Is it any different if it goes like this:

Team A: "I don't see anybody worthy of the #1 pick. Anybody want to work out a trade?"

Team B: "I don't even have a first round pick, but I'll trade you last year's first round pick if you draft Player X."

Any time you ask another owner to perform a transaction on your behalf because you cannot do it yourself . . . it's a problem.

Quote: Originally posted by tecwrg on 12/29/2009Any time you ask another owner to perform a transaction on your behalf because you cannot do it yourself . . . it's a problem.

Damn those problematic sign-and-trades...

Quote: Originally posted by MikeT23 on 12/29/2009
Collusion. You can't trade for future considerations. Owner turnover should tell you that it's not "fair" to incoming owners.
Of course, if they keep their yaps shut and just do the deal next season, no one knows.

Irrelevant. It isn't fair to incoming owners that long-time owners have had seasons to develop their clubs, trade-rape newbs and create a good ol' boy network. HBD isn't fair to incoming owners.

Quote: Originally Posted By jimmystick on 12/29/2009Is it any different if it goes like this:

Team A: "I don't see anybody worthy of the #1 pick. Anybody want to work out a trade?"

Team B: "I don't even have a first round pick, but I'll trade you last year's first round pick if you draft Player X.

Not a prob. Well, smart owners are a problem for less smart owners, but that's RL.

Quote: Originally posted by tecwrg on 12/29/2009Any time you ask another owner to perform a transaction on your behalf because you cannot do it yourself . . . it's a problem.

Except that in your example, no one is performing a transaction for another owner.

Team A still has to draft the guy and develop him for a season before dealing him. The transaction would be no different if Team B approached Team A the day after the draft, or at the end of that season, rather than before the draft.

And both sides are trusting the other party not to reneg after the player actually gets drafted and the accuracy of Team A's scouting is revealed.

So it's OK if you have to trust someone else to do something for you?

So you're OK with the trade if it gets negotiated the day after the draft, or at the end of the season, but not if it happens the day before the draft?

Are you answering a question with a question?

But, to answer your question, I'd be a lot more comfortable if the deal was negotiated at the beginning of next season.

My "problem" is allowing someone who doesn't have the first pick to dictate the first pick in the draft. Too much information may have to be exchanged and, with owner turnover, one or both of the parties might not be around to actually complete the deal. So it's possible that owners holding the 2-4 picks get screwed.

Draft the player you believe will bring back the most in return, make it known that you'll be moving him for the right price in ST next season and see how it plays out.

Quote: Originally posted by MikeT23 on 12/30/2009So it's possible that owners holding the 2-4 picks get screwed.

If Team B is "dictating" who gets taken first overall based on their roster needs, it's more likely the owners holding picks 2-4 get rewarded because a better player who normally would have gone first overall is still available in the #2 slot.

Or maybe arguing that other teams get "screwed" over something as subjective as recruit valuations is a silly exercise to begin with.

If if and buts were candy and nuts, we'd all be happy at Christmas.

The point is we don't know how it affects the draft until it's done. Maybe Owner 20 tells Owner 1 to pick a player that Owner 1 rates about 15th. Owner 2 or Owner 3 no longer get a shot at said player. Maybe Owner 20 tells Owner 1 to pick a player that Owner 2 and Owner 3 don't even see. Maybe Owner 1, once the player is drafted, says "Whoa! He's much better than my low HS scouting showed. No deal!" Someone with a different scouting budget is now dictating who goes 1st in the draft.

Understand?

Candy and nuts are all it takes to make you happy at Christmas? What are you, Buddhist?

The owner with the second pick will have their own draft board. Either the player they had at #1 actually goes #1 -- which is what they think 'should' have happened -- or he doesn't, in which case they get the player they expected to get or a better one.

Ditto for every other team below them. Either they get the player they 'expected' to get based on their draft board, or they get a slightly better one because the team picking first went off the board.

No, we don't know exactly how the draft will be affected if the team picking first takes a player to be traded instead of developed. But I have a hard time seeing how that would "screw" other owners.

At worst, in your 'low HS scouting' scenario, the team picking first suckers some other owner into doing their scouting for them with offers of a trade they won't go through with. But that's not exactly collusion... and it doesn't force any other owner to draft a player worse than the one they expected to get anyway.

Quote: Originally Posted By MikeT23 on 12/30/2009
So it's possible that owners holding the 2-4 picks get screwed.

The owner of the team holding the #2 pick would get ... *drum roll, please* ... the #2 pick!

The owner of the team holding the #3 pick would get ... *drum roll, please* ... the #3 pick!

The owner of the team holding the #4 pick would get ... *drum roll, please* ... the #4 pick!

Even dummies who cannot read more than three lines of a forum post should be able to see a pattern here. Well, no, that might be expecting too much from those poor souls.

The problem is, I think almost everyone is thinking about this under the best-case scenario- that Owner A (who wants the guy) and Owner B (who has the pick) both see the guy (Player X) on their board and have him rated highly. It's not explicitly covered under fair play rules from what I can see, but I'd say it's highly questionable. However, there are some other ways this could play out:

1. Owner A wants a guy who Owner B knows isn't good enough to ge the deal done, so he says, "He's no good. I'm taking Player Y instead".

2. Owner B doesn't have Player X rated highly and wouldn't draft him on his own, but sees Owner A has a big scouting budget in that area.

3. Owner B doesn't see Player X, so they go back and forth to agree on someone else.

All three involve collusion. If I'm a fellow owner, I don't know that any of these didn't happen.