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Mandatory Trading? (1 Viewer)

WheelsUp

WheelsUp

Footballguy
Does anyone have any mandatory trading rules in your leagues? If so, how do you implement them?
I want to generate the most active league ever and need to emphasize trading.

I have a buddy who discussed how his league works and he said the key is making sure you have owners who want to be active and trade. While that is so, even then you have people who lose the will to trade. So he docked them draft picks, roster spots and even had a radical -5 points for your score that week if you did not make a trade as some of his penalties. Now you would see meaningless trades, but the point is for players to shift teams and owners trying to send offers instead of just want to receive them, keeps the league active all year. Thought it was different. Now you cant really turn any league into this as some owners are set in their ways, but you can create a new league where owners know what they are signing up for.

A league like this isnt for everyone, but I know many who would love a league like this as they would never be punished since they would have to trade. One owner told me he has seen a week where one owner is left and he has to trade, so everyone is low balling him, knowing he had to make a trade. It made him never wait to be last to trade again and he see 10 trades a week. Sign me up for a league like that. Would love some thoughts.

 
Too many potential problems to be worth commishing it, but I wouldn't turn down a league like that - would be fun to at least try it for a year. Definitely would not do it for dynasty. At some point people need to have confidence in their drafting ability and a little patience. 

 
WheelsUp said:
Does anyone have any mandatory trading rules in your leagues? If so, how do you implement them?
I want to generate the most active league ever and need to emphasize trading.

I have a buddy who discussed how his league works and he said the key is making sure you have owners who want to be active and trade. While that is so, even then you have people who lose the will to trade. So he docked them draft picks, roster spots and even had a radical -5 points for your score that week if you did not make a trade as some of his penalties. Now you would see meaningless trades, but the point is for players to shift teams and owners trying to send offers instead of just want to receive them, keeps the league active all year. Thought it was different. Now you cant really turn any league into this as some owners are set in their ways, but you can create a new league where owners know what they are signing up for.

A league like this isnt for everyone, but I know many who would love a league like this as they would never be punished since they would have to trade. One owner told me he has seen a week where one owner is left and he has to trade, so everyone is low balling him, knowing he had to make a trade. It made him never wait to be last to trade again and he see 10 trades a week. Sign me up for a league like that. Would love some thoughts.
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Conceptually I 100% agree with your buddy. However, I've been in a league like this - requiring each team to make x number of trades each quarter of the season - and it was more trouble than it was worth IMO. For every "real" trade you had a half-dozen guys swapping kickers or reserve TEs back and forth in successive weeks to adhere to the letter of the law rather than its spirit.

If you really want to encourage trading, you should tell the commish to do what one of mine did ... expanded the benches (to 20 roster spots for a 1/2/3/1/1/1 format) and allowed unlimited trades - but only 8 add/drops per owner for the entire season (later increased to 10). He also allowed add/drops to be traded alongside players - so a guy who was out of pickups but needed a fill-in didn't have to get bent over a barrel trading for a player, but could instead swap (presumably) a lesser quantity for a 9th WW add. Alternatively, a softer version of this makes trades free but imposes a hefty transaction fee (5% or more of the buy-in) for each WW add, or an escalating price per add per owner ... so $2 for the first add, $4 for the second, then $6, $8, etc.

If you mandate that owners do something, they'll find ways to do it without really doing it, and you'll piss them off in the process. Better to disincentivize the alternatives and let them come to their own realization that frequent trading is the best way to win.

 
Lord no.  Trading isn't a prerequisite for success in fantasy sports.  It helps if you are a good trader however, but it's just one of many variables to success. 

 
Holy crap that league sounds terrible.  I love a league that trades somewhat often but forcing trades is ridiculous.

I suggest doing it similar to how my league does transactions.  My league charges $20 at the start of the season to go towards transactions.  This gives people a reason to be active in picking players up since they already paid for them.  It works well because people forget how much they've spent on transactions and just keep making them all season long.  Those fees get paid out to teams that make the playoffs and win their divisions.

I would charge a small fee for all trades season long.  Before the season starts I would make it so everyone has to pre-pay a certain amount that goes towards trades.  This would give them a reason to be active in trading since they have the money already invested.  In order to make it sound better you just raise the entry fee to the league and tell them that price increase goes towards trades.

 
I won my championship this year without making a single trade - that's not the norm, but people value players differently and I would rather not be penalized for not trading because the value people put on players varies so much from my own

 
I can't say I would want to be in a league like this. I'm an active trader in my leagues, but in some leagues other owners are not. I don't agree with penalizing them for managing their own team in the manner they want to. I like Hawkeye21's idea..Good luck

 
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Johnny, PPR isnt a prerequisite either, but people can choose to join those leagues if they so choose. Same with redraft and dyno, people can choose. Saying NO isnt helpful, trying to figure out how to make it work is the point. IDP is a choice too, having to break down IDP isnt a prerequisite, but you can join those leagues.

Hawkeye, if we are being fair, that idea of yours sound just as terrible, lol. Raising fees are always a pain as your league can fall apart fast.

The help needed here is working out how to make it the best for people who choose to join such a league. Thanks for the advice and input from all however. Lets me know the different points of views.

 
WheelsUp said:
Johnny, PPR isnt a prerequisite either, but people can choose to join those leagues if they so choose. Same with redraft and dyno, people can choose. Saying NO isnt helpful, trying to figure out how to make it work is the point. IDP is a choice too, having to break down IDP isnt a prerequisite, but you can join those leagues.

Hawkeye, if we are being fair, that idea of yours sound just as terrible, lol. Raising fees are always a pain as your league can fall apart fast.

The help needed here is working out how to make it the best for people who choose to join such a league. Thanks for the advice and input from all however. Lets me know the different points of views.
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Well, I think raising the league fee $20 would be a lot easier than forcing people to make trades.  Pre-paying for trades does not force anyone to trade but does encourage it.  If I drafted a team that is doing great I do not want to be forced to make a trade.  I know it's a choice to be in that league but if you are trying to make it enjoyable in order to keep people in the league I suggest my idea.  You'd be surprised how simple it can be.

 
Contract league with increasing salaries and a hard salary cap would greatly increase the amount of trading if that is what you are looking for. The penalties are already built in by design by forcing teams to cut salary or trade to get under their cap limit or incentivizing teams to create cap space to bid on quality Free Agents. Also refreshes the available player pool more frequently keeping owners more interested (IMO.)

Although a lot of people aren't interested in this type of league because most owners dream of drafting Peterson or Rice as rookies and holding them for their entire career's.

 
Buckna said:
Contract league with increasing salaries and a hard salary cap would greatly increase the amount of trading if that is what you are looking for. The penalties are already built in by design by forcing teams to cut salary or trade to get under their cap limit or incentivizing teams to create cap space to bid on quality Free Agents. Also refreshes the available player pool more frequently keeping owners more interested (IMO.)

Although a lot of people aren't interested in this type of league because most owners dream of drafting Peterson or Rice as rookies and holding them for their entire career's.
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Now that's interesting and even more like managing a real NFL team.

 
Contract leagues where newly acquired players can be extended might be good in dynasty. 

But with mandatory trading? I'd be trading my backup kicker many weeks. 

 
Not surprised at the people dropping one liners with no other input. Not surprising people are not looking forward and trying new things.
You can even say this isnt for everyone and looking for input and people will still think they are being forced to join such a league.

Problem is people are looking at the other leagues examples and thinking thats the only way and not even realizing it was just one way a guy in one league does it and the point of this is to evolve on it or make it better.

 
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My 12 team dynasty league is a salary cap league where each offseason a player's salary goes up a % based on their scoring compared to their peers.  For example, the top 3 QB's go up 30%, 4-6 go up 25%, 7-12 20%, 13-24 15%, 25-36 10%, below 36, no increase.  All cents round up.

It's not as complicated to manage as a contract league, but replicates the feel of managing talent and cap really well.  We charge a transaction fee for free agent pickups, but trades are free.  We also have no trade deadline, which means that aging studs on poor fantasy teams have high value at the end of a season for a playoff team to strengthen their chances in the playoffs.

Every one of our members says there are more trades in this league than any other league they have been a part of.  This season alone we had 20 trades.

Regardless whether you like our setup or not, it seems to me that creating an environment where making trades is desirable would be far preferable to mandating trades.

 
WheelsUp said:
Not surprised at the people dropping one liners with no other input. Not surprising people are not looking forward and trying new things.
You can even say this isnt for everyone and looking for input and people will still think they are being forced to join such a league.
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It sounds like a lot of unnecessary work for the league and especially the commissioner.  How do you enforce someone to make a trade when they like their team?  Like someone said above, they would be trading a back up kicker.  The problem I see is that people are going to be picking up scrubs just so they have a crappy player to trade.  I don't see the benefit of that other than there being action.  I can see it being fun when people are making legitimate trades but that's not going to happen all season long.  I see it as being a pain for some owners as the season goes on and more work than being enjoyable. 

 
Yes and thats the point.

The mandatory trading does seem hard and tough to do, it is why I am asking a fantasy football community on ideas to make one work for those who so choose.
Contract leagues seem interesting and love the idea, but would love other ideas.

 
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WheelsUp said:
Yes and thats the point.

The mandatory trading does seem hard and tough to do, it is why I am asking a fantasy football community on ideas to make one work for those who so choose.
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Well, you've gotten a couple ideas.  If I were in your league I would some sort of incentive to make a trade.  I'd want it to be something that benefits me and not something that hurts my team.  Having to trade out of fear of losing points, picks or roster spots.  To me that's not very fun or even fair.

 
Sure, but that was just one guy I spoke to who actually has a league has his. Not the be all end all. The league owners play by the same rules, so how is it not fair?
Is it fair you lose points for an interception? But its a rule everyone abides by, so its fair for all. If the league rules are of you must trade, everyone follows the rules, so it is FAIR.
Again, I'm trying to hammer home a league just like this is just like any, a choice to join.

 
Maybe instead of monitoring completed trades, you should monitor trade offers. Sometimes you don't get a deal done, the real crime is not trying.

 
WheelsUp said:
Sure, but that was just one guy I spoke to who actually has a league has his. Not the be all end all. The league owners play by the same rules, so how is it not fair?
Is it fair you lose points for an interception? But its a rule everyone abides by, so its fair for all. If the league rules are of you must trade, everyone follows the rules, so it is FAIR.
Again, I'm trying to hammer home a league just like this is just like any, a choice to join.
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Serious question here.  If you already know someone in a league like this that is successful enough that you want to create one just like it, why aren't you just tapping that individual for a copy of his rules?  I would say that the majority of people here - based on the responses so far - have never played in a league like this and can't conceive of a scenario where being forced to trade a certain number of times each season seems like fun or even realistic.

You've got a model for success already, why not use it?

 
Im not sure it really is successful in my eyes of success its heading into his 2nd year, I also am not a fan of all his rules, I do want some input from anyone who can give it. Got some good stuff here, but more criticisms than anything really helpful. The best advice was a whole different type of league.

 
Thrifty rocker is onto something. People would say monitoring that gets into privacy and is also hard to dictate the legitimate trade offers. But there may be ways around it as getting offers from teams themselves as they disclose the amount of offers from each team they got. The crime is in not trying to better your team and we all know trading is an attempt to do just that. I know drafts do that, but keep in mind this is not a draft discussion but creating trades.

 
When all is said and done, the most important thing is that the league is fun.  Trading, generally speaking, is fun - most in this thread acknowledge that.

I think what you're bumping up against is that the idea of being forced to trade a given number of times each season takes some of that fun away.  Especially when you start to think about ways that some owners might attempt to circumvent that rule by trading kickers, "swapping players" every other week, navigating all the rules you'd have to put in place to prevent these types of scenarios, and then suffering the consequences when one of these rules prevents a legitimate attempt to improve a team.

It isn't that the idea doesn't sound fair - you're right, if everyone abides by the same rules then it's fair - it's really that it doesn't sound like fun.  I love trading, and I love encouraging my league to trade, but forcing teams to trade doesn't sound like fun at all.

I stand behind my comment earlier - and it's a point others have made as well: you're better off creating rules that encourage trading than you are forcing it.  If you create league rules that reward trading, then the trades will come naturally.

 
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I think the hey here is to encourage trading without making it mandatory.  Not every person has a team that needs to trade so I see no reason to make them.  How can you make it so people want to trade is the question.  There need to be some other benefits other than just trying to improve your team.  I'm not so sure punishment is the best way to get this done.  Punishment will most likely get more trades going but I'm not sure they will be very good ones and I don't think people are going to enjoy it as much.

I'm struggling coming up with a way to benefit people for making trades though.

 
Absolutely terrible idea.

Not being able to run your team the way you see fit is a terrible league philosophy.

 
In my 14 team league that has been together for 22 years we used to meet every Thursday at the same bar that a league member owned. We would do our drop and adds, then with people drinking there would be trades almost every week..the more booze the bigger the deals.

Since we went all online there are only a few trades a year. In most FF leagues people over value there own players far too much.

 
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Hawkeye21 said:
I'm struggling coming up with a way to benefit people for making trades though.
Click to expand...
It's all in how you set up your rules:

  • Charging a fee for other transactions but not trades
  • No trade deadline
  • Using a salary cap and having players increase in salary each season
  • Using contracts
  • Dynasty leagues in general encourage trading more so than redraft leagues
  • Allowing the trade of future draft picks
  • Larger roster sizes
These are all ways, right off the top of my head, that you can get people trading more without forcing owners to trade.

 
Da Guru said:
In my 14 team league that has been together for 22 years we used to meet every Thursday at the same bar that a league member owned. We would do our drop and adds, then with people drinking there would be trades almost every week..the more booze the bigger the deals.

Since we went all online there are only a few trades a year. In most FF leagues people over value there own players far too much.
Click to expand...
The bolded is really the thing that discourages me from trading (and I'm sure I'm part of that problem)

Always cracks me up when people start offering me trade deals 2 days after the draft. Uh...if I wanted those players, I'm pretty sure I would have drafted them.

 
As others have said I don't think it is a good idea to force people to play a certain way if they don't want to. Fantasy football does not have to be all about trading. In dynasty leagues especially one of the goals may be to get the players that you like, once you have done that then why would you want to trade them away?

I think it is fine to make rules that may encourage trading, but there is still the issue of free will and autonomy that needs to be respected. 

Since we are spit balling however I did have an idea that would cause people to want to trade good players frequently.

What if the league had a rule that whoever is your highest scoring player of each week on your roster, you cannot start that player again in that same season. 

So every week every team will have their best player become eliminated from eligible use. So they will be trying to trade those players away following this and every team will have good players to trade that are no longer useful to them.

That might be an effective way to make every week more active for trades. The high scores of each week basically turn into the trade block, because owners will not want to cut them.

 
I'm in a 3-year old dynasty league that doesn't like to initiate trades. I have traded approximately 15 times in those 3 years. There has been 3 trades so far, in 3 years, that didn't involve me in some way (and 1 guy was involved in all 3 of those trades). So really, it's just 2 of us trading. But I know that people are trying, I hear about offers after they've been declined.  I think my league is just afraid to trade and make a mistake. When I send offers I usually overpay or make situational trades (Ex. team that needs a RB that just made the playoffs, send a mediocre RB for a high price).  I think that has upped my trade success rate, but I wish there was a good way to increase trade volume.

 
WheelsUp said:
Does anyone have any mandatory trading rules in your leagues? If so, how do you implement them?
I want to generate the most active league ever and need to emphasize trading.

I have a buddy who discussed how his league works and he said the key is making sure you have owners who want to be active and trade. While that is so, even then you have people who lose the will to trade. So he docked them draft picks, roster spots and even had a radical -5 points for your score that week if you did not make a trade as some of his penalties. Now you would see meaningless trades, but the point is for players to shift teams and owners trying to send offers instead of just want to receive them, keeps the league active all year. Thought it was different. Now you cant really turn any league into this as some owners are set in their ways, but you can create a new league where owners know what they are signing up for.

A league like this isnt for everyone, but I know many who would love a league like this as they would never be punished since they would have to trade. One owner told me he has seen a week where one owner is left and he has to trade, so everyone is low balling him, knowing he had to make a trade. It made him never wait to be last to trade again and he see 10 trades a week. Sign me up for a league like that. Would love some thoughts.
Click to expand...
Mandatory trading and penalizing owners who don't is amateur night. No self respecting owner would join a league like that.

 
Biabreakable said:
As others have said I don't think it is a good idea to force people to play a certain way if they don't want to. Fantasy football does not have to be all about trading. In dynasty leagues especially one of the goals may be to get the players that you like, once you have done that then why would you want to trade them away?

I think it is fine to make rules that may encourage trading, but there is still the issue of free will and autonomy that needs to be respected. 

Since we are spit balling however I did have an idea that would cause people to want to trade good players frequently.

What if the league had a rule that whoever is your highest scoring player of each week on your roster, you cannot start that player again in that same season. 

So every week every team will have their best player become eliminated from eligible use. So they will be trying to trade those players away following this and every team will have good players to trade that are no longer useful to them.

That might be an effective way to make every week more active for trades. The high scores of each week basically turn into the trade block, because owners will not want to cut them.
Click to expand...
Very interesting idea. I can't see this working in a dynasty format, but redraft certainly.

 
Tybeeman said:
Very interesting idea. I can't see this working in a dynasty format, but redraft certainly.
Click to expand...
I agree this would only work in a redraft league.

Dynasty leagues are about being able to keep players for their whole careers if you want to, so that idea would be in direct conflict with this goal.

 
One of my leagues have "mandatory trade offers" during the offseason, even if it's a total garbage offer.  Each team is supposed to receive offers from the rest of the league during a specific trade window in the offseason and there are 4 of these windows for each of the divisions.  This was done to drive activity.

It sounded like a great idea when I joined.  It's never worked though.  In the 3+ seasons since we had the startup, I have yet to receive a trade offer from the 15 other teams during my division's "trade offer window".  

 
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Careful of your insults Pete over simple things like tossing around ideas. Closed minded thoughts like that do not propel ideas, they hinder them.
eNdblu, what was their to force the sending of trades, good will? You need something to encourage people, not just their word.

 
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WheelsUp said:
Does anyone have any mandatory trading rules in your leagues? If so, how do you implement them?
I want to generate the most active league ever and need to emphasize trading.
Click to expand...
I think you are going about this the wrong way, but good luck. You can't force owners to be active by the rules/format. Get awesome owners and set up an awesome league and you'll get the most active league ever. Setting up a rule in the bylaws that says you must be active or there is X penalty is not going to work.

 
WheelsUp said:
Careful of your insults Pete over simple things like tossing around ideas. Closed minded thoughts like that do not propel ideas, they hinder them.
eNdblu, what was their to force the sending of trades, good will? You need something to encourage people, not just their word.
Click to expand...
Looking over our bylaws again, I don't think there's anything in there about penalizing teams that don't send the offers.  All I can see is reporting to the commish about teams that fail to respond to trade offers, so I'd assume it's the same deal.  Basically ratting out your league mates.

In the past I've asked the commish how he plans to enforce it, but never gotten a straight answer.  Its a 32 team league, so I can only imagine how difficult it would be to micromanage that type of thing.  I eventually stopped sending offers during the mandatory trade windows since I'm sending out offers all offseason.

 
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WheelsUp said:
Not surprised at the people dropping one liners with no other input. Not surprising people are not looking forward and trying new things.
You can even say this isnt for everyone and looking for input and people will still think they are being forced to join such a league.

Problem is people are looking at the other leagues examples and thinking thats the only way and not even realizing it was just one way a guy in one league does it and the point of this is to evolve on it or make it better.
Click to expand...
I think most people are just being realistic and telling you, that you can't really legislate trade activity. The best way to have an active league is to find the right mix of owners.

Also, trading just for the sake of trading doesn't make some one a good active owner. Maybe what you could legislate, at the very least, is creating penalties for owners that let trade offers expire. The problem with forcing trades has been addressed numerous times already in the thread.

 
I would not play in such a league. I ran a dynasty league once where a couple guys were mad at me for never agreeing to their trades. They tried to lecture me about how I should make trades because it is a dynasty league. F you, guys. That league was folded at the end of that season. I hate when league members try to tell you how to run a league and how to even play fantasy football in general.

 
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