Kicking Rocks: The Dump Trade
With the second half of the season beginning this weekend and your league’s trade deadline rapidly approaching, keeper league owners are making the same tough decision that numerous MLB teams are making. Are they buyers or sellers? If in contention for a top finish, keeper league owners are deciding which stud protect to deal off to bolster their roster for a run at the title while the bottom-feeders are licking their chops, ready to give up the world to get their man. It turns into quite the ugly battle in most leagues and is usually a primary source of fantasy angst. But like it our not, it’s reality. Welcome to the dump trade.
The arguments both for and against the dump trade are plentiful. Those that are in favor of them usually come from two schools of thought. The folks at the bottom of the standings cite that they are building for the future. They are not giving up players that they would protect and should be allowed to build their fantasy franchises in any way they see fit. Their trade partners at the top talk about the inherent value of keeping a particular player the following season and the advantage it provides a team next year to own such a guy. Wouldn’t you agree that a team has a distinct advantage to walking into 2012 with Adrian Gonzalez rather than hoping their $12 bid lands them Justin Smoak? If so, then what value do you assign to that in a trade this season?
On the other side of the coin, you’ve got those that are vehemently against the dump trade. In a lot of cases, they are some of the top teams in the standings that would rather not part with their studs and are attempting to block their competition from pulling off such a deal. Understandably, they are protecting their place in the standings. But you also have other owners who, regardless of standings, talk about the integrity of the league and how it is no longer about knowledge and savvy GM-ship, but about who can pull off the most egregious dump trade at the deadline.
There’s also a third group that lurks in here. There are those that are not in favor of the dump trade, but feel that they are forced into it based on the trade market established by the league. If the league vote vetoes the dump trades, then this owner has nothing to worry about. But if your league passes them through, then this owner is left with the decision between: Do I make my own dump trade to keep up with the Joneses or do I maintain my ethics and integrity and risk finishing in 7th place? More often than not, the former is the road most often taken.
Every side has it’s merits and every side has it’s flaws, but the bottom line is that it’s up to the league to ultimately decide. That is why there is a league vote and not some autonomous commissioner ruling. Sure, you can go that route, but usually the commissioner has a vested interest in the league and shouldn’t be allowed to make such unilateral decisions without some sort of checks and balances. You could go to a third party site, but who are these people voting and how do they know what’s really fair or not fair in your particular league? How do they know if your league favors starting pitching which ultimately increases the value of a player like Clayton Kershaw? They don’t. Not to mention the fact that most people voting on these sites go by names rather than actual research and numbers.
The responsibility is in the hands of the owners and whether you are for or against this common keeper league practice/dilemma, you have to trust the process no matter how flawed it may be. Lobbying for votes to sway it towards your opinions is wrong. You have to let everyone make their own decisions. Owners at the top will usually vote no, owners at the bottom will usually vote yes, and the decision is ultimately made by those that are paying close enough attention to vote objectively based on the merits of the trade. If the player being dumped for four non-keepers is truly worth it, then the trade should go through. If not, then it’s back to the drawing board and time to re-work the deal. When the league speaks, stop arguing and actually listen.
Howard Bender has been covering fantasy sports for over 10 years on a variety of websites. In addition to his work here, you can also find him at his site, RotobuzzGuy.com, Fantasy Alarm, RotoWire and Mock Draft Central. Follow him on Twitter at @rotobuzzguy or for more direct questions or comments, email him at rotobuzzguy@gmail.com
Voting on each trade one-by-one is nonsense. All trades should be approved unless there is collusion at play.
It’s pretty simple: if you don’t like dump trades, don’t take part in keeper leagues. Keeper leagues NEED dump trades for survival.
The Open Market Trading system is the best format I have seen for resolving this issue and really leaves no room for complaints.
This is a ridiculous statement. Open markets lead to situations like we have in America right now….an extremely wide gap between the rich and the poor. You get a few dominant teams at the top, a few absolutely depleted teams at the bottom, and a bunch of mediocre teams that are good enough to stay with it but have no chance of winning. I am in a 20 team league that has a tight voting policy and is going strong in its 4th season. Most of the leagues I have been in with this laissez-faire type voting policy have become inactive within 1 or 2 seasons. Until you have a full group of owners that you know are absolutely knowledgeable and dedicated to the league, you can be pretty sure your league isn’t going to last long with an “open market” trading system.
This is by far the worst comment I have ever read.
The problem with America right now is that the majority apologizes for the poor and loathes the rich. Let me rephrase that, the majority apologizes for those who did not strive to learn and achieve success financially and loath those who worked hard to learn and achieve success financially.
Why should the rich be condemned for being successful? Why should the poor be revered for being unsuccessful? This is horrible logic and is why economies, governments, and societies fail time and time again.
obviously rich people worked hard and poor people didn’t! easy peasy!
In an Open Market Trading system for dump trades, the rebuilding owner places his stud on the open market and then gets to pick and choose the best offer for his team. It is in the best interest of the league long-term if the rebuilding owners gets as much as he can for his stud. The other contending owners can all choose how much they are willing to give up. In this way, nobody can complain. Why exactly do you have a problem with that, R M?
First off-
Don’t start your reply with “this is a ridiculous statement”. That already shows you’re not the type of person who reads and respects other owner’s opinion. You are showing that you think you know it all and no one else knows what they are talking about. Basically you are saying you are the type of person who vetoes trades because you know what is best (which is impossible because baseball is not an exact science, otherwise there wouldn’t be a need to play at all).
Contrats on your awesome league of 20 teams in the 4th spectacular season of drama free with you “absolutely knowledgeable and dedidcated” owners. Your fantasy baseball Utopia sounds quite annoying acually… let owners make their own decisions and you worry about your team. If you don’t like the way the league is set up (or how apparently knowledgeable you opponents are) find another league. Please not one of mine though.
I love armchair economics mostly because you can take a group of 350,000,000 people living together and decide how to fix it in one sentence, all while seemingly making other people look stupid.
And no, trickle down economics doesn’t work. The tax rate on the wealthy was 94% in 1945. NINETY FOUR PERCENT. It stayed over 90% all the way until 1964 at which point it was lowered to 77%, where it stayed for some time. You can thank mostly Reagan for its low of 28%, which has pretty much become the norm, with the top bracket now in the mid 30’s. Yet the wealthy bitch and moan about raising it to 40%. These aren’t your well-off upper class people we’re talking about, these are people that make over $1 MILLION a YEAR. How many of these people do you think actually started out with nothing, rolled up their sleeves, and went to work?
The American dream is dying along with the middle class. Our Government, politicians and lawyers will be our end.
I’m sorry that I actually just got political on a baseball site. It won’t happen again.
I love baseball because it is a free market. I love the fact that there is no cap and the fact that teams like the Rays and Marlins (the teams I grew up with, follow, and love) can face giants like the Yankees, Phillies, and Red Sox and prevail. They prevail, not because they are rich, but because they make smart decisions and work hard. They prevail because they do not make excuses and point to the fact that they are less “fortunate” than others.
I grew up below the poverty line and now I am currently on my way to financial security for the rest of my life because I studied hard and worked hard to get where I am. My brother on the other hand goofed off in school, got in trouble with the law, and can now barely stay out of jail/hold down a job. Why would anyone pity him and loath me? I made good decisions and he made bad decisions. How is that logical?
I hope to be a millionaire one day. It is a goal that I have in life. Most millionaires have acquired the fortunes in the same manner. Most ARE NOT silver spoon offspring (look at the general richest people in the world lists). And if they are, they usually fade into oblivion within a few generations. Those who are rich, do great things with their fortunes. Not because they are forced to by some government, but because they want to. Because it fulfills them.
Baseball and Objectivism philosophy mirror each other in numerous ways and it is why I love both.
“The problem with America right now is that the majority apologizes for the poor and loathes the rich.”
The poor ARE the majority. What are you smoking? The ability to convince so many poor to vote for policies that only help the rich is the greatest achievement in the history of the Republican party.
Alex:
You could have driven several 18 wheel vehicles through the deductions in the tax code when the rates were so high. To actually believe that anyone paid those rates is to believe in fairy tales.
My league has been around since 1986 and has never vetoed a trade. Fail
Why would you ever want to be in a league where the other owners decide as a group whether MY trades hold enough value? If that’s the case, why have individual owners at all; just have 12 teams that are all collectively owned by 12 owners, with every roster decision, from weekly starting lineups to waiver wire pickups all decided by the group as a whole. The whole point of having a competitive league is to compete against the league. The owners who vote against these trades aren’t doing anything for “league integrity,” they’re vetoing because they are mad that a team they’re competing with is getting better.
I’ll close by saying that if you have a problem with trades like this, your “dilemma” isn’t that teams are trading unproven prospects for established players, your “dilemma” is that you’re in a keeper league in the first place.
Unless you are in a league where you know everyone, there will be weaker owners and stronger owners. The weaker owners will be exploited without a tight veto system. The purpose of the system is not to “protect” these owners, but to protect their teams. Presumably, the weaker owners will lose interest as they fall in the standings, but if they were allowed to dump all their talent, their teams will sometimes take years for a new owner to recover, which makes for a pretty shitty league.
I don’t understand the nonsense statement. But I agree with Andrew on all fronts otherwise. Dump trading allows for constant change in the standings with losers in year one getting better holdovers in year two and vice versa for winners.
I like keeper leagues and dump trades. Keeper leagues give a whole different picture to drafting and trading.
“But you also have other owners who, regardless of standings, talk about the integrity of the league and how it is no longer about knowledge and savvy GM-ship, but about who can pull off the most egregious dump trade at the deadline.”
Most egregious dump trade–here used instead of the real meaning, “knowledgeable and savvy GM move.”
Any league that vetoes trades for anything other than evidence of collusion is not one I want any part of. The league is not a babysitter for any owner. I assume every owner the courtesy and respect that he or she knows what is best for his or her own team. Collusion is a different story, and trades should be screened for that, but absent any reason to suspect foul play, all trades must go through. The conflict of interest of the other owners in the league canceling a trade between two consenting adults cannot be overlooked or understated.
“The conflict of interest of the other owners in the league canceling a trade between two consenting adults cannot be overlooked or understated.”
Here the operative word is “adults.” What if you have an owner acting like a child? I am in a re-draft league, so this is not to address dump trades, just the narrower issue of vetoes and collusion. My league had a big debate a few weeks back. Our last place team was frustrated and bitter, and so gave away Ryan Howard for Panda, Dempster, and Peavy. He didn’t shop Howard, he just made the offer to the most predatory trader in our league, who of course couldn’t accept fast enough. There was a big ruckus, but in the end the trade wasn’t vetoed due to the “lack of evidence of collusion.” Of course, there is NEVER evidence of collusion unless one person decides to admit to it. Are the league members going to subpoena the traders’ emails and correspondences? Wiretap their phone conversations? Of course not. Evidence of collusion can only be the terrible trade itself, and that’s it. If you can never prove collusion, people who reserve a veto only for use in that scenario are really just saying, “no veto.”
Needless to say, the last place guy is now even more in last place, and Ryan Howard is going to win the league for the other guy. Everyone regrets not stopping the trade now. Point is: if you can never prove collusion, what’s the point of a veto at all? Sometimes people can sabotage a league without colluding by just being a jerk, and that should be stopped too.
The simple solution to all this is not to allow the protection of players that are traded from one fantasy team to another (at least in-season). I’m in one keeper league that has this very rule. The only keepers you get are the players you originally acquired at auction, via free agency, or from another team during the offseason. This may sound less than ideal from the standpoint of giving the bottom place teams some extra incentive for the future, but it sure has cut down on controversy (and the ensuing ill-will that follow from these kinds of trades). I think we have had literally zero turnover for the past five years. About 3/4 of the owners have been in the league for over a decade.
Having never been in a keeper league, I must be missing something… In all seriousness, can someone explain the nature of the problem to me? How is this kind of trade controversial? Again, having never been in a keeper league, I would have thought it was precisely these kinds of transactions that differentiate keeper leagues from redraft, both in terms of strategy and tactics. Otherwise the only difference would seem to be in how you approach the draft. But perhaps I am missing something.
See my response to andrew.
I understand what people claim the result is (somehow the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor) but I fail to understand the mechanism by which this kind of trade actually causes it. If that is the result, isn’t the problem that sellers of current talent in those particular leagues aren’t asking for sufficient value back from the buyers, as opposed to the nature of the trade itself?
No, you’re not missing anything. I think the contreversy would happen when, say, a last place team would be trying to basically fill one keeper spot, and gives up the world to get that one player that he likes. Overall the winning manager would be getting a much better value, but the last place manager has already given up on this season and knows that he can only keep a certain number for next season. So basically he values anyone that he is not planning on keeping as having very little value, when actually they have a great deal of value to anyone playing for this year. And then he trades them for that one player, and people don’t like it.
And I do agree with most of the other commenters that vetoing should be reserved for collusion only. Vetoing a trade because “the best team is only getting better” or some shit like that to keep the next-best managers from falling too far behind is wrong. Vetoing should only be used for collusion, not for helping out managers who make stupid trades. Or sometimes even slightly off-balance. It can be ridiculous the things people want to veto. This is why I think it is very important to choose wisely who you play fantasy sports with if you want to avoid headaches.
I see, that makes sense. The problem arises because of a limited number of keeper slots.
Again, having never been in such a league, couldn’t it then be solved by increasing the number of keeper slots, bringing things closer to “real life” where e.g. the Padres can deal A-Gon for several prospects, all of whom they know they can hold onto for years? “Too few slots” seems like the real issue; “dump trades” seems like a symptom.
Sure, you could do that. But then the talent available in the re-draft the following year is diminished, and the ability to improve for a cellar dwelling team becomes more difficult. It’s a conundrum.
I am having a problem with the evaluation of dump trades in my league. In particular, how to value keepers vs stars (ie.nonkeepers). Here is what I wrote. Please try to find flaws in my evaluation of this dump trade.
here is how i got espn’s updated (from today!!) dollar values.
i took the pre-season dollar values from this link:
http://sports.espn.go.com/fantasy/baseball/flb/story?page=mlbdk2k11top300
i then cross-references those rankings with these rankings and assigned the same dollar values: (ie. player 201 is worth $11)
http://sports.espn.go.com/fantasy/baseball/flb/story?page=ASB2011ranks300
now let’s do this again using espn’s dollar values:
lowe:
cost: $2
value: $6
value in trade:$11 (this # was gotten by using the value for the remainder of this year PLUS the value minus the cost of the player for any additional keeper years) to see the math for lowe, it is (this year: 6/2=3, keeper year one: 6-2=4, keeper year two: 6-2=4, total: 3+4+4=11)
maybin:
cost: $6
value: $11
value in trade: $15.5 (5.5 + 5 + 5)
zimmermann:
cost:$1
value:$14
value in trade:$20 (7 + 13)
TOTAL VALUE GIVEN UP: $46.5
lee:
value:$26
value in trade:13
gallardo:
value:$15
value in trade:$7.5
ubaldo:
value:$15
value in trade:$7.5
werth:
value:$17
value in trade:$8.5
TOTAL VALUE GIVEN UP:$36.5
so, according to espn, i am giving up $46.5 and getting $36.5.
while lowe is older and will likely not retain his $6 value, zimmermann and maybin are very young and will likely only increase their value. in addition, while in my calculations there was half a season left, there is actually only 43% of the season left. so keepers are actually even more valuable in relation to non-keepers.
sorry, to clarify, the trade was:
jordan zimmermann $1 (for 1 more year)
derek lowe $2 (for 2 more years)
cameron maybin $6 (for 2 more years)
for
yovani gallardo
cliff lee
ubaldo jimenez
jason werth
ALL OF THOSE ARE NON-KEEPERS.
what’s the flaw in my analysis, that some people still say the trade is egregious.
how would u evaluate the trade?
because it should be evaluated so that the current year is more valuable than future years
Yeah, I’ll just say that if both owners are making a deal because they feel it improves their teams (whether in the now or in the future), the deal should not be vetoed. A trade can be lopsided–that’s not the goal. The goal is to improve one’s team in whatever time frame you are currently focused. If it becomes clear that one of the managers is not making the deal for some reason, then you veto.
Really, if you’re just going to finish 7th at best anyway, what’s the point in holding onto players you won’t keep when you can acquire better keepers and/or better picks for next year?
-j
I don’t see the big deal, it’s no different in principle than a high-paid-superstar for multiple prospects deal in real baseball.
Some teams are playing for now, others are trying to set themselves up better for next year. I’m in a 12-team, 5-keepers-per-team league, and there are teams at the top who have more than 5 studs and teams at the bottom who have less than 5 (or may have keepers that are expiring, there is a keeper limit in our league). What’s wrong with trading several valuable pieces for one stud who will improve your core 5 players?
I’ve been in normal winners take all keeper leagues for a few years and just started a new one this year that gives a prize for each category winner. This helps solve the pure “throw away the season” problem since the last place team that is second in steals still helps hold up the market for speed guys while the 9th, 10th, and 11th guys each are trying to get first in another category.
I assume that people are complaining about keeper leagues that do not involve cash? Because if everyone is contributing cash, just impose a cash penalty on those who come up short.
(Its no accident that those commenters opposed to the U.S. economic system firmly believe that unfortunate, struggling Team Owners who dump need a firm, technocratic hand to save them from themselves. And those who oppose and mistrust a majority, or a Star Chamber, with the power to veto a mutually beneficial, voluntary exchange between two free-born team owners are pretty cool with the USA. I see a Pew poll of roto participants in the future.)
Just putting it out there:
I like taking over the worst teams in video game dynasty settings, and I like building from the bottom in fantasy leagues, too.
The easiest solution: Play for money.
I find the best keeper leagues have rules to keep dumping in check. You have to make it as hard as possible to diminish the integrity of the league. Leagues with no system of checks and balances or leagues with voting will ultimately lead to failing because real or imagined injustices.
Btw. The best thing you can give a poor man is not food stamps or welfare, it’s a job.
And the world is much different than the time when taxes were near 90%. And you could thank JFK for tax cuts that spur growth.
We don’t need new or higher taxes we need more taxpayers.
I ran into a “league integrity” issue when I took over the team in dead last place of a 14 team Dynasty league with rosters 30 players deep and 8×8 settings (2b, 3b, OBP, Cg, Holds, k/9). The first few trades I made caused a huge commotion and half the league was complaining that I was giving up too much in my trades.
One trade in particular had me giving up Mariano Rivera and Mark Reynolds for Clay Buchholz and Daniel Hudson right before the trade to Arizona. It went through after a lot of arguing. After turning over my entire roster in a matter of weeks I proceeded to put up the 2nd best record over the last 6 weeks of the season. This season I’m a game and a half out of first place.
This is a perfect example of how something that looks like a dump trade can turn a loser into a winner.