My first year playing H2h. I have just missed the playoffs so I was considering cutting players that I know I will not confirm next year due to their salary and pick up some prospects and some 60IL players. Is that a perfectly acceptable thing to do while others are playing in the playoffs or am I doing a “faux pas”?
I’d be pretty careful about who you cut and who is really, truly not keepable. Otherwise I don’t think there’s anything wrong here, but you really might annoy some people in your league if you cut something like a $50 Betts in order to get 2 injured starting pitchers.
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Great question!
It might bother those in the playoffs if you dumped a lot of expensive stars in order to pick up cheap, future talent. It would allow playoff teams to pick up quality guys during the playoffs. They might think those moves are tipping the scales in one way or the other.
To that, though, I say the platform allows any team to drop and pick up players during the playoffs. If top tier teams are worried about such things, then they should accommodate that in their salary strategies heading into the playoffs.
Further, you paid for a whole season on the platform. Why should your functionality be limited just because you didn’t crack into the playoffs? If your league values club parity, then this would be the time for non playoff teams to start to think about next year and use that to your advantage. I guess it depends how competitive you all are, your league tier and if there’s prize money at stake, if you are friends, or if it’s relative strangers participating in your league.
If this is all just too much fun and too dramatic for your league, then perhaps your league should set a custom rule about such things for next season. For most of these issues, I find that the platform is built in such a way that is optimal and does not need to be messed with.
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If I had Betts at $50 i would definitely keep him for next year. I was going for the players like Lynn $15 and Stanton $14 that I want no part of next year.
Thanks for the responses
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One more thought: the other consideration is the advantage to hanging on players on the bubble into arbitration. You might have no value for these guys, but other owners might put money against them. All the more satisfying when you drop them because those arbitration dollars are therefore lost. So, just a counter argument to dropping people during playoffs. There might be value into waiting until after arbitration.
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I had something similar happen in one of my leagues, although it was via a trade rather than cuts. I was in 9th place and had no path towards contending, so I threw in some overpriced guys who had zero keeper value on top of what I thought was the two players with actual value. Some people were irked by it (4 voted to veto the trade), but as it happens 4 of the 6 players I traded away have been cut. In fact, I barely valued the return over the cap space, but I already had plenty of that so I went with a return.
Anyway, my point is that you should do what makes sense for your team. But, during trade season, it helps to make clear that the players are available before you cut them. If you cut a rental that you weren’t able to trade before the deadline and you had him on your trade block, then I don’t think anyone should complain too much if you elect to simply cut him after the deadline.