Am I the only one who has a problem with this trade?

[AirTimid]

An owner, who has the worst pitching in our league, last in every category, just traded Mark Prior and V. Nunez for Chad Fox, DeJean, Dempster, Scott Steward and TJ. Tucker. Does this make sense to you? He basically traded for 4 closers from 2 teams. Chances are, Nunez will equal 2. Leaving 2 "closers" and Dempster for Prior. Even if he gets the extra saves, he needs to use up 5 lineup spots just to equal the 2 he gave up? I offered him Lieber and Ausmus for Fogg and Barrett, which he rejected. I'm not so much bitter about the trade, I just don't see how the guy benefits at all by dealing Prior and Nunez. Damn, he also dropped Jason Marquis and Randy Wolf to make room for these guys???

[timkell]

This trade seems real suspicious to me. Dejean and Fox? Neither of these guys are closers, at this point. Yesterday, the manager announced Leskanic will be the closer. Fox may eventually become the closer, but there's no guarantee.

Dempster is, I guess, a top 60 pitcher, but that's not saying much, unless you're in a 12 or 14 team league.

Steward is the likely closer for Montreal, making Tucker a middle reliever. But Tucker may take some save opps from Steward, making Steward even less valuable.

So, three middle relievers, an OK starter, and a closer who may lose some save opps for A solid closer whose job is assured and a most sought after starting pitcher? While a rookie, Prior is definitely top 30 right now, in terms of demand.

This is an awful trade, especially when you add in that some guys have to be waived to even make it happen. If it werent's so early, I would say this is a classic dump. Wolf and Marquis have more potential than Dempster! Who's going to pick them up, the guy who traded all these weak middle relievers? He may end up getting three decent starters and one solid closer out of this!

To me, it really seems so blatantly foul that it's either collusion or one player having prior knowledge of these two closer's (Dejean and Tucker's) demotions and not sharing it with the other. Either way, I would seriously have to consider protesting. Both reasons are valid for protest.

[AirTimid]

bump

[Arlo]

Hmm... I'm usually very hesitant to protest or veto trades, but this one is pretty awful. Even if you allow for overrating Dempster (as many rankings do, for instance) and jumping off the Prior bandwagon after his last start (which I feel would be wrong), dropping Marquis and Wolf to make this deal makes no sense to me. I can't even think of any league format where this would be a good deal for the side giving up Prior and Nunez.

Is it collusion? Maybe - you'd probably have to know the folks involved to make this judgment. It may also be a case of a veteran taking a beginner for a ride. While it depends on your own league's rules (written and unwritten), that sort of thing is usually frowned upon even if it isn't cheating per se.

Whether it should be overruled or not depends upon those circumstances, but it's definitely a pretty ugly deal considering the players dropped. I'd say it's at least worth looking into to get all the details.

[chuckr37]

I am always a little suspicious of these kinds of trades. The first thing I usually do is to check the transaction history. If there are similar transactions that add up to collusion then call the guy on it. Not just trades but watch for the guy who waives a good player just when he seems to be getting hot. I found a case this year of a guy dumping one player each of the first three weeks and the same team picking those players up. Since I am not doing to well in this league and have a high waiver priority I picked up Jaque Jones one week and Kaz Sasaki the next week and then he went into a crying fit saying he waived Kaz by accident. If it looks like a horse and sounds like a horse, always look for horse.. apples.