The Trade Block Commandments
On the morning of the second month of the fantasy baseball season there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the trade block, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in your dynasty league trembled. Then the Commissioner led the people out to meet with The Dynasty Guru, and they stood at the foot of the trade block. The trade block was covered with smoke, because the Dynasty Guru descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole trade block trembled violently. As the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, the Commissioner spoke and the voice of The Dynasty Guru answered him.
And The Dynasty Guru spoke all these words:
“I am The Dynasty Guru, who brought you out of redraft leagues, out of the land of poorly constructed trade blocks.
“You shall have no other blogs before me.
You shall not make for yourself a trade block lacking meaningful information. Your trade block should include actual players offered, positions or stats requested, or at least a comment with meaningful information.
You shall not consider ‘serious offers only’ as meaningful information if you are only offering waiver wire-caliber depth pieces.
Remember the trade block and keep it updated. Do not be the person whose trade block lists Alex Rios and Greg Holland and has not been touched since August 2015.
You shall not seek to deal your depth for a top player if you are not willing to deal equal value. A combination of middle relievers, right handed platoon bats, and AAA catchers will not return you an SP2 no matter how many paragraphs of justification you belligerently write in your trade proposal.
You shall honor the trade block and keep it holy by including in your trade proposals or conversations the actual players, stats, or skills referenced in your potential partner’s block. The team who has Paul Goldschmidt at 1B and is offering to trade Justin Bour is not interested in dealing you Goldy so that he can slot Bour at first, and you are not going to convince him to do so.
You shall not covet the player you just traded away, even if the team you traded him to already moved him for more than you got in return.
You shall not collude.
You shall not whine.
You shall not veto.
You shall monitor the trade block and leverage it to improve your team and your relationship with the other members of your team. The trade block is a conversation starter, not a conversation avoider, and you shall treat it as such and honor those who respect your trade block with thoughtful counter-proposals.”
The Author
8 Comments
cracking me up there.lol.
You guys should insert the link to this on emails/twitter when knuckleheads ask you about dumb trades to rate.
i got this gig by being one of the knuckleheads asking about dumb trades. dreams do come true
What are we supposed to do if M.Franco is being traded for C.McHugh, if not veto?
Should thou attempt to exploit the less knowledgeable owner as well?
if you suspect collusion, veto. otherwise, the less knowledgeable owner will learn eventually. vetoing a trade you see as lopsided that the other teams involved agreed to is basically the same as whining, unless you suspect foul play was involved.
Why would you veto that trade? That isn’t even close to being veto-worthy.
Just make your trades and let other teams make their trades. Other owners can run their teams as they see fit.
People who veto trades always claim they want to “protect the less knowledgeable owner” when in reality they are vetoing the trade simply because they are jealous that somebody else got a good deal.
And yes, you should try to “exploit” other team owners. That is how competition works. In any sport or game, the good players beat the bad players. If you have more knowledge or skill you should certainly use it to defeat everyone else.
What do you do when you see a really lopsided trade, you mention it to the league owner and all they say is “eh, it seems pretty fair”. Its clearly not like… I just didn’t respond and shook my head. Now the dude who was getting obviously ripped off has a horrendous and mostly-worthless team, borderline last place. He now hasn’t been around much and pretty much stopped changing his lineup. I’ve mentioned it openly but it doesn’t seem like the commissioner cared enough to find a replacement owner. *shrug* negligence effects leagues I guess
it’s definitely true that losing a lopsided trade can lead to a manager feeling unappreciated or taken advantage of, and a league where some teams consistently take advantage of others can become dysfunctional. but vetoing one trade doesn’t solve that underlying problem, and if the teams feel as though the trade is fair at the point of accepting it then no one else should be able to stop that. i do believe a commissioner should keep teams from abusing each other within reason,. it’s the commissioner’s job to ensure no one is ruining the fun of others, but not his or her job to ensure everyone is equally smart
I’m new to dynasty leagues and I have read you should leave your Trade Block empty. The theory is if you put players in there it gives your competitors free information, such as ‘I want to sell this player’ – it encourages them to think they can low ball you, or you are desperate to sell. Conversely, it also discourages them from making good offers on players not on your block.
Do you have a view on this and any other reasons you shouldn’t use one?