Fantasy Etiquette: Intentional Benching
In most formats of Head-to-Head leagues, this is the last week of regular season play before the seeds are set and the playoffs begin. In most leagues there one dominant team, a few great teams underneath, some lucky teams even lower, and depending on the number of teams that make the playoffs a few mediocre teams that have the chance to secure that last playoff spot. Of course the team that does sneak in will have to play the dominant team week 1, (unless top two seeds have a bye for the first round, a setting I advocate) however in a week's worth of games, any bad players can put up good numbers, and good players can put up bad ones, so playing the 1 seed is not an automatic loss. I've seen it happen, where the 8th Seed edges the One Seed in steals because Ryan Howard got his one Stolen base of the year that week. Although that's not what I'm here to talk about this week.
Intentional Benching is the subject of this week's discussion. Note that I'm not talking about cute, little benching like when you have a lead a WHIP and ERA and do not want to blow that by throwing Oliver Perez (5.56 ERA against sub-.500 teams, 2.36 ERA vs. above-.500 teams) out there against the Nationals. I will explain the more serious type of Intentional Benching after a quick note.
There is fantasy baseball etiquette, just as there is etiquette with everything else in life. On almost every issue, I disagree with the conventional fantasy etiquette. I believe you should exploit any exploitable setting in your league that allows you to win. That includes trying to trade Ryan Braun the Royal under the pretext it's his Milwaukee counterpart or starting only relievers in a league where the Min. Innings per Week Limit is too low (meaning anything under 20, I prefer 40-50 because it forces teams to build a strong, deep rotation of starters). Basically anything within league rules I consider fair, no matter how manipulative the maneuver may be. And obviously prior to the draft the league's rules must be precise to prevent moves and strategies too unfair, however if the league's rules suck, then make the league pay as best you can. But that's just me.
Nevertheless, there is one strategy an owner can use that even I cannot tolerate. As I mentioned before, it is Intentional Benching, and it would take place in the hypothetical league you see below:
This is the last week of the Regular Season before the Playoffs begin, and as indicated by the line, 6 teams get in with 1st playing 6th, 2nd vs. 5th, and 3rd vs. 4th for the first week of Post-Season play. The team names given are not random, they reflect the type of season the player has had. Obviously teams 1-3 are awesome, team 4 is very solid, team 5 might have gotten a bit lucky this year, team 6 struggled for most of the year, but is turning it up as of late, team 7 has also struggled, but still has a small chance to salvage a disappointing season, and team 8 has been flat-out garbage all year.
The conflict begins when Team Pujols begins to get picky about who he wants to face in the playoffs. He sees an easily defeated Team Bradley, and then a Team Rollins that is looking scarier by the minute. What does Team Pujols do? He intentionally benches his players the last week so that he drops into 2nd place, therefore playing Team Bradley the first week of the playoffs. To him, it is definitely worth it. But a team in this whole ordeal is going to get screwed over big time. Do you know which team it is?
Team Rollins. Look at who Team Pujols is playing. Team Fielder, who is only 2 games behind Team Rollins. Let's say after Team Pujols when benches all of his players he loses that week 10-0 or 9-1. That forces Team Rollins to win at least 7-3, or they drop out of the playoffs. Quite unfair in my opinion. Maybe Team Rollins will roll off another good week, but if they don't and fail to make the playoffs, they lost due to unfair manipulation of the league.
At this point in time, the Saturday of the last week, it is too late to pull off this strategy and I chose to put up this article one week too late for a reason - so nobody uses it. In an otherwise friendly league I was in last year, this exact situation unfolded and it caused some of the most heated arguments I've ever witnessed in fantasy sports. Luckily I wasn't involved, but it did leave a bad taste in everyone's mouth when the league was finally over.
Remember: taking advantage of crap league rules = good, intentionally benching = bad.
Intentional Benching is the subject of this week's discussion. Note that I'm not talking about cute, little benching like when you have a lead a WHIP and ERA and do not want to blow that by throwing Oliver Perez (5.56 ERA against sub-.500 teams, 2.36 ERA vs. above-.500 teams) out there against the Nationals. I will explain the more serious type of Intentional Benching after a quick note.
There is fantasy baseball etiquette, just as there is etiquette with everything else in life. On almost every issue, I disagree with the conventional fantasy etiquette. I believe you should exploit any exploitable setting in your league that allows you to win. That includes trying to trade Ryan Braun the Royal under the pretext it's his Milwaukee counterpart or starting only relievers in a league where the Min. Innings per Week Limit is too low (meaning anything under 20, I prefer 40-50 because it forces teams to build a strong, deep rotation of starters). Basically anything within league rules I consider fair, no matter how manipulative the maneuver may be. And obviously prior to the draft the league's rules must be precise to prevent moves and strategies too unfair, however if the league's rules suck, then make the league pay as best you can. But that's just me.
Nevertheless, there is one strategy an owner can use that even I cannot tolerate. As I mentioned before, it is Intentional Benching, and it would take place in the hypothetical league you see below:
This is the last week of the Regular Season before the Playoffs begin, and as indicated by the line, 6 teams get in with 1st playing 6th, 2nd vs. 5th, and 3rd vs. 4th for the first week of Post-Season play. The team names given are not random, they reflect the type of season the player has had. Obviously teams 1-3 are awesome, team 4 is very solid, team 5 might have gotten a bit lucky this year, team 6 struggled for most of the year, but is turning it up as of late, team 7 has also struggled, but still has a small chance to salvage a disappointing season, and team 8 has been flat-out garbage all year.
The conflict begins when Team Pujols begins to get picky about who he wants to face in the playoffs. He sees an easily defeated Team Bradley, and then a Team Rollins that is looking scarier by the minute. What does Team Pujols do? He intentionally benches his players the last week so that he drops into 2nd place, therefore playing Team Bradley the first week of the playoffs. To him, it is definitely worth it. But a team in this whole ordeal is going to get screwed over big time. Do you know which team it is?
Team Rollins. Look at who Team Pujols is playing. Team Fielder, who is only 2 games behind Team Rollins. Let's say after Team Pujols when benches all of his players he loses that week 10-0 or 9-1. That forces Team Rollins to win at least 7-3, or they drop out of the playoffs. Quite unfair in my opinion. Maybe Team Rollins will roll off another good week, but if they don't and fail to make the playoffs, they lost due to unfair manipulation of the league.
At this point in time, the Saturday of the last week, it is too late to pull off this strategy and I chose to put up this article one week too late for a reason - so nobody uses it. In an otherwise friendly league I was in last year, this exact situation unfolded and it caused some of the most heated arguments I've ever witnessed in fantasy sports. Luckily I wasn't involved, but it did leave a bad taste in everyone's mouth when the league was finally over.
Remember: taking advantage of crap league rules = good, intentionally benching = bad.
4 Comments:
Can't have it both ways.
Can you please be more specific on what you mean by that.
On the contrary, I believe doing whatever is best for your team within the rules is the action you should take. Unless the rules prohibit intentional benching, I believe you should try if it's what's best for your team.
But that's an article for another time....
However, if leagues want to prohibit this manuever, I suggest setting a rule that states teams must have a full roster every week.
If you are playing an insignificant team, which is basically every team except for those just in/out of the playoffs, no one would care to much if you intentionally benched. The problem with intentional benching, unlike other questionable strategies where a simple rule can be placed to prevent it, there really is no league rule that can be placed that would prevent it, at least on the major fantasy providers like Yahoo, Espn, CBS.
It's tough to do, knowing that you might be ruining a team's chances at getting in the playoffs, especially if they have been an active owner all year long.
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