What is Ottoneu?
So, what is Ottoneu?
Ottoneu is a smarter, better brand of fantasy baseball. By design, it’s a fantasy platform engineered for the hardcore baseball fan that doesn’t enjoy the term “off season”. Ottoneu is the perfect fit for FanGraphs readers looking to join a competitive fantasy baseball league with a lot of cool features, a sabermetric-economy, and a massive community of raving fans.
You can read first-year feedback from Ottoneu players here. You can also learn a lot more about the game from the FAQ, but here are the top 10 reasons you should consider joining or moving your fantasy baseball league to Ottoneu this year:
1) Depth & Breadth
Ottoneu is deep. Standard leagues are 12 teams with 40 man rosters. The available player pool is massive, which means you have access to the full minor leagues so that you can more easily build for both the present (22-man starting lineup) and the future (prospects). But don’t let the size of the player pool intimidate you. It simply means you can target any player you want, build your roster any way you like, and keep any player that fits into your $400 budget.
2) Year-Round Baseball
Ottoneu never sleeps, so it’s not ideal for the casual baseball fan. Ottoneu is better suited for the hardball rat who follows the game as closely in the winter as they do in the summer. While Ottoneu stops just short of a true dynasty league, you have the option to keep every single player on your roster from season to season, which means you may be negotiating just as many trades in December as you are July. Leagues and communities are active year round, so the result is more options, more flexibility, and a much better fantasy baseball experience.
3) Scoring Formats for All
Roto:
If you play Roto, Ottoneu has you covered. The standard game offers two versions of rotisserie baseball.
- The “Classic” 5 x 5 (AVG, HR, RBI, R, SB x ERA, W, SV, WHIP, K)
- The “Old School” 4 x 4 (OBP, SLG, HR, R x ERA, WHIP, K, HR/9)
Points:
If your preference is for a more sabermetrically-inclined points format, try “FanGraph Points”, which is based on linear weights. Closely related, the FIP-based “SABR Points” is also available, and both points systems are fully integrated with FanGraphs.
New: Head-t0-Head is coming to Ottoneu!
4) Player Auctions
All players in Ottoneu are purchased via auction, either in the annual Spring live auction draft or during the season via 48-hour free agent player auctions. The market (your league) dictates player salaries, the primary reflection of player value, which makes leagues more dynamic, more economic, and more realistic. Gone are the days of lamenting your pick in the snake draft or missing out on a free agent because you could not get to your computer in time. If you want to own Cody Bellinger, you need only bid $1 more than your competition.
Resource: How to Calculate Auction Player Values for Ottoneu
5) Salary Arbitration
In addition to standard salary inflation ($2 increase for each MLB player/year), Ottoneu leagues also use one of two forms of arbitration as a seasonal competitive balance measure. Regardless of which process you choose, you’ll have the opportunity to increase the cost of players on rival rosters at the close of each season. A great deal of ink has already been spilled on the endless strategies behind Ottoneu arbitration because it’s one of the most unique, dynamic, and addictive features of the game.
Ottoneu Arbitration Results (2017)
6) Prize Leagues
While you can join your first Ottoneu league for a small registration fee, Ottoneu is primarily designed for the committed baseball fanatic, which is why prize leagues are growing in popularity. Ottoneu owners take game play seriously, so whether you’re a fantasy veteran looking for a higher level of competition this year, or an experienced commissioner looking to move your league to a premium platform, check out the Ottoneu prize league tiers.
7) FanGraphs & RotoGraphs Integration
Ottoneu is fully integrated with FanGraphs. Let that sink in for a minute. You already read FanGraphs daily, so why not align your fantasy league with FanGraphs, too? Ottoneu stats, player pages, and features are interconnected with FanGraphs, further making it the clear choice for the advanced fantasy manager, and an easy transition for established leagues looking to move to a host with better analytics and support. Plus, we’ll provide you dedicated Ottoneu content right here at RotoGraphs.
8) A Massive, Engaged Community
One of the best aspects of Ottoneu is the massive contingent of game players discussing all things baseball (and football) 24/7/365. You can find the most active Ottoneu gamers on the official community site and on Slack, which we’ve hijacked for all things Ottoneu, now with well over 1,000 members. Complementing the already feature-rich platform, the Ottoneu community brings all owners together in one place to crowdsource player information, trade feedback, auction tips, keep/cut decisions, enhanced league communications, and a forum for recruiting new league owners. Even if you don’t play Ottoneu (yet), the community is a goldmine of daily baseball dialogue, strategy, and advice, and it also the perfect place to dip your toe in if you have any interest in learning more about playing and joining Ottoneu. When you do play Ottoneu, you’ll want to get acquainted with the community as soon as possible, as it is an excellent resource for new Ottoneu players.
9) A Challenge Worth Taking
If you can’t tell, Ottoneu is premium fantasy baseball. It’s challenging, it’s analytical, and it might just be the best fantasy format you’ve never heard of until now. While more traditional fantasy platforms can offer a fun, casual experience, you should try your hand at Ottoneu this year if you’re reading RotoGraphs right now. Ottoneu will put your skills to the test and you’ll quickly become a better fantasy player because Ottoneu is a better fantasy game.
10) The Most Dedicated Designer
All these reasons above help make Ottoneu a refreshing change to the typical fantasy experience, but the thread that holds it all together is the dedication of its founder and developer, Niv Shah. Unlike most other fantasy platforms, Ottoneu’s single biggest advantage may be its relative youth (created in 2005), which means improvements are coming in almost real time, and often by request. In fact, here’s a great example:
A Thank You, from me to all of you https://t.co/9DMu115QHc
— Ottoneu Fantasy Sports (@Ottoneu) December 25, 2017
Whether it’s the initial creation of the game or the recent roll out of fantasy football (2015), Ottoneu’s accessible creator is constantly tweaking an already excellent game to make it the best fantasy sports product available today. You can contact Niv here with any questions you may have as you get started.
Bottom line: If you play fantasy baseball and you read FanGraphs, you should play Ottoneu fantasy sports. You can find a list of available teams or post your interest in joining Ottoneu here. You can also check out an interview with creator Niv Shah here.
If you’re playing #FantasyBaseball this season, you should get started by playing @fangraphs @ottoneuBaseball https://t.co/U5PXj3LZaW ⚾️🏆
— Lucky Strikes 🍀 (@fazeorange) January 6, 2018
Have questions about Ottoneu before diving in? We’ll answer them all in the comments.
More Ottoneu resources here:
Approaching the Trade Deadline
Production, Salary, Surplus, Value
Trey is a 20+ year fantasy veteran and an early adopter of Ottoneu fantasy sports. He currently administers the Ottoneu community, a network of ~1,200 fantasy baseball and football fans talking sports daily. More resources here: http://community.ottoneu.com
I am curious why you don’t offer NL or AL only leagues.
NL/AL only leagues may be an option in the future. For now, Ottoneu is built to be deep, especially with 40 man rosters being standard. Niv may want to weigh in on this question later as well.
AL/NL-only becomes weird with the full minor leagues. There are some folks interested in those options, so they may be added in the future.
Definately would be interested in NL only. 10-12 teams, 40 man rosters.
If guys like Carson Sands, Aramis Garcia, or Braxton Davidson aren’t owned, it ain’t deep enough.
I, too, would love an NL only option.
Need a couple owners for a new fantrax NL only dynasty league, roto 5×5 standard, very competitive crew, slow draft starts soon. Email eliassensportsbureau@gmail.com if interested
Can you shortly explain how you can make other teams players more expensive? That premise is lost on me. Also, how many leagues dissolve per year?
Yes, arbitration is unique to Ottoneu and it’s used as an annual competitive balance measure. Essentially each team gets to add a few dollars to every other roster as a measure of inflation.
Here’s the exact process: “The allocation system gives a $25 budget to each team in the league. The team can allocate this budget towards players on other teams. Each team must allocate at least one dollar to every other team, and no team can allocate more than $3 to any other team. At the end of the allocation period, all players have their salary increased by the amount allocated towards them. Allocations take place after the initial offseason salary increase, so any allocations will be in addition to the $1 or $2 increase each player gets at the end of the season.”
Otherwise known as “Arrieta went from $9 to $31 in a few weeks.”
Because it is easy for commissioners to replace owners as needed, very few leagues dissipate from year to year. If you start a league with a good group, it is very easy to stay together!
Thanks for the reply! Can a newbie view existing leagues as a member or does the commissioner need to reach out?
Derek, yes you can view open leagues here: http://ottoneu.fangraphs.com/joinleague
If you want to join an existing league, you should post yourself on the available owners board http://ottoneu.fangraphs.com/available
Commissioners check that page for new owners as needed!
I’m beginning Year 3 and we have already turned over ownership of ten to twelve teams. Only three teams participated in this year’s allocation process. Not every league makes a go of it. Ours should change its name to Moribund.
This sounds like a good reason to join our community on Slack to find more committed, active owners. The #leagues-wanted channel is a great place to start.
its essentially partly crowdsourced arbitration numbers by the rest of the league.
this cuts down on the dynasty aspect, as having a $5 carlos correa won’t be a forever bargain.
Exactly, but even Correa’s average increase across all leagues was only ~$10 dollars. So maybe a $5 Correa becomes $15 or $20, then $35 the year after (still allowing him to be owned with surplus). Bottom line, if you hit on a cheap elite player, you can own him for 3-4 years below market value.
And also if you have a $5 Correa, other GM’s are going to nail him in arbitration, but that means the rest of your squad avoids it.
Would it be very difficult to support custom category combinations for Roto? This is the only reason our league hasn’t switched over from ESPN.
I’m interested in this as well. My league has replaced HR with TB (a move I love) and are looking into a way to integrate walks into offensive stats (either TB + BB + IBB or OBP) and potentially replacing W with QS.
Email help@ottoneu.com about new stats, and I’ll see what I can do!
Yeah, our league has kept 5×5, but have switched to OBP instead of AVG, Net SB instead of SB, QS’s instead of W’s, and net Holds+Saves instead of just saves. We have liked it much better and seems to be the best 5×5 format over the past 15 years that we have settled on.
I’m currently in the 6th year of a Dynasty league over at CBS. I’ve been curious about Ottoneu for a little while now. Other than the salary arbitration, can someone outline the main differences between Ottoneu and Dynasty?
Other differentiators include the way free agents are added (48 hour blind auctions, and the $ bid is deducted from the $400 salary cap rather than having a separate FAAB budget), the unique points formats that are based on season totals rather than weekly head-to-head, and in general the very specific way ottoneu serves as an economic system for fantasy baseball (auction drafts, salary increases, arbitration, waiver claims). All of that tightly integrated into Fangraphs tools, and coupled with a vibrant community of passionate owners.
I enjoyed playing ottoneu the past couple years but I am stopping this year because the web page was so hard to use. It was a major pain on the phone, which is where I end up setting my lineup at night. The website is clunky and needlessly complex. I appreciate that it is the brainchild of Nev and I have no doubt the maintenance of the site is a daunting task… but for a pay league I would expect a much better platform.
I look forward to checking back next year and hope to play again when the site functionality catches up to its competitors, because the format of the league is really really cool.
For what it’s worth, the Roster Organizer and Lineups page have been updated in the past month and are much easier to use now.
I’m sorry to hear that, but I definitely know the kinds of issues you’re talking about. I’m constantly working on improving the interface and I have high hopes for the 2016 improvements, so reach out and maybe I can change your mind
Agree with jjdouglas, improvements have been made. The platform isnt sexy, but it gets the job done.
I will say, nothing was worse than the football hiccup that happened last season and interrupted baseball lineups. Man do I irrationally hate football!
I would echo this sentiment. I looked into playing, but the interface was confusing, I couldn’t sort the player database, the message boards were difficult to read. I am sure the back end is excellent, but the front end experience needs a lot of work.
Daily lines, weekly, or choice?
This was supposed to say “lineups”
There is a weekly lineups option but the default is daily
Love the Ottoneu experience, it is a better game…
Wishlist:
1) Any chance to get Ottoneu Ap? Fangraphs Ap? Would love it
2) Other sites let you search free agent players by ownership percentage in all leagues– can that be added?
What does integrated with Fangraphs tools mean?
Mostly what I meant by that is all player searches and statistics shown within ottoneu link to Fangraphs pages. If I want to see the highest scoring 1B in a Fangraphs points league, I’m presented with a leaderboard that looks exactly like a Fangraphs leaderboard, because that’s basically what it is. Another example are the roster exports you can do within the ottoneu league page, that export includes Fangraphs id so it is easy to take that rosters.csv and tie it to Steamer or ZiPS projections downloaded from Fangraphs.
How do I join a league and how much does it cost?
There are multiple tiers, with the basic leagues costing $9.99 and prize league tiers of $49.99 and $99.99. You can join a new league here (http://ottoneu.fangraphs.com/joinleague) or look for openings in existing leagues here (http://ottoneu.fangraphs.com/claimteams). You can also add yourself to the available owners list so commissioners can find you here (http://ottoneu.fangraphs.com/available). Lastly, I would definitely encourage you to join the Slack community, we have channels dedicated to new owners and owners looking to join a league. Send an email to ottoneutrades@gmail.com for an invite.
Explain the reasoning behind the RP and SP rules. A guy like Danny Duffy last year was tough to own.
In Ottoneu, pitchers only accrue points when placed in the lineup that matches their role during that day. You can put any pitcher in your SP or RP slots, but they only get points at SP if they were the starting pitcher for the game. Likewise for RP slots, points are scored only if the come on in relief that day.
The reasoning is that players who had SP/RP eligibility (because role change) could be put into SP positions even when they were coming out of the bullpen. Coming out of the bullpen for a few batters almost always results in better K/9, BB/9, etc, so it was a viable strategy to stream mediocre pitchers at SP instead of pitching actual starting pitchers.
There are always a few players who straddle between bullpen and starter, but on the whole this was an important and good change.
It’s a great way to stay in shape.
Another badly needed improvement is a one-button test of everybody’s hardware and software draft capability. I could not submit bids quickly enough last year and landed only one player in that draft by overpaying for him. And I never learned what was wrong with Firefox or the Otto draft software, so it could happen again. That would be very disappointing.
I commish 2 otto baseball leagues and 1 football. It is easily the best fantasy option out there for nerds like me. The improvements come quickly and Niv is always available to trouble shoot with you. Every season I crowds source my managers for changes and email them Niv. I have yet to submit them yet but here they are for everyone to agree/disagree with:
4×4 League:
-Drafting can be glitchy with lots of freezing, which leads to someone getting Paul Goldschmidt for $22.
-Continue regular updates to mobile site
-Allow expanded ability for commish to make roster/lineup adjustment in case of emergencies
Points League:
– Ability to play H2H instead of running points (this would be a neat option for people starting a new season, and football version does it).
Football:
-Continue to get analysis/advice from “professional fantasy people” maybe weekly projections for points?
Important question–how do you pronounce Ottoneu?
It is an important question. “Otto-New”
Is H2H categories an option? Or is it only roto and points?
Right now Ottoneu only offers Roto and Points, but I believe H2H options may be in the works for the future.
Prize tiers are pretty weak. You should pay out just about every dollar you take in. $120 for a 12 team league with no pay out is more than weak, it’s insane. Take into account the bad interface and sadly Ottoneu isn’t worth playing.