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Leonard
Trade protests
March 13, 2012 at 10:55PM View BBCode
It's time to eliminate trade protests. Every time I log on there's some trade being protested in one of my leagues. Owners protesting trades is not like real life. It's a nuissance to have to deal with these. Most protests have no basis except that someone doesn't think that the trade is even. Who ever said that a trade had to be even? Admin has posted messages stating that trades should only be protested if someone feels there is collusion or cheating involved but many owners apparently can't read as they continue to file protests that are contrary to this.
paulcaraccio
March 13, 2012 at 11:21PM View BBCode
I disagree. There's got to be something. I just looked at the trade protest board yesterday and saw one where a brand new owner traded the 4th or 5th pick in the draft for a 29 year old B overall position player. There must be something in place to prevent/overturn things like that. The process could probably benefit from some change, but I don't think eliminating trade protests entirely would be a good thing at all.
paulcaraccio
sure it is, NBA, Cavs owner protested the Chris Paul-to-Lakers trade, boom, overturned.
March 13, 2012 at 11:23PM View BBCode
Originally posted by Leonard
Owners protesting trades is not like real life.
sure it is, NBA, Cavs owner protested the Chris Paul-to-Lakers trade, boom, overturned.
Leonard
[Edited on 3-14-2012 by Leonard]
March 14, 2012 at 01:06AM View BBCode
This is baseball. How many major league baseball trades have been protested in the last 25 years? SimDynasty existed and ran quite well for a number of years without trade protests. If an owner comes out on the short end of a deal, consider it part of the learning process. There are ample resources on the site for new owners to get the opinions of others before making a deal. If they choose to ignore them, then that's their problem. Maybe there should be a message that goes out to new owners when they sign up for their first team that makes them aware of how to get help.[Edited on 3-14-2012 by Leonard]
dirtdevil
March 14, 2012 at 02:15AM View BBCode
to be honest, i agree with both of you. there are a lot of trades being protested that shouldn't be and it a colossal nuisance. but paul is also correct in saying that there are trades, like the one he describes, that do need to be overturned and some mechanism for that process needs to exist. i think the best solution is to somehow raise the threashold for what trades get protested and how that takes place. eliminate the nonsense stuff and keep the justified ones.
Leonard
March 14, 2012 at 08:21PM View BBCode
If I remember correctly, at one time any trades that were suspicious as to whether there was collusion involved were reported to admin who looked into the trades. The problem started when it was left to the league owners to file and vote on protests.
dirtdevil
March 14, 2012 at 08:56PM View BBCode
the difficulty is, admin no longer has time to deal with all the trade issues, which is why it got automated in the first place.
Leonard
March 16, 2012 at 12:41PM View BBCode
Another trade protest to vote on yesterday and today I find out that one of my trades is being protested. It's a joke and I'm losing interest in this game.
Leonard
March 16, 2012 at 12:42PM View BBCode
Another trade protest to vote on yesterday and today I find out that one of my trades is being protested. It's a joke and I'm losing interest in this game.
redcped
I actually think the education needs to be aimed at the existing owners, not the new ones.
Most complaints are of this nature: "Player A is not worth what Owner A paid for him."
The problem with automation is you can't get the computer to read the protest and reject it for being petty or an opinion or the like.
I almost wish we could create something that popped up on your screen when you try to protest a trade that says: 'The only valid reasons to do this are ..."
Should there be consequences to protesting for competitive reasons or just having an opinion that a trade is unfair, rather than the legitimate reasons to actually overturn one? you know, like when an NFL coach throws the protest flag but the play stands?
March 16, 2012 at 01:14PM View BBCode
Everyone is right, alas.I actually think the education needs to be aimed at the existing owners, not the new ones.
Most complaints are of this nature: "Player A is not worth what Owner A paid for him."
The problem with automation is you can't get the computer to read the protest and reject it for being petty or an opinion or the like.
I almost wish we could create something that popped up on your screen when you try to protest a trade that says: 'The only valid reasons to do this are ..."
Should there be consequences to protesting for competitive reasons or just having an opinion that a trade is unfair, rather than the legitimate reasons to actually overturn one? you know, like when an NFL coach throws the protest flag but the play stands?
dirtdevil
that's an interesting concept. i had the idea a little while ago that we should charge a nominal fee to register a protest, that would be returned if the trade was overturned. but a penalty would work too. a draft pick would be the most obvious, i guess. i'd suggest a 2nd, but that might not be enough of a potential loss to eliminate the ones you're going after. make it so that they forfeit a 1st if the trade they're protesting isn't overturned and i bet the number trims down. you'd need to have a 1st available in order to protest.
the main issue with the system that i see though is that there isn't a consensus on what a "legitimate" trade protest is. despite clear guidelines from admin that a trade needs to be collusion or clearly predatory to be protested there are many who do not agree with that rationale and feel that it should be their right to protest any trade which they feel is unfair, which isn't the same thing.
March 16, 2012 at 01:25PM View BBCode
Originally posted by redcped
Should there be consequences to protesting for competitive reasons or just having an opinion that a trade is unfair, rather than the legitimate reasons to actually overturn one? you know, like when an NFL coach throws the protest flag but the play stands?
that's an interesting concept. i had the idea a little while ago that we should charge a nominal fee to register a protest, that would be returned if the trade was overturned. but a penalty would work too. a draft pick would be the most obvious, i guess. i'd suggest a 2nd, but that might not be enough of a potential loss to eliminate the ones you're going after. make it so that they forfeit a 1st if the trade they're protesting isn't overturned and i bet the number trims down. you'd need to have a 1st available in order to protest.
the main issue with the system that i see though is that there isn't a consensus on what a "legitimate" trade protest is. despite clear guidelines from admin that a trade needs to be collusion or clearly predatory to be protested there are many who do not agree with that rationale and feel that it should be their right to protest any trade which they feel is unfair, which isn't the same thing.
CaseyStengel
Another penalty/consequence if a protested trade is NOT overturned is that there are no improvement chances recorded for 30 sim days, both in the majors and minors of the team that protested the trade.
March 16, 2012 at 05:40PM View BBCode
Originally posted by redcped
Should there be consequences to protesting for competitive reasons or just having an opinion that a trade is unfair, rather than the legitimate reasons to actually overturn one? you know, like when an NFL coach throws the protest flag but the play stands?
Another penalty/consequence if a protested trade is NOT overturned is that there are no improvement chances recorded for 30 sim days, both in the majors and minors of the team that protested the trade.
dirtdevil
March 16, 2012 at 05:49PM View BBCode
i've got no issue with something like that as a "punishment". i do wonder how easy/hard it might be to automate, though.
Admin
One clarification, under the old system, we didn't investigate the trades. We just manually did what is being automatically being done now.
Tyson
March 16, 2012 at 06:06PM View BBCode
At one point, Chris had a talk with people who seemed to be protesting too many trades. If you are in Dynasty leagues, these protests seem to crop up the moment new owners enter the league. So hopefully they will die down.One clarification, under the old system, we didn't investigate the trades. We just manually did what is being automatically being done now.
Tyson
redcped
Yes, take away a draft pick for wasting our time. :P
March 16, 2012 at 08:07PM View BBCode
Trade protest reason given today:
This trade is pretty one sided.
Yes, take away a draft pick for wasting our time. :P
barterer2002
March 17, 2012 at 12:35AM View BBCode
I used to read every trade protest and weigh in on it. I typically had 3-6/month to look at which wasn't too much of a problem. With them coming in a rate of 1/day or 1/every other day I just haven't had the time to look at them recently.
barterer2002
March 17, 2012 at 12:42AM View BBCode
For the record I have 151 unread trade protest in my inbox at the moment.
barterer2002
March 17, 2012 at 12:42AM View formatted
You are viewing the raw post code; this allows you to copy a message with BBCode formatting intact.
For the record I have 151 unread trade protest in my inbox at the moment.
redcped
March 17, 2012 at 04:41AM View BBCode
I confess I actually read them all. If I get one that looks like the protest is highly valid, I look into it. But 95% are sour grapes, difference of opinion, or it's a CP trade that the owner didn't bother to check for on the league boards first.
Admin
The trade protest system is in place mainly to catch cheating and predatory acts... but there is a tiny little sliver space that it is acceptable to protest a trade that is grossly unbalanced enough to be detrimental to the league, and about 90% of protests are crammed into this little space.
The fact is an actual balanced trade is so rare that I'll go as far as to say truly balanced trades don't exist. People aren't selfless enough to make balanced trades; if they have what they other team wants, they will extract a high payment for them. Unbalanced trades are normal. We ban "lopsided" trades which I define as "grossly unbalanced", but most protests are against regular old somewhat-unbalanced trades. And appropriately most protests go down in flames.
The last time protests came to a head, we both in a frenzy started going through the database and realized that really there aren't a lot of successful protests. But ANY successful protest in a subscription or private league blows up on the league boards, specifically because they ARE so rare in these leagues, and these leagues usually have the most experienced and "professional" owners.
A real issue lately has been with draft pick trades just before a draft. I think people tend to view these last-minute trades with suspicion and have knee-jerk reactions. They also are a pain to clean up because a successful protest usually occurs after the draft. I've considered the possibility of maybe disallowing accepting draft pick trades within 4-5 real-life days of the draft (or more specifically the league's protest/vote deadlines) to prevent this sort of thing from happening.
The idea that there are a few individuals protesting everything at the drop of a hat is not true. In all paid leagues, subscription, dynasty and private combined, there are only 3 owners who have filed more than 3 protests: two of these have filed 4 and one has filed 5 (this one is a relatively new owner and may need some education).
In pay leagues for the last 6 months:
Oct: 45 protests
Nov: 26 protests
Dec: 18 protests
Jan: 33 protests
Feb: 29 protests
Mar: 25 protests (on track for 37)
(These are based on the deadline date so they are a bit off but close enough here.)
There are 136 pay leagues covered by these numbers, and in those leagues there have been 8,190 trades completed during those 6 months. 176 protests means one out of every 46.5 trades is protested. Now of those 176 protests, only 34 have been reversed. So 1 in every 240.9 trades is reversed. Protests took place in 75 leagues; 61 pay leagues have not had a single protest in the last 6 months.
I think these numbers indicate we are not facing an epidemic; however, I am sure that if a team of us went through these 34 reversed trades, we would probably find that a thirds to a half of them probably should not have been overturned.
Top 15 leagues with trade protests (last 6 months):
Orlando Cepeda League (Majors)* 9 (1 reversed)
Vida Blue League 8 (1 reversed)
Manny Ramirez League 7 (1 reversed)
Harmon Killebrew League 6 (4 reversed)
Mookie Wilson League 6 (2 reversed)
Mark Fidrych League 6 (2 reversed)
Whitey Ford League 6 (2 reversed)
Ed ONeill League 6 (1 reversed)
Dennis Eckersley League 5 (1 reversed)
Jesse Orosco League 5 (1 reversed)
Larry Doby League 5 (1 reversed)
Hank Aaron League 4 (2 reversed)
John Smoltz League 4 (1 reversed)
Warren Spahn League 4 (1 reversed)
Richie Ashburn League 4 (0 reversed)
*Note: The Orlando Cepeda League is a special case, as it has a rule prohibiting trades before game 1 for technical reasons; all but one or two of the protests in this league were for that reason. All leagues not on this list had 3 or fewer protests in the last 6 months.
*Note 2: No league with protests not on this list had more than 1 trade reversed. 47 leagues that had protests had none of them successfully reversed.
I would like to cut these numbers in half, at least, with a combination of education, programming (moving the voting process out of News so it's not hanging there as a temptation), and perhaps a narrowing of the rules. I am open to any recommendations, as always.
-Chris
[Edited on 3-20-2012 by Admin]
March 20, 2012 at 07:02AM View BBCode
The biggest problem is the slippery slope of "unfair trades".The trade protest system is in place mainly to catch cheating and predatory acts... but there is a tiny little sliver space that it is acceptable to protest a trade that is grossly unbalanced enough to be detrimental to the league, and about 90% of protests are crammed into this little space.
The fact is an actual balanced trade is so rare that I'll go as far as to say truly balanced trades don't exist. People aren't selfless enough to make balanced trades; if they have what they other team wants, they will extract a high payment for them. Unbalanced trades are normal. We ban "lopsided" trades which I define as "grossly unbalanced", but most protests are against regular old somewhat-unbalanced trades. And appropriately most protests go down in flames.
The last time protests came to a head, we both in a frenzy started going through the database and realized that really there aren't a lot of successful protests. But ANY successful protest in a subscription or private league blows up on the league boards, specifically because they ARE so rare in these leagues, and these leagues usually have the most experienced and "professional" owners.
A real issue lately has been with draft pick trades just before a draft. I think people tend to view these last-minute trades with suspicion and have knee-jerk reactions. They also are a pain to clean up because a successful protest usually occurs after the draft. I've considered the possibility of maybe disallowing accepting draft pick trades within 4-5 real-life days of the draft (or more specifically the league's protest/vote deadlines) to prevent this sort of thing from happening.
The idea that there are a few individuals protesting everything at the drop of a hat is not true. In all paid leagues, subscription, dynasty and private combined, there are only 3 owners who have filed more than 3 protests: two of these have filed 4 and one has filed 5 (this one is a relatively new owner and may need some education).
In pay leagues for the last 6 months:
Oct: 45 protests
Nov: 26 protests
Dec: 18 protests
Jan: 33 protests
Feb: 29 protests
Mar: 25 protests (on track for 37)
(These are based on the deadline date so they are a bit off but close enough here.)
There are 136 pay leagues covered by these numbers, and in those leagues there have been 8,190 trades completed during those 6 months. 176 protests means one out of every 46.5 trades is protested. Now of those 176 protests, only 34 have been reversed. So 1 in every 240.9 trades is reversed. Protests took place in 75 leagues; 61 pay leagues have not had a single protest in the last 6 months.
I think these numbers indicate we are not facing an epidemic; however, I am sure that if a team of us went through these 34 reversed trades, we would probably find that a thirds to a half of them probably should not have been overturned.
Top 15 leagues with trade protests (last 6 months):
Orlando Cepeda League (Majors)* 9 (1 reversed)
Vida Blue League 8 (1 reversed)
Manny Ramirez League 7 (1 reversed)
Harmon Killebrew League 6 (4 reversed)
Mookie Wilson League 6 (2 reversed)
Mark Fidrych League 6 (2 reversed)
Whitey Ford League 6 (2 reversed)
Ed ONeill League 6 (1 reversed)
Dennis Eckersley League 5 (1 reversed)
Jesse Orosco League 5 (1 reversed)
Larry Doby League 5 (1 reversed)
Hank Aaron League 4 (2 reversed)
John Smoltz League 4 (1 reversed)
Warren Spahn League 4 (1 reversed)
Richie Ashburn League 4 (0 reversed)
*Note: The Orlando Cepeda League is a special case, as it has a rule prohibiting trades before game 1 for technical reasons; all but one or two of the protests in this league were for that reason. All leagues not on this list had 3 or fewer protests in the last 6 months.
*Note 2: No league with protests not on this list had more than 1 trade reversed. 47 leagues that had protests had none of them successfully reversed.
I would like to cut these numbers in half, at least, with a combination of education, programming (moving the voting process out of News so it's not hanging there as a temptation), and perhaps a narrowing of the rules. I am open to any recommendations, as always.
-Chris
[Edited on 3-20-2012 by Admin]
Admin
Important note here: Leonard is correct. Trade protests are NOT part of the baseball simulation; they are an abuse-reporting mechanism outside of the game, like reporting personal attacks or one player controlling two teams. Unfortunately, right now it LOOKS like just part of the game. This is something I aim to change, by moving protests off to the Help menu under a new "Report Abuse" option and referring to them as abuse reports rather than "trade protests" which sounds like part of the sim.
--Chris
March 20, 2012 at 07:19AM View BBCode
Originally posted by paulcaraccio
Originally posted by Leonard
Owners protesting trades is not like real life.
sure it is, NBA, Cavs owner protested the Chris Paul-to-Lakers trade, boom, overturned.
Important note here: Leonard is correct. Trade protests are NOT part of the baseball simulation; they are an abuse-reporting mechanism outside of the game, like reporting personal attacks or one player controlling two teams. Unfortunately, right now it LOOKS like just part of the game. This is something I aim to change, by moving protests off to the Help menu under a new "Report Abuse" option and referring to them as abuse reports rather than "trade protests" which sounds like part of the sim.
--Chris
paulcaraccio
I assume you're semi-joking and this would never actually be considered, but just for the record I would vehemently oppose anything like this...not being able to trade draft picks before the draft? that's too crazy...
but its awesome that you put this together, always like to see data. but it looks like there's only roughly 1 protest a day, on average? as an outsider, my input shouldn't mean much, but that doesn't really seem like a lot...certainly not enough to outlaw trading draft picks.
Why not just make it like a fantasy sports-veto process? For a certain period of time (24 hours or so), the "protest" trade link is active, and if a certain minimum number of league owners hit that link (6? 8?), then the trade is reversed, automated-style. Clear guidelines, no admin involvement, you want to complain that your trade got vetoed? take it up with your leaguemates, they decided it was not in the best interests of the league and there's nothing to be done about it, it's over, get on with your life. Inevitably complaints about the process or particular trades will find their way to the admins anyway, and you can just put in a stock comment like:
Site policy is that admin does not comment on or get involved in any way with trade protests. We used to be heavily involved in the protest process, but the results never pleased everyone and the process was time-consuming, so we decided to leave it up to the leagues so we could focus our efforts on improving more important areas of the game.
you know, in the vein of "United States policy is to not negotiate with terrorists", "Sim Dynasty policy is to not f*** with trade protests", boom, admin out
March 20, 2012 at 09:45PM View BBCode
Originally posted by Admin
I've considered the possibility of maybe disallowing accepting draft pick trades within 4-5 real-life days of the draft (or more specifically the league's protest/vote deadlines) to prevent this sort of thing from happening.
-Chris
[Edited on 3-20-2012 by Admin]
I assume you're semi-joking and this would never actually be considered, but just for the record I would vehemently oppose anything like this...not being able to trade draft picks before the draft? that's too crazy...
but its awesome that you put this together, always like to see data. but it looks like there's only roughly 1 protest a day, on average? as an outsider, my input shouldn't mean much, but that doesn't really seem like a lot...certainly not enough to outlaw trading draft picks.
Why not just make it like a fantasy sports-veto process? For a certain period of time (24 hours or so), the "protest" trade link is active, and if a certain minimum number of league owners hit that link (6? 8?), then the trade is reversed, automated-style. Clear guidelines, no admin involvement, you want to complain that your trade got vetoed? take it up with your leaguemates, they decided it was not in the best interests of the league and there's nothing to be done about it, it's over, get on with your life. Inevitably complaints about the process or particular trades will find their way to the admins anyway, and you can just put in a stock comment like:
Site policy is that admin does not comment on or get involved in any way with trade protests. We used to be heavily involved in the protest process, but the results never pleased everyone and the process was time-consuming, so we decided to leave it up to the leagues so we could focus our efforts on improving more important areas of the game.
you know, in the vein of "United States policy is to not negotiate with terrorists", "Sim Dynasty policy is to not f*** with trade protests", boom, admin out
dirtdevil
1) raise the bar for an official vote from 3 complaints to 6. that's over a third of a league and if that many people think something is fishy, something probably is. it also reduces the chances that a small group of owners could use trade protests merely to block a move by some other owner.
2a) count abstensions in the voting totals. if people are abstaining, they are clearly not voting to overturn. if 3 people vote to uphold, 6 to overturn and 4 abstain, that is NOT 67% support for a veto. that is 46% support for a veto.
OR
2b) require 8 overturn votes to nulify a trade. in any league there are 14 people eligible to vote on any trade protest. if 6 people vote and 4 vote to overturn, that is not really a league vote to overturn. that is a vote by roughly 33%of the league's eligible voters to overturn, which shouldn't really be enough.
March 21, 2012 at 08:47PM View BBCode
i really think that two simple things could go a long way to resolving some of this without resorting to more complex measures right away:1) raise the bar for an official vote from 3 complaints to 6. that's over a third of a league and if that many people think something is fishy, something probably is. it also reduces the chances that a small group of owners could use trade protests merely to block a move by some other owner.
2a) count abstensions in the voting totals. if people are abstaining, they are clearly not voting to overturn. if 3 people vote to uphold, 6 to overturn and 4 abstain, that is NOT 67% support for a veto. that is 46% support for a veto.
OR
2b) require 8 overturn votes to nulify a trade. in any league there are 14 people eligible to vote on any trade protest. if 6 people vote and 4 vote to overturn, that is not really a league vote to overturn. that is a vote by roughly 33%of the league's eligible voters to overturn, which shouldn't really be enough.
Admin
The last time this came up, Tyson and I specifically looked at all three of these options, but they are all problematic.
The problem with raising the bar to 6 is that we do not allow post-trade discussions related to whether or not a trade is okay. thus, the only way to bring a bad trade to the attention of the league is to make a protest. Raising the bar from 3 to 6 makes it likely that too many valid protests may slip by unnoticed before the deadline.
Abstentions are just that: a refusal to vote. They only exist to allow someone who chooses not to vote a way to stop the system from reminding them to vote. Personally, I believe that voting to abstain is doing your league a major disservice. More information on the effects of abstaining should probably be on the vote page. I have looked into making abstentions count as half a vote to allow the trade to stand; I am still indecided, because that is not a true abstention, it's more of an "I'm okay with allowing the trade to stand", which isn't really the same thing at all.
Requiring 8 votes is problematic in trial leagues, allowing a rogue "bad faith" trader to run unchecked in leagues where many owners are absent or don't check in often.
--Chris
March 22, 2012 at 05:33AM View BBCode
Originally posted by dirtdevil
i really think that two simple things could go a long way to resolving some of this without resorting to more complex measures right away:
1) raise the bar for an official vote from 3 complaints to 6. that's over a third of a league and if that many people think something is fishy, something probably is. it also reduces the chances that a small group of owners could use trade protests merely to block a move by some other owner.
2a) count abstensions in the voting totals. if people are abstaining, they are clearly not voting to overturn. if 3 people vote to uphold, 6 to overturn and 4 abstain, that is NOT 67% support for a veto. that is 46% support for a veto.
OR
2b) require 8 overturn votes to nulify a trade. in any league there are 14 people eligible to vote on any trade protest. if 6 people vote and 4 vote to overturn, that is not really a league vote to overturn. that is a vote by roughly 33%of the league's eligible voters to overturn, which shouldn't really be enough.
The last time this came up, Tyson and I specifically looked at all three of these options, but they are all problematic.
The problem with raising the bar to 6 is that we do not allow post-trade discussions related to whether or not a trade is okay. thus, the only way to bring a bad trade to the attention of the league is to make a protest. Raising the bar from 3 to 6 makes it likely that too many valid protests may slip by unnoticed before the deadline.
Abstentions are just that: a refusal to vote. They only exist to allow someone who chooses not to vote a way to stop the system from reminding them to vote. Personally, I believe that voting to abstain is doing your league a major disservice. More information on the effects of abstaining should probably be on the vote page. I have looked into making abstentions count as half a vote to allow the trade to stand; I am still indecided, because that is not a true abstention, it's more of an "I'm okay with allowing the trade to stand", which isn't really the same thing at all.
Requiring 8 votes is problematic in trial leagues, allowing a rogue "bad faith" trader to run unchecked in leagues where many owners are absent or don't check in often.
--Chris
sharbrough
First, and Chris is very clear about this, is that we are looking for site abuse, but labeling it "trade protest," which most people think is about fairness. Moving trade collusion to the help menu, and clarifying that it's not about the fairness of trade but just about collusion, cheating.
Second, there are egregious cases where predation is involved. As has been made clear here, there isn't a metric for evaluating the degree of lopsidedness in trades. While it might be possible to calculate a value for the rest of a player's career, that's part of what the game is about - betting that your guy will do something good. It sounds to me like the process for reporting collusion will be suitable for this process as well. And we just make clear to people that trade protests really don't exist. Instead, we have reports of site abuse and predation.
About that ... how long does a person spend on the site before they need the training wheels off? It would not be difficult to identify seriously unbalanced trades involving new customers - that's a query that could be defined easily enough. What would happen after that in terms of education, remedy, or restriction would be up to admin, but it's finite.
And finally, I think that the biggest problem I have with the status quo is the anonymity and the gag rule that goes with it. I understand that talking about these things often makes them worse. But I'm also concerned that there's somebody in the DEL who either doesn't get it, or is just obstructing trades. As Leonard pointed out at the top of the thread, it just makes the whole process less fun for me. I'm geared to take it up with the people who don't get it and raise their level of consciousness, but in these cases I can't do that.
The idea that anonymous people are going to torpedo my trades is not new to me. It's impossible to make a trade in a free ESPN fantasy baseball league. Voting against all trades is automatic over there. My point is that giving people the opportunity to vote on every trade creates an atmosphere that is the opposite of the simball experience. This is social, right? People have profiles, reputations, that whole bit. By enabling people to monkey around in the game side with protests, but keeping it anonymous, we're enabling them to engage in activities that don't reflect in their record. And in the process, we're creating that same set of handcuffs that people find on sites like ESPN.
The statistics are helpful. But they don't measure the trades that didn't happen because the frequency of trade protests made it seem like it's not worthwhile. I only mention that because they are helpful, but not fully indicative of the scale of the problem created by the protest mechanism on the site. In my case, I'm in 9 leagues, and the only one that I see protests in is the DEL. If I don't like them and think they're silly, I can just quit that one, and get away from it.
March 22, 2012 at 11:40AM View BBCode
Well, there are two things to clarify here.First, and Chris is very clear about this, is that we are looking for site abuse, but labeling it "trade protest," which most people think is about fairness. Moving trade collusion to the help menu, and clarifying that it's not about the fairness of trade but just about collusion, cheating.
Second, there are egregious cases where predation is involved. As has been made clear here, there isn't a metric for evaluating the degree of lopsidedness in trades. While it might be possible to calculate a value for the rest of a player's career, that's part of what the game is about - betting that your guy will do something good. It sounds to me like the process for reporting collusion will be suitable for this process as well. And we just make clear to people that trade protests really don't exist. Instead, we have reports of site abuse and predation.
About that ... how long does a person spend on the site before they need the training wheels off? It would not be difficult to identify seriously unbalanced trades involving new customers - that's a query that could be defined easily enough. What would happen after that in terms of education, remedy, or restriction would be up to admin, but it's finite.
And finally, I think that the biggest problem I have with the status quo is the anonymity and the gag rule that goes with it. I understand that talking about these things often makes them worse. But I'm also concerned that there's somebody in the DEL who either doesn't get it, or is just obstructing trades. As Leonard pointed out at the top of the thread, it just makes the whole process less fun for me. I'm geared to take it up with the people who don't get it and raise their level of consciousness, but in these cases I can't do that.
The idea that anonymous people are going to torpedo my trades is not new to me. It's impossible to make a trade in a free ESPN fantasy baseball league. Voting against all trades is automatic over there. My point is that giving people the opportunity to vote on every trade creates an atmosphere that is the opposite of the simball experience. This is social, right? People have profiles, reputations, that whole bit. By enabling people to monkey around in the game side with protests, but keeping it anonymous, we're enabling them to engage in activities that don't reflect in their record. And in the process, we're creating that same set of handcuffs that people find on sites like ESPN.
The statistics are helpful. But they don't measure the trades that didn't happen because the frequency of trade protests made it seem like it's not worthwhile. I only mention that because they are helpful, but not fully indicative of the scale of the problem created by the protest mechanism on the site. In my case, I'm in 9 leagues, and the only one that I see protests in is the DEL. If I don't like them and think they're silly, I can just quit that one, and get away from it.
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