The Z Files: Common Post-Break Mistakes

It doesn't seem like much, but this is one fewer week than we're used to coming out of the break. As such, it's even more important not to make a few common errors when evaluating pathways to take home the championship. What follows are four mistakes often encountered while managing the rest of the season.

Ignoring ratios

This has been a bit of a crusade for me as I still see and hear the theory espoused that too many at-bats or innings have built up to gain significant points in categories like batting average (or on-base percentage), ERA and WHIP. It's simply not true. In fact, if you play in a league tracking category movement in the standings, you'll see right up to the last day, more points are gained or lost in ratios than counting categories.

The reason for this is two-fold. First, unlike the counting stats, you can gain ground in ratios by having your competitors drop below you. Often, you gain pitching points without having any hurlers active that day. Second, the ratio categories are more bunched than their counting counterparts. Yes, with the accumulation of at-bats and inning, ratios don't move much in terms of numbers, but as you'll see in a moment, they don't need to.

To demonstrate the compact nature of ratio categories, I like to deploy normalized standings. Keeping in mind ultimately, your ability to gain or lose points depends on where you're situated within the categories, normalized standings take the league's actual standings and redoes them by assigning the same number of units per category.

What's presented below are normalized standings from the 2017 National Fantasy Baseball Championship Main Event, a 15-team mixed league competition. I averaged the final standings for several leagues to use as the basis. Then, the stats were adjusted so there are exactly 1000 units in all 10 categories. Here's the results:

The closer the top and bottom numbers are, the more bunched the standings are. Here's a table with the difference per category:

As you can see, the three ratio categories are the tightest. This same pattern has held true year after year. Your ability to move in each category also depends on the availability of stats within each category along with your relative placement in your league, but on average, less is needed to move in the ratios.

Not prorating gaps

This is another faux pas I've been warning about for years, but it's still common. I receive trade offers all the time from a competitor trying to convince me I can gain five points in the standings with only 10 more homers, therefore their offer is a no-brainer to accept.

Here's the problem with that. For the sake of facilitating the math, let's say we're exactly two-thirds of the way through the season. My would-be trade partner failed to account for stats accrued over the last third of the season. Assuming everything keeps the same pace, that 10 homer gap is actually 15. That is, if I make the deal and end up with 10 more homers than if I hadn't, I've only made up two-thirds of the gap, likely falling short of the five points I was after.

Obviously, stats don't add on at the same rate. Still, by failing to recognize the difference is greater than it sits at the present time, you can underestimate what's needed to capture the maximum number of standings points.

Using most of your FAAB at the trade deadline

Obviously, this is apropos in American or National League-only formats rather than mixed leagues, having to do with the FAAB frenzy that occurs during the transaction period immediately following the July 31 trade deadline. Though, in the past few years, big crossover deals have also occurred in the weeks leading up to the last day of July.

Those without enough FAAB to contend for the best available players often settle for the secondary options, exhausting most of their budget in the process. While it's true the earlier players are acquired, the greater they can affect your roster, getting stats from a better player or two for a shorter period can help more. The question is, how many players are there who can really make that kind of difference after the trade deadline?

Here's a short list of some of the batters and their September stats picked up last season from mid-August to early September in the AL and NL-only LABR and Tout Wars leagues:

Considering in deep leagues, you're usually upgrading a spot with far less production, having the assets to contend for a few of these batters can be vital when trying to squeeze out every last point. I'm not listing pitchers since more often than not, the winning bids were on two-start hurlers or those with perceived good matchups that week. Still, depending on where you're situated in the categories, having the pick of the streaming litter could be the difference between winning and losing.

Focusing on value, not standings

While all four of these points are likely obvious to the seasoned fantasy player, this is the one driving me the battiest. Hopefully, you don't fall in with those continuing to gauge trades based on the value-in-a-vacuum of the involved players. I apologize, to many I must sound like a broken record, or is that a corrupt mp3 in today's lingo?

Anyway, the equity of a trade should be solely based on how it affects each party in the standings. The algebra isn't the difference in perceived value garnered from a player rater or rankings, but rather the net gain of points with and without the trade. Granted, if there's a disparity in "value", it's fair to ask, "Could I get more?" However, if the answer is no and the deal as is helps you, it's a good swap.