I'm in a situation similar to this, but I changed a few details to make it as clear as possible.
I'm fourth in a ten-team league, and my team has a healthy lead in SBs. The three teams ahead of me are ranked 7th, 8th, and 9th in SBs. The team that's 10th overall is also 10th in SBs. The owner's still active. I've been trying to find a way to trade him Juan Pierre, but the owner doesn't like Pierre b/c he only contributes in steals -- all my reasonable offers have been declined. If Pierre gave him 30 steals for the rest of the season though, the last-place team would move up to 7th in steals. With my lead in SBs I don't need to start Pierre, so he's usually on my bench.
Now that the trading deadline is upon us, I just want to get Pierre on his team. I could offer him Pierre for the worst player on his team, like a third-string catcher or a pitcher that's out for the year... someone I'd drop immediately. In effect, I'd just be giving him a top-100 player for free to improve my place in the standings, but I wouldn't be improving my team necessarily.
What do you think - would this look like collusion to you? What if you were one of the top 3 teams?
Sounds like good strategy to me. But you can't give up Pierre for nothing, that would be the shady part. If the other team would start Pierre than he would have to have some value to him, therefore you can make the trade at least look fairly even.
I don't think it's collusion, because you are trying to win here, even if it is by hurting your opponent, but I can see where people may think that it is collusion, because he's not giving anything up to get Pierre. Is there any way that you can get something useful from him for Pierre? I'm not saying anything near equal value, but at least something you'd use so that you can say that you are helping your team?
It's just a hypothetical, not really gonna happen. The other guy really has zero interest in Pierre, so to make the deal I'd have to be getting some guy that he was on the verge of dropping anyway.
It could be argued that it is collusive, but I wouldn't think so. I personally love the strategy of playing defense to prevent others from doing well. You are still helping yourself which is the entire point of trading. Anywho...
I'd suggest that you try to trade Pierre to a team who is in 7th, 8th or 9th place in the standings and is 6th in the steals category. By doing so, you don't risk getting caught in the standings and you prevent the Top 3 teams from making up any ground in steals. It's not as good as them losing ground in steals, but the next best thing and you won't have anyone crying collusion.
"The government cannot give to anyone anything that it does not first take from someone else"
I've done this type of thing in the past... traded players (who I can't get anyone to give me anything back in a deal) to teams that can't hurt me for next to nothing -- simply in order to help them hurt my competitors or to prevent my competitors from picking up the player I was forced to drop. Is it collusion? I certainly don't think so. It's simple strategy.
If I was in your league and had a vote I would veto it on the basis of the imbalance of the trade. Pierre for "next-to-nothing" doesn't fly with me, collusion or not. Not to say I wouldn't get what was going on but what you're doing, while clever, is against the spirit of fantasy baseball IMO and I would use the imbalance as my official excuse to veto. But if you were able to get anything of consequence to your team and remotely equal in value to Pierre I would let it slide.
Also, it's easy to sit here on a message board and say "Cool idea, not collusion, go for it" but if you were one of those 3 guys who would be getting screwed over by it I think your perspective would be a little different.
Trojan Pony wrote:If I was in your league and had a vote I would veto it on the basis of the imbalance of the trade. Pierre for "next-to-nothing" doesn't fly with me, collusion or not. Not to say I wouldn't get what was going on but what you're doing, while clever, is against the spirit of fantasy baseball IMO and I would use the imbalance as my official excuse to veto. But if you were able to get anything of consequence to your team and remotely equal in value to Pierre I would let it slide.
Also, it's easy to sit here on a message board and say "Cool idea, not collusion, go for it" but if you were one of those 3 guys who would be getting screwed over by it I think your perspective would be a little different.
So, let me get this straight... if I'm the one 'giving away' Pierre, and you're one of my closest competitors, you're OK with the deal if I get something of value to strengthen my team, but you're NOT ok with it if I give him away, and thereby have a weaker team?
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by johntudor » Sun Aug 12, 2007 12:51 pm 
