It goes without saying that I love fantasy baseball. If I didn't, I probably wouldn't have created this site. And I clearly wouldn't have put my day job and marriage in jeopardy time and time again to check Rotoworld's player news umpteen times a day.
But that's not to say that some aspects of this game don't annoy me more than a "He went to Jared!" commercial. Well, okay, not that much; but you get the point. And I'm sure you have your share of gripes as well. So, by all means, put them in a comment below!
Here are my top five:
5. Power hungry commissioners - I appreciate that, without the dudes who step up to act as commissioners, there would be no fantasy baseball (except, of course, that of the Sporting News/CDM/ESPN variety). But some guys suck the fun out of it with their Henry VIII style of leadership. You wonder if they revel in their one chance to exert some authority, because at home they get treated like the referee with the screaming wife in the Budweiser commercial. (Man, I need to be quicker with the DVR fast forward.) The worst commissioner I ever had was actually in an "experts" league started by a radio talk show host by the name of Dave Volin who used to have me on his show Roto Rooting regularly. Somehow the commish got the impression that two of the owners were colluding and froze their rosters. That's when all hell broke loose. The two owners and the commish began exchanging progressively nastier messages on the league message board. Then other owners started chiming in, and the commish started locking dudes out left and right...purely out of spite! It was such a mess that he would misinterpret posts from owners who tried to defend him and lock them out! In the end, about half of the owners got locked out--including Volin!
4. Guilt - When my wife and I are lounging on the couch at night with our laptops, and she (Mrs. Overachiever) is cranking out some grad school homework or presentation for work, and I (Mr. Underachiever) am perusing box scores, sometimes I can't help but think of all the more productive things I could be doing: shoveling the snow on the walkway, reading The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, checking my kid's homework folder, calling my grandmother, brushing my dog's teeth, yoga, etc., etc., etc. Oh well, at least I'm not at the strip joint.
3. Mr. Friends and Family - I respect dudes who are tight with their friends and extended family...just so long as they don't go inviting Cousin Edmund--who thinks “soccer field” when he hears the word “pitch” and “Odyssey” when he hears the word “homer”--to join our league! Bring some fish into the mix, and suddenly it's all about who can fleece him worse than Danny Ocean and who can spend the most time hawking the wire, so they can be there when the newb dumps Chone Figgins.
2. Dudes who won't trade even when they're in last place - Nothing screams "wuss bag" more than some guy who won't pull the trigger on a trade when he's cemented at the bottom of the standings. You know your team sucks. You know you have no place to go but up. Yet you're content to linger in mediocrity? Hats off to my bud, The Thief, who named his hoops squad "TeamHappy@Basement" to mock the wussies in our league.
1. Dead beats - When dudes don't pay the league entry fee, it gives me renewed appreciation for the collection tactics of bookies. You know, I still haven't been paid for a football league I won in 2007! That's like four pair of Saucony Grids that could be gracing my closet (or should I say the corner of my wife’s closet that she so generously let's me use.)
Got more? Post a comment!
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12 comments:
1.5 Internet Sites that publish nothing more than common wisdom. A-Rod a top pick, really? Johan a staff ace . . . fascinating. How about digging a tad deeper, like boldly advising that a Cliff Lee could be viable in 2008 or Evan Longoria didn't need any more "seasoning".
Gangi, don't know whether to congratulate you or thank you for the new site. Looking forward to (continuing to) reading your stuff.
Good stuff, Gangi. #1 is why my "main" league is going to be killed in the next few weeks. People didn't pay for football....
I hate it when people overvalue their players and will not trade them. I'm as guilty as the next guy of sending a trade proposal that is a complete joke, but when I do, it is exactly that, a joke. Some guys, though, think it completely plausible to offer up Adrian Beltre for Lincecum because your 3bagger just got a hemorrhoid.
So true, Andyp. I once worked with a writer who would put Peyton Manning and T.O. in his "Who to Start" column. Thanks Genius, I was planning to with Byron Leftwich and Joe Jurevicius!
I hate the guy who has mid level fantasy experience and thinks that just cause he doesn't know who Stephen Drew is or Mike Aviles, that makes it a horrible trade. BTW I offered Drew and/or Aviles, and Aramis Ramirez for D Wright. He had Brendan Harris for a SS. He went as far as to post a deal saying all idiotic trades will not be entertained, bla bla bla. He finished second to last out of 1.
Loved #5 - I dealt with a commissioner a couple years ago who randomly in the second year of the league, changed the rules for position qualifications from the default (to 20 games played in the current season) without telling anyone. No one could understand why he passed on guys like David Ortiz or Travis Hafner until the new setting came to light after the draft. Then he claimed it was our fault for not reading more carefully in advance of the draft despite the fact it was clearly changed without warning.
Teams that don't shop their players around. I play in two very deep leagues with "experts", and believe me, every single person knows every single player in the league.
It it beyond me why you'll see major trades (especially dump trades) go down without even knowing those players were on the block.
If you're throwing in the towel and playing for next year, and trading ARod, Halladay, and Jenks, how can you NOT at least post a message saying that you're taking offers for them?
I'm surprised no one has brought up one of the most aggravating thing about fantasy baseball leagues, namely, owners who bag out on the league halfway through the season. This seems to be a problem mainly with public leagues, but I've run into the problem in private leagues too. Come on, you paid your money, put the time into the draft--at least show up for the duration.
Owners who overvalue their own players could be the subject of its own column. Experimental psychologists have done studies on the "Endowment Effect," which is about how we value something much more when it is ours, than when it is someone else's. In some situations, succombing to the Endowment Effect may be rational--it makes sense that I value my own used car more than your comparable used car, since I know the shape my car is in but I don't know whether your car is a lemon or not--but it makes no sense in fantasy baseball, where a player's value is easily determinable simply by looking up his stats. Sure, you don't know whether the player will continue to produce at that level, but the player's owner doesn't know that any better than you do. I've been trying to figure out a way to use the Endowment Efect to my advantage in fantasy baseball, but I haven't been able to so far--the Endowment Effect works to my advantage when other owners overvalue their own keepers, but that would happen regardless of what I do, so I'm not really using the Effect to my advantage there. In the end, I am more surprised when I find an owner who correctly values his players than when I find one who overvalues them.
Good points guys.
Rabbit, that is a very interesting link to the Endowment Effect. That is why I, most of the time, never make a gut decision on a trade offer. Ever. I always run the numbers, and ask at least one of my "inner circle" what they think, to make sure I'm being logical.
#2 - Owners who draft only the players they know from the only team they watch and root for, so you end up with a Cubs fan drafting Fukudome ahead of Abreu or J.D. Drew.
Fukudome IS better than JD Drew
In our keeper league, guys bag early in the year all the time. (Sometimes 2 weeks after the draft) It has actually become a stategy, where they can flip 5 or 6 players and drafts, and they end up better than they started. I have seen several occasions where guys bagging it in May actually finish Top 3!!
I love the Endowment Effect connection...so true.
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