Dynasty League Football Forum

So back story I just saw linked on twitter a trade that was done and then the commish's reply as to why the trade was reversed.

After reading that I had a question to all those who say that "protecting the integrity/competitiveness" of the league is a justified reason for vetoing trades. What is the standard for reversing a trade on this ground?

now please understand my question presumes some points so I'm not looking for anyone to argue or defend 1) that vetoing trades is reasonable, 2) that vetoing trades on competitiveness grounds is reasonable or justifiable

I am asking that believing vetoes to be allowable, what standard should Commissioners be using to determine a trade "changes" the competitiveness of the league, and "changes" it too much as to be unallowable?

I doubt you'll find many willing to defend vetoes on the grounds of "changes to league integrity/competitiveness", even in an exercise of thought.

Outside of clear collusion, veto use is based on subjective valuation of trade pieces in both current and future timelines; and if you aren't the subject, but rather inserting your own biases into a foreign matter, well that's wrong and incorrect.

From the "league competitiveness" angle: say some goober offloaded OBJ after week 1 for a random first plus D Funchess and J McKinnon. This arbitrary concept of league integrity/competitiveness would most likely have resulted in a reversal and most of us on this board would have said "dumb move". However, OBJ is out for the season now and his new owner, having also given up Funchess, had a team careening toward worst overall record and his future 1st is looking like the #1 pick. The team who gave OBJ suddenly goes on a hot streak with Funch/McKinnon, wins the league title, AND has the 1.01 pick next year to further stock his team with future studs. How'd that concept of league competitiveness work out now?

ETA: leagues do have some level of protection for the so-called competitivess/integrity concept - trade deadlines and prepayment of dues when trading future draft picks (not all leagues do this one, though)

Generic Username wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 6:15 am I doubt you'll find many willing to defend vetoes on the grounds of "changes to league integrity/competitiveness", even in an exercise of thought.

Outside of clear collusion, veto use is based on subjective valuation of trade pieces in both current and future timelines; and if you aren't the subject, but rather inserting your own biases into a foreign matter, well that's wrong and incorrect.

From the "league competitiveness" angle: say some goober offloaded OBJ after week 1 for a random first plus D Funchess and J McKinnon. This arbitrary concept of league integrity/competitiveness would most likely have resulted in a reversal and most of us on this board would have said "dumb move". However, OBJ is out for the season now and his new owner, having also given up Funchess, had a team careening toward worst overall record and his future 1st is looking like the #1 pick. The team who gave OBJ suddenly goes on a hot streak with Funch/McKinnon, wins the league title, AND has the 1.01 pick next year to further stock his team with future studs. How'd that concept of league competitiveness work out now?

ETA: leagues do have some level of protection for the so-called competitivess/integrity concept - trade deadlines and prepayment of dues when trading future draft picks (not all leagues do this one, though)

^This exactly. No vetoes, unless collusion. Set up a prepayment system for future picks to protect league integrity. That's it.

Agree with above responses... Veto only in case of collusion, but that should also come with warning or kicking the teams colluding.

Ive told this story before, but i'll tell it again. This was in a redraft league, but i think the point still holds.

Back a few years ago we did a draft. I was working and missed it. Team got auto drafted. When i saw what i had to work with, i decided i my WR depth was deficient. I set about trying to find a trade partner. Now two of my players that had been autodrafted were a 2nd year TE who had had a really good rookie year, and a 30 year old veteran slot WR who was coming off a down year. They both happened to be on the same team. Now we had a huge homer of that team in our league and i offered both players to him for his stud WR, who had gone over 1200 yards 4 of the previous 5 years, and over 100 catches 3 of the previous 5. The homer accepted.

The trade hit the transactions page and one owner went absolute apecrap. He blisterred the message board with long angry posts using "integrity of the league" and "competitive balance" and calling me all sorts of nasty names for taking advantage of a naive little homer. Other owners started turning on us (mostly me)

For a week it raged. Then, because it was a free league amongst online friends, i asked the other owner if he would be ok with reversing the trade. He said yes, and so we sent our players back.

The outcome?

The rookie TE was Rob Gronkowski. The aging slot WR was Wes Welker. Gronk went for 90/1300/17. Welker got 120/1500/9

The stud WR i tried to trade for? Andre Johnson. He had his worst year as a pro...33/500/2.

The autodraft had selected Calvin Johnson in the first round for me. 96/1700/16. In some mid round, the computer picked Matt Stafford for me, 5000/40. I dont remember who my RB were, because frankly it didnt matter. I ran roughshod over the league, losing only once during the Lions BYE week.

By the end of the season, the owner who had raised such a ruckus was trying to walk it back by saying he was trying to protect me from trading away two obvious studs. It was sort of satisfying. I never played in that league again. The way some other owners turned on me left a sour taste in my mouth.

The moral? People need to stop trying to read the future.

motherlode wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 6:49 am Ive told this story before, but i'll tell it again. This was in a redraft league, but i think the point still holds.

Back a few years ago we did a draft. I was working and missed it. Team got auto drafted. When i saw what i had to work with, i decided i my WR depth was deficient. I set about trying to find a trade partner. Now two of my players that had been autodrafted were a 2nd year TE who had had a really good rookie year, and a 30 year old veteran slot WR who was coming off a down year. They both happened to be on the same team. Now we had a huge homer of that team in our league and i offered both players to him for his stud WR, who had gone over 1200 yards 4 of the previous 5 years, and over 100 catches 3 of the previous 5. The homer accepted.

The trade hit the transactions page and one owner went absolute apecrap. He blisterred the message board with long angry posts using "integrity of the league" and "competitive balance" and calling me all sorts of nasty names for taking advantage of a naive little homer. Other owners started turning on us (mostly me)

For a week it raged. Then, because it was a free league amongst online friends, i asked the other owner if he would be ok with reversing the trade. He said yes, and so we sent our players back.

The outcome?

The rookie TE was Rob Gronkowski. The aging slot WR was Wes Welker. Gronk went for 90/1300/17. Welker got 120/1500/9

The stud WR i tried to trade for? Andre Johnson. He had his worst year as a pro...33/500/2.

The autodraft had selected Calvin Johnson in the first round for me. 96/1700/16. In some mid round, the computer picked Matt Stafford for me, 5000/40. I dont remember who my RB were, because frankly it didnt matter. I ran roughshod over the league, losing only once during the Lions BYE week.

By the end of the season, the owner who had raised such a ruckus was trying to walk it back by saying he was trying to protect me from trading away two obvious studs. It was sort of satisfying. I never played in that league again. The way some other owners turned on me left a sour taste in my mouth.

The moral? People need to stop trying to read the future.

Seriously ya'll say no to veto. Even in this hypothetical thread I can't condone brain storming when it is ok to veto. Both Motherlode and Generic Username both summed it up beautify. Unless you play fantasy with some future psychic no one knows what will happen next week. The best minds in fantasy are constantly surprised by emerging studs.

No if Odell is traded for a 3rd or something that is probably collusion and is a different matter, but a handful of guys for X should never be veto'd.

First, it has to be a serious and significant overpay at the time of acceptance. This is subjective, but bad trades are usually clear to those of us who have played long enough. I think if you overpay by a mid-1st it's a bad trade but any more than that and a veto should probably be considered.
If the owner can defend his trade somehow that makes sense (not just in their mind but to others) and if they have shopped around to prove that they couldn't have done better elsewhere, then put it through. Just because OBJ is worth a lot more than McKinnon to the rest of the world doesn't mean anyone in your particular league wants him, but you should at least have tried.
My personal opinion is that if the team that wins a bad trade is the worse of the two teams then I'm okay putting it through. This doesn't unbalance the league. What I don't want is a top team to get there because it keeps taking advantage. That's not fun.
A trade bad enough to overturn should also be grounds to replace the owner, unless they can show that they learned from the situation. It doesn't protect the league if they just keep doing this.

Someone in my league just traded Antonio Brown for two late 1sts (16 team league), a late 2nd, and Edelman. I would have given way more, and the team that got Brown is already stacked. But I didn't get an opportunity. So how do I compete with this? It makes the league unenjoyable and unfair. I don't play this to make money, if someone invented a game where the idea was to take advantage of idiots the fastest I wouldn't play it. I like the strategy of fantasy football when the competition is competent.

Also, it has nothing to do with trying to read the future. The trade value exists when it happens only. If you traded Trent Richardson for OBJ you're still an idiot when you could've gotten OBJ plus something else. It doesn't matter how it looks years later, that's not the point.

Tsunami wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 7:45 am First, it has to be a serious and significant overpay at the time of acceptance. This is subjective, but bad trades are usually clear to those of us who have played long enough. I think if you overpay by a mid-1st it's a bad trade but any more than that and a veto should probably be considered.
If the owner can defend his trade somehow that makes sense (not just in their mind but to others) and if they have shopped around to prove that they couldn't have done better elsewhere, then put it through. Just because OBJ is worth a lot more than McKinnon to the rest of the world doesn't mean anyone in your particular league wants him, but you should at least have tried.
My personal opinion is that if the team that wins a bad trade is the worse of the two teams then I'm okay putting it through. This doesn't unbalance the league. What I don't want is a top team to get there because it keeps taking advantage. That's not fun.
A trade bad enough to overturn should also be grounds to replace the owner, unless they can show that they learned from the situation. It doesn't protect the league if they just keep doing this.

Someone in my league just traded Antonio Brown for two late 1sts (16 team league), a late 2nd, and Edelman. I would have given way more, and the team that got Brown is already stacked. But I didn't get an opportunity. So how do I compete with this? It makes the league unenjoyable and unfair. I don't play this to make money, if someone invented a game where the idea was to take advantage of idiots the fastest I wouldn't play it. I like the strategy of fantasy football when the competition is competent.

Also, it has nothing to do with trying to read the future. The trade value exists when it happens only. If you traded Trent Richardson for OBJ you're still an idiot when you could've gotten OBJ plus something else. It doesn't matter how it looks years later, that's not the point.

it'd be so worrisome to me to join a pay league that has such subjective standards like this. Essentially saying you pay the fees, but we'll decide if you can win a championship and run your team the way you like or not. there's no standard for what a baseline competitive is, or a standard for acceptable deviations (all trades are attempts to change the competitive makeup of a league) just essentially a bunch of owners now think their chance of winning became unacceptable harder so they'd rather two other owners not trade or they don't wanna play anymore.

I don't wanna find out after I've paid and negotiated a trade that I'm in a league with people like this. And yes "bad" trades happen, that's part of fantasy, but how to say a subjective standard for when it's bad enough that gets a applied on a "we'll know it when we see it" is an ok way to conduct a league.

I think I'm against this standard in reality. In principle it makes sense and I even have a clause in the charter giving me as commish power to veto a trade on this ground, but in practice? but after we had AB sold for a SINGLE 2017 1st and a 2017 3rd in June of 2016, I literally cannot say what sort of trade would ever be enough for me to invoke it on the grounds that it just hurts the competitiveness of the league too much.


And yes obviously, the team that got AB for a 1st is one of THE top teams in the league.

motherlode wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 6:49 am The moral? People need to stop trying to read the future.

To me this is what it all boils down to. No vetos unless there is obvious collusion.

Tsunami wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 7:45 amSomeone in my league just traded Antonio Brown for two late 1sts (16 team league), a late 2nd, and Edelman. I would have given way more, and the team that got Brown is already stacked. But I didn't get an opportunity. So how do I compete with this? It makes the league unenjoyable and unfair.

100% false. How does that make a league unenjoyable and unfair? You had every opportunity to send trade offers for Antonio Brown. You're just mad because you didn't, and someone else got him instead for a reasonably fair price instead of an overpay. In theory then you would veto Amari Cooper for Chris Hogan. What if a contender wants Hogan for a title run now? Yes market value might suggest Cooper is worth more, but it's worth it to the contending team to win a title now and who cares if Cooper rebounds and is a WR1 for the next 10 years?

No veto ever unless there's clear collusion.

Only collusion/team dumping (have dealt with this before, not sure if it's classified as collusion)

A trade so unbalanced that no reasonable dynasty football manager would ever make it. Every non-trading owner needs to make that conclusion. Then overturn the trade.

End discussion.

WhatWouldDitkaDo wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 10:38 am

Tsunami wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 7:45 amSomeone in my league just traded Antonio Brown for two late 1sts (16 team league), a late 2nd, and Edelman. I would have given way more, and the team that got Brown is already stacked. But I didn't get an opportunity. So how do I compete with this? It makes the league unenjoyable and unfair.

100% false. How does that make a league unenjoyable and unfair? You had every opportunity to send trade offers for Antonio Brown. You're just mad because you didn't, and someone else got him instead for a reasonably fair price instead of an overpay. In theory then you would veto Amari Cooper for Chris Hogan. What if a contender wants Hogan for a title run now? Yes market value might suggest Cooper is worth more, but it's worth it to the contending team to win a title now and who cares if Cooper rebounds and is a WR1 for the next 10 years?

No veto ever unless there's clear collusion.

This, completely and utterly.

Tsunami seems pi55ed because a good team got even better? Maybe the Brown owner didn't come to you because you had nothing he wants, or like Ditka said you just didn't bother to go after him.

chopping mall wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 8:24 am I think I'm against this standard in reality. In principle it makes sense and I even have a clause in the charter giving me as commish power to veto a trade on this ground, but in practice? but after we had AB sold for a SINGLE 2017 1st and a 2017 3rd in June of 2016, I literally cannot say what sort of trade would ever be enough for me to invoke it on the grounds that it just hurts the competitiveness of the league too much.

And yes obviously, the team that got AB for a 1st is one of THE top teams in the league.

The way I see it is, whether you're paying a fee or not, having another team being given the gift of Antonio Brown for a 1st is something totally out of my control, and it gives me a competitive disadvantage. This kind of thing makes the league more like gambling and less like strategy, and that's not what I am in this for. I am willing to give up a certain amount of autonomy to ensure that my strategy matters more than someone else's good fortune. Why would unlimited freedom of choice be more important than a fair playing field?

I would also argue that vetoing of your trades is not ever going to happen unless you are either very bad at this game or you are unscrupulously taking advantage of a weaker owner. If you are in this purely for profit and you want to be able to take money from weak competition then by all means play in a league without vetos, but that's not enjoyable to me, and it's pure gambling because it might be another owner that gets the random bad offer. In order to avoid a situation that is unlikely to happen you are allowing a situation that is just as (if not more) harmful to you that has already happened and is more likely to happen again. This isn't rational.

WhatWouldDitkaDo wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 10:38 am

Tsunami wrote: ↑Thu Oct 12, 2017 7:45 amSomeone in my league just traded Antonio Brown for two late 1sts (16 team league), a late 2nd, and Edelman. I would have given way more, and the team that got Brown is already stacked. But I didn't get an opportunity. So how do I compete with this? It makes the league unenjoyable and unfair.

100% false. How does that make a league unenjoyable and unfair? You had every opportunity to send trade offers for Antonio Brown. You're just mad because you didn't, and someone else got him instead for a reasonably fair price instead of an overpay. In theory then you would veto Amari Cooper for Chris Hogan. What if a contender wants Hogan for a title run now? Yes market value might suggest Cooper is worth more, but it's worth it to the contending team to win a title now and who cares if Cooper rebounds and is a WR1 for the next 10 years?

No veto ever unless there's clear collusion.

This is the point. I did ask about Antonio Brown in the preseason, but the person wasn't selling then. (Also, it's ridiculous to say that you should send an offer for every valuable player, and if you don't that it's your fault when they give them away. But I send out more than most people.)

At some point they lost a game or whatever and something clicked and they suddenly wanted to trade him no matter what, and they gave him away. I can't read minds, so I didn't know when that happened. The only way I could have reasonably competed with this other owner (who did nothing other than accept a gift) is if I had sent out unfair offers to every bad owner every week. And that isn't a game I want to play.

What is the practical difference between collusion and a bad trade? The motive doesn't matter, if someone gives Antonio Brown to a top team it hurts my chance of winning just as much if they do it randomly as if they do it intentionally.

Benjamin Franklin once said: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."


this is that in a nutshell ^^^^ , vetoes are rooted in 100% self interest and jealousy. They are a hallmark of a weak league and weak owners ! The veto lovers scream about the sanctity of the league but what it is in reality is just they want to win and think the other owners should get permission to run their own teams the way they see fit. They are so deluded and arrogant as to think they are the only ones who know value and the "right" way to win .

The above post about hogan /cooper is a perfect example as would have been a trade I made a few years back when I traded keenan allen straight up for leveon bell after their rookies seasons , nearly unanimously the league laughed and agreed my steeler homerism had gotten me destroyed and the mocking started but how has that turned out since? If not for bell's injuries and suspensions that deal would be so lopsided in my favor thus far that it is nearly 180 degrees from the consensus opinion. The point being I had a feeling about bell and turned out I was right but in a veto league if some other owners disagreed I miss on bell's big time # and end up waiting years for allen just now getting back to where he was in 2015 after scoring once in the chargers last 29 games.

you think you know but you just don't know .