How many of you have been angry time and time again over a league rule that seems like it was developed by Congress--out of place, misused, or just plain stupid?
Now is the time of year to petition your league-mates to enact changes to your constitution so they can take effect in time for the 2009 season. Waiting until spring will simply be too late. Even if you still remember your proposed change by then, others will argue they needed more time to react. Then, you’ll be stuck having to deal with another season of frustration.
Just make sure you consider all the potential ramifications of your proposed change. Sometimes ideas created under the best of intentions can turn out badly. Such is the case in the XFL or Xperts Fantasy League, a group of 15 of the very best players around, including many owners of fantasy-related businesses.
Before I get into specifics, let me brag a bit about the XFL.
Of all the leagues in which I play, this is my favorite. It has just about every element of fantasy baseball all rolled up in one diverse, fun package. It is a mixed keeper league with a live auction draft, conducted in person in late October with no paper or computers allowed, mano-a-mano.
In March, a reserve snake draft is held, designed to fill out the 40-man rosters and plug any gaps exposed since the previous fall. This reserve draft also enables one to select any player anywhere, high schoolers, foreigners, anyone. These prospects can be held until/if they reach the majors, even if it takes years.
For purposes of the next season, all reserve players carry a base salary of one dollar. Once they reach the majors, these “farm” players salaries escalate each season at only $3 per year instead of the $5 for regular players.
So, this reserve draft is crucial to the future as well as current success of one’s team. This spring, along with such prospects as Matt LaPorta, Austin Jackson and Jason Heyward, I selected my (now) keeper closers, Kerry Wood and Brian Fuentes. In addition to getting a combined 64 saves from the pair this year, next season they’ll be $6 bargains.
The farm players become important trade fodder during each season as the “haves” bulk up for the stretch run while the “have nots” prepare to reload for a future go at it. For example, Jackson, Heyward and Jose Tabata are now members of Ron Shandler’s squad as I made an ill-fated attempt to win this season. Turns out that neither Brian Roberts nor Aaron Roward were impressed to be joining my team. But, I digress.
I was honored to first join the XFL four years ago when the league expanded after its second season from 12 to 15 teams. I finished fifth my first time out. As part of expansion, an earlier rule was amended that determines the order of the spring reserve draft. (The league constitution can be viewed here.)
League commissioner Ron Shandler explained the original intention was that any team ending in the top five was anticipated to get bragging-rights value from their finish, so it was decided that the reserve draft seeding for the next March would begin with the sixth place finisher from the previous season, run up through 15, then go five through one.
Instead of being elated with my fifth-place finish in 2005, I ended up losing ten spots in the 2006 reserve draft because I hadn’t finished in sixth. In other words, instead of drafting first, I picked 11th. The difference that year was between getting first pick Josh Willingham and 11th selection Jeremy Reed, a delta of most significant proportions.
In reality, we can barely remember who won the league each year, let alone who ended up fourth or fifth. I must admit that I never appreciated the reasoning behind the rule and never liked it.
A hastily-called vote on draft day last fall to change the rule failed because there was not a majority supporting any one of the various alternatives. You can imagine how it goes when 15 guys who are used to having their own way are asked to try to solve a problem together. Alas, the bad rule was to remain another year.
By mid-season 2008, the debate erupted again, this time rehashed over dozens of emails. After a number of owners polished their stand-up comedy routines and at least one vomited all over his keyboard, we were finally organized enough to hold another vote. It came out in the following manner.
Beginning with the March 2010 reserve draft, which of the following draft order methods would you prefer?
8% A. First seed goes to last year's winner (1-2-3-4...15)
54% B. First seed goes to last year's second place team (2-3-4-5...14-15-1)
23% C. First seed goes to last year's fourth place team (4-5-6-7..14-15-3-2-1)
15% D. Seeding should be in some type of spiral (actual ranking TBD)
I was among the majority that voted for “B”, feeling that everyone should be motivated to try to finish as high in the standings as possible every year. The winner’s benefit is obvious and the second-place team is awarded the first reserve pick the next season.
Yet, it was deemed too late to affect 2009. Some clubs in the second division had already instituted dump trades of stars in return for farm players, cheap keepers for next season.
At the time, I was around ten points out of the lead, in fourth place and thought I might be able to help my strong pitching with some offensive assistance. Little did I know that neither Roberts nor Rowand would contribute much in the second half.
Once Adam Wainwright (one of my former farm players) went down for 2 ½ months and Carlos Zambrano and Kerry Wood lost their consistency, I began a slide to about 20 points out and into fifth place.
After the vote, then-sixth place owner Don Drooker had only partially joked that his only objective for the remainder of the season was to hold onto that spot in the standings.
Peter Kreutzer had other ideas. Like me, “Rotoman” had made his own run for the top, but also came to the conclusion that he and his partner Alex Patton couldn’t crack the top three of eventual winner Steve Moyer, defending champ Doug Dennis and always-tough Trace Wood.
Kreutzer explains. “Though there were better teams out there, we went for it by trading all our bench players in June plus Melvin Mora for Juan Pierre and Garrett Atkins. Atkins is an OBP horse, Pierre promised to get us plenty of steals (which would get us plenty of points), if our pitching held up we figured we had a shot and should go for it.
“Alas, the next day Pierre got hurt, so it didn't really matter that Mora actually outperformed Atkins after the trade (Atkins was fine),” Peter observed.
After trying and failing to trade stars for keepers, Kreutzer made the following decision. “I set my sights on sixth place. As you know, the team that finishes sixth gets the first pick in the March draft. I had to drop 20 points to get to sixth, but it was a long drop to seventh,
so I thought it was worth a shot.
“Not to draw undue attention, I didn't want you or Don Drooker to notice, if I could help it. But I had to bench my best players,” he explained.
And bench, he did. Among the offensive players sitting on PK’s pines as the season ended were Bobby Abreu, Shin-Soo Choo, Vladimir Guerrero, Hanley Ramirez, Brian Giles and Kevin Youkilis. His pitchers given the rest of the season off included Roy Halladay, Dan Haren, Armando Galarraga, Troy Percival and Jose Valverde. Kreutzer’s active roster was quite a rag-tag band, including a player in the minor leagues and big Richie Sexson, then out of work completely.
Not surprisingly, Kreutzer’s team began a free fall in points. It was impossible not to notice. While not explicitly against the rules, did the maneuver violate the spirit of fair play in a league where dumping stars for prospects each summer is commonplace behavior?
Neither Drooker nor I chose to react to the ploy, so Kreutzer didn’t need to worry about blowing his cover. Not pulling any punches, Drooker summed up his feelings in the following manner.
“When I looked at the standings in August, it was clear to me that the Dux could impact the close pennant race between three teams if my team stopped accumulating stats in specific categories...especially on offense. Without sounding altruistic, I wasn't capable of doing that.
“Having been fortunate enough to win the XFL a few years, I can imagine how Steve, Doug or Trace would have felt if they lost a chance at the championship because some other team owner was that selfish,” Drooker said.
We don’t know for sure whether Kreutzer’s decision to tank his own team would have changed the order among the top three, but freeing up as many as 20 points surely could have affected a tight race. It is too bad it even had to come under discussion.
With just two days remaining in the 2008 regular season, Kreutzer had seemingly achieved his objective, finally reaching sixth place for the first time after having shaved off those 20 points.
The baseball gods were not with him however, as the likes of Jose Lopez and Wandy Rodriguez stepped up with solid season-ending performances at precisely the wrong time for Kreutzer.
Once the season concluded with the Monday tie-breaker game in Chicago, the oh-so-tight battle for sixth ended as follows:
4. Kreutzer 89 points
5. Drooker 87 points
6. Walton 85 points
In a league that is an acknowledged sandbox for new ideas among the fantasy elite, Kreuzter summed his move up this way, “It was the most interesting fantasy thing that I did this year.”
Drooker is among those of us relieved that the loophole has finally been closed forever. “I'll live with having the 11th pick instead of the 1st pick...and be secure in the knowledge that we've addressed the issue and this circumstance can't happen again,” he concluded.
Take another look at this column Patton ran this past March at BaseballHQ. Prior to the reserve draft, he forecasted the 2008 XFL standings using Kreutzer’s projections, pegging the top three as Drooker (5th), Moyer (1st) and Dennis (2nd) (actual finish in parens).
I think I did even better, providing this outlook as part of my input to the article. “Dennis is well-stocked for another solid run as I noted above. A real wild card is Moyer. Clearly, Steve stocked his roster with inexpensive young talent, augmenting them with Pujols, Derek Jeter, Mo Rivera and A.J. Burnett. Steve should finish much higher than 13th this season and has a killer farm holdover group, too.”
Congratulations to the 2008 XFL champion, Steve Moyer, from Baseball Info Solutions.
Oh yeah, Patton/Kreutzer had me pegged in the pre-season at 88 points, good for seventh. Though I ended with just 85 points, I became the final, artificial “second winner” of the XFL as I finished in that coveted sixth-place spot.
Keepers are due in three weeks and our draft will be held in conjunction with Shandler’s First Pitch Arizona conference in just 30 days from now, so it will soon be time to start anew in the XFL.
In summary, let this story reinforce two points for you.
1) Make necessary changes to your league constitution now.
2) Before you do, consider all the ramifications of the change.
Finally, before I go, I have one more suggestion. If you haven’t already, please take a few moments to thank that person who has the unenviable task of managing your league’s transactions and stats all season long. It is a tough job in any format and often good work is taken for granted, going unrecognized.
For the XFL, National League Tout Wars and many others, my thanks go out to FantasyBaseball.com’s Todd Zola. Great work, “Lord Z”!
Brian Walton’s work can also be found daily at stlcardinals.scout.com.