First I want to point out that this seems to just be a new name for a very old concept. Whether or not it's better or worse than other baseline methods is certainly debatable, but it's not new in any way.
Also, in reading your article it seems like you may be conflating the concepts of
value and
price. While they are frequently related, it's important to remember how they differ.
Who determines the value of a player? We do. We are the market.
No we don't. We determine the
price of a player. That price may turn out to be way too high, or just about right, or the steal of the draft. The player's
value is determined by how many more points he provides your team than other players you could have taken in his place. This is something we try to calculate based on projected fantasy stats, not "market" conditions.
We determine the relative value of players by the order in which we draft them.
Again, no we don't. We determine the price of players by the order in which we draft them. Their actual value can be quite different.Since you're using market analogies, think of players as stocks. Every stock has a
price, which is determined by what the market is willing to pay. The underlying company or asset also has some intrinsic
value, which is determined by their business model, profitability, etc. This value can sometimes differ greatly from the market price of the stock, which is why there are undervalued and overvalued stocks. Just because someone's willing to pay $40 for a share of Facebook doesn't mean a share of Facebook is worth $40.
You may dispute that last part by pointing out that if someone is willing to buy Facebook stock for $40, then it IS worth $40. You're right in that sense, and this is where the market analogy starts to break down when you try to translate it into fantasy football terms. Unlike stocks, you don't draft players with the intention of selling them later for a profit. You draft them because you think they will produce more points for your team. That's the value of fantasy players. If everyone else in your leage (i.e. the "market") decided that Sebastian Janikowski was worth a 1st round pick, and all tried to trade up to the #1 spot to get him there, that doesn't mean he's actually worth the #1 overall pick. In other words, even though his
price (determined by the market) was 1.01, his
value (not determined by the market) wasn't anywhere near that.
Let's take this to an absurd level just to really expose the flaw. Imagine you found yourself in a league with standard roster and scoring settings, but for some reason everyone drafted nothing but kickers for the first 12 rounds. Starting kickers, backup kickers, retired kickers, high school kickers... they just can't get enough kickers. Your "market-driven" baseline would determine that kickers are ubervaluable (since the baseline kicker would be like the 144th kicker down the list) and that players at all other positions are essentially worthless (since the baseline players would be the #1 guy at each position). This is the exact opposite of a winning strategy, of course - in reality, the optimal strategy would be to scoop up studs at every other position and destroy your competition every other week.
That highlights a problem with the "market-driven" value model - the way to really succeed is not to let the market determine player values for you, it's to determine player values independently of their market price, and then select the ones that are the most underpriced by the market. Really the best way to use "market" tendencies to your advantage is to use dynamic baselines during the draft.
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