Discussion: How egregious does a trade need to be before you support a veto?

[Lumps]

Not. At. All.

I'm saying that I don't think it's 50% lopsided. I certainly don't think it's egregious, as the title of your post suggests. You're making the argument (I think) that Commish/league intervention should not be reserved for collusion only. IMO, that's an interesting conversation. What to do when an egregious trade takes place?

1st: This isn't my trade nor am I in the league. Just an example that spurred the post.
2nd: The commish said everyone aside from those involved were in an uproar about it. That tells you what most people think value wise.
3rd: The 50% lopsided came from the trade calculator used by the other post. They still seem to not understand math.

I then found it ironic that you posted a hypothetical that, in my eyes, is nowhere near egregious. Which is why I think doing what your suggesting is so difficult.

Or say that two teams make a trade that is really, really, really off. And then say that the team giving up too much knows they're doing it and simply wants to be out on a player ASAP and got the best deal he could. Then what? Say the player was D. Watson or Rice over the past years? Or say the player was Tua after week 5 last year? That's exactly what I did with Tua last year in a team not in sig. I traded him in an "egregious" trade because I was willing to bet my season that he was going to have a HUGE drop in the second half of the year. And after his blow-up start, I wanted the best package I could get. I didn't want to wait to get better value because I saw the drop coming. Had I been wrong, I would have killed my championship run. Obviously, it worked out for me. Even though I made an "egregious" trade, there's no way in the universe it should have been vetoed or reversed.

Absolutely, there are times where you take the best offer you can get for any number of specific reasons. However, I would argue that these kinds of players are not the ones regarded at the top of the game. See: Najee Harris as an example. Not Mahomes. Not JJ. Tua is not Mahomes (and I know that you know that), but the dynamics around his valuation are completely different.

That could very well be the same in your hypothetical. The owner trading Jefferson (again, I don't think it's egregious) could believe a few things:
1) JJ's value is going to tank this year.
2) D. Smith is a growing stud.
3) Fields will return to top-12 status by the end of 2024.

And maybe the previous owner of D. Smith and Fields shared similar notions. No trade calculator -- and no other person in the league -- might take those into account. They are, however, all reasonable thoughts. No way that trade should be vetoed/reversed.

Now you are getting into what others have suggested and is extremely flawed. You are talking about motivation/outlook versus what a player can actually pull in the market.

Regardless of what YOU personally think of JJ going into this season (I happen to think you are absolutely incorrect as we saw what he did with everyone else not named Kirk Cousins last year and it was still elite), he still commands top value. See any number of sources on that. Startup ADP from every single dynasty platform. Trades. Etc.

Regardless of what YOU personally think of D Smith, his value is what I stated. Again, ADP. Trades.

Regardless of what YOU personally think of Fields, his value is what it is. Same thing. The reality is Fields is being valued (appropriately so and I can't believe people still want to argue the opposite) as a borderline starter in the NFL. If you think Fields is going to be a top 5 QB, great for you. But you don't pay top 5 QB value for him because that isn't what his value actually is. Nor do you pay 1/2 that price.

I've reiterated this in a multitude of ways and the arguments are still coming in about outlook/motivation and not what is reality. From trading startup picks for the players referenced and how no one would do that deal. Converting players into rookie picks and analyzing it from that vantage point. No one would do those pick swaps either. Again, I said when it involves actual players, people seem to hand wave it away.

Finally -- and here is where I think you and I agree, and perhaps we're saying the same thing all along -- if a trade does seem absolutely egregious (understanding that the determination of egregious is different for every single owner), the commish certainly could and in some cases should reach out to party making the egregious trade to see what's up. Depending on the response, the commish/league can go from there.

Example: a few years ago, a new team joined my dynasty league (team 1 in sig). He was a loooooong-time fantasy football players, first-time dynasty player. As commish, I told him I'm happy to talk through things, trade values, league history values, etc. Sure enough, right away, he made a trade that you and I would 100% agree was egregious. I called him up right away, explained where by our league's typical trades, that was pretty off. He had a kind of facepalm moment. I went back to the other owner who was gracious enough to add something (I think it was a high second pick). Was still pretty bad, but it helped smooth things over for everyone. The new owner eventually got a little better but ended up deciding dynasty wasn't for him.

*If those are the situations you're talking about, then we're on the same page. I think it was the example you listed that simply missed the mark for me.

Hard to say from the information given. I did not post this with a direction/process of how to resolve a problematic trade. But yes, the blood in the water new owner to the league, followed by disastrous trades is certainly one of the many ways these things happen.

Personally, I want a highly competitive league with knowledgeable managers, where it is difficult to win, and I don't see absolutely bananas trades going down. I have grown weary of leagues that have to replace 2-3 owners in the off season, it being difficult to find owners for the teams due to horrific deals in the past, and now the team is decimated. Where we have talent concentrated at the top of the league and half the league in constant rebuild mode. So then new owners come in with the crappy team and invariably people start trying to prey on them.

Maybe people like being in leagues like that. Maybe people like playing with Tacos. Certainly, I have seen a growing number of posts bragging about lopsided deals in recent years. The Team Advice section is littered with people suggesting to reject reasonable deals and expecting to profit a 1st in value or more off every deal.

[Amishbeard]

If you allow trades like this, you end up with teams so lopsided that people leave. Then you have to try to find someone willing to pay to take over a team that has no shot of winning for the next 5 years. So find someone willing to pay entry for 5 years or more with no chance at all.

Worst team in my 16 team league below that made bad trades and is now abandoned. Team doesn't have its first round pick this year or next.

QB: Watson, DTR, Browning
RB: Jones, Mostert, Hunt,
WR: Chark, Doubs, JuJu, Renfrow, Slayton,
TE: Fant, Ertz

2.02, 2.10, 2.16, 3.02

No bench whatsoever.


At what time do you veto a trade or trades so that someone doesn't run a team into the ground and then leave over and over again?

This is the third team we are replacing a owner of in as many years.

[moishetreats]

If you allow trades like this, you end up with teams so lopsided that people leave. Then you have to try to find someone willing to pay to take over a team that has no shot of winning for the next 5 years. So find someone willing to pay entry for 5 years or more with no chance at all.

Worst team in my 16 team league below that made bad trades and is now abandoned. Team doesn't have its first round pick this year or next.

QB: Watson, DTR, Browning
RB: Jones, Mostert, Hunt,
WR: Chark, Doubs, JuJu, Renfrow, Slayton,
TE: Fant, Ertz

2.02, 2.10, 2.16, 3.02

No bench whatsoever.


At what time do you veto a trade or trades so that someone doesn't run a team into the ground and then leave over and over again?

This is the third team we are replacing a owner of in as many years.

You don't.

First, it's not simply that simple. Say an owner makes ten trades. At the time of the trades, the owner is "losing" on value by an average of 8%. There is no individual trade that is way off. In the aggregate, that owner has torpedoed about 50% of their roster value. In my experience, it's rarely one single trade that "ruins" a league. It's the accumulation of misses over months and years.

FWIW, the flip side is true. Dominant teams that are in the championship game 3 years out of 5, winning 2, are rarely made with one big league-ruining trade. They've made incremental gains here are there and occasionally hit big on a rookie (e.g., Puka) or a waiver wire claim.

Rather than vetoeing a single trade because it seems lopsided, I've instead reached out to the individual team owner(s). I start by asking if they're enjoying the league. Once, there was someone who simply enjoyed and didn't really care about winning or losing. Loved the league, loved the people, wanted to stay part of it. Always paid dues on time, voted for rules right away, and was 100% active. Well, he's open for business for trading, and we all know it.

Another time, I talked with the team owner about how their team kind of got to where it was. They were frustrated and pissed. Love the league but hate their team. So we talked through ideas, strategies, possibilities. We talked about how their team got there and different ways to approach trading and team-building. They're now happily on a multi-year rebuild (year 3, made the playoffs last year).

One other time, I talked to the co-owners of a dumpster-fire team. They're the exact kind of owners we're talking about most in this thread: make terrible trades, kill their team, and then start to lose interest (even though they always paid their dues on time). I simply suggested that perhaps this league isn't right for them. We'd love them to stay, and their waning commitment seemed to suggest that it wasn't a priority. And I/we would get that. Pretty immediately they said that they think that's the case. They just didn't want to "quit" and would have felt bad leaving.

TL;DR -- In my experience, it's rarely a single trade that ruins things. It's more likely a composite of small things and/or an owner (or owners) who simply don't prioritize getting value or the league itself. At that point, it's less about throwing out a veto than about the commish and league determining the best course of action.

[Amishbeard]

It's the doubling up. Trading your first round pick when you are out of the playoffs for players that help you this year. Then going ahead and trade next years first to get a one year rental.

[Shcritters]

A couple suggestions:

Regarding running teams into the ground and then leaving... that's why you make owners pay a year ahead in dues (or as far out as they are trading draft picks). There's a pretty large population of people who enjoy taking a team and trying to bring it back to relevance... especially if they get a free pass for a year or two (just go look at SafeLeagues, they always have orphans that get scooped up, even at some pretty obscene yearly buy-ins).

Regarding really bad trades... I've often found that the reason I'm so upset is that mine wasn't the team that benefitted from the bad trade. There have been a dozen times in my 15 years playing that I've messaged an owner after a 'bad trade' and said 'I would have paid you significantly more...'.

For new leagues everyone is always looking for 'the rube' in the league, and it's a race to find them first. I've usually seen that when a team makes one bad trade they either:
1). Continue to make bad trades with many other teams, bottom out, and then leave the league. Usually once blood is in the water all sorts of offers get made to a bad trading team... so the incentive is to be the first to get in on the action (unfortunately).
2). They correct their behavior. This happens either through getting razzed so bad that they correct, or other owners share with them information that better informs them on current value (KTC, other trade calcs, etc). One league I'm in has a guy who I doubt will ever trade his future 1st again because he's been ridden so hard about his last 3 trades that didn't work out for him. That's called learning.

Over 15 years I've had one trade vetoed in one of my leagues because I 'received too much'. Current value at the time it was completely fine in value - it just made my team very strong because I traded for a perceived position of need. Single QB contract league... it was something like a mid RB and mid WR and cap space for Aaron Rodgers (when he was good). People vetoed it not because it was unfair, against the rules, or collusion... but because they thought it was creating a super team that would automatically win the league. Irony was, I went back and looked at the end of the year, and one of my backup QB's did just as good as Rodgers that year and had the trade gone through I would have done better than I did with it vetoed. That almost made me quit that league... and the league ended up folding a few years later. That really turned me off to vetoes... and so my position is only veto when there is clear collusion.

[wickerkat1212]

Good stuff here. I recently took on two new orphans as I liked the challenge of trying to resurrect them. One had the 1.01 and I wanted a share of Bijan so that plus the 1.06 was enough to entice me to take it over. Two years in and through a number of moves I have drafted Bijan, JSN, Downs, Harrison, Maye, BThomas, Penix. I am on the edge of contending this year with—

Goff, Cousins (Maye, Penix)
Bijan, Brian Robinson/Zamir (Allgeier, McLaughlin)
DJM, Higgins, JSN, Harrison, BThomas/Downs (Atwell, RMoore, SMoore)
Ferguson (Kraft, Tremble, Trautman)

Lots of good advice in this thread.

[Prison_Mike]

I saw a trade making the rounds on twitter today, asking this same question. I'm team #NeverVeto, but was a bit perplexed by this one.

The trade was:

Team A: 1.03+ AJB
Team B: 1.02 + Daniel Jones + Hubbard + Bigsby + Renfrow

The context was that there were two orphan teams. They found a manager and he said he had a friend that would like to take the last team. They made this trade 5 minutes after joining the league.

Technically there is no hard evidence of collusion, but it stinks...

[Lumps]

I saw a trade making the rounds on twitter today, asking this same question. I'm team #NeverVeto, but was a bit perplexed by this one.

The trade was:

Team A: 1.03+ AJB
Team B: 1.02 + Daniel Jones + Hubbard + Bigsby + Renfrow

The context was that there were two orphan teams. They found a manager and he said he had a friend that would like to take the last team. They made this trade 5 minutes after joining the league.

Technically there is no hard evidence of collusion, but it stinks...

I’ve got my popcorn ready for the hand waving at this trade (ignoring the friends angle).

[Lumps]

Good stuff here. I recently took on two new orphans as I liked the challenge of trying to resurrect them. One had the 1.01 and I wanted a share of Bijan so that plus the 1.06 was enough to entice me to take it over. Two years in and through a number of moves I have drafted Bijan, JSN, Downs, Harrison, Maye, BThomas, Penix. I am on the edge of contending this year with—

Goff, Cousins (Maye, Penix)
Bijan, Brian Robinson/Zamir (Allgeier, McLaughlin)
DJM, Higgins, JSN, Harrison, BThomas/Downs (Atwell, RMoore, SMoore)
Ferguson (Kraft, Tremble, Trautman)

Lots of good advice in this thread.

What does this have to do with this topic?

[wickerkat1212]

Good stuff here. I recently took on two new orphans as I liked the challenge of trying to resurrect them. One had the 1.01 and I wanted a share of Bijan so that plus the 1.06 was enough to entice me to take it over. Two years in and through a number of moves I have drafted Bijan, JSN, Downs, Harrison, Maye, BThomas, Penix. I am on the edge of contending this year with—

Goff, Cousins (Maye, Penix)
Bijan, Brian Robinson/Zamir (Allgeier, McLaughlin)
DJM, Higgins, JSN, Harrison, BThomas/Downs (Atwell, RMoore, SMoore)
Ferguson (Kraft, Tremble, Trautman)

Lots of good advice in this thread.

What does this have to do with this topic?

They were talking about the incentive to take over an orphan, that some people the challenge, so I thought I'd shared my experience of taking over an orphan and how I was doing with it. Maybe it'll encourage others to (a) take over an orphan or to (b) have faith that if you get bad owners to pay for future years (when they trade their picks) that you can find a good owner to come in a right the ship. That's all.

[Shcritters]

I saw a trade making the rounds on twitter today, asking this same question. I'm team #NeverVeto, but was a bit perplexed by this one.

The trade was:

Team A: 1.03+ AJB
Team B: 1.02 + Daniel Jones + Hubbard + Bigsby + Renfrow

The context was that there were two orphan teams. They found a manager and he said he had a friend that would like to take the last team. They made this trade 5 minutes after joining the league.

Technically there is no hard evidence of collusion, but it stinks...

Yeah, that one smells of collusion in my opinion. If it is a new owner making a bad trade with an established team or an established team making a bad trade with a new owner that is one thing... but two new owners making a very sus trade minutes after joining the league? That's suspicious.

If I were the league commish I'd be making some phone calls on that one!

[Prison_Mike]

I saw a trade making the rounds on twitter today, asking this same question. I'm team #NeverVeto, but was a bit perplexed by this one.

The trade was:

Team A: 1.03+ AJB
Team B: 1.02 + Daniel Jones + Hubbard + Bigsby + Renfrow

The context was that there were two orphan teams. They found a manager and he said he had a friend that would like to take the last team. They made this trade 5 minutes after joining the league.

Technically there is no hard evidence of collusion, but it stinks...

Yeah, that one smells of collusion in my opinion. If it is a new owner making a bad trade with an established team or an established team making a bad trade with a new owner that is one thing... but two new owners making a very sus trade minutes after joining the league? That's suspicious.

If I were the league commish I'd be making some phone calls on that one!

Yeah I thought it was a rare instance where you don’t have hard evidence, but as the commish I think I’d reverse it and find 2 new owners

[Lumps]

I saw a trade making the rounds on twitter today, asking this same question. I'm team #NeverVeto, but was a bit perplexed by this one.

The trade was:

Team A: 1.03+ AJB
Team B: 1.02 + Daniel Jones + Hubbard + Bigsby + Renfrow

The context was that there were two orphan teams. They found a manager and he said he had a friend that would like to take the last team. They made this trade 5 minutes after joining the league.

Technically there is no hard evidence of collusion, but it stinks...

Yeah, that one smells of collusion in my opinion. If it is a new owner making a bad trade with an established team or an established team making a bad trade with a new owner that is one thing... but two new owners making a very sus trade minutes after joining the league? That's suspicious.

If I were the league commish I'd be making some phone calls on that one!

Yeah I thought it was a rare instance where you don’t have hard evidence, but as the commish I think I’d reverse it and find 2 new owners

So, just checking in here, are you saying this goes down with an established owner you are letting it go?

[Prison_Mike]

Yeah, that one smells of collusion in my opinion. If it is a new owner making a bad trade with an established team or an established team making a bad trade with a new owner that is one thing... but two new owners making a very sus trade minutes after joining the league? That's suspicious.

If I were the league commish I'd be making some phone calls on that one!

Yeah I thought it was a rare instance where you don’t have hard evidence, but as the commish I think I’d reverse it and find 2 new owners

So, just checking in here, are you saying this goes down with an established owner you are letting it go?

Not necessarily, but I would imagine I’d have much more information with an established owner

[Anteaters]

I saw a trade making the rounds on twitter today, asking this same question. I'm team #NeverVeto, but was a bit perplexed by this one.

The trade was:

Team A: 1.03+ AJB
Team B: 1.02 + Daniel Jones + Hubbard + Bigsby + Renfrow

The context was that there were two orphan teams. They found a manager and he said he had a friend that would like to take the last team. They made this trade 5 minutes after joining the league.

Technically there is no hard evidence of collusion, but it stinks...

I am kind of not upset by this trade.

Assuming SF, there is the gap between 1.03 and 1.02 to be considered. I've seen enough variance in the DLF forums about this topic, so I'm willing to give that a lot of leeway in calculating the value/production of each side. Arguably, there is a huge gap between taking Caleb/or/MHJr or taking the second QB or second WR.

I know trade calculators are flawed, but KTC has the basic 4 assets of this trade (1.03+AJB for 1.02+DJones) acceptable but in favor of the side receiving AJB+1.03.

I don't think the other pieces matter all that much. They're just sweeteners that could go on either side and not matter, IMO. Mostly this trade hinges on your opinion of Daniel Jones. If you think Daniel Jones is half a season away from being permanently demoted to backup QB status, you think this is an awful trade. If you think Daniel Jones has a good chance of keeping his job this season and for the next few seasons, this is not a bad trade.