Dumping early is a bad strategy

[Teenwolf]

Why would anybody dump in April when we haven't seen prospects play in over a year?

I see it every year, guys dumping in April when we know almost nothing about the players being targeted.

I understand people believe there's a 'premium' supposedly paid for early deals. Last year I got 3 studs for Lux in April, but other than that, I believe the lack of information is a much bigger hindrance to receiving value than whatever premium could be offered.

I just said the same thing to a player in an email and thought I'd bring it up for discussion.

Anybody find any tactical edge to early dumping? I guess you could target prospects or players you believe will blow up this year before they play and demand more of a return. But I think that would be a narrow range of players, largely high money internationals that haven't had enough stateside exposure to get accurate scouting looks.

[The Feral Slasher]

There is some advantage in being the only seller if there are multiple buyers. Plus the potential to choose what players to target before any other deals are made.

[umjewman]

I guess if you come out of an auction and feel like you have no chance, you avoid the worst case scenario of your high-priced commodities getting hurt or diminishing their value with a bad start to the season. I mean, if you have a superstar who suffers a major injury in late April, you lost your chance to deal him.

I guess that's the justification. I've never dumped before like June or so, I don't think.

[Sour Masher]

The practice is discouraged in my league, but has happened. Most often, if selling happens at all this time of year, it is of a specific type of asset--a player at high risk of injury that is doing well early. Last year, someone sold Stanton just a couple of games in, for instance. I agree that if you think the player will be healthy and do well, it is better to wait. There is risk in that, though. The player can get hurt or suck, ruining his trade value. I wish I'd have sold Paxton to the guy I outbid, for instance. He was offering decent prospects, but I am trying to win so it made no sense. If, however, I was a bottom tier team and he made that offer, I'd have jumped on it, for what are obvious reasons.

[Gregg]

In both of my only leagues we cannot trade prospects until after the All Star Break.

If I am in the rebuilding mode I will trade my X contracts as soon as I can. It gives my assets the most value to my trading partners.

The expensive non-X contracts vary on how I trade them. Who ever finishes 5th gets first pick in the next season's reserve round. Our finishing position also effects how many keepers we get.

1=10 keepers
2nd=11
3rd=12
4th =13
5th=14
6th=14
7th=14
8th=14
9th=13
10th=12
11th=11
12th=10 keepers

The All Star prospect rule plus the finishing/keeper rule was implemented (along with a couple of other things) to help control dumping. Dumping was threatening our league and diminishing the importance of our auction.

While not perfect is has helped a lot.

[chancellor]

I guess if you come out of an auction and feel like you have no chance, you avoid the worst case scenario of your high-priced commodities getting hurt or diminishing their value with a bad start to the season. I mean, if you have a superstar who suffers a major injury in late April, you lost your chance to deal him.

I've only dumped early once, and I'm not even sure if it was late April, but it was somewhere close to there. I went all-in on the 2015 season in my AL only, came into 2016 with a terrible keeper list. Two of us in the league really liked Garrett Richards; I had him in '14 and '15, with his contract expiring in '15. Wanted to get him back, but got outbid to a pretty outrageous level by the other manager who mancrushed on him. I ended up spending big on David Price as part of my rebuilding Stars and Scrubs strategy.

Richards blew out his arm pretty early in 2016, and I got paranoid at that point, and traded Price shortly thereafter, and my high priced hitters shortly thereafter.

[Hornsby]

In a couple of my leagues, the salary cap ends up being something of an incentive to dump early. I've seen a lot of instances where teams are already up against the cap in June, so you can't deal away high priced assets without a corresponding dollar drop, You can make it work, but it's not a lot of fun.

[Gregg]

I've only dumped early once, and I'm not even sure if it was late April, but it was somewhere close to there. I went all-in on the 2015 season in my AL only, came into 2016 with a terrible keeper list. Two of us in the league really liked Garrett Richards; I had him in '14 and '15, with his contract expiring in '15. Wanted to get him back, but got outbid to a pretty outrageous level by the other manager who mancrushed on him. I ended up spending big on David Price as part of my rebuilding Stars and Scrubs strategy.

Richards blew out his arm pretty early in 2016, and I got paranoid at that point, and traded Price shortly thereafter, and my high priced hitters shortly thereafter.

Did you write about it back then? I have a vague remembrance of this.

[The Feral Slasher]

In both of my only leagues we cannot trade prospects until after the All Star Break.

If I am in the rebuilding mode I will trade my X contracts as soon as I can. It gives my assets the most value to my trading partners.

The expensive non-X contracts vary on how I trade them. Who ever finishes 5th gets first pick in the next season's reserve round. Our finishing position also effects how many keepers we get.

1=10 keepers
2nd=11
3rd=12
4th =13
5th=14
6th=14
7th=14
8th=14
9th=13
10th=12
11th=11
12th=10 keepers

The All Star prospect rule plus the finishing/keeper rule was implemented (along with a couple of other things) to help control dumping. Dumping was threatening our league and diminishing the importance of our auction.

While not perfect is has helped a lot.

interesting rule that teams have different numbers of keepers based on finish.

Regarding the bolded point. Part of a keeper league is the ability to manage your team roster season over season. Not every team should expect to compete every year, even if they have a good auction - if they badly mismanaged their roster or traded away lots of pieces to compete the year before. Anyway, that's how I look at it. Which is I guess why it doesn't really matter to me if someone dumps in April or May or June - in the big picture of multiple seasons it doesn't really matter much. If a team is horrible they are going to trade their assets at some point, doesn't matter much to me when they do it. My perspective might be in the minority, I've certainly seen some extreme proposals for those who make dump trades early.

[Gregg]

interesting rule that teams have different numbers of keepers based on finish.

Regarding the bolded point. Part of a keeper league is the ability to manage your team roster season over season. Not every team should expect to compete every year, even if they have a good auction - if they badly mismanaged their roster or traded away lots of pieces to compete the year before. Anyway, that's how I look at it. Which is I guess why it doesn't really matter to me if someone dumps in April or May or June - in the big picture of multiple seasons it doesn't really matter much. If a team is horrible they are going to trade their assets at some point, doesn't matter much to me when they do it. My perspective might be in the minority, I've certainly seen some extreme proposals for those who make dump trades early.

I agree with everything you have written.

Others were tired of being in the money only to lose out by large lopsided trades on the last trading day. Too many good owners were thinking of leaving the leagues if something wasn't done.

I would rather play with these rules than not play in these leagues with these guys.

[The Feral Slasher]

I agree with everything you have written.

Others were tired of being in the money only to lose out by large lopsided trades on the last trading day. Too many good owners were thinking of leaving the leagues if something wasn't done.

I would rather play with these rules than not play in these leagues with these guys.

Yeah, anti-dumping rules dont bother me, and I am fine with less restrictions. Having a good set of owners is a lot more important

[Ken]

interesting rule that teams have different numbers of keepers based on finish.

Regarding the bolded point. Part of a keeper league is the ability to manage your team roster season over season. Not every team should expect to compete every year, even if they have a good auction - if they badly mismanaged their roster or traded away lots of pieces to compete the year before. Anyway, that's how I look at it. Which is I guess why it doesn't really matter to me if someone dumps in April or May or June - in the big picture of multiple seasons it doesn't really matter much. If a team is horrible they are going to trade their assets at some point, doesn't matter much to me when they do it. My perspective might be in the minority, I've certainly seen some extreme proposals for those who make dump trades early.

I'm in the middle.

In general I agree that keeper leagues are keeper leagues and there will be dumping, it is just part of the game.

However I've participated in leagues where, in order to compete for the top 3 spots, you HAVE to churn 1/3 of your roster from dumping teams. If you don't, you have no chance because the dumping teams dump so early and so dramatically that *not* participating in the dumb trades means you lose.

There's a middle ground there somewhere that we always try to find.

[cleo]

we had one owner who was the master of the 2 year plan. He would be the first to dump and could cherry pick the best keepers and also would have less chance of the start players he traded in getting hurt if he traded them in April. He pretty much won the league on even years.

[The Feral Slasher]

we had one owner who was the master of the 2 year plan. He would be the first to dump and could cherry pick the best keepers and also would have less chance of the start players he traded in getting hurt if he traded them in April. He pretty much won the league on even years.

Pretty cool that you are in a league with Bret Saberhagen

[The Feral Slasher]

Pretty cool that you are in a league with Bret Saberhagen

Wait, I think he was good in odd years