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Agreed. I don't disagree that there is an element of luck involved-as there are with ALL forms of gambling-but in most leagues you'll see the same owners consistently at the top. To call that complete luck is idiotic.The only people who would claim that it is 100% luck are those who aren't intelligent enough to win once in a while."It can't be me, it must be luck!"
Not to mention unflattering to your multiple championship game appearances.Agreed. I don't disagree that there is an element of luck involved-as there are with ALL forms of gambling-but in most leagues you'll see the same owners consistently at the top. To call that complete luck is idiotic.The only people who would claim that it is 100% luck are those who aren't intelligent enough to win once in a while."It can't be me, it must be luck!"
But I've lost each time. Getting to the championship was complete and total skill. Losing each time was nothing but bad luck.Not to mention unflattering to your multiple championship game appearances.Agreed. I don't disagree that there is an element of luck involved-as there are with ALL forms of gambling-but in most leagues you'll see the same owners consistently at the top. To call that complete luck is idiotic.The only people who would claim that it is 100% luck are those who aren't intelligent enough to win once in a while."It can't be me, it must be luck!"
Then you* arent much of a sportsman.For people who want to do such things... why not bypass all the pomp and circumstance and just go out and buy a trophy - instead of joining a league - and put it on your mantle and talk about your greatness and victories to any who view it. Dont you want to earn the damn trophy? Instead of trying to scheme it into your possesion.* not really directed at you, but directed at those who dont like (are afraid of) competition.
Same boat here. I have never missed the playoffs. Luck is involved, but I have LJ and ADP injured and still won my division.
Yes, it's really tanking. That someone's end goal is increasing their odds of winning the championship doesn't negate not following common rules of sportsmanship.Ask yourself how you think the NFL should and would react if an NFL team that had clinched just let the other team walk into the endzone a few times to win the game.
What about an NFL team that plays an inferior QB, thus decreasing their chances of winning, because they are eliminated from the playoffs?
I would prefer team B. That said I have been in this situation before, tanked and faced the weaker team. Only to get beaten by the weaker team. Had I played my normal starters and faced the "better" team A I would have won.Since that I just play my best players every week and let the chips fall where they may.
Phurfur said:
Karma is a #####.
What are you talking about?If you mean that NFL teams sometimes play a younger QB once they're out of the playoff race because they want to see what they have for the future, that's not exactly how you phrased it.I'm not sure I've ever seen a fantasy team that has to set their lineups a certain way in order to see how their players will develop for next season.
I thought it was open-minded for both sides. The 'win at all costs tanker' and the league's expections.The slippery slope of ethics. If win at all costs is the mindset, rules are only rules that can enforced. Collusion is near impossible to prove. Win, win, win. Destroy the competitivenous of the league is the ultimate domination. One owner can destroy a league. These are the same owners that quit leagues they can not be competitive in because they can't win every year by playing fairly. It is never their fault and they shouldn't have bad luck.On the other hand, maybe you just want to play in a league that puts in there best lineup each week, enjoys watching football, and understands the players on the screen and how special they are at their position and in football. I don't mind being the "bad karma" for these unsportmanlike owners. "Penalty. Unsportmanlike conduct. Here's your league fee back. I paid your portion of prizes that were missing. You win nothing. Bye, bye, now."
I'm with you, but just as Devil's Advocate, what about a team that has clinched the #1 seed resting their top players, with the intent of having a better chance to win in the playoffs? Is that "tanking"? Do the NFL teams also have the duty to play their best players each week?GregR said:
Why would the league permit you to give out prizes based on what ever you feel like?
The prizes are and should always be set ahead of time. I don't think any rules can be made that
I agree with this. I would not tank on principle.However, I have seen other people tank successfully and I am okay with their doing it. Their principles are just different than mine.For me - the concept is to win every game and ultimately win the title. I prefer to do that by playing the best lineup every week. I find it a little unseemly to backdoor the system.However, it does make sense that if someone wants to tank to help their team it is an option. just not one I would choose.Steeler07 said:
What if you were invited to the New 10 million dollar Fantasy Football Reality TV Show?
Selective integrity. Nice.
No. NFL teams do not rest their players to manipulate the playoff seedings. They rest their players to avoid injury to key starters and to have players back at 100% in games that matter the most. But they still do their utmost within the game to win. Their actions are not taken to try to lose the game. Resting the players is attempting to improve their GAMETIME efforts in the games that matter most.Obviously there is no such extra benefit in fantasy. Resting your player from your fantasy lineup doesn't keep him from getting injured. It doesn't allow his nagging hurts to heal for your next game. It doesn't keep him fresh for his next game. Starting a rookie QB doesn't help you evaluate what his future is and what roster moves you may need to make at QB next year.ETA: If you want an analogy between what NFL teams do and what would be a fantasy equivalent, here is one. Your starting TE has horrible matchups in the playoffs but there is a normally lesser TE with better matchups. However, the lesser TE has a bad matchup th elast week of the season. I think most people would see no problem with you dropping your better starting TE now for the lesser one, if you think it's likely someone else will take him first if you don't. Yes, you accepted a lessened gametime effort that last week of the season, but it was done to improve your playoff gametime efforts. It wasn't a loss that didn't do anything to improve the bottom line of the points your team put up.Most of the people who are willing to tank know it is wrong, but they are willing to do it anyway. Going back to a previous poster and my reply to him... when people feel they have to lie to the league about the motivation for their actions rather than honestly state the truth, that is a generally a pretty good indicator they are doing something unethical. And that they know it.
Well now, HOW MUCH are my principles worth is a different question then isn't it?
Another word that has little meaning to me in a, let's be honest, silly little game. I have integrity and principles, I have yet to have to question them in fantasy football.In before "honor".
You must have been the guy who hides a couple hundred Monopoly dollars under the board before the game starts, or looks at the Trivial Pursuit cards before your friends arrive.Silly little games? You are cheating your friends and yourself. So you don't get to selectively have things like integrity and principles. You don't have them in this case. You just don't care. And that's fine. As others have said, if I was in a league and you tanked, one of us would not be in the league next year.
That's cheating. Your comparison sucks. As far as I am concerned, it's gamesmanship, if it's within the rules. If someone gets huffy about it, then they should have known the rules of the league before joining. I think almost all leagues I have been in has a rule about tanking. Which I am fine with. I am trying to win within the framework of the rules.
You are either breaking the rules, or you are not. I don't have to help my opponent up after I tackle him.
Many people consider tanking to be cheating. So question for you. Obviously rules cannot cover every possible contingency. I've never seen a league that says, "A commissioner cannot use his commisioner powers to alter other teams or to view other teams queued up transactions". Or that says, "You may not hack another team's account and alter their lineup." Yet I don't imagine just because there isn't a specific rule against it that people think it would be allowed.
How so? Is there a rule in Trivial Pursuit that specifically says looking at cards before guests arrive is cheating? Is there a rule in Monolpoly that says all money must be kept in plain site? No. And integrity isn't just about "following published rules." So if anyone's comparisons suck, it's yours.
I was really offended till I realized I didn't make that statement.
First, tanking happens every year in the NBA. And whatever their reason for doing it, NFL playoff teams resting their starters late in the season accomplishes the same feat: Their best ain't out on the field. So, it exists. And we aren't talking about bad teams jockeying for Adrian Peterson here. We are talking about a team making a strategic decision on whom they want to start, basing their decision on what they think is their best way of winng a title.
"That's cheating. Your comparison sucks. As far as I am concerned, it's gamesmanship, if it's within the rules.""You are either breaking the rules, or you are not. I don't have to help my opponent up after I tackle him."Uhm, ok....
Resting your injured players and avoiding injury in a game that is meaningless to your team is not tanking. Tanking is intentionally losing. Show me an NFL team that has their defense step aside to let the offense score with the motivation being to lose the game, and then you can say an NFL team has tanked in the same way that you're advocating fantasy teams do.
Or I can turn that around in the same way and say that 75% might not. The fact is that the majority of people at the least view it as questionable enough they aren't likely to do it.That is a poll asking whether people would do it, not whether they think it's ethical. Judging from talk from those who say they do engage in it, having to conceal it, I think it's pretty clear they know it's viewed as unethical.
So in summary, "Because the person tanking may not be able to do it with 100% competence, the integrity of the league isn't brought into question."
That is just asking for trouble.
And I didn't say the NFL version of it was tanking. I was pointing out that the result was (or could be) the same. Does it matter which strategy is being used (resting starters, or maybe trying to influence playoff seedings)? And as I mentioned before, it's business as usual in the NBA.
I think the majority would agree it's a gray area at least. As unethical as trade collusion, etc.? Ehhh. I am sure some think it's unethical. And I think a lot would take the attitude, "I'm not really cool with it, and I wouldn't do it, but I don't think it's cheating. Just kind of bush league" I think it's a subjective thing, not as black and white as many other issues I have seen discussed.
No, not at all. I was pointing out the gray area. Because this treads into "People should be allowed to manage their teams how they see fit." My hypothetical question stands. What if someone is accused of tanking, and forced to change his lineup, and loses. If his original lineup would have won, does he still get the loss?So in summary, "Because the person tanking may not be able to do it with 100% competence, the integrity of the league isn't brought into question."
What's the rule? Has the commish stepped in yet?And I am sure this will sound like I am talking out of both sides of my mouth, but that is definitely dirty pool.
Look, I'll address this and move on, because frankly, it's boring.I didn't offer up my definition of integrity. Whatever it is, it isn't as narrow a definition as you have assigned to me.
Yes he still gets the loss. I don't understand the point of the question in a discussion on the ethics of tanking. The league stepped in to make the owner do what an ethical owner should have done in the first place... start his best lineup. If the league was wrong on his intent, that doesn't say anything about the ethics of tanking. It just says that it can be hard to judge actions, especially when people take advantage of grayer areas. And that it's too bad some owners lack of ethics make leagues have to play sleuth in the first place. As I already said, just because people can't cheat with 100% competence doesn't change the ethics of the situation.
