Tricks of the Trade

If you ask me, (which I believe you are since you’re reading this article), it is imperative to make a few trades during the season in order to win your baseball league. Unless you’ve got Carnac-esque abilities and can avoid all injuries, suspensions, and down right lousy seasons with your draft, your roster will need to be tweaked via trades, waiver wire pick ups, or free agent acquisitions. Now don’t get me wrong, you can certainly find a few gems out there with the last two options. However, I believe that you can more accurately address your team needs by addressing them with well thought out, properly executed trades.

Now normally when you begin reading an article like this, you would expect the typical, buy-low, sell-high adages that you can find on any fantasy baseball website. And while this is a very important aspect of trading, I would like to give you a few other insights to trading that may help maximize your trade chances and value:

1. Patience is a virtue

More times than not, hounding a fellow owner about a potential trade will only a) annoy them to the point where they won’t want to trade with you… possibly ever or b) make yourself appear extremely desperate. Desperation is like blood in the water for many owners. As someone wise once said, “Patience is a virtue”. Just because an owner hasn’t returned your phone call or e-mail, it doesn’t mean they are not interested. Believe it or not, people do have lives that interfere with their fantasy baseball teams.

2. Don’t be Monte Hall

We are all guilty of it. Come on now, you can admit it. And if you can’t, denial is not just a river in Egypt my friend. We’ve all sent embarrassingly low-ball offers to our fellow owners. On very rare occasions, these trade offers get accepted and you feel like you’ve found a Honus Wagner baseball card at a garage sale for 25 cents. Let me strongly advise you against making this a habit. Every league has the one or two owners that nobody will deal with because they won’t make a deal unless they are clearly coming out of the deal smelling like a rose. Don’t be that owner.

3. Who can you trust?

Every once in a while it’s nice to get a little input on a deal from a fellow owner. My only advice to you on this is: be careful. Asking for advice from someone in your league can be a dangerous proposition. A few tips: 1. Do not ask the owner who’s neck-in-neck with you in the standings about whether you should or shouldn’t do a trade. The odds of getting a straight, genuine answer are about as good as Paris Hilton winning a spelling bee. 2. Don’t ask an owner who is close to you in a certain category on whether or not you should trade for a player that would help you pass him or her in that category. No good can come of this, I repeat; no good can come of this because, either a) he or she won’t give you a straight answer (see above), b) he or she may try to snipe the player you’re trying to acquire right from out under you or c) try to talk your potential trade partner out of the deal. None of these outcomes are beneficial.
So where do you get advice? There are numerous websites, such as this one, that can provide valuable insights on players, teams and trends. Ask your friends, unless they fit the description of section three above, and then proceed at your own risk. Finally, use your gut; you’d be surprised how often it will tell you the right answer!

Finally, as we’re entering the heart of the fantasy baseball season, the fantasy hot stove is heating up. Soon, trades will be flying around your league like airplanes at LaGuardia. Remembering these three trade etiquette tips may not guarantee a trade getting done, but they may be that extra little edge that may make or break a deal now or in the future.

Good luck and most importantly, have fun!!!