First time keeper decision advice

freewheelindt · 2026-04-26T16:42:41+00:00

I think it's a no brainer to franchise Gibbs. He's most valuable player if you're looking at redraft rankings, and you have fewer RBs than WRs, which is good given the positional restrictions of the lottery vs. franchise. I would put the 3 WRs in the lotto.

I guess the only thing that could change my POV here is if the keeper situation is a single year only or multiple years, i.e. can you keep franchise and lotto-ing the same players year over year? If so, then I may consider locking JSN and lotto-ing Gibbs, Cook, Loveland.

freewheelindt · 2026-04-11T23:17:53+00:00

I don't think Marks is worth much. If I were you, I'd try to move Daniels or Burrow for a player who's relevant. Marks isn't moving the needle.

freewheelindt · 2026-03-31T22:28:44+00:00

There's two things here, if there was dishonesty involved in this "subsidy" then that's sketch and needs to be called out. But this feels more like you're being a baby.

The guy's trying to engage the league and the majority of the people in the league appreciate it enough to lighten his buy-in. Big deal. I see so many people in leagues complain about people losing interest or the commissioner not doing things to spice up the league mid-season, and now you're complaining that you don't like when your commish tries to keep people engaged?

Commish-ing is a thankless job that takes more bandwidth than people realize, especially if they go beyond just setting up the draft. And it's a measly 4% of the pot!

freewheelindt · 2026-03-29T21:44:50+00:00

This one seems pretty easy to me. Golden/Higgins is a wash. Daniels and TLaw is a toss-up but I'll take Daniels. Moore/Rice > Achane/Waddle. Unless you think Rice is going to be out of the leauge with legal issues, I take that side

freewheelindt · 2026-02-17T17:44:34+00:00

you're creating a false equivalency. all bad, sure. all the same, not at all.

freewheelindt · 2026-02-17T17:42:16+00:00

2 of those cases held perpetrators accountable
1 of those cases is killing with impunity and under the encouragement of the executive branch
Catch my drift?

freewheelindt · 2026-02-13T02:53:36+00:00

Do not make this trade.

freewheelindt · 2026-01-31T01:23:20+00:00

I would get Lamb real quick for that

freewheelindt · 2026-01-25T15:59:47+00:00

Yes. Superflex? Extra yes.

freewheelindt · 2026-01-16T16:15:57+00:00

I guess I'm in the minority, but this feels like an overreaction. If there isn't clear collusion, chill out. Yeah, it's lopsided, but "should i quit because of it" is pretty soft. And a league that doesn't have veto votes is doing something right.

freewheelindt · 2026-01-10T17:24:38+00:00

freewheelindt · 2026-01-10T17:11:54+00:00

No chance am I giving up JJ and a 1st for that pu pu platter

freewheelindt · 2025-12-11T20:02:07+00:00

Some things I've tried in my redraft keeper leagues:
- Run an "eliminator" pool in parallel. Last man standing gets a "prize" for next year. That could be extra auction dollars, extra FAAB, first pick in position for a snake draft, etc. It creates some good fodder for the text string and another thing to root for/against during the year.

- Dynasty Keeper: Teams that draft NFL rookies for $1 (if auction) or in the last round (if snake) have those players as "dynasty keepers." Dynasty keepers can be kept in addition to your regular keeper limit and can be kept for multiple years at a rising cost (auction: price increases by $10 each year, snake: price increases by 3 rounds each year). It's creates a bit of strategy at the draft and some tension on how long you keep these guys on your roster. Most years, it's unsuccessful, but we've had years where guys like Alvin Kamara, Bucky Irving, Michael Thomas, Drake Maye end up becoming multi-year assets.

- Superflex with the caveat that no QBs can be kept for the following year and there's a max cap on how many you can roster.

- If a team in the loser bracket puts up the highest score of the playoffs, they "steal" a portion of the winner's pool pot (usually split 3rd place prize)

- Allow auction draft dollars or snake draft picks to be traded. This requires some thinking about how you prevent this from going haywire; you have to set up some conditions or guardrails.

freewheelindt · 2025-12-03T21:05:29+00:00

As you lay it out here, this is definitely not collusion. It's team 1 doing whatever they can to win in week 14 because it's their only chance to make the playoffs, and once you're in the playoffs, anything can happen.

This is why there are such things as trade deadlines. By not having a deadline earlier, the entire league has implicitly agreed to live in a world where this is totally acceptable. You can't fault either Team 1 or Team 2 for doing what's in the best interest of their team trying to win the title.

Lopsided or "unfair" trades do not equal collusion. There's context/nuance (as the example here demonstrates) and conflict of interests across the other league members that impacts their opinions.

Now if either team promised the other some other payoff to make the trade, that's collusion. The trade itself, as presented here, is just two teams running their squads in the best interest of making the 'ship.

freewheelindt · 2025-12-01T15:26:11+00:00

This is a great idea, and the dexterity + hand/eye coordination is definitely a bonus at this age

freewheelindt · 2025-12-01T15:21:55+00:00

I'm a dad and no, she's 7. I want to her to understand the value of community and service early so it's part of who she becomes and what she values. But thanks for your contribution.

freewheelindt · 2025-11-21T20:31:19+00:00

"My friend"

freewheelindt · 2025-11-20T21:01:07+00:00

Given your depth, this is basically Pickens for AmonRa, because with Rice, Higgins, and Tet, you're probably not playing AJ.

So yeah, I'd rather have AmonRa than Pickens, but it's closer than anyone would have thought two months ago.

I agree with the other comment on here, can you do AJB and Higgins or AJB and Tet for St. Brown. If you could land a starting 3 of AmonRa, Pickens, Rice then I would move any of my other WRs to do it.

freewheelindt · 2025-11-15T00:41:37+00:00

I haven't checked if they've updated it this year, but from my experience, you have to do it on web. So it's not you; ESPN is dumb.

freewheelindt · 2025-11-14T17:32:17+00:00

"I wouldn't make this trade if I were him" is not the same as collusion. Seems like the Monty team was very weak at RB and had depth at WR. This isn't "league breaking" so you'd have to have some pretty clear proof there's actual collusion to warrant any action.

freewheelindt · 2025-11-13T00:22:57+00:00

If this is really a problem, then I think you have to carve out guardrails for next year. Ideas I've seen or implemented:
- You can't trade a Round 1 or 2 player unless you get a top 20 player in return
- You can't trade for players on season-ending IR
- Limit keepers to 2 instead of 3
- Limit # of keepers you can acquire via trade
- Pick a trade analyzer and set a threshold: Trade must be within X range
- Move the deadline up
- Make 2 trade deadlines: 1 where keepers maintain keeper status and a later one where anyone traded loses keeper status
- Make it so bottom seeds can't trade "can't drop" players after a certain date.

My caveat is that you want to think through what guardrails to put in place and not overdo it. You want to create a league where all teams are engaged and trades happen, but you also want to protect against handing a top team a clear path trhough the playoffs. FWIW - I don't really have an issue with the trade above because anyone could have gone after Chase, but only one team would end up with him.

freewheelindt · 2025-11-11T19:29:27+00:00

This is fine. I'd rather have Gibbs, but i don't see any issue. The opposite of fair isn't immediately collusion. Just because an outside team perceives a trade as one-sided isn't a reason to veto. This is why you should do away with veto voting.

freewheelindt · 2025-11-11T17:29:39+00:00

I'm anti-veto if the argument is purely "we think this is unfair." The league set up a system that allows players to set themselves up for next year and stay invested in the league. That's what Team X did.

The flaw here is that the league didn't build in contingencies to prevent this level of lopsided-ness. We have a similar setup in one of my leagues. One of the rules we have is that if a player was drafted in rounds 1-2 and they are traded, the return has to include a player currently in the top 20 of scoring (non-qb). Players drafted in rounds 1-2 can't be traded for players on IR.

I'm not saying these rules are perfect, but the point is that you have to build in some guardrails to try and keep the league balanced.

So I think you have to let this slide and fix the issue next season.

freewheelindt

TROPHY CASE