Question about your keeper league(s)

[Pogues]

On average, what percentage of player slots are available for your auction each year, league wide?

In other words, how many slots need to be filled after keepers are declared.

Follow up question: Is 25% of the slots needed to be filled reasonable for competitive balance?

[Fresno Bob]

in my NL 12 team 5x5, we can only keep a maximum of 8 players, I've played in leagues where we keep up to 15 and most people do. I'd think that only auctioning 25% of the players would lead to some frightening inflation.

[Sour Masher]

We keep 15, but have 30 man rosters (we start more and have a deeper bench to allow us to go deeper into the player pool as a 14 team mixed league). So, we auction 50% of our players, but the majority of the best ones are usually kept. I think anything more than 50% kept is too much.

[bryanbutler]

all leagues i'm in cap at 10 keepers (and most keep 10 or close to it), so a bit more than 50% of slots are open after keepers. i think that promotes year-after-year competition. personally i think 25% is way too low.

[Erik]

As with many things, my league is not easily categorized on this. We have 6 keepers per team and 21 spaces on the active roster (28.6%). However, we also can buy bench players in the auction (majors or minors, we don't distinguish), and one's bench can be anywhere from 0 to 9 players. Most teams buy less than 9 bench players in the auction and acquire the rest via FAAB. Last year there were an average of 5.8 bench players per team purchased in the auction. So in reality, it was 6 keepers per team and 26.8 spaces per roster (22.4%). So we auction around 75% of our players, which is a ratio I'm quite comfortable with.

My feeling is any more than 50% of roster spots filled before the auction is going to lead to high inflation, a better chance of teams tanking before the season even starts, and a sense that the auction is no more important than trading and FAAB are to success.

[DMT]

all leagues i'm in cap at 10 keepers (and most keep 10 or close to it), so a bit more than 50% of slots are open after keepers. i think that promotes year-after-year competition. personally i think 25% is way too low.

Same here on all points.

[virgonomic]

We had 42 keepers for 10 teams (plus 2 expansion teams), so 18.3% of spots on returning teams were keepers.

[dslaw]

In my draft league we have 34 man rosters and can keep 12. Usually between 10 and 12 are kept. In my auction league we have 25 man rosters and can keep 10. I kept 10 last year but dropped to 6 this year. Most teams kept 8 or 9.

[Sharky]

We keep 7 of 23 total (in only leagues). No bench, but we do have a small minor league roster. Hope that helps.

[rhd]

In my 3 keeper leagues:

#1 - 5-keeper limit. Most teams keep 5, but all. This year, there were 12-13 keeper slots that werent used. We have 21-man rosters, and 21 teams so the % of roster spots to fill at auction was 349/441 = 79.1%. Inflation typically runs around 10-15%. In addition to the low keeper limit, inflation is held down by the fact that the keeper price is either 50% higher than the player's prior year's price or an additional $4 (equivalent) whichever is higher, the fact that no player can be kept for more than 3 years, and the fact that even tho it is a mixed league it is shallower than even a typical only league because only 25 MLB teams are eligible for the auction.
#2 - 7-keeper limit. Seldom does anyone keep less than 7, and I dont think anyone did this year. We have 23-man rosters, and 11 teams so the % of roster spots to fill at auction was 176/253 = 69.6%. Inflation runs around 20% or higher. Inflation is higher than typical because of the fact that reserve round picks have low keeper prices ($1-$5) so many of these get kept.
#3 - No keeper limit. People typically keep around 7-15 players. Lately, we've increased the roster size since some owners have dropped out. This year we'll have 10 teams and the roster size will be 27. So the % of roster spots to fill at auction should be about 160/270 = 59.3%. But inflation in this league is pretty typical, around 15% or so. This is because our rookie keeper prices are high ($10 equivalent) and FA keeper prices are even higher ($15-$25 equivalent). So the keepers are either bargains at the auction or elite prospects.

I agree generally w what was said above about the available slot % being as low as 25% being very anti-competitive. That would be more like a dynasty league than a typical roto league. It depends on the rules of league but I would say that generally the available slots to be filled need to be at least 50% or so.

I've also noticed that teams seem to be keeping more players in recent years than before, especially the higher-priced players.

[Lucky]

Up to 10 active players toward the 23 man roster, plus up to three minor leaguers for a separate reserve roster which is filled by a rotation draft after the auction. So, we have almost 57% of the active players in our auction. And having that many, plus three year contracts, means there are a good many valuable players every year.