Navigating the Auction
Last night I completed my third straight ottoneu auction in as many nights, and sixth overall so far this draft season. Every year the auctions I’m a part of seem tighter and more difficult, but the massive hours I’ve spent participating in ottoneu auctions the past two seasons has given me a good feel for what to expect. Let’s take a look at the different auction phases, and the strategies for dealing with them.
Before I start breaking down the auction phases, I want to take a moment to discuss the interplay between auction preparation and the application of that prep work during the auction. As I have discussed in other articles, my prep work involves generating dollar values, modifying those values using the inflation rate for that particular league, identifying positional and specific player targets, and generating expected auction prices for each player to identify bargains and players I value much less than others (these are the players I try to nominate in the early going).
How much of that plan actually gets carried out in my auctions? Less than you might think. As the great American philosopher Mike Tyson once said- “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face”, and the typical ottoneu auction will likely leave you feeling like you took an uppercut to the jaw. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t have a plan going into an auction, but rather that any plan you make must be fluid and adaptable, rather than rigid, otherwise you are bound to make mistakes (or more mistakes than usual!) in the heat of the auction battle.
Auction Appetizer
This is a sort of mini-phase that kicks off each auction, lasting through the first half dozen or so nominations. In both a first year auction and a returning league my experience has been that owners are generally fairly passive during the first half round of the auction, as they sit on their piles of auction dollars and see other worthy targets they prefer to spend their money on. My advice for this phase? If you plan on competing this is the best time to throw out a stud and acquire him at par or at a slight discount, so if you have an early nomination don’t be shy about throwing out one of your top targets.
Early Auction
Once the introductory phase of the auction is over we reach the phase of the auction that is most variable from league to league. In some leagues this phase is characterized by heavy bidding as owners spend whatever it takes to acquire studs (this is more typical in first year leagues, as all twelve owners are trying to compete and the demand for production is high even though the supply is also high), and in other leagues the passivity of the introductory phase carries over into the early phase (this is more typical is returning leagues, where there might only be two or three strong contenders and the studs being nominated may not fit each contender’s roster and budget). The key to navigating this phase is to identify as quickly as possible if the league is being aggressive, or passive, or somewhere in between. When your league mates are being aggressive in the early phase, it may be tempting to follow the herd and overspend yourself, but be very careful that you don’t ruin your flexibility in a panic. In a passive league, this phase carries the same advantages as the very beginning of the auction, and you should try to acquire a couple top tier assets at good prices. Another strategy I like to employ during this phase is to nominate younger and lower tier assets, those types of players will always auction at a higher price early in the auction than they will middle and late since there is a greater chance of more owners having the roster space and cap space to get involved.
Mid-Auction
This is the phase where the trends begin to reverse themselves. If the league was aggressive early, it will begin to become more passive as teams start to run into lineup and cap space constraints. If the league was passive early, aggression will become the norm as owners realize the talent pool is dwindling and there is more demand (auction dollars) than supply (productive players). Another key characteristic of this phase are positional “bubbles”. These bubbles occur when there are only one or two players at a particular tier within a given position, and owners become extremely aggressive in order to acquire one of the last players of the tier. The other night in the Champions League (#530) auction Matt Holliday went for $32 because there was a bubble at OF, Holliday was the only $10+ outfielder left and two teams (myself included!) traded blows in an attempt to not be shut out at the position. The biggest lesson? Don’t wait until there are only a couple options left at a position to fill it, as the bubble will explode in your face!
Late Auction
Depending on how tight your league is, this is either the phase where you can gobble up $10 players for $2 or $3, or the phase where you fill out the back end of your roster with $1 fliers. Given the roster and cap space constraints all owners are dealing with at this point of the auction, the winning bids will likely be determined by who has the most cap/roster flexibility and/or whoever nominates the player first. This (and the mid-auction) are often the points in a first year auction where you can acquire quite a bit of value, but in a returning league your options will be more limited.
Do you have any other lessons based on your auction experiences? Let me know in the comments!
Justin is a life long Cubs fan who has been playing fantasy baseball for 20+ years, and an ottoneu addict since 2012. Follow him on Twitter @justinvibber.
Dont drink and draft or youll wake up the next morning with a $15 Jacoby Ellsbury
Yes, a very sound lesson indeed!
Counterpoint: If you DO plan to drink and draft, keep a “sleeper list” on you. That’s how I ended up with a $1 Adam Duvall I didn’t remember drafting last year.
I like to throw out DH only players to clog up the flexibility of other owners or get a DH at a discount for myself. Usually works well, exception was someone getting Ortiz for $17, likely a combination of it being early in the auction and people fearing his age. Obviously earned surplus value there.
FYI. I think Ortiz is retired….right?
We had 2 owners unable to participate in our 1st night draft. So both will be starting the 2nd half w/$400, while the rest of us will be starting w/$150 or less. I’ve not been involved in an auction where this has happened before. Has anyone else? If so how did effect the rest of the draft?
With computer bidders, its in your best interest to get them to fill up their rosters ASAP, so nominate bad/injured players and force them to buy them at suggested prices.
I’ve only had it happen once, after which we instituted a rule that owners have to be present for the draft. In that one experience people pretty much looked at the $ values on the draft engine (we were in an ESPN auction) and price enforced every player right up to the ESPN values. The result was the autodraft teams never overbid, but spent full price on players who should have been values, and left a lot of draft dollars on the table.
I did my first Ottoneu draft this week and played the part of Mike Tyson. I bought Trout, betts, bryant, Archer, and Cespedes in the first 15 nominations. 55% of my budget gone.
my calculations had me profiting $25 on those picks.
What it did was cause people to over spend on the top remaining players. Leaving me at the end with my pick of $10 players for $1-3. I was able to draft Stroman, Estrada, Skaggs, Norris, Cotton, and Wacha for a total of $21.
If you were truly able to get those 5 players for only 55% of your budget you are drafting against a bunch of morons.
I did my first auction two days ago. I was eagerly waiting months and had a ton of research done. Then, about an hour in, I had 9 players drafted and had 88$ left for the other 31. It was a nightmare because I considered myself a saavy fantasy baseball guy and to be smart, but in the end, I did the exact thing I told myself I wouldn’t do. It really sucks because over half of my roster are going to have to be 1$ guys and I really regret how I handled it, especially given how excited I was for it. If there’s a silver lining, it was a good learning experience I guess.
Many first-time Ottoneu auctioners have experienced this, so no worries. This is why the auction is really a refined skill over time (and probably a reason Justin plays in 10+ leagues/season)…
i wouldn’t sweat it. it’s a long, unpredictable season. and worst case scenario, you just sell off the expensive guys along with big loans for cost-controlled studs that you build around for next year.
To guard against that in the future, your prep should include placing players in projected price ranges $1-$5; $6-$10; etc. and creating a number of scenarios about how many players you would take from each range to complete your roster. Taking two $30+ players, for example, might dictate that you only take two $20-$29 players and 15 $5-$15 players. While it’s fine and expected that you won’t be able to adhere strictly to every parameter in a scenario, and in fact, you want some flexibility to deviate, staying closer to those scenarios will prevent being stick with 25 $1 players (and prevent ending up with a wad of unspent cash)
Great points on sneaking a mid-level target in the appetizer phase and avoiding the bubble popping on your guy. Planning to spend my 5th overall nomination on one of my targets in the lower-half of the $18-$25 outfielder tier.
I noticed the same thing happen in a recent 12 team draft when the last of the undisputed top 10 bats was nominated (and a couple of the other teams already drafted two of them). The remaining 5 teams without a “first round” bat paid an $8 premium or so on the #10 guy.
That is a great argument for not filling your Utility position with a DH or other player early in the draft. That way, if you see a bubble ready to pop at a position you have already filled, you can nominate the last or second last player in the bubble and watch the bidding war ensue, taking valuable bidding dollars out of the hands of your opponents.
Some tips from someone who has played in deep A.L. only keeper leagues with 12 owners and 40-man rosters (including a 17-man reserve):
(1) In any league in which you go against the same owners year-after-year, you need to vary your approach to nominating players. While it’s generally prudent to nominate players early who you think will cause rivals to over-spend, you need to mix it up a bit, sometimes nominating a player you want. Like poker, rivals will try to anticipate how aggressively you will wager (or in fantasy baseball, bid), and you want to keep them off-stride.
(2) It’s absolutely true most leagues have cautious bidding on the first player or two. But it’s not only because owners are spending shy, its because the first name or two nominated tends to be the Mike Trouts of the world. If you are tossing out the first name, only nominate a stud if that player’s salary fits into your plans, because otherwise, you are helping a rival land that player at a discount.
(3) In the end game, keep careful tabs on the maximum each owner can bid and which positions they have available, and craft your bids and nominations with that in mind. If you and two other owners need a middle infielder, your max bid is $3 and the max bid of the other owners is $3 and $2, nominate the player you really want for $3 so you can’t be outbid.
(4) While it’s critical to track pricing trends, it’s just as important to prepare by setting league-specific targets for each category, then track during the auction as you acquire players what remains for each target, as this helps you better focus on addressing your team’s needs. I start out each auction with a spreadsheet with targets for homers, steals, etc., then deduct from those targets with each acquired player. This is especially important in leagues that are more trade-adverse.
(5) If you are in a keeper league and have an enviable keeper list, some of your rivals may try to bid up players you seek in an effort to make you spend more money. While the easy thing to do is to simply not bid above projected value plus inflation, it is sometimes better to lure a rival into an early bidding war on a player you don’t want, then let then have that player, so you blow up their budget and reduce the chance they will deliberately target you again. It’s a bit of a risky gambit but sometime helpful and I have used it with success.
1) Concede in early rounds you have to spend to get talent
2) Watch for runs
3) Consider position scarcity
4) Look for mid-round bargains
5) Make sure you money for the late rounds because having only enough money to buy $1 player sort of sucks
A nomination strategy that’s worked for me in the past:
Before the auction, pick a few $3-4 players that you wouldn’t mind having on your team, but that you aren’t invested in owning either. Nominate them EARLY in the auction for $1, and a few things can happen:
1. Everyone is so surprised that such a low value player is nominated that they freeze and you get the guy for $1, improving your $/player ratio for the rest of the draft and getting you a quick $2-3 surplus.
2. Guys are so geared up to bid on players that someone tops your $1 bid. If this happens, I completely withdraw from the bidding on that player, and hope that he goes for more than his $3-4 value. If he doesn’t, you didn’t really lose anything aside from another owner getting a buck or two of value. If he does go for more, you’ve taken extra draft dollars away from an opponent.
One word of warning is that depending on your bench size I wouldn’t try this past the point that you roster one of these guys, as it could create some inflexibility if you start to get too many of them on your roster too early.
Some great replies, not too much to add. I do find that, in my NL-only keeper auction league, I tend to hang onto money for too long waiting for those bargains and/or sleepers at the end of the draft. Problem is, those types of players are usually nice to complement a team but not to spend a ton of money on for a reason. Don’t wait too long.
Regarding the offering a players to bid on, when I don’t want anyone to know who I’m targeting I offer catchers. It’s a two catcher league, so someone is going to want the backstop no matter how mundane. It allows me to keep secret who I’m waiting for or interested in.