How to curb dump deals

[Pauly]

In an NL only league I joined this season, the way they curb dump deals is to force you to keep for next year every traded player who is not in the final year of their contract. Well, to be frank, this policy totally blows and literally takes 75-80% of all players off the market. Why would I want to trade an expiring contract for a $5 Chris Heisey, for example, when I'd be forced to keep him for the rest of this year and next year? Too much foresight and luck involved in that!

There are a lot of people who hate the concept too, but there's never been a better suggested rule in this league history and several owners would rather have this rule than have trades that turn the league on its head.

I was searching around for a thread on ways to curb dump deals, and I remember a big one but I think it was on the old site. Anyway, do you guys have some good suggestions for a good rule to keep the dump deals fairly in check? I'd like to refer them to this thread or throw out a few ideas to them and get the debate going.

Thanks junkies!

[Fresno Bob]

How about the owner getting the studs has to put the salary difference between the traded players in the pot?

[Sour Masher]

Our league is the most dump heavy league ever. To be competitive as a top team, it is just a part of the league that you'll have to trade the future for the now. A couple of factors work to make our league probably the most dumpy league ever. Being in such a league has forced me to think a lot about why our league is so dump heavy, and how we could change that if I could ever get enough votes. So, I offer two ideas that I think are the biggest factors in the sorts of dump deals that frustrate those who hate dump deals.

To me, the worst type of dump deal is when one team trades tremendous future value for tremendous current value. A system that encourages that sort of deal forces all the haves and have nots into an unending cycle of dumping with the most extreme results. A much better system would force teams that want something to give up at least some present value, which leads to deals which offer more marginal upgrades for contenders and leaves them giving less long term. This evens out the rollercoaster, and I think that is a good thing. My league, however, loves the ups and downs. They love trading for huge in-season gains when contending, and getting huge long term value when dumping. Which is why we do the following things that you should avoid if you don't want that:

1. We go 50 deep, with 30 man rosters and 20 man minors. This means that the waiver wire is thinner than it should be both in the majors and minors. Reducing bench spots and minor league spots raises replacement level talent, eliminating the need to trade for just average players and reduces the gap between elite talent and replacement level talent.
2. We have an increased cap and a reduced extension cost. We have a $400 cap and extensions only costs $4 per year. This increases the value of young players and minor leaguers, which means that many dump trades revolve around players doing nothing in the majors at the moment, which makes for more lopsided deals in terms of current value. No matter how fair the deal ultimately is, it gives teams a huge edge to be able to trade minor leaguers for super studs. In the past, I've traded Harper, Trout, and McCutchen to make title runs. All of these deals ended up way better for the teams I gave these players too, but that is small consolation to the teams I passed with the massive influx of major league talent without having to give up any major leaguers of consequence back. So, a way to combat this is to go to the other extreme--lower the cap and/or increase the costs of extensions. That will reduce the value of young talent and minor leaguers.

The results of these two things will reduce dump deals, and it should mean that "dump" deals look less like Matt Holliday for Byron Buxton and more like Matt Holliday for a cheaper Desmond Jennings. In the former case, while both teams get what they want, the net gain of the dump deal makes it so that competing teams have to participate in the arms race to keep up. In the latter type of deal, the contender gains, but not without giving up current value, and not so much that it forces all other contenders to act in kind to have any shot of competing.

Of course, many might be against such moves. My league loves going 320 deep in the minors, even though that makes minor leaguers more valuable, because just about everyone who will ever make the majors as a solid regular is rostered in our minors. My league also loves small salary increases, because they love having young stars cheap for years, even if that makes for insane inflation that leads to Albert Pujols being traded annually from the dumping team that overpaid for him to one of the contenders willing to part with a top 10 prospect to get him.

[swampdragon]

I dont like FBs idea because then it becomes a who can spend money battle.

What about the in season salary cap that some leagues have?

[virgonomic]

My 10-team AL league did the following:
- in-season salary cap $310 (new)
- in-season salary floor $160 (new)
- 6 bench spots (down from 10)
- 4 DL spots (new)
- reserves are (salary / keeper price): 10/5, 10/5, 5/5, 5/5, 1/1, 1/1 (used to be flat $10)

The shorter bench should make for more player movement. It remains to be seen what the cap will do.

In 2012 the Sewell Rats won the title. In the 10 years prior to that I won 2 and Holgate Pumps won 8. Maybe we should just give him the boot to make the league more competitive.

[hombre]

Any player acquired via trade cannot be kept- period. It's the only 100% bulletproof way to stop "dump" trades in their tracks.

[JudeBaldo]

Any player acquired via trade cannot be kept- period. It's the only 100% bulletproof way to stop "dump" trades in their tracks.

Thank God this isn't a rule in any league I play in. It would make me stop playing in that league as this is a patently idiotic rule.

[DMT]

Any player acquired via trade cannot be kept- period. It's the only 100% bulletproof way to stop "dump" trades in their tracks.

Yep, and like Jude I'd never play in such a league.

[Lucky]

Any player acquired via trade cannot be kept- period. It's the only 100% bulletproof way to stop "dump" trades in their tracks.

This. It is what I have been saying for years.

Some people like dump trades, some don't. But if the objective is to stop them, this is the only way that cannot be gotten around.

[mgwiz22]

Any player acquired via trade cannot be kept- period. It's the only 100% bulletproof way to stop "dump" trades in their tracks.

It's not absurd it just goes too far. The rule prevents people from making legitimate trades as well as dump trades. Our league adds salary to players traded after a chosen date but once again it penalizes all trades.

[schlesinj]

We use * trades. Every team is allowed to trade for 2 * players (any player with salary over 20 or last year in contract, or player in AL or FAAB player over 60. A team is allowed to trade away as many as they like. A dumping team can trade 1 per team. This allows a decent distribution per team. We also allow free * for * trades that do not count against the total.

[TopChuckie]

I found there is no one good thing to fix dumping, but that it took a combination of things to significantly curb dumping, all things that I think add to the strategy of our league, unlike that silly no traded player can be kept rule. We encourage out of contention teams to trade for their future, we just don't want the trades to be unfairly lopsided.

Caps are important, so there is only so much salary one particular team can take on.

Maintaining some keeper value for players in the final year of their contracts is also important. Otherwise, if a team is out of contention and he has several quality players on expiring contracts, why not give them all away for that one stud prospect? In order to retain some keeper value, some leagues use Toppers, but I didn't feel toppers was enough incentive, so I created "Finchers", so named because it started in my Sidd Finch Rotisserie League. We give each team an additional budget between $1 to $5 with which after bidding at the draft has finished on their particular "Fincher" they can undercut the final bid based on how much Fincher Budget they have. Basically it equates to your final year players being restricted free agents at the following year's draft and gives you the opportunity to not only match their best offer, but to get a little bit of a "home town discount". I have found that this does motivate our owners to demand more value in return when considering if they should trade away their expiring contracts. There was a long thread at the old site outlining this idea when I first proposed it and following its fine tuning as I worked out the kinks. We were able to find it at a web archive site shortly after we first moved over here, but I don't think that works anymore. If you are interested, I can post the rule verbatim from my constitution, but it's kind of long.

I also created a tiered benefits system that allows more Fincher budget, more winter roster spots, more keepers, and the first picks in the reserve draft to the 5th, 6th, 7th, etc. place finishers over the 9th, 10th, 11th finishers so as to try to motivate teams to always finish as well as possible and not dump all their current talent for future talent.

Finally, I always encourage all my owners to talk to as many teams as possible before trading off their studs to insure they are getting the best value in return.

I have found these rules to significantly curb dumping, without eliminating the ability to make trades to build for the future, and actually added to the strategy and enjoyment of the league, unlike a "no traded player can be kept" rule which just detracts from the fun of a league and a team's ability to ever set itself up for the future.

[Lucky]

I found there is no one good thing to fix dumping, but that it took a combination of things to significantly curb dumping, all things that I think add to the strategy of our league, unlike that silly no traded player can be kept rule. We encourage out of contention teams to trade for their future, we just don't want the trades to be unfairly lopsided.

Caps are important, so there is only so much salary one particular team can take on.

Maintaining some keeper value for players in the final year of their contracts is also important. Otherwise, if a team is out of contention and he has several quality players on expiring contracts, why not give them all away for that one stud prospect? In order to retain some keeper value, some leagues use Toppers, but I didn't feel toppers was enough incentive, so I created "Finchers", so named because it started in my Sidd Finch Rotisserie League. We give each team an additional budget between $1 to $5 with which after bidding at the draft has finished on their particular "Fincher" they can undercut the final bid based on how much Fincher Budget they have. Basically it equates to your final year players being restricted free agents at the following year's draft and gives you the opportunity to not only match their best offer, but to get a little bit of a "home town discount". I have found that this does motivate our owners to demand more value in return when considering if they should trade away their expiring contracts. There was a long thread at the old site outlining this idea when I first proposed it and following its fine tuning as I worked out the kinks. We were able to find it at a web archive site shortly after we first moved over here, but I don't think that works anymore. If you are interested, I can post the rule verbatim from my constitution, but it's kind of long.

I also created a tiered benefits system that allows more Fincher budget, more winter roster spots, more keepers, and the first picks in the reserve draft to the 5th, 6th, 7th, etc. place finishers over the 9th, 10th, 11th finishers so as to try to motivate teams to always finish as well as possible and not dump all their current talent for future talent.

Finally, I always encourage all my owners to talk to as many teams as possible before trading off their studs to insure they are getting the best value in return.

I have found these rules to significantly curb dumping, without eliminating the ability to make trades to build for the future, and actually added to the strategy and enjoyment of the league, unlike a "no traded player can be kept" rule which just detracts from the fun of a league and a team's ability to ever set itself up for the future.

Those all sound like excellent ideas, and very good ways to minimize dumping.

As I mentioned, some people don't see dumping as a problem, while others think it tends to ruin leagues. I've seen leagues that did fine with dumping, and others that let it tear them apart.

There are good ways to minimize the effect of dump trades, as has been pointed out above. But all of them can be circumvented in one way or another, especially if the dumper doesn't really care about the next year. And collusion is damn near difficult to prove...like trying to prove conspiracy. And as I also mentioned, the only real way to eliminate it is the nuclear option...anyone traded during the year disappears at the end of the year.

[The Dane]

This thread depresses me.

[hombre]

Thank God this isn't a rule in any league I play in. It would make me stop playing in that league as this is a patently idiotic rule.

Geez Jude, why don't you tell me how you really feel.... sheesh

I won't repeat what Lucky has said- but I think he's right on the mark.

I will say that to a man, 100% of the managers in my 23-year old NL-only league fully support this rule, once we adopted it about 7-8 yrs ago. Over those years, I've played in enough roto leagues to know that it's all about context; what works well in one league or w/ one set of owners often doesn't translate well to another setting. And I would probably take more care to learn more about the particulars, before brushing something off as "patently idiotic," but that's just me.