Suggestions for encouraging trades?

[PFKFootball]

Guys,

We are entering our 22nd season of our league. Many of our owners are original from day 1. Everyone seems to really enjoy the league but our trading volume seems to be very low compared to many other leagues in the DLF community and those dynasty leagues that are discussed on many of the industry podcasts. Looking back at trade history, we average about 40 trades per season (I was surprised it was that high), but only about 30 over the past three years. About 4 of the 12 teams account for 80% of the trades completed.

The league is not cheap ($250 entry) and the prize money is solid. I've tried to correlate winning to owner activity but just can't seem to get the non-active 2/3 of the owners to make deals, or even negotiate them. With the age of the league, I know that I'm wandering down the "old dogs and new tricks" conversation but I was wondering if any of you have been in leagues that have had success in rewarding trade activity and unique ways to do it. The owner in me thanks those inactive owners for their annual donations but the commissioner side of me would love to see activity pick up. It's really the one missing thing in our league.

I would love to hear your experiences and read about successes you've had in your dynasty leagues in boosting trade activity.

Thank you

Andy
Twitter: @PFK_Football

[Pac_Eddy]

I think you're right, it's hard to get people to change their ways, particularly when they've been in a league that long.

One trick that's worked for me is to make some trades where I lose value just to get things rolling. Maybe downgrade a WR to one lower in a tier plus some small piece. While it sucks to do that, I was surprised how often it worked out that I unexpectedly ended up with the better end of the deal. Yeah, you're sacrificing your own team in the short term, it's now easier to make trades with low activity owners.

It will be interesting to read what others have tried.

[palevermilion]

I guess my question is: what is your ultimate goal of this? If they are bad owners, just replace them. That's really all you can do. "Rewarding trade activity" to me just seems like a cheap ploy. The reward should be the championship, especially in a league with $250 entry per owner. People are who they are. Either they see the value of something or they don't, and any type of trade reward system is just going to benefit the owners who are already trading even more and the owners who don't trade will just fall even more behind. You can't actually force trading I've found.

I actually think it's way more common than podcasts and such let on that the majority of trades are usually down by a smaller percentage of the owners.

[Ice]

My take is manage your own team.

If you want to trade or acquire a player then make offers. Trust me, if the offer is good enough and a win/win you will make a deal. Additionally, it is okay to overpay on a deal if looking long term based on other projected moves.

If Team A & B don't trade with each other and your team C it shouldn't matter.

No idea how many different champions your league has had and how many in the league won money the last decade but trading for trading sake is silly. I know many real smart winning owners that rarely trade but build effectively through the draft.

I have a couple in one league I simply won't trade with because they only offer win/lose trades. Older longstanding leagues usually have better players so they won't trade as much because they really don't need to and many realize that often the best deal is no trade at all.

Lots of ways to manage a franchise but quantity trading is usually not a sustaining plan for most owners.

[Anteaters]

The owner in me thanks those inactive owners for their annual donations but the commissioner side of me would love to see activity pick up. It's really the one missing thing in our league.

I've found that many people who don't like to trade (meaning they rarely or never trade) are usually that way because they are bad traders. When you talked about the lower number of owners being responsible for nearly all the trades in your league, it reminds me of my leagues. Some guys absolutely love trading and are always pitching deals, or just pitching the possibility of discussing a deal. It's like they want to talk about trading even if they don't have an actual trade to discuss. Others guys never trade. Never.

What I've learned is sometimes it's better to allow sleeping dogs to lie. Forcing incompetent traders to trade more often will result in lopsided deals that upset the competitive balance of the league by creating a couple of superteams and a handful of teams with zero chance of winning. Even worse, it may make the incompetent traders feel hopeless and lead them to quit.

Bottom line, traders want more league trading because it makes them happy. I would counter and say the non-traders are very happy not making (m)any trades. Leagues should be set up to allow both types of owners to be happy and successful. Instead of trying to create penalties to encourage more trades, I would just let managers do what they want. It's fine to do zero trades, and it's fine to do 20 trades a year. There is no bad answer here - only bad trades.

[dustyroads]

40 trades in one year, let alone averaging that over multiple years, blows my mind. Averaging 10 trades a year the past three years sounds like a real healthy active league to me. Guess that just shows how different people's perspectives, opinions, and realities can be with stuff like this.

Taking the above out of the picture; I'd just like to present an alternative theory to what happened in your league as it's how I explain what happened in a dynasty league of mine over the past few years. Simply put, when your league started all the owners were young dogs. They made a ton of trades because it was new, it's exciting, and it's something to do. Over the years they've become old dogs who actually have learned new tricks. One of them is that a bad trade can crush your team, and set you back for years. So making trades frivolously for nothing more than the sake of making them is a very risky venture that can majorly impact your team in a negative way.

Back to my own experience and opinion for one last point: It irks me when people posit that not making trades makes an owner inactive. Trading is one slice of the large pie of dynasty. Drafting, working waivers, setting line ups, following injury/recover updates, paying attention to matchups, tape work, analytic work, etc. etc. are all major points to fantasy success; and in my experience, the time and effort spent in those categories have yielded me MUCH more tangible success than all the time I've spent discussing dozens of trades with owners every year that eventually amounts to nothing but frustration.

I think in a vacuum the impact of trading is one of the lower sources of success you can bring to your team when considering the time cost vs payoff, and the risk involved. And by in a vacuum, I mean not taking into account league Taco trades where someone is a clear winner and someone else is a clear loser. Obviously those will always pay off pretty good for the owner on the winning side. And not coincidentally, I think those are normally the people I hear making arguments and statements like you did in your original post. They tend to rely greatly on taking advantage of other less-knowledgeable league members in trades to gain an advantage over the rest of the league. And then get super salty when people stop trading with them lol. I'm not saying that's you at all, it's just been my experience with it. If the number 1 thing I hear accompanying most bad trade offers/negotiations is the good old "this guy sucks anyway, sell him to me" line of rationalization, the number 2 would certainly be "you can't win if you don't trade". Comments like that normally help me save my time and cut off trade talks early. I don't need someone to used-car salesman me about how their goal is to actually help me and my team with their trade offers lol.

In the end, my best advice here is the same for just about every league rules/settings issue brought up on these boards: if they paid money to run the team, let them run it how they want.

[ColdZealDonkeyStrike]

My long running league (year 21 this season) has also seen a drop in activity, but I think you are getting into "messing too much with a good thing" territory. Sounds like there is still activity and it's a good group. It's also normal that people have different responsibilities and levels of engagement depending on their state of life.

That said, if you want to see more activity, throwing out some overpay offers will probably jumpstart movement a bit

[CGW]

I wouldn't worry much about it. 40 a year seems reasonable.

I'll be the first to admit, I dont trade a ton. I don't send "fishing" offers or trade offers just to make trades. I do regularly update my traid bait with what I'm offering and what I am looking for. Most leagues I average maybe 1 or 2 trades a year, but when I make them they are very intentional to what I am trying to do with the team.

Looking at my leagues, the winning fantasy managers are not necessarily the most active traders. Actually, its been somewhere in between favoring the teams that do make some moves but have really drafted very well.

I will also mention in one of my leagues, the guy who's earned the 1.01 four years in a row hasn't made a single trade, but he also drafts poorly, and doesnt make good waiver pickups.

[Lehigh98]

One thing that's helped me get better responses to trade offers is to send multiple options. For example, I'll send 2-3 offers at the same time for the same guy but with different options of what assets I'm willing to send. In some cases, when it's at least close, I think subconsciously the other guy is then deciding on which offer is best rather than if they should be taking the offer at all.

[killer_of_giants]

send nudes of the wife/gf/mum/sister to everyone that completes a trade.

[Pac_Eddy]

send nudes of the wife/gf/mum/sister to everyone that completes a trade.

Are we trying to ENcourage or DIScourage trades?

[jordanzs]

I would just join a league or 2 that has hyperactive traders. And enjoy this league for what it is. I have both leagues with tons of trade activity and leagues with very little activity. I appreciate both

[abloom]

Do you have a trade deadline? If so when is it? How many teams? How many roster spots? What are the starting requirements?

How active are people on free agents?

It's possible that some of your settings can be tweaked to make trading a better option.

[killer_of_giants]

send nudes of the wife/gf/mum/sister to everyone that completes a trade.

Are we trying to ENcourage or DIScourage trades?

i mean, having an ugly mum or sister is not your fault, but an ugly girlfriend...

[dondickenson]

I talk strategy in chat or by text to make others more comfortable knowing my intentions. I’m often overly honest and open with my strategy talk and intentions, and straightforward and helpful in giving my thoughts on others and their squads. I try to follow through and not act differently than I speak. It ends up being much appreciated by league mates.

I always maintain that I hope all trades make both teams better, and then in that case it’s just the team that trades the most that gets better the most.

I use “stagnant” as a pejorative in describing my own team behavior that I don’t like. “I can’t believe I’ve been so stagnant this off season and not made any trades to shape my team and fit my strategy. I hope I haven’t fallen behind.”

I am willing to lead by example and overpay to get trades done, and then follow that up by sending out trades to others that may follow my lead. I sent 22 1st + 22 2nd + Gaskin for Higgins + Singletary before 2021 season. Was deemed an overpay at the time, Im super happy now, esp as those picks ended up 1.12 and 2.12. Then mid season sold D Henderson + R Gronk for 23 1st + struggling Bateman. Felt like my willingness to overpay in picks made my trade partner more willing to overpay in picks right back, but that I got the better end of both deals by being more value savvy and future looking.
(Don’t know if this point made sense but it does to me)

Lastly, I just send out a ton of offers. Every few weeks I’ll send out like 10 cold trade offers to guys and if they accept they accept. Right now I have ARob out pretty much to everyone in every league I own him for 2023 1st + random flyer guys on their teams like Romeo Doubs or KJ Hamler. Someone will usually bite