League Commish (should I intervene?) (1 Viewer)

[jeaton6]

Question about whether I should intervene as commissioner in our league. One team is 0-4 and as of last week doesn't appear to be managing his team at all. No waiver wire pick-ups, no starting line-up changes, etc. He presently has 4 players on bye this week sitting in his starting line-up.

I just sent a note to the league reminding them to continue managing their teams and in the very least starting players that aren't on a bye week for the integrity/competitiveness of the league. I told the teams that I would be scanning the teams at 12:45 game day and any bye week players would be substituted out for bench players based on the bench players that were averaging the highest points per game.

My question is whether this is a reasonable way to go or whether I should just let things play out and let the owners manage (or not manage) their teams as they so choose? From a competitive standpoint I'm concerned that the division with this particular owner has a distinct advantage since they get to play him twice and the rest of the league owners only play him once.

I really appreciate feedback on this issue.

Thanks, Evan.

 

[two_dollars]

Don't manage their teams for them. Let them eat the loss. Send them a warning by email that should they continue to start BYE or OUT players, they will be removed from the league. THEN you can ghost manage their team by projections and find a new owner next year.

 

[kroyrunner89]

I'm a comish in a league too with a similar problem, its a league of my friends so basically i talked to other people in the league and we all agreed to warn him to start paying attention or he'd be replaced in the next season. i think changing lineups for them goes a bit too far, going up against teams like this is kind of a luck of the draw thing, his team was 0-3 before the bye weeks came along so chances are it won't win much anyways even if you sub in the players.

 

[Hipple Long Ware & Peete]

my leagues have rules to address this, but YES i would sub them in. all teams have to field a starting lineup for the integrity competitiveness of the league (all teams should have to face full teams at least) Hwever I'm not sure how to handle the WW issue with an inactive owner. In one of my leagues you have to field a roster no matter what and if you say don't have a kicker b/c yours is on bye you have to drop the bye week kicker.

 

[Ignoratio Elenchi]

I think you should intervene and set his lineup, not for his sake but for the sake of all the other owners in the league. It is unfair to them that someone will be awarded what is essentially an automatic win.

 

[Hipple Long Ware & Peete]

if you truly think the owner is absentee at this point, I'd address it with the league and figure out if you can agree on someone to ghost manage it.

 

[Buckeyedawgs]

a mistake here or there or a roster problem bye is acceptable occasionaly.

For instance I had a owner without a back up qb when his starter was on bye because its dynasty and hes holding quinn and stanten. I don;t have a problem with that. I did wisecrack him about it. And he did get another qb to cover it this year.

But if the dude is inactive I would remove him! Even if I have to sell the team discount! I also would use the shark to determine his starters until I got a new owner in. Beleive it or not I have never had this problem in 20 years!

Thats why my touch bonus leagues are best on net! I do replace owners here or there for other reasons but never for continuiosly failure to fill byes.

I play in a lot of roster limited dynastys. I've even ate a bye on a kicker because I dont want to drop mine and didnt have a reasonable drop. That is acceptable!

 

[Bears_Man2]

Had this issue a couple years back in my local, just went to an all-play schedule.

 

[j ViLLA x PE]

I'm in a similar situation in a money league $1800 on the line. The guy is 0-4 and has 3 bye players on his starting line up. The thing is, i work with the guy, he's already paid his dues, and i think he's on vacation.

I contemplated of setting his line up for him based on projections only. But i will wait it out a couple more weeks before stepping in as commish.

 

[Ignoratio Elenchi]

I don't get all the responses who think you should not intervene. It's not fair for anyone involved that this guy has four players on bye in his starting lineup. Especially if there's money on the line.

 

[amphibianbri]

If he hasn't responded to you warning him about it (call, e-mail, etc.), at this point I would make one last attempt to call and understand where he is coming from. If he isn't going to manage the team, the opponenet for that team each week will play against the average score of the league for that week. You shouldn't be making moves for him. I've warned two owners in my league to pay attention to things like that or they will be removed for next year. Hope this helps.

 

[Buckeyedawgs]

I'm in a similar situation in a money league $1800 on the line. The guy is 0-4 and has 3 bye players on his starting line up. The thing is, i work with the guy, he's already paid his dues, and i think he's on vacation.I contemplated of setting his line up for him based on projections only. But i will wait it out a couple more weeks before stepping in as commish.

i disagree with this! u either need to address it right away and fix it weekly or stay away! its not fair to other owners to pick and choose when your going to fill byes and when your not. as a commish you needed to take this to your league immediatly. each situation is different but if your gonna replace byes one week you need to all weeks. to be fair to the inactive owners opponets.

 

[Jeff Pasquino]

1. Contact the owner and find out why he's doing it.

2. Check your rulebook and see if you have any provision for this - even a "best interest of the league".

3. If #2 is "No", change your rulebook next year to cover this situation.

You can't change the rules of your league after the league starts play. That's the deal, and something every commish must abide by.

The only other option is if the league wants to / is able to boot the owner. Then you'd have to have consensus of every owner to bounce him and agree how the team would be managed. That'd be messy if it isn't in the rulebook.

Good luck, it's not a great situation.

 

[Jersey35]

In my league, I've set it up so that each team basically plays two games per week - one for head-to-head, and one for top or bottom half of the league in scoring. We require an owner to actually set a lineup each week (even if it's the same as last week). If they don't, they automatically lose the head-to-head matchup and are given the previous week's lineup. Their score counts to the top/bottom win/lose but they can't win the head-to-head.

This allows us to effetively punish the inattentive owner without going overboard, while not punishing the owner he was facing.

We also have a rule that specifically states that two weeks in a row without setting a full lineup is grounds for action by the commish, resulting in possible removal and ghost team status until the team is filled (which doesn't take long because we have owners in the wings in our "rookie" league - basically a waiting list for our dynasty league.)

To address the OP, if you don't have rules stating what should be done, I would adjust the roster with best rated lineup. I would then remove the other owner if he doesn't respond or fix the issue after you attempt to contact him. Immediately begin looking for a replacement owner. State that you are doing that, and establish that as precedent moving forward.

Good luck!!

 

[jeaton6]

I honestly believe he is doing it out of ignorance. This is his second year doing FF and he doesn't know much about football in general let alone fantasy. He was 3-10 last year but in general he appeared to manage his team week to week (though I didn't keep close tabs as much as I am now that I'm the commish). I took over the league last minute from the outgoing commish this year and unfortunately we didn't have a rule book established.

Unfortunately I don't think anyone would be up for booting him this year as he is "easy money" and there is no way we could ever get someone to take over the team (even at a discount). Next year he won't be in the league unless he cleans up his act.

I'm interested to see how the league reacts to my email. I'm expecting the guy who plays him this week and the guys who play him twice in his division to have a fit and I expect the rest of the league to adamantly support replacing bye week players with starters, unless of course they are teams that never would start a guy on a bye week and they think that affords them a competitive advantage to get into the playoffs.

 

[hellz_fireflies]

Question about whether I should intervene as commissioner in our league. One team is 0-4 and as of last week doesn't appear to be managing his team at all. No waiver wire pick-ups, no starting line-up changes, etc. He presently has 4 players on bye this week sitting in his starting line-up. I just sent a note to the league reminding them to continue managing their teams and in the very least starting players that aren't on a bye week for the integrity/competitiveness of the league. I told the teams that I would be scanning the teams at 12:45 game day and any bye week players would be substituted out for bench players based on the bench players that were averaging the highest points per game. My question is whether this is a reasonable way to go or whether I should just let things play out and let the owners manage (or not manage) their teams as they so choose? From a competitive standpoint I'm concerned that the division with this particular owner has a distinct advantage since they get to play him twice and the rest of the league owners only play him once. I really appreciate feedback on this issue.Thanks, Evan.

If you want I run his team for him...not going to pay though for it..already paid..LOL

 

[j ViLLA x PE]

I'm in a similar situation in a money league $1800 on the line. The guy is 0-4 and has 3 bye players on his starting line up. The thing is, i work with the guy, he's already paid his dues, and i think he's on vacation.I contemplated of setting his line up for him based on projections only. But i will wait it out a couple more weeks before stepping in as commish.

i disagree with this! u either need to address it right away and fix it weekly or stay away! its not fair to other owners to pick and choose when your going to fill byes and when your not. as a commish you needed to take this to your league immediatly. each situation is different but if your gonna replace byes one week you need to all weeks. to be fair to the inactive owners opponets.

The thing is, it could be premature panic. Last week i played a team that still had Reggie Wayne in his line up prior to kick off. Half the league was complaining about the dude. I wasn't sure what to do. 10 minutes prior to kickoff, he fixed his line up and posted a comment that he over slept.I'm calling the guy right now though for this week.

 

[hellz_fireflies]

Not that its the same as the op's question..but in most of my leagues the rule is, if no starting lineup by 1PM Sunday (depends on sch.of course) the lineup will fall back to the past weeks lineup...seems fair in case someone couldn't just place a lineup in.

 

[BAT1man]

To ensure active participation every week throughout the season, our league has an interesting financial reward/punihment system.

League entry fees are $135. This reward/punishment system helps build the pot.

Weekly Rewards:

- The team with the highest score of the week wins $5.

- Each team that wins their head-2-head match-up wins $5

Weekly Punishments:

- The team with the lowest score of the week pays $10 into the pot, to be split at the end of the season.

- Each team that loses their head-2-head match-up pays a fee based on how badly they lost to their opponent:

1-10 point loss = pay $2

11-20 = $4

21-30 = $6

31-40 = $8

41+ = $10

By not managing your team, you may lose up to $20 a week, and the league runs all 17 weeks. Do the math.

 

[mistersmith]

We have a general rule in our league that a team that fails to field a full lineup will be forced to throw in another 20 bucks in the pot. Generally we've been pretty lax about it if someone does everything they possibly can to field a full lineup but can't due to bench space. But its proven to be a pretty solid deterrent to those thinking about tanking the season.

 

[Coach3K]

The issue isn't really that he'd be an easy/automatic win.

It's really that he'd be such a win for those who face him late in the season...or in the middle of the season if he were to start involved, drop off the face of the earth in week 4, then come back to it in week 10 or something. That would definitely impact balance.

We had this come up briefly last week. A guy left Eli in his lineup with Favre on the bench - clearly he just didn't log in to change anything for whatever reason. Sad thing is, he still ended up winning!

Our league rules have a "fair play/honest effort" rule that outlines this kind of stuff. It's pretty vague and allows latitude for my roomate and me as co-commissioners to step in when needed to set lineups on obviously "dead" teams. We'd basically sub in the players with the highest point-totals at the vacant positions for the week. Not very subjective, so not many concerns about bias there. Of course, the first step is determining if the team is dead. Like others here, I put a reminder post on the league board and emailed the guy directly, as he again had a Bye week player in the lineup until about Thursday. He's since changed his lineup to be fully active.

 

[CiscoKid]

Unfortunately I don't think anyone would be up for booting him this year as he is "easy money" and there is no way we could ever get someone to take over the team (even at a discount). Next year he won't be in the league unless he cleans up his act.

Why would you be looking to get money for the team - didn't the guy already pay? You just need to get someone else to agree to manage it for the rest of the way...

 

[Hoss_Cartwright]

The only time starting players on a bye, or starting injured players should be tolerated, is if it's a dynasty league and the owner doesn't have any options on their bench. No owner should be forced to drop a player he might want to keep for the sake of having someone cover a bye. Anything else should be considered tanking.

 

[DawnBTVS]

Several questions...

1: Did you try to contact him outside of just a league wide e-mail? Maybe a personal situation has come up (family death?) to where the owner, rightly so, wouldn't think of the league first.

2: Was he active last week but just hasn't done anything this week? Could be a case of #1 where a real life situation popped up if he was active last week.

3: Does he set his lineups late (i.e. right before kick off) in general? If he does, it'd be a little premature to call him out whereas if he's often the first one to do so, it'd raise eyebrows.

4: Has he ever just not competed before? You mentioned he played last year (all the way through?) and it sounds like he played all four weeks this year, right? If so, it could again be something drastic that resulted in the change.

5: What kind of league is this? Dynasty?

 

[Marc Levin]

Too early to manage someone else's team. Maybe he is "punting" this week.

But, it'd be good to get a little inquisitive and proactive.

 

[Neil Beaufort Zod]

Absolutely okay to make this change, but the guy has to lose the team. You need to find a replacement ASAP. Even if it's at no cost. This will get rid of the bad apple and send a message that not taking at least five minutes a week to run your team is not acceptable.

 

[Pictus Cat]

If he doesn't have the time,

and booting him could cause professional, family, or friend problems,

suggest a more active co-owner for him.