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How do you judge collusion vs stupidity? There is a pending trade in my league: Jacob Ellsbury for Ryan Roberts. The guy giving up Ellsbury is a Red Sox fan, so this makes it even more suspicious. I have never voted against a trade, and I wouldn't unless something was really obviously wrong. Just wondering what others think about this.

The only time i will consider a veto is late in the year where a team that is out of it is loading up his buddy to make a run at the title. It's only happened once in my money league. If the guy with Ellsbury is out of it, then it is probably shady. If the guy with Ellsbury is competitive and absolutely sucks at 3b/2b or needs the flexibility that Roberts provides, then he's probably just an idiot. Dunno.. you would have to make the call on that yourself.

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punch me in the face....

It is a head to head league, so the guy with Ellsbury is not technically out of it. His team sucks though, and the other guy is in first place. It's very suspicious, but I also get the feeling this guy is not the brightest. This is the same guy that took Pedroia with the #1 overall pick in the draft. I am going to let it go for now.

any money at stake?

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punch me in the face....

there are quite a few teams that grabbed Hanley, Crawford or Longoria in the top 5 who would LOVE to have been stupid enough to take Pedroia instead.


The trade is certainly suspicious, but there are a couple other details that are necessary to judge it.
keeper league? if so, what are the keeper rules and penalties? I.e., if Roberts can be kept for a last round pick and Ellsbury requires a 2nd or 3rd rounder (i don't remember where he was drafted this year) - or some comparable difference in auction values - there's a good case to be made for Roberts.
is the other team working with a giant hole at 2B or 3B?

If the team giving up Ellsbury is just plugging Roberts into the OF spot, there's legitimate reason to question this.

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"If you can't spot the sucker in your first half hour at the table, then you are the sucker."
-Mike McD, Rounders

No.

Redraft league. The guy has Youkilis and Freese at 3B, and Pedroia at 2B. He also has Billy Butler, so Youkilis isn't stuck at 1B or anything. If it was about positional need, there are players in our FA pool who are comparable to Roberts. Brett Lawrie is available, and I think I would rather have him than Roberts right now.

Sounds like a garbage trade that intentionally helps only one team.
I tend to not question trades that look grossly lopsided early in the year, but deals like this at the trade deadline when it's pretty clear what players are doing this season and what each team's chances are for the postseason are suspect.

In a free league, I can't get as upset about it. One way to avoid stuff like this is to move the trade deadline up. Teams are less willing to dump their better players if their postseason chances are still uncertain.

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"If you can't spot the sucker in your first half hour at the table, then you are the sucker."
-Mike McD, Rounders

if the guy is mathematically eliminated from the playoffs already, then this is a collusion trade. no doubt about it.

After looking at the standings again, I realized that the guy is in fact out of playoff contention. I voted against the trade but it went through anyways. Extra motivation for me to beat him this week.