Need Advice - Tanking Issue (1 Viewer)

[pinda]

Here's the situation:

11 year 9 player keeper league.

Owner has been part of the league for about 6 years. Has been relatively competitive every year except last and this year. Last year he gets 3 fines for dressing bye week and injured players on 3 different weeks. We've never had an owner had that many fines in 1 year. Owner says it's hard for him "to be into it" because his team is so bad.

Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers. Just check in once a week and answer trade offers. He's been on the site but does not answer offers for 3-5 weeks. The kicker is during the offseason he has the nerve to call out another team for not being a good owner

Fast forward to this past weekend and he starts Alex Smith. He is currently out of it again and is going for the first overall pick. There were 6 starting QBs available to be picked up. He has one other QB on his roster, Chad Pennington. During our regular Thursday waiver run, he picks up no players. On Friday, we open up a free for all for 24 hours, and he picks up JJ Arrington and Drew Carter but does not address his QB situation. 2 owners complain that he's tanking, I take it to the board and they return a 2-1 verdict that he's tanking.

Now here's where I come in. I can levy any punishment and there has never been a previous incident like this. I have no faith that this guy won't do it again considering it's the 4th time now. Owner says he wasn't tanking, it was just bad management. I should remove him and normally it is known if you tank, you are removed from the league. What do I do, remove him, strip him of his first rounder, drop him out of the lottery in the first round? Just need some opinions.

 

[DMXATF23]

Do you have a no-tanking rule?

-chris

 

[pinda]

Do you have a no-tanking rule?-chris

Yeah we do and if it's tanking, all the owners know that they can be removed. However, as Commish, I have discretion to give him a lesser punishment.

 

[lion_crazz]

Well if he is that bad of an owner, why is he still around in the first place? This would be his last year, in my opinion. Even the 1-9 owner in my league is still filling in a valid line-up each week.

 

[Bri]

Pinda, just a sidenote. If he was competitive and knows FF and can't get his team to be competetive, you might need to analyze your rules some. Dynasty Leagues often don't account for this.

I hate tanking and even if it's legal in a league it makes me not want to be a part of it. I do recall a commish once going back to the last competetive lineup someone put in and putting that in for him every week. I saw that as a fair solution and didn't mind the commish taking some liberties there. I would start with a phone call to this guy. If it's been several years like you said, maybe you can recall another guy tanking that you can use as an example to discuss and not be combative.

 

[phillyphan07]

I think its a fine line. If its a dynasty league and he obviously needs to rebuild should he be picking up vinny testeverde? even pennington has more long term value. I'm in a dynasty league with a couple owners who constantly drop young talent for 34 year old RBs (think priest holmes) off the waiver wire and it really just keeps them down

I think as long as he is submitting a valid roster and not picking the worst players off his active roster you can't kick him out for no picking up a ww QB

 

[Power Monster]

No thanks. Tell him it has been nice. These are the exact owners that ruin leagues. Unless you want to hear the rest of the owners endlessly complain in your ear when this sore loser pulls this nonsense tell him to hit the road.....

 

[Sabertooth]

I'd strip him of his first rounder. He'll most likely quit. If he doesn't, kick him out. Put on a dog and pony show press conference (see FEMA) and talk about how great of a guy he is....then turn your back on him.

 

[FavreCo]

Here's the situation:

11 year 9 player keeper league.

Owner has been part of the league for about 6 years. Has been relatively competitive every year except last and this year. Last year he gets 3 fines for dressing bye week and injured players on 3 different weeks. We've never had an owner had that many fines in 1 year. Owner says it's hard for him "to be into it" because his team is so bad.

Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers. Just check in once a week and answer trade offers. He's been on the site but does not answer offers for 3-5 weeks. The kicker is during the offseason he has the nerve to call out another team for not being a good owner

Fast forward to this past weekend and he starts Alex Smith. He is currently out of it again and is going for the first overall pick. There were 6 starting QBs available to be picked up. He has one other QB on his roster, Chad Pennington. During our regular Thursday waiver run, he picks up no players. On Friday, we open up a free for all for 24 hours, and he picks up JJ Arrington and Drew Carter but does not address his QB situation. 2 owners complain that he's tanking, I take it to the board and they return a 2-1 verdict that he's tanking.

Now here's where I come in. I can levy any punishment and there has never been a previous incident like this. I have no faith that this guy won't do it again considering it's the 4th time now. Owner says he wasn't tanking, it was just bad management. I should remove him and normally it is known if you tank, you are removed from the league. What do I do, remove him, strip him of his first rounder, drop him out of the lottery in the first round? Just need some opinions.

Kick him out? He gave you the reason why he should be above.

 

[Black]

Seems like the straw that broke the camel's back was he started Alex Smith?

If I were not following football because my team sucked that bad, and saw SF offense vs. STL DEF, I might start A.Smith.

Maybe he preferred to try to do better at RB / WR with JJArrington and Carter, possibly building for the future? (Not my choices, mind you, but it's possible).

 

[Nemesis]

Step 1 - Find a reliable replacement owner before you do anything.

Having the replacement in hand will help if you decide to remove the owner now.

If you DO decide to give that owner one last chance, call him up and I'd tell him that you've already got a replacement and see what he says.......it may just be a "graceful" way for him to resign / "fade away" w/o a huge embarrassment or dramatic episode in front of the league.

 

[pinda]

17 man rosters when we start 1 QB, 1 RB, 3 WR, 1 TE, 1 flex RB/WR/TE, K and Defense, we only protect 9, so he has 8 roster spots to pickup a QB old or not.

The QBs on the waiver were:

Vinny Testaverde

Dante Culpepper

Rex Grossman

Byron Leftwich

Trent Dilfer

Tarvaris Jackson

 

[TxBuckeye]

Step 1 - Find a reliable replacement owner before you do anything.

Having the replacement in hand will help if you decide to remove the owner now.

If you DO decide to give that owner one last chance, call him up and I'd tell him that you've already got a replacement and see what he says.......it may just be a "graceful" way for him to resign / "fade away" w/o a huge embarrassment or dramatic episode in front of the league.

Good point. Since he said he isn't in to it, he may be happy to have an "out" to quit doing something he doesn't really enjoy.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Fast forward to this past weekend and he starts Alex Smith. He is currently out of it again and is going for the first overall pick. There were 6 starting QBs available to be picked up. He has one other QB on his roster, Chad Pennington. During our regular Thursday waiver run, he picks up no players. On Friday, we open up a free for all for 24 hours, and he picks up JJ Arrington and Drew Carter but does not address his QB situation.

I'll probably be in the minority on this one, but I don't think this qualifies as tanking. If this is a dynasty/keeper, I can see somebody deciding to take a zero at that position during a hopeless season rather than blowing a roster spot on a meaningless fill-in who won't make your roster next year. It sounds like this guy has problems that go beyond this one particular anecdote though.

 

[JAA]

Do what you think is right. That is why you are commish and given this power.

 

[benbadman]

THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX

Don't just simply give the #1 draft pick to the worst team.

You have what like 10,12,14 teams in the league? There must be a playoffs for the winning teams, right? Make a consolation playoff tournament for the LOSING teams.. and the winner of that playoff bracket gets the #1 pick. Consolation game for #3 pick, etc etc.

 

[massraider]

Fast forward to this past weekend and he starts Alex Smith. He is currently out of it again and is going for the first overall pick. There were 6 starting QBs available to be picked up. He has one other QB on his roster, Chad Pennington. During our regular Thursday waiver run, he picks up no players. On Friday, we open up a free for all for 24 hours, and he picks up JJ Arrington and Drew Carter but does not address his QB situation.

I'll probably be in the minority on this one, but I don't think this qualifies as tanking. If this is a dynasty/keeper, I can see somebody deciding to take a zero at that position during a hopeless season rather than blowing a roster spot on a meaningless fill-in who won't make your roster next year.

I don't really think so either. The guy has been in the league for 6 years, I am not sure refusing to pick up Tavaris Jackson or Rex Grossman at the end of a crap season is worthy of being kicked out.

 

[fatness]

I'd strip him of his first rounder. He'll most likely quit.

Probably not a good idea. If the goal is to get him to quit, another owner will likely take over the team and try to be competitive. They shouldn't be without the first round draft pick.

 

[TD Ryan]

Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers.

I don't feel I have to respond to any trade offer at all.Sure, it's a nice courtesy and all, but sometimes the trade offers are worse than telemarketers; they're all too frequent and all too unappealing.It isn't my responsibility to field your (or anyone's) crappy offer.

 

[andy_b]

Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers.

I don't feel I have to respond to any trade offer at all.Sure, it's a nice courtesy and all, but sometimes the trade offers are worse than telemarketers; they're all too frequent and all too unappealing.It isn't my responsibility to field your (or anyone's) crappy offer.

we ask people nicely at the beginning of the year to respond.then we give a stern warning if someone complains.then they are not asked back ever again if complaints continue.Luckily 99% of the people we have played with over the years are human and polite enough to take the 3.5 seconds needed to simply say "no thanks, I don't like that trade"

 

[Krewe]

When you lose interest in playing FFB and pull a few like this owner has, you basicly kick yourself out of the league.

All you as commish are doing is making it official. I have never had to do this is my cycles as commish but I would, no question and I'll bet your co-owners would appreciate dealing with this guy appropriately.

 

[The Man Who Met Andy Griffith]

I find it really bizarre that you would punish somebody for not responding to trade offers. Seems a little nanny-state, but if that's the rule, that's the rule.

As for not fielding a competitive line-up, it's a little tricky. In true dynasty leagues, I think it's fine to start injured players if you have nobody better on your team. You shouldn't be forced to drop somebody with long-term value for somebody with only short-term value.

However, in a 9-player keeper league it's a little different. If he clearly won't be keeping Pennington, he really has no excuse not to drop him and pick up a starting QB.

If you feel that Pennington & Smith are not amongst his likely keepers, then I'd suggest that you send him an email outlying your concerns, and see if he can explain his decision. If he can't, then yes you should consider booting him.

 

[Couch Potato]

Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers.

I don't feel I have to respond to any trade offer at all.Sure, it's a nice courtesy and all, but sometimes the trade offers are worse than telemarketers; they're all too frequent and all too unappealing.It isn't my responsibility to field your (or anyone's) crappy offer.

Wow. You don't belong in leagues that allow trades. You just don't. How inconsiderate.

 

[Giants4Life]

Why dont you offer the first pick to a team that finishes 6th or 7th? Then a team will have to win to earn that first pick.

 

[Gottabesweet]

Our Toliet Bowl winner (bottom 6 teams) the winner of that gets the first pick just for the first round, it keeps the lower teams all fighting for 1.1 - its a dynasty league so they all continue to try for 1.1

last year they all tried for peterson.

 

[Warhogs]

I can't believe you would consider kicking an owner out of the league and calling it tanking because he started Alex Smith against what looked to be a weak opponent. He started a starting QB. It's not like he tried to start Pennington over Smith. Don't over manage your position. This is not blatant enough to remove an owner but if your league would remove him or punish him in any way over this I would want out of that league and would be begging to be banned from it.

 

[Couch Potato]

I can't believe you would consider kicking an owner out of the league and calling it tanking because he started Alex Smith against what looked to be a weak opponent. He started a starting QB. It's not like he tried to start Pennington over Smith. Don't over manage your position. This is not blatant enough to remove an owner but if your league would remove him or punish him in any way over this I would want out of that league and would be begging to be banned from it.

Smith was ruled out very early in the week. Anyone paying attention to their team would have known Dilfer was starting.Owners like the one the OP is concerned about just drag down a league, and he needs to go. Even if he is out of it for this year, he should have been busy trying to makes now-for-later deals with playoff bound owners, working the WW, whatever he could do to make his team stronger for next year. Not just saying he's not into it. And he has a duty to the league to field his most competitive lineup. If he owns only Smith and Pennington, maybe he can't be expected to win, but why is Pennington even rostered? He hasn't started for 2 weeks, why does he even own this guy in a keep 9 league? Certainly not for next year. It's because he doesn't care. The owner needs a nice free anonymous redraft Yahoo league where half the owners drop out once they are losing, not a league where other owners care about competitiveness.

 

[fsufan]

Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers.

I don't feel I have to respond to any trade offer at all.Sure, it's a nice courtesy and all, but sometimes the trade offers are worse than telemarketers; they're all too frequent and all too unappealing.It isn't my responsibility to field your (or anyone's) crappy offer.

how hard is it to click on the reject button

 

[Warhogs]

I can't believe you would consider kicking an owner out of the league and calling it tanking because he started Alex Smith against what looked to be a weak opponent. He started a starting QB. It's not like he tried to start Pennington over Smith. Don't over manage your position. This is not blatant enough to remove an owner but if your league would remove him or punish him in any way over this I would want out of that league and would be begging to be banned from it.

Smith was ruled out very early in the week. Anyone paying attention to their team would have known Dilfer was starting.Owners like the one the OP is concerned about just drag down a league, and he needs to go. Even if he is out of it for this year, he should have been busy trying to makes now-for-later deals with playoff bound owners, working the WW, whatever he could do to make his team stronger for next year. Not just saying he's not into it. And he has a duty to the league to field his most competitive lineup. If he owns only Smith and Pennington, maybe he can't be expected to win, but why is Pennington even rostered? He hasn't started for 2 weeks, why does he even own this guy in a keep 9 league? Certainly not for next year. It's because he doesn't care. The owner needs a nice free anonymous redraft Yahoo league where half the owners drop out once they are losing, not a league where other owners care about competitiveness.

I had a brain cramp and forgot Smith was ruled out early in the week. With that in mind my opinion has changed. I agree that this owner should face some sort of punishment. I am factoring in the fact that this owner has been in the league for many years. I would suggest he be fined and sternly warned that he must attempt to field a competitive lineup every week and that any more incidents like this will result in him being replaced immediately. My argument against penalizing the draft pick is it sounds like you may need a replacement owner for next year and that will be tougher to find if you penalize the pick this team has.

 

[pinda]

Thanks for all the suggestions guys. I wanted to boot him too but the human side to this wanted him to have control of his own fate. So here is what myself and the co-commish came up with. I put in Team ABC for his team name.

The board has ruled against Team ABC 2-1 for the starting of Alex Smith.

After discussion with numerous owners, here are Team ABC's two options:

a) Team ABC's first rounder is dropped to the last pick of the 1st round, 1.16. This is only for the first round. He also is on a probationary period of 3 years. The terms of the probationary period are simple. If Team ABC is fined anytime in the next 3 years for his lineup submissions, then he will be immediately removed from the league. The probation lasts til week 12 of the 2010 season.

or

b) Team ABC decides he does not accept option A and he is removed from the league immediately. If he decides this option, then the new owner will be slotted at 1.8 for the first round.

 

[mozzy84]

Here's the situation:11 year 9 player keeper league.Owner has been part of the league for about 6 years. Has been relatively competitive every year except last and this year. Last year he gets 3 fines for dressing bye week and injured players on 3 different weeks. We've never had an owner had that many fines in 1 year. Owner says it's hard for him "to be into it" because his team is so bad.Fast forward to the offseason. I have to tell said owner that he needs to respond to trade offers. Just check in once a week and answer trade offers. He's been on the site but does not answer offers for 3-5 weeks. The kicker is during the offseason he has the nerve to call out another team for not being a good owner Fast forward to this past weekend and he starts Alex Smith. He is currently out of it again and is going for the first overall pick. There were 6 starting QBs available to be picked up. He has one other QB on his roster, Chad Pennington. During our regular Thursday waiver run, he picks up no players. On Friday, we open up a free for all for 24 hours, and he picks up JJ Arrington and Drew Carter but does not address his QB situation. 2 owners complain that he's tanking, I take it to the board and they return a 2-1 verdict that he's tanking.Now here's where I come in. I can levy any punishment and there has never been a previous incident like this. I have no faith that this guy won't do it again considering it's the 4th time now. Owner says he wasn't tanking, it was just bad management. I should remove him and normally it is known if you tank, you are removed from the league. What do I do, remove him, strip him of his first rounder, drop him out of the lottery in the first round? Just need some opinions.

I am going through almost the exact same thing, like last week he starts alexander and then says well he was listed as questionable so he might have played, thats legal. Multiple weeks of starting guys on bye (we do have fines in place for this anyways), qb's were injured for weeks anb never picked up a backup. No one is really #####ing about him but I am probably going to give him the boot anyways, maybe I take this stuff to serious but I can't stand guys like that in my league.

 

[Warhogs]

I think you are possibly punishing a new owner too much by having him/her take over a mismanaged team and slotting him that late. I think you will be replacing that owner soon enough. Run it how you see fit though.

 

[pinda]

I think you are possibly punishing a new owner too much by having him/her take over a mismanaged team and slotting him that late. I think you will be replacing that owner soon enough. Run it how you see fit though.

Warhogs, good point and I took that into consideration. However the team actually isn't that bad overall, just some bad luck and poor management.Pennington, SmithMJD, Alexander, Mo Morris, Chris Henry, JJ ArringtonBoldin, Coles, Cotchery, Randall El, Drew Carter, ColbertHeath Miller, Zach MillerRobbie GouldMinny defense/st

 

[Couch Potato]

I think you are possibly punishing a new owner too much by having him/her take over a mismanaged team and slotting him that late. I think you will be replacing that owner soon enough. Run it how you see fit though.

I think I agree with Warhogs here. Would this owner's pick have risen to 1.08 even if he had fielded a full lineup? Probably not. This punishes a new owner, not the old one. I'd instead use my judgment to determine where in the standings the team would have ended up with a real lineup (using its own roster and minimal WW moves -- a starting QB for example) and then slot the pick accordingly.

 

[fatness]

After discussion with numerous owners, here are Team ABC's two options:

a) Team ABC's first rounder is dropped to the last pick of the 1st round, 1.16. This is only for the first round. He also is on a probationary period of 3 years. The terms of the probationary period are simple. If Team ABC is fined anytime in the next 3 years for his lineup submissions, then he will be immediately removed from the league. The probation lasts til week 12 of the 2010 season.

or

b) Team ABC decides he does not accept option A and he is removed from the league immediately. If he decides this option, then the new owner will be slotted at 1.8 for the first round.

a) Most like will make sure that if the owner returns next year he'll have a team that's not improved. He'll lose interest again, and you'll be where you are today.b) Penalizes a new owner, one selected to be more competitive, for faults that got the previous owner booted.

 

[madd futher]

I don't like EITHER of the two ooptions you have laid out for him. I don't like taking away the 1st round draft choice option for the reasons cided above by others. I also do not like the 3 year probation option - in fact, it demeans him and it sucks!

Here's my strong suggestion. Tell him that you as commish have already decided he will NOT be invited back next year. Don't lay it on the 2-1 vote by other owners, take on the responsibility for the decision yourself - just cite the examples of him not managing his team. In other words, here's a case where you have to put on your 'bad guy' hat. Then give him the option of managing his team responsibly the rest of the way out and 'resigning ' at the end of the season with dignity, or, if he doesn't go for this, immediately lock him out, announce your decision to the rest of the league, and find a 3rd party (hopefully someone who might want to take over his team next year) to responsibly manage his team the rest of the way.

 

[pinda]

Hey Guys,

I wish I would have consulted you guys about the decision I suggested as I did with the situation because there are some great points that have been made.

I guess what it boiled down to was the human element to fantasy football. He's been a long standing owner and it was tough for me to make the tough decision if that makes any sense. I wanted a way for him to control his own fate. If he screws up, it's now cut and dry and no other owners in the rest of the league would be up in arms because he was well aware of the consequences if it happens again. As it stands right now some of the owners feel that the decision was too severe. I think it's a better option for the current owner than to be booted out of the league, because I know he really has passion for the league as a whole, but these last 2 years he's just went downhill.

I think if this owner does leave, based on all your suggestions, I'll definitely re-visit the pick being dropped to 1.8