Sunday, March 21, 2010

Fantasy Baseball Disbelief

My writings about fantasy baseball may increase a tick since Jack and I get to do a little brotherly bonding by being in a league together this year.

It bewilders me how many people will offer nonsense trades like:

Rafael Furcal and Rickie Weeks for Brian Wilson.

Most Hidden Bloggers follow pro baseball about as closely as nuns surf Craigslist, so let me explain this as if we're talking about cars instead.

Suppose you have a new Chevy Tahoe in your one-car garage. The garage also holds your kids' two new bikes. A neighbor with greasy black hair and shifty eyes rings your doorbell and says "Hey, I got these two tricked-out five year old bikes. What say you give me the Tahoe for them?"

Clearly there are several issues. The first is that you'd be without motorized transportation to your job twenty miles away as the snow flies. Your net worth would drop by roughly $25,000, ignoring the loss of income when you're fired from your job after showing up bicycle-sweaty. You have no need for more bikes, especially not ones that are inferior to the ones in the garage. The resale value of your property is now less than you paid for it, given that the neighborhood's certifiably populated by one or more morons. And now that you're not going to let the kids wander about the neighborhood unsupervised, the new bikes are pretty much worthless too.

Probably 75% of trade requests I receive are like this. I wish I could be a fly on the wall when they try to sell their cars.

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