suggests that every league’s market is pretty different. Part of that is availability – Ronald Acuña Jr. was picked up (at $62) in just one of the leagues, presumably because he was kept in the others. On the other hand, players such as Bradgley Rodriguez, A.J. Ewing, Aiva Arquette, and Troy Johnston were likely widely available, but only of interest in one league each.

Getting into specific names, here are the ten players selected in all four leagues with the highest average auction cost.

One big takeaway here is that these leagues all kept at least some stars. The biggest names in the fantasy world – names like Juan Soto, Ronald Acuña Jr., Yordan Alvarez, etc. – are not here not because they go for less money, but because they were kept in at least one of these leagues. All three of those players were auctioned in at least one league, but none in all four.

To be universally available (even in a universe of just four leagues), seems to require one of three things:

1. Being super disappointing in 2025. Riley, Trout, Altuve, Castillo, Albies, and Lewis were all pretty expensive a year ago. They all performed poorly. They were all cut loose in the offseason in a high percentage of leagues.
2. Joining an MLB organization for the first time. Imai, Murakami, and Okamoto were all outside the Ottoneu universe until recently, so they couldn’t be picked up until 2026 auctions got started.
3. Moving to Coors. Castro isn’t new to MLB, and I don’t think it is fair to call his 2025 disappointing, given expectations were never high, but now he is in a new home park, and it is a park that makes all the difference.

Riley and Trout both have wide ranges in this table – $14 and $13, respectively. That likely reflects three things:

• Manager preferences. It only takes two managers to be high on a player to drive his price up. But it does take two. If the average price on Riley is $32.50, as suggested here, finding a sample of 12 managers who are down on him isn’t that unlikely. Nor is finding two managers who are high on him.
• Market dynamics within the league. If Trout was the best outfielder available in a league, he might go for $28 not because any two managers believed he was worth $27+, but because at least two managers decided he was a good use of $27+ in that auction. Sometimes you have to pay up to get the guy you need. Inflation is also a factor here. If a league has managers who are quick to cut borderline keepers, inflation will be higher in that league than one where managers hold more talent.
• Auction dynamics. Sometimes just the order names are nominated can swing prices. If Trout was the first outfielder nominated, he might go for $15 because multiple teams are holding back dollars for a safer bet; or he might go for $28 because everyone is flush with cash and ready to spend. If Riley was one of three big third basemen available, his final price will vary if he is nominated first, second or third.

I tried to avoid needing 3B going into my auctions and these prices on Riley are part of why. I like him to rebound, but there is some real risk there. If I could get him in that $30-$33 range, I am pretty happy. If I have to go to $35, I would be willing. But third base can be thin and prices pushing or over $40 won’t be uncommon when multiple managers need to fill that spot and options are limited. I don’t want to be stuck doing that.

Trout, on the other hand, looks pretty interesting to me based on this data. That $28 Trout is more than I am comfortable with, but the other three? I am in at those prices. He is being added to my targets list for future auctions.

The prices on the three Japanese stars are interesting, but also incomplete. One of my leagues is using a slow auction, so the results are not yet ready to be included here, but Okamoto went for $21 and Murakami for $20. As I write Imai is at $13, but teams have almost 10 hours to push that higher. It’s possible this league will set new high prices for all three of those players (we already have for two of them).

If your leagues are yet to auction, it looks like you will need to budget at least $10 to have a realistic shot at any of those three players, and perhaps as much as $20 to be confident you can win them. I have come around to Murakami as a guy worth a double-digit salary. The upside is so big that, even with the strikeout risk, I am willing to take a shot. Okamoto, however, I am not sure I can see paying up that much. The floor seems higher, but the ceiling just isn’t the same.

Imai, meanwhile, is probably the one of the three I like best, in theory, but there are fairly consistently other pitches in the $10-$15 range that I like more. I suspect I won’t end up with him anywhere, unless I am fortunate enough to be in the a league like 1720, where the bidding stopped under $10.

It’s also interest that while all three have similar average prices, Okamoto is the highest priced in two leagues, while Imai is highest priced in the other two. In the two leagues where Imai is the high price, Murakami went for more than Okamoto. There is simply no consensus on how to rank these three, at least based on this very small sample.

I asked on Bluesky if there were any players followers were particularly interested in hearing about, and three names came up:

• Freddie Freeman was auctioned in three of the leagues at $29, $24, and $22. His star has definitely taken a hit, and I can see why, but I am not sure I agree it should have fallen this far. At 36-years-old, regression is to be expected. Freeman is not the 30-homer threat he once was, and that takes a bite out of his value, especially for a guy who is only eligible at first base. But his .370 wOBA last year was still excellent, and he still hit the ball hard. His max EV was the highest it has been since 2016. His hard-hit rate was above his career average. He posted a double-digit barrel rate. I have him in my $21-$27 tier for FanGraphs Points league and my $28-$35 tier for 4×4. Those are pre-inflation, so for established leagues, I would be very comfortable going to $30 for him. If I needed someone at first or util and he were available, he would be a primary target for me, given these prices.
• Lawrence Butler was only auctioned in one league and went for $11. After looking poised for a breakout coming into 2025, he was pretty disappointing. Enough so that you might expect to see him on that list of players auctioned in all four leagues. But no, he was widely held (86.14% rostered as of today), so you likely can’t get him at your auction. His median salary in Ottoneu is $9. If he does go for $11 consistently, it suggests that his price has perhaps gone up a bit, or at least stayed fairly steady, despite his 2025 season. That $11 price point seems pretty fair to me, but if you were hoping for a bit of a discount, very early returns suggest that won’t happen.
• Colton Cowser had a similarly disappointing 2025 after appearing on a much stronger path, but he apparently caused his 2025 managers more pain than Butler. He was auctioned in three of the four leagues for $9, $5, and $2. He is only 53.31% rostered as of now, so he is far more likely than Butler to be available. But, dollar for dollar, I prefer Butler. Cowser has that big scary 35% strikeout rate, and as much as Butler’s streakiness worries me, that worries me more. I still like Cowser, but I don’t want to be relying on him as a key component of my team, if I can avoid it. At $9, I would be bowing out; At $5, I am still in; at $2, I am thrilled.