Bad teams don't have to kill your fantasy enjoyment
As the first day of summer arrives, fantasy owners generally know whether or not their teams have a chance to compete for a title or are destined for also-ran status.
While we all love to manage those teams with a chance to win it all — and we’ll put in the extra time to give ourselves the best chance — the losing teams typically don’t get anywhere nearly as much attention.
It makes sense, of course. There’s much more satisfaction in guiding a team from fourth to first than there is taking one from 12th to sixth in the final standings. Much of what is written in columns such as this one is geared toward making moves that ultimately pay off in a league title.
But that doesn’t mean we can’t have fun with our less-than-stellar teams at the same time.
I’d love to win all of my leagues, but the effort needed to keep making moves and sweating every RBI and strikeout through the end of September can be exhausting. So I don’t mind if a couple of my teams are doomed before the season reaches its midway point.
That’s the case for me in 2017. I have several extremely competitive teams I’ll be watching carefully all season: two teams in the League of Alternative Baseball Reality (mixed and National League), my home NL-only keeper league and the Fox Sports experts league. I’m in the middle of the pack in NL Tout Wars.
This could be a very successful year if those teams continue to play up to their capabilities. But that leaves three teams of mine that are doing poorly.
That’s probably the case for most people with more than one or two fantasy teams. The law of averages says you’re likely to end up with a few clunkers every year.
Since there will be plenty of time during the rest of the season to address ways to keep our good teams in contention, I’d like to do something a little different this week and offer up a few ways I’ve been able to make managing my losing teams more enjoyable.
There’s a certain rhythm with keeper leagues.
Build … contend … mortgage the future in pursuit of a title … scuffle … rebuild.
We see this cycle play out all the time. Without several extremely cheap superstar keepers, owners are rarely able to build and maintain a contending team for several years in a row.
That has been the case in our American League-only league. One owner has had Manny Machado for six years (his salary is up to $26 this season) and Mike Trout for seven years (still a bargain at $31). Otherwise, the rest of the league has been up and down.
Since winning the league in 2014, my team (Try the Jamocha, if you click on the league link above) has been fighting to become relevant again. Still in the process of trying to build a contender, I took a chance this season on high-risk pitchers David Price and Garrett Richards and spent heavily on outfielders Justin Upton and Carlos Gomez.
Predictably, it didn’t work out too well. In our head-to-head format, I lost each of the first seven weeks. As a result, I was the first owner to start offering up my best players in trades. But with the regular season 25 weeks long, the other owners weren’t quite ready to start dealing away their keeper-worthy players until the playoff picture became a bit clearer.
With hardly any pressure on me to win at that point — and with the team with the worst record getting the first waiver-wire pick each week — I was able to take a long-term approach in managing my roster.
I was able to pick up Logan Morrison, Jordan Montgomery, Chad Pinder, Sam Travis, Eric Young, Matt Olson and Derek Fisher on waivers. Some I plugged into my starting lineup; some I stashed when they were sent back to the minors.
Then a funny thing happened.
Jose Berrios has been outstanding since he was promoted. Jonathan Lucroy, Ryon Healy and Mike Moustakas have started to heat up. Price came off the disabled list. And my team has won four in a row to move within three games of the division lead and two games of a playoff spot.
Yes, it’s an uphill battle. But I’ll always remember this team was once 0-7 and had no business even sniffing the playoffs. It’s like playing with house money at this point.
I’ve written about this simulation league before and how much fun it is to actually play the games online -- even if your team is 14-25. (As with most sim leagues, we use player cards that look to replicate the previous year’s statistics.)
After winning the AL pennant, I had to replace four-fifths of my rotation this offseason. With starting pitching at a premium in sim leagues, I knew it was likely to be a rebuilding year when I wasn’t able to restock my rotation with established arms. (Though I was happy to get James Paxton and Julio Urias, whom I hoped would have big seasons in 2017 and be rotation anchors for me next year.)
This past week, my Orioles unloaded our three best players with an eye toward making the team better in the future.
Brian Dozier had a great card after his 42-homer outburst last season, but he’s in the final year of his contract on my team. So I traded Dozier and a fairly expensive Randal Grichuk (whose contract with two years remaining could become an albatross if he doesn’t rebound from his minor league exile) for a $1 Mike Foltynewicz and a reserve-round Yulieski Gurriel, whom I have the option to keep next year at $10.
I liked both Foltynewicz and Gurriel coming into this season, and while neither has been exceptional, they both have shown flashes of excellence I hope we’ll see more of the rest of the way.
And in a move only owners in deep or simulation leagues can appreciate, I also swapped lefty Brad Hand and his expiring contract for a $6 Arodys Vizcaino. After a couple of poor appearances in April, Vizcaino has been lights-out since May 1 with a 0.50 ERA, 0.78 WHIP (walks plus hits allowed per inning) and 21 strikeouts in 18 innings.
While I’m leading in NL LABR and have at least a shot in the mixed league, my AL team is dead last. Despite the recent acquisition of Josh Reddick (for Eduardo Rodriguez), my team still lacks offense. Getting Wilson Ramos, plus Danny Duffy and Nate Jones back from the disabled list isn’t likely to make a huge impact.
So in this non-keeper AL-only league, there isn’t a whole lot I can do to improve my fortunes.
Then again, there isn’t much I can do to make them worse. So I have a golden opportunity to make moves without worrying about the consequences.
Teams in this situation can spend liberally on the waiver wire and make a few long-shot trade offers.
And with only a small chance of even getting back into contention, there’s still 60% of the season remaining. So if a couple of those long-shot moves pay off … who knows?
You’re not going to win every league. But above everything else, fantasy baseball should be a fun activity. If your team is going to hell in a bucket, at least you can enjoy the ride.