Why is the Ottoneu trade deadline a month after the MLB trade deadline?
Because it keeps more teams engaged for a longer percentage of the season, which is good for league health and also much more fun.
Here is a thread from a few years ago when I explored the idea of moving the deadline up to July 31:
FWIW I do think its a bit too late. For me, it really discourages trading in July since you know you’re going to have more teams in late August that are completely eliminated and will be willing to sell their big players on overvalued contracts for a lot less. Just one opinion, though, not sure how universal that feeling is, guess it depends on leagues.
I have three kind of separate responses to this.
- I think this actually means its more of a seller’s market in July, which comes with its own trade-offs, but having a time of the season when its ok to trade but still a seller’s market is a good thing.
- Having teams that may be sellers still checking in on lineups, auctions and waiver claims, etc because they are getting trade messages longer into the season is an important benefit.
- No matter when the trade deadline is, it will deflate trading 1.5 months before the deadline.
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Oh and of course, without pulling specific numbers (though it’d be fun to look up at some point!), based solely on the trade thread, I do not think Ottoneu Fantasy Baseball has a “not enough trades” problem 
Here are all the trades from 2021, broken up by month:
| Month | Trades |
|---|---|
| January | 1816 |
| February | 57 |
| March | 816 |
| April | 1024 |
| May | 1218 |
| June | 1101 |
| July | 1141 |
| August | 1355 |
| November | 955 |
| December | 1014 |
Seems like an ok distribution to me.
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